House of Gold, page 1
PRAISE FOR THE SCARLET ODYSSEY SERIES
“Wakanda meets Warhammer 40,000 . . . Readers will enjoy the setting and the magic system.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Rwizi’s debut is noteworthy for its African-inspired setting.”
—Library Journal
“Raised in Swaziland and Zimbabwe but now residing in South Africa, C. T. Rwizi is a remarkable new talent. He deftly juggles five very different protagonists; establishes a vast yet intricate new magical system unlike anything else I’ve ever seen; and unfolds stories scattered across the distant past, the chaotic present, and entirely different planes of existence.”
—Tor.com
“C. T. Rwizi . . . builds a rich setting by combining recognizable aspects of his home with deft and fantastical world building.”
—Medium
ALSO BY C. T. RWIZI
THE SCARLET ODYSSEY SERIES
Scarlet Odyssey
Requiem Moon
Primeval Fire
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Otherwise, any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2023 by C. T. Rwizi
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
Published by 47North, Seattle
www.apub.com
Amazon, the Amazon logo, and 47North are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.
ISBN-13: 9781542037129 (paperback)
ISBN-13: 9781542037136 (digital)
Cover design by Richard Ljoenes Design LLC
Cover illustration by Natasha Cunningham
Cover image: © Bernd Vogel / Getty; © shunli zhao / Getty; © simonkr / Getty; © Tuul & Bruno Morandi / Getty; © antishock / Shutterstock
For Takunda. Sweet dreams, little brother.
CONTENTS
PART 1: THE HABITAT
CHAPTER 1: HONDO
CHAPTER 2: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 3: HONDO
CHAPTER 4: NANDIPA
PART 2: ZIMBATECH
CHAPTER 5: HONDO
CHAPTER 6: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 7: HONDO
CHAPTER 8: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 9: HONDO
CHAPTER 10: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 11: HONDO
CHAPTER 12: NANDIPA
PART 3: ILE WURA
CHAPTER 13: HONDO
CHAPTER 14: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 15: HONDO
CHAPTER 16: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 17: HONDO
CHAPTER 18: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 19: HONDO
CHAPTER 20: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 21: HONDO
CHAPTER 22: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 23: HONDO
CHAPTER 24: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 25: HONDO
CHAPTER 26: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 27: HONDO
CHAPTER 28: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 29: HONDO
CHAPTER 30: NANDIPA
CHAPTER 31: HONDO
CHAPTER 32: NANDIPA
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
PART 1:
THE HABITAT
CHAPTER 1:
HONDO
Tick, tick, tick.
My eyes drift to one of my twenty-four siblings, who are waiting with me outside the War Room, and I’m reminded yet again of why I hate that word. Sibling. She and I are not genetically related. None of us are. I certainly don’t like to think of her as a sister. But that is how we were raised: as equals, counterparts, rivals. Siblings.
She notices me staring, and a slight frown visits her face. I look away.
There’s a clock ticking on the cement wall behind me, a curious anachronism the Custodians say once hung in the office of some consequential leader back on the Old World. I feel the movement of its little analog gears like a musical beat inside my head. A pleasant sound, even though each tick should remind me I’m a step closer to what I know will be the end.
Because a month from now, I will be recycled.
Tick, tick, tock.
I sneak another glance at Nandipa, my not-sibling. She has a look of deep concentration as she watches the simulation unfold on the other side of the glass windows separating us from the octagonal War Room. I catch myself wishing I could brush the cloud of hair around her face, that I could make her smile at me the way I’ve seen her smile at Benjamin, that she would laugh as she watched me strangle Benjamin until his dead eyes bulged and . . .
And I should probably go see Counselor to find out exactly what’s wrong with me. Something has been wrong with me for a while now, I think.
I look away again, and the clock keeps ticking. I would be afraid if the fear of endings had not been rigorously trained out of me. But people like me, people like my Prime—we were born for endings. Our existence is a temporary and carefully controlled deviation from the norm. Expies, they call us. As in experimentals. Our purpose is to stress test the durability and social cohesion of the more established genetic lines, and judging by the numbers on the all-important scoreboard inside the War Room, our usefulness is almost at an end.
My Prime, Jamal, is in session in the War Room with his two dozen siblings, seated at a round conference table where the hologram of a world map hovers at their center. Every year the Primes begin a fresh war game as leaders of their own geopolitical domains on a new hypothetical planet, a patchwork of colors spread out across the map. But as the game progresses, the colors bleed into each other, uniting, conquering, forming strategic alliances. These games are what the Primes were built for.
My siblings and me? We were built for the Primes.
As always, today we watch their game of empires from outside the glass War Room, keeping one eye on the players and the other eye on each other. A digital scoreboard in the room tallies the victories and losses accrued throughout the year, ranking the Primes from first to last.
I’m no dimwit, I don’t think, but I understand what’s going on in only the most basic sense. Sophisticated programs simulate the behavior of populations and armies, as well as individual generals, diplomats, politicians, and even assassins. Throughout the year the Primes pit their respective forces against one another in a scramble for influence. Send an assassin program to dispatch a rival general, and if you succeed, you earn influence. Get caught, and the game turns against you.
