A bid to rule, p.1
A Bid to Rule, page 1
A BID TO RULE
THE STARS AND GREEN MAGICS
BOOK 3
NOVAE CAELUM
Robot Dinosaur Press
https://robotdinosaurpress.com
Robot Dinosaur Press is a trademark of Chipped Cup Collective.
A Bid to Rule
Copyright © 2023 by Novae Caelum
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, magical, photocopying, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright holder.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, and events portrayed in this work are either products of the author’s or authors’ imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Ebook ISBN 978-1-958696-19-4
Paperback ISBN 978-1-958696-20-0
Cover art and book design by Novae Caelum
Author photo credit Novae Caelum
https://novaecaelum.com
CONTENTS
Author’s Note
1. News
2. Change
3. The Uniform
4. Deflection
5. Okay in There
6. Count Me In
7. Names
8. The Performance
9. The Corridor
10. The Pastry Chef
11. The Kitchens
12. The Encounter
13. The Sanctum
14. Enough
15. These Games
16. Absolute Control
17. Public Face
18. Happy
19. The Question
20. The First Magicker
21. A Bid to Rule
22. Ten Days
23. Tavven
24. Trust
25. Vulnerable
26. Cloak and Dagger
27. The Back Corridors
28. Riveredge
29. Evening Air
30. The Safe House
31. Release
32. Waking Up
33. Shadow Brother
34. The Crash Site
35. The Risk
36. Truth
37. The Long Term
38. What I Can
39. Calculation
40. Control
41. Privacy
42. The Summons
43. A Friendly Chat
44. Samples
45. The Search
46. Layers
47. The Approach
48. Competence
49. The Stranger
50. Dynastic Citizen
51. The Argument
52. Reasonable Questions
53. Go Back
54. A Walk Not His Own
55. Proof
56. Administrative Mode
57. The Ninth Unit
58. Tired
59. The Door
60. The Request
61. Looking for Answers
62. Eyras
63. The Study
64. Boundaries
65. No Visible Fear
66. Ready
67. A Second Bid
68. The Challenge
69. In Deep
70. The Meeting
71. Convincing
72. Codes
73. Unconscious Lies
74. The Future
75. The Makeover
76. Lavender Hall
77. The Buyer
78. Tension
79. Damage
80. Down
81. The Study
82. Contempt
83. Evening
84. The Pattern
85. Investigations
86. Identical
87. Letting Go
88. Frayed Nerves
89. All the Pieces
90. Drawn Pistols
91. Arrest Me
92. The Confession
93. Adapting in the Moment
94. The Housing Block
95. Live
96. Back
97. The Seritarchus
98. Flawless
99. The North Hall at Ten
100. The Usurper
101. Stricken
102. Cheering
103. Promises
104. Butterflies Drifting on the Wind
The Cast
The Factions
About the Author
Also by Novae Caelum
Also from Robot Dinosaur Press
AUTHOR’S NOTE
A Bid to Rule was originally published as The Seritarchus, a prequel serial to The Stars and Green Magics series, covering episodes 1-107, the complete book. While it was first intended to be a standalone (and, quite honestly, less than fifty pages), it took on a glorious life of its own. This book changed the course of the main series in many ways, deepening the characters, interweaving new plotlines, and showing me the story I was building toward all along.
So, this book has been renamed A Bid to Rule, been given a proper place within the series (Book 3!), and as of this moment is the longest book in the series. It’s also a spy novel inside a court intrigue thriller inside a family saga, and I’m deliciously happy with that.
So don’t skip this book—so much in here is woven into the story moving forward! I deeply hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it, and that Homaj, Iata, Zhang, and Jalava will find a happy place in your heart, too.
As far as changes, I made some moderate editing changes from the original serial version, most notably that one of the rival families’ last names is now Delor. I combined some chapters, too, and there are now 104 chapters, not 107. I also added my beloved header quotes! These are all new and were not in the original serial.
This book features several characters who use gender neutral pronouns (they/them/their, fae/faer/faerself, e/em/eir, or other neopronouns).
This book, barring the occasional and inspired burst of strong language, is PG-13, with a note that it deals with grief, parental death, and mistreatment among family members.
For detailed content notes, please see:
https://novaecaelum.com/content-notes
1
NEWS
The death of a ruler is a cataclysmic event in the life of a Truthspoken. But also, it’s only to be expected.
