Aurum: The Golden Planet Read online

  CHAPTER 6

  K’Sati tossed another forkful of straw into stall number fourteen, and spread it across the floor, stomping down the vegetation to make sure there was plenty of padding to cushion the feet of the occupant. Bits of straw and dust tickled her nose; she sneezed several times in succession. Behind her, the number fourteen traggah, Neatfoot, snorted a response, and pushed her big head over the half-door leading from the paddock.

  “No laughing, you,” K’Sati reached up rubbed the animal’s long striped nose. She drew back the bolt and opened the half-door giving the large animal access to her stall. “In you go.”

  Seeing her favorite charge dig into her grain bin so eagerly warmed K’Sati’s heart. After losing her qualifying heat in the Gold Fest prelims yesterday, Neatfoot had sulked; even refused her dinner last night. As the traggah chomped the special blend of grains K’Sati fed to all the Arkady Stables racing stock, she stroked the animal’s wide warm side.

  “I am glad you have your appetite back.”

  The traggah pulled her head out of the feed bin and gazed at her with expectant eyes. The question was unspoken, but K’Sati didn’t need to use her empathetic abilities to understand the question.

  “No, dearest. No racing for you today.”

  The traggah sighed deeply, and returned to her breakfast.

  K’Sati kept her thoughts well shielded until after she left the stall and put the pitchfork back in its proper place in the tack room. No point in getting Neatfoot upset again, but the traggah had lost her last race for the Arkady Racing Stables. She wouldn’t run again until released back into the wild after the end of the festival.

  “Where were you last night?”

  She jumped. Wayne must have been hiding behind the tack room door, waiting for her. Her stomach flipped uncomfortably. Only a few more weeks. Once the festival ended, all the Arkady people would leave and he’d go with them.

  “You surprised me.”

  “I missed you.” Wayne’s gloved paw slid down her bare arm.

  She stiffened to his touch, but said nothing. He was big, even by Terran standards, and accustomed to taking whatever he wanted from any of the stable girls. Most were half-breeds, like her, who straddled two cultures without being accepted by either. After he tired of a particular girl, he’d find a reason to fire them. In spite of her efforts not to attract his attention, his eye had settled on her anyway.

  His grip around her wrist tightened. “Is Golden Boy running today?” He liked that she bruised easily. She did not welcome his touch, not anymore, but could not seem to stop it. Any resistance on her part only made things worse. It excited him. Aroused him. Only her meekness, her absolute acquiescence seemed to pacify him. Lately, she found doing as he wanted ever more difficult.

  “Not today.” She kept her tone even. All the Arkady Mining executives were quite taken with Golden Boy, who was faster and had the greatest desire to win of any traggah she’d ever known. When Wayne discovered her affinity for the traggahs and realized she could pick which traggahs would be most likely to win on any given day, he brought her to the attention of the Terran training master, Ruben. Ruben made her an assistant trainer and depended on her intuitive abilities to improve the care and training regimen for the traggahs. It took a while to convince him, but now even Ruben agreed that Golden Boy was the closest thing to a sure winner; the first the Arkady Racing Team had seen in decades.

  Wayne also used her knowledge of the traggahs to bet on the races. By company rules, gambling by employees was not allowed, but Wayne told her several of the Arkady Mining executive had given him money to place wagers for them on Golden Boy winning the Final.

  “Why not?” An edge of warning crept into his tone. The grip on her wrist grew painful.

  “I am taking him to the farrier. That hoof needs to be looked at.”

  “Ya said that yesterday.”

  Tears of pain pooled in her eyes and he let her go. She turned her back to him but refused to rub her throbbing wrist. Instead, she selected the green bridle for number 19, and the brown for number 12.

  “Ya told me 14 would win her heat yesterday. The beastie didn’t even place in the top five. Mr. Duprees is very disappointed, and so am I.”

  Even after all these years of racing, the Terrans did not understand the traggahs drive to win. If they did, they would know Neatfoot had run her best race yesterday. “They tell me are ready to run, and in their hearts, I know they mean to win.” She eased her way toward the door.

  “I noticed ya fed her real good this morning.”

