The Melier: Prodigal Son

by Poppy Rhys

  More of Vu’Mal’Su’s guards were coming.

  He could try to finish him now, take on the three guards before the others reached him. He didn’t doubt they’d be equipped with weapons.

  Kill his enemy, the bane of his existence for the last year, or get to Dania? That was the choice he faced, as Dania had nearly reached the craft. He didn’t have time to do both.

  Air seesawed from him, claws lengthened, and he took a step forward, the need to destroy Vu’Mal’Su threatening to completely overtake him.

  He had to choose.

  Val’Koy spat blood on the ground, erupting a frustrated shout before he turned his back and ran.

  Dania and Jruviin were more important.

  The Emperor shrilled in pain, favoring his arm even as he lunged after Val’Koy through the crowd before more of his guards appeared, panting and bloody themselves.

  “Get him!” Vu’Mal’Su demanded, snapping his jaws. Another explosion erupted. The guards disobeyed and grabbed their leader. “Heed my orders!” he howled.

  “The dome is destabilizing!” his guards yelled. They were still dragging him away when Val’Koy looked back one last time.

  The hope of killing that sack of pus had been the spine of what kept him going for so long. Dania and the illusion of a son had been his reason for staying alive. Decimating the pest that was Vu’Mal’Su—that dream had stoked his anger, fueled him.

  He wanted to destroy the Treps where it would hurt the most. Cut the head off the snake. Put an end to a dynasty that’d ruined so many lives.

  I will find you, he promised Vu’Mal’Su.

  But he wouldn’t lose his mates for mere vengeance.

  Never.

  ****

  DANIA

  She scrubbed away her watered vision when Val’Koy raced toward them. He remained in one piece, despite his injured arm. It was a deep, cauterized graze. He would survive it.

  River scrambled up the ramp on the side of the craft, surging over a dead body. She assumed it was the owner of this ship, or he’d been successful in opening it up at least.

  Dania slid off River’s back in a small antechamber that connected several chambers, and darted for what she hoped was the craft’s bridge.

  Then the ramp clanged with heavy footfalls, and Val’Koy burst through, scanning all of them, as if doing a headcount, before slamming his hand on the emergency sensor. The ramp pulled up as the door shut and sealed.

  Dania shoved against his immovable chest. “Why would you do that?” she hollered. “Why would you scare—”

  Val’Koy grabbed her shoulders and kissed her.

  Dania pulled back, pushing against him and he lifted off. “Stupid, stupid—”

  He kissed her again, and that time, she didn’t push him away. Even the foul taste of blood from his enemies didn’t take away from how much that kiss calmed her, spoke to her soul, and felt right.

  “I want to do that many more times,” he rumbled when he finally pulled back, “but after we get off this planet.”

  She blinked away her daze and swiped the back of her hand over her mouth. “Uh huh...” she murmured, unable to find words for a span of seconds.

  He spun her toward the bridge console and asked, “You know how to fly this craft?”

  “I might.” Dania paused and did a double take. “Wait, why did you bring us to port if you don’t know how to fly a ship?”

  “Figure it out.”

  “Unbelievable,” she muttered, turning her attention to the keys. “What if I didn’t know what I was doing?”

  “I have yet to believe you do.” His expression grew tighter, and he jabbed a clawed and gunky finger at the console—a stern reminder to pay attention.

  “You’re a prince,” Dania exclaimed. “Aren’t you the one with the fleet of spaceships?”

  “Yes, but I have staff who fly them!” he burst.

  “We are running out of time,” Jruviin called, his voice nearing a shout as he limped forth to slump against a chair and eye the shield. The crowd ran amuck outside. “If we do not leave soon, this craft will be swarmed!”

  Dania tried to concentrate, pull the words from every how-to manual her grandfather had shoved in her face as an adolescent, but it was exceedingly difficult with every quake, and every crash outside the ship, and with the impending sense of doom weighing her shoulders if she couldn’t remember how to get the craft up and running.

  Think, think, think...

  “Any day now,” Val’Koy breathed, a nervous edge to his voice as he strapped himself in. That only made her nervous. More than she already was.

