Quantum Light

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Space Colony Journals – 7

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Gail Daley

Quantum Light Copyright © 2020 by Gail Daley dba Gail Daley's Fine Art

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.

For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed "Attention: Permissions Coordinator," at the address below.

Gail Daley

5688 E Sussex Way

Fresno, CA 93727

www.gaildaleysfineart.com

Ordering Information: Quantity sales. Special discounts are available on quantity purchases by corporations, associations, and others. For details, contact the "Bulk Sales Department" at the address above.

Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction, and any resemblance to any persons living or dead is unintentional and accidental.

Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.

Book Layout ©2017 BookDesignTemplates.com

Quantum Light © 2020

Cover Art Copyright © 2020 by Gail Daley's Fine Art. Used with permission

Amazon ASIN:

E- Book ISBN: 9781393128588

Print Book ISBN 9781393099567

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Gail's Other Books

SPACE COLONY JOURNALS

Options Of Survival

Destiny Rising

Tomorrows Legacy

The Interstellar Jewel Heist

The Designer People

Alien Trails

Quantum Light

PORTAL WORLD TALES

ST. ANTONI THE FORBIDDEN COLONY

Warriors of St. Antoni

The Enforcers

The Gaslight Bandits

MAGI OF RULARI

Spell Of The Magi

Magi Storm

NON-FICTION

The Complete Modern Artist’s Handbook

PAMPHLETS

Introduction To The Internet #1

The Hard Stuff – Handbook #2

Art Show Basics – Handbook #3

Framing on a Budget – Handbook #4

Are You Making Money? – Handbook #5

About This Book

A family of innocent botanists finds themselves thrust into the middle of a drug war on an alien planet.

Rupert and Aire have come to Trellya to negotiate the purchase of plants Rupert uses in the medicines and cosmetics his company makes. The dactyl Pelcon is with them because he goes everywhere Rupert goes. Sesuna came with them to find out what is happening on her family's estates. Teenage Selick came to see Trellya and meet the birth mother who sold her to the Thieves Guild as an infant. Will she love her or hate her? Either way, Selick has a lot of growing up to do.

To her horror Sesuna discovers her family's property has been over-run by rebels who plan to finance their revolution with the sale of Submit, a banned, highly addictive drug employed to make users compliant. They have already planted some fields on her property with plants used to create it. If she can't prove her innocence the Magistra will use this as an excuse to seize the estate. But Before Sesuna can destroy the fields she and Selick are kidnapped by the rebels, whose leader intends to force Sesuna into marriage to gain control of the estate. Can Rupert and Sesuna defeat him and save her family's lands?

Birthday Girl

L

ady Selick O'Teague ni's'Rudin studied her image in the mirror on her dresser. It showed a mixed-race teenager with the slender build, tightly curled maroon hair and the light grey skin of her Trellyan heritage. Her human ancestry was revealed in her bright blue eyes. It was her birthday and as near as she knew, she was fifteen years old today. After four years she still wasn't quite used to being addressed as Lady Selick, the title bestowed on her the day Lady Katherine and Lord Zack adopted her and the other children rescued from a Thieves Guild breeding farm on the continent of Brisai.

Unlike some of the other children, she hadn't been born in the embryonic laboratory at the farm. Selick was half Trellyan but she had never seen her birth planet. Rather than accept a half-breed human as one of them, immediately after her birth, her biological family sold her to the Thieves Guild. Selick's biological mother, Berindar s'Rudin, had stolen out of her home to attend a forbidden party. On the way back she had been caught and raped by a group of drunken free traders. The attack had resulted in a child, Selick.

The caste system that dictated Trellyan society was strict. Children of mixed parentage were a disgrace. Berindar might have been forgiven for birthing a child out of wedlock, but not one who was half human. The Magistra, the matriarchal theocracy who ruled Trellya, strictly forbade the killing of children, but the laws had not prevented the s'Rudin's from disposing of an unwanted half-breed child by selling her.

Selick had always privately felt her birth family had thrown her away. This view wasn't shared by her adopted mother. A rape, Lady Kathrine said gently, was brutal and frightening. She suggested that perhaps Berindar s'Rudin had given Selick up because she wanted her raised in an environment of love, even if she couldn't face the reminder of the attack Selick represented. According to Lady Katherine, her birth mother's sacrifice enabled Selick to take her rightful place as Lady Katherine's daughter. Selick had smiled and nodded, but she didn't really believe it. Lady Katherine was notoriously tenderhearted, and she made no secret of the idea that she believed all of the rescued children were meant to be hers.

