Lord Regret's Price: A Jane Austen Space Opera, Book 3 Read online

  “The virus leaped from the computer systems to your people.”

  The alien stiffened, lifting her head and staring out over the crowd. “Such a thing should not be possible, but yes, that’s what we suspect. An inorganic virus that invaded organic tissue and began…mutating.”

  Nausea made Charlotte’s stomach pitch. Her fingertips burned with cold. Or maybe she was simply losing feeling in her hand that was still clutched in the alien’s iron grip. My nanobots. Dear God. What have I done? I knew MIGS had taken my research and twisted it. I knew… But hearing it is so much worse than I imagined. They saved my life and Sig’s, but killed millions more.

  The alien lowered her head to whisper directly against Charlotte’s ear. “What no one outside Razar knows is that we could transform before. Now that transformation is worse.”

  “What do you mean?”

  The alien gripped her forearm, squeezing so hard Charlotte involuntarily gasped. Nails lengthened, pricking through the sleeve of her gown. Impossibly long nails…no, claws. Stunned, she leaned down, eyes locked on the alien’s arm. Something moved beneath the swamp-colored skin. Glittering scales?

  “The virus magnifies the transformation, taking away our choice, our honor, our very identity. Your Queen has created a race of monsters. Monsters who will devour the flesh from her bones and her scientists if given the chance.”

  Charlotte could only draw shallow, rapid breaths, fighting to keep her feet. Her knees weakened, her head dangerously foggy. She knew Sig had been changed, but those changes had been improvements. He was better, faster, stronger.

  Not a monster.

  “I…I must…help you.”

  “It’s too late. The virus has infected every Razari, whether they were on the planet or not. It spread from computer to computer, ship to ship, male to female to child. Once they start, the mutations are impossible to stop. Our best scientists have tried.”

  Despite her horror, Charlotte’s mind buzzed with possibilities. The nanobots in Sig had been amplifying his abilities to make him better. What if that was all the Razari virus was doing? Highlighting their existing ability to transform—making them more powerful? “Have they tried reprogramming the virus?”

  The alien narrowed slitted eyes, her breath a low hiss. “How?”

  Claws dug into her arm, nearly breaking the skin, but she didn’t react. I can’t show any weakness. No hesitation. No fear. “I think I could do it.”

  “There are rumors that have reached even Razar that the Queen’s Physician was responsible for the technology that destroyed us.”

  Charlotte held her breath for a count of ten and slowly released it in a controlled exhale that revealed nothing. Hopefully her face remained as blank. “I heard the good doctor was assassinated.”

  The alien nodded and even managed a smile, although the curve of her lips didn’t indicate friendship, but rather what Charlotte feared to be a taste for flesh. “The story goes that the infamous assassin Lord Regret was hired by the Razari to kill her with one of their crystals. Our methods—if we could have gotten our claws on her—would have been much less…public. A quick and merciful death is a right reserved for the honored who fall in battle. Not pathetic scientists playing with creation and destruction.”

  “What if the creator was not the destructor?” Charlotte weighed each word carefully. The very reason Queen Majel wanted her dead if she couldn’t have her research was that she knew too much. She didn’t dare spread too much of the truth, for then the Queen would have absolutely no doubts where those secrets originated. “Something created for good might be warped by others into a weapon. Yet good might still come from it.”

  Long moments ticked by while the alien mulled over her proposition. Sweat trickled between Charlotte’s breasts and her face began to ache from keeping the serene mask while her life might hang in the balance. She didn’t doubt that Gil and Sig would be on the alien in a moment’s notice, but the woman was so close, they might be too late. Besides, she couldn’t fault the woman in the slightest. In many ways, she did deserve to die. She was counting on the alien’s desperation to save her people to outweigh her desire for vengeance.

  “What would you need?”

  The low roar of the busy market suddenly washed over her. She glanced around, but no one seemed to take note of them. In the crush, she couldn’t even find Gil, and he’d been with her just a moment before. But what if a Runner was here, watching a Britannian lady conversing with a Razari? A faint humming filled her head, increasing her sense of urgency. “Not here.”

