Born of Shadows

"Lay down your weapons!"

  That was easier said than done. He was covered in them. Took him two hours to get all this gear on...

  Only thing that could induce him to take it off fast was a hot naked woman in his bed, clawing at his back. Definitely not one of those here and he had no interest in being defenseless with this much artillery pointed at him.

  A warning blast shot over his head.

  "The next one will be right between your eyes." Targeting lasers let him know exactly what they were aiming for. Honestly it wasn't the one at his forehead that gave him pause as much as the one at his crotch.

  "Put your hands behind your head!"

  Caillen frowned. "If I put my hands behind my head, I can't drop my weapons, people. Someone needs to make up their mind here. What do you want me to do and in what order?"

  "Drop the weapon in your hand, then put your hands behind your head!"

  He did as instructed.

  They moved in closer.

  Yeah, come to Papa, baby. Closer... closer...

  Don't be shy.

  When one of them went to cuff him, Caillen grabbed him and used him as a shield. Three sniper rounds went into the man's chest. Caillen flung the body at the Enforcer coming in at his back. Twisting, he grabbed another man, disarmed him and knocked him flying. His morals on killing drones out the window under this assault, Caillen used his spring loader to pop his fighting knife into his palm and took out five more before the Trisani grabbed him by the neck without touching him and paralyzed him where he stood.

  The Trisani tsked at him. "I almost hate to hand someone with your skills over to the drones."

  "Fuck you."

  The Trisani laughed. "Sorry. In this the only one getting screwed is you."

  Caillen locked gazes with the Trisani. The moment he did, he felt the surge of power that Nero had taught him. It was the only weapon anyone could really use against the Trisani species--unless this guy was as strong as Nero this would work.

  Here's hoping he's not.

  He focused it with everything he had. One second the Trisani had him, the next, Caillen was free and slamming the Enforcers into each other. He shot his cord up the wall and started to leave them in his wake... until he heard something in his ear that gave him pause.

  "There's an unconscious woman here in the street, under some garbage. Not sure if she's with our perp or not. But she is covered up by what appears to be a man's coat."

  Fu-fu-frick.

  They'd found Kasen. If he escaped, they'd take her in and she'd never stand up to their questioning. She was the kind of witness who spilled more guts than a butcher.

  Of all the flying-ass bad luck.

  Caillen sighed as he flicked his wrist to miss the shot and allowed the hook to fall back to the pavement. He let them think they'd done it when the truth burned deep inside him. But for Kasen's discovery, he'd have made it out.

  They cuffed his hands, then carefully disarmed him over the next twenty-eight minutes.

  "Damn, boy," one of the officers said as they continued to find weapons hidden on him. "It's like disarming an assassin. You sure you ain't in the League?"

  He had to force himself not to lash out and escape again. Submission was not in his nature.

  Think of Kasen...

  Yeah, what he was really thinking about her was how badly he wanted to beat her.

  The Enforcer jerked his cuffed hands. "Who's with you?"

  Caillen met the Enforcer's gaze without flinching or hesitating. "No one. I fly alone. Check the logs." Thank the gods he was good at what he did. They wouldn't find a trace of anyone except him.

  "What about the woman?"

  "Nameless vic. I stole her wallet. You check my pocket, you'll find it." He always had a fake ID and wallet for his sisters with aliases.

  Just in case.

  The Enforcer pulled it out, then lifted his arm to speak into the mic in his cuff. "She's innocent. Get her to a hospital."

  "You want me to take a report from her?" the voice asked.

  "No. We have a confession and mugging is the least of what we're taking him in for. Just dump her and go."

  Caillen met the Trisani's frown. The bastard either suspected he was lying or knew it for a fact, but for whatever reason, he kept it to himself.

  End of the day, the Trisani was definitely right about one thing. He was royally screwed and they hadn't even fondled him yet.

  That was bad enough.

  Worse than bad came as they were hauling him toward the transport and they began reading him his charges.

