Page 8 of The First Spark (Dynasty of Fire #1)

“And that’s the worst part of all.” Zane stood up, brushing aside the gauzy curtains hanging over the alcove. “This conversation is over.”

“Wait. Wait .”

Her hand closed around his wrist. Zane’s lips twisted into a snarl as he whipped around, wrenching his hand free.

“Unless you want to find yourself at the wrong end of a pulser,” he snapped, leaning towards her, “do not touch me.”

“Then listen.” Rising to her feet, she inhaled deeply. “The money and a lordship. Not a barony, but a city. It’s the best I can promise. You want something in Avington? There are two lordships on the island. I’ll draw up new boundaries and create a third. Deal? ”

He almost said yes. Getting a city on the island was better than nothing, but her family had broken too many promises to trust she would follow through. There was one vow, though, that she wouldn’t break.

“Swear it on your aunt’s soul.”

Hannover blanched and staggered back.

Part of him hoped she’d swear the vow and go back on her word later. In her religion, a vow made on someone’s soul was unbreakable. If someone dared to break it, their soul, and the dead’s, would be condemned to the darkest pits of hell.

Duchissa Calida had only been twenty-one when everything happened, but two decades of near-poverty on a world where bombs fell daily gave him no sympathy for her.

“I—I can’t,” Hannover stammered, her voice cracking.

Zane ground his teeth together. She could do it easily—just a few words, and he’d have proof that she wasn’t planning to screw him over like the rest of her family.

Pain shone in her bleak eyes, and Zane’s lip pulled back in disgust. She wouldn’t sway him with grief. There was too much at stake. If he was risking his life for her, he was damn well going to get a reassurance that she wouldn’t stab him in the back.

A gloss covered her eyes, and her lip wobbled.

The tears carried him back to an ancient church with burning candles.

He swallowed the knot expanding in his throat.

Mom would spit at Hannover and order him to ignore her tears the way they’d ignored hers.

But while the memories were hazy, he remembered Dad’s kind smile and his steadfast loyalty to the royal family.

He could imagine him frowning in disapproval.

“Fine. On your throne.”

She hesitated. But instead of breaking down and becoming a weeping mess, she raised her chin. “I swear, on my throne and my soul, that I won’t go back on my word.”

“And I swear, on my father’s soul, that I won’t rat you out to Carik.

” The words flowed out without a trace of hesitation.

Her people’s conviction that there was some benevolent court of gods was a load of crap.

If there was anything out there, it was only the god who brought death, and Mordir didn’t give a damn about oaths made on the souls of the dead. Neither did Zane.

“But,” he continued, flashing his cruelest smile, “if you go back on your word later, I’ll hunt you down. And I promise, you’ll regret it.”

She shivered. “I won’t.”

“Good. I’m going to the bar. Stay in your cabin until we land.”

Hannover frowned. “I didn’t get your name.”

“I didn’t give it to you.” He shrugged. “It’s Zane. You can figure out the rest.”

He didn’t expect her to pick up on it, but as pulsing neon lights danced across her beige coat, Hannover went deathly still.

She grabbed his arm and yanked him back to the alcove.

Zane nearly snapped at her to keep her hands off him, but as she tossed the gauzy curtains aside and spun around, her wide eyes found his.

“You’re Baron Wells’s son.”

“How kind of you to remember me.” Zane sidestepped the curtains as they swung into place. “It only took your family twenty cycles.”

“Your father…” Hannover inched back, gnawing on her lip. “He died in the war, didn’t he?”

“He and my grandparents.”

As she sank into the booth, her guilty eyes shifted away. “I’m so sorry.”

He scoffed. “Little late for that, Princess. My whole family died fighting for your aunt in her stupid war, and how did the greedy bitch repay us?” Hannover’s pretty face twisted in rage, and he spat, “By stealing our barony.”

Hannover jerked to her feet, and Zane smirked as she stormed towards him.

Her face was inches from his, her lips pulled back into a snarl. “Aunt Calida just died?—”

“And good riddance.”

As Hannover reeled back, horror twisted her features.

Then her palm cracked against his face.

He must’ve been deeper in his cups than he thought, because it took half a moment to register that she’d actually managed to land a blow, then another moment for it to sting. He pushed off the wall, closing the last of the distance between them. Her face blanched as he towered over her.

“You know how many lives she destroyed because she wanted to steal the throne from her mother? Don’t —” he growled, when she opened her mouth— “tell me there’s more to the story.

