I am thrilled to be hosting a spot
on the THE ROYAL TRIALS (LAST GATE OF THE EMPEROR #2) by Kwame Mbalia &
Prince Joel Makonnen Blog Tour hosted by Rockstar Book Tours. Check out
my post and make sure to enter the giveaway!
About The Book:
Author: Kwame Mbalia & Prince Joel Makonnen
Pub. Date: July 19, 2022
Publisher: Scholastic Press
Formats: Hardcover, eBook, Audiobook
Pages: 272
Find it: Goodreads, Amazon, B&N, iBooks, Kobo, TBD, Bookshop.org
From Kwame Mbalia and Prince Joel David Makonnen comes an Afrofuturist adventure about a mythical Ethiopian empire. Sci-fi and fantasy combine in this epic journey to the stars.
Yared has traveled a long way to find
his place in the universe. Light years, even. Though the battle of Addis Prime
is over, the spacefaring Axum Empire is still fractured. The kingdom once gave
their technology away free of charge, to better humankind. Now, having been
missing for over a decade, they’re returning to the planet where their
galaxy-spanning civilization began―Earth.
But they find the planet in disarray.
Old Earth’s atmosphere is a mess of junked shuttles and satellites. This is
especially true of Debris Town, an orbital flotilla where poor spacefarers―left
to rot by the Intergalactic Union that rose up in Axum’s place―have taken to
piracy to survive.
Yared is set to speak at the opening
of the Royal Trials, a competition of the best exo pilots in the Sol System.
But on the day of his speech, the pirates launch an attack!
The siege sets off a chain of events
that will lead Yared into the depths of Old Earth―and the jaws of a cruel
betrayal. There’s more to the pirates―and Debris Town―than anyone saw coming.
Grab book 1 LAST GATE OF THE EMPEROR now!
Excerpt:
Automated
voice: Checking
approved holofeeds for today, 2150.227.
Automated
voice: No feeds
approved. Prisoner restricted at quantum levels.
Automated
voice: Unauthorized
access detected. Automated voice: Processing . . . processing . . . proc
Automated voice: Access granted. Welcome, USER_ID_NOT_FOUND.
Automated
voice: Three feeds
approved. Playing first holofeed.
INA
Newsbot: Intergalactic
News Association. News from the stars you can trust. Now this.
INA
Newsbot: Excitement!
Speculation! And more than a little curiosity, as an empire returns.
Axum, long thought destroyed, has reemerged. But is the former
benevolent superpower what it once was?
Even now, as
the iconic traveling space station enters the edges of the Sol-Luna
System, people are divided. INA Newsbot: Some welcome the return of
the creators of much of the technology we currently use, including
this newsbot. Others can’t help but point out their convenient timing,
just as the Inter galactic Union is set to vote on who will be awarded
all the scientific research left behind when Axum disappeared. And just
where were they? Why do preliminary scans show battle damage on the space
station? And, as several IU ambassadors have mentioned privately, what do they
want? These questions and more will have to be answered, and soon. INA
Newsbot: And now this: Another inner-system attack by the group
calling themselves the Shrikes. IU authority says—
Automated
voice: End of first
holofeed. Automated voice: Playing second holofeed.
nanoL0gic:
Welcooooooooome to a
special episode of epiCast! Coming to you live from the
Jupiter Colony Academy! Thank you to our partners at
LunaCola—because of them, we’re now streaming throughout Sol
System.
nanoL0gic:
The Royal Trials are
almost here. Are you ready? We’ll have highlights and commentary
from games across the tournament. I’m your host, L0giiiiic, and it’s time
for my favorite segment and yours, “Stream Hopping”! So plug in, get your
questions ready, and hold on to your digitized butts, because YOU might
get to hop in stream with me. Ready? Let’s gooooo!
nanoL0gic:
Hey, what’s up,
you’re holo’ed in the epiCast stream. What’s your name, and
what’re you most excited about?
Bank$hot:
Hey, I’m on! I’m on!
MOM! Holy . . . okay, hey, L0gic! My name is Bank$hot, I’m eleven, and
I’m super excited about the Royal Trials, especially the Trios.
nanoL0gic:
Hey, Bank$hot,
welcome to the stream! And Trios! Definitely ready to see our faves
compete. If for some chaffing reason you don’t know what Trios is, jack
up the volume on the stream and pay attention. Trios is the new
battle royale format—not one, not two, but three players team up in
squad-based action to take on other teams, all competing to reach the
final level. But the fun doesn’t end there! Once at the final
level, it’s every player for themselves! Ultimate betrayals and
backstabbing! If you thought the rivalries were heated in Duos, look out!
