CHAPTER TWO
Storr
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MY VOICE ECHOED through the cramped room, freezing all of the humans into place.
Much like the docking tube we had been forced to use, the human space station was primitive and poorly made.
It was little more than a large ring rotating around a central axis.
They did not even have true artificial gravity.
My nostrils flared, filled with the stench of inadequate air filtration. How had such a technologically inferior species done such damage to the Varool? If they had not utilized forbidden biological sciences, we would have bested them easily.
It grated, and the anger filled my voice.
Grol shifted, a scowl lengthening his square face. My head of war didn’t trust the humans, even for this peace accord. And why should he? The duplicitous aliens had already proved willing to stoop to the lowest level to get what they wanted.
The memory of my ship’s Healing Hall flashed through my mind—every bed and spare cot filled with one of my people. Each fought her final battle against an implacable enemy. They had been proud warriors—I had hated how the human virus rampaging through their bodies made them cry out in distress.
The silence afterward had been far worse.
Anger boiled in my veins, and the muscles of my back tightened, locking the plates of my spine together into its strongest form. It would thwart any honorless enemy who attempted to attack from behind. The added stability it gave my torso also made each strike of my fists more powerful.
If only there were a worthy opponent present.
The admiral who gave the order to release the virus was dead.
The humans claimed all of the scientists who created the virus were men who died.
Humans cannot be trusted. If I ever discovered that one of these women were responsible, my justice would be swift—and personal.
It was difficult to imagine any species surpassing the Folri for most-hated enemy.
Yet for all the horror the Folri had caused the Varool, destroying our home world paled in comparison to the death of our women.
Planetless, we still had a future. The humans had left us with a twisted echo of a future that barely deserved the appellation.
I shoved away my anger. It would do little good here. Today, I would lead my people into the new chapter of their lives, one that rewove a thread of hope through our tapestry of despair.
Lun turned to shoot me a puzzled look. My heart pinched in my chest. My brother looked so much like Mother. He had her bright-green eyes and joyful disposition, while I took after our father, a huge block of a man, all hard angles and thick muscle.
Those eyes now asked a million questions. Yet he voiced not a one of them, unwilling to show our enemies any sign of division or weakness.
Pride swelled my chest. He was a good prince and an even better brother. It was a blade to my heart to disappoint him. He had been excited to be the Varool to marry and seal the official peace treaty. I would need to tell him it was not a lack in him that led to my declaration.
A scent cut through the stink of the station.
Light and sweet and foreign, it teased at my nostrils, setting my pulse thrumming.
Shock jolted through me anew as my zural heart began to beat for the first time in my life.
The secondary organ offered the additional circulatory support needed to maintain the hurvon, the larger mating erection.
I had searched for this scent amongst our women for years, to no avail. When they all died, I thought my ability to mate had died with them.
Now it wafted from the human woman—my enemy.
My teeth ground together. It cannot be!
Yet it was.
This human was my fated mate.
Deirdre Hutchins was the daughter of the man who had killed every Varool woman and doomed my people to a future of interbreeding with inferiors.
Their evil virus still lingered on the planet below, set to kill again if given the chance.
The only solution any of our scientists had found was to hope our offspring had hybrid vigor.
At least her father’s own weapon turned around and killed him and all of the other human males. My lips pulled back from my teeth. The Divine Mother had been swift with her justice, though why she then chose to offer me such a mate was a mystery.
Deirdre Hutchins was tall for a human, yet far shorter than I was used to.
Her hips and breasts protruded from her body in unnatural curves—at least when compared to varoolian women.
Her skin was the same unmarked light-brown so many of them had, with brown hair that coiled strangely instead of hanging straight.
At least her mouth was shaped the same as ours, and her nose was wider but not too jarring.
It was her eyes that were the most alien, their color yet another shade of brown.
Why could she not have been one of the few to have green eyes?
Yes, human green eyes were a pale and weak substitute compared to the rich depths of a Varool’s, but it would look better than the color of dirt!
The worst of it, however, was the clothing she wore.
Anger burned hot in my blood. I flicked my fingers at her.
“What is this? You pretend to be Varool? What is next? Skin dyes? Tattoos?” Our stripes were hereditary, not something to be mocked or mimicked.
Such tricks would fail to fool any of my people.