  "... and for smuggling prillion."

  He felt his stomach shrink. Shit.

  His sister's contraband carried a death sentence...

  2

  Three Weeks Later

  How bad would decapitation hurt?

  From the window of his pathetically small, sparse cell that barely accommodated a bunk, sink and toilet, Caillen stared out across the yard teeming with people, at the heavy electronic blade that was being charged and sharpened in preparation for his execution.

  Yeah, that was definitely going to leave a mark.

  Don't worry, Cai. In just a few more measly minutes your problems will be over.

  Forever.

  His neck tingled in expectation of the coming blow, which would end a life that really hadn't been all that great. Strange thing though, bad as it was, he wasn't ready for it to be over. Not by a long shot.

  I could have been something.

  Ah hell, who was he fooling? He was a third-generation smuggler with a gambling problem his family knew nothing about...

  Yeah? So what? He was still the best damned pilot in all the United Systems. There was nothing he couldn't fly and no one he couldn't outmaneuver when he was in a ship.

  He never missed a target. Ever.

  None of that matters now. Not while he was standing toe to toe with death.

  What a way for a warrior to go...

  Forget a last meal, what he really wanted before he checked out was a good lay. One last bang to end all others.

  He laughed evilly under his breath as he remembered the look of dumbfounded shock on the warden's face when they'd asked him for his last request.

  "Any of your daughters horny?"

  That had been answered with a vicious head slam to the wall. Not that he wouldn't have done the same, or more to the point, worse, had someone asked him that about one of his sisters. But...

  He was ever a thorn in the ass of those he hated and that was basically anyone who had any kind of authority.

  Yeah well, that's about to end too.

  He sighed as he stared through the small open window covered in bars, watching the soldiers outside rush around in last-minute prep. There was a part of him terrified about dying. Okay, there was a lot of him terrified about dying. He'd always hoped it would be when he was really old and in his sleep. But practically speaking, the alternative druther would have been in a brutal fight where he took out as many of his enemies with him as he could.

  At least you're not dying alone in the gutter.

  He flinched at a memory he always did his best not to think about. If he lived a thousand years he'd never forget watching his father die alone like he was nothing but trash. And in all the morbid scenarios he'd conjured over the years for his own death never had execution entered his mind.

  Even now he could hear his sister's desperate call. "Cai, I'm in the Garvon sector and running from their Enforcers. Can you help me?"

  Kasen had omitted the fact she was transporting prillion--an antibiotic so potent it was outlawed by every government that took payoffs from the medical communities who feared the dent it would put into their profit margins. But to smugglers like him and his sister, it was pay dirt. One shipment would leave you flush for at least a year.

  And it was a death sentence to carry it through certain systems.

  Garvon happened to be one of them.

  Even if she'd told him when she called what
she had on board, it would have changed nothing. He'd have still taken her place in the noose.

  Altruism sucks.

  Right now he was thinking he should have learned some self-preservation and been about ten minutes late. But at the end of the day, his sisters were his world and even though he might like to pretend otherwise, he wouldn't have been able to live had he let one of them die.

  Even Kasen's crabby ass.

  He checked his chronometer and felt sick again. Thirty more minutes and everything was over.

  Thirty minutes.

  He remembered times in the past when that had seemed like an eternity and now...

  He wished he had the power to stop time. To teleport himself out of here and see his rat-infested dive one more time. To have his sister Shahara tell him he was an idiot.

  Well, at least he wouldn't have to stare at the drab tan walls and that nasty crusted-over toilet anymore.

  Boy, are my creditors going to be pissed. He still owed two years of payments on his ship that had been impounded by the Garvons after his arrest. And face it, he'd dogged the absolute shit out of it and it still had blast marks down both rear stabilizers from his last run-in with the authorities.

  He sighed again.

  His friends and family had tried everything to negotiate a stay of execution. But the Garvon governor had been adamant that they make an example of him.

