Chapter 1

Koraq scanned the ballroom once more, shifting her vision slightly into infrared, just enough to be able to see the glow of a plas pistol or heat blade. At nearly two and a half meters tall, she was easily able to see over all the others in the room to spot any threats. Nothing. Again. Only the security personnel spread throughout the perimeter grounds and outer edge of the room carried weapons; besides herself of course. The security guards around the room were all well dressed, wearing suits to blend in. They didn’t blend in. They stood stiffly against the walls and near exits, their jackets bulging from ill concealed weapons. They all wore HUD wraps over their eyes, giving them protection from sudden changes in light as well as access to tactical information and facial recognition. They were, like the ballroom guests, an assortment of humans, elves, and dwarves; however, they were also painfully conspicuous. But, Koraq had to agree, so was she.

Koraq also wore a suit. However, hers was tailored to allow quick movement and made of a dense nano-fiber material that stretched slightly to allow unimpeded movement. The suit was comfortable but did little to hide her large muscular frame. It also provided protection from most blades and small arms, but that was less important. She carried a kinetic pistol in a concealed holster below her left breast and two throwing knives were buried in her thick mane of dark hair that swept back from her brow and hung to her shoulders. Skintight braids along the side of her scalp gave her a mohawkish appearance as well as made it easier for her large, hypersensitive ears to pickup sounds without her hair interfering. Occasionally, she thought of shaving her hair off completely to solve the problem, but that would only strengthen the idea of her as some uncivilized, barbarian brute, and that would reflect badly on her ward, Lady Illeisiel Saylian. The politicians and the leaches that hung among them would see her as more savage and so treat her ward with less respect; that was not acceptable. The safety of her ward was paramount, and it was easier to do her job when people respected her Lady.

However, what made Koraq stand out most wasn’t who she guarded, but what she was. After all, the Orks were responsible for more war and death in their collective history than all the other races combined. In fact, the Orks had fought each other to near extinction, now accounting for less than five percent of the population. Even worse, Koraq wasn’t a common green ork, but a rare gray. A recessive gene caused one in every hundred thousand or so orks to be gray; physically stronger, larger, faster, and fiercer than all other orks. As well as a few leaser known ... deviations. An untrained adolescent grey could carve a swath through any ten trained and armed soldiers of any race. Koraq was neither untrained, nor an adolescent, as her numerous tattoos of accomplishments displayed to all, though only the ones on her face were visible at the moment. Only the red berserker ork’s, born once a century or so, could outmatch her.

She shifted her weight as she glanced around the large room. This wasn’t a political gathering, so Koraq was spared the veritable assault of hundreds of security personnel and active sensor sweeps. Instead there were maybe two dozen guards with only six in the ballroom with the guests. The relatively low coms chatter allowed her to more easily focus on her surroundings. Her boring surroundings. The tedium of the party was making it hard for her to keep her mind from drifting to her plans for later tonight. Did she have everything she needed in her kit? Was Lady Saylian’s schedule still cleared for tomorrow? Was she prepared to head down this path?

Yes, she was fully prepared. She had been planing this night for months. Had started down this path when she stumbled across Illeisiel’s little secret. She had observed and monitored her ward for months before settling on this course. She had gathered supplies in secret, scoured the net for information, and meticulously groomed palace security to differ to her when it came to her ward. Her word had become as unquestionable as the Lady’s, and she would use that to her advantage.

With a little difficulty, Koraq pulled her attentions back to the present. It wouldn’t do to be distracted now so close to her goal. When she slid her gaze back across the crowd, she paused at the dais on the far side of the room. On the dais, there was an orchestra of mostly gnomes playing a quiet waltz. Among the diminutive figures was a troll hunched over a bass. His tall, lanky body was bent over the instrument as he worked the bow with one hand and the strings with the other. Koraq found the whole scene amusingly ironic. People mingled in time with the music but no one danced, the pomp and ceremony having ended over an hour before. None of the guests had left yet, but it wouldn’t be long now.

Koraq glanced back to her ward, never more than a few paces away. They had been here for more than two hours now and she could see the strained weariness in Illeisiel’s posture. They had originally planned to leave shortly after the host’s speech, but she had been sidetracked by some minor lord or some such; Koraq couldn’t remember his name. He was youthful and soft like most of those here, the others being old and soft. Though that wasn’t to say the people in this room weren’t dangerous in their own right, but their weapons were politics and rumor rather than the cold steel and hot plasma Koraq preferred. The young human’s expressions and posture radiated barely restrained cockiness as he spoke of some inane subject; Koraq hadn’t been paying attention to the conversation either. Illeisiel gave every appearance that she was hanging on every word with rapt attention, but her bodyguard knew her better than anyone and wasn’t fooled. She saw the almost imperceptible way the elf’s delicate, slender ears twitched back with impatience. The slight stiffness to her shoulders that belied her feigned interest. The way she nodded along to the conversation that most took for polite attention, but was actually her way to force herself to follow conversations she cared little about.