Centauri Pax Read online

  Centauri Pax

  Skyler Grant

  Contents

  Previously

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Authors Note

  Previously

  Captain Quinn Jade is the captain of a beat-up old ship, the Kathryn, and living mostly on the wrong side of the law, mourning the loss of his wife, Kat, and accompanied by his loyal first officer, Taki, and the ship's engineer, Melody.

  The ship soon wound up taking passengers, including a cold and calculating lawyer named Tamara, and her client and charge, Jinx. They also took aboard Dela, an appraiser and xeno-archaeologist who had also turned to a life of crime.

  The announcement of the death of the Emperor placed the Imperium on the verge of a civil war. Jinx, inheritor of a previous royal line, was on the run from those who might use her to strengthen their own claim.

  The green-skinned alien mercenary, Kara Vex, invaded the ship to capture Jinx, but when made a better offer she decided to stay and become a member of the crew.

  After a series of betrayals, the Kathryn and its crew of people who are all running from something decided to form a family of their own, a Centauri, and to rename the ship the Centauri Bliss.

  While foiling the schemes of the wicked Lord Barr they met up with Mara, a genetically-enhanced spy of unknown allegiances. In time she too would be joining the Centauri.

  Having made many enemies in the Core, the crew of the Centauri Bliss headed for the Rim. Seeking a new life and a new beginning.

  They found work almost impossible to find, almost all crime on the Rim being handled by the guilds or through the crime families of Arkstone.

  When a client ambushed the crew to try to avoid payment, the crew turned the tables on them. This brought them to the attention of a crime family that needed a job done well outside civilized space.

  Quinn and his companions found a system that was a graveyard. A planet, ships, and a space station all filled with long-dead corpses. The result of a purge by the Emperor, and an effort to destroy two of the "Unshackled" who had been in the system, the Unshackled being powerful magic-users with the ability to contaminate others. The system was also home to the Divide, a magical barrier the Emperor had constructed that cleaved the old Empire in two.

  Investigating the station the crew triggered an ancient medical stasis pod, awakening the Unshackled Ilinar. He, in turn, stole a ship and managed to breach the Divide, leaving the system and journeying to wage a war on the colony of Hope's Reach. Ilinar was accompanied by a horde of wrathspawn, mercenaries corrupted with his magic.

  The crew of the Centauri Bliss managed to stop the invasion, and Jinx, for the first time truly mastering her own magic, executed Ilinar. Upon his death her hand was marked with a glowing magical rune.

  Tamara is always a believer in the long game and the ship would spend the majority of the profits they had made to help restore the colony of Hope's Reach in exchange for shares of its future. The colonists knew that Jinx had saved them from Ilinar, and cured them of a plague that infested them. Prepared to swear their loyalty to her, they were stopped only by her insistence she wanted no such title. Lords, ladies, and empresses had no honor. She was a thief, nothing more. The title Queen of Thieves was born.

  The Centauri Bliss is capable of jumping through systems without the need of Runestones, due to the acquisition of a runic sphere, and the crew decided to put their considerable talents to good use. Justice was a thing reserved only for the wealthy on the Rim, and the Centauri Bliss would achieve it for as many less-fortunate souls as they could.

  Their first target was to steal the yacht of the notorious slaver, Damian Sinclair. Sinclair was not a man to forgive insults easily and seeking revenge used his vast fortune to hire mercenaries, declaring that the crew of the Centauri Bliss must turn themselves over to him or the colony of Hope's Reach would pay for their crimes.

  They decided to rob Sinclair of his powerbase and free the innocents he had tormented. This could be done by staging a slave revolt upon his floating marketplace, The Block.

  Things did not go to plan. Jinx lost control of the runic sphere, and when Tamara tried to help her regain control the sphere locked upon the strongest desire in their combined minds—Tamara's desire to go after the archive of her ancestor, Tourmaline.

  The archive had been lost for over a thousand years, hidden deep on the other side of the Divide. The Centauri Bliss along with The Block crashed onto the jungle world.

  Captured while scouting the planet, Tamara was tortured so badly that her death seemed imminent. A fellow prisoner named Vess declared that she knew the location of the archive, and that it alone was capable of saving Tamara. Quinn decided to trust Vess.

  According to everything Tamara knew of the Tourmaline, it was a collection of knowledge named after its founder—thousands of years of wisdom and personalities handed down from her ancestors, all powerful and capable women, and absorbing it—and them—would make Tamara far more than she was now. That turned out to be something of a lie. The millennia of experience was there, but control didn't go to the most recent personality of the line—but rather to the original member, Tourmaline herself.

