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“Yes, Your Highness. We’ve had news concerning your husband. I’ve come to take you to King Davos’s office.”
“What kind of news? What’s this about?” Kalen grabbed the door frame as a sudden wave of weakness hit him in the knees. The general extended a hand to him, but he ignored it. “You can tell me—please tell me. Is he hurt? He is, isn’t he? How bad is it? Do you know?”
“King Davos has asked to speak to you, sir. He’ll tell you everything we know.”
“All right, all right. I’m coming. I-I just have to…I need some shoes, or... Or maybe I…”
He turned with a vague idea about finding his boots and another wave of weakness hit him at the same time the tears rushed up to clog his throat. Choking on them, he coughed and stumbled right into the wall. Instantly a steadying hand came to save him. and there was a kind voice in his ear.
“It’s all right,” the general said. “We don’t have all the details yet, but he’s alive, Your Highness. Listen to me. I would have told you right away if he wasn’t.”
Kalen closed his eyes and nodded, his heart pounding a little less violently. One of the physicians had found his boots, so Haggoz watched silently as he sat down and put them on. The general even helped him lace them up, when his hands were shaking too badly to do it himself. Then with the guards trailing behind, General Haggoz escorted Kalen down the long corridor to reach King Davos’s office.
Inside the huge room, lit up as if it were midday, there was a hotbed of activity, with several family members already summoned, in addition to the many clerks and counselors bustling around the room. Prince Mikos was there, of course, looking fierce and furious and upset. Ryan was beside him, clutching his arm but looking determined. Kalen could see he was scared, though, and that frightened him again. Blake was there, near Davos and sitting beside Rakkur, who had an arm around his shoulders. He was blond and beautiful, and he looked so much like Blake when he was younger that Davos had hired a special guard to accompany Rakkur wherever he went. The guard was standing at the door now, as a matter of fact.
There were others in attendance, staff members he didn’t know, and all of them—everyone in the big room—turned to look at him as the general led him into the room.
He was frozen for a moment, and then Ryan dropped Mikos’s arm to come and embrace him. “Hello, Kalen. I’m sorry you had to wake up to this. I’ve only just arrived myself, and I know what you must be feeling. Come over here and sit down.”
Blake nodded and scooted over to make room for him. “Yes, come over here and sit down by me, honey, before you fall. Mikol is all right, as far as we know. But he’s been captured by that asshole uncle of yours.”
“Blake,” Davos admonished.
“What? I was just telling him what happened.”
“Not until we know more about what’s happened, and if…”
“Oh, for god’s sake, look at his face. He’s practically in shock and scared to death. You don’t seriously think he knew anything about this, do you? That’s insane. It’s obvious the two of them are crazy about each other.”
Davos frowned, but Kalen shook his head violently.“I don’t know anything about any of this,”he cried out.“I swear it!”
Blake sent Davos an irritated look. “Of course, you don’t. Now Davos, go ahead and brief us. Tell us what you know about Mikol.”
Davos scowled at his mate but waved a hand at Mikos to begin.
“All we know is what the officers and crew were able to glean from the scans on Mikol’s warship, which he left in orbit around Loros. From what little we know,” Mikos began, “Mikol and his landing party arrived on Loros late in the day and were taken onboard Lord Nerol’s private shuttle to survey the damage from the Pton attack. According to a message sent by Captain Florin, Mikol, along with his entourage, then travelled to a large fenced in compound of some kind, on the western outskirts of the capitol city. Scans confirmed this.”
“It must be my uncle’s private estate—he calls it a compound, and no one knows much about it. I think my father was suspicious of it not long before his death.”
“I see. Mikol and his men were taken captive there and then, we believe, as the ship has been unable to raise him on the private channels since that time. Shortly after they lost contact, they received a message from Lord Nerol, confirming the capture. The message said he’s being held as Nerol’s hostage.”
“Hostage? To what purpose?” Ryan asked sharply. “What do they want? How could he possibly think we won’t attack?”
“It’s unclear. As to what they want…he has asked for gold, of course. But outside of that, we have no idea. He says he’ll only negotiate with our representative when he arrives.”
Ryan leaned forward, looking tense and scared. “What are they threatening?”
“To kill Mikol and all the men with him if we don’t send someone. Or if we don’t deliver on their demands within the allotted time.”
“He’s insane,” Blake said quietly, his face a mask of anger. “What does he plan to do about the warship they came there on? If he dared harm Mikol, does he really think there would be anywhere he could run that we wouldn’t go after him?”
“Yes, he does,” Prince Mikos replied. “He’s been working with the Pton. They must have promised him sanctuary.”
Silence and shock met this announcement, until finally Kalen found his voice. “What?How is that possible? How do you know, sir? They haven’t even arrived in our galaxy yet, have they?”
Mikos nodded. “They’re on the edge, or at least the main force is. We’ve suspected for some time that they might have sent in some advance ships. Only a few, like scouts, in a way. I have a theory about them that I shared with my son before he left. Those new pirates who have been reported—these so-called Rothafari. I think they’re actually Pton, sent here to gauge our capabilities and find out more about the planets in this galaxy. The Nilaniums have been concerned about them for a while now, and they’ve been upset that they’ve copied some of their methods so that people have mistaken them for Drex. However, they’re unlike any Nilanium or Drex we know of, and from our forensic examinations of the bodies recovered after the attack on Mikol’s ship when he was returning to Tygeria with Kalen, we’ve discovered they have genetic material that marks them as alien to any known humanoid in this galaxy.”
“So they’re actually these Pton scouts,” Ryan said.
