Alien General's Fated: SciFi Alien Romance (Brion Brides) (14 page)

To counter that, Ryden had to be like one as well.

"I will hear no more of this," he cut in, allowing his deep voice to carry to every corner of the hall again. "The last time I stood here, I hoped I would be able to work alongside you, but I see now that was a mistake. You may be fit to lead in times of peace, but this is war and this ends now. I asked for an explanation, a real concern. Spare me the politics, they hold no value to me."

The Palians spoke, this time.

"General," their ambassador said, smiling oddly. "
We
called our army here to give you support."

It was hard to surprise him, but that was definitely something he hadn't assumed. Ryden didn't let it show, even when the ambassador went on.

"We agree with you. About the traitors. About us not being prepared to fight this war. We called our Commander Goy here only after we heard of the other two. Do not be offended."

A smirk dragged the corners of his lips upward. The damn Palians, they were always full of surprises. He couldn't say he liked the smug bastards, exactly. Palians were a nurturing species, always looking for peaceful ways to settle things, that's why they were often used as conciliators. But they had the annoying habit of coming to the right conclusion.

"I am not," he said simply. "It's good to see not everyone on this council is irredeemable."

The council murmured again, but the general had had enough of them. He signaled his warriors, knowing that somewhere, the hive mind was enjoying the show.

Hundreds of Ryden's elite warriors marched to the hall. Ryden saw Aria wince, looking around in bewilderment. There was a sad look in her eyes, reminding him of the one of fear.

Stavor tensed up, but he rose calmly, a spark of danger in his eyes.

"This is a coup," he stated. "I see why I was called here."

Ryden turned to him. "This is martial law. I declared it days ago, but I see it needs to be established more firmly. As for you, what you said before is true. The Clayors need to be rooted out before their support gets here."

Stavor nodded.

"I agree," he said, looking at Ryden seriously. "Trust me, I agree. But this is where we are different. I follow orders. Your orders were to reinforce security on Ilotra. After it became known the Clayors were already here, the task to find and kill them was added. But you've gone beyond that."

"There is no way to do this separately, as you can see," Ryden said coldly.

"All that means is that you didn't look hard enough," Stavor replied.

Before Ryden could say anything, Aria spoke.

"He did," she blurted out, looking startled in the next second as though she hadn't intended to say that out loud.

She turned to the council, her eyes steely.

"He is right," she said. "General Ryden is right. I have seen the enemy. You're helping it. Some of you are doing this on purpose, one of
us
is urging the discontent on, but you are
all
a part of this. The enemy is here and I can assure you, we are not ready."

A burst of pride warmed Ryden from the inside, the makings of a smirk on his lips. The little Terran was proving to be more and more to his liking.

Aria looked toward Ryden then.

"He is," she added. "And when you're thanking him afterward, I want you to remember this moment."

 

She fell silent after that. Ryden ignored the desire to throw Aria over his shoulder and take her away from it all, see if she had changed her mind. Her words were sincere, because he could hear the resentment in her voice. She didn't want to believe what she did. She wished to deny the truth, but could not. That spoke to a strong character in his mind, one he liked a lot.

He turned to the council, knowing that once he'd done it, there would be no going back. Bad choices for bad times, but he only did what needed to be done.

 

"You will all return to your quarters and stay there until further notice," he said, speaking over the rising protests. "You will be ready to move and evacuate at a moment's notice. As of this moment, I'm disbanding the council until this conflict is over."

At that, the shrill screams rose to the sky, but he ignored them. His warriors got to work escorting the ambassadors back to their rooms, essentially arresting them. Some went kicking and screaming, others—like the Palians and Brions—accepted his judgment with cold dignity.

He wondered if he'd still have the support of the Palian fleet after that, but he chose not to single anyone out. It was better if he knew where they all were.

The commanders stayed when all the ambassadors had been led away. The Palian was observing him coldly, Stavor was the picture of calm as he always was, and the Fremma had yet to speak. The scavenger species of Fremmas had no worlds to call their own, even though they'd been offered a home world.

Their perpetual home was in space, the biggest fleet to ever sail together, composed of ships mostly found, bought, borrowed or simply stolen from others. They looked a lot like humans, save for their pale greenish skin and the wires at the back of their heads, which were connected to their partly mechanical bodies.

Stavor moved first, approaching him without fear. It was a posturing move, but Ryden knew the warlord had the strength to give him a decent fight. He wouldn't win, of course.

"Are you going to stop me or do I need to threaten you?" the Koliar asked.

"I will not stop you unless you make the mistake of threatening me," Ryden replied.

Stavor snorted.

"My ship will stay," he said. "The Clayor are the main enemy right now, but mark my words, Brion. When this is done, I
will
bring you to justice."

Ryden didn't answer that. Stavor gave him one last look and left. The Palian was next.

"My fleet still supports you," he said, "but that might not have been the wisest move."

"Perhaps," Ryden said. "I doubt I was sent here to make friends."

Finally, the Fremma approached him, a short warrior with his trademark wires buzzing.

"And you," Ryden asked. "Who do the scavengers support?"

The man gave him a wide, mischievous smile. "We side with the winners, of course."

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Aria

 

It hurt, to be proven right.

Aria had tried so hard to deny the fact that the Union's council was bringing everything down upon itself. Even the ones who weren't actively trying to aid the enemy were doing it by letting the others tie Ryden's hands.

She remembered how impossible it had been to even get to talk to the moon's security chief. And now it might be too late. She hoped Ryden had a plan for the incoming Clayor armies, already reported to be days away, maybe hours.

Because Ilotra sure as hell didn't.

It bothered her. She hadn't thought of herself as the bright-eyed naïve girl, but apparently that's what she was. Not naïve about the general, not that. Aria had known what he was from the start. About the council and the entire galaxy.

