Erebus Dawning: A Space Opera Adventure (Seven Stars Saga Book 1) Read online

  Contents

  Also in the Series

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Epilogue

  Thank you for reading Erebus Dawning

  More In Sci-Fi

  ABOUT AJ Super

  French Glossary

  Dedicated to my Grams Bobbi for the summers reading her sci-fi and fantasy collection, to my Grams Lillian for teaching me to be a stubborn, opinionated woman, and to my loving hubster Josh for all the amazing support. Without the three of them, I would’ve never had this dream.

  Also in the Series

  EREBUS DAWNING

  A STAR REBORN

  QUEEN OF THE BLACK

  Acknowledgments

  There are so many people and groups who have been instrumental in helping me make this book a reality. Thanks to my Critique Partner groups: The Peoples What Writes the Space Magic Stuff (including absent members) and The League of Extraordinary CPs, as well as a shout out to the Space Bees and the Writers Sprinting groups. This would not have been possible without the constant support of my family. They have cheered me on from the very beginning. I am so grateful to the Aethon team for taking a chance on me and the trilogy, to Hayley for being a wonderful inspiration and editor, and Stephanie Sauvinet for all her help to get the French right. Thanks also to Michael Mammay for a fortuitous tweet and for being such a kind and generous soul who put me on a wonderful path; I hope to emulate your generosity in the community. I can’t forget my first mentor, Carrie Callaghan, for sharing terrific writing tools and encouraging me. Michelle Hauck introduced me to the amazing contests and community involvement which allowed me to connect with such inspirational mentors. C.M. Fick and Jonathan E. Hernandez persevered and motivated me through my edits. Thanks to all the authors in the 2020 Debut group and SFF Debuts 2020 group for their support. The online community of QueryConnection are fantastic cheerleaders. And finally, a special thanks to all the people in my Twitter writing community. I can’t name each and every one of you, but you’re all amazing.

  1

  Nyx hovered near the closed door to the command deck of the Thanatos. The slight increase in gravity pulled her down. Malcam and Kai hadn’t followed her—yet. C’est bon. She gripped the door frame with her fingertips as she swung her feet to the floor. No use falling through the sliding hatch and onto her face as the gravity shifted from the corridor’s low gees to whatever level was present on the bridge.

  She floated inches above the ground, heart racing. Sneaking away from the main boarding party to get here was still a dereliction of duty. All so she could prove to her father that she was the legacy of his ship, the Medusa, and the rightful new captain.

  Nyx put her hand on the door pad. The harsh red glow indicated locked.

  “Come on, connard,” she swore in Queen’s Speech. “Work.” Her heartbeat accelerated more. It wouldn’t be long before someone noticed she had abandoned her post taking command of Engineering with the boarding party. Her job was to control the ship from there. But if she wanted to deliver her father’s obsession to him, she needed to be on the command deck. If she didn’t, there would be consequences.

  Fingers shaking, Nyx yanked an electrical panel next to the pad off the wall, exposing a tangle of wires. A spray of sparks showered her long hair, but she quickly brushed them aside. An arc of blue shocked her fingertips as she disengaged the lock on the door. “Putain,” she swore again. Nyx shook the tingling from her quivering fingers. Acrid smoke poured from the open panel, and the blackened air burned her throat.

  She bit her lip, placing her hand on the pad by the hatch. She knew what she would walk into. The Medusa’s Communications Officer had hacked and reprogrammed the Thanatos’ Ship Interface Android—Sia, for short—to run the ship into the edge of a singularity and forcibly take over the bridge while the crew was working to get off the edge of the black hole. The deck would be a bloodbath. The Medusa’s CO would have programmed Sia to leave only Captain Leo Matthews alive, since he knew where the planet-killing weapon, the Star of Erebus, was. Where her father’s obsession was.

  The door whooshed open, and Nyx stumble-stepped onto the second level of the amphitheater-style deck and stared. Her gut flipped as she regained normal gravity.

  Bodies were slumped over their workstations or crumpled onto the floor. The crew lay in puddles of blood, some still with weapons drawn. She exhaled heavily and furrowed her brow, leaning on the hatch-frame. Everyone was dead.

  Nyx didn’t expect Malcam’s plan to be so thorough. He was more brawn than brain, a bull of a man, whose generous spirit as a boy had been beaten out of him on the Medusa. It wasn’t like him to plan an op so well. It was like him for it to be this cold and brutal.

  She turned to the Executive Officer’s station to her left. The body of the well-known ExO sat at his console, his coifed, red-bearded head blown from his shoulders. Nyx spun around, her gut churning, and searched for the First Officer. She lay in a pool of blood with her arm draped over the edge of the second level of the deck, weapon drawn and still dangling from her fingers. The Communications Officer lay next to her, his arms folded underneath him, slouched forward and half-leaning on the rail. All the famous Thanatos crew were posed in a bloody tableau, as if they were on a stage performing their last acts of valor.

