Kaldean Chronicles: Kaldean Sunset (Book I) (11 page)

There was no point of reference for Antoni to compare them to at all. Their two furry legs rose up to unnatural proportions, holding up a perfectly spherical body. There were five of them, dwarfing the group.

Antoni was nearly knocked back by the jolt. Something inside him, like a voice inside his head, told him to follow the Larvos
. The other guards felt too, because they appeared startled. Magnus moved close to him, fearful of the strange power the creatures were displaying.

The shock wasn't in the tone of the message, which was jovial, it was the fact that none of them had ever experienced it before. Antoni was particularly unsettled because he could feel them still, and the force that surrounded them. They had invaded his mind, and now something told him he was tied to them in a way.

Could they move through his mind and invade his thoughts? Were they capable of making his see and feel things that weren't there?

They walked slowly to the end of the chamber. It was made out of the same red brick dust that everything else was made of, but there images inscribed on the walls depicting scenes of people killing sentients, traveling through the stars. It meant something, but he didn't have time to study it.

Instead, he was ushered into a large meeting hall with a long table where the ambassador to the Vermillions were waiting. You would think that he would wear something appropriate for the occasion. Instead, he was wearing the same dirty rags that everyone else wore.

He had a brisk manner to match his leather, dust worn skin, and when he stood up to greet him Antoni could see his eyes darting around, displaying the same paranoia he saw in the Jihadis. “Thank you for coming.”

“I am glad that we were able to meet.” The prince walked over to extend his hand, but the man pulled back, almost as if he were unsure of what the boy was doing. Antoni grew embarrassed. “I am Prince Antoni Leon, heir to the Kaldean Empire, and this is my personal guard, Magnus.” He pointed back at the man who was wearing a brand new cloak that had been soiled with dust.

The man nodded his head in acknowledgment, but he didn't bow. “My name is Rufus Delani. I am the leader of the Vermillions and the de facto ambassador to the Empire.”

A Larvos stepped forward, and transmitted his voice into Antoni's head. “I apologize. I know that our method of communication is disturbing to your species, but I promise it is noninvasive. We don't have names, but among the humans, I go by Yuri. I am the Leader of the People who reside in this region.” He lowered his legs and let his body dip just a bit.

“It's very nice to meet you, Yuri.” Antoni
was shivering inside, but he did his best to keep his composure while he took his seat along with the rest of the group.

“Where's your father?” Rufus was quick to jump on Antoni.

“I was told that he would arrive shortly after I arrived. I assure you, he will be here soon.”

“Are we allowed to continue without him present,” Yuri asked.

\ “I don't think he's representative of their government,” Yuri countered. “Understand something,” he turned to the prince. “I came to you. I'm here with a solution to your problem, and I'm working with you to fix things. You should be taking us seriously.”

Magnus moved to Antoni's side, and Rufus tensed up. His sharp stare was like an icepick to the face. “I—he told me he would be here soon. I don't know why he's not here yet, but please let me impress upon you just how important this is to us.”

“I don't trust it. I think they're playing with us.” Rufus was speaking directly to Yuri.

This was a good way to get Antoni killed. He was furious. He wanted to storm out and head straight back to the palace, but something told him that that wouldn't be a good idea. Instead he was being forced to sit and wait while his father delayed as long as he possibly could.

“He's coming.”

Rufus was on his feet. “How do I know!?”

A guard moved behind Antoni and bent down to whisper in his ear. “A word, your highness.”

'There's been news of my father's arrival.” Antoni left quickly to meet with his father before going back in. The guard stayed close to his side as they walked up to the front steps where he turned around and let his eyes pass over the prince.

The gesture meant something. “What's going on? Where is he?”

“Your father was found dead in his bed.”

Antoni's heart stopped and everything faded. There was no dust, no wind, even the guard disappeared. His father was picking up, and he was bouncing on his knee laughing. He loved Antoni. He would've done anything. Victor looked past his son's indiscretions and saw the man underneath them.

He sincerely believed in what he was doing, and had mastered the art of balancing all of the factors necessary to keep the peace in the Empire. Without his father, the Empire was going to fall.

Victor had more than a century of experience before he took the throne. He had already lived, and seen the galaxy. He knew what it took to hold the Empire together because he'd been doing it for decades. By the time he ascended into power, he had already been ruling as regent for 7 years.

Victor told Antoni every day that he believed his son was going to become a better Emperor than he was, but how could Antoni possibly accomplish that if he didn't know what he was doing? He wasn't ready.

Antoni let his body stop, and he focused on his breath. This was real. The Empire needed a leader. He wasn't the man to do it, but there were already a thousand assaults to Kaldean sovereignty and he was the legitimate heir. Somehow, he would have to reach down deep in his gut and find a way to become an Emperor.

The guards left the meeting hall promptly with Magnus taking the head. He wasn't the same man he was five minutes ago. His face was no longer flushed, and his eyes seemed to have sense of purpose. For the first time in decades, he was fully present.

As soon as Antoni needed him by his side he was there, ignoring the protests of the Vermillion who was running after them. “Please. I'm your only chance. You need to listen to me.”

Antoni didn't care. They would let him in no matter what. They needed him, and he needed to know whether or not they had a solution to their problem, but sovereignty came first. Magnus bent down and whispered in his ear. “I'll get you to the ship if we have to blow the dome off of this place. Let's just leave.”

Antoni waited until all the guards had congregated and looked around at them. They were simple men, brutes like Magnus mostly, but they were the first ones to witness his ascension, so they mattered. They would hold the memory close just so they could say that they saw something big. Antoni could use that.

They fell on their knees with their hands touching their foreheads.