  "This is to stand as a lesson to any outsider who thinks they can travel through our system and not obey our laws. We might be a small system, but we are big on intolerance."

  Caillen shook his head as the governor reiterated those words he was obviously proud of just a few feet away from his window to the news crews surrounding him. What an effing idiot. Whatever aide was supposed to keep the governor on a leash was failing epically.

  One of the female reporters panned her camera Caillen's way to catch a shot of his reaction to the governor's speech while he watched from his cell.

  Caillen flipped the camera off.

  The governor sputtered in indignation, letting Caillen know he'd struck a nerve with his silent defiance.

  Big mistake on the governor's part. That was like baiting a wild predator and the little brother in him kicked into overdrive.

  Never let me see your underbelly.

  Flashing a wicked grin, Caillen couldn't resist shouting to them. "It's not my friends in high places you need to worry about, Gov. It's the low ones who are going to crawl up from the sewers to cut your throat. You know, my brother assassins who'll be honor bound to come after you and the rest of your sycophantic morons while you sleep. Forever Sentella! We're cleaning the gene pool one fatality at a time."

  The mention of the phantom rogue agency of assassins out to challenge the corrupt governments that were led by the League and her goons sent the media into a frenzy and made the governor look around as if trying to find an assassin in the crowd. Like he'd be able to ID one. Beautiful thing about Caillen's friends--by the time you saw them coming for you, your head was already rolling across the floor.

  But as much as Caillen wanted to pretend otherwise, he knew his friends couldn't help him today. He'd gotten himself into this and for once there was no escape.

  I'm dead. Completely. Utterly...

  Painfully.

  Twenty minutes and counting...

  Might as well accept it. It was what it was and he'd volunteered for it.

  "I'm so sorry, Cai." Kasen's tear-filled words whispered through his mind from her last visit.

  Not half as sorry as I am. Darling always said his sisters would be the death of him. Little bugger had been right.

  C'mon. Better you than her. You know that.

  Yeah, that thought not really comforting right now. I should have drowned her when she broke my favorite toy fighter as a kid. It'd been the only toy he'd had and she'd stomped it into pieces in a fit of anger because he'd stuck his tongue out at her.

  It's all right, Cai. Calm down. You've faced worse.

  Yeah, but I didn't die then.

  There was that and he was getting tired of his brain bitching at him over things he couldn't change. He'd kept his promise to his dad. Kasen was safe.

  Him, not so much.

  Sliding down the wall to crouch in the small space between it and his bunk, Caillen banged his head against the wall, welcoming the distracting pain. Why couldn't the bastards just come and kill him already? The waiting was the worst part. No doubt that was their intention. Make it as miserable as possible.

  Closing his eyes, he rubbed his hand over his face. At least he wasn't leaving Shahara in a bind. Now that she was married, she had someone else who could protect and take care of her.

  Which was what really pissed him off at Kasen. There'd been no sense in her making that run. Yes, money was good. But it wasn't worth your life and it wasn't like they were in dire straits for it. Not like they'd been in the past. Their freakishly rich brother-in-law would have gladly given her the money had she only asked Syn for it.

  Stupid moronic idiot.

  Selfish--

  "You ready, convict?"

  He dropped his hand and opened his eyes to see the warden in front of his cell with six guards. He was flattered they thought he'd be that much trouble. And his spirit was certainly willing to give them a fight and then some. However, they had a neuroinhibitor on him that prevented him from doing anything other than glaring at them. If he tried to attack, the inhibitors would bite down, flood his body with pain, lock his muscles tight and send him straight to the floor.

  Worst of all, it'd make him piss his pants.

  They would never have that satisfaction--not until he was dead and couldn't control his bladder anymore. After all, he was a Dagan and Dagan, no matter the poverty or situation, were proud people.

  Show no fear to your enemies. Only contempt. Never let anyone look down on you. You're just as good as any of them. I don't care who they are. Better in fact. In our world, Dagans are royalty and you, my son, are a prince.