  The alien inclined her head in agreement. “Even where Britannia is no longer welcome, I suspect blackbirds flit in the shadows.”

  The roar increased, a dull thrumming that made her bones tingle and vibrate. Charlotte slipped her hand into her reticule to find her compact and rose up on her tiptoes, searching as unobtrusively as possible for her men. “How long do you plan to trade in Hoeng Gong? Perhaps we could exchange notes at another venue?”

  “My next stop is Morocco, but I plan to return home before our New Year in three weeks’ time.” The alien hesitated a moment and then touched the crystal around her neck. “Beware. I have reports of a battleship approaching Zijin. Where there’s one, there are a dozen more, slipping up in all directions. Soon enough, I fear Zijin may befall the same fate as Razar.”

  Not if I can stop it before it starts. “Thank you for the information. I don’t plan to remain here long.”

  The alien slipped into the flow of people rushing back and forth, leaving Charlotte alone. Chilled, she hugged her arms across her chest, keeping the small metal container palmed against her body. Her head ached abominably from that annoying sound. She’d never had such a reaction before, but every instinct she had swore something bad was about to happen.

  Something very bad indeed.

  Chapter Three

  After living in hiding for so long, Charlotte was used to always suspecting someone was going to turn on her. In the busy marketplace, it was impossible to tell who might be sending her nerves into high alert. No one was even looking at her. Certainly no one shoved and pushed their way through the crowd toward her.

  Gripping the compact shield, she headed back toward where she’d left Gil.

  The sound of ripping material made her jerk her head up. A black shape hurtled over the top of the tented shops, slipping down the side directly in front of her. She stumbled back, knocking over a table of rings and necklaces that scattered over the ground, earning harsh words from the wizened woman running the tent.

  Another black form dropped seemingly from the sky, blocking her return to Gil. She could only assume more were blocking her retreat to the rear as well. She cast a quick look around, searching for a wall, a pillar, something firm to put at her back, but here in the center of the square she saw only tents and rickety stands.

  The old woman who’d been shouting at her just a moment ago took one look at the black attackers and quickly dropped the flap of her tent, as though the dark, no-doubt stuffy interior could protect her. Across the square, news of the attack must have spread, for shops were closing and the once-teeming marketplace was quickly emptying. Yet no one shouted a warning. No one called for the Imperial Guards.

  Certainly no one was going to come to her aid, except her men.

  At that thought, she heard the explosion of gunfire off to her left. The buzzing in her head worsened, vibrating her teeth until her face began to throb. One of the attackers seemed to float over the ground, leaping over tables, flying over every obstacle toward her, just feet away. Without trying to reason how or why, she accepted the warning and depressed the button on the device in her hand.

  As though she’d detonated a bomb, the assassin tumbled backward and slammed through one of the tents. Despite the crash, she couldn’t assume that he was down for the count. Not knowing much about these attackers, she didn’t know how quickly they’d give up.

  If at all.

  Despite the danger, her sc
ientific mind was consumed with curiosity. She couldn’t accept the dropping-from-heaven metaphor these killers were trying so hard to sell. With the shield firmly up, she dared to move closer to the other one still dancing his way toward her. He bounded over a low tent like an antelope. Silver sparked in his hand, though not a knife. He raised his arm and threw the item at her.

  It struck the shield…but didn’t rebound. Not like she’d expected. Her shield worked by using its charge to repel metallic items like bullets and knives. Instead of bouncing off, this item stuck in the invisible energy field, slowing enough for her to see its sharp-pointed ends spinning. A four-pointed star, edges honed to a cutting edge.

  It’s managing to defy my shield. How interesting.

  The attacker who’d thrown the star suddenly fell backward, tangling up with Sig, who’d returned to protect her. They rolled across the ground, crashing into another stand of pottery.

