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  “Charlotte, is it?” Morbain’s blue-black eyebrows rose nearly to his elaborately coifed hairline. “You call the female you claim is the True Incarnation by her first name? How very familiar of you. Seeing that you swear she is the new Empress, I trust you’re keeping your hands to yourself? You do remember that for a commoner to touch a Royal in that way is blasphemy, do you not?”

  For the first time, I saw Kristoff falter. At least, his cheeks went briefly red. Then he seemed to collect himself and his skin went back to tan with a tinge of gold.

  “My Lady is the True Incarnation,” he said, not answering Morbain’s implied accusation. “And we will prove it tomorrow.” He turned to the Council. “I ask that my Lady be granted the rights, privileges, and securities due to her station and that she be installed in the Royal Apartments both for her safety and as a sign of her status.”

  “Absolutely not!” Morbain roared. “My sweet Eucilla belongs in the Royal Apartments! Not that tattered little tramp Verrai dragged in here.”

  “Hey—” I began but the Head Councilor was already speaking.

  “No one shall be installed in the Royal Apartments until we determine who is the True Incarnation!” he shouted. “For now, both candidates will spend the night in the Guest Quarters.”

  “Head Councilor, the Guest Quarters are difficult to defend,” Kristoff protested. “There have already been three assassination attempts against my Lady’s life in the past three solar days!”

  “Then you must keep a good eye on her, Verrai,” the Head Councilor snapped. “And hopefully bring her to the Trials tomorrow in one piece.”

  Both Kristoff and Morbain started to say something else but the Head Councilor picked up a heavy looking pink crystal the size of my fist and pounded on the desk.

  “Dismissed!” he shouted and that was that.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Kristoff

  I took Charlotte by the hand and left the Council Room with a red haze of anger clouding my vision.

  I wasn’t surprised that Morbain had dared to bring forth an imposter—though it was an outrageous act of blasphemy, it was no more than I expected of the lying bastard. But that he dared to insult my old mistress, Sundalla the 999th and then threaten my new mistress… It was almost more than I could bear. Only knowing that I would be thrown in confinement where I would be unable to attend and protect Charlotte had kept me from slitting his filthy throat.

  “Captain—what can I do?” It was T’zorin at my side looking anxious as we strode along the main hallway. Someone had already cleaned up the exploded remains of the would-be assassin—that was something, at least.

  “Go ahead of us and do a complete sweep of the Guest Quarters,” I said. “Look for bombs, bugs, remote access devices—anything that could be harmful.”

  “At once!” T’zorin saluted but before he could leave, I put a hand on his arm.

  “T’zorin,” I said. “The trip back to Femme One with the Assimilation vessel—what happened?”

  His eyes shifted uneasily. “Pirates, Captain! We barely got away with the ship intact and I…I was the only one who survived.”

  I could see his discomfort but there was something about his eyes that made me uncertain. I wanted to ask him more but just then Charlotte faltered and nearly fell.

  “My Lady!” I turned and caught her before she could hit the floor.

  “Sorry…” Her voice was a whisper. “Just…dizzy. I shouldn’t have skipped breakfast, I guess.”

  “Skipped breakfast?” Then I remembered how I had offered her some nutrient paste for first meal, which is what most Imperial cruisers are stocked with, and she had refused it, saying she was too nervous to eat. But I didn’t think that simple hunger was the only thing causing her faintness.

  She’d been through a lot today—not the least of which was standing by my side as we faced down the Council of Wisdom—half of which I was willing to believe were in Morbain’s pocket. Her face was smudged with dust and grime and her scrubs were splattered with blood—mine and the would-be assassin’s.

  She still looked beautiful.

  “My Lady,” I murmured, settling her more comfortably in my arms. “Let’s get you to a safe place to dine and bathe and relax. You’ll feel better soon, I promise.”

  “Hope you’re right.” Her eyes closed tiredly and she let herself relax against my shoulder. “Could hardly…feel worse.”

  “You care deeply for her, don’t you?”

  I looked over to see T’zorin looking at us with an unreadable expression on his face. I frowned.