  His father had trained him on that and he held those words tight as he faced them.

  Activating the electromagnets in his cuffs that caused his hands to lock together behind his back, the guards lowered the force field that kept him inside his cell.

  Caillen curled his lip as he looked at them. "You could have waited until I stood up, guys. Kind of hard now."

  The warden returned his smug glare with one of his own. "We'll wait."

  He snorted. Were they really that afraid of him that he couldn't even stand up without them sweating?

  Wow, Cai, even a hard-ass assassin like Nykyrian would be impressed with that feat.

  Then again, they had good reason to fear. But for the inhibitor, he'd already be free and they'd all be bleeding or dead.

  But not today.

  Caillen leaned his back against the wall and wiggled his shoulders until he made it to his feet. The guards moved forward with trilassos--a noose attached to the end of a three-foot pole--to put around his neck so that they could drag him forward and keep him six feet away from them.

  He laughed at them and their fear. "Bloody wankers."

  They tightened the noose around his neck until he was coughing from lack of oxygen.

  "Careful, men. We don't want to kill him in here."

  The warden might feel that way, but the look on the guards' faces said they'd be more than happy to send him to death fifteen minutes early.

  Caillen wheezed and coughed as they dragged him down the lackluster hallway and out into the common ground where spectators, dignitaries and newspeople waited to catch a glimpse of the legendary smuggler who, until now, had been more myth than real. The networks would make a fortune charging for this show.

  Ironic really. He'd had to fight every minute of his life to scrape together two credits, but his death would make some asshole a nice rent payment for a few months.

  I should have taken them up on the offer for a tranq. 'Cause right now as he walked up the platform
and neared that gleaming blade, his panic was seriously setting in.

  Ignore it.

  How? Look around you, moron. You're about to die. And there was at least a hundred people here to witness and gloat. Damn them all for their sadistic entertainment.

  Don't think about it.

  Something hard to do since he was being forced to kneel under a ten-foot blade that was shining with metallic bloodlust over his head.

  You can do this...

  I don't want to die. I don't. I need to live. I got plans. Well, not really, but I could make some. Some that don't include my head rolling into a plastic bucket that still bears stains from the last execution.

  He ground his teeth together to keep from begging for his life. He wouldn't give them that satisfaction either.

  "Any last words?"

  Caillen glared at the warden. "Yeah... See you in hell." He looked over to the group of three giggling young women standing in the dignitary section. One of them bore a striking resemblance to the warden. "And for the record... your daughter has a hot ass."

  She let out an excited shriek.

  The warden's face flushed with rage.

  The guards tightened the noose again, choking off the rest of his words.

  Caillen's sight dimmed as his ears buzzed. Oh yeah, much better to strangle to death.

  Not.

  They forced him to his knees, then bent his head down on the arc that had been designed to cradle necks and hold them in place until the blade fell. Still, he choked as the guards refused to loosen the noose. He heard something loud, like maybe someone shouting, but he couldn't tell what it was or where it came from.

  It was almost over.

  A few seconds more.

  Just let go.

  Relax...

  He was too much of a fighter for that. He tried to hang on to every gasping, ragged pain-filled breath. But the fight was useless as he heard a loud clattering sound.

  In the end, the darkness took him under.

  3

  Caillen came awake to a vicious pain throbbing around his throat and a worse one pounding in his head. Yeah, he was in hell. He had to be to hurt this badly.

  "Is he coming around?"

  He didn't recognize the concerned tone that belonged to an older man.

  Someone pried open his eyelid and rudely flashed a light in his eye that made his headache pound even harder. Groaning, he flinched, moving his head away.

  Gently, the doctor turned his head back and held it in place while he continued to test the dilation of his eye. Good thing Caillen's arms were strapped down or the man would be bleeding over the intrusion and that light would be shining out of an orifice the gods had never meant to hold it.