  The menace in his voice made the hair along her arms stand up. “Until they are released back into the wild at the end of the festival, they all get fed the same.”

  “Yeah, but she won’t be in Final. No point in wasting expensive feed on a loser.”

  She stared at him in disbelief. He had to be joking. There was so much about these Terrans she still didn’t understand. “No traggah wins every race.”

  “The company doesn’t care about every race, they care about the final.” He leaned closer and whispered, “I asked you where you were last night.”

  She clutched the bridles to her chest. He fairly radiated heat. He was starting to scare her. Last week, someone had sliced up her work boots. Wayne claimed innocence, but he wore that big knife sheathed at his belt, and she could think of no one else who would have done such a thing.

  She stopped sleeping in her quarters to avoid him. He had not been around at all yesterday, so it had been several days since he’d lain with her. She could not evade him forever, but now that the daily racing had started, Ruben had kept her much busier than usual, which was good. Wayne would not dare go against the training master. “Ruben told me to keep an eye on Golden Boy. I fell asleep in his stall.”

  He grabbed her by one horn and shook it playfully, even though she repeatedly asked him not to. “So why isn’t he running today?”

  “I do not decide when he runs. He will run when Ruben decides he is ready.” The Arkady stable had seven other traggahs competing. Silverbeard and Stripe would both run today. This year, Arkady’s fleet of traggahs looked like the strongest herd they ever trained. Neatfoot’s unexpected early loss made everyone jumpy. The corporation expected to sweep the top four spots. Ruben wanted to hold off running the favorite until the final heat. That way they would know just how fast he needed to run to make the final without ruining the odds.

  Wayne clamped his heavy paw down on her already bruised shoulder. She fought the feeling of suffocation she endured every time he came near her. Could he see not he was smothering her? She appreciated how difficult it must be for the young traggahs when they were brought into the stables after living free on the broad plains of the steppes. Even her old life at the temple had seemed less cloying than this Terran.

  He pulled her close and put her hand on his erection. “I told you, I missed you.”

  Perhaps this was how all earthmen acted. He seemed oblivious to her reluctance. “I must go. We have two races to prepare for today.”

  He wrapped his hand around her neck, and her pulse protested as his grip tightened. “No more losers, understand? They don’t win, they don’t eat.”

  She nodded, terrified he was serious; certain Ruben would never agree.

  His fingers dug into her throat. He pulled her closer, his breath hot in her ear. “Good. Tonight we’ll celebrate the double win. Just you and me.”

  * * *

  Hours later, K’Sati left the track and walked up the hill toward the stables. Behind her, Silverbeard plodded like an olding, his head down, and his ears at an unhappy cant. Even Ruben, the training master had turned his back on them. He refused to listen when she’d tried to explain that Silverbeard had been kicked just before the start, and then thrown off his stride twice by other riders who’d crowded him in the straightaway. She couldn’t understand Ruben’s reaction. Silverbeard had not lost on purpose.

  She tried to assuage Silverbeard’s wounded pride, bu
t the inborn desire to win instilled all traggahs with a fiercely competitive nature. Every traggah lived for the joy of leading their herd across the steppes. Racing with a rider on their backs was almost second nature to them. For two years, they raced these traggahs daily. Daily racing not only fed their need to run, but prevented them from dwelling too much on any one loss. Once they heard the roaring crowds, they fed on the excitement, and became mad with the will to win. Stripe had won his heat with ease. Silverbeard had been the last to cross the finish line in his. For a wild traggah, being last meant being left behind. Being last meant being eaten. To lose was to die.

  She stopped outside his stall and stroked the lathered fur of his neck. She could sense his unhappiness like an itch he couldn’t scratch. Anger, too. “I will brush you down and you will feel better. Soon you will be running free on the steppes with your friends.” She sent him images of the herd racing across the plain, but he shook his head abruptly and pawed at the ground.

  Wayne approached her, his face dark with anger. “What’s he doing here?”

  “I am putting him in his stall.” She slid open the bolt to his stall but he grabbed the traggah’s lead rope out of her hand.