  “I’m trying!” She exhaled roughly, rubbing her forehead as her eyes roamed, unseeing, over the myriad of colorful controls displayed before her in the ancient hunk of metal.

  She spontaneously pressed a blue button, only to hear an alarming, single blare. Wrong button, idiot, the ship seemed to yell at her. Try again.

  “Blue, blue, blue,” she repeated over and over, knowing she memorized colors so long ago for a certain model of craft.

  “Yes, that button is blue.”

  “Just shut up for a moment,” Dania blurted, hands flapping in the air. “I’m trying to remember!”

  Another explosion, and the lights flickered.

  “Blue is glue! Blue is glue!” she shouted, the rhyme she’d taught herself resurfacing in a lightning moment of clarity.

  Vaguely, she heard Val’Koy sarcastically murmur great, but she was too focused on pressing the three orange keys in sequence, opening the fuel gauge.

  Then the blue, which unlocked the ignition, making it the glue that held the startup together while she held down the black knob that fit perfectly in her fist.

  Engines revved, the tinny hum vibrating the ship.

  “It worked,” she gasped, disbelieving.

  “Save your celebration, as we have yet to leave the ground,” Val’Koy reminded her.

  “Permissions denied,” the ship’s artificial intelligence monotonously announced. “Scans show you are not this craft’s captain.”

  “Shit, shit, shit,” she chanted, racking her brain for the right codes.

  “This is not good,” Jruviin panted, groaning as he sank into the chair, clutching his side.

  “I’m sorry! Try to hold on.” Dania pushed up his shoulders, so he leaned back against the chair and helped strap him in.

  “I can do it,” he weakly protested, brushing her hands away. “Tend to the ship or it will not matter.”

  “Code five-five...” she stuttered, standing and clasping her head as she tried to recall the override.

  “Dania,” Val’Koy warned, “we need to go. Now.”

  She looked up, seeing most of the ships had lifted off, and now people were congregating toward the few left. This ship was too small for all those people, and if they swarmed, they could damage the hull trying to get in.

  She screeched her frustration. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m thinking!” she apologized when they winced.

  “Breathe,” Jruviin sighed, as if taking his own advice.

  Dania took a deep breath.

  “Code five-alpha-fox-three-nine.... seven!” she shouted.

  Nothing happened.

  “It did not—”

  “Shut up!” she shouted at Val’Koy. “I don’t know why it’s not working! It should be w—”

  “Factory reboot in process,” the A.I. informed.

  Dania shrieked and whooped, “YES! Yes! It’s working!”

  “Sit down and strap in,” Val’Koy demanded. She quickly plopped down and buckled herself.

  She glanced over her shoulder to find the wolvenk bracing himself under a side console. “Hold tight, River!”

  “All facilities operational. I am Zed, Captain.”

  “Initiate auto pilot, Zed,” she commanded. “Set warp destination to the nearest trade planet.”

  “Yes, Captain,” Zed smoothly obliged, the craft eerily creaking as it began lifting. “Setting cour
se for planet Vishik. Enabling plasma shield.”

  “Why?”

  “An asteroid dust field surrounds planet Tundrin, Captain,” he provided. “Without the shield, this craft would not withstand the damage.”

  “Okay.” Dania was already sweating, her nerves shot to hell. They were so close to freedom.

  Another craft shadowed theirs, disappearing into the storm and then they were engulfed in it too. The gold and scarlet clouds rushed over the view. A bright light burst causing all of them to glance away.

  “Atmospheric breach imminent.”

  Dania uncovered her eyes when they hit space. The burning of asteroid dust as it touched the plasma shield flared brightly through the glassy panel, but nothing made it through the protective buffer.

  Escaped crafts from the planet zoomed away or into the waiting mother ships. Those had probably never touched the surface of a planet—they were too large and most likely built in space.

  If the emperor was here, one of those had to be a Trepnil craft, and Dania had no desire to be there any longer.

  “Entering warp.”

  After countless minutes of silence, she could feel the weight of attention on her. She glimpsed Val’Koy staring at her expectantly. Jru sat in the chair to her left, watching her too.

