Page 26 of Colossal

Where else are you gonna go, idiot?

He grew more tense with each turn they took, muscles bunching under fitted black carbonsilk. Yes, she’d been nervous. But this didn’t seem to be a walk in the park for Orion Halen either. Somehow Kaia doubted he was expecting a warm family reunion.

This time, it was Kaia that had to stop short after nearly colliding with the broad wall of his back. He’d stopped dead in front of a door and stayed there, unmoving. He rolled his rounded shoulders a few times and flexed his hands into fists, then shook them out.

How bad could his mother be if her own son was so stressed about seeing her?

Then, with a hiss, the door was open. Kaia followed her new fiancé into the beam of light ahead.

CHAPTER15

ORION

The command center was just as he’d remembered it: bright, sterile, stifling. Monitors projected trajectory and resource graphs over the thermaview, text and figures glowing over the blackness of space. Black carbon seats were molded along the walls, presently empty.

Mare Halena sat in the commander’s chair in the middle of it all with her chin on her hand, studying something on one of the projected screens. Per Halen stood rigid at her side.

“Mother.”

“Oh, good, you’re here.” She tore her gaze with some hesitation from the screen and spun the platform on which both her seat and her husband were positioned toward Orion. “Bretton said there was some nonsense with an attack?”

“Nothing we couldn’t handle.”

“Naturally. What is that?”

Orion realized Kaia was hiding behind his bulk, and she was the “that” Mare Halena was peering at.

Sorry, princess. Time to shine.

He stepped aside and pressed a hand to the small of her back to nudge her forward. He gritted his teeth at her flinch. She shouldn’t be wincing from him in front of his mother. Shit, she shouldn’t be wincing from him at all!

Mare Halena’s forehead furrowed. Her brows, now raised, were thinner than he’d remembered. She looked old and almost mortal. Almost. His mother's glacial eyes, mirrors of his own in color, narrowed to slits.

“What have you brought, Orion?”

Orion opened his mouth to respond, but his girl seemed to have grown a bit of a backbone because she straightened and took a step forward. “Kaia.”

“Kaia who?”

She clenched her helmet in one hand—Orion didn’t know why she was insisting on carrying that thing around—and put the other on her hip. “Just Kaia.”

“Why are you in my command center, Just Kaia?” The peculiar rattle in Mother’s voice, auditory evidence of the sickness marching her towards Heaven, didn't make her sound any less intimidating.

Orion stepped up behind her and slung both arms around her shoulders, letting them hang. She stood rigid against his chest, and she'd better not fucking move away and ruin this for him.

“She’s here because she’s my fiancée.”

There it was. That sweet pang of satisfaction at the punchline. He knew Mare Halena too well to expect avisiblereaction, but he also knew she would be seething inside. And confused. And maybe a little scared? Hopefully anyway.

“Orion…” It was his father who spoke, placing a pale hand on his wife’s shoulder.

“We have candidates picked for you, Orion. As you know.”His mother ignored her husband in his entirety and opted instead to subvocalize to Orion directly.

How rude,he thought,to exclude my wife-to-be from the conversation like this.

“Well, good news for you then. I’ve already done the legwork of finding a bride,” he said out loud.

Mother pursed her lips, scanning Kaia’s body. Orion knew what she was looking for: signs of privilege. Signs of physical strength and stamina. Signs of fertility most of all.

---