Thanks, Bank$hot!
nanoL0gic:
Hey, what’s up?
You’re holo’ed in the epiCast stream. What’s your name, and
what’re you most excited about?
ImanI: Heeeey, L0gic. My name is ImanI, and
I’m ready to meet the new prince! Do you think he’ll make an
appearance? Ooh, do you think he’ll play in the Royal Trials?
nanoL0gic:
Hey, ImanI, nice
holofit! And the prince! What a story, right? Royalty at the battle
royale. The headlines stream themselves! Prince Yared the First, better
known as Yared the Gr8, is one of the top gamers across the
leaderboards, especially the HKO. I sure hope he enters the Trials.
But who knows? No one’s seen or heard from him since Axum entered the
system. Will one of the galaxy’s top gamers miss out on the tourna ment
of a lifetime? Where is Prince Yared?
nanoL0gic:
Where is Prince
Yared?
nanoL0gic:
Where is Prince
Yared?
nanoL0gic:
Where
aazzse22&^2 . . . . . . . . .
Automated
voice: Holofeed
corrupted. End of holofeed.
Automated
voice: Playing third
holofeed.
. .
.
. .
.
. .
.
The
Fallen: They’re here
. . . It’s time.
Automated
voice: End of
holofeed.
Log Entry,
0923 ST, Private Diary of the Royal Heir, Lij Yared Heywat
I, Yared
Heywat—recently discovered prince of the Axum Empire, and
not-so-recently-discovered top-ranked gamer on any leaderboard you can
name—am formally using this diary entry as my personal confession.
First, I did
not mean to start an intergalactic incident with an entire nation of
artificial intelligences. I love sentient AIs. One of my best friends, a
bionic lioness, is a sentient AI. The Coalition of Sentient Intelligence
Networks has my deepest apologies, and I will do my best to support them
going for
ward. I even
bought an I Love CoSIN pin for my flight suit. Second, I 100 percent
believed that solar collector I destroyed was already broken. To the
wonderful LiquiBulb corporation (I’m a huge fan of your juice bulbs, by
the way—super refreshing and tasty, ten out of ten, would buy for
my friends), I am super-duper sorry. Hopefully power will be restored to
your facility soon and we all will get to enjoy . . . your
spinach-and-salmon-soufflé juice bulbs once again. Mmm. I can taste the
energy already. Lovely.
Finally, to
the person whom I will actually be sending this diary entry but can’t
actually name because some bionic lionesses like to read my outgoing
comms for “protection,” I’m sorry. I really am. But, if I had to do it all
again, every single action taken up to this point, you know what? I
would.
Even the
part where I nearly died.
CHAPTER ONE
0645 ST, Harar Station, Axum
The
shrieking alarm caught me with my pants down. Literally. Look, I don’t
like telling you any more than you like hearing it, but the truth is the
truth. And my Royal Education Adviser and Reminder constantly begs me to
tell the honest truth. Not boast, brag, or stretch it in any way.
And I don’t know about you, but I listen to my REAR.
“Azaj,
what’s going on?” I asked, fumbling with my for mal flight suit. It’s hard to
put on a uniform while hovering upside down in midair. More on that in a
second.
The Harar’s
minister of the palace—an AI assistant that lived in Axum’s
servers—appeared as a translucent hologram in front of me and frowned. “It
appears that you need help dressing, among other things.”
“Not my
status—the station!” I snapped. “What’s the emergency?”
The hologram
sniffed. Can holograms sniff? Azaj, when it had to appear in front of
people, took on the image of a thin older man with a pencil-thin graying
mustache and a shimmering green shamma. The long cloth twisted and wrapped
around the AI in a formal pattern, an arrangement I couldn’t hope to imitate. I
should know, because it’s what I was currently wrangling with.
Upside down,
again. I promise I’ll explain why in a second.
“I shall
brief you once you’ve extricated yourself from your current predicament.