  “Where did you learn that?” Val’Koy finally voiced. “How to hijack a ship.”

  When the silence lengthened, a click emitted from Val’s throat.

  “My grandpa taught me some shady stuff, okay?” she blurted.

  “A grandpa is a greatDrae; the father of your father?” Jru asked. Dania nodded, understanding the shortened species name of a Draekiin.

  “That’s why I chose this b’oto ship. Back in his day, these were the systems he knew. The older the ship, the less likely the security features will be catered to owner DNA.”

  “Why would your greatDrae teach you to steal?”

  “It’s not like that,” she said defensively. “He’s a nomad or was. My whole family is. Sometimes it’s good to know how to get yourself out of a sticky situation.”

  Her gaze darted between the two men. Jru peered at her curiously while Val’s hairless brow pulled low. It gradually lifted until it didn’t look like he was about to scold her.

  Almost at the same time, both men reached for her hands. Jru’s thumbpad brushed her skin, and Val lifted her right hand to kiss her knuckles.

  “People take advantage of nomads. It’s not unheard of,” she continued, feeling the need to explain herself. “I settled on Dor Nye because I thought I’d never have to deal with that, yet here we are. I’m not a bad person—”

  “We know,” Jru soothed, and Val removed his straps and lowered to his knees beside her. His suspicious demeanor faded, and he leaned in to bump the ridge of his nose against her chin.

  “Thank you,” he sighed. “We would undoubtedly be under the dome had your grandfather not taught you what he did.”

  “Neither of us know,” he waved a hand toward the console, “what these buttons and levers do. We are thankful.”

  She swallowed the lump in her throat, a weight lifting as she realized something. “Guys...” Dania blinked. “We’re free.”

  Jru’s hand slackened and slipped from hers, his body slumped forward against the straps and he went silent.

  Dania struggled with her buckles. “Jruviin?!”

  THIRTY-TWO

  DANIA

  “Jruviin?” she called again, panic gushing her veins. “Shit,” she swore, looking down so she could free herself from the straps.

  “It is the wound.” Val’Koy removed Jruviin from his straps and hefted him up.

  “Ahh,” Jruviin groaned, waking and grabbing his side again. “Put me down, idiot.”

  “Shut up,” Val’Koy grunted. “You are hurting. I do not need to lick your head to know that either.”

  Jru weakly laughed and winced. “This is not a time for humor.”

  “Zed, where’s the med kit?”

  “In the lounge kitchen, Captain.”

  Dania didn’t know where that was, but she figured it out. The ship was small enough, there were only a handful of doors.

  The entrance to the lounge split down the middle, the grimy doors sliding into pockets.

  “Cabinet to the right of the sink,” Zed informed, and Dania pulled it open, rummaging through the disarrayed contents.

  “Found it!”

  Val’Koy swiped a hand over the rectangular, silver metal island, the sharp clang of tin shakers and bowls twirling against the floor spiking her heart rate. He lay Jru upon it.

  “I have no idea what I’m doing,” she admitted, trying to sound calm, but struggling.

  “When in doubt,” Val’Koy hurried around to her side, sifting through the kit and withdrawing bandages, antiseptic, and a pen-shaped tool, “sterilize, cauterize, and patch.”

  He hurriedly held the antiseptic aloft and squeezed. Clear liquid spurted against Jru’s wound, ripping a roar from him.

  “Fucking Grabindo hells!” he shouted, and kicked his foot, denting the cabinet it met with.

  Dania jumped at the violent outburst. She’d never heard Jru talk like that.

  “Let it out,” Val’Koy instructed as the liquid bubbled pink, “because it will get worse.”

  “Fuck you,” Jru panted, shaking his head back and forth, his colorful plumage splayed against the metal and his gold beaded feathers gently scraping.

  “Shhh, shh,” she soothed, stroking his forehead, hoping her touch distracted him. “You’re going to be okay. Right Val’Koy?”

