Dragon Lords 4-Warrior Prince

Dragon Lords:
THE WARRIOR PRINCE

By

Michelle M. Pillow

© copyright January 2005, Michelle M. Pillow
Cover art by Eliza Black, © copyright January 2005
ISBN 1-58608-577-8
New Concepts Publishing
Lake Park, GA 31636
www.newconceptspublishing.com

This is a work of fiction. All characters, events, and places are of the author’s imagination and not to be confused with fact. Any resemblance to living persons or events is merely coincidence.

Dedication:
To Dan, My Warrior Knight in Colorful Armor

Chapter One

Pia Korbin gasped, sputtering as she jerked back from the blood spraying across her scarred hands. The knife slipped from her fingers to land on top of the man bleeding to death beneath her. Gradually, her drunken mind sobered. His pants were around his ankles, the evidence of his intent lowering as the artery next to his groin bled out onto the snowy black ground.

"You ... ugly ... bitch," the man growled at her, his throat gurgling in pain, his eyes glaring with hatred. Even as she stood above him, she smelled the foulness of his breath. He weakly reached his hand to his bleeding thigh, but then let it fall lifelessly to the side. Those words were the last he ever said.

Pia took a deep breath, looking desperately around from behind the industrial dumpster to the end of the alleyway to make sure no one saw her. Swallowing nervously, she reached down to search the man’s pockets, not bothering to check him for a pulse. She knew he was dead. Pulling out an ID card, she froze. It was as she feared. He was the mayor’s son.

Behind her, fire burst from the tops of industrial smokestacks. The city of smog, metal and stone was no place to trifle in. She coughed. Even the snow here was as black as death.

Looking down, she knew she’d really done it this time. They wouldn’t care that the man had attacked her, thinking to have a bit of morbid sport. On a planet like Rayvic, the mayor’s son had every right to take whatever he wanted--including an unwilling woman. They ran their city like the medical mafia ran its mob. One look at her ugly face and they’d kill her--slow and painful like.

Grabbing her knife, she wiped the bloody blade on the man’s shirt, grabbed a wad of cash from his pockets, and buried the body beneath a pile of refuse. Taking a deep breath and one last look around, she took off down the alleyway. Daylight would be hitting the cold planet soon. Then all the goons in the city would be looking for her. She had to get out of there.

Pia sprinted, taking the back streets she’d memorized like the back of her hand. She climbed down to an old, abandoned space dock nestled on the grey shores of the lapping black river. Going to a pile of rubble, she uncovered the personal transport that would take her off the desolate black planet of ice.

* * * *

Two weeks later...

The doctors of Galaxy Brides Corporation eyed the patient before them. The pristine white of their walls matched the white of their jackets and even the white of one doctor’s beard. As they searched, they couldn’t see the woman’s face beneath the heavy fold of her hooded cape, but they’d seen her hand--a wrinkly, scarred mess of variegated flesh.

"Miss Korbin," one of the doctors said delicately. "I’ve brought a specialist to speak to you. Your blood tests have all come out fine. But we need to see your face to see if we’re going to be able to correct it."

Pia lifted her scarred hands. Her hazel eyes were hard as she pulled back the hood. Instantly, she saw the doctors flinch as they took in her face. She refused to show a reaction. It was the same every time--horror, fascination, repulsion, a rush of unasked questions.

One eyelid drooped with a covering of flesh, pulling it down at the corner. The lashes and brow were long since melted away. Her right eye always watered and she dabbed it with a tissue. Part of her hair no longer grew, except in splotchy patches, which she kept cropped short like the rest of her locks. The burns continued down her skull to the left side of her face, burying an ear, over her neck and shoulder, down her arm, to cover over sixty percent of her body. The scars no longer hurt her when she moved and she’d gotten used to their tight feel.

The doctor with the white beard cleared his throat. "Yes, well, Miss Korbin, you’re in luck. The burns haven’t affected the structural ... integrity of your face."

"So you can fix it?" she asked with emotional detachment.

"Yes," the woman doctor answered. Her eyes strayed to the side, trying not to stare at the patient. "But it will be an expensive procedure. With no Medical Alliance insurance ... "

"So long as you agree to sign a contact with Galaxy Brides, it will be covered completely," the bearded doctor said when the lady hesitated. "We have a shipment--forgive me, a load of eager young women just like you going to Qurilixen next week for their Breeding Festival. I can give you a brochure on the planet if you like. I’m told royalty might be there."

"That won’t be necessary." Pia had been over all of her options. The Rayvikians were looking for a scarred woman with her description. Soon every lowlife in the galaxy would be trying to collect the price on her head. No, a scarred woman was too easy to see and remember. It wasn’t like she could just change her hair color and blend into oblivion. She had to change her face and, thanks to the Medical Alliance jacking up every medical service in the galaxy, this deal was the only way she could afford to do it. "I’ll sign right now."

"Wonderful," the doctor said, claiming the company commission for himself. The others looked at him, knowing they were in for a lot of work. "I’ll order some uploads brought down for you so you can learn of the Qurilixen while we perform the surgeries. It might take your mind from the procedure."

"Miss Korbin," the lady doctor said pensively. The bearded man walked to the intercom to call for the contracts. "We want you to understand that, due to the nature and advanced age of your scars, it will be a painful procedure. We won’t be able to put you out all the way for the entire time."

"It’s fine." Her eyes shone forward. "Let’s just do it."

"Very good. I’ll go set up. If we only have two weeks, we need to get started right away." The bearded doctor smiled. He pushed the intercom again. "Dr. Charles, ready room twelve, please."

Pia nodded. She touched the scars she’d grown used to. There was a strange comfort to their familiar pattern. She was almost afraid of what she would look like underneath them.

