Kayelle Allen's A STOLEN HEART (a book feature)
After rescuing a half-alien / half-human child who's running for his life, warrior-turned-entrepreneur Luc Saint-Cyr stumbles onto a conspiracy at the highest levels of the powerful Thieves' Guild. Complicating matters, Luc's immortal ex might be involved.
Now Luc must deal with his ex, find a home for the child, squelch the flames of conspiracy and eradicate its perpetrators. As if that's not enough, an unseen enemy is undoing every good thing Luc accomplishes.
But when it comes time to give up the child to a family who can care for him, how will Luc bear to part with the adorable little boy who has stolen his heart...
Luc Saint-Cyr paced the length of the Negotiator's observation deck and back. No short distance. The view of Kelthia's black seas from space filled one transparent wall. From here, Miraj City glowed like a million lampyris birds trapped in a net, subject to the whim of their masters.
His luxurious top-of-the-line private transport entertained twenty passengers in comfort for a month and navigated hyperspace without nav-crystals. But when the ship reached his king's monstrous bird of prey, Le Persequor would ingest Luc's vessel like a hawk gulping a flitting gnat.
Once Luc boarded, he'd be no more free than a lampyris, with his net the grace of his king.
He played the man's holovid again.
"Will you meet with me?" Pietas's calm tenor voice offered no overt danger. No concrete menace. No definable threat.
His king was smiling, but that meant nothing. Pietas smiled when commanding his panther to devour an enemy too.
Since receiving the message two days ago, Luc had replayed it at least thirty times. Dread choked him, each time.
No, this was too simple. Too short. Too cordial. Too... not Pietas.
Luc had verified the origin and veracity of the message, but still refused to believe it. Even he, the closest Pietas had to a true friend, received commands, not requests.
"I'm only one jump away from Kelthia. Uurah will let you know when we reach orbit. I hope you won't leave the planet before I get there."
Since when did Pietas say he hoped you wouldn't do anything? He flat out told you.
"Talk to you soon." Pietas reached down, off camera. From the motion, he had to be petting the panther. His smile pierced the holocam. "Can't wait to see you, Cyken." The scene went black.
A tap skipped the vid back to its final image. Luc zoomed in on his king's face. No wrinkles around the eyes, no lines around the noble mouth. Pietas had been reborn and the age difference showed. Makeup and poorly lit images hid plenty, but only an immortal with a planet-sized ego would think he could shave off that many years and the mortal public wouldn't notice. Why would he risk revealing their biggest secret?
Immortal blood brought mortals back from the dead.
They'd soon learned never to reveal what they were. The brazen entitlement of mortals to commandeer an immortal's blood for their own use put his people at risk. Had for millennia.
Luc looped back to the final sentence. "Can't wait to see you, Cyken."
As an Ultra, Luc had lived thousands of years among mortals, and had used hundreds of different names over his many lifespans. His Sempervian name never changed. Not to his king. To his king, Cyken was a family name. Family was everything.
But the disquieting way Pietas had crooned that last sentence layered implications Luc preferred not to consider. The man never missed an opportunity to flirt, no matter how many years they'd been apart. What issue did Pietas have with the word no?
And now this baffling holovid. In over thirty-four hundred years since their exile from Sempervia, when had the king come to him instead of summoning?
Luc powered off the vid. "That would be never."
A Stolen Heart, sci fi from Kayelle Allen
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Kayelle Allen writes Sci Fi with misbehaving robots, mythic heroes, role playing immortal gamers, and warriors who purr. She is the author of multiple books, novellas, and short stories. She's also a US Navy veteran and has been married so long she's tenured.
How nice to have a name that fits today's challenge! Thank you for featuring A Stolen Heart. :)
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