  “You cannot die yet.” The prince flashed a fang filled smile even as his eyes narrowed in concentration when he turned on the cauterizing pen. It flared a vibrant white-blue.

  “I will kill you,” Jru wheezed, “when this is over.”

  “Same thing you said when you got lanced in sector two a while back, remember?”

  “I mean it this—AHH—” Jruviin bellowed and a string of dangerous insults and curses hurtled from his mouth as Val held the hot pen to the wound. Dania buried her nose in her arm while the smell of cooking meat, burnt chemicals, and singed feathers choked the air.

  Jru’s foot repeatedly kicked the floor to ceiling cabinet until it finally fell off its hinges, crashed to the floor, and caused the contents it held to spill out.

  “Stop. Moving,” Val’Koy gritted out, trying to keep his hand steady.

  “Hurry the fuck up!” Jru shouted, lifting his head to look at the smoking puncture.

  “There,” Val’Koy lifted off and quickly applied a salve adhesive that fused to the wound. “Done.”

  Jru breathed heavily, splayed on the table.

  “Now flip over so I can clean the other side.”

  Again, Jruviin cursed Val’Koy out as he rolled over. Some of the things he said had Dania’s jaw dropping and her brain sputtering. Who was this person on the table?

  She realized pain made a person say and do things out of character, but damn—Jru could make a space pirate blush.

  Val’Koy picked up another pen, but this time he shoved it into Jruviin’s thigh.

  The Draekiin went limp.

  “What did you do?”

  “Tranqed him.”

  Dania scowled. “Why didn’t you do that before?”

  Val shrugged. “Had not noticed it before.”

  She shook her head, stroking Jru’s feather-hair. “Poor guy.”

  Val grunted.

  “He’s going to be okay though, right?”

  “Yes. Draekiin’s heal well.” He leaned closer, being more careful with the cauterizing pen. “Jruviin is resilient.”

  Dania’s hand smoothed Jru’s feathers along his shoulder while Val’Koy finished up.

  “Did they save her?”

  His voice held a puzzled tone when he asked, “Who?”

  “You said your brothers killed one of Vu’Mal’Su’s commanders to save their mate. Did they save her?”

  “Yes, of cour
se. Family is their first priority.” Val’Koy’s brow ridge dipped curiously, and in a soft murmur he admitted, “As it is mine.”

  Dania studied him. Were they a family? Val’Koy had chosen her and Jru and River over vengance with Vu’Mal’Su. Just a few minutes more and he could’ve killed that monster.

  Yet he hadn’t.

  “Are they still happily together?”

  “Yes...” he dubiously drawled. “She is human, like you.”

  Dania did a double take. “Human? Melier don’t forbid interspecies relationships?” Many alien civilizations did.

  He canted his head to the side as if he were internally debating. “Not by law, no.”

  That sounded like a roundabout answer, but it was allowed. Maybe they had a future. “You said you’re a prince... which means your brothers are too, most likely... There’s a human princess on your planet?”

  The corner of his mouth inched up. “Yes. There is a human princess on Melierun.” His green eyes darted her way after he applied the adhesive, dangerous teeth peeking from behind his curved lips as he teased, “Want to make it two?”

  She swallowed.

  THIRTY-THREE

  DANIA

  Val’Koy captured her chin with his gunky fingers, the sides of his claws brushing her skin, then he stooped down to press his mouth to hers.

  Oh, sweet imploding planets.

  Dania moaned, reaching up to curl her fingers around his thick, corded neck. Her blunt nails scraped along his hard, blood-spattered scales, and Val’Koy burst a groan against her lips that vibrated her flesh, forcing her thighs to clench tight.

  “Mmm,” she sighed in return, her tongue tangling with his, lips compressing, teeth bumping in their frenzied connection.

  A pair of hands gripped her ass and hauled her up. The world moved as he walked and set her upon a counter.

  “Want you so bad,” he whispered in between kisses, roughly pushing up her dress’s scratchy hem. “Need you,” he uttered, trailing wet lips against her jaw and neck. His teeth nipped her earlobe, and her eyelids squeezed shut at the delicious zip of heat that tightened her cunt with arousal.