It was little wonder that she was an ambassador. She certainly had a knack for convincing people to do the right thing and get along, and she had an amazing capacity for forgiveness. He didn’t deserve such forgiveness. He didn’t deserve her.
“I was bored,” she said with a small shy smile, as though confessing she had done something bad. “You were sleeping and I saw no harm in it.”
“They seem to like you,” he said and nodded towards the children. She looked over at them with a fond smile, watching them play. His gaze remained on her, drinking in her beauty and the warmth that she radiated.
“They were teaching me the finer points of cheating at Loretsil. I don’t think I have the art but perhaps I’ll beat my brothers next time we play.”
“Brothers?” He frowned at the mention of her family. He knew little about them, only her name and that she was royalty.
Royalty.
She didn’t act at all as he had imagined one would. She had no pretentions and airs. She seemed happy to be amongst common people in the lowest possible class on a public transport freighter.
“Yes. They’re both in the Lyran Imperial Army. It wasn’t to my taste so I became an ambassador instead. I didn’t want danger and adventure like they craved. I seemed to have found myself mixed up in it after all though.” She sat back down and looked out of the round window at the stars.
They were already halfway to Minerva Eleven. They would need to contact her family soon to have them rendezvous with them there so he could get the money to save his sisters. He hated to ask her for it, hadn’t saved her because of her promise to give him money, but he needed it. He had to save his sisters. He would offer the man who owned them a price that he couldn’t resist. He would set them free.
The ship shook and the lights went out.
“That wasn’t a ship docking, was it?” Miali’s voice came out of the darkness and she grabbed his arm, clinging to him.
“No, it felt like weapons fire.”
Blue flashing lights punctuated the darkness and an alarm sounded, deafening him. He looked down at Miali, seeing her in the split seconds when the light was on. She looked frightened. The tight grip she had on his arm confirmed her fear.
The room filled with the clamour of voices and he grabbed Miali’s hand and dragged her in the direction of them. It was hard to cross the room in the darkness. The bursts of blue light did nothing to help him find his way. Eventually he made it to the corridor. Everyone that had been in the room with him and Miali now lined the windows of the corridor. He looked out of the window nearest him and his heart leapt into his throat.
“Nostra,” he said and stared at the small old fighter as it fired upon the freighter again and dodged the return fire.
“Cruskin,” Miali muttered beside him and he seconded that thought.
This wasn’t good.
Crew rushed past him, armed to the teeth. Children screamed and clung to their mothers. Kosen looked down to see one of the children that Miali had been playing with wrapped around her legs. She bent over, the flashing blue lights making her look as though she was moving strangely, and picked the boy up. Kosen watched as she soothed him, speaking Minervan with an expert tongue. He couldn’t understand how she could be so calm. They were under attack and it was only a matter of minutes before Nostra convinced the officers of the freighter to allow them to board. Nostra had connections with the Minervan military. He had probably already obtained permission from them to board any Minervan vessel that he wanted.
The small fighter fired again and Kosen grabbed Miali when she stumbled backwards. The child in her arms shrieked and buried his face in her neck. Miali whispered something to the boy and then smiled at him.
“Are you alright?” Kosen said, smoothing her flat hair. Her expression and actions might not give away her fear, but her hair did.
She nodded and moved closer to him as the fighter ship closed in.
Kosen drew his gun, ready to fight to protect Miali. He wouldn’t let anything happen to her.
There was a bright burst of pale purple light similar to what happened when a ship went into sub-space. When his vision came back, an enormous sleek top-class fighter ship was overshadowing Nostra’s small fighter. Kosen didn’t recognise it as Minervan. If anything, it looked Lyran.
His gaze shot to Miali.
The blue emergency light flashed again, highlighting her face.
She was grinning.
“Perfect timing as always.”
Kosen looked back at the huge fighter vessel.
“You know them?” he said, getting the impression that while he was sleeping, she had been doing things other than playing with children.
“I might have sent a message or two asking for assistance. You needed money after all and I needed passage back to my home. So, I had my home come here.”
Home. He looked at the ship. For some reason, the thought of her returning home made him feel queasy. He had expected to have at least a few more days with her.
