Chapter One
Zaruv
Tick, tick, tick, tick. My eyes darted across the emerald table, meeting those of my youngest brother. The incessant tapping continued, much to my chagrin. Every time the heavy, golden, ring on his middle finger brushed against the table, the noise rang out across the silent ship. He was going to start a fight without ever lifting a fist in anger.
That was Pavar’s thought. He had a way of stirring the pot to his liking. Young and wild, my twenty-five-year-old brother shot me an easy grin. At once, I felt my anger giving way to amusement. It was damn near impossible for me to stay angry at his hotheaded ways. The youngest of five brothers, Pavar always seemed to play on the line between prince and prisoner.
“If you continue to act like this, you will be the death of us all,” I said finally.
He cocked his head and the tapping finally stopped, “Come now, Zaruv. We both know that the Dragselian people are not going to change their ways. The system has worked for thousands of years.”
“It’s flawed and you know it. Hell, I would even venture to say that the other brothers know it too. None of you want to speak up though. Even now, we are all heading to our exile and still, you won’t speak against the old ways.”
“It’s not my place to speak ill of them. Nor is it yours.” Came Karun’s steady voice.
He stepped into the ship’s hull and nodded toward me as a sign of respect. As the second oldest son, I held the honor of being charged with my younger three brothers. We all knew that the day of exile was coming, but now that it was here, old struggles seemed to be flaring up. It didn’t help that we’d been stuck in the small passenger spaceship for the last two weeks. No amount of preparation could ready one for spending so much time in close quarters with their siblings.
Pavar glared at Karun while nodding in respect toward his elder brother. “We are heading to Artax, where we are sentenced to live out our lives away from our home and our people but you still support the rule?”
“I do,” replied Karun confidently. “The system, though flawed, has worked well long before we were here. It will continue to work long after we are gone.”
“You make Artax sound like a prison,” I interjected. “Artax is a resort planet, dear brother. We are going to live out our lives with more Dragselian woman and servants than we can handle. Yet you seem to find a way to make it sound terrible.”
“That’s because it is! I want to be back home on Dragselia, not billions of light years away from it.”
“You are so ready to start a fight when our father has not even been dead a week. You mourn the loss of your comfort, but not the man who provided it. You should be ashamed, Pavar,” Ragal said.
My two brothers sat down at the table with myself and Pavar. Looking around at them I saw the stark differences between them. Each one of them had a different personality that had its flaws, but also its winning qualities. I could think of no better warrior than Karun. His strength, speed, and agility were almost matched with my own. An anger boiled below the surface though. He hated the exile even more than Pavar, though his loyalty to the Dragselian way ran deeper than his disdain.
“We are not far from Artax now, I think you will sing a new song once you see what waits for us there, Pavar,” Karun said
“Karun, you won’t win. I would encourage you to let it go now before a war of our own starts,” interjected Ragal.
“I agree,” I said while nodding to Ragal. “There is nothing that we can do about it now. Pavar, you may voice your concerns among us brothers, but once we reach Artax, there will be no room for that hostility.”
“Why not?” Pavar fumed.
I started to speak, but it was again Ragal who answered. “Because Artax is a haven of Dragselian. To speak against your king would be unforgivable.”
“Maybe that’s what I need to do then, at least I wouldn’t be living a lie.”
Karun sighed and shook his head, “Then we will be forced to live with your death. You will be painted the selfish, spoiled brat that you are.”
Pavar leaped up, but I raised my hand in a command for him to sit. He begrudgingly listened. This wasn’t the first time that he’d tried to start a fight in the close quarters and I knew it wouldn’t be the last. I didn’t worry about Ragal. His level head and passive nature wouldn’t allow him to partake in such a pointless fight. It was the others that I was worried about. Karun was a fighter and Pavar was an instigator but Ragal only wanted peace to reign out over all others. I smiled at him as he sat silently, looking out at the stars as they flew past us.
“We are close,” Ragal whispered beneath Pavar and Karun’s argument.
I looked out the front window and took in the beauty of the planet. It had been many years since I’d ventured to the area. Everything seemed the same. A small flicker of light caught my eye. At first, I thought that it was a star, but it seemed to be moving. Another ship in this area was common. Artax was a popular resort planet. No chime of the security console came but that did little to comfort me. It was programmed to send a message to all ships in our area, keep track of their level of danger.
Our vessel did not bear the royal insignia of our home planet. It was too dangerous to openly declare that there were royals on board. Throughout the area, there were Infernians lurking and waiting for our capture and eventual death. If no heirs to the throne were alive, they could easily overthrow our rule. I kept a watchful eye on the ship. It wouldn’t take much to fool our system. A false sense of security might blanket those who didn’t know the price on our heads, but it did little to put my mind at ease.
