Embrace the Romance

by S. E. Smith

  ‘We shouldn’t be working with the Kaliszians.’ The thought insidiously whispered through his mind. ‘They are weak. We can take what they have, take what Earth has. That would better serve our brother warriors. It would make them see who the worthy and fit one was in his family.’

  Ull didn’t know where these thoughts were coming from, but they made sense. There was no guarantee his mission to Earth would succeed. After all, what did the Emperor know? He was allowing a female to influence his decisions, just like the King of Luda was, as was the Supreme Commander of Kaliszian Defenses. It made them weak. Females were only ever meant for one thing. All females.

  His gaze went to the little one in the King’s arms and was surprised to find her staring unflinchingly back at him.

  “Beware the darkness that speaks to you.” Miki's words while quiet were spoken in a voice much older, wiser, and more powerful than hers could ever be. “It knows where you are most vulnerable when you are at your weakest. It then lies to you with the truth, making you believe and do things you never otherwise would. Terrible things. Beware the darkness, Warrior Ull.”

  “Miki,” Grim growled looking down at his youngest in shock. Her hand, the one with the Raptor’s Eye, gripped his neck and for a moment he felt such power radiating from it that he thought it would burn him, and her eyes seemed to glow.

  “What, Manno?” she asked, her voice once again full of innocence, her touch was cool, and her eyes were the beautiful amber of her mother’s.

  Grim’s gaze went to Ull to demand what had just happened, only to find the Warrior closing the hatch of his shuttle.

  “I should have brought cookies for Warrior Ull," Miki said, watching as the shuttle flew away. “He’s not very happy.”

  “That is truth, little one.” Grim’s concerned gaze remained on the shuttle.

  “Maybe Trisha’s cookies will make him happy. They’re the best.”

  Acknowledgments

  I’d like to thank my family for all their support during this exciting time of my life. I couldn’t have done it without you. I’d also like to thank all my friends that have been there for me, answering questions, and helping guide me especially you Reese.

  Also by M.K. Eidem

  Cassandra's Challenge: The Imperial Series, Book 1

  Victoria's Challenge: The Imperial Series, Book 2

  Jacinda's Challenge: The Imperial Series, Book 3

  Grim: Tornians Book 1

  A Grim Holiday: Tornians Book 1.5

  Wray: Tornians Book 2

  Ynyr: Tornians Book 3

  Oryon: Tornians Book 3.5

  Kirall's Kiss

  Nikhil: Kaliszians Book 1

  Treyvon: Kaliszians Book 2

  About the Author

  Michelle has always loved to read, and writing is just a natural extension of this for her. Growing up, she always loved to extend the stories of books she'd read just to see where the characters went. Happily married, she is the proud mother of two grown children and with the house empty has found time to write again. You can reach her at m.k.eidem@live.com or her website at http://www.mkeidem.com. She'd love to hear your comments.

  www.mkeidem.com

  The Prince, the Pilot, and the Puppy

  (“Star Puppy”) A novella in the Star Series

  By

  Susan Grant

  ABOUT The Prince, the Pilot, and the Puppy

  Trysh joined the Space Forces with the secret hope that her absentee father might notice her accomplishments and acknowledge her. At the top of her game as a starfighter pilot, the last thing she needs is a way too charming prince to get in her way. Trysh had learned at a young age what happened when a person lost their heart to someone above their social class – it led to heartache.

  Prince Rornn feels fortunate he can pursue his passion both in the air and on the ground. He decides being third in line for the throne definitely has its advantages – it allowed him to join the Space Forces as a top-gun starfighter pilot. What he doesn’t expect is to find a woman there who not only competes with him – she completes him!

  Everything Rornn tries appears to push Trysh further away – that is until they rescue a tiny, starving yipwag pup from an alien world. It turns out that “Puppy” is as good at sniffing out terrorists as she is at helping her two clueless humans figure out that they need each other as much as they do her.

  Can Rornn convince Trysh that he is nothing like her father and that she is just the right woman for him before the terrorists discover their furry little companion?

  Prologue

  Bezos Station, above the Colony of Barésh

  Forty-three light-years from Earth.

  Puppy

  I sit on the floor with Tall Ones towering all around me. My long pink tongue dangles as I pant. I’m excited but also a little nervous about what I’m about to do. I want to please the Tall Ones I love most. To be a “good girl”. A pouch containing two rings rests against my front paws. A big white bow My Trysh tied around my neck almost blocks my view of it. Rornn, my other Tall One, made me practice countless times to get ready for today. “When it comes to Earth traditions, I am woefully inexperienced,” he admitted during one of those sessions. “But I want the moment to be perfect for Trysh. All right, Puppy, one more time.”

  Of course, I figured it out the first try. I’m a lot smarter than he thinks, and he already thinks I’m very smart. I can see and understand much more than the Tall Ones realize. I herded My Trysh and My Rornn here, didn’t I? Not that they weren’t destined to be each other’s Forever Mates from the beginning. They just wandered away from the scent trail for a little while. They needed me to help steer them back to it.

  Sitting as straight as I can, I try to keep my tail from wagging too hard as I listen to Colonel Duarte’s booming voice. He’s the pack leader of Bezos Station—“the commander” the Tall Ones call him. Every starpilot in my Tall Ones’ squadron is here in the conference room. All wear blue-and-silver formal dress uniforms, including the bride.

