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lost his beloved father to a violent death the boy couldn’t understand.
    It had taken a long time to recover, but eventually, several years later, Roca had remarried, this time choosing for herself. Darr Hammerjackson had been handsome and charming, everything a lonely widow could want. Roca swore to love him forever, certain she and Kurj had found an end to the loneliness.
    The first time Darr had hit her, she hadn’t believed he meant it. She learned the hard way how wrong she had been. Roca flinched at the memory, the flash of his hand, his incomprehensible fury. The impact of his rage on her mind had been even more debilitating than the blows. But Ruby Dynasty heirs didn’t divorce. No public disgraces were allowed; they kept their private hells out of sight. In private, she had done everything she could to stop the violence, and when nothing worked, she had tried for over a year to accommodate the nightmare.
    Then he had beaten Kurj.
    That night, Roca had taken her nine-year-old son and left Darr. Nothing swayed her: no excuses, no promises, no threats. No one— no one —hit her son. She began legal proceedings the next day. In the years after, as she had recovered her sense of self-worth, she came to realize she should have protected herself with the same ferocity she protected her child, regardless of what five millennia of tradition dictated about the behavior of Ruby heirs.
    Kurj had never revealed what Darr said to him that day, when the two of them fought. But it had changed her son. And that was only the beginning. As a Jag pilot, he had lived far too many horrors in the constant, undeclared shadow war between the Skolian Imperialate and the Eubian Traders. Over the years it had turned him into a hardened stranger. Now he was a phenomenon, the towering warrior prince respected by his officers, admired by women, and feared by many. But beneath his square-jawed, golden exterior, his rage festered, threatening to explode. In that, he had become like Darr, with an outward self-possession that hid his seething anger.
    Roca exhaled. Dwelling on the past would help nothing. This looming threat of all-out war was insanity. Kurj was wrong if he believed they could win. He knew what they risked—and he welcomed that specter. If her son couldn’t defeat his inner demons, he would expend his fury leading two empires into a star-spanning conflict that would tear them apart.

2
The Dalvador Bard
    R oca slept, ate, and spent her waking hours in the copilot’s seat. There was nowhere else to go except for the minuscule head. She had little room to exercise, only enough to flex and stretch her cramped muscles.
    Neither she nor the captain talked much. The woman grunted when Roca asked her name. It didn’t surprise Roca; the less all of them involved with this illegal takeoff knew about one another, the less likely anyone could implicate anyone else.
    Eventually Roca said, “Director Vammond said you were the only pilot willing to take off during the storm. I thank you for your courage.”
    “My courage?” The captain laughed. “Where’d you learn to talk like that?”
    “Like what?”
    She copied Roca’s accent. “So disdainfully sophisticated.” In her normal voice, she added, “Maybe sophisticated is the wrong word. You don’t sound like the rich twitches on Capsize.”
    Roca stiffened. “I don’t know Capsize.”
    “That port.” The captain gave an irreverent grin. “You’d have to capsize before you’d be willing to put in there.”
    “It does seem antiquated.”
    “Antiquated. Gods. You talk like a dictionary.”
    Roca’s voice cooled. “Do you always ridicule your passengers?”
    “Aren’t we touchy?” The other woman shook her head. “You have it all: wealth, privilege, status, family. But it’s not enough, is it? No, you need a lover on the side. It sickens me.” She slanted Roca a look. “How much did that body cost you?”
    “I beg your pardon?”
    “Oh, come on. No normal person