  Tamara is refined, whereas Tourmaline is crass and fond of her short-term pleasures instead of the long-term gain. As inheritor of Tamara's memories, Tourmaline also claimed to love Quinn and the rest of the Centauri, declaring herself a member of the family.

  They would ultimately agree, but only on the terms that Tamara not be lost. The two now share a single body, switching back and forth between them. Vess, who reveals herself as a shape-shifting dragon, joined the family also as Tourmaline's long-time protector.

  Magic had long been disrupted on the planet due to the efforts of an Unshackled to tame a source of wild magic. Jinx was able to use Order magic to restore balance to the world, freeing Vess's people and earning Jinx a second glowing rune, this one upon a thigh.

  With Tourmaline's knowledge of this side of the Divide they set off to explore and found they weren't the first to come this way. One of the many contenders for the throne, calling herself the Empress Joline, had a runic sphere of her own and she had fallen into the hands of the Unshackled Kalisa.

  The crew found that instead of a united Imperium on this side of the Divide, space was divided amongst countless warring clans. The most powerful of these often formed around one of the Unshackled, becoming warped and twisted by the magic of these powerful mages. The crew of the Centauri Bliss decided to be a clan too, the Clan of Thieves, named out of respect for the mage Jinx.

  Mara was captured attempting to infiltrate Kal
isa's holdings. Where subterfuge had failed, the crew tried diplomacy. They found the Unshackled was willing to make a deal—if Mara could win a duel against her apprentice she could go free. Jinx channeled the power of her evolution rune, using it to mingle with the power of Mara's genetic alterations to awaken magic in the spy. Utilizing that magic, Mara was able to wield Ilinar's blade and, consumed by wrath, kill Kalisa's apprentice.

  Kalisa proved true to her word, and more. The magical runes, marks upon the skin, are a sign of respect and power amongst the Unshackled. That Jinx already had two was noteworthy, although she had little idea how to use that power. Kalisa had her own motives, and was willing to accept Jinx as her new apprentice and help her to hone her abilities, as well as release Joline to them, all in exchange for accompanying them on their journey back to the other side of the Divide.

  When the Centauri Bliss returned they found Hope's Reach once again being invaded, Damian Sinclair true to his word as he attempted to enslave the populace.

  Quinn had to face his own demons, meeting with the ruthless and predatory pirate admiral called Ice, once his best friend and lover to him and Kat. Ice's fleet could save Hope's Reach, but she didn't want payment in coin, she wanted to become a part of their family.

  Taki had always hated Ice, but even she was forced to eventually agree that the pirate had something to offer, although she was unwilling to let her live with them on the ship. Ice would instead become the Admiral of Hope's Reach, putting her skills in command to good use.

  They freed the colony, but they were keenly aware that their respite was brief. The clans were coming from beyond the Divide, and while disorganized and fractious, they were armed with technology more powerful than the Imperium possessed.

  Empress Joline was respected by the Imperium Navy, and was the most likely claimant to unite the Imperium once again under one rule and face the coming storm.

  The crew of the Centauri Bliss made the decision to escort her back to the Core and to aid her in that struggle. To steal for her a crown.

  It was a really bad idea.

  Those seeking the crown hated competition and all saw Jinx as a contender.

  Tourmaline wiped out the first of these would-be Emperors and, finally mastering her powers, Jinx later killed another in the Grand Arena winning the title of Champion. There were some aliens too. Destroying a mothership later brought them the cautious gratitude of Rena Vartan, greatest crime lord left in the Core.

  When it finally came time to put Jolene on the throne, it turned out she had ulterior motives all along and she released the Glittering Sands, a powerful artificial intelligence nanite swarm. They took over her body and her mind. On the plus side they also let the crew of the Centauri Bliss get paid.

  Making contact with Mara's family, they formed an alliance to take on the Sands. Jinx enchanted their whole armory, including nuclear bombs, and a strike was planned on Imperius, homeworld of the Imperium.

  When they found the Sands it was still in the form of Jolene, but now calling herself Sand, and she wanted to talk, not fight. The Emperor had made her into a weapon, but she wanted to be something else, to try a chance at a new life, and she offered a powerful bribe for helping her to escape. She'd rebuilt Kathryn Jade, Quinn's deceased wife, from a brain scan. Not quite the original, this version of Kathryn was filled with combat implants and loaded with magical potential, and would play host to both Sand and Kat.

  Quinn is nothing if not loyal to family, and he agreed. In a daring escape they left Imperius behind them despite Mara's family having found a way to block the runic sphere.

  A Triumverate finally restored order, and their first order of business was a new most-wanted list. This was revealed to be headed by Sand, a.k.a. Kathryn Jade, with Jinx getting a respectable number two.

  Quinn got fifth and he's happy to grumble about it.