“I want you to remember what you saw today. This is history.” He caught their eyes peeking up and met them. He wanted them to think that he cared, and in a way he did. He had to care about everyone or none of this mattered. “I'm not going to tell you that I will fix all of the problems in the galaxy, or that the Sisterhood will fall tomorrow. What I will tell you is that I was the one who told the Emperor what the Sisterhood was doing, and since then I have dedicated my life to fighting them. I promise, as your Emperor, I will give everything, my body,
my mind—everything I have, to stopping the threat we are facing today. Then I will build a new Empire, one that listens to the problems of its people and works to solve them. I'm not going to sit in a palace and hide from the galaxy. I'm going to confront the problems facing the people and come up with real solutions to solve them.

Right now, at this second, I am your Emperor, and my life is in danger. There are those who are working to seize power away from me. As Jihadis, you have pledged your life to your Emperor, but as men you have your own thoughts, and your own opinions about what should be done. If you have any concerns about my legitimacy, please leave now and you will not be killed, but if you are willing to give your life to me then escort me back to the palace.'

Not one man moved, not until it was obvious that they were leaving. Magnus took his place at the back of the line and sounded out, “Salute!”

The men rose, slamming their fists to their chest, directly over their hearts. They kept their heads bowed and flanked him in a defensive formation. Antoni turned to Magnus. “Can you get on the comm with palace guard and find out what is going on?”

“Yes, your highness.” He pressed a tiny impression in his jaw then began moving his mouth, forming silent words as he spoke to the guard, aided by a transplant that sent the transmission to the palace. He stopped and the other guards stopped with him. “Your highness, the guard isn't answering.”

“What does that mean?”

“There's nobody there to answer.”

The governors met quietly, their ships cloaked so they could enter the asteroid field and meet in private. There were millions of them, each with their own concerns about what was going on. Many of their planets had been ignored for centuries while their infrastructure crumbled and their people starved. The Emperor believe in a policy of detachment, they were told. They had to handle those problems themselves without the forces, or the industry necessary to do so.

Artemis saved their lives. It gave them the infrastructure necessary to feed their people, and give them everything they ever wanted. There were nomads living in prefabricated homes complete with all of the latest appliances, and it didn't cost them a thing. Money was being phased out, because expansion and the hunt for resources was almost fully automated, but the Emperor was hindering progress.

Their loyalty was wavering, and many systems were already talking about open revolt. They believed that the Emperor had left them to fend for themselves, and they wanted a government that aided the people. Others were loyal. Many of the prosperous systems were glad to have sovereignty over their planets, and didn't want to face Imperial interference. When they heard that the Emperor was dead, they accepted the young prince as their ruler. The rest wanted him gone. They would've stormed the palace if they had its coordinates. They wanted change, and they were going to have it.

Nobody knew the consensus. It might be that the revolutionaries had enough force to take control, or it could be that the loyalists outnumbered them. This was not something that people spoke about openly, not for fear of persecution, but because they didn't have an alternative to the Emperor's rule. There were systems that had been proposed, but they were fantasies formed in the drug addled minds of overgrown adolescents. Nobody knew what to do, or what would happen if the Kaldeans fell.

The governors had always been to scared to chance a revolution. The Emperor’s army was a formidable force, one that could easily match those of their guards. Some of the loyalists were able to build up troops, but they weren’t willing to lend a hand to the smaller systems. The ruling consensus among them was that those systems were being neglected by their governors, but the reality was that they didn’t have the resources to sustain themselves.

Now that the Emperor was dead, they were left with a momentary vacuum, and a short window of time with which it could be filled. The prince was undoubtedly on his way to the coronation at the time of their meeting, but something was rolling past, an unexpected wave that might be able to offer them hope.

Illya appeared to them like an apparition in digital space. She took over their consoles, their comm systems and their tablets. Her face appeared on every screen in their systems like a beacon of hope. They all knew why she was there, even before she spoke.

She told them that the Lorian Sisterhood was aware of their grievances. She named each and every one by name--the hunger and poverty, the people who died in the remote reaches of the galaxy because they couldn’t get the things that they needed to live. She wanted them to know that things could change. There was a new order rising from the ashes of the old Lorian state, and that they could become the rulers of a new republic.

So they gathered from all over the universe, every one of them to witness the historic event. She was coming soon. The governors shifted anxiously, paced around their ships. Many of them wondered whether or not this was the right thing to do, and some were openly hostile, but they weren’t about to miss it.

With nothing but the piles of frozen rock to keep them company, the men became restless. One ship, from the Alterus system decided to leave. It fired up its space folding engine, the pilot activated it, and it exploded, sending the entrails of its inhabitants flying into space.

Something was happening. The rocks stopped floating and started moving in slowly, surrounding the gathering in a circular formation, then they flew in like bullets racing towards their targets, sensing somehow where the ships were located, as if they had been programmed to do so. Fire turned to ice, and metal flew on all sides as the men watched the ships get torn to pieces, waiting for an asteroid to send them careening into space.

It was a secret meeting, so their deaths were not reported by anyone. The public never found out what happened to them. Their families never got an answer. They just left their homes unexpectedly and never came back, leaving their families to fend for themselves.

Illya watched all of this from a tiny screen in her sanctuary, holding her infant child while singing to it softly. “Look,” she whispered, pointing towards the screen.

The baby sat up to watch. “I did that.”

“Yes, you did. Isn’t it wonderful?”

“I wanna do more.”

“You will do more.”

Nothing happened at first. The escorts stopped and stared at Antoni, while he stood silently, wondering what to do. The Jihadis would keep constant communication with their Imperial guard, and ensure that it was never interrupted. His safety and that of his father’s would’ve been their highest priority, which meant that something terrible had happened in the palace.