Page 20 of Devil May Hunt
It had not.
There were only a couple of special forces teams on Vitality, all with ties to either the Imperial family, or in cahoots with the Brumal. The planet itself hadn’t experienced war in over three centuries, but there was plenty of crime, especially thefurther out from the capital, where both the Diars and the Voids, the two families in charge of the planet, resided.
Building an organization that helped the people without ties to those in power was…an extravagant dream, to say the least. With Cree funding, it would be doable, but no easy feat, and they hadn’t worked out any of the kinks since they decided to go in on the plan together.
To say he wasn’t looking forward to any of it would be an understatement, but since it meant so much to Daylen, Brennon would follow through.
Which meant the last thing he was going to do was get involved with someone from another planet. Especially not when that someone clearly wanted to use him to stick it to his family back home.
No matter how good a cook that person happened to be.
“It’s not worth it,” he said on a sigh. “Screwing yourself over just to get back at your grandfather? Take it from someone who’s tried that angle and learned to regret it. You won’t be happy in the long term if you settle for me just to spite some dude on a throne.”
“He would love to hear you call him that,” Gunho drawled sarcastically.
“I don’t know that much about your history, be it Synastry or Glyph.” Brennon was smart enough to receive average grades in all subjects without having to try too hard, but the downside to that was his lack of interest made it hard to retain information long term. They’d been taught the differences between the two planets in the Feud galaxy, but it was proving difficult to recall the details.
“Emperor Hangyeol Idris had two sons, both deceased, and three grandsons. The twins who will take control of the throne after him, Arbor and Avi Idris, and you. You’ve always sort of been the black sheep of the family, sent as a RoyalHostage to Synastry to make peace when you were…” He frowned.
“Twelve,” Gunho supplied for him.
“That’s pretty young to leave home.”
“I didn’t leave. I was basically banished. My father didn’t like me much. He blamed me for my mother’s death.”
“How’d she die?”
“Childbirth.”
“I’m sorry.”
Gunho shrugged. “It’s hard to miss someone I never knew.”
“It’s not hard to miss an idea of someone you’ve always known you should have.” Brennon scrunched up his nose as soon as the alpha gave him a surprised look. “That was overstepping. I apologize.”
“Don’t start talking to me like we’re at an official event. I don’t like it.”
“Events, or the way I sound?”
“Both?” The alpha shook his head. “We’ve deviated from what’s important. Drink. I made it especially for you.”
“I thought you worked in the military for the past decade?” Brennon eyed the strawberry colored drink set before him and then noticed the empty space on Gunho’s side. “What is this, and why aren’t you also drinking it?”
“Hangover cure,” the alpha replied. “I’m not hung over.”
Fair enough. If it was even half as good as the porridge, Brennon would drink the whole thing.
“I’ve been a general for the Synastry Elite for the past decade, you are correct. Do you know much about that part of my history?”
“Only what they’ve taught us at the Academy about it so far,” he said, sipping the drink. It had the texture of a smoothie, and was sweet with a slight bitterness at the end he wasn’tentirely fond of, but it wasn’t bad. “Synastry was at war with Hollowyn Array for fifteen years.”
Hollowyn was a planet located in the Feud galaxy and was a neighboring planet to Synastry, where Gunho was said to have grown up, despite being a prince of Glyph. “You’re famous for winning that three-year-long battle in the Mystara Belt.”
“We were stationed on a nearby moon for that time period,” Gunho told him. “During which, we were surrounded by the enemy and couldn’t leave. That’s where I learned to cook. We arrived in the hundreds, and left in double digits. Toward the end, even the cooks had to join in the fighting. A lot of good people died. Many of them were more than my comrades, they were my friends.”
“I’m sorry for your loss.”
“My father and uncle died during the war, in an accident. When I returned to Synastry, it was to find an Imperial edict ordering me back to the planet I hadn’t been on since I was a preteen. I didn’t want to go, but no one can disobey an Imperial order.”