Selick's buyer had been Thieves Guild Lieutenant Hans Grouter. He had developed the breeding farm where she lived until she was eleven. He had intended all the children at the farm be raised and trained to take their places in his various criminal enterprises. He had his fat fingers in all types of illegal activities from black market arms deals to burglary, assassinations and fencing stolen property. He had dreamed of children trained from birth to be his agents in these operations.

Selick and the others were not the first children Grouter had created and raised for this purpose, nor was the embryo lab on Brisai his first attempt at creating designer children.

He had moved his original lab from Fenris to Vensoog because it had been discovered by Jerrod Van Doyle. Van Doyle ran the local arm of the Thieves Guild Prostitution business and was constantly in need of 'fresh meat' for the child sex trade. Having his future agents 'mucked up' by Van Doyle wasn't a part of Grouter's plans so he protected 'his' children as much as possible from Van Doyle's recruitment forays.

Van Doyle's discovery of the first lab also forced Grouter to move his original three designer girls to the child placement center he ran on Fenris. There, Grouter and the children he intended as his future agents, had existed in a state of cold war with Van Doyle. When Van Doyle's involvement in child sex trafficking was discovered, Grouter was implicated and jailed.

The Karamine war, an interplanetary conflict involving nearly all of the Confederated Planets, ended shortly after Selick's placement at the breeding farm. As a result of the wars end, Lady Katherine had traveled to Fenris and met Lord Zack. They rescued five of Grouter's first designer children and returned with them to Vensoog where they raised them to adulthood.

Lucinda, one of the original girls, became a police officer and through her work discovered the designer children and the new embryo lab. Selick had been eleven when this happened. That year her entire world had been turned upside down. She and the others had gone from the regimented, sterile environment of Grouter's school to the warm and open family life of Clan O'Teague.

That same year she had been introduced to Lady Ispone and her daughters, Trellyans who had been adopted into the clan. From them she had learned much about the planet of Trellya and its laws and customs. Selick loved Vensoog and her new family, but she couldn't help being intensely curious about Trellya and about her birth mother, however disloyal that curiosity made her feel.

"Hey, you're going to miss your party!" exclaimed Byrony, one of her sisters. Byrony was blond and blue eyed, a little on the plump side, and one of Selick's best friends.

Lady Katherine and Lord Zack had adopted all fourteen of the children found alive in the camp on Brisai, gladly extending their immediate family to include the now homeless orphans from Brisai. None of the seven girls, except for the twin Syrenes, Azalure and Meredia, with their copper hued skin, aqua hair and silver eyes, looked much like each other. Rachel was tall and gangly with white hair and blue eyes. Since she shared DNA with her older sister Lucinda, it was a safe bet that she would grow into a tall, full bodied woman. Patrice was slight with green eyes, a pale complexion and her flaming hair was pulled back in a long braid. Zahra was slight too, but she had straight, blue-black hair and almond shaped dark blue eyes. Like her older sister Violet, Zahra was a powerful empath. Anita also had blue eyes, but hers were a lighter shade of blue, her hair was brown, and she shared Juliette and Patrice's dainty build and pale skin. She also had some healing ability.

"I'm coming!" Selick said, shaking off her pensive mood and following Byrony down the stairs.

Before coming to Veiled Isle, none of the rescued children had ever celebrated a birthday. The staff at the lab had usually just marked another year on the charts they kept on the children. The child might not even know a birthday had passed. Here, every birthday was a celebration.

As Selick entered the common room, everyone began to sing the Birthday song. There was quite a crowd in attendance. In addition to her adopted brothers and sisters, most of the children whose parents worked on the estate were present. As a number of them owned Quirka, the small vermin predators adopted by Vensoog natives, their joyful chirps and churrs added to the canopy of noise.

Selick felt her face flushing and she smiled self-consciously as Lady Juliette, Lady Katherine's First Daughter and heir, led her to the place of honor at the head of the table where a pile of wrapped gifts waited for her.

Like Lucinda, Juliette had been one of Grouter's original designer girls. She was slight, with a long curling mane of red hair and pale porcelain skin. Selick didn't envy her older sister her position as heir to Veiled Isle. Being chosen as a First Daughter was an honor, but it meant a lot of work as well.

"Make a wish and blow out the candles," Juliette whispered, while her dactyl Saura crooned encouragement overhead.

Selick took a deep breath, blew hard, and all the candles went out.