ANATHARIE RHIALDEN, SERITARCHUS VIII AS QUOTED IN THE CHANGE DIALOGUES
Homaj Rhialden, second Truthspoken heir to the interstellar Kingdom of Valoris, sat rigid in a wingback chair in his sitting room. He stared down at the single square of quality card stock in his hands. Creamy paper, the writing cramped and hurried. There was a smudge of dirt near the edge. Or was it possibly blood?
His hands, despite all his efforts, were shaking.
He looked up at the messenger, a young woman who’d introduced herself as Sergeant Vi Zhang of the Palace Guard, she and her pronouns. She wore a maroon and silver uniform, dark bobbed hair framing a heart-shaped face. She couldn’t have been much older than he was, maybe mid-twenties at most. She stood stiffly at attention, waiting for him to speak. To react. Anything.
“This—” He cleared his throat. “This is from Commander Tavven’s own hand?”
“From the scene, Ser Truthspoken, it was handed off to me at the palace gates. The commander is on their way back to the palace now, and I’m to relay it’s their first priority to make sure the palace is secure and you are safe.”
Homaj stood, unable to sit still with the storm welling up inside him. “Yes. Fine. I’ll go meet them.”
He couldn’t stay here. Not with the walls too solid, not knowing that just down the hall sat his parents’ apartment, which they’d never inhabit again.
“Ser?” the guard said, startled into a less formal address. “Ser, you must stay here. I’m to stay with you, in your quarters. The Seritarchus, your father—”
“Is dead,” Homaj said softly.
His hands steadied by his sides, but his insides roiled, and he couldn’t gather his thoughts enough to soothe them.
It was what the note had said. The Seritarchus and the Seritarchus Consort were dead, assassinated in an explosion in the city during a tour of one of the city’s hospitals. A hospital.
And his older sibling, the Truthspoken Heir, wasn’t in the palace, and wasn’t responding to calls.
And him? Was he safe here, in his sitting room, in the royal residence of Palace Rhialden? Was he, a Truthspoken, ever safe?
He needed focus, a purpose, a direction at which to aim.
Zhang shifted. “Ser—Truthspoken—please stay in your quarters. We have two guards at the doors, and myself, and more on the way. I was the fastest runner. They’ll be here shortly.”
She was adamant, but not losing her cool. Homaj examined the rank pins on her collar. Yes, sergeant.
“Sergeant Zhang. What is your assessment of my immediate situation?”
She tilted her head, calculating. “Two prime targets down, one missing. The Truthspoken Heir was last seen in a meeting with Lord Xavi Birka, with whom they’re known to have casual intimacies. We’ve been unable to contact Lord Birka as well. Or the Heir’s bloodservant, who is also missing. The palace is on lockdown. We are searching and strengthening the perimeters around both the palace and the residence wing. You—you are exactly where you need to be. I advise you to go into your bedroom, which has no windows. We will guard all doors, including the doors into the back passages. You, at least, will absolutely be safe.”
She sounded like she knew what she was talking about, but Homaj read uncertainty in her voice. His Truthspoken training in reading people and all their subtle cues left little room for lies.
Not that he thought she was lying to him. Only that she wasn’t so sure of events herself.
Because it was logical, if you assassinate the ruler, and possibly the Heir, to take out the only other Truthspoken in existence as well. Which would be him.
“You don’t trust the other guards?” he asked.
Could he trust her? If there was even a chance that any of the Palace Guard had a hand in all of this, could he afford to?
She narrowed her eyes, her shoulders shifting uncomfortably in her uniform jacket. “They are the Guard. We are the Guard. We’ll protect you.”
She also didn’t believe that.
Zhang looked down and away before bracing herself and meeting his eyes. She knew he’d seen through that statement, too.
Was this a game, something she was trying to tell him but couldn’t say outright?
No, she just couldn’t bring herself to say that it might have been someone in the Guard who’d betrayed his family.
Homaj drew in a long breath.
He had to Change. He was dressed, now, in his own court finery—an embroidered blue silk blouse, flowing white trousers. His long black hair was braided in an elaborate, asymmetrical pile, set with tiny diamond and nova heart pins. All flow when he needed…command? He didn’t know if he was in command, and he couldn’t think it. Not yet. His sibling hadn’t been contacted, might be alive, might be fine. Had to be fine.
Adeius. Had to be fine.