  Even Sia lay on the main floor of the command deck, her brown skin singed from a single shot to the head and leaking black coolant. Nyx walked down the center stairs and bent to look at the Sia’s damaged parietal. She fingered through the exposed wiring on the side of the android’s bald head. She was fixable, but it would take time.

  She glanced at the captain’s empty chair, black leather worn from use. Beneath it sat a balled-up man.

  Captain Leo Matthews stared into empty space, rocking erratically. He never struck her as a pillar of inner strength, but falling apart on deck wasn’t something a captain of a renowned ship would do. Maybe seeing all his crew massacred had been too much.

  Nyx knelt by his side, her hand lingering on the grip of a small black energy pistol holstered on her thigh.

  The slack-faced Captain Matthews looked up at her with blank hazel-green eyes.

  “Where is it?” Nyx whispered. The Star of Erebus had to be nearby somewhere. Matthews had kept it safe for many years, according to rumors.

  “Mon petit papillon. What are you doing here?”

  A chill eased up Nyx’s spine. Mon petit papillon. Her maman used to call her that. She shook her head. It didn’t matter. She had a mission. “I’m here for the Star. Where is it?”

  He drew his thin lips into a line. “What?”

  “The Sta
r of Erebus. Once upon a time, you had a big mouth.” She fingered her pistol grip. “Everyone in the black knows.” Matthews had boasted about having the damned thing on board one night while he was at a bar on Elysion many years ago, or so the story went. It was Matthews’ assurance that he and his crew would always be in the black, because as long as the queen thought he had it, she let the Thanatos fly. And everyone in the black left the Thanatos alone because of the boast. Until now.

  “That’s what we’re here for. Give it to me,” Nyx demanded. Her father wanted the Star so badly he would go up against the most dreaded pirates of the known universe.

  Matthews tensed. “What do you want with a god?”

  “What? A god? I want the weapon. Not the damned god.” Nyx scrunched her face, confused. He surely didn’t think she wanted the actual Star of Erebus, one of the seven gods worshipped by half the known universe. She wanted the weapon. The planet-killer that had been only a myth among pirates until Matthews’ drunken boasting. It explained how the Thanatos had slipped by the Queen’s Navy so often. Queen Phoebe knew all along that he had it and therefore let the Thanatos go. Now her father wanted that for the Medusa, and Nyx was going to get it for him.

  “And what’ll you be doing with her?” Matthews growled, raking a hand through his blond hair. With his back against the leather captain’s chair, he looked feral.

  “We’ll hide it. Then we can leverage the rest of the crews’ lives for it.” Would he buy that? She had to convince him to give it to her. Somehow.

  “Do you even know what she does?”

  Nyx looked at him blankly. She didn’t. No one really did, beyond that it could kill a whole world. But Matthews clearly knew…

  “No one should have the power to destroy a world. No. I won’t give up the Star of Erebus for all my life. It would be the end of the universe if I just let her go. She’s the salvation of this crew. Of me.” A sad look passed across his eyes.

  “Exactly. It’ll be their salvation here and now.”

  He smiled ruefully. “No one wants to end up in front of la reine’s firing squad.”

  Nyx clenched her fists by her knee, scratching at the maroon fabric of her form-fitting jumpsuit. She could prove her worth to her father if she had the Star. Maybe even rank up. Get that much closer to her goal to inherit the Medusa. To have her own ship. Her own crew. Her own family.

  “And no one wants to be shot out an airlock today.” Nyx grabbed the front of Matthews’ jacket and yanked him up. She spun him around to see the carnage on the command deck. “This is just the beginning of what they’ll do if you don’t hand over what they want. S’il vous plaît”

  Her father could easily lose his temper and execute the entire Thanatos crew, especially if Malcam recommended it. What would he be capable of if he actually got a weapon powerful enough to destroy a planet? Nyx didn’t want to think about it. He was still her father. And her commanding officer.

  Matthews’ eyes widened at the sight of the carnage on his bridge. A loud gurgling erupted in his gut, and he ripped away from her and vomited. With the back of his hand, he wiped his mouth.

  Nyx covered her nose. The smell on the deck was becoming noxious, the iron of blood mingling with the burnt copper of fried circuits, and now Captain Matthews’ dinner.

  The command deck door suddenly slid open.

  “It’s too late now, anyway.” The captain grimaced.

  “It’s only too late when you’re floating in the black,” boomed a voice from the second tier of the deck.

  Nyx and the captain looked up to see a monster of a man standing on the stage above them, tongue pushing his lower lip. Captain Matthews reflexively stood in front of Nyx, vomit streaked down the front of his brown leather jacket and white mandarin-collared shirt, all the way to the crotch of his black pants.

  Nyx put a hand on Matthews’ shoulder and pulled him back. “Malcam,” she oozed. “I didn’t expect you here. Aren’t you supposed to be rounding up the rest of the crew and taking them to the Medusa for sale to the mines?” It wasn’t pleasant, but selling hostages from raided ships to the asteroid mines was the best money the Medusa could make to keep her in the sky.

