QSFer Maya Darjani has a new queer space opera out (MF, ace): The Star-Crossed Empire.
For fans of Lois McMaster Bujold, David Weber, and KB Wagers. Get swept away into a lush and romantic space opera that transcends time, untangles court intrigue, and spans the entire Galactic Whorl.
A Republic soldier
A reluctant Emperor
When love and duty collide, who wins?
Layla is a patriotic soldier of the Altainan Republic. And patriots don’t ally themselves with rival empires. But when she reencounters the handsome imperial noble she fell in love with years before, she falls again. Hard. And she decides: she’s going to marry that man. Duty be damned.
Unfortunately, he’s also the new Valharan Emperor.
And their planets are about to go to war.
As tensions rise between the two worlds, Layla’s attempts at neutrality go awry. She finds herself unsafe and threatened, a foreigner no matter where she lands. Eventually, instability in their isolated galactic community leaves it ripe for invasion. Layla has to overcome her dual loyalty and end this war for once and for all–before the Whorl goes up in flames, and she loses the man she loves.
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Excerpt
“Tell me again,” the security investigator says. His eyes hone in. I let my breathing slow, imagining cool water trickling down my back, just like Ignatius taught me.
A simple lie detector test is easy to beat, but I’m not trying today. Today, I have nothing to hide. Good thing, too. The cuffs on my hands measure my pulse, and that’s the part I could cheat. But those eyes—those eyes are unrelenting.
He wears bionic contacts, all the better to measure any hesitation in my manner, or the slightest dissembling.
“Ignatius and I started writing two years ago,” I repeat. “I’ve kept your office informed about the frequency and nature of the correspondence.”
“No face-to-face calls?”
I start to shake my head but think better of it. “We know suspicions run high between Valhar and Altain. No reason to get ourselves into a situation where it’s only our word we haven’t been discussing anything inappropriate. A written trail, we believed, was best.”
He narrows those eyes. The contacts make his irises gleam electric blue, and the lenses within whir about like clockwork gears. Something in the background clicks and ticks with steady precision, and though the light in the room is evenly distributed via inset bulb, I imagine one ponderously swinging lamp threatening to fall and crash onto my head.
Damn you, Ignatius. You get to live your life all lordful and high, and I’m always the one left scrambling to explain.
“What did he say about the new position?” he asks.
“His ascension? I had no idea it was happening. He said nothing at all, ‘cept he’d need to stop writing for a while. Then Carlus abdicated, and ten days later, I saw the announcement.”
The interrogator steeples his fingers, assessing me. “And then?”
“I haven’t heard from him since. For the last six months.” Fine. It’s fine.
He scoffs and makes a note on his tablet.
“But I’ve told you all this already.” I finally allow myself some irritation. “This is a scheduled counterintel screen. Why the drama?”
“Have somewhere to be?”
I grind my teeth. “Well the President of the entire Whorl-damned Altainan Republic has that Armistice Day speech to give tomorrow and if I don’t get back to it—”
“Let me be clear, Ms. Kamil—”
“Commander Kamil.”
He smiles toothily. In my imagination, miniature snakes slither out his mouth, chattering and hissing to go in for the kill.
“How Valharan of you.” His voice oozes with derision.
I suppress the shiver, but of course he catches it.
“The chief of staff,” he continues, “is the one who asked me to do a second level investigation, so I think he can forgive a slight amount of tardiness.”
Chief of sta—Damnit, Srivani. “As long as I’m back by 1400.” My hands clench and release. “I have a meeting with Roya herself.”
“We wouldn’t want you to be late for the President. I agree. Now, let’s go over this again,” he says. “When did you start fucking Emperor Ignatius I of Valhar?”
I leave, the claustrophobic room leading into a claustrophobic hallway, down in the ass pit of a shabby edifice: the People’s House, the seat of power for the leader of the Free Whorl. It’s as humble as possible, a nondescript brick squatting on a nondescript square. Typical Altain: down with the pomp and circumstance! Down with the gilded corridors and the stately busts. We’re afraid to admit our predations, so invested we are in being the moral leaders of the Whorl.
I promptly run into Ransom, leaving the observation room to the south.
“You two never even kissed?” Ransom asks. Amazing, for how much he knows me, he can’t understand how little physical intimacy matters.
“You were listening in?” Ugh. Of course he was, because—
“It’s literally my job.” He finishes what I assume is the rest of his lunch, grimacing as he picks at his teeth. “Haff a toofpick?”
I make an urph of disgust and hand him a neatly folded square of cloth. “Use this.”
Ransom nods in thanks. His stubby fingers dive in and then he finishes up, stuffing the cloth into the pocket of his kurta. Looking over at me, he arches an eyebrow. “What?”
“I’m serious.” I grimace. “Can we not talk about my unexciting romantic history when we get out in the open? I’d rather the general populace not know about, well, you know.” We keep walking through the pit and emerge from the basement door into glorious sunshine. I bask in the gust of afternoon sea air, craygulls squawking in the distance.
Ransom pokes my shoulder. “What, that the joint heroes of the Mazaran invasion wanted to boink each other the entire war?”
I scan the plaza, noting the interns, journalists, and minor officials gathered nearby, and turn back to him glaring. “I’m open about it with my superiors, because they need to know.” My tight whisper seems to ring out over the square. “Now, can you just shut it?”
“Yes, ma’am, Commander, ma’am.” He salutes. “I guess that’s what I call you now.”
“Oh, stop.” I roll my eyes. “That kid—”
“Already doing the ‘kids these days’ thing? You’re not that old, little Layla.”
Youngest O-5 in a generation, that’s me. Aged 26 when I made rank, now 30. Hardly a pimple-scarred youth, but pimple cream and wine spritzer is the Republic Defense Force’s stock in trade. At any rate, eventually they retired me, too, patting my back and telling me to stay close to the capital, while keeping me corked in case of emergency—and also for the occasional parade.
He spins off from me as we reenter the building from the street level, going wherever he goes to sit on his throne of lies and intrigue, cackling as he tweaks and pulls gossamer threads of intelligence and makes minions out of men.
Ransom’s actually the deputy assistant national threats minister for counterespionage and leadership profiling, but I like to pretend he’s a sin
Author Bio
Maya Darjani is a writer and photographer from the heartland of America who writes genre-bending fiction about badass women, dual loyalty, and the false promise of patriotism.