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Jax just kept up that lazy grin, aimed at everyone in the room, or the situation, or, heck, I had no idea. He just smiled all the damn time, and instead of being annoying as it seemed like it should, it was kind of—sexy?
Was that weird?
Well, no, I mean obviously the dude was sexy. He was seven feet tall and ripped, with long glossy black hair and sparkling blue eyes. He belonged on the cover of a romance novel or in a beefcake calendar to raise money for kids with cancer.
But the other Thorzi I’d met, hybrid and full-blooded alike, had all been serious to the point of being dour. Jax’s smile set me at ease in a way that even shockingly gentle Prince Kaelum didn’t.
So yeah, no matter who needed what, I was going with him. Whatever it took, I was following Jax.
With Ree’s uneasy acceptance and one more hard hug, we split up. Almost half the humans went with Kaelum to the big cargo ship, and it struck me I might never see some of them again. Because Earth? Yeah, had no interest for me when an actual freaking space adventure was on the table.
I stared after them for a second, but Jax touched my shoulder. I nodded, and he led me onto the bridge of his ship—well, Prince Kaelum’s ship, I supposed—and unlike any of the other Thorzi I’d met, he turned and looked to me. Watching me for a response or a reaction maybe.
So like the mother of a toddler, I looked around and... well, I didn’t exactly have to feign being impressed. It was like something out of a science-fiction show with a really big budget.
He motioned to the big chair in the middle that looked almost like a throne. “Care to play captain?”
And okay, maybe he was being condescending, and he was making fun instead of being serious, but I was on the bridge of a spaceship. Not a ride at an amusement park, or a dream about spaceships that would turn into a dream about looking for my Dad as soon as I sat in the chair.
I was on the bridge of a real-life spaceship.
Darn right I sat in the captain’s chair.
There was even a giant blank panel in front of the room that might—and I had to push down a delighted schoolboy squeal at the idea—be a view screen.
Jax turned and plopped into a chair in front of me and started pressing buttons. “Shall we take off, Captain?” he asked, and despite the amusement in his voice, I couldn’t hold back my giddy delight.
Or the grin that spread across my face as I rested my elbows on the armrests of the chair and said, “Make it so.”
CHAPTER4
JAX
This one was amusing. I understood only half of what he said, but he said it with complete sincerity and confidence, as if the words meant something to him or were those he had heard repeated often—a warrior’s creed.
I laughed to myself as I readied the ship to fly.
The plan was simple—we would fly Kaelum’s ship over the lab, over the palace, drawing attention. It was late enough in the morning now that we hoped Crux would see the humans missing and might think that this was our escape attempt.
From this smaller vessel, we would fly boldly and take evasive maneuvers long enough for the cargo ship I had procured for the prince to escape, to start its return trip to Earth with the humans who wished to leave Thorzan.
Once they were clear of the planet, beyond the scope of being reasonably caught, Wesley and I would let Crux catch us. He would find an empty ship—only me and this one human, the rest escaped, and the two of us here to make a case, beside Ree and the queen and the other humans who had stayed behind, that Crux had overstepped. This time, he had broken the law and needed to be punished.
I thought myself well suited to the task of defending Wesley from Crux or anyone else. I was a warrior, son of Zul the Proeliator, strongest fighter of his age. If I could not prove myself against a worm of a scientist, then there was no point in me at all. The power of my family’s mark to intuit the stratagem of battle negated his ability to see my thoughts—perhaps I’d never tested the theory in a fight, but I was more than willing to try.
All my life, I had trained as a warrior, brought up to protect Prince Kaelum from larger Thorzi who would do him harm, threatened by his human heritage. And mine.
I could protect one soft human from Crux’s anger. And soon, Kaelum would return and speak for himself. Then, this matter would be settled, and with any luck, King Xyren would find Crux guilty of his many crimes and send him and his spiteful progeny, Vorian, to the icy wastes.
As the twin suns rose over Thorzan, we took off. Only moments after we flew from our docking place near the lab, another ship rose to give chase, and we darted off across the jungle.
Behind me, I heard the short intake of breath from Wesley of Earth. When I threw a look over my shoulder, he was beaming, leaning in his seat to accommodate every twist and turn I made.
“You like this,” I observed, turning back to the screen so I could guide us closer to the treetops below.
Crux’s ship was slower, less agile. But he was coming up behind us quickly, burning all the fuel his ship had in its crystals.
“Me?” Wesley breathed. Another quick glance showed me the ardent sparkling of his eyes behind the strange clear mask he wore. “I love it.”