  “It’s my mission,” Malcam growled. “I have the authority to tear this place to shreds until we find what we’re looking for. And I will.” He ran a hand from his ash-blond widow’s peak to the nape of his white neck. “Nyx Marcus, what are you doing here? You should be in Engineering, getting this beauty back up and running.”

  “Wouldn’t be a problem if you hadn’t run her into the edge of a singularity to begin with. Besides.” She glanced behind her to Matthews.

  Malcam’s nose flared. A silver ring pierced one nostril, and on the other, a glittering diamond caught the light.

  Nyx didn’t know whether to smile or grimace. He wouldn’t want to hear that she was close to finding his prize.

  “Did you find it yet?” He rested his hand on a heavy silver, wooden-handled projectile revolver resting on his waist.

  She frowned and bit the inside of her cheek. Putain de merde. Quel branleur. If only Malcam hadn’t come. She would have gotten the information from the captain and been on her way with the Star to see her father. He was always in her way. She shook her head, “No.”

  “Then you should have used your womanish devices.” He smiled and tipped his head, pulling at the black gauge-plug in his ear.

  “I’m not some pre-AI War sex-Sia.” She ground her teeth.

  Matthews snickered behind her.

  “What are you laughing at?” Malcam growled.

  “You two are funny. Lovers?” Matthews giggled.

  Nyx screwed her face. “Ew. No.”

  “What? Ew? What do you mean, ew?” Malcam stuttered.

  “Just that you’re—you,” she said.

  He rolled his ice-blue eyes. “You’re no catch yourself, princess.”

  Matthews burst out laughing. “Mon petit papillon. Don’t listen to him. You turned out quite pretty. A lot like her.”

  Nyx glanced back at the captain, her eyebrows drawn. He couldn’t mean her maman. The few people who spoke of her appearance always said how much Nyx looked like her. They were both petite white women with sable hair, fine, angular features, full bottom lips, and almond-shaped eyes. Vid-pics were the best Nyx had for memories. Her own were fuzzy at best. Her mother had died when she was a child, and her father wouldn’t talk of it, saying it was too traumatic. But Matthews couldn’t know her maman. He seemed too young.

  Malcam flipped the snap on his holster and calmly lifted his pistol. “Enough. You’re both out of time,” he growled. “I might decide to shoot. And don’t think for a moment that your daddy can stop me.”

  Nyx’s face went blank. Malcam’s clear blue eyes pierced the tepid air. Icy fingers gripped her spine.

  “The Star of Erebus. Where is it?” Malcam waved his pistol, upper lip quivering like a mad dog.

  The captain grinned and spun around with his arms spread. “Here, there and everywhere. Up and down and all around.”

  “What the—?” Malcam’s pistol went limp. His hooded brow clenched. “Is he crazy?”

  Captain Matthews grabbed Nyx and jigged around the bridge, avoiding the corpses of the crew. “It’s all dust and stars.”

  She pulled against his hold, but he clung, yanking her across the deck in a wild gavotte.

  Malcam’s gun blasted high in the air.

  Captain Matthews stopped still at the sound, twitching in fear, and fell whimpering to his knees. Wide-eyed, he felt down the length of his body for wounds.

  Malcam sneered and slowly lowered his gun to aim at the two dancers. “First shot was a warning. Second, I’ll put a hole through both of you.”

  Nyx ducked, covering her head, glaring at Malcam. “T’as pas de couilles, enculé.” The mumbling captain would get them killed.

  “What’s he saying? What’s he babbling about?” The panic rose in Malcam’s voice through his tightly grit teeth.

&
nbsp; Nyx put a hand on the captain’s shaking head. She had to comfort him, calm him somehow so he’d trust her, though he was a near stranger. Something felt familiar about him, however. Some fuzzy memory that ran along the edge of her mind. She passed her hand through his tousled blond hair as she knelt beside him. “Matthews, what did you do with the Star? The weapon? Leo?”

  He looked into Nyx’s eyes, stopped whimpering abruptly, and sucked in a deep, shuddering breath. “I destroyed her.” He curled into a ball and began rocking. “All dust and stars.”

  Bile rose from Nyx’s gut. He wouldn’t. He couldn’t. All that power…

  “What’s he sayin’?” Malcam swung his gun.

  “You’re going to get us killed,” she whispered, ears roaring. She hadn’t heard him right, had she? “You can’t be serious. What did you do with the Star of Erebus?” Nyx ran a hand across Matthews’ cheek. “Tell me where it is.”

  He glanced up at her. “Everyone’s dead who knows. Now she’s gone. All gone. Secrets are meant to be hidden. Destroyed. She’d have destroyed everything. So, I destroyed her. I made sure she would be gone. I destroyed her, Nue.”

  2

  The command deck hushed. Nyx held her breath, and Malcam leaned forward, straining to hear the captain’s words. Matthews had just whispered her mother’s name. She was sure of it. No. He couldn’t have. She cleared her head. Watching his companions die had scrambled the captain’s brains. It could be even worse: running into the singularity could have given him time dilation sickness. There’s no way he could know her mother.