It’s about getting the timing right; knowing where you’re vulnerable, where to protect yourself, where to deploy your resources; knowing who to bribe, who to ally yourself with, who to betray.
And all the while, the scoreboard watches, keeping a tally that will doom whoever ultimately falls short.
Jamal’s name has been sitting at the bottom of that tally for months now, and any hopes he might escape from that hole were squandered long ago.
I know what this means for the both of us. Jamal knows, too, but he’s been more reckless than usual this year, bent on being contrary, thriving on the frustration of his siblings. While they were jockeying for influence, forming competing axes of power that grew to span the globe, he cornered a small but strategically vital patch of land and sealed it off from the rest of the map, nurturing an insular but self-sufficient population protected behind impenetrable defenses, firewalls, and the threat of mutually assured destruction.
No one has dared to attack him.
Unfortunately, seeing as the war games are about questing for influence, not hunkering down, the scoreboard has not been impressed. And now there’s a stalemate between the two main coalitions, both of which need his cooperation to win.
“Give it up, Jamal,” says Chairman David, the room’s holograms casting a greenish film across his broad face. “I’ll give you thirty points if you concede. Thirty points. Think about it. You’ll have a fighting chance to save yourself.”
David has been chair for the past three years, winning every game since the Custodians began the first simulation the year we all turned sixteen. He has the charisma and physique of a team captain from one of those soccer vids from the Old World. He smiles a lot. Likes the sound of his own voice. I heard his genetic profile came from a long-dead leader of the United Nations. His Proxy, Benjamin, is almost a carbon copy of him. He smiles a lot too. Likes to tell the rest of us what to do, and most of the other Proxies follow his lead.
Sanctimonious pricks, the both of them.
“Make it three hundred and I’ll consider it,” Jamal says in the War Room, getting a few snickers from his siblings and a few more from those of us watching outside.
I glance at the scoreboard. Three hundred extra points would put him halfway up the rankings, leaving the second-lowest score to take the fall. But the owner of that score happens to be a member of David’s coalition, and knowing the chairman, he’s not letting one of his own get recycled.
“No one sane would give you that much,” David growls at Jamal. “No one has to give you anything, in fact. We could end the game now and we’d all be safe, except for you. I’m doing you a favor.”
“How very thoughtful of you,” Jamal ripostes. “But if you end the game now, you lose the chair.” He grins lopsidedly, eyeing the scoreboard, where David’s name is currently second from the top. The name holding the place of honor belongs to the lea
David’s eyes find Paul, the high-strung owner of that second-lowest score, whose shoulders stiffen. Paul looks up at the silent shadows watching from behind the windows on a second floor, our ever-present and often faceless Custodians, and a touch of fear makes his lips tremble. He shakes his head at David, his face almost pleading.
“You know I can’t do that,” David finally says, words spoken as a sigh.
“Then I guess I’ll have to congratulate future Chairwoman Clarice.” Jamal’s cunning gaze latches on to the young woman across the round table. “I hope, future Chairwoman, as you celebrate your imminent victory, you’ll make a toast in my name. To honor my memory.”
Even in the standard-issue sky-blue jumpsuit we all wear every day, Clarice has the stature and bearing of royalty. I wouldn’t be surprised if some genetic ancestor of hers was a queen.
She bares her teeth. “Don’t address me, Rat. I have nothing to say to you.”
Jamal stopped taking offense to that particular epithet years ago. In fact, the only thing it ever does is embolden him. His grin sharpens with cynical amusement. “A marvelous strategy. Keep me at arm’s length. Don’t look like you’re cozying up to me too much. Otherwise people might start thinking we’re working together. Or . . . are we?” He winks at David, which makes Clarice fume.
“Why are we tolerating this?” she demands, glaring at the rest of the room. “He’s hijacked the simulation. He’s been a constant source of division and disruption all our lives, and we finally have the chance to get rid of him. I say we take it. At this point his absence would be a greater good than any chair.”
“Agreed,” says a nervous Paul. “Jamal has the lowest score. He should be the one to take the fall.”
I can’t help but snort. How transparently desperate. Paul’s Proxy hears me and throws me a dirty look. I grin at him until he looks away.
“Yes, Chairman David,” drawls my Prime in the War Room. “Concede. Help future Chairwoman Clarice get rid of me. But of course, if she was so devoted to the greater good, she could simply concede herself and let you declare the game over.”
“A fair point,” David says thoughtfully. “Are you willing to concede, Clarice? For the greater good?”
“Go to hell, the both of you,” Clarice throws back, and Jamal’s eyes glitter with smugness.
“And thus we return to where we began,” he says. “Three hundred points for the chair, David. No more, no less.”
When the day’s session ends, I wait outside the War Room for Jamal. Most of the Primes walk out in pairs or in groups, their Proxies falling in silently behind them. I keep my gaze studiously on the floor as Nandipa passes by with her Prime. Jamal is alone when he joins me, the look on his face the usual blend of pride and resentment.