Three hundred million Dalians died. None of you nobles suffered, the rich never do.

And now , this conversation is over. Get me my money, give me my land in Avington, and stay out of my way. ”

Zane flung the curtains aside and marched out of the alcove. He winced. The volume of the thumping music had shot up exponentially.

Hannover called after him, but he ignored her. Sliding onto a barstool beside Crea, he barked for the bartender to bring him the strongest drink he had.

Crea rested her hand on his thigh. “You okay?”

“I need a distraction.”

But even as she slid into his lap and pressed her lips to his, even when he came up gasping for air long enough to down a gulp of alcohol, two decades of pent-up rage lingered. And this time, it wouldn’t be easy to forget.

By four, the bar was deserted. They’d shut down the anti-gravity dance floor so the skeleton crew could clear the trash away.

The nude Britirian woman dancing on a stage had an audience of two.

The thumping music had dropped several octaves, and the strobe lights were set to a gentle fade in the darkness, which was a miracle. His head was throbbing.

Zane took a sip of his last cyr.

He’d closed his tab at three, after one last round of drinks. Once the money was gone, his rowdy coworkers had bailed and left him alone .

Crea had left around two. “ I’m going to bed ,” she’d said, pressing a kiss to the corner of his lips. “ Although if you want to join me for the first round of negotiations, I wouldn’t mind company .”

He’d been tempted. It wasn’t like he’d get much sleep anyway. The nightmares made sure of that.

But he had a meeting with the big boss at nine, which left him a small window to sober up. Meeting Captain Stotz with rumpled clothes and alcohol on his breath was asking to be fired.

So he’d stayed and spent a hellish thirty minutes in the bathroom with his third Purging Tonic of the night, to flush the alcohol out of his system. Then he’d headed back to the bar for one last drink.

Zane turned his holocomm over in his hand. A holographic contact card hovered above the comm’s projector.

Mira.

Frowning, Zane stirred the dregs of his drink. It wouldn’t be breaking his promise to Hannover. He’d promised not to tell Carik. He’d never promised not to tell anyone else.

His hand hovered over the call button.

It was a win for all of them. Hannover would make it back to Dali. He’d get his money and the lordship in Avington. And Mira, whose primary clients had almost certainly hired her to find Hannover, would collect a huge payout.

But Mira had three specialties—sharpshooting, causing chaos, and blowing things up. That was exactly what he was trying to avoid.

Powering the holocomm off, Zane slumped over the counter. His eyelids crashed down like blocks of iron, but he dragged them open. He’d given up on sleep. It was never restful.

He must’ve dozed, though, because his eyes were shut and the strobe lights were off when the shrill chime of his holocomm roused him.

Zane shot upright and fumbled in the near-darkness for his comm. Flipping it over on the countertop, he groaned and rubbed his bleary eyes. It was four-thirty in the morning. Way too early for work to be bothering him. Especially Guest Services, of all things.

But he had a promotion on the line, so he shook himself out of the daze and put the transmission through .

A holoprojection of the Guest Coordinator’s head appeared in his palm. Sweat coated her face, and her eyes were wide. He’d seen the look on shell-shocked shinies more than once.

He gripped his holstered pulser.

“We need you on the bridge.”

His mouth went dry. “Nova,” he said slowly, hoping she’d simply made a mistake, “I’m not on shift.”

“Now, Zane.”

Nova ended the transmission. Chills raced across Zane’s skin, flushing the last of the alcohol from his system.

He pocketed his holocomm, paid the bar tab, and strode towards the door.

This wasn’t the normal call for a passenger complaint.

For the Guest Coordinator to be so spooked, this had to be bad.

Like, maybe, a fugitive princess, whose only disguise was an auburn wig and a faulty chip scrambler.

Zane took off at a sprint.

The Chimaera ’s halls were deserted this early in the morning, so he made it across the ship in record time. At the door, he popped a few breath mints and waved his wrist over the chip scanner in the door’s codebox. The screen flashed green. The metal door slid aside, and he barged onto the bridge.

It was chaos.

At the center, Captain Nyroc Stotz sat in his command chair, shouting orders at a frightened technician. The persistent beeping of the warning radar cut through the haze of voices. An officer sprinted across the bridge, waving a holopad.

Throbbing pressure pounded at the back of Zane’s skull. Cringing, he pressed a hand to his temple.

He should’ve downed another Purging Tonic.