Page 123 of Star Marked Warriors

I ignored Crux for the rest of dinner, precisely as I had ignored my own king for nearly thirty cycles.

There was only one, save myself, whose opinion on the tournament mattered to me.

So the next morning, before Crux even woke to begin work for the day, I went to visit Beau. As we had taken to doing, we wandered the wide walkway around the building. Beau fascinatedly pointed out plants and animals and buildings he found intriguing, and I told him what they were.

Finally, after a discussion about how surprisingly little of Earth’s vegetation was carnivorous, I sprung the subject on him.

“I am taking part in a tournament later today.”

He turned to look at me, green eyes bright, and smiled. “Oh yeah? Let me guess, fighting.”

“Is there another kind of tournament?”

For some reason the question made him laugh. After a moment, he shook his head and rolled his hand in a way I’d learned meant for me to continue. “Sorry, no, you’re fine. We have other kinds on Earth, but that wouldn’t be you guys’ style. So why are you in a tournament today?”

“It is a tournament for the right to have a child with one of the new humans.” With the other humans, I might have tried to use pretty words, or talk around the subject, but Beau... Beau was different. He seemed to enjoy me being forthright and honest, and he never cringed or scowled at me when I told him the truth.

This time, though, he scrunched up his nose. “Well, best tell them if they win, they should pick someone pretty, like Ree or Hiroki.”

I scoffed aloud. “If someone other than I am the winner, I will be sure to inform them that they may ask for the gametes of Ree or Hiroki.” I sincerely doubted that any full-blooded Thorzi who won the tournament would be interested in speaking to me, let alone discussing the merits of each human.

But no, that was not my purpose in this conversation.

I met his eye. “If I win, I would like to choose you.”

His mouth fell open, eyes rounded in the human expression of shock. Why was he surprised? I had spent more than one of my afternoons accompanying him around the building, speaking to him and—

But he didn’t know me.

Beau had not grown up on Thorzan, not seen me at court or heard the whispers about Crux’s hateful son who spoke to no one, curried no favor, and only glared at everyone and everything around him.

Beau had only seen the person I became in his presence.

A person I hardly knew, who smiled and laughed and allowed the touch of another. Someone who might, just possibly, be likable. At least, likable to Beau, and he was the only one who mattered.

So I reached out and cupped his face, leaning in close, until I could feel the gentle warmth of his forehead against mine, the tickle of his breath on my skin. “I would like it very much.”

“Yes,” he blurted, then scrunched up his face adorably. “I mean, why?”

“There is no other on all Thorzan I would care to ask,” I answered simply. And damn everything, but what else could I say? No one had ever given me pretty words, so I knew little about how to make my own. “I wish it to be you.”

He leaned hard into me, wrapping his arms around my middle and pressing his head into my chest as though he needed to listen to my heart. “I dunno if I’d make any kind of dad, Vorian, but... yeah. I’d like that too.”

My heart soared.

Perhaps I was being ridiculous and childish, as no doubt Crux would say if he could see me, but Beau was... he was kind, and sweet, and he smiled at me and met my eye and called me by my name, as no one else did, and no one ever had. In his presence, I felt... human. Soft and weak, perhaps, but at the same time it wasn’t a bad feeling, because I knew Beau would never use it to hurt me as others would have.

I did not have Crux’s inclination to read minds, but somehow, there was no doubt in me. I had never before doubted that anyone I met would be willing—many even happy—to thrust a knife into my chest.

But not Beau.

Never Beau.

So for him, I would win the tournament. I would come back to the lab and tell Crux that the first child in the new generation of hybrids would be mine, and Beau’s.

For Beau.

And maybe, strangely enough, it would not simply be to prove that I was as skilled as any other warrior on Thorzan. But maybe I would win the tournament for myself.

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