Measure of the Stars (Starian)

Chapter One

The parents of Wesley Bradnell-FitzRoy Leonhart should have never been allowed to name their own children.

Wesley was a fairly normal name, but the way his parents said it reminded Wes of the way nobles addressed their inbred dogs.

The upper-class dogs of Staria were little more than tiny abominations, wheezing and puffing through noses mashed too close to the skull.

Bradnell-FitzRoy was simply too much. Even nobles didn’t give their kids more names than they had to unless they were royalty, but royals were about as inbred as the snub-nosed dogs and could be forgiven.

A name like Wesley Bradnell-FitzRoy Leonhart belonged to a weak-kneed, red-haired cousin of the king, not a commoner who didn’t need a chart to untangle his family tree.

People with names like Wesley’s were supposed to be respectable.

They married nice rich suitors and taught horses to dance if they wanted a bit of excitement.

They didn’t have the wherewithal to do anything else.

No doubt his parents had hoped Wes would live up to his name when he’d been born.

His older siblings hadn’t. Louise had stuck her head in a book as soon as she was old enough to lift one, and Ferrin had been dead set on being a member of the king’s guard in the womb, despite the fact that the guard had to, on principle, voluntarily approach the king.

Ferrin’s rise in the guard hadn’t been respectable enough for the Leonharts, though.

Wes’ mother and father had to hope that a posh name would be enough to make Wes the kind of man to nab a noble partner and climb the ranks of high society.

Instead, he’d turned out to be a capital disappointment.

“Seaman Wesley Bradnell-FitzRoy Leonhart.” Lord Cecil Freemantle, a former commander in King Emile’s navy and a walking relic, lifted a pair of gold spectacles off his nose.

He had the face of a seasoned aristocrat who had been left in the sun and was starting to melt, and his jowls drooped into the sunken divot nobles liked to call a chin.

According to rumor, he’d been one of the worst commanders of his time.

One of Wes’ mates said he used to have insubordinate sailors taken ‘round the fleet, flogged until they were a pile of bones and strips of flesh. Wes believed it. Lord Cecil had the look of a rabid weasel with ambition, and age hadn’t softened that a whit.

“Commander Freemantle,” Wes said. The only thing Lord Cecil commanded these days was a piece of the military court, but Wes would be damned if he called the little bastard my Lord.

He saluted the other members of the court; a row of nobles with ranks they didn’t earn, sitting on a bench with Lord Cecil just because they’d drawn an unlucky lot that month.

Lord Cecil grunted. “You stand before this court accused of insubordination of the highest order. The charges are; Attacking a commanding officer, insult to a peer of the realm, laying hands on a dominant of his majesty’s navy, inciting mutiny, and...

” He pursed his dry, cracked lips. “General malfeasance. According to the new law laid down by his majesty King Adrien, you are permitted to speak in your own defense.”

Wes clasped his hands behind his back. “No, thank you.”

Lord Cecil squinted at him. Behind him, one of the nobles on the lesser court stirred in his chair as Lord Cecil’s natural dominance rang out in the cramped room. “You will repeat yourself.”

“I said, no,” Wes said, leaning toward Lord Cecil. “Sir.”

A hush fell over the courtroom. The navy wasn’t like the rest of Staria.

While King Adrien was heralding a new era in Starian politics, paving the way for submissive nobles to take higher positions in the government, the navy was firmly entrenched in the past. Submissives were expected not to talk back.

A submissive officer was rare, usually noble, and never taken seriously.

A submissive commoner was about as valuable as dirt.

Outside, the port city of Redmason hummed with life.

They were only a few streets away from the docks, where sailors and dock workers fucked off until someone in charge passed by.

Brothels pulled up their colorful ribbons for the day and turned into public eating houses for exhausted workers, and thieves slipped in and out of the crowd, robbing anyone who didn’t pay attention.

Somewhere out there, through the thick of sailors, workers, thieves and courtesans, Captain Lennox was bleeding all over his nice silk sheets.

“I insist on an explanation,” Lord Cecil said.

“No explanation necessary, sir,” Wes said. “I tied Captain Lennox to the mast, beat him with his own whip, and spat in his face for good measure. Mutiny, violence, insult, and general malfeasance.”

Lord Cecil’s voice wavered, but the dominance choking the room did not. “I will not abide you making a mockery of this court, young man.”