Two smaller fighter ships detached from the large vessel that Miali had called home and escorted Nostra’s fighter, guiding it to dock with the vessel. He didn’t want to imagine what fate awaited Nostra and his crew onboard the Lyran fighter. He was only glad that he had chosen a better path for himself to follow, one that would take him away from a world involving slaves.
The passenger freighter slowed to a stop and the Lyran fighter drew alongside it, eclipsing the view out of the window. It was massive. He had never seen an attack vessel on such a grand scale.
Miali was still grinning when he looked at her. She ruffled the hair of the boy that she was holding and set him down on his feet. Dim lights flickered back into life above them.
“Run along now,” she said and the boy disappeared into the crowd. It wasn’t dispersing. Everyone was watching the Lyran vessel now.
“Home?” he said and pointed at the ship.
“The Nebula-Lyra II. My father’s ship.” She looked around them and then back at him. “Do you know where the docking bay is?”
He dumbly pointed along the corridor. She grabbed his hand and dragged him in that direction.
“My father will want to meet the man who rescued me.”
Those words sent a chill to his heart and made him nauseas.
Her father?
Was she forgetting that he was also one of the men who had kidnapped her and had intended to sell her into slavery? He was sure that Nostra would be quick to mention that when he met her father.
Kosen tried to get his hand free of hers but by the time he had managed it, they were in the docking bay. He swallowed his thundering heart and pulled himself together. Nostra probably didn’t need to tell her father that he had been involved. It wouldn’t take much for her father to piece it together. After all, the only place they could have met was on the ship that had taken her. Perhaps they could pretend that he had been a captive too. That would work until her father had spoken to Nostra. Perhaps it was better not to lie. Her father might kill him for such a thing. Perhaps it was better just to avoid the situation entirely.
“This isn’t a good idea,” he said.
Miali looked at him and he gave her a nervous smile. Understanding visibly dawned in her eyes.
“Perhaps you’re right—” Before she could finish that sentence, one of the airlock doors further along opened.
They both looked there. Her hand fell from his as two tall, broad built males walked through it. Their black hair and black eyes made them look Minervan but Kosen knew that they were Lyran. They wore the black and blue flight suit of the Lyran military.
“Miali!” One of the males grinned and came rushing towards her. The other rolled his eyes and walked.
“Aksel,” Miali gasped moments before she was wrapped in the male’s arms.
Kosen’s blood boiled at seeing the man handle her so familiarly. If he wasn’t one of her brothers then Kosen was going to kill him.
It was a strange feeling, as
violent as others he’d had since meeting her. For some reason, he needed to protect her, to keep her shut away from other males. It all clicked into place in his mind. He really did like her, more than he had thought. He liked her enough that he had attacked Sasue, a man easily able to kill him, and he was considering attacking both of these Lyran males at the same time.
“Miali,” the other man said in an official and somewhat displeased tone.
Her smile fell off her face and the man she had called Aksel put her down.
Miali lowered her head as though in shame. “Taelis.”
“Come Taelis, show her a little affection. Be pleased that your rigorous and ridiculous training served her well and she was able to escape.” Aksel slapped the other man on the back.
Kosen decided that they had to be her brothers. No man unrelated to the one she had called Taelis would dare slap him.
Taelis gave Aksel a thunderous look and then patted Miali’s cheek. “Mother was having Snrikiks over this. She’s had father flying around half the galaxy looking for you. I am glad that you were able to escape.”
Miali cringed. “I didn’t do it alone, or use anything that you taught me.”
Kosen stepped back and the two males’ eyes immediately locked onto him. Perhaps moving had been a bad idea.
“Miali,” Taelis said and stepped up to her. “You appear to have a young man with you.”
She grinned but it looked more like a grimace to Kosen. Kosen smiled and then backed off another step when the two men frowned.
“A young Minervan man,” Aksel said and then his eyes narrowed with a sly smile. “Don’t tell me that he helped you... that you and he—”
“Brother!” Miali shouted and slapped him hard enough that the sound echoed through the docking bay. When her hand fell away from Aksel’s face, there was a bright red mark on it.
“What in Iskara’s name is happening here?” Another male voice joined them and this one held such a note of authority that Kosen’s palms sweated.
