Don’t ask me what it is about magic and machines, but if I was a betting girl, I’d say it had something to do with magnetics. It didn’t particularly matter how or why it happens, but the fact of the matter is the iron cores of a lot of comets, asteroids, and other space junk really like to tag along in our wakes when we jump. A Forgothian priest tried to explain it to me one time in a bar. I think the slimeball was trying to get into my pants, but he clearly didn’t know I liked tits as much as he did.

Anyway, if what he said was true, then my magic gave off just enough of an aura to alter the gravitational pull of a ship traveling at high velocities. He told me to think about it like a gravitational well that I was always at the bottom of. Long story short, this meant that if we were anywhere near magnetic space junk when we jumped, it was gonna come along for the ride, albeit behind us. Normally, this wasn’t any big deal, as we could just get out of the way, but when we coupled the centripetal force of Bradley’s spinning move to my already magically magnetic personality, well then that comet came rocketing out of hyperspace right off the nose of our ship.

I say all that to say this, thank the stars Bradley is one hell of a pilot. Never tell him I said that, but although my stomach bounced off my throat for the second time in ten minutes from the sheer acceleration, I was in one piece and we weren’t smashed like Heiroach on a windshield in the jungles of Forgoth where that crazy priest was from. He pushed us laterally out of the comet’s path and then completed the calculations for a short jump past the nearest dead planet. Of course, the comet swung around and came after us. That’s what gravity wells do. Bradley’s angle brought us near enough to the planet that I could feel the heat through the hull, but that crazy trash man bounced us off the atmosphere and jumped again towards deep space. The comet must have crashed into the planet, feeling its much stronger gravitational pull so close or else couldn’t swing around in time and ruined some pre-civilized ant colony’s day.

“We’re clear,” he called over the speaker system. I pushed my lunch back down where it belonged before replying.

“Good. Now let’s get to the nearest port and offload this crap. I’m beginning to think the cargo’s cursed.”

“Don’t say that when we get there. They’ll drop the price.”

I made it down the corridor and plopped into the chair next to Bradley in the cockpit. “They’ll drop the price anyway if they see me. I’ll stay as far away from that transaction as I can.”

“Well, we’ve got an hour on this jump until we get to Revaulo. Figure we sell their own fuel back to them at a premium since we got it back where they didn’t want to go,” Bradley said.

“Sound good to me. I’ve got a contact there that might not just run the other way when I show my face.”

“Well, wear your cloak just in case. The Revaulo don’t mind humans much, but your tattoos might cause some trouble. Oh, and leave the staff on the ship.”

“I’m not an idiot,” I said, unplugging the focusing crystal from the titanium staff tip. I slipped it into my pocket and got up. “I’ll be in my room getting cleaned up.”

“Your contact wouldn’t be Tessa, would it?”

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I stopped at the door and turned around. “What if it is?”

Bradley bit his lip to stop himself from smiling. “Nothing,” he said, throwing up his hands. I turned to leave again, and almost made it into the hall when he added, “Make sure you shower off those Revaulo guts. You’ll never impress her if you smell like sulfur.” I gave him a rude gesture and kept walking. He couldn’t see me, but I was damn sure he was watching on the hall camera.

One hour for the space jump and another to slow down enough to dock and we were sitting just off the end of the Revaulo space port’s cheap-side entrance. “Look, we’d already settled on the fee,” Bradley said through the comm link with the port authority. They replied in Revaulo which I didn’t speak. “That’s not a fair price. You’re cutting your own tail off if you don’t let me in. I’ve got fuel you need and I’ll just take it somewhere else.”

I stood just behind the cockpit’s threshold. Even though Bradley was arguing over the radio, the port authority could easily see him through the bow window. If they were giving him grief, they really didn’t need to see a necromancer. I had my cloak on draped over my shoulders, keeping the tattoos on them and my arms hidden. My staff sat secured in my phase-locked gun safe in my room.

Revaulos would almost always break into an unguarded ship. They didn’t ever really want the stuff you left there, but they were always looking for a reason to impound ships and leave their crews stranded and spending their money at the spaceport. These lizard-brained assholes were crafty in large groups, and this was the largest group of them outside their home world.

Bradley argued back and forth with them for a few more minutes before they came to an agreement. We pulled into the docking bay and attached to the super expensive airlock adapter I’d mentioned before. These were almost never found on ships, but were required by interstellar treaty for all space ports.

“How bad was it?” I asked, opening our inner door to the airlock.

“It’s practically skyway robbery. These guys keep getting greedier. We might need to head deeper across the gap next time.”

The gap was a colloquial term used for the space around a rogue black hole near our end of the galaxy. It had eaten all the stars and solar systems near it, but it wasn’t much danger since it was traveling at the same speed as the galaxy’s natural spin. It left an enormous gap between systems, and it took a lot of fuel to cross. Personally, I was a fan of getting to the other side because although it would be expensive, it would put us a lot closer to the Valraith’s home turf. Every day that passed decreased my brother’s life expectancy with them, and I needed to catch up to them as fast as I could.

The outer door opened, and we stepped out into the sky-bridge. There were various unused ends sitting around in the space. They were for the infinite other kinds of ships that came into port. At the far end of the corridor, there was another airlock that led into the port authority’s main bribery center, where we headed.

We made it to the counter and a large female Revaulo motioned us forward. She spoke Human, asking us for Bradley’s ship registration. He handed her a small metal plate with a digital readout. She scanned it for a moment before sniffing the air. “You smell like death,” she said.

Bradley glanced sideways at me. “Don’t look at me. I took a shower,” I said.

The Revaulo woman leaned closer. “Where is it you said you’re coming from?”

We couldn’t really tell them we had just re-murdered a bunch of zombified Revaulos.

Luckily, Bradley had a quick answer that appeased the administrator. “You had a dead ship. We’re here to return your fuel, for a price.” Look at him go, not too much information, but also not lying. That second part was super important, as the hive intellect in the room would most likely be enough to detect it.

She took the payment, exorbitant as it was, and let us through into the hot and humid interior of the Revaulo Space Port. It was raining inside, as it always seemed to be. The lizards liked their condensers on full-blast all the time, and I felt my hair immediately fall and plaster to my face. “I’ll see you back here tomorrow?” I asked.

Bradley nodded once. “Don’t go having too much fun,” he said, grinning.

I didn’t give him the entertainment of a response and instead turned and walked off into the steamy crowd, looking for Tessa.