Wes wanted to tell him that he’d know if Wes was mocking the court, but he didn’t see the point.

Captain Lennox had staggered off the ship with a bloody back and a fear in his eyes that wouldn’t go away in a hurry.

Wes’ fate had already been decided before he’d entered the court. It didn’t matter what he said now.

“Why did you do it?” That voice came from one of the men behind Lord Cecil.

Wes tried not to pull a face. Lord Delauney de Mazet, the younger son of one of the wealthiest families in Staria, leaned forward.

He was pretty for a noble, with a round face and a soft frame, but his hair was ghost-pale with too much sunlight.

Unlike the other members of the court, he was wearing a working captain’s uniform, pale blue with silver buttons and a black sash hanging loosely off his shoulder.

“Why isn’t what we’re here for, de Mazet,” Lord Cecil said, turning his withering look of displeasure to Delauney. Delauney blinked in the face of Lord Cecil’s dominance, but kept his pale blue gaze on Wes.

“I’d like to know,” he said.

“As a man who served under Lord Lennox,” Lord Cecil said, “one would think that you’d want justice.”

Wes met Delauney’s gaze. When had a pampered submissive noble like Delauney ended up serving under a man like Lord Lennox? Even if he had, Delauney wouldn’t have suffered under his command. There were rules about abusing nobles, particularly ones whose lands grew most of the grain in Staria.

“He was whipping a boy,” Wes said, looking at Delauney.

“You might as well fine every officer in the navy if that’s a crime,” Lord Cecil said. His face melted a little more into his nonexistent chin, and he let out a burbling sound that might have been a laugh.

“Is the boy all right?” Delauney asked.

“Enough,” one of the other nobles said. “Let Lord Cecil get on with it, Delauney. I have an appointment in an hour.”

Delauney opened his mouth as though he might speak, then closed it and sat back, his soft eyes troubled.

Everything about him was soft, now that Wes had a better look at him.

He wondered how Delauney made it to the courthouse without being scammed by every con artist on the docks.

He was the genteel kind of nobleman they liked to take advantage of: worrisome, sympathetic, and about as sturdy as a handkerchief in a hurricane.

Lord Cecil cleared his throat, and Wes turned to face him.

“I have been recently reminded,” Lord Cecil said, glaring at Delauney out of the corner of his eye, “that we are no longer permitted to execute sailors for mutiny under King Adrien’s rule.”

Don’t look so disappointed, Wes thought.

“You will have your rank stripped from you, you will not receive the customary pension, and you will be escorted to the Mount Hazel prison for ten years of hard labor.” Lord Cecil put his glasses back on. “That will be all.”

Wes’ stomach lurched unpleasantly. This wasn’t unexpected, but it was a wrench to hear aloud.

Staria didn’t formally execute people anymore, but ten years of hard labor was still a death sentence.

Mount Hazel was too far away for King Adrien’s people to conduct regular inspections, and Lord Cecil knew it.

“My Lord.” Delauney spoke up again, scooting forward in his chair as two military guards approached Wes on either side. “You do understand who we are sentencing?”

Wes’ blood turned to ice.

“In my day, submissives did not contest the opinion of the court,” Lord Cecil said. One of the guards slipped a manacle over Wes’ right wrist.

“There weren’t royal representatives on the council then, either.

” Delauney seemed unbothered by Cecil’s dangerous tone.

The sash meant that he reported to King Adrien, then.

Wes wasn’t sure what kind of power Delauney held as a second son, but his family’s wealth clearly had weight.

“Ferrin Leonhart serves as the king’s guard captain, and he was a personal friend of King Emile.

” Delauney held a hand over the papers on Lord Cecil’s desk.

“Perhaps it would be unwise to send his brother to Mount Hazel.”

Wes couldn’t speak. It was as though a rock had lodged in his throat. Wes had spent his entire career avoiding using his brother’s name to get anything, and now Lord Delauney was acting like Wes was a jumped-up noble who’d raise a fuss if a guard told him to stop pissing in the public fountains.

Wes stood still as the military council closed around each other, whispers filling the small room. It wasn’t that he wanted to be sent to hard labor. He simply expected it. He had known that it would happen the moment he had tied Captain Lennox to the rigging of his own ship.

Now, he clenched his fists as Lord Cecil, red-faced and trembling with weaselly rage, turned back to his notes.