  Jinx has declared they now have one goal. Steal technology, steal power, become the storm they've been fearing.

  They quickly secured new supplies of mana, but when seeking space stations to defend them found themselves transported to another universe, one where the Divide had never been formed and the Imperium and the clans waged an endless war. After a confrontation with the Unshackled Mahara they ultimately reached an agreement to return to their universe with her.

  Once back home they took the first steps to securing Arkstone, working to build a criminal empire that would cross both clan and Imperium space. Soon, however, word reached them that Mahara was in pursuit of an ancient power, one the Emperor had originally used to form the Divide in an effort to completely exterminate the users of Order magic. With the assistance of Mara's family the Centauri Bliss gave chase and soon found a world filled with magical power and defended by the Legion, a massive navy the Emperor had left long ago to keep anyone from ever using the world again. They also found themselves surprised when the Imperium also showed up, and soon a massive three-way battle occurred between Imperium, Legion, and the clans.

  Making their way down to the surface the family found themselves separated as Quinn was given visions of a dark future. He was also given access to the power of the world. Jinx was dying, having fought the version of herself from the other universe, and he used his newfound abilities to create a bridge between them healing them both. This had unexpected consequences, the child that Jinx bore being transferred to her duplicate and the duplicate losing the runes she bore, instead giving Jinx two more. It also did the impossible, giving Quinn a rune of Order to go with the rune of Chaos he already wore. The combination causes him incredible pain and were it not for Jinx reinforcing the order of his pattern it would already be fatal.

  The Triumverate now in charge of the Imperium pursues weapon projects prepared by the Emperor, enslaving whole species to turn them into living weapons. Meanwhile the Divide has fallen and across the whole of the Rim the clans now swarm. The first great battle of the war has been fought, and future ones promise to be more terrible than any could have imagined. One ship, one family stands between these great forces, forged of the best of them both.

  Our story resumes ...

  1

  "This is a terrible idea," Dela said.

  They were dressed to blend in with the clans. Quinn was wearing armor with a set of gloves covering the two runes upon his hands. Dela for her part hadn't been able to resist playing dress-up. Barbarian bikinis really shouldn't be a thing, but she was trying to work it. They each had a pair of energy pistols, neither of which had been taken from them despite them being surrounded by valuables.

  The museum of Farella was arguably the greatest collection of artifacts and cultural relics in clan space. The facility wasn't nearly as grand as the great museums found in the Core in Imperium space, but what it lacked in ornateness it made up for in sheer size. The complex was sprawling and, unlike the museums Quinn was used to, had no barricades keeping one from touching anything, or even well-dressed security watching the visitor's every move.

  "You're not wanted here. I'm not wanted here. If you were going to complain, you could have done it before making an outfit," Quinn said.

  "I've had the outfit made for weeks. Jinx gets to be a mostly naked super-heroine, Mara the skintight super-spy outfits, Kara has a heavily armored bikini," Dara said, grumbling a bit as they walked through rows of artifacts.

  "You got a snazzy hat," Quinn reminded her.

  Dara shot Quinn a wry look and snorted. "I do, and it is an amazing hat, but it doesn't have variety, you know? I can do better." She stopped. "We've got something here."

  They were in the hall of the unknowns. Artifacts from worlds with no known species to match them and mysteries of space long forgotten. There were only a few clan folk, all heavily armed, straggling through the exhibits.

  Quinn saw where Dela was looking. The artifacts in question appeared almost like the shells of snails, scalloped folds swirling inward and made of some sort of opalescent metal.

  "You're sure? These don't look like anything o
f the Ido stuff we've seen," Quinn said.

  The Ido were the creators of the artifact that had given humanity their magical abilities, as well as responsible for creating the Divide.

  "And that is why you asked me along," Dela said, crouching down to study them.

  It was true, Quinn had seen some Ido ruins, but he hadn't seen them with Dela's trained eye. Or Dela's improved eyes, which were now enhanced by all the sensory upgrades that Kalisa had given her.

  Quinn got a bit closer and quietly said, "I hope you aren't going to tell me we need to steal all of this."

  The hall displays were grouped together by species, and miscellaneous artifacts from this section loomed far into the distance.

  "I don't think so. We're not starting our own museum—although if you want to I am so in. Let's walk. Use that magic of yours and see what looks interesting, and I'll do the same," Dela said.

  Quinn didn't like that. He had just been getting the hang of his magic before he gained the new Order rune. It wasn't just that his power was amplified now, it was almost like he had two distinct powers. The Chaos side of his abilities allowed him access to the might-have-beens, the different worlds. The Order side he was still coming to terms with, but so far it seemed almost like a navigational console in his head. He'd always had a good sense of direction. Since getting the new rune he had a perfect one.