Cosmic Honor

by Jade Waltz

  Her eyes sharpened as a snarl ripped through her. “They are foolish if they thought that they could assassinate Idris and escape this starbase soon after. Even if they defeated Erlyn, the number of soldiers aboard would have stopped them.” She gave Jaiya’s hand a squeeze before letting go. “I don’t care what gender you are. Your actions prove that I can trust you.”

  “Will I be able to explain myself to him?”

  “I don’t know what happened between you two, but I respect his wishes.” The Warrior Princess stood up from her chair and sighed. “Once Qatszo says you have fully recovered, you will have to leave. I refuse to make you a prisoner of war, but you can’t remain here.”

  “But I committed treason by coming here disguised as my brother, and for taking part in killing the assassins sent here. They will strip me of my titles, send me to trial and convict me for murder.”

  She shook her head. “You can’t remain here.”

  Jaiya nodded. “I understand.”

  Ushyaz’s eyes softened. “Believe me. I wished things were different, but I can’t keep a member of our enemy here, no matter what good deed you have done. We are in the middle of war.”

  Jaiya didn’t fault her for that logic. She would have done the same in her shoes. There was no use arguing.

  “How long was I unconscious?” Jaiya asked softly, wanting to get all the facts she would soon need. She was here only a week when the CTA representatives arrived. There was no telling how long she was out healing the serious wounds she had.

  “It took a couple of days before you were fully stabilized. Idris tended your wounds until he wasn’t needed.” She glanced down at her wristband. ”It’s been a little over a week in by your standards since you saved him.”

  She has been here for over two weeks and spent half of it dead to the world.

  “What should I do about your brother?”

  “Give him space and let him come to you.”

  “And if he doesn’t?”

  Sadness filled Ushyaz’s face. “Then it would be his mistake. Just know that I am honored to meet the woman who saved my brother’s life by risking hers.”

  Jaiya packed her remaining belongings into her travel cases, preparing for the trip back to her moon base.

  She knew when she wasn’t wanted around any longer.

  Soon after Ushyaz left, Qatszo came in and examined her. Other than letting her know her new scales will itch as she healed, she was free to go as long as she took it easy.

  Prince Idris refused to speak with her, and Erlyn remained beside him, faithfully fulfilling his role as a prince’s assistant. The only remaining male who stayed by her side was Raizxl, and she believed it was more out of duty than because he wanted to.

  The only person who openly spoke to her was Princess Ushyaz, but she was busy defending her starbase, so her time was limited.

  Jaiya placed the chunk of long hair she’d saved onto her sand bed with a note addressed to Idris.

  Maybe they could be friends in another lifetime, but obviously, her being a human was too big an obstacle for him.

  Raizxl carried her travel cases for her and helped her load them into her fighter, telling her ruefully it was the most he could do.

  “Stay out of trouble, little assassin.”

  Jaiya raised an eyebrow at the nickname but didn’t comment. She didn’t know if it was a joke or if he was calling her that because she had killed three of the five representatives. She hoped it was the former.

  They would likely never meet again. Jaiya reached for his face and touched her forehead with his.

  “Protect them for me, okay?”

  He nodded without a word as sadness filled his eyes.

  This was it. She was leaving, and the only farewell party she had was the private guard who had been assigned to her.

  Jaiya sighed and climbed the ladder to her fighter’s cockpit, jumping in. She opened the personal security box and grabbed her ID and mission holodisk, placing them into their rightful places as she prepared to take off.

  Combing her hair back, she grabbed her helmet off the steering wheel and put it on. She took one last look at the hangar, hoping someone might try to catch her, to say goodbye before she left. Sadly, only Raizxl remained, valiant as ever, nodding as her gaze landed on him.

  She pushed her ID all the way into its slot, hearing it click as the fighter’s engines turned on. The sounds of the ladder collapsing into the fighter disappeared as the dome sealed.

  The instruments and displays lit up, welcoming her one last time.

  Jaiya checked the energy cells, making sure the Daextru grounds crew had done their job and smiled when they read full. Her weapons were recharged and restocked. All systems were green—ready to go.

  She turned on the holodisk reader and entered the moon base coordinates, mapping them out as she drove her fighter to the launch strip.

  Flicking all her communications systems on, Jaiya turned toward the hangar’s Control Room, knowing he was watching her.

  “It is my turn to see just how much of a male you really are.”

  “It is my turn to see just how much of a male you really are.”

  The silence within the hangar’s Control Room was deafening. No one wanted to be the first to speak, but Idris knew they all were peaking at him from in the corner of their eyes.

  Those words struck a chord within him.

  They were the same ones he’d told her during that night that still haunted him.

  Idris couldn’t understand why she wanted anything to do with him. He had assaulted her in the practice room, ignored her because he was so disappointed with himself, and then nearly let her die so he could live. The only way he’d seen to save her life was to heal her with some of his secondary scales.

  Now he was struggling to get him—her—out of his head.