  “She is my mistress—and yours, T’zorin,” I said sternly. “After her Investiture I’ll have you and the rest of the Imperial Guard come to swear your vows. Spread the word among the other warriors— Sundalla the 1000th has arrived and she must be protected at all costs.”

  “Yes, Captain.” He saluted again. “I’ll go ahead to clear the Guest Quarters now.”

  “Do that.” I cradled Charlotte tenderly in my arms. “And have some refreshments sent for my Lady. She’ll need her strength for tomorrow.”

  Charlotte

  I faded in and out of consciousness as Kristoff carried me through the halls of the palace. I had a blurred impression of immense wealth—lots of marble columns, expensive looking art work, ornate carving, and servants dressed in black and gold livery scurrying everywhere.

  Can’t believe I’m supposed to live here, I thought blurrily as one opulent part of the palace faded into another and then another and yet another. It was as though someone had told me I was suddenly going to go live in Buckingham Palace and not just live there—be the queen of the whole place.

  How in the world could the Goddess-Empress deal with such a huge living arrangement? Then again, she wasn’t just dealing with the immense city-sized palace and all the people who lived in it, she was also responsible for all the people on all the planets in the entire galaxy.

  It was mind-blowing.

  No, not she—you, whispered a little voice in my brain. You’re responsible, Charlotte so you better figure out how in the hell you’re going to manage because this is getting awfully real awfully fast.

  God… I closed my eyes tightly, wishing I could faint again. But now that my brain was working—whizzing along with worry and uncertainty—unconsciousness refused to come back. I still felt weak from hunger and shock and I had the feeling that at some point in the future I was going to have some kind of freak-out due to nearly getting blown to bits by an assassin’s bomb—but for now I was wide awake.

  “Here we are, my Lady,” Kristoff murmured as we entered a side corridor off the main hallway. There were several widely spaced doors and he took me to the farthest one at the end of the short passage.

  The door, which was spotless white trimmed with gold, opened and a male servant wearing a black and gold uniform bowed us inside.

  “This way, my Lord Captain,” he said in a formal tone. “The quarters have been made ready as requested.”

  “And they’re all clear.” The other guard Kristoff had called T’zorin came out of one of the side rooms.

  “Good.” Kristoff looked down at me. “Are you well, my Lady? Can you stand?”

  “I’m all right,” I said, trying to make my voice sound normal. “I was just a little faint there for a minute—that’s all.”

  He set me gently on my feet but kept an arm around my shoulders for support, which was nice. I leaned against him, feeling like he was my only friend in the whole, huge palace.

  Friend…or something more?

  I pushed the thought away and looked around. The Guest Quarters weren’t as opulent as the Royal Apartments which Kristoff had brought me through but they were still nicer than any hotel room I’d ever been in.

  There was a round, brick fire-pit in the middle of a sunken living area, surround by low couches upholstered in some kind of lush, pale gray fur. Beside one of the couches someone had placed a little rolling, silver trolley bearing a selection of wh
at looked like Majoran food.

  I assumed it was food, anyway, but I couldn’t be sure because all Kristoff had to eat on his ship were tubes of bland nutripaste. The paste was supposed to offer all the nutrition a full grown warrior needed for an entire day but it tasted like gummy, meat-flavored cardboard.

  The elegant looking finger-foods arrayed on golden dishes were a far cry from the bland, meaty paste. I saw what looked like little round blue sandwiches with pink and purple filling, some flaky orange and yellow pastries as big as my fist that were completely square and some long, thin, straw like things with turquoise and fuchsia striping along their length. I didn’t know what they were but I was so hungry I would gladly take a bite and find out. There was even an elegant looking mug with a golden rim and steam rising from the liquid inside.

  My mouth started to water—despite all the craziness I’d been through recently, I realized I was really hungry. Also, that steaming cup was drawing me like a magnet. I knew the Majorans had probably never heard of coffee but any kind of hot, soothing liquid sounded good right now. Tea would be all right. So would soup.

