Page 4 of Hunting the Warlord's Daughter

Kaz joined him. “That seemed to go well,” she said. “No alarm was raised; it was treated as a routine docking. I do hope the warlord’s affairs are in order, for this is surely the end of him.” Her lips curved. “I hope his daughter’s affairs are in order too.”

He shot her a dark look through his fingers. “Very funny.”

“Aral. I’m serious. She has no idea she’s your wife.”

“I married Awrenkka to protect her.”

“Your marriage-by-proxy. You never sent word of it. At this late date, the news may come as an unwanted surprise.”

He dropped his hands to the desk. “Fighting the war and plotting to destroy the Empire has kept me a bit busy,” he retorted sarcastically. “As soon as she’s under my protection, I’ll make sure she understands the situation.”

Kaz played with an earring. “You mean your marital intervention.”

“Call it what you will. I kept her safe.” From the other battlelords. From his father. A memory burned in the back of his mind—the warlord parading a young girl past his top officers; the men recoiling in unison at his undersized daughter and her ugly, thick eyeglasses.“She looks like an insect,”Karbon had confided to Aral, his tone amused and conversational, as if only hours earlier he hadn’t beaten Aral so violently that even after being pumped full of nano-meds to hide the evidence, Aral still felt broken inside. Broken and angry. He’d had no desire to watch the spectacle—orthe girl. In silent protest, he’d refused to participate. Yet he’d looked up anyway.

And she’d looked back. Magnified by her clunky glasses, Awrenkka’s eyes had been the clearest, purest violet blue. Her honest gaze had grabbed his heart in a way that nothing else ever had.

She’s beautiful,he’d thought. More than that—in her eyes, he’d imagined he saw someone much like himself, both of them the products of pure evil, completely cowed by their fathers, in their thrall and utterly terrorized.We’ll run away together.It had been a young boy’s fantasy, a boy who, despite his dysfunctional upbringing and having had anything but a normal example to follow at home, still believed he was capable of giving and receiving romantic love, of creating a happy home with a mate. Then he’d felt Karbon’s attention shift from her to him, shattering the spell. If his father had noted his fascination with Awrenkka, he would have been spurred to campaign to marry her himself. The man had always been skilled in figuring out whatever Aral cherished—then destroying it in the most wrenching way possible.

You will never have her, Karbon. In the more than ten years since, Aral had done unspeakable things to protect Awrenkka, sacrificed more than she might imagine.

Lost a brother.

An invisible fist gripped his chest. Whoever had taken out Bolivarr could be hunting for the warlord’s daughter too. According to his brother’s revelations, she was much, much more than anyone realized.Including me,he thought.While he ached with urgency to depart at that very moment and bring his wife under his protection, doing so prematurely would place her in even greater danger. Being the warlord’s daughter was the least of the threats to her life.

He met Kaz’s eyes. “She’ll be fully briefed—on everything—as soon as I am able. But first, the plan must play out.” The warlord and his heir headed to their well-deserved deaths? Check. Karbon was next.

Then, at long last, his Awrenkka.

His heart. His destiny.

He would find her, fight for her, and together, they would complete his mission to save them all.

CHAPTERTWO

Later that year

On Barokk, the door to Wren’s bedroom crashed open, rattling her eyeglasses and the books stacked on her bedside table. She fumbled for her glasses, sliding them up her nose to see Sabra rooting out clothing from her dresser. She threw a shirt and pair of pants to Wren. “Up, up—now, Awrenkka. Change clothes. You’ll need your warm coat. Your work boots.”

“Not more chores.” Wren groaned. She’d spent the morning fishing, then cleaning the catch with Ilkka, and finally, while both guardians had been away at a village meeting, smoking the fish for the lean times ahead. She’d since been curled up in bed with her nose buried in a favorite book. “I’m so tired. Can’t it wait until morning?”

“No—it cannot. I have news, and it isn’t good. Get dressed and I’ll tell you.” Sabra crammed more clothing into a travel pack.

The boom of a ship entering the atmosphere shook the chalet. Wren jumped out of bed and hurried to change clothes. “A freighter, Sabra! Finally. That will make you forget your bad news.” Elsewhere in the galaxy, the war raged on. No ship had been able to break through the Coalition blockade for many months. No supplies, no news, no juicy rumors from off-worlders—nothing. Everyone’s provisions were now running low. She pulled on her clothes. “Come on, we’ll watch it land, and—”

“Wren, no!” Sabra’s face revealed an emotion Wren had never seen there before—fear. “It’s not a freighter.”

If not a freighter, then… “It’s him, isn’t it? That’s your bad news.” Wren’s heart flapped against her ribs like a trapped bird. “He’s finally come for me.” The nameless, faceless husband-to-be. One of the men in red uniforms who laughed when her father had mocked her. Ever since returning from the palace, she’d dreaded being handed over to one of them: a man who would want her only to further his own interests.

“We’ll find a way out…”Her heart skipped a few beats as a memory of Aral Mawndarr surfaced. She hadn’t thought of him in years. For the longest time, her stubborn heart had refused to give up on him. In countless girlhood daydreams, she’d envisioned Aral arriving on Barokk, where they would remain, living happily ever after in the tumble-down fishing shack on the far lakeshore. He would fix up the place, bare-chested and sweaty, and every day she’d catch plump fish for their dinners. If the warlord insisted on heirs from their commingled aristocratic bloodlines, well, they’d acquiesce and make one or two to satisfy him.

Eventually, the passage of time extinguished her silly fantasies. Real life wasn’t like her favorite books, where the endings were happy. If she’d believed for even a moment Aral would rescue her from her dreaded fate, then Sabra was right: she was a fool, a squeaky little mar-mouse fool. Aral was a no-show.

So too were the calculating old men in red uniforms. No sleek starships arrived to whisk her back to the Imperial Palace for her unwanted wedding. Ten years and no news of a betrothal reached Barokk to herald her doom. By now, her presentation felt like a lifetime ago. She’d let down her guard.

She should have known the warlord wouldn’t forget about her.

“Who is it?” Wren asked flatly. “Who won the prize?”

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