As an aside, Her Royal Highness—your mother—instructed me to collect
you. And to, I quote, ‘tell him to stop trying to cheat. He’ll
still lose during family game night, regardless of whatever hacks he
uploads to his nefasi.’”
I folded my
arms and glared at the hologram, but Azaj merely lifted an eyebrow. I
guess it’s hard to appear intimidating when you’re wearing nothing but
high-tech undies and floating upside down.
“I wasn’t
trying to cheat,” I grumbled.
Explanation
time, because I don’t want anyone saying Yared the Gr8 is a cheater. I
have to protect my rep—people already thought I got an unfair advantage,
what with being a prince and all.
I was
currently hovering high above the Meshenitai simulation room. It was a large
oval space the size of a field. The walls sloped out and up in a gentle
curve, with silver lines forming a checkered pattern against the soft
gray. When activated, the room could simulate any environment,
under any conditions you could think of. Want to pilot a powered
exoskeleton (exo for short) around a tropical island? What about through
an abandoned battle cruiser that crashed on a moon? The possibilities were
endless, and I spent hours coming up with different scenarios. Days
sometimes. Just . . . me. By myself. Coming up with ridiculous
tasks and trying to complete them.
The Ibis
used to help me program them, but ever since she started her Meshenitai
astrogator training, she had less and less time to hang out. Uncle Moti
used it to train Meshenitai in different maneuvers, but he’d been called
away for some important meeting a few days ago. I hadn’t seen him
since. In fact, I hadn’t really seen anyone over the past few days.
Even Besa, my bionic lioness turned Guardian, a half-ton bodyguard with
diranium claws and a ticklish spot behind her ears, was gone a lot. Something
about getting new claw upgrades. I don’t know, that cat was always
getting her nails done.
The point is
I was . . . I was lonely. There. I said it. Nobody tells you that being a
prince means missing gaming sessions with friends because you have to
learn protocol. So to help out, Mom, the Empress, came up with family
game night. I got to pick the game, and we all—me, Uncle Moti, Dad,
Mom, the Ibis, and Besa—would trek to the simulator and laugh, eat
snacks, and game.
Nobody also
told me that Mom was a genius when it came to capture the flag.
Seriously. It was borderline unbelievable. Have you ever played CTF in an exo?
You have to stay on your toes, and Mom was a pro.
So that’s
why I was in there, late for dinner, upside down in my nefasi as the
mysterious alarm blared and the simulation froze. Practice. Not that Azaj
cared. The virtual minister’s responsibilities—making sure every part of
Axum Station ran smoothly—didn’t include listening to my excuses.
By the way
the hologram was tapping a virtual finger impatiently, a certain newly
discovered prince was complicating things.
You can take
the boy out of Addis Prime, but you can’t take Addis Prime out of the
boy.
“Just give
me two seconds, Azaj, and I’ll be ready. They gave me a defective shamma.
Am I supposed to wrap it over the arm or under the arm?”
“You’re
supposed to be on the ground right side up when you put it on,” the AI
said drily.
“That’s
boring.” I finally managed to pull the cloth into position and grinned.
“See? Just your esteemed presence helps me out. By the way, have you seen
my REAR?”
Azaj winced.
“I wish you wouldn’t call it that.” “‘Every good prince’s REAR should always be
right behind him,’” I quoted from the orientation holovid I had to
watch when the adviser bot was assigned to me. “‘Backing him up.’”
Azaj
scowled, then the hologram straightened at its edges. It began to
shimmer. “It appears I am being summoned. Possibly because of the station-wide
alert that was just issued. I would suggest, my prince, that you
familiarize yourself with station protocols before leaving your
quarters. And not just the ones that are in place during an
emergency. Day-to-day ones, such as dressing in appropriate attire,
are also important. I will send your REAR—oh, teff of the saints,
now he’s got me calling it that. Your adviser should be along
shortly.”
With that,
the AI palace minister disappeared, and so did the grin on my face. There
was so much I didn’t know about being a prince. Sooner or later, it was
going to catch up with me. I just hoped it wouldn’t be in front of
anyone.
Okay, you
guys, I’m back with another update. I hope you all liked the last one. It
felt kinda nice talking to y’all, even though you can’t talk back.
Anyway, enough of that dull stuff. Listen up, here are Yared’s Top Ten
Facts You Didn’t Know about Being a Space Prince:
1.
Talking!