She couldn't believe she'd thought that in the Union, there might be an actual purpose for her. Some way to put her knowledge to work for the benefit of all. It only ended up getting her bumped down to meaningless tasks which she—as it turns out—didn't even have to do.

The next time she saw Sota, she'd give that guy a piece of her mind. If her trial run should have been over a while ago, there would be hell to pay.

But all her worries seemed to be of little importance when she suddenly found that she'd been left in the great hall alone with the general.

Immediately, she backed away. The room seemed so weird now, big and empty, her footsteps echoing in the room where the fate of the galaxy was decided. She knew Ryden was in big trouble for what he'd done, but she believed he was doing it for the Union's sake. With no way to know who the traitors were, it was better to make sure that the council members had no chance to mess anything else up.

Ryden followed her with slow, measured steps. His eyes were alight with desire; Aria couldn't mistake that look for anything else. It was the same as in her rooms, but she felt considerably less sure about her feelings now. The general was as relentless with her as he was with the fortress. She got the sense they were both being worn down.

A guy like that was probably not used to having to wear a girl down. Her eyes wandered over his perfect form, from his wide shoulders to the powerful build of his body. Again and again, her eyes drifted back to his face, mesmerized by his eyes and the fire in them.

She'd missed him, but she wasn't sure if it was her talking or the frantic rescue that made her weaken. But she knew that she needed to make up her mind
really fast
, because there was no doubt in her mind Ryden was about to suggest it again, one way or another.

Aria was saved by a com link, regretting it the second when the general's face dropped.

"Stay here," he ordered. "There has been an attack."

He stopped then, suddenly, listening to the link intently, the frown deepening on his brow. Aria saw him grit his teeth in fury.

"She's the only one now?" he asked, not from her.

Aria wondered if they were talking about her. In the next moment, when Ryden looked at her with worry, she had her answer.

"Are you absolutely sure?" he growled. "How could they have gotten all of them?"

The general listened to the answer before taking a deep breath.

"Aria," he said. "You know how to operate the defense systems of Ilotra?"

That was a strange question.

"I..." she stuttered for a moment. "Yes. Most of them, if need be. But a lot of the controls are a bit odd here, I'd have to read up and—"

"The shield," Ryden said hurriedly. "Do you know how to turn on the bubble?"

Aria wasn't sure she liked the direction the conversation was taking. She nodded hesitantly.

"I think so," she said.

The general was looking at her seriously. "You need to be sure, Aria. Can you turn on the shield?"

"Yes," she assured him. "What happened, General? I, yes, I could handle the controls, but why would I? Did something happen to Captain Algos?"

Ryden seethed with fury.

"We angered the hive mind," he said then. "It got its revenge. Algos is dead, so is all of his crew. So are practically all of those who worked in the command center, both the central one and the one regulating the shield. The hive mind threw all it had into this. It's only you now. You and a few rookies who have the basic ideas of how to work one console."

Time seemed to slow down for Aria. Her head started to spin. It couldn't possibly be happening to her.

Well, you wanted to be important
, her mind said.
You wanted to be needed
.

 

***

 

The way to the command center had changed drastically. Bodies littered the ground everywhere, mostly Clayors, with some Brion warriors and crew members scattered around. Aria walked on, thinking that there were
so many
. Ryden had to be right; there was no way the hive mind didn't use almost all it had.

The smell was nauseating, unshakable. Aria held a hand before her mouth, but it still reached her, rotten, repulsive. The crews were already hard at work trying to clean it all up, but the smell would be more difficult to get out. Nothing quite as foul as a dead Clayor, unless there were hundreds of them.

Ryden walked beside her, his face twisted by fury. She knew he hated it. The enemy had waited until he and most of his warriors were cleaning out the council and then attacked. Even if they'd been alerted in time, there was no way they'd have made much of a difference. Ilotra was vast and running only helped so much. Not even the inner transportation lines would have done much difference.

She noticed other warriors with them too. Ryden had spoken very fast to them in Brionese, but Aria had caught some words and figured out the rest. After all, it was pretty logical that with one hour, she'd become the most valuable person there.

The hive mind had exhausted itself with the massacre, but the general had been right. Almost nothing remained in its wake. The Clayors had just killed, killed, killed. The command center had been hit the hardest, but not only. Many engineers, and people who manned the weapons were dead too. It seemed to Aria that the hive mind had just lashed out, tried to get as many as it could.

She was horrified, but she had an impossible task to conquer.

What she'd told Ryden was true. She
did
theoretically know how all the stuff worked, but she'd barely even been allowed to touch it up to this point. Not to mention that the looming knowledge of being the only one with
any
idea at all made the pit of her stomach ice over.

Still, Aria would not let it get to her. Ryden had comforted her in saying she wasn't suddenly tasked with the entire fortress's defenses. While the others might not have had the knowledge of the particular layouts, there were plenty of very perceptive and wise species on the moon. Ryden was bringing down his own technicians too, but Aria would have to show them the basics.

She had hoped against hope that it wouldn't be too bad, but the command center was in complete disarray. She ignored the dire need to sleep and got to work, finding the most apt people to aid her and worked from there.

She lost Ryden from her side somewhere in the process, being left with an impressive armed guard in his stead. The screens showed the general moving around on Ilotra, whenever Aria had the moment to spare them a look. He seemed to be everywhere at once, pushing his warriors harder than ever before to make sure all of the Clayor hideouts were found. He was also telling them about the Host.

Aria hadn't wanted to believe that, but then she remembered the presence she'd felt. When she asked the general about it, he'd looked positively ready to kill and confirmed that she had indeed met the Host. The look in his eyes made it very clear to Aria how close she'd been to dying in that moment.

"You should never have met him," the general growled, a dark look in his eyes.