  “Is this for me?” I asked, as I stepped down into the sunken living area and went towards the snack trolley.

  “Yes, my Lady. Of course. One of the undermaids just brought it from the kitchens.” The servant in black and gold livery bowed elaborately to me, overlooking my crazy, dirty, disheveled appearance.

  Kristoff was still talking to the other guard so I thanked the butler-guy and reached for the steaming liquid.

  I could smell it even before I touched the elegant mug it was in. It had a sweet, slightly bitter aroma a little like hot chocolate. Mmm—I couldn’t wait to taste it!

  But just as I lifted the dainty mug, Kristoff looked up.

  “My Lady, wait,” he said urgently. “None of that has been tested for poison yet.”

  “Tested for poison?” I had been about to sip the delicious smelling liquid but now I pulled it away from my mouth abruptly.

  It was a good thing I did. At that exact moment, the elegant mug shattered in my hand, spraying me with boiling hot liquid and incredibly sharp shards of glass.

  I gasped and dropped what remained of the mug—mostly just the handle—on the polished hardwood floor.

  “Charlotte!” Kristoff was by my side in an instant. “Are you all right?”

  “I don’t know,” I said and burst into tears.

  Normally I’m not a girly-girl and I hate to cry in front of people but this was just too much. It was the freak-out I’d felt coming on and I have to say I didn’t think I could be blamed for it. I’d nearly been killed so many times in the past few days it was ridiculous. From the two assassin-droids, to my close call with the Burning Blood disease, to the crazy activist guy with the bomb whose blood was still soaking my shoe, I’d been through a lot.

  Having my mug explode like a grenade in my hand on top of everything else was just too much.

  Through my tears I could hear Kristoff ordering everyone out of the guest suite. The prim and proper butler servant was apologizing again and again, sounding aghast at what had happened and the other guard, T’zorin, was saying that he was sorry he hadn’t thought to check the food.

  At last, though, they all left and Kristoff locked the door behind them.

  Then he came back to me and peeled off my scrub shirt, pulling it carefully over my hair and trying not to let any of the sharp little shards cut me any more than they already had. He moved me away from the mess on the floor and took off my scrub bottoms too, and my blood soaked shoes and socks.

  Through it all I stood there sobbing, tears pouring down my bloody, dirty cheeks as he stripped me to my underwear. Now that the tears had started, I didn’t seem to be able to stop them—I didn’t even try.

  Kristoff sat me on one of the couches and kneeled in front of me to examine me.

  “It’s all right now, Charlotte,” he murmured, softly but firmly, taking my face in both his big hands and looking me over for injuries. “You’re all right, my Lady.”

  “I…I don’t feel all right,” I managed to gasp, through my tears.

  “But you are.” He looked at me seriously. “Thank the Goddess you only have a few scratches. If you’d actually brought that cup to your lips the explosion could have blinded you.”

  This made me cry even harder. To think that I was now living in a place where people came at me with bombs and my freaking coffee mug could explode like a grenade at any minute—it was awful!

  “I…I don’t want to be here,” I managed to say at last. “I don’t want to have to deal with this! I want to go home—go back to my old life on Earth!”

  “I know, my Lady,” Kristoff murmured. “I am so very sorry but you can’t.”

  He sat beside me and tried to put his arm around me but I pushed it off and buried my scratched and cut face in my hands.

  “This place is horrible! We haven’t even been here an hour and someone has already tried to kill me twice!”

  “I suspect the mug wasn’t so much an assassination attempt as a warning.” Kristoff sounded grim. “Morbain wants us to know he’s willing to do anything he has to in order to eliminate the competition.”

  “Who is he anyway?” I swiped at my eyes and looked up at him, finally regaining some control. “Is he really the, uh, son of your old boss? Of the other Empress?”

  “He is,” Kristoff said heavily. He sighed and ran a hand through his blue-black hair. “He has always desired the throne for himself though it is against a thousand generations of custom and religion to allow a male to sit upon the Golden Throne.”

  “Was he behind the crazy activist guy with the bomb too?” I asked. “What was he yelling about? The oppression of the Majoran males or something?”