Everybody
wants to talk to me. Wait, I don’t think that’s right. Everybody wants to
talk AT me. It’s like all the newsvid reporters want to talk to the new
prince about Axum and what my daily routine is and stuff like that. I
think one group even sent a camera-drone by one-way courier rocket to
have it follow me around for a day in the life of Prince Yared. But no one actually
wants to have a conversation with me, you know? It’s like, they don’t
want to talk to Yared—just “the prince.” Does that makes sense?
Anyway.
2.
Space!
Not the
stars and planets and that asteroid I got to name. (Hope you like the
Haji-0043 vids I linked.) I’m talking about all the room there is aboard
the Harar. That’s the name of the top section of the Axum capital space
station. There are two more modules still missing, and we’re heading to
find one of them, Adwa, now. Maybe there will be a bunch of kids living
there when we arrive. It’d be nice to have some people in all this
space. I mean, yeah, it’s cool to have my own room and not hear
Uncle Moti snoring and Besa having that one dream where she fights
a bunamech for the last bulb of lubricant oil. But it’d be nice to have
some more people to hang out with in all this space, too.
Wow, this
is getting kind of sad. That’s not the point of these updates! Okay, the
next one should be really cool.
3.
Medical tattoos!
Okay,
technically they’re miniature med-drones that are assigned to check my
vitals, give me vitamins, and make sure I have the latest antibiotics.
But still. They draw them onto your skin, and you can pick the pattern
you want! It’s only right, since no one really likes robugs crawling
around them. (That name is patent-pending, by the way, so don’t steal
it.)
The
robugs are super important, apparently, because did you know there are,
like, millions of things that can get you sick if you travel the galaxy?
It’s like every world has their own version of the flu and they’re just
itching to give it to you.
Anyway,
that’s it for now. I gotta go; there’s somebody coming. I’ll drop this off at
the next Nexus uplink I see. Later, guys!
My REAR
found me frozen in a desert.
No,
seriously, I’m not joking. All the birr a royal allowance provided, and I
couldn’t get a decent holosim to work. There I was, Prince Yared of Axum—an
empire of advanced technology and sparkling ingenuity—floating
helplessly two hundred meters up in the air.
Upside down,
mind you!
The harness
of my nefasi, the backpack I lined with anti-gravity padding, held me high
above the space station’s sim chamber floor. Technically I wasn’t
supposed to be here. The Meshenitai, fabled warriors and protectors of
Axum, trained here. Battle scenarios, space station defense, rescue
strategies—they all could be programmed to play out in thousands of different
environments. If my uncle Moti— excuse me, General Moti Berihun, commander of
the Burning Legion of Axum—caught me here, I’d be doing laps around
the docking ring for hours.
Good thing
he was off chasing space pirates.
Although . .
. I could’ve used his help right then. Anyone’s help, actually. I was
using one of the Meshenitai sims to do a little training of my own. Not
that I needed it, but the Royal Trials were days away, and I’d just
learned it was going to be a Trios format. Three teammates.
I’d just
gotten used to having one partner, and now I had to have two!
Hopefully the Ibis and Fatima would get up to speed quickly. I’d assumed they’d
want to join my team. Why wouldn’t they? Two Meshenitai (well, one
Meshenitai and one new recruit) plus me, the greatest gamer that
ever crossed the stars? We couldn’t lose! Good thing I scheduled an
impromptu training session and messaged them about it in the middle of
the night. They hadn’t responded yet, which was weird, but maybe they were
just too excited and stayed up all night watching the Royal Trials level
reveal like I did. Now I just had to wait until they showed up and
we could start training.
After they
rescued me.
I sighed.
I’d been doing fine! But apparently the Meshenitai training sims weren’t
configured with the latest patches from, well, any game played in the
last century. Let alone the new Royal Trials levels. So I took the
liberty of uploading them, tweaking them a bit to provide more of a
challenge, and here we were! The perfect training sim!
Well, at
least until the desert level glitched around me. My nefasi was just about
to respond to the new level pick ups (I added a turbo boost for fun) when, all
of a sudden, the sim froze.
I couldn’t
move. I could only stare at the wonderfully rendered environment—the
sandstorm threatening to engulf me was delightful—as I waited to be
rescued. But any moment now the Ibis or Fatima or even Besa, my
bionic mouse catcher/lioness/Guardian, would arrive and—
“Selam, my
prince!” a cheerful voice said behind me. I sighed. Maybe being rescued was
overrated. “About time, Doombot.”