"What did you wish for?" Patrice, another graduate of the Brisai farm, asked. Like Juliette, Patrice was a designer child, The same tissue and DNA material used to create Juliette had also been used in her design. If not for the twelve-year age difference, the two girls might have passed for twins.

"Now, she can't tell you that," admonished Lady Corine, "it would spoil the wish." Lady Corrine was nearly sixty and the actual ruler of Veiled Isle, but these days she and her husband Vernel spent most of their time in leisure activities, leaving much of the actual work of administering the affairs of Veiled Isle to Lady Katherine and Lord Zack.

Later, after she had unwrapped her gifts and thanked everyone, Selick found herself sitting with Lady Ispone and her daughter Sesuna, watching Ispone's youngest daughter Shalendra play with several other clan toddlers.

The Trellyan woman was a tall, full breasted lady with a matronly figure. Her maroon hair was coiled up into a tightly wound headdress. Her skin, a darker shade of grey than Selick's, was smooth and unlined.

"Are you enjoying your special day?" Ispone asked her.

"Yes I am," Selick admitted. "Thank you for the plant. It smells wonderful."

"It's a Trellyan plant—Heart's Lily. If you put it in a window with plenty of sun and give it lots of water, it emits a soothing aroma," Sesuna interjected. "It will help you sleep without nightmares. We got it from Rupert."

Rupert was Lord Zack's nephew. He and Sesuna were both botanists and spent a lot of time working together in the new greenhouse.

Selick looked up with a wry smile; a little miffed that her nightmares had become common knowledge, but she had learned that this was how a family operated. On Veiled Isle Clan O'Teague had no secrets; Everyone seemed to know everyone else's business.

"I thought Hearts Lily was one of the plants you needed for the birthing center," Selick said. "Isn't it a rare plant?"

"It's true we don't have as many available as I would like for the new births, but Rupert is planning to travel to Trellya to arrange importing more seedlings," Ispone said. "I want Sesuna to accompany him to check up on my property there. I don't like the reports I'm getting back. I think something is off."

Selick hesitated, then blurted out, "I've never seen Trellya and I've always wanted to see it. Do you think it would be possible for me to come along on the trip?"

"What does your mother say?" Ispone asked.

"I haven't asked her," Selick admitted. "I didn't know you were going until just now. I know it's a dreadful imposition, but I'd try to stay out of everyone's way. I just want to see it."

"And maybe pay a visit to your birth family?" Ispone asked shrewdly.

Selick felt heat rising in her face. "Well, maybe. I'd just like to meet her face to face to see what she's like."

"She might not want to meet you; Half-bloods don't have an easy time on Trellya," Sesuna warned her. "It's nearly as bad as Y'Lelenor that way."

Selick's chin went up. "I can take it."

"Well, If you can get permission from your parents, you can come along," Sesuna said.

Lady Katherine and Lord Zack looked at Selick gravely when she made the request to accompany Sesuna and Rupert to Trellya.

"Darling, I understand you are curious about your birth planet," Lady Katherine said gently, "but Trellya has a very rigid caste system, and anyone who isn't pure Trellyan is considered very low rank or has none at all."

"Sesuna warned me about the same thing," Selick said. "I told her I can take it. I don't want to live there; I just want to see the place."

"If Sesuna and Rupert don't mind looking after you, you can go," Lord Zack said.

Lady Katherine frowned, but nodded.

When they were alone afterwards, Lord Zack explained to Katherine, "If we don't allow it now, she'll go as soon as she is an adult. At least this way she won't be alone in a hostile environment. Rupert will take good care of her."

At the last moment, Rupert decided to take along his assistant in Port Recovery, Aire Philen. Like Selick, Aire was one of the rescued children, and like her he was only half human. Aire was actually in his early twenties and considered an adult although he looked much younger due to his Elven heritage. He had received his first Match List two years ago and soon after went to work for Rupert and Roderick as Rupert's assistant. Aire had brilliant green eyes, and straight blue-black hair worn a little longer than the current fashion. With his Elven good looks and natural charm, he made an excellent salesman. This made him a good counter foil for Rupert's scientist leanings. Rupert hoped the young man's abilities would assist in convincing plant growers on Trellya to agree to allow the company to import seedlings from several species of plants he wanted for his cosmetics and medicine lines.