  No ya don’t. He’s lost his stable privileges. That piece of meat cost me a bundle today. The only thing he deserves is a bullet through the brain. Take this one and 14 over to security. Tell Harvey I said to put them both down.”

  Her heart caught in throat. Traggahs were the heart and spirit of the Khirjahni people. To cause harm to any traggah was taboo. “You cannot be serious!”

  The slap came out of nowhere, and nearly knocked her down. Silverbeard whistled and stamped angrily; she held her hand to her glowing hot cheek.

  “Don’t tell me how to run my stable. If those animals can’t win, I’m sure as hell not going to feed them. And I don’t see any point in releasing the losers back into the wild. Taking those two out of the gene pool will make the next generation faster.”

  Silverbeard reared, jerking the rope out of Wayne’s grip, whistling his displeasure. Traggah heads emerged from every stall, each whistling an answer. Wayne stepped back; K’Sati snatched the rope from him.

  “Easy.” She stroked Silverbeard’s neck to calm him. Her face burned where Wayne slapped her. She sent soothing thoughts to all the agitated traggahs.

  Wayne pointed at her as he backed away. “I want it done by sundown.”

  She hustled the still anxious traggah into his stall. “He does not mean it. I will never allow him to harm you, I promise.” She soothed him with a remembered prayer from her childhood. We are herd, my beloved. Though the rahgs may chase us through the forest, and the longteeth hunt us on the plains, I will never leave you. Though the wind and cold surround us, and craggons seek to snatch us from above, I will stand beside you. As brothers and sisters we stand together. You are mine and I am yours. We are herd.

  * * *

  As the shadows lengthened, and the twin suns neared the horizon, K’Sati began to panic. Her appeals to the training masters at each of the six largest racing stables fell on deaf ears. None of them would agree to take the Arkady traggahs. Not one of them offered to help.

  Time was running out. She would need someplace to hide Neatfoot and Silverbeard until she could talk to Ruben. In a flash of inspiration, she remembered the farrier’s paddock. She had to bring Golden Boy over there anyway. Most off-worlders couldn’t tell one traggah from another. Without their numbered bridles, K’Rui’s paddock would be an ideal place to hide the traggahs.

  She gathered up Neatfoot, Silverbeard, and Golden boy and trotted them over to the farrier’s paddock. After removing the bridles from Neatfoot and Silverbeard, she released all three traggahs to join half-dozen others already in the pen.

  She trotted over K’Rhui’s workshop, but couldn’t find him. She called his name, but received no answer. Perhaps he’d been called away to one of the other stables. She didn’t want to leave the traggahs there without telling him. He might ask Wayne about them, or bring them back over to the stable. She remembered K’Ruhi sometimes drank after work with his friend Jason.

  Jason had the dream powder sickness, which affected some Terrans, but the traggahs all liked him, which spoke well for his character. She rounded the barn and found him sitting alone in the last of the fading sunshine outside the storage shed where he occasionally stayed. In one hand, he held a large jar of brown porridge; in the other, a spoon. The heady smell made her want to gag. Jason called the thick slurry, which the Th-Dorrans called makiri, hooch. Made from fermented grains, it was a favorite of dirt-eaters.

  “Well, hullo K’Sati,” he slurred. “What can I do for you?”

  “I’m looking for K’Ruhi. I’ve put Golden Boy and two others in the paddock to get their feet trimmed.” She hesitated to tell him more. “Do you know where he is?”

  He shook his head. “What are you all wound up about? Have another run-in with that boyfriend of yours?” He patted the seat next to him.

  She shook her head. Jason didn’t work for Arkady stables. He claimed to be a horse expert on Terra, but he had nothing to offer in the care and training of traggahs. As far as she knew, the only reason, the Arkady team tolerated him was because K’Ruhi sometimes needed an extra hand and the traggahs all liked him. K’Sati once asked Neatfoot why the traggahs liked Jason so much, but the only answer she ever got was that he smelled good. Probably because he always smelled like makiri.

  “Just tell him to come find me before he does anything.”

  “No worries, pretty girl.”

  “And don’t tell Wayne you saw me.”