  Another shot drew her head toward Gil. With the pistol raised and pointed in her direction, he ran, shouting, but she couldn’t hear it over the humming in her head. He fired again and she instinctively ducked, though he’d never deliberately shoot her.

  Behind me.

  Sparks shot through the shield, warning that someone was trying to break through. Meanwhile, the star still spun toward her, progressively working its way through the invisible protection. No metallic weapon should have been able to push through the field. Unless they’d deliberately charged the weapon first so that it wouldn’t be repelled. But how could they possibly have known?

  It was so close to her body she wouldn’t have much time to twist away if it broke through the shield. Out of the corner of her eye she saw sparks like lightning tearing through the shield. The assassin was still trying to get through the shield from the rear. In her mind’s eye, she pictured a black-garbed man with a blade, trying to slice his way through invisible layers. The shield still held firm, but the star was only a few millimeters from passing through the field and sinking into her heart.

  She gripped the device in her sweaty palm, trying to analyze the angles. She couldn’t be sure where the man was behind her, but the shield was constructed to pass very close to her body, surrounding her in a cocoon of protection. Sucking in a deep breath, she threw herself down toward the ground as she let the shield dissolve.

  Rolling across the courtyard with a twisty snake of an assassin, Sig called himself all kinds of a fool.

  He never should have left her, even for a moment. He knew more than anyone how many contracts were out on her head.

  The assassin punched him in the back, not with his fist, but with outstretched fingers, a sharp, hard thrust that stole Sig’s breath and made sweat break out on his forehead. It felt like a knife had sunk into his kidney. Gritting his teeth, he fought for leverage. If he could pin the man down just for a moment, he could unsheathe another blade. He’d be more careful with the placement this time, since the first blade hadn’t even slowed the man.

  Dark eyes glittered down at him. Swathed in black from head to toe, the assassin slammed his fist down against Sig’s right hand. Pain exploded, sharpening his mind to electrified speed. Disabled with a blow to the kidney. Right hand pinned to the ground with some kind of blade. This bastard’s good.

  Almost as good as me.

  Unluckily for the assassin, Sig didn’t need his hands to kill. He tapped his left boot on the ground, triggering the heel and toe spikes. Then he kicked his leg up high, twisting beneath the man to jab his boot against the man’s throat. It was a short, triangular spike, barely visible if you weren’t looking for such a weapon, but with the right placement, it was certainly enough to puncture an artery.

  Blood fountained from the assassin’s throat and he quickly sagged on top of Sig. Rocking sideways, he threw the body off him and turned his attention to his trapped hand. A bladed silver star spiked his hand to the ground. He’d probably thrown at least a hundred knives to eliminate his target before, but he’d never seen a star. The blades were short, but as the assassin had learned by his boot spikes, a blade didn’t have to be long to cause a great deal of damage. If one hit a target in the eye…

  Shuddering, he gripped the star with his left hand and tugged it free of his flesh. His arm burned with a strange but familiar icy heat as Charlie’s invention moved to the source of the damage. Millions of microscopic robots marched through his veins toward the wound, already working to close it up. They’d devour any debris—organic or metallic, it didn’t matter. No infection would ever find his body a warm and welcoming habitat.

  Worry for her pushed him to his feet. He’d seen at least two black-garbed assassins coming at her from his direction. He’d only been able to eliminate one. While he didn’t doubt that Gil would do his best to protect her…there were certain situations that required killing where his past as a lawman might be a handicap.

  Cradling his wounded hand, Sig found them both studying one of the bodies. Relief swept through him. I wasn’t too late. This time.

  But how many times would she be attacked? No matter where they went, they’d never have peace. He was good, but could he always keep her alive? Would he and Gil be enough protection for her?

  Sig counted three bodies in the empty marketplace. Others might have escaped. In his book, it was unheard of to send that many assassins after a single target. Any assassin worth his price would figure out a way to lie in wait and make a sure but easy kill. Why attack so publicly, with so many assassins at once? Had it been a message?

  Get out of Zijin while you still can?