A silver
pyramid-shaped bot buzzed into my upside down view. Gold lines swept diagonally
down and around its surface, and the faint blue glow of its antigrav
thrusters gave it a majestic look. Too bad it was just a glorified
snitch. “I’m glad the Azaj sent me to you,” Doombot said. I named my REAR
that as a joke, but since I always happened to get in trouble whenever it
popped up, the name stuck. “According to my logs, it appears you have
avoided my carefully laid schedule for today’s events. I am here to
rectify that.”
“Can’t help
you there, Doombot. I’m super busy.” Doombot bobbed in the air and waited.
Silence fell. I folded my arms and tried to whistle, but have you ever
tried to whistle upside down? It’s impossible. Just a few spluttering
raspberries and a glob of drool. And you never want to drool while upside
down.
After
several seconds passed, Doombot spun in a circle. “Are you still—”
“Still
busy!” I said, wiping my face. “My friends should be here any
minute.”
“Ah! If you
are referring to the newest Meshenitai recruit—”
“The Ibis.”
I nodded.
“—and her
trainer—”
“Fatima,
too.”
“—and your
Guardian—”
“Besa, yep,
those are the friends. They’ll be here any minute now. Practice, you
know?”
“—they’re
not coming.”
“The Royal
Trials are coming up soon, and Trios will be the toughest competition . .
. Wait, what?” I glared at Doombot. “What do you mean, they’re not
coming? We’ve got practice! And I was up until morning programming
this desert environment.”
The helper
bot spun on its axis again. “The human ‘friends,’ as you like to call
them, have an assembly they’re attending. Your lioness is being refit for
close-quarters protection. Which leaves you, Your Highness. And as your
schedule clearly says, this time was reserved for speech
rehearsal.”
I stared at
it in confusion.
“For the
upcoming Intergalactic Union reception?” Doombot said helpfully.
Still
nothing.
“You have to
give a speech about Axum’s mission to find the missing modules.”
My eyes
widened. “Ooohhh, that! I thought that was, like, you know,
optional.”
“I’m afraid
not, my prince. You will be required to stand in front of thousands of
ambassadors, millions more watching via holofeed, and deliver a perfect
speech that will surely be replayed around the galaxy far into the
future. History will be made when you address the IU. Now, then,
let’s just go over . . . Wait, what are you doing? My prince?”
Look, I’m
not afraid to admit I panicked here. But do you blame me? They wanted me
to give a speech! To people! You send a princely message to the Nexus one
time—in order to stop a rampaging Bulgu—and all of a sudden
they make a figurehead out of you. Well, not this kid.
I unclipped
the harness on my nefasi. “I don’t do speeches. Nope. No, sirree, bot.
I’m out. If anyone needs me, I’ll be under my bed.”
“But, my
prince!”
“Later,
Doombot,” I called as the last snap unbuckled . . . . . . and I began to fall
six stories to the sim floor below.
The air
whistled past my ears as I plummeted. Somewhere above me, I heard alarms
blaring and Doombot shouting for help, but it all faded into the
background as I squinted and let out a giant whoop.
“This is
amaaaaaaaaaaaazing!” I shouted.
Everything
merged together into a gray blur. The only thing that mattered was this
moment. Me and the wind— artificial or not—between my fingertips as I spread my
arms wide. I hadn’t been able to get away from my newfound princely
responsibilities for a while. Everyone wanted me to do something. Study the
history of Axum. My family’s history. Aunts and uncles and cousins and
grandparents: this branch of the family tree or that one. Or maybe they,
like Doombot, wanted me to do what princes were supposed to do.
Make speeches, attend dinners, pose for holosims that would be broadcast
throughout the galaxy.
And that’s
cool and all.
But . .
.
What about
me? Did being a prince mean I had to stop being Yared?
The grin
faded as I scowled, my eyes still closed. No. Not today. Today, Yared was
doing something I always wanted to do . . . fly.
I opened my
eyes and flicked my wrist. A beam of light shot out from the sleeve of my
flight suit, and I caught it in my left hand. Glanced down.
The sim
floor grew closer and closer, much quicker than I’d expected.