“What troubles you, brother?” Ragal asked, watching the changes of my face.
I shook my head, not wanting to alert the others of potential danger until I was sure. “It’s nothing, just my paranoid mind playing tricks on me. I think that I, too, am getting a little stir crazy.”
Ragal smiled and leaned back, “I believe it's infected me as well. I will be glad when I can again rest my feet on solid ground.”
I snickered, Ragal hated to be on ships. The uncertainty of the unknown did little to comfort him. He was not one for adventure. Left alone with his charts and the stars, he was a very happy nomad. I glanced back at the window, searching for the small blinking light. At first, I thought it had gone, moved onto whatever planet it was destined for, but then I caught it again, this time it was closer and worse, it wasn’t alone.
My heart started to race, wondering if it was enough danger to alert the others. In my hesitation to speak though, a heavy silence fell over the cabin. Karun and Pavar were no longer arguing with each other. The silence had transformed into a heavy fog, waiting for me to speak and lift it. I glanced back at the approaching ships, four in total and knew that I needed to make a decision. They would be on us in a matter of minutes.
“Zaruv?” Karun asked, “What troubles you?”
I looked him in the eyes, dark and brooding as always. We were an incredibly attractive lot by human standards. Our bodies had little to no hair, save for our heads which flowed freely down our backs, mine in waves of deep auburn. My heart was racing; we were not prepared for a fight as we flew in a passenger vessel with no security. Instantly, I regretted my decision to not push for some sort of escort. These were troubling times for our kind, as evident by the unmarked ships now closing in.
Karun saw them before I responded to him, “Are they Infernian ships?”
I shook my head, “There is no way to know. They do not have any markers or colors. I don’t think they are coming to be friends though. Jartex?”
A computer voice rang out over our heads. Jartex was our security system. “Yes, my prince?”
“Can you send them a message please and ask that they identify themselves?”
“Shall I share make your royal presences known?” Jartex asked.
“No,” I whispered. “Do not share who we are with them.”
The four of us stood watching through the window as the ships grew closer. They couldn’t see us through the thick glass, but we could see enough that my heart sank to the pit of my stomach. No passenger vehicle carried the two heavy missile portals on either side, as were the ships that were now hovering a few hundred feet from us. There was little doubt in my mind that they knew who was on board.
“Sir?” said Jartax, “They do not respond to my signal. Should I try again?”
I shook my head and took a step backward, tugging Pavar and Ragal along with me. “No Jartax, it’s too late.”
My three brothers looked to me, then back to the ships now facing us. They saw the same thing that I did, the missiles being lowered by long, metallic, arms as they prepared to fire. I could feel my stomach flipping in anticipation for a split second before I reacted.
“Jartax, drop range now!” I screamed out.
My brothers scurried around and quickly buckled into the seats around the emerald table, but Pavar wasn’t fast enough. Our ship dropped from the dark sky and Pavar was shot up in the air, his back cracking against the ceiling. He quickly recovered, our bones and skeletal structure being stronger than that of humans. In our dragon forms, we were almost impossible to kill but shifting now would rip apart the small craft, sending us floating pointlessly into space.
“Take evasive measures!” I called out.
Karun quickly unbuckled and took the seat next to me as the autopilot engaged and started to dodge the incoming missiles.
“We need to get to the escape pods,” Karun said.
I shook my head, “This far from Artax, we would never make it.”
“What other options do we have? We cannot fight back; we are too far to call for help from home. It’s the only chance that we have for survival.”
An argument rose to my lips, but before I could share, the ship started to shake violently. One of the missiles had made contact, sending everything on the vessel flying through the air as we struggled to breathe through the debris and depleting oxygen. I nodded to Karun. He grabbed ahold of Pavar and I did the same to Ragal, shoving each one into an escape pod.
Before shutting the doors on the pods, I looked over at Karun and yelled, “Make for Vaxivia, I will find you all there.”
Karun nodded, as did Pavar and Ragal before we sealed them in. Within seconds we heard the alarm of an incoming missile and quickly we both dove into our escape pods. Looking around at my brothers, I hit the eject button and was sent soaring into space. Unequipped for long travel, the air in the pod grew thin just as we entered Vaxivia’s thin atmosphere.
The last memory I had before the darkness consumed me, was of my brothers. All I could do was hope that their fates had not yet ended. They were all the family I had left; someone had told the enemy where we were. There was a spy among our kind.
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