  Charlie laughed delightedly and pulled something off the dead man’s soft-soled boots. “I knew it! What an ingenious device. I’ll have to run some tests to be sure, but I believe it acts like my shield by creating a magnetic field that repels from the ground and gives them the ability to ‘fly’. Sig, wouldn’t you like one of these?”

  “My best contracts are the ones where I’m in and out before anyone knows,” he replied dryly. “Instead of flying across the marketplace and not only warning my target but also frightening away all the people who will spread word about my attempt.”

  Some of her scientific enthusiasm waned. “It was a very public attack.”

  “What scares me is that they seemed to know about your shield.” His face hard and grim, Gil tipped his head down at the assassin who had a star buried in his chest. “That was meant for your heart, not his.”

  Sig bent down for a closer look. While gruesome, the star alone wouldn’t have killed the man. The bladed tip was hung up against a rib. It’d probably hurt like the devil, but it hadn’t done enough damage to drop an assassin. Gil’s bullet between his eyes had done that, although the star had slowed the assassin down. Sig pulled the black cloth away from the man’s face.

  No surprises there. A Zijin man, young, though he couldn’t be sure from which planet in the large system the man had actually hailed. He patted down the rest of the body, not expecting to find much identifying information. No assassin in his right mind took any sort of identification along with him on an assignment, other than his weapons, possibly a good-luck charm if he was the sentimental type.

  He grimaced at that thought. Him, sentimental? It took all his self-control not to touch the small inside pocket of his coat where his own good-luck trinket was stored.

  Not for luck. For memory. So it never happens to me.

  As he ran his hands over the man’s abdomen, his fingers tingled. Intrigued, he slowed his search until he felt something flat and round sewn into the assassin’s shirt. Sig unsheathed one of the many blades he kept hidden on his body—this one up a sleeve of his coat—and sliced the material open. A black coin fell out, dull and unevenly poured. On one side, a dragon; the other, a phoenix.

  He passed it up to Charlie. “Symbols for the Emperor and Empress of Zijin.”

  “Which one of them wants me dead?”

  “Does it honestly matter?” Gil asked. “Besides, Sig is right. What if it was a public message, whe
ther the attempt succeeded or not? Thousands of people just witnessed Imperial assassins trying to kill you in an open marketplace. You, sweetheart. So they know who you are. You’re not safe here.”

  A soft exhale escaped her lips and she stared down at the dead man. Her proud confidence and aristocratic air wavered, revealing a world-weary and, yes, scared, woman. Sig stood and pulled her against him. Gil hugged her from the other side, careful not to interfere in Sig’s space but determined not to be left out.

  “Let’s return to the inn.” Her words were muffled against Sig’s shirt. “I’ll decide what to do there. I need to meet someone in a fortnight anyway. Perhaps it’ll be best if we leave now. I was warned that a Britannian ship might be headed this way.”

  Great, that’s the last thing we need. Sig linked arms with her, Gil on her other side, and they quickly made their way back toward the inn. It’d be a race to see how many thugs and bounty hunters came to assassinate her.

  Chapter Four

  Ignoring the bustle about her in the room as the servants organized her packets for transfer to the ship, Charlotte sat at the lacquered table and jotted quick notes about everything she’d seen in Zijin so far. She opened a silver metallic casket that held her field research equipment. Her most important devices and notes were safely hidden on Sig’s ship, but she couldn’t resist the opportunity to continue her studies and experiments now that she no longer had to hide.

  Although with recent events, perhaps that thinking was a mistake. Someone knew she was here, even though she’d only just arrived and had never used her real name.

  Was it as easy as assuming a Britannian lady—where no Britannian ships were welcome—must be a threat?

  She didn’t think so. No, this attack had been too personal. The assassin had known enough about her shield to try and circumvent it.

  Before her, she’d laid out the star that had nearly killed her—still stained with the assassin’s blood—and the device he’d worn on his boot to help him defy gravity. If he was truly an Imperial assassin, she’d love to meet the Imperial doctor who’d created such clever devices.