When the two males in front of him parted to reveal the owner of the voice and they saluted, Kosen made a small whimpering noise in his throat.
He knew about the sons of Lyra.
Only one had a cybernetic arm that could easily crush a man’s throat.
Why did that one have to be her father?
“Father!” Miali bounded over to him and threw herself into his arms. “You were cutting it close.”
The captain’s handsome face shifted into a wide smile as he held her and then set her back down on her feet.
A cold trickle of sweat eased down Kosen’s spine and he considered running for it but didn’t think he would get very far with Miali’s two brothers only feet from him.
“We have the men who kidnapped you,” her father said and looked her over. “Did they hurt you?”
“No... Erm, father?”
Kosen prayed that she wasn’t about to point the man in his direction. If only he could fade into the darkness and disappear. He had never had to face something as terrible as this. The moment this man realised who he was and what he had done to his daughter, he was going to crush him like a bug.
“Miali has a lover.” Aksel grinned.
The heat drained from Kosen in a flash, leaving him cold and numb.
“What?” he said at exactly the same time as Miali, Taelis and her father.
Aksel’s face blanched too as all eyes came to rest on him and his father stormed towards him.
“A lover?” her father said, face dark.
“Wait wait wait,” Miali chanted, her cheeks bright red.
Kosen held his hands up when her father diverted his course away from Aksel and straight towards him. Miali ran in front of him, trying to block his way.
“Wait, father, it’s not like that.” Miali pushed against his chest and then looked over her shoulder at himself.
Kosen waved his hands in an attempt to tell her not to speak. If her father asked her anything that would make her think about the things that had happened between her and himself, then no matter what answer she gave him, her body would tell the truth.
“He’s not your lover?” her father stopped and scrutinised him.
Kosen frowned at him and had a change of heart as he wondered why it would be such a bad thing if he were Miali’s lover. He was a good man who could easily make something of himself. He had been honest with Miali throughout their time together and she liked him. So there was that little fact that he had played a part in her kidnapping, but he had surely cancelled that out by helping her?
He was about to ask whether her father objected on the grounds that he was Minervan when the man stepped up to him, sandwiching Miali between them. When she backed into him, Kosen placed his hands on her upper arms, holding her.
She was shaking.
“Father, I can explain. Kosen helped me escape those men. He was the doctor on their ship.” She held her hand up when her father’s look turned deadly and he opened his mouth to speak. “Was, father. Was. He helped me escape. Now I want to help him. I need money.”
“Money? Lovers? What in Iskara’s name is going on?”
Kosen had the distinct impression that this wasn’t going well, especially when her two brothers came up behind their father, flanking him and drawing their weapons.
“He kidnapped you. He’s one of them. Step aside, Miali,” Taelis said, taking aim with his laser gun.
Kosen swallowed hard and stared down the barrel of it.
Miali stretched her arms out across him and shook her head.
“No,” she said, her voice shaking as much as he could feel her body was. “Kosen saved me. I promised that I’d help his sisters. He needs money to buy them back from their master. Please, father?”
“Answer something for me, Miali.” Her father’s look softened and a tiny flicker of hope ignited in Kosen’s heart. Perhaps he wasn’t going to die today after all.
“Anything.”
“Is he your lover?”
Kosen couldn’t help looking at her as she struggled for an answer. Her silver hair shifted and she frantically pushed it back down. It seemed to be the only answer that her family needed.
“A Minervan?” Taelis grumbled and shook his head.
Miali whined and then said, “What does it matter if I’ve fallen for a Minervan? Aunt Terea is Minervan and she’s the queen of Lyra!”
All three men pulled faces that clearly expressed that they couldn’t deny that. Kosen joined them. It was true. Her family had no right to complain about her choosing a Minervan when they were under the rule of a Minervan female.
His eyebrows rose.
Wait.
Choosing a Minervan?
He stared at Miali but her hair obscured her face. He turned her to face him when frustration got the better of him. He had to see her when he asked this.
She dropped her head forwards, looking at her feet. He cupped her cheek and raised her head up until her eyes met his.
“Fallen for a Minervan?”
Daughters of Lyra: Heart of a Mercenary Page 7