"We also need a waver from you so we can document the procedure," the woman doctor said, going to get an electronic clipboard from the wall.

"No," Pia said, stopping her. "I evoke the right of privacy. I don’t want anyone knowing I was here. And I don’t want any pictures taken of me before, after, or during the procedure."

"But, think of all the people who will be inspired by your story, Miss Korbin," she insisted.

"Don’t worry, Miss Korbin, if you don’t want pictures there will be no pictures. Our lawyers will even put a privacy clause into your contract if you like. I’m the best in my field, so you have nothing to worry about." The bearded doctor gave the woman doctor a look of displeasure. The compensation for finding brides was great, as there was a shortage of willing women in the galaxy. He didn’t want to scare the prospective bride off. "We’ll have all your scars removed in no time. Soon it will all be a bad dream. You’ll be very pleased, Miss Korbin, I promise."

"All but the gash on my ribcage," Pia said calmly. This doctor knew nothing of bad dreams or the nightmares that could haunt a person even in wake. "Do what you can with the others, but that scar stays."

* * * *

Six weeks later...

Pia stared at the mirror. No matter how much she looked at herself, she didn’t recognize the smooth face or wide hazel eyes that stared back at her. The doctors had worked miracles with her. All her burns were gone, her cheek had been reconstructed, her hair follicles stimulated to grow so she again had a full head of hair. The doctors swore she looked exactly like she would’ve if she hadn’t been burnt.

It was like they scraped off the top layer to reveal what lay beneath. The scars were also gone from her body. Her left breast was made to match the right, both of them lifted and reshaped. She saw muscle definition where before the flesh had been so tight she hadn’t been able to see the form beneath it.

Oh, how it had hurt! It was worse than she could’ve ever imagined. Sometimes her limbs still ached with the memory of it. She’d never complained, not once during those two weeks of surgeries. The doctors had done their job. The Rayvikians would never find her now. How could they? She couldn’t pick her own face out of a crowd. When she imagined herself, she still looked as before. In her dreams she was scarred, running away from a stranger that looked like her.

Pia spent most of the voyage alone, getting check-ups from the robotic doctor on the flight. She couldn’t find common ground with the other women on the ship. They were nice, but they talked of things she knew nothing about--cosmetics, men, marriage. They all seemed fixated with marrying one of the four Princes rumored to be at the festival.

Thinking of the festival, she frowned. She had to find a husband. Because of her extensive work, she was forced to sign an exclusive contract that said she would go on any voyage Galaxy Brides had until she was married--whether it was this one time, or a hundred times. But, in the end, the result was the same, she would be a wife. Until she said ‘I do,’ she was their property to be shifted around. Pia didn’t relish the thought of making more of these trips and she couldn’t risk a delivery possibly taking her to Rayvik or one of their affiliated districts.

Besides, she thought, Qurilixen doesn’t sound so bad.

The planet was inhabited by primitive male types similar to the Viking clans of Medieval Earth. They were classified as a warrior class, though they’d been peaceful for nearly a century--aside from petty territorial skirmishes that broke out every fifteen or so years between a few of the rival houses. They kept to themselves, had a simple religion, favored natural comforts to modern technology, and even prepared their own food.

It would be better than being on some high-tech planet run by dimwits. Pia liked the idea of warriors and combat training. She’d be in her element in such a place. She’d have a better chance of finding herself a job.

Qurilixen suffered from blue radiation and over the generations it had altered the men’s genetics to produce only strong, large, male, warrior heirs. Maybe once in a thousand births was a Qurilixen female born. Since Qurilixen women were so rare, Pia wouldn’t be surrounded by housewives all day, being forced to plan dinner parties.

Well, she thought with an unamused look around her, no women but these and others like them.

Pia was so used to standing off by herself and being rejected that she’d been unwilling to make a move toward friendship with any of the other women. With men, you just had to prove yourself in a fight and they would allow you into their ranks. They treated her just like one of the guys. Women were generally much more fickle.

The spacecraft was outfitted with the best accommodations and services the star system had to offer. Personal droids were assigned to each passenger. There were cooking units in each of their quarters that could materialize almost any culinary desire. Even the doctor Pia had spent all those hours with finishing her treatment had been mechanical.

The women aboard the ship weren’t all bad and a few Pia even liked. They were the only company she’d had in the last month of travel, being as they were quarantined from the ship’s crew to insure nothing unseemly happened.

The brides were being prepared for the Breeding Festival that night on Qurilixen. It was the one night of darkness on the otherwise light planet and considered the only night the men could choose a mate. It was a primitive ceremony, but Pia thought simple was good. She didn’t fancy wearing a large white gown and standing in front of an audience in her new body. She wasn’t comfortable in it yet and even missed the protective, familiar comfort of her old scars.

Pia hated to admit it, but she was nervous. She didn’t know anything about marriage. From what she’d been told, her parents had been happy before her mother died. As to having children, she knew even less.

Gena, one of the women Pia absolutely couldn’t tolerate, laughed. Her voice was abrasive and harsh, as she announced, "Rigan finished her Qurilixen uploads first. It would seem she is most eager to please her new husband."

"Or to be pleased by him," someone added from across the circular room.

Pia rolled her eyes, knowing it wasn’t likely she would be chosen for those reasons. Perhaps there would be a nice blind man in need of a wife--a nice blind man who was sterile and couldn’t have children.

Well, a girl could always dream.

Pia sat still as the beauty droid worked. She’d refused its services for most of the trip. But now, seeing as it was her best option to get married, she let the robot tend to her. Feeling it pull on her overly long blonde locks, Pia frowned. The miles of hair on her head were going to be the first thing to go.