Prince of Passion: Sheerspace, #2

Prince of Passion

Sheerspace Book 2

By Jessa Slade

Prince of Passion: Sheerspace Book 2

By Jessa Slade

When mercenary raiders targeted the empathic crystals that imbue the legendary l’auraly lovers with extraordinary sensual prowess, Icere, the last male l’auralyo, helped destroy the crystals. Rather than let the source of uninhibited pleasure be corrupted into a mind-controlling drug, he allowed his passionate destiny to remain forever unfulfilled. Now, Icere channels his fury into revenge. Tracking the raiders through the interstellar sheerways to a watery world infamous for its aphrodisiac liqueur, he finds a queen—as adrift and alone as he—forced for years into a fate she never desired.

Saya-Rynn inherited duty, command and control from her cruel grandfather and fought to transform her dangerous planet into a paradise for her people—but the price was literally a poison that runs through her veins. Though she feels as ancient as the seas, she finds herself awash in the hot male potency of the young Icere. Still, she resists the chance for indulgence she thinks has passed by her. But when the raiders strike again, Rynn must embrace her troubled legacy, and Icere will find his place as a lover and a fighter. Together, the reluctant ruler and the deposed prince of passion find common purpose, combating the mysterious entity seeking to rule the sheerways, and claim a love as bright as the infinite stars.

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Table of Contents

Prince of Passion

Introduction

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Thank You!

Excerpt: Assassin's Hunger

About Jessa Slade

Acknowledgements

PRINCE OF PASSION

Chapter One

The restless chop of waves at the end of the landing pad tightened the knot in Icere’s stomach. In the last sol-year, he had discovered he was not prone to space sickness, even on the most turbulent threads between the sheerways, but the violet-silver liquid churn around the port island set his teeth on edge. Or maybe that was just his impatience.

The cruiseliner shuttle attendant gave him a rueful grin as she scanned his identity card and handed over his bag. Sorry for the delay, sir. Captain said we were lucky to land at all with the storm season whipping up so early.

No matter. Nothing at stake besides the future of every intergalactic outpost connected between the sheerways.

The storm means the Malac Festival will begin soon. When the attendant returned his ident, her gaze lingered a moment on his thin gray gloves. If the shuttle can’t launch until the next lull, maybe we can… She drifted the sentence toward him like one of the little paper boats shown in the tourism vids for this waterlogged planet.

In his travels, Icere had also discovered the best way to deflect such invitations. Hope had to be handled with as much delicacy as the stitching in his gloves and sunk as quickly as a boat on these waters. I wish we could. He left the exact nature of their imagined mutual wishes up to her—a shamefully uninspired and always effective ploy—and pitched the right amount of regret into his tone. But sadly my business here precludes any pleasures.

She must have heard the truth in his voice—though she would never understand the whole of it—because she let out a sigh. "Too bad. They say malac liqueur tapped at the peak of the storms is a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Well, enjoy your stay on Saya-Terce. Ahawe-aulu."

Ahawe-aulu. The wind blows in a circle. In his research on Saya-Terce, Icere had found the proverb used to express surprised pleasure at unexpected meetings or upon parting to imply a heartfelt hope for eventual reuniting. But originally, and more ambivalently, the phrase was invoked whenever fate had its rough way with a man. He dredged up an answering smile for the attendant though the airborne brine stung his lips like a punishment. It’s certainly trying to blow me somewhere.

Her gaze locked on his mouth and she sighed again.

Ignoring her involuntary reaction to the unique heritage that made him an object of unconscious desire, Icere pushed the tightly plaited length of his blond hair out of the way, shouldered his duffel, and navigated through the crowd. The port teemed with shuttles disgorging passengers before the threatening weather made traffic impossible. Though located at a dead-end outer thread of the sheerways, necessitating several expensive passages, Saya-Terce was a popular destination. Its land masses—mostly atolls, rings of islands around central lagoons—were almost cliché tropical paradises. The rainbow array of beaches were matched in their fantasticalness by the lavish architecture of the guest accommodations and the fermented beverages with wildly suggestive names.

Saya-Terce was never more popular than during the spring storms that even now were massing wild snarls of clouds on the horizon. A few hours at most, Icere guessed, and the leading front would be on them. The captains of the boats playing in the foam-peaked swells around the port obviously agreed. Most had turned their bright archaic sails for home. The shuttles, meanwhile, aimed for the stars, to wait out the storms in the silence of space.

Icere wished he could join them. Sometimes, alone in the dark, immersed in the puzzle of his hunt, he could almost forget what he’d lost. Almost.

In the press of bodies—half naked in the moist heat—he was glad for the thin but tough fabric of the long gray tunic that covered him from the neck down.

He didn’t want to be distracted by a heedless touch.

As he dodged the tourists, he memorized the visible ship idents for later research. The longest, darkest, quietest threads in the sheerways hadn’t gotten him closer to his quarry, but with careful planning, perhaps here he could lay his trap.

Though he had synced all his tech before leaving his cabin in the cruiseliner and committed all the relevant details to memory, he checked his device again anyway. Nothing since the brief message that had come in while the shuttle was landing: At the Akua. Last place on the pier. Get down here or we’ll drink yours too.

Icere grimaced. Should he wait awhile longer in the hopes they did as threatened? If only he could be so lucky. Saya-Terce was no more likely to run low on mind-altering substances during the Malac Festival than the sheerways would run out of beings who wanted to have their minds altered.

Or for that matter, others who wanted to alter their minds for them.

Which was his whole point for being here, pretending to be something—someone—he wasn’t. No sense waiting; better to get on with pretending.