His hands were trembling again, and he squeezed his palms tight. What could he do? Who could he be that would most effectively shield him from any attack and allow him to direct the outcome of events? Let him know what the hell was going on?
He started for his bedroom, and Zhang followed.
2
CHANGE
I’m good at Change. I like Change. It’s a core part of who I am.
HOMAJ RHIALDEN, SERITARCHUS IX IN A PRIVATE LETTER, NEVER SENT; AS QUOTED IN THE CHANGE DIALOGUES
On the way to the bedroom, they passed through Homaj’s prep room, with the closet door open and cosmetics scattered across two separate vanity tables. Then into his bedroom, which didn’t feel nearly as safe as it should.
Homaj glanced through the open doorway to his bloodservant’s bedroom, adjoining his. “Where’s Iata?”
He vaguely knew that his bloodservant, Iata, had gone to take care of the things he usually took care of in managing Homaj’s daily life in the palace, but Homaj wasn’t in the habit of tracking his bloodservant’s daily tasks. Iata managed his life; he didn’t feel the need to manage Iata’s.
He scowled. Iata should be here right now. Iata should be here when he needed him.
Zhang raised her ring comm and spoke a few quick words in code, wrapped around Iata’s name. Homaj quickly translated: Verify Iata’s whereabouts.
Zhang listened as the reply came into her earpiece, and it irked Homaj that he couldn’t hear that, too.
“Iata’s in the kitchen,” she said. “Verified.”
“Send him up.” He wanted his bloodservant now, but the kitchens were in the basement, two floors below where he was standing and under the administrative part of the palace, not the residence. It would be at least ten minutes before Iata made it back. He needed to start his Change, now.
Homaj shut the door to his bedroom, locked it, and moved toward the large, four-poster bed.
“Watch me, Zhang. I will be vulnerable in the trance.”
“Ser,” she said, startled. “Please wait until the reinforcements have arrived.”
“Do you think there’s time for that? I don’t. This will be a quick Change only. But I must start it now.”
He lay down, his thoughts already racing ahead to what he would Change. His facial features, surely. His skin pigmentation. Not his height or overall body shape—there wasn’t time for that sort of structural Change. But he’d shift some of the musculature in his legs so his walk would be different. He’d—Adeius, he hated beards, but it would be useful now.
With one last glance at Zhang, who had her pistol out and was facing the door, he sank back into the soft mattress and closed his eyes.
The Change trance came easily to him, and he slipped just below the level of consciousness, his body carrying out the Changes his mind had assigned.
He knew it was only minutes later when he opened his eyes again. The bones of his face ached, his skin feeling taut and prickly. He hadn’t had the concentration to block all the pain and discomfort of the Change, especially a quick Change, but he sucked in a breath and diverted his concentration there now, only breathing out again as the discomfort eased.
Zhang looked back, did a double take. “Oh.”
Homaj levered himself out of bed, hands already combing through his long hair, gathering it into a bun. He hadn’t changed the length or texture, but he had changed the color from black to a dark gold. He stepped into Iata’s room, which held a wall mirror—his own was in his prep room, and he didn’t want to leave the bedroom just yet.
His features were blockier, brow thick, nose longer. He had a small gap between his front teeth now. His face was paler than his usual tan skin, scattered with freckles. His eyes were wider, though he hadn’t changed the color, which was brown. The color mattered far less than reshuffling his features.
His enemies, whoever they were, would be expecting him to Change. It was what Truthspoken did. It was how Truthspoken ruled. They might not be expecting him to Change this fast, though—Truthspoken rarely accomplished a Change in under an hour. But then, he’d always been a prodigy of the one thing he was supposed to be good at.
Homaj finished tying up his hair, smoothed down thick brows and the golden-brown beard.
He was shaky, he needed to eat and replenish his body’s reserves after expending so much in a fast Change. He pulled open a drawer in the stand beside his bed, grabbed an energy bar, and tore open the wrapper. He’d have privacy in his own bedroom and prep room, but when he went beyond it, he would be this new person. And this new person would definitely not know how to Change.
“Is it safe to go to the prep room?” he asked. The door would have locked behind them as they’d entered the suite, and it was nearly as secure as his bedroom. But the walls of his bedroom felt more of a fortress just now, one he was suddenly reluctant to leave.
Homaj cleared his throat. He hadn’t Changed his voice yet—that was a more delicate Change, but he moved it down in pitch. Burred the edges. “Please, check the prep room.” That was better.