  This whole time, Aydin Lian had been Jaiya Lian, the fierce fighter pilot he’d met on the battlefield. She was the one he’d loved finding and toying with, just to see her reaction. Now he knew why Aydin had seemed so maddeningly familiar.

  “So, are you going to go after her?” His sister asked, strolling into the room with a letter in one hand and something black dangling in the other.

  “You and I both know that I can’t.”

  “There is no ‘we’ in this situation, brother. You are the only one who messed up here,” Ushyaz scolded, tossing him the two objects she carried. “You only meet a female like that once in a lifetime. So go.”

  Idris caught the long lock of black hair and the letter she’d brought, confused.

  He unfolded the letter, feeling his heart shatter as he began reading.

  Prince Idris,

  I wanted to explain myself to you, but you never gave me the opportunity.

  The day before the mission trip, I was called into my Rear Admiral’s office. He ordered me and my wing to escort my brother on a diplomatic mission to meet you and plan a peace treaty.

  When I visited my brother, he was a nervous wreck. He had already given up on the idea of forging peace.

  How could I, in good faith, allow him to go on the mission, knowing that he was doomed to fail?

  So I made a plan.

  If I was going to restore my family’s name and gain recognition, I needed to make sure this mission succeeded.

  I want to be the one to tell you about my family’s name—and how the CTA blamed both my mother and father for starting the war.

  My mother was the senior diplomat’s assistant before she was killed when her vessel was shot down. My father, the former Admiral, was blinded by anger and refused to answer any hails from the Daextru, instead choosing to incite a war.

  He was forced to retire in dishonor shortly afterward.

  Because of my parents, and the fact that I am a female, no one has ever taken me seriously.

  That is until I came and met you.

  Working alongside you and your people has shown me how good life can be. You treated me with respect
, despite our cultural differences.

  But now my dream has come to an end. Instead of mocking me for being female, you’ve labeled me as a human. No matter how hard I worked on the peace treaty alongside you, I will always be part of the species that betrayed you, twice.

  Before I chopped it off to disguise myself, my hair almost touched my tailbone. Once, you might have seen me as your equal.

  I am leaving all of my honor with you, knowing whatever I have left will mean nothing when I return home.

  Until the next life,

  Jaiya Lian

  “Jaiya Lian, you are hereby charged with treason and fraternizing with the enemy,” Rear Admiral Dias snarled. “As punishment, all of your titles and privileges are stripped, and you will be offered as part of the first tribute to our new allies.” He leaned in close, hatred burned in his hardened gaze. “I will enjoy watching you scream for mercy as the Vresqoxk break you and broadcast your punishment for all to see.”

  Jaiya jerked her body, wrists tugging uselessly at their restraints.

  “Why?” She hissed, as the guards tightened their hold on her. “Why would you go through the motions of organizing a diplomatic mission if an alliance with the Daextru was never the goal?”

  Laughter rolled through the room.

  “The Vresqoxk offered to become our allies shortly after the Daextru first betrayed us. Your father refused to accept their offer to join forces, unwilling to trust another alien species. His rage blinded him to the opportunities the Vresqoxk presented. Our superiors saw this.” He chuckled. “In fact, we all did. So he was dismissed for disobeying orders.”

  Dias reached forward and gripped her chin in a bruising grip, turning her head side to side.

  “You look a lot like your father with all of your hair shaved. It will give me great pleasure to know he will watch his daughter be punished for a mistake he made. We’ll make an example out of you, so anyone who considers opposing the CTA will think twice from now on.”

  “That’s not what this is about, is it? Your daughter and her crew didn’t return from the base. Instead, you got me, who returned, hoping that the betrayal at the signing was a mistake.” She yanked her chin from his grip. Venom laced her voice. “I had the pleasure of killing your daughter. My only mistake was ever entering CTA space again.”

  A loud snap sounded as her head jerked to the side with the force of his blow.

  She gasped when Dias gripped her hair brutally and brought his lips to her ear.

  “You are going to wish you’d died after the Vresqoxk are done with you.”

  Jaiya stared at the ceiling and wondered what was happening in the galaxy. She felt betrayed, used, and, most of all, annoyed.

  The whole mission had been a lie, and her gut was telling her that it had been pre-planned to cover some nefarious plot.

  The problem was, she didn’t have any idea what that plot entailed.

  Jaiya resented not speaking more with her father after all these years. The loss of her mother and betrayal of the very military they had all enlisted in led him to live his life in seclusion. A part of her blamed him for her current situation; if he’d only been honest with her about their government’s dishonorable dealings in the past, she could have been more careful. Maybe she wouldn’t be locked in a cell, waiting to face her gruesome punishment.

  She would have become a mercenary pilot or run trade routes, if only he had warned her.

  But instead, she had taken what she’d thought was the best route to fix his mistakes and make a name for herself. In a male-dominated environment where your family name defined you, it was no wonder her coworkers had always kept her at arm’s length.

  Stuck in both of her parents’ shadows, she had lived an ostracized life.