  Jason held up a finger in front of his mouth. “Your secret is safe with me.”

  She ran.

  CHAPTER 7

  Renly came downstairs for breakfast the next morning and the Khirjahni concierge handed him two messages. The first, from Ambassador Reinhardt, informed him that His Royal Excellence, King Hakaroah of Khirjah had granted him a brief audience that afternoon. Renly debated cancelling the interview, but decided against it. The Arkady execs hadn’t stipulated he couldn’t meet with the king, only that he couldn’t ask for assistance in finding his brother. His offer of a commission for the royal family was still on the table; he could think of no reason not to go through with the meeting. Renly carefully folded the note and slipped it into his jacket pocket.

  The other message was from the Arkady executive, Edward Duprees, telling him his man, Wayne Strickland would be waiting for him at breakfast. As soon as he walked into the dining room, the bear-like Strickland introduced himself as his personal escort for the day.

  “Hey Renly.” Strickland’s big paw engulfed his. “Wayne Strickman. I’m the Barn Manager for Arkady Racing Stables.”

  Having grown up around polo stables, Renly could not imagine a more unlikely barn manager. Wayne wore his black hair pulled back tight into a braided tail that reached halfway down his back. His broad cheekbones bespoke of past scarring, badly derma braded, but did not detract from the classic profile and strong jaw of the man’s face. A high forehead and piercing eyes gave him an air of keen intelligence unmatched by his speech pattern.

  “Mr. Duprees asked me ta show ya around the festival for the next few days.”

  Yellow gold buttons decorated his ear cartilage in the fashion of many of the ex-pat Terrans he’d seen so far, and more gold flashed on his powerful fingers and a pair of heavy wrist cuffs. Anyone who’d been around horses knew better than to wear jewelry, and the ostentatious display ruffled his sense of propriety. As a goldsmith, he appreciated the value of gold more than most, yet he noticed the Arkady executives seemed hold it in no special regard. He noticed even the smallest Khirjahni coins were of pure gold, but the Khirjahni wore little in the way of personal adornment.

  After a breakfast of seamed grains and fruits in the hotel dining room, Wayne drove him out to the festival site in his lithium-battery-operated Personal Vehicle. Unlike the PVs on Earth, this one seemed to be without heating c
ontrols. Once again, Renly regretted not bringing warmer clothing. He shivered in his light jacket as he surveyed the alien landscape. Not a city or a building in sight. Only low rolling hills covered in some sort of grey-green grass, and a few stretches of open forest populated by wind-sculpted trees.

  Wayne warmed to his role as tour guide, seemingly unbothered by the chill. “This is one of the few roads on the whole planet,” he announced. “Aurum was discovered centuries ago, but until the Arkady Universal Mining Corporation began mining operations sixty years ago, they had no paved roads.”

  He gestured to the featureless landscape. “Doesn’t look like much of a problem.”

  “Do not let the lay of the land fool ya. This area is full of rahgs. They hunt in packs and eat anything that moves.”

  “What’s a rahg?”

  Wayne paused before answering. “They’re like wolves; they hunt in packs. If anything happens to the car, don’t leave the vehicle, and don’t ever, ever leave the road. Too easy to get lost out here. The Khirjahni won’t allow us to put up transmission towers, and the high metal content in the soils and rocks produces subspace magnetic fields, which interfere with satellite transmissions.”

  “Why not just use aerial transport?” They were probably heated. Faster, too.

  “We do, at the mines. But not inside the habitable zone. The risk of being attacked by those damn flying lizards is too great, unless we stick to the coastline. Real territorial, and big enough to damage or bring down about any ship. They go after anything that flies into in their territory. In case ya haven’t noticed, they got no birds on this planet. Craggons won’t tolerate anything in their airspace.”

  He gripped the armrest tighter. “I was told they live in the forbidden zone.”

  “Relax. They don’t come out this far. But just so ya know, the forbidden zone covers most of the interior of this planet. That’s why Arkady set up mining operations are well outside their territory. Workin’ the mines is like living in deep freeze, but at least ya don’t have to worry about craggons or that damned dragon pox. Don’t worry. You’re perfectly safe.”