  Kristoff sighed. “There are a few malcontents—males who do not like the way our society works—the fact that most males worship their females as goddesses. They want a patriarchal society—or say they do, anyway. Most of them are just males who have been unable to bond with a female and they’re bitter about it. But Morbain makes use of them, pretending he’s sympathetic to their cause. I’m sure he thinks he could use their hatred as a stepping stone to gaining the throne.”

  “He seems like a horrible person,” I said, wiping at my eyes again. “I mean, who tries to have their own mother killed?”

  “It grieved my old mistress terribly.” Kristoff looked sad. “She blamed herself—said that she had spent too much time ruling and not enough mothering her children. It was one of her deepest regrets.”

  “Well just because she didn’t make it to all of his little league games is no reason to order a hit on her,” I said sharply. “Or to try and blow up her successor. If I am her successor.”

  “You are, my Lady.” Kristoff took my hands in his and looked earnestly into my eyes. “You alone have the rainbow aura. I wish you could see it as I do.” He cupped my cheek in his big, warm hand and murmured, “It’s so lovely. So perfect.”

  For a long moment I stared up into his shifting eyes, their colors changing so rapidly I could hardly track them. My heart seemed to stop in my chest and I felt myself wanting him—felt the desire I’d been trying to push down and ignore come bubbling up to the surface in an undeniable flood that threatened to swamp me. It had been days since the transfusion—why hadn’t this longing I felt for him faded? If anything, it had grown stronger…

  “Kristoff,” I whispered hesitantly, leaning towards him. He leaned towards me too. He was going to kiss me—I knew he was. I could feel him wanting to and I wanted him to—so badly I could hardly breathe.

  But then he looked away and dropped his hands.

  “My Lady,” he said, his voice becoming more formal and businesslike. “Perhaps you will feel better after you’re bathed and fed.”

  I felt a surge of disappointment but I tried to cover it and sound unconcerned.

  “Uh, a bath would be nice. But I think I’ve lost my appetite.” I looked around him to t
he once-inviting snack trolley which was now littered with shards of glass.

  “Nevertheless, I’ll have something sent up along with a poison tester,” he said. “You have to eat something—you must be strong for tomorrow.”

  “For the Trials of, uh…”

  “Of Ascendancy,” he said, getting up. “I know you must have many questions and I will do my best to answer them. But let me draw your bath first.”

  I sighed. “All right. I’m sorry I got so emotional there for a minute.”

  “My Lady…” His deep voice softened and he took my hand again. “You have every right to be upset. But I promise you, it will not always be like this. Once you’re upon the Golden Throne, your status will keep you safe for the most part. And for the rest, I will always be by your side. I swear I won’t let you be harmed.”

  “Well…” I sighed. “I guess I’ll have to take your word for it. I’m just scared right now, you know?”

  “Of course you are. Frightened and hungry and tired. Let me draw your bath and we’ll see if I can make you feel better.”

  “You don’t have to wait on me,” I protested as he rose and went towards one of the side rooms where the bathroom presumably was. “I can manage myself.”

  “Absolutely not.” Kristoff looked scandalized. “The Goddess-Empress does not bathe or wait upon herself.”

  “Wait…what? You’re going to, uh, bathe me?”

  The thought made me feel suddenly shy, even though I’d spent almost all of the night before last pressed naked against him. And don’t forget the way he held you in his arms and helped you come, whispered a little voice in my head.

  Yes, but that had been when the desire inside me was at a fever pitch—I had needed to come so badly I hadn’t minded being on display, just as I had needed to breathe too badly during my bout with the Burning Blood to mind being pressed naked against his big, hard body.

  But I was cured of the Burning Blood—or at least past that stage in my “cycle”—and though the sexual need was still growing inside me, it hadn’t yet reached the fever pitch that would allow me to just toss all my clothes to the wind and not mind being intimately washed by my huge, muscular bodyguard. In fact, just the thought of it sent a hot shiver down my spine that was equal parts embarrassment and desire.