  ‘The Great Lian War’—that name had been mockingly thrown at her every day by colleagues trying to get a rise out of her. Her parent’s story was a lesson taught to every soldier enrolled in the military—love had no place in times of war.

  Her side itched. Just another reminder of the moment her life came crashing down. Afraid to alert the cameras monitoring the room, she gripped the hem of her dirty shirt before sneaking her other hand to touch her hidden treasure. Idris’ golden scales still covered the injuries she had received from the failed assassination attempt, and they protected her battle wounds from harm as they healed.

  But there was a cost: they could never be removed, as far as she knew.

  In a fit of worry, she had tried picking at them, to remove them before she arrived at the moon base, but they refused to budge.

  Since then, she had always kept her chest and torso hidden in fear of what would happen if her captors found out. She was lucky they left her in the clothes she’d arrived in and never inspected her other than a rough pat-down.

  The scales frequently itched, as if the Stars were reminding her of Idris.

  No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t keep the sapphire-scaled male out of her mind.

  The harsh words she had overheard him say cut deep within her. His refusal to speak with her before her departure only added to the pain. Whatever they had built between them was ruined, ripped apart by both the representatives’ actions and her own deception.

  If only she had told him who she was before the humans had arrived and explained her motivations, things wouldn’t have gone so sour, so quickly. Perhaps he would have been more amenable to the truth if he had learned about it before the attempt on his life.

  Too much doubt and danger surrounded him.

  Even though it hurts, I don’t blame him for sending me away. In his place, I would have done the same.

  She didn’t fault the Daextru for their hostility. A woman had disguised herself and spent time getting close to their prince, only for her species to try to renege on their promise of peace. It didn’t matter that she had saved his life by killing members of her own species—she was guilty by association.

  Born into her family, she should be used to taking the blame for others’ actions by now.

  She didn’t bother to wipe away the tears of frustration that fell down her face.

  For once in her life, she had felt respected, like an equal, instead of defined by her family’s name. Those five short days had been like paradise to her. Her opinions had mattered, personally, and professionally.

  Even though the outcome of her life was already set in stone, that didn’t stop her from worrying about her loved ones.

  What had happened to Aydin? Had he reported her? Or had he done what she’d asked and snuck away to Gaia to hide with their father? Or had he gotten caught—was he waiting in the same facility as her?

  And then there was her wing. Would Zaera take over? Or would they be assigned someone else? She knew nothing about their fate. It was safe to assume that they wouldn’t be split up, only because dividing an established wing during a war was a waste of resources. Wing members needed time to establish trust in order to avoid preventable mistakes and deaths.

  And most of all, she wondered: was the Daextru safe?

  It pained her that her very own presence could have somehow put them in more danger.

  She was in the dark, and it was driving her insane.

  About a week had gone by since she had returned and was thrown into her prison cell. No visits. No threats. Not even a taunting announcement over the one-way page system.

  The two daily meals she received through the exchange window were her only way of telling how much time had passed in her cell. She had given up trying to talk to the guards; they refused to acknowledge her when they took her last meal’s dishes and replaced them with the next.

  The cell’s metal walls were bare and soundproof, leaving her to wonder where she was and who else was locked up here besides her.

  With nothing else to do, she often reflected on past battles and wondered why no one else questioned the timeline of the war’s events. She had a lot of free time to think now that she wasn’t focused on becoming better, fighting ha
rder, and surviving as a female in the military.

  After hearing the Daextru side of the story, she questioned everything she’d learned from her fellow humans.

  The Daextru and Vresqoxk had gone to war long before the Daextru asked the CTA for help. It was suspicious for the Vresqoxk to offer an alliance shortly after the vessel filled with the original peace treaty’s representatives exploded.

  Unless they were the ones who blew it up . . .

  It made sense. Why would the Vresqoxk want their enemy to ally with another species? The alliance between the CTA and Daextru could have grown strong if it ever had the opportunity to flourish, especially since humans had enough sand to supply the Daextru for generations. Their offer to share advanced terraforming and space travel technology was worth the trade for the CTA.

  Start a war between your enemy and their potential ally, and then swoop in to join forces with the recently scorned in order to beat them.

  But why did the CTA attempt another peace treaty? And why, after twenty-five years, was the Vresqoxk asking for a tribute?

  “I will enjoy watching you scream for mercy, as the Vresqoxk break you and broadcast your punishment for all to see.”

  A shiver passed through her, but not from the damp cold of the room. It was from the realization of who she was about to be delivered to. She connected that threat with Raizxl’s explanation about the other species in the galaxy.

  “Our warrior females would rather become sterile than take the chance of being captured while fertile, to be raped and forced to incubate for a deranged species that values no one but their own.”

  Something had happened while she was away that made the Vresqoxk push the CTA to pay up, and she had a sickening feeling that her government was offering women as payment.

  What was worth more than the lives of your female citizens?

  The sound of a buzzer filled the room as a red light flashed above her cell door.