Page 105 of Alien Prince's Fake Bride
“Who’sthey?” I ask, starting to tremble a little as I realize I just escaped a murder attempt.
She sits back in her seat. “All I know is that they’re enemies of the Empire. It seems that includes the Calanian Guards.”
“How did you know it was happening?”
“I didn’t know, but Prince Nerox persuaded me that you were in danger. I didn’t trust him, but when an Imperial prince first takes the trouble to track me down and then talks to me like the sky is about to fall down, it’s hard to resist. He just asked me to fly a gunship here at a certain time and keep an eye on that platform from a distance. The risk seemed small. After all, if there was treachery, I was pretty safe in a gunship.”
“How did he know about you and the extraction plan?”
“He didn’t,” Sigise says flatly. “It quickly became clear that he came to me only because he’d seen me in the palace and he knew I’m a shock trooper. There aren’t that many active soldiers left on Khav now, but he needed a good one to help him get you out, and he didn’t have a lot to choose from.”
“He knew the password,” I point out. “He must have been extremely persuasive.”
I swear her cheeks go a little red. “I took a risk,” she admits. “If anything he said was true, then you had to get off Khav. And I couldn’t get to you because of the Calanian guards. They changed after Prince Mareliux left. I didn’t recognize any of them anymore, and they wouldn’t let me see you when I came to check on you after the Prince had contacted me. That was the main reason I agreed to his request. Something felt very strange about the Calanians.”
The millions of lights from the palace pass by underneath us. It’s even more beautiful than the starry sky at night, a dense and sparkling ocean of light points that seems to go on forever. I will never see them again. And probably not Mareliux.
“What now?” I ask to take my mind off that great loss.
Sigise checks her gun. “Now the extraction plan is active. We didn’t need the rest of the team for this, so I left them where they are. Wecouldtravel to Earth in this, but it would be uncomfortable. It’s too far away. We have a bigger ship for that.”
I nod. “I suppose this could be a way for Prince Nerox to get me off the planet in the easiest way. I’m no longer a problem for him now.”
“It could,” Sigise agrees. “But this extraction plan had certain criteria for activation. Number one on that list was an attempt on your life. Number fourteen was me unexpectedly losing my access to contact you because of a sudden change in the guards surrounding you. As it turns out, both criteria have now been hit. It would actually have been difficult for me to do this without the prince’s help. We might have had to carry out a direct assault on the Calanians. Or whatever they are.”
The gunship rises fast through the atmosphere, and the lights below draw away. “Do we know what’s happening? Is it the Empress? Nerox said she was dead.”
The colonel shrugs. “Your guess is as good as mine. But I have to say I feel better with you out of that deadly palace. Even if it means taking you back to your own planet. At least you’ll be alive.”
“What will you do? After you take me back to Earth.”
“Then I’ll find out where the Twenty-Ninth Legion is, and I’ll go do whatever they’re doing. Hopefully it’s a battle of some kind, not another secret mission. Turns out it’s not my kind of thing.”
“Could have fooled me,” I mutter in English.
42
- Mareliux-
“Careful, sir!” Sergeant Gramjeon yells.
I swing Bellatriz, cutting down two Vyrpy enemies that come charging with their spears held out in front of them, one on the ceiling and one along the wall. It should be confusing, but I’m used to fighting them now.
They both drop to the floor, and Gramjeon slits both their throats in one swing of his titanium sword with its tungsten edge. He’s been detached to be my aide, but he behaves mostly like Caret’ax would have.
“Not many left,” I comment, shaking ice cold Vyrpy blood off my hand. “They should attack all at the same time, not in pairs.”
Gramjeon goes ahead of me to the next door in the Vyrpy ship. “They should, sir. I’m not about to tell them. But I’m grateful they activated the gravity in their ship. I never liked being weightless.”
“Take a break,” I order him. “Before we move further into the ship. Something about this whole thing feels off.”
The Vyrpy ambush was finally sprung on us, but it was a pitiful attempt. Eleven ships attacked our ships from the side, shooting their guns from a long range and mostly missing. It was easy for us to shoot back, destroy half of the Vyrpy attackers, and then board the largest of the ships, hoping to find information about their battle plans. But we’ve fought our way through nearly the whole ship now, and we’ve found nothing of interest. The Vyrpy destroyed their control room before we could get there, and now we’re looking for any information we can find.
“Yes, sir. Spreading their forces out like this is dumber than the Vyrpy usually act.”
“Either they just want to slow us down,” I ponder. “Or their fleet is much smaller than we thought. Or it’s a trap that hasn’t sprung yet.”
“My bet is on the latter,” Gramjeon mutters as he cleans his sword. “There’s something we haven’t thought of, sir. There must be.”