He and I actually share genetic material, so in many ways, we are alike. We are both lean, long limbed, and sharp featured, though the people of the Old World might have thought him North African by the lightness of his skin and the slickness of his curly hair, whereas I am more strongly descended from the ancient Maasai and the rebel fighters of millennial Uganda.
I used to think Jamal was jealous of David and the other Legacies—the regal Clarice, the silently intelligent Adaolisa, the smooth and elegant Moussa, who are each, unlike us, the progeny of highly successful genetic lines refined by the Custodians over many generations. I used to think he hated existing solely to test them, living with the knowledge that his own line would not continue past him.
If only it were so simple. Jamal’s resentment and discontent go well beyond his siblings to the very foundations of the Habitat, a dangerous mindset to have in a place where disobedience can make you vanish.
“I’m beginning to think being recycled would be preferable to another day of this bullshit,” he mutters as he joins me.
By reflex I look around the hallway to check if anyone overheard him. “Be careful, Jamal,” I say in a low voice. “The Custodians could be listening.”
“You worry too much,” he says dismissively, stretching the muscles of his neck. Then he frowns as he looks at me. “What’s got you so worked up anyway? I’ve felt nothing but tension from you all day long.”
How can he not know? I was built to care for him beyond anything else in the world, beyond even myself, and now I have to live with the knowledge that in a few weeks, he will die. How can he, of all people, not see it on my face? “It’s nothing,” I say.
He scowls but holds his tongue when we notice David approaching us with Benjamin in tow. We’re of a similar height, but those two wear their jumpsuits like princely supermen, and unlike us, they are almost identical in appearance.
Benjamin eyes me the whole time. I watch him back. The way he’s built, he could probably snap me in half. But I know I’d slit his throat before he ever got the chance.
“Stop being unreasonable, Jamal,” David says. “Thirty points would put you just fifteen off from Paul. He’s an ally, but I can’t protect him if you beat him fairly, and I know you’re smart enough to make up the difference with a little luck. It’s your best chance.”
“It’s a shit chance, and you know it,” Jamal replies. “No way in hell I’m closing that gap in less than a month. I’ve given you my terms. What happens next is up to you.”
An ill-tempered sentiment crosses David’s noble features. He glances at me, then back at Jamal. “So you’d let your Proxy face recycling just to spite me, is that it?”
“Oh, I’m sure he doesn’t mind.”
David’s frown deepens. “You realize you’ll be right next to him, don’t you?”
“I don’t mind either,” Jamal says blithely. “It’ll be a nice change of pace. I’m getting bored with these games, to be honest.”
When David glances my way again, I smirk.
Disgusted, he tugs his Proxy away. “Let’s go, Benjamin. These two are hopeless. Fucking expie rats,” he adds under his breath, just loud enough for us to catch it.
“I could kill them both if you want,” I suggest to Jamal as we watch them go, and I’m not completely sure I’m joking.
“I’ll not have you waste a single breath on that hypocrite. He’s not worth the dust on your shoes.” Jamal considers me again. “But you’re not actually worried, are you? About the Big R? Is that why you’re so on edge?”
I could lie. He’d know, but he wouldn’t push it. “I don’t want you to die,” I answer honestly.
“And I’m not going to die, you idiot! Neither will you. Do you really think I’d gamble your life away? We’re getting those points, Hondo. Someone is taking the fall, but it won’t be us.”
“How?” I ask. “David wants the chair, but he’s not the type to betray an alliance.”
“Like I’ve told you before, what David wants is irrelevant. It’s the person pulling his strings I’m counting on, and I know she’ll do whatever it takes to win.”
I still can’t imagine David being under anyone’s control, but the Primes were engineered for the War Room, and even though I can sometimes follow their choices and predict their moves, their games are ultimately beyond my ken. My sole purpose is to keep Jamal safe and let him do the thinking. I should trust him implicitly.
I nod. “As you say.”
He pats me on the shoulder. “Good. Now, why don’t we go release that tension I sense inside you? I’m sure you’ll feel better after you hit something.”
“If we spar today, I’ll hurt you,” I warn him. “I’m too wound up.”
“I can take it. Just . . . go easy on me, okay?”
I nod, but we both know that I won’t.
One side of the gymnasium is a thick layer of reinforced transparent polycarbonate. An ocean of pale-blue water presses up against the glass-like material, clear enough that the other sectors of the Habitat are visible as beehives of titanium, glass, and lights rising out of the seabed.
The story goes our ancestors left Africa on Old Earth centuries ago, crossing a long-range jump gate to a distant arm of the Milky Way and settling the habitable worlds scattered across what they called the Tanganyika star cluster. They came to this world and named it Ile Wura, House of Gold, for its richness in natural resources. They settled on Tripoli V, the moon of a gas giant orbiting a gentle star. They settled on New KwaNdebele, Mawu-Lisa, Élysée Bleue, and several other planets and moons, building cities and nations that grew prosperous enough to compete with those on the older colonies closer to Sol.