After all, he had a lifetime of it ahead of him.

***

The Saya heir hadn’t managed to drain the cantina completely dry, but he and his companions had made impressive inroads. Or would have, if roads were more common on a water planet. Ni-Saya-Luac rose from the central seat in the Akua’s private lounge and embraced Icere like a long-lost brother instead of a long-distance acquaintance with common interests. His companions—a dozen males and females, half of them as stocky and bronzed as Luac himself, the others broad-shouldered and pale blond—watched with eyes half lidded from drink and judgment.

They were all of a similar age to Icere, but with their jealous jockeying for position around their future king as they rearranged themselves on the low-slung divans, they seemed so young and silly.

Perhaps losing one’s planet and one’s future contributed to premature bitterness, Icere mused. He accepted a purple-hued drink from the unobtrusively efficient server. Regardless, he was here to try to prevent that from happening to anyone else. By putting this oblivious crowd into a certain amount of danger, of course, which couldn’t be helped. They might thank him for it later; certainly the billions of inhabitants of the sheerways would.

Unless he failed. But then he wouldn’t know how much they’d curse him because he would most likely be dead. The quarry he had tracked for the last sol-year seemed to find loose ends anathema. He’d never been too fond of loose ends himself, even though he was one.

And now he was pretending to be at loose ends. He forced himself to slouch, though reclining caused the high neck of his tunic to half-strangle him, as he observed the Saya heir over the rim of his drink. The prince continued some story his arrival had interrupted, his gestures poised and confident as befitted a future ruler.

Icere had courted Luac through the usual channels of youth with too much time and too many credits, and finally procured the invitation to assuage—or maybe the better word was indulge—his supposed ennui at the Malac Festival. He might have felt bad about the deception if he hadn’t known mercenaries were targeting the young Ni-Saya for far more fiendish purposes.

After the failed blackmailing of his own world that ended with the destruction of the enemy ship, the anonymous power behind the mercenaries had become even more circumspect. He had discovered no other way to intercept them except maybe through the unsuspecting Luac.

Luac finished his story—something about a drowning at the last Malac Festival—to a chorus of appreciative laughter and turned his attention to Icere.

Maybe you’ll try your hand at the harvest. Luac’s gaze, slightly unfocused, paused on Icere’s gloves. By ritual, though, you have to swim naked.

Icere raised the glass to his lips, bringing Luac’s gaze up to his, knowing the purple of the beverage and the violet tinge of the ocean behind him would bring out the highlights in his own eyes. He sipped around the dark-blue flower decorating the cocktail. I hate the water.

After a moment of tense silence, Luac laughed, and the others echoed him. Then why come to Saya-Terce?

Because you are here. Icere layered his tone with the stark truth and a touch of the promise he’d withheld from the cruiseliner attendant earlier.

Luac’s eyes widened, and even the echo of laughter vanished in a suspended moment of breathlessness.

Icere took a sip, rolled the sweet liquid down the back of his tongue, then gave his lips a parting lick and set his drink down with a clack, releasing his audience. One of the female companions let out a soft moan. The rest of the group downed their drinks as if to quell a surge of inner fires.

Icere turned his gaze to the ocean outside the windows. There were certain tactical advantages to being the only living l’aurlyo in existence—born, sculpted and infused with the purest of passions—even if no one in all the sheerways knew what or who he was.

Well, a few people knew, but they were far away and had their own lives now on a sheership that would likely never return to the l’auraly world. Icere squelched the surge of homesickness. He had no home, not anymore.

When the server brought another round, conversation resumed, though the wary curiosity of eyes on him had turned to more blatant interest. Good. He didn’t want suspicion; he wanted their interest, and above all, he wanted their wanting. It made them more accessible.

By the time the first bank of storm clouds rolled over the landing pad and the last of the purple beverages had been consumed, he was practically one of them. The camaraderie intensified as they left the cantina in the rain—the deluge was warm and practically effervescent—and raced for the end of the dock. They laughed at the blustery bath and clambered aboard a boat that bucked at its anchor. Icere steadied two of the girls who squealed at the rough tossing.

One took advantage of the moment to slip her fingers over his crotch and gave him a look as sultry as the air itself. You’re staying on the Saya barge for the festival?

I am. He lifted her over the decorative plasteel cleat—the boat had no protective railing—neatly dislodging her hand before she noticed his lack of fleshly response.

Maybe I’ll find you there.

He was spared the need to answer by Luac’s bellow to cast off. The Saya heir had taken the controls, though an attendant hovered anxiously just behind him. The companions hastily took seats as Luac deployed the sails which filled with a furious snap. Icere grabbed a handhold just as the boat leaped away from the dock, fleeing the whipping wind.

He had studied up on Saya-Terce, of course, and had known all seagoing vessels were kept low tech to minimize impact on sensitive marine life. The emphasis on antiquated transport had obviously induced a similar primordial bravado in the planet’s inhabitants. The l’auraly from whom he’d descended were naturalists in their own way, since the desires of the body were the most natural of impulses, but he hadn’t appreciated how being at the mercy of nature’s elements could be decidedly not merciful.

The boat lacked shelter, being little more than three pontoons and a confusion of ropes and sails. The trimaran skidded like a three-legged spider over the water, barely touching the waves as the wind chased them. Ahawe-aulu, indeed. This wind was likely to blow them all the way around the world.

Half the Ni-Saya’s companions were cheering, but the other half and the attendant who lurked at Luac’s elbow weren’t, which made Icere think this was not the safest of courses.

If he drowned before he could save the universe, he would be exceedingly irate. Which was nowhere near as