I stretched
the light out with the gleaming silver-etched black gloves on both my
hands. The beam flattened into a wide, winged triangular shape that
glowed brighter than a thousand stars.
The floor
was only a dozen meters away.
I pushed the
winged light toward my boots and kicked my heels into place, smirking
when the energy board turned silver-blue. Birhani activation
complete.
The floor
was close enough for me to see my reflection, less than a meter before
Axum’s newest prince turned into Yared injera, when I twisted my legs
sharply. The birhani pivoted, skated along the training room’s wall, and
let out a high whine as I grabbed the front lip of the energy board
and shot forward, centimeters above the ground. I sped out of the room
and into a curved hallway.
What? You
thought I was in danger? Please.
I raced down
the empty corridor, laughing and shouting. Sometimes I’d ride up one curved
wall and loop around to the other side, dodging parked people movers and
leaping over the occasional cleaner bot. The training sim room was
located in one of the sections of Axum where no one had been for years,
which was good and bad. It was good because it meant I could do whatever
I wanted without someone telling me I was doing it wrong or wasn’t doing
it princely enough.
The bad?
Well . . .
I swerved
gently to avoid a stuffed undertaker bird lying in the middle of the
corridor. Frowned, then began to slow.
Some child
had probably dropped it and cried about missing it for weeks on end. Every now
and then, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t escape the knowledge
that the Werari and their monster, the Bulgu, had done this. They
forced the people of Axum to flee! To scatter across the galaxy! My heart
broke all over again.
But that was
the whole point of the journey we were on right now. Axum—the Emperor and
Empress, their Meshenitai, Guardians, and other staff—was on its way
to reunite the fractured pieces into a whole. Somewhere out there
among the stars, a kid like me stared up and wondered where they really
belonged.
I hoped we
could bring them that answer soon. To that end, we would need the help of
others. Like the Intergalactic Union, or IU for short. The governing
body of the galaxy. The people I had to make a speech in front of
later.
I sighed,
then paused and looked around. I . . . didn’t recognize a single
centimeter of my surroundings. “Not again,” I groaned. The one drawback to
zooming around the abandoned sections of a giant space station: It
was super easy to get lost.
A blue light
flickered over my wrists as I opened my wrist comm. A map of the local
area floated in the air in front of me. Scratching my head, I tried to
zoom in and rotate to find out where I was, but the maze of passageways
and doors made no sense. As I zoomed out to try and get a better look, a
red light blinked on my wrist comm. Message ping. Sender, Uncle Moti.
“Great,” I
said. “Just great. Just what I need, a lecture about getting lost and
responsibilities and blah blah blah.” I hesitated, then dismissed the
alert. It was probably best for me to figure out where I was before
facing the interrogation.
The birhani
cast a soft glow as I floated in the middle of a giant six-way junction.
Empty streets lined with benches and hoverlamps stretched off into the
distance all around me. The space station was a giant obelisk surrounded
by habitation rings larger than the city of Addis Prime, where I
grew up, and it was far bigger on the inside. I got lost once trying to
find a shower in my bedroom. (Fun fact: The showers were giant spheres
that rotated around you, like standing in a gentle whirlpool that cleaned
you instead of terrifying you.)
Anyhoo,
traveling on a path toward the outer ring was called moving ringward, while
traveling toward the inner ring, in the direction of the central obelisk,
was called moving inward. From the little info I could pull from the map,
I was in a section of the space station highlighted in orange, a
flashing rectangular message in the middle.
“‘Closed due
to insufficient number of residents,’” I read aloud. “‘Royal decree
required to reopen.’”
I looked
around. The highlighted section of the map was right in front of me. The
streets were clear. The residential living modules, bright and airy hexagons
with built-in green spaces, were in pristine condition. Somewhere in
the distance, I could hear a water fountain, and hidden speakers filled
the air with gentle birdsong.
Basically .
. . it was perfect. And yet . . .
I sent the
birhani humming down the street and drifted lazily from side to side,
taking in the beautiful patterns and intricate designs decorating the
sides of the lot of buildings. Holo-ads for neighborhood businesses, eateries,
and other attractions materialized as I floated by. Street names
written in Ge’ez traced themselves in light, disappearing as I moved on.
I could almost hear the people going about their day—looking for a meal,
gathering with friends, laughing at something that happened earlier in
the day. It was . . . really sad.