The New Greenhouse

R

upert had missed Selick's party. He arrived by shuttle from Port Recovery several days later. As he stepped out of the shuttle, he surveyed the new greenhouse with approval. It was enormous, a clear plasti-crete dome. The clear panels let in sunlight and could be opened during the hot summer months allowing the cooling breezes to keep the plants from overheating. During the winter they could be shut permitting the temperature in the dome to remain constant. He was sure Lady Corrine would be pleased with it; his great aunt was constantly looking for ways to add revenue to the island coffers and the plants he intended to grow were in high demand from pharmaceutical and cosmetic companies for use in their products.

Like his twin Roderick, Rupert was tall and slim with a narrow, dark-complexioned face, brown eyes and hair, which he kept cut short. He spent a lot of his time in the office and lab of R & R Security and Pharmaceuticals the company he owned with his brother. Even though he hadn't been able to give the new greenhouse on Veiled Isle the attention he wanted, he had felt confident leaving it in Sesuna’s charge. She was young—she would get her third Match List in the Planting Festival this spring, but The Trellyan girl had proved quite talented with plants.

In his opinion, it had been a boon when her mother, Lady Ispone a former Priestess of the Fire Mother on Trellya, had broken with the Trellyan Magistra and joined Clan O’Teague. Lady Katherine had invited her and her daughters to settle on Veiled Isle where Lady Ispone had set up a birthing center which was becoming quite popular with the Clans.

He heard his name called in excitement and looked up to see Sesuna racing toward him. She greeted him the way she had for years; she threw her arms around his neck, giving him an exuberant hug, while his dactyl Pelcon flew around chirping excitedly.

Dactyls were native to Vensoog and came in a variety of sizes. Early settlers had been reminded of the pterodactyls found in old earth history books. The name had been shortened to Dactyl. Dactyls had four limbs and a set of wings. Pelcon was of the tiny variety. His front hands, face and rear talons were clear of the fuzzy hair covering the rest of his body. Ever since Rupert had found him as a starving kit whose mother had been killed, the pair had developed a unique bond. Part of a dactyl's predator defense allowed him to pick up on emotions of those around him so they could sense being hunted. It had been discovered they could share that bond with humans as he did with Rupert.

Laughing, Rupert hugged Sesuna back, realizing with something of a shock that it was a well-filled armful he held. He set her abruptly on her feet and stepped back. He looked at her with new eyes, realizing she had grown into a lovely woman. She hadn't felt like a little girl anymore and his body had reacted to hers pressed against it. Over her head, he caught his Uncle Zack giving him the fisheye and felt his ears turning red. His uncle had obviously read his feelings like a book. Thankfully Zack refrained from mentioning it in front of Sesuna, although Rupert could sense Pelcon's inner mirth at the situation. Pelcon liked and approved of Sesuna as a mate for his friend.

Sesuna was short for a Trellyan woman, only about six-foot-tall, with a lushly curved figure. Her short-cropped maroon curls framed a delicate, fine-boned face with large ebony eyes and full curved lips. No, not a little girl anymore.

She looked a bit puzzled at his abrupt release, but she was too excited about the new greenhouse to let it disturb her. She grabbed his hand and tugged him toward the dome. "Come and see the new Hearts Lily bulbs! I knew they had to be put in soil right away, so I went ahead and planted them."

"I need to put up my stuff," he protested.

"Go look at the new plants, son," his uncle said with a grin. "She’s been on pins and needles all week to show them to you. I’ll take care of your bags."

When Zack reached the family’s private entrance to Veiled Lodge, he handed off the two duffel bags to the house-bot he found waiting in the hall, with instructions to take them to Lord Rupert's room.

His wife looked up from the program she was coding when he came in. "What did you do with Rupert?"

He smiled, thinking how fortunate it had been when Katherine had come to Fenris seeking new genetic material for her devastated planet. After twelve years, he still found her the most beautiful woman he knew. Her flaming hair was just as bright, her smile as warm and her heart as big, and her figure just as straight as when he first met her.

"Sesuna dragged him off to see those plants that arrived this week. I barely got a chance to say hello."

Katherine looked thoughtful. “Ispone and I were talking about that the other day. She thinks her daughter has a crush on Rupert. Sesuna's received a List for the past two years, but she apparently didn’t like any of the men on it well enough to form a connection," Katherine said, referring to the list of eligible DNA partners given to every Vensoog teenager when the reached adulthood. "She’s a very pretty girl. I’m surprised we haven’t been swamped with suitors.”

Zack laughted. “Well that might change soon. If I’m any judge, Rupert just realized today that she’s all grown up.”

Katherine looked an inquiry and Zack grinned. "She gave him one of her knock-you-off-your-feet hugs. There’s nothing like having a girl throw herself at you to make you aware she’s all woman."