Yet should I expect anything else from such a duplicitous species?
A spark of anger flashed in those muddy eyes. Perhaps they were not quite as plain as I first thought. “This—” She plucked at her over layer. “—was supposed to be in honor of you and your people. But I’m sure you’re going to take affront at every little thing, just as your ambassador always does.”
“Deirdre—” Admiral Hutchins said.
My voice boomed over them both. “Did.”
“What?” the younger Hutchins said.
“The correct tense of the verb is ‘did.’ The ambassador you speak of so dismissively is dead by your father’s hand.”
“Oh.” Her shoulders slumped, and color leached from her face. Interesting. I had been told humans could turn redder, but I did not realize they could also lose color.
She seemed an odd mix of attack and conciliation. Would her reactions be similarly complex in bed? I imagined her underneath me, part softness, part fire.
My cock hardened, my zural heart thudding faster, a new disturbing presence in my chest. Her scent wrapped around me, scrambling sensible thought.
No! I will not succumb.
I held my breath, forcing my circulatory system to slow. The mating frenzy, once begun, would be difficult to control. I had duties to attend to. The human would be mine before this day was done.
That would have to be soon enough.
The new admiral led all of those gathered to a different room on the station.
Its walls were a uniform gray plastic, its floor un-softened by carpets.
A rectangular table stood surrounded by chairs, the fabric on the seats worn shiny and smooth.
There was not even a window to provide a view of the planet that had brought both our species to ruin.
Did they really hold important governmental functions in such a nondescript room?
The admiral sat toward the middle of one of the long sides and gestured that I should take a seat across from her.
I bared my teeth but complied. It was a compromise that allowed neither party to hold the powerful position of the table’s head. So be it.
Lun took the chair next to me, still silent.
Deirdre Hutchins sat at her mother’s side, in easy view and only a couple of arm lengths away. Her smell overrode every other, and my nostrils flared wide, setting my zural heart speeding. I ground my teeth.
Lun’s head whipped around, his eyes narrowing as he studied my chest. He had heard. I refused to look down, to acknowledge the new pounding of my zural heart and the visible pulse it created in the very center of my chest.
It should have beat for a woman of my people, not the daughter of my enemy. I glared at her.
Her eyes narrowed, and she glared back.
“King Storr, we need to finalize the documentation,” Admiral Hutchins said.
Yash stepped forward to stand behind my right shoulder. As the new lord of ambassadorship, he had taken over such duties upon his predecessor’s death. He offered me a screen. The thin piece of clear plastic lit up, displaying all the pertinent forms.
I sat it on the table and signed my glyph on the requisite spot, then slid it over to the admiral.
The older woman slipped on a pair of goggles that must be the human’s alternative to a translator chip. She stared down at the screen, a frown marking her light-brown face.
“Is there a problem?” I asked. Impatience ate at me. The sooner I could consummate this marriage, the sooner the zural heart would calm.
“I can’t read it,” she said. “My translation program doesn’t recognize the language.”
Gah! Could such petty disputes not be ignored?
“It is High Varoolian, the language of binding contracts.”
Yash pulled out another screen and tapped at it, his long fingers flashing across its surface. “I have sent you an updated translation program.”
A high bell tone sounded from the admiral’s person, and she said, “Yes. It’s working.” She read for a few minutes and pressed her thumb to the screen. “Now ours.”
One of her women sat a clunky tablet in front of her, and the admiral used a finger to sign. She offered it to her daughter. Deirdre Hutchins stared at me for long moments, her expression blank and impossible to read.
She shivered as if waking, signed, and slid the tablet over to me.
I picked it up. It was heavy, and its screen only displayed on one side. Primitive. Yash leaned over my shoulder to point to a specific flat line toward the bottom of the form. He had coached me a few days ago on the procedure, and I pressed a finger to the surface to write my glyph.
Medics stepped forward, one for each of us. A sting pinched my bicep, and Deirdre Hutchins winced as the injector pressed into her throat. It was done—we could now successfully breed.
“Well. That’s all taken care of,” the admiral said, standing and rubbing her hands together. “King Storr, I’d like to invite you and all of your people to a celebration. We’ve arranged a party in the main atrium.”
They expected me to celebrate this mockery of a mating?
“No. No party.” I shoved to my feet, anger tightening my muscles. “We consummate now.”