Something
beeped shrilly in the distance.
I
froze.
What was
that noise? I leaned forward, and the light wing hummed a little faster down
the street. “Hello?” I called out. “Anyone there?”
Nothing.
Only the artificial birdsong. I frowned, then sent the lightwing creeping
forward even farther before coming to a stop near a plain one-story
storage building. I listened for that weird noise, but there was nothing.
The storage building’s hatchway had lights running around it, but
when I moved closer, it remained shut. Must’ve been locked.
The beeping
sounded again. It was definitely coming from the storage
building.
“I’m warning
you, I have a”—I glanced down, then gulped—“a map, and I’m not afraid to
use it.” Still no answer. I cruised forward a few more meters before
frowning and slowing to a stop. Maybe I was just paranoid. Battling the
Werari—had that really only been a few months ago?—had turned my nerves
to glass. The slightest surprise would—
The floor
beneath me fell away. A square section col lapsed into a ramp that slid into
darkness. I shouted as the birhani and I tumbled down, head over heels. I
crashed into two poles, ribs first, and grunted in pain. That was
going to leave a mark.
“Jeeez,” I
groaned, clutching my side. “I’m suing. Someone. Everyone. Who leaves a
trapdoor there? That’s just . . .” My voice trailed off as the birhani—which
had gone dark—flickered back to life. The light from the lightboard filled
the room I’d just fallen into. I hadn’t crashed into poles. They were
legs. Armored legs. I stood slowly, the birhani rising with me.
Dented armor
legs.
An armored
chestplate that looked to be scorched and beat up beyond repair.
Midnight-black
helmet with tinted faceshield. “An exo,” I whispered. “Old, but . . .”
A light
blinked on in the upper-right corner of the faceshield . . . and the
helmet moved.
I screamed
and ran. I’ve never climbed anything as fast as I climbed that ramp. When
I reached the top, I threw the birhani beneath my boots and cranked up
the speed as far as it could go, only for it to flicker off again.
It crashed to the street and sent me skidding across the ground
once more.
Boots
dropped into view as I rolled over. When I looked up, a group of
silver-and-black Meshenitai exos, loaded down with a small armory,
dropped to the ground in bright trails of fire. Five, ten, fifteen of
them landed around me, circling in a ring of bristling metal and burning
thrusters. Black faceshields masked them, and as one they
unsheathed curved swords bigger than me, their blades rippling with
black fire.
A bead of
sweat rolled down my face. The birhani fizzled and disappeared.
“Um . . .
hi?” I said.
One of the
exos stepped forward, and the faceshield slid up.
“You are in
huge trouble,” said the Ibis.
About Kwame Mbalia:
KWAME
MBALIA is a husband, father, writer, a New York Times bestselling
author, and a former pharmaceutical metrologist in that order. He is the author
of Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky, a Coretta Scott King
Honor book. He lives with his family in North Carolina. Visit him online
at kwamembalia.com.
Website | Twitter | Instagram | TikTok | Goodreads
.JPG)
PRINCE JOEL
MAKONNEN is the great-grandson of His Imperial Majesty Emperor Haile
Selassie I, the last emperor of Ethiopia. He is an attorney and the co-founder
of Old World/New World, a media and entertainment company focused on telling
powerful African stories that inspire global audiences through film, TV and
books. He lives with his wife, Ariana, in Los Angeles.
Website | Twitter | Facebook
| Instagram | Goodreads
Giveaway Details:
1 winner will receive a finished copy of THE ROYAL TRIALS (LAST GATE OF THE EMPEROR #2), US Only.
a Rafflecopter giveawayTour Schedule:
Week One:
|
7/5/2022 |
Excerpt/IG Post |
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7/6/2022 |
Excerpt |
|
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7/7/2022 |
Excerpt |
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7/8/2022 |
Excerpt/IG Post |
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7/9/2022 |
Excerpt |
Week Two:
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7/10/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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7/11/2022 |
IG Post |
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7/12/2022 |
Review |
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7/13/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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7/14/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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7/15/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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|
7/16/2022 |
Review |
Week Three:
|
7/17/2022 |
Excerpt |
|
|
7/18/2022 |
IG Review |
|
|
7/19/2022 |
Review |
|
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7/20/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
|
|
7/21/2022 |
Review |
|
|
7/22/2022 |
Review/IG Post |
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