Katherine frowned. "I think Ispone would be pleased if they got together, but he might not have much time to court Sesuna. If I remember correctly, Ispone intends sending Sesuna to Trellya to check on their property there. I don't think it has occurred to Ispone, but If she goes alone she would be subject to their marriage laws; in particular that stupid 'marriage capture' thing allowed there. She could be in danger of being forced into a marriage she doesn't want."

"Ispone lived there for years. Why wouldn't an issue like that occur to her?"

"Ispone was a Fire Priestess," Katherine reminded him. "The Priestesses are exempt from that law."

Zack frowned. "We could send security with her the way we did with Juliette when she went out with that explorer team on Kitingzen," he suggested.

Katherine nodded. "I suppose so, but there might be another choice. Didn't Rupert say he planned a trip there to increase the number of plants he imports? He gets a lot of his stuff from Trellya."

Zack looked thoughtful. "You're thinking of asking him to escort her to Trellya? What does Ispone think is wrong on the estate?"

"Ispone didn't exactly say; she just doesn't like the reports she's been getting."

"I can tell there's something you aren't telling me. What is it?"

Katherine sighed. "Ispone says they need more Fire Indri's for the birthing center."

"Isn't it illegal to sell them to someone intending to take them off planet?"

"Yes. But apparently Ispone has a connection with a man who trades on the black market. She and this man were very close friends. She thinks he might provide Sesuna with some Fire Indri embryos because she's her daughter."

"For him to break the law, they must have been more than just good friends," he pointed out.

"Probably. According to Ispone he always volunteered for the Fertility rites in the hope of getting her as a partner."

"How does she plan for Sesuna to get the Indri's off Trellya?"

"She didn't say, I suppose she must have a plan though. She may have broken ties with The Magistra but she spent several years developing influential contacts so she could make good marriages for her daughters."

Zack frowned. "I'll warn Rupert. He needs to know what he's likely to be getting into if Sesuna is planning to smuggle Fire Indri embryos off the planet."

"Do you think we shouldn't let Selick go?" Katherine asked anxiously.

"The reasons I gave earlier for allowing her to accompany them haven't changed, hon. Rupert will look after the girls."

When her mother took her into her office to discuss the upcoming trip, marriage was the furthest thing from Sesuna's mind. There was a strong physical resemblance between mother and daughter, which grew stronger each year.

"Something is wrong there," Ispone said.

"Why do you say that?"

Ispone slapped the desk. "These all read the same! As if someone was simply copying the last report. I don't think Corsik is writing them."

Sesuna picked up the reports and read through them. Finally she looked up at her mother. "You're right, they do read as if they have been copied from earlier reports. What do you think is wrong?"

Ispone sighed. "When I was a girl, there was a rebellion against the Magistra. It was put down, but some of the instigators escaped. It was rumored the escaping rebels retreated up into the hills behind our lands. When Eloyoni went there soon after we joined the clan she heard rumors that the rebels were active again,"

"On our property?"

"You must understand that your great grandmother favored reforming the government and allowing more secular laws to replace some of the Magistra's edicts."

"Great Grandmama was a rebel?"

"Oh, no, she was never accused. The faction she favored wanted to reform the government through political means, not violence. But I suspect she allowed the rebels to take refuge in the hills behind our property and didn't report their presence."

"I don't understand the connection."

"The rebels may have taken control of our property near their stronghold. If that is the case, they must be made to release it, or we will lose our land."

"Are you going to return to Trellya?"

"No, I cannot. I made too many enemies in the Magistra when I broke with them. I want you to go. Eloyoni is too involved with her duties as a cook on that exploration team, and she has a new husband and child as well. You are single and unencumbered, so you are free to make the journey."

"Is that the only reason?"

Her mother gave her a wry smile. "You are quick. No the property isn't the only reason. I want you to get in touch with an old friend of mine, Jolimser s'Legume. He breeds Fire Indri's for the Magistra. I think he will remember me fondly enough to help you obtain a few Fire Indri embryos to bring back with you."

"It's illegal to export Fire Indri's off Trellya," Sesuna reminded her.

"Yes, I know," her mother said. "If we are to make this birthing center a success, Fire Indri's are essential though."

"And if I get caught?"

Ispone smiled. "You won't. You are my daughter."

"Will your enemies come after me because I'm your daughter?"

Ispone frowned. "There is one Priestess—Eloyoni mentioned that Priestess Celthe had attempted to cause trouble when she was there."

"Who is this Celthe? Why does she hate you?"