Page 54 of Mated to the Alien Rogue

Cara wrapped her hands around Gravin’s biceps and smiled up at him. “Thank goodness you’ve got me to run interference for you, huh?”

His face softened. “I thank the Goddess for you every day.”

A bird alien landed a few feet away from us, her large yellow wings closing gracefully down her back. She walked to the wide double doors that let into a glass-enclosed lobby, then into a waiting elevator. And that right there made it really sink in how different the Sjisji were. The main entrance to the building was up here, on theroof, because of course it was for a species that flew.

“What are we facing in there?” Wrin asked as the four of us entered our own elevator.

“Nothing new.” Gravin scowled. “The Sjisji and Tula keep trying to one-up each other.”

“Except your mother keeps handing everyone their ass when they get too far out of line,” Cara said. Then she hurried to add, “Metaphorically, of course. Though she looks like she could throw down.”

I nodded. “She really does.” Devalia was as tall as Wrin and carried a good amount of muscle.

“Of course she can fight,” Wrin said. “Who do you think taught me when I was young?”

He said it so matter-of-factly, as if women were treated exactly the same in Zaarn culture. Was that why he liked it when I fought? My fingers drifted to the new knife he’d given me. I’d had special thigh pockets added to my new clothes, thrilled to finally be dressed in black canvas pants and durable boots like the others. The bra and panties were nice, sure, but the boots—I could kick some ass in these boots. Literally.

The elevator opened on a huge room, one whole wall made of glass that looked out into Breyva. Everything else was made out of honey-colored wood. A large desk stood at one end of the room, but everyone was gathered in a more comfortable seating area made up of couches, stools, and an odd kind of chair. The Sjisji senator leaned forward onto a front-rest instead of using a more human design that would have crushed the wings on her back. The lizard alien sat on a stool, her thick tail stretched out behind her, and Devalia took up one of the couches.

It felt less formal than the conference table we’d used for video calls, but no less tense.

Wrin and I settled onto a couch, his presence beside me solid and strong. My heart thumped harder as if readying for a physical fight, and I grinned.

Here we go.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Wrin

The meeting proved to be a continuation of the issues discussed on previous days. Raxnor had led a group of Zaarn mercenaries from theMarauderon a mission to destroy another of the Grug emitters that created the mind-destroying telepathy field of the Abyss. So now we had two teams who were experts at that.

The Tula had ramped up production of the zurilium alloy that blocked that same telepathy field, and the Sjisji had covered the hulls of two more battle shuttles, theSaberone of them.

Now I had a ship I could fly into the Abyss without anyone needing to wear special helmets. It would allow for multiday trips instead of hour-long excursions. But no matter how well-armed theSaberwas, the shuttle was still far smaller than a Raptor-class warship like theDaredevil. I sent a message commanding Tark, Ell-Laa, and Zo-Fee to work on a way to fly theDaredevilinto the Abyss.

My lips pulled back from my teeth at the thought of taking the fight to the gray aliens. I’d always considered the Grug’s past misdeeds as horrible, but it had been at a more intellectual level. All of that had changed the moment I realized the Grug had been the ones to remove Vivv from her ship, to sell her to Glovar for medical experimentation.

Now I wanted to pound the pain of every injury, every discomfort—every moment of anything other than her perfect happiness—into their flesh and let their telepathy transmit the feeling to all of them.

The discussion once turned to what to do about the Grug.

“We destroy the Grug! We kill them all!” the Tula said, the quick anger of her species evident even in their politicians.

“As lovely as that sounds, it’s amazingly shortsighted,” the Sjisji countered.

“Are you calling me stupid?”

“You are the one to use the word, and I could never think to gainsay you.” The bird alien’s large eyes glittered with amusement.

Which only made the lizard alien angrier. “Why, you—”

“You’re both right.” My mother’s voice cut through the room, making everyone look at her. “We need a way to defeat the Grug.” She nodded to the Tula senator. “Andwe need a way to keep them a functioning member of our society.”

“What? Why?” Vivv blurted. When all eyes turned to her, she lifted her hands, palms out, and patted at the air. “I’m not disagreeing. I simply don’t know enough.”

“The Grug control all trade and manufacture in the seven sectors,” I said, and Mother nodded to agree this had been her thought as well. “They have infiltrated every facet of our lives. Even if we could capture all of their facilities without damaging anything—and that’s a long-shot now that they’ve created soldier drones—it would take time and a great deal of manpower to get everything up and working.”

“A lot of people would go without while that happened,” Mother said. “We’d lack medicines, critical supplies, and the replacement parts to keep ships from breaking down in the middle of space far from help. All of it would be an ongoing problem for potentially years.”

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