  “Lieutenant Milton,” Colonel Duarte asks her, “will you have this man to be your husband, to live together in holy marriage? Will you love him, comfort him, honor, and keep him in sickness and in health, and forsaking all others, be faithful to him as long as you both shall live?”

  “I will,” My Trysh says, her fingers tightly woven with My Rornn’s, her voice trembling a little.

  My Trysh is a lot like me. Our early lives were hard, and we never knew our fathers. Her heart was broken by that and even though the pieces knitted back together, it too easily tore along the same old scars. Our mothers were worn down by hardship but still had the strength to love us more than anything. Yet sometimes it’s those who pay us no mind, who won’t acknowledge us no matter how hard we try, who won’t care for us or love us the way we deserve to be loved and cared for, that we seem to focus on the most. That was the case with My Trysh. She wanted nothing more than her father’s attention. So much so that she almost missed seeing true love when it was right in front of her nose. She was so focused on making a mistake with My Rornn that she almost let him go.

  “Lieutenant B’lenne, will you have this woman to be your wife, to live together in holy marriage? Will you love her, comfort her, honor, and keep her in sickness and in health, and forsaking all others, be faithful to her as long as you both shall live?”

  My Rornn swallows, nods, then lets out a deep breath. “I will.”

  He takes an extra moment to answer, not because he feels hesitant or needs to think things over before deciding on his answer, but because he feels so much joy and relief that it squeezes his throat. It was the way I felt the first day I met him and he held me close. He, too, was ignored by his father. But unlike My Trysh he wanted to be. Yes, King Laren loves him, but he wants to keep My Rornn close to the den when he has the brave, confident heart of adventurer. But when it came to communicating his love for My Trysh, My Rornn was like a dog that jumps when he should sit and barks when he should list
en. To My Trysh, this made his feelings seem false. But luckily, I was there to help or he might have kept tripping over his own tongue and let My Trysh get away.

  It grows quiet as the bride and groom seem to forget about everyone else. That tends to happen when they look into each other’s eyes. They are warriors, trained for combat, and yet they can be overpowered by a shared gaze.

  Colonel Duarte clears his throat.

  “Yes, Sir.” Rornn crouches on one knee and beckons to me. His smile is warm. “Puppy—bring the rings.”

  Puppy—that’s me. My Tall Ones tried a few times to give me another name, a real name they said—Cocoa, Blackie, Kaylee, Lucky—but none stuck. It’s okay. My mother called me Puppy and that’s who I am. I’m a yipwag, but the Tall Ones consider me a species of canine. We’re more intelligent and attuned to emotions than Earth-bred dogs; we can even read minds some say. My Trysh calls me an old soul.

  On cue, I snatch the important pouch in my teeth and prance down the aisle formed by the legs of standing Tall Ones. Some smile and clap their hands, others coo, “Aw,” and yet still others watch me with tears rolling down their faces. That’s the thing with Tall Ones. They will cry from sadness and they will cry from happiness. They’ll even cry when they can’t figure out why. It is a mystery to me, but every day I learn more about them, and they about me.

  My Rornn lifts me high in the air—he is very tall—and holds me tucked under one arm so he can slip the special ring on My Trysh’s finger. Now her eyes are wet too. I stretch up to lick My Rornn’s cheek then My Trysh’s chin as she leans forward to rub my ears. There is so much happiness that my heart feels ready to take flight. My tail whips fast enough to have propelled me.

  How we three arrived at this moment is my favorite story. Sit, stay, and you’ll see how it all began…

  One

  Trysh

  “Titan Squad, this is Station Control—we have multiple bogeys out of G quadrant!”

  The frantic voice filled Lieutenant Trysh Milton’s headset. A distress call. It came from the station, a giant, rotating city in space. It housed thousands of people inside—military personnel like her and their families. Children. She and her squadron had just cleared the area of enemy fighters. Giddy with victory after destroying a wave of alien invaders, they were exhausted, sweaty, pumped with adrenaline. But just when they had thought it was over, it wasn’t.

  “Titan Squad—we’ve got multiple bogeys! I repeat—multiple targets. They’re coming from… My God—Encke Gap!”

  From an opening in Saturn’s rings? How? Plowing through the rings would get you killed in an instant. Trysh gripped the joystick of her starfighter, craning her neck to see if she could get a visual on the threat. Saturn was a creamy-yellow and orange globe surrounded by an ethereal halo. Those rings were nothing like they looked when viewed from a telescope on Earth. Up close, they were snowstorms of ice particles with eddies and whorls caused by tiny embedded moons, some moons as small as hailstones. Imagine—a moon you could hold in the palm of your hand! It was breathtaking, a scene she never grew tired of admiring…until the sight of enemy alien craft pouring out from a gap in the rings pulled the last of the air from her lungs.

  The Dragaar! They had but one goal—destroy the space station and then Earth. In moments, the alien fighters were upon them, firing vivid streams of plasma at the defending starfighters.

  Flying at her side, the Vash alien exchange officer, Prince Rornn B’lenne, call sign “Charming”, sounded unfazed as they joined the dogfight. “Firefly,” he said, using her call sign. “Go private.” The starfighter-to-starfighter channel allowed them to speak to only each other. “They must have precision-jumped through the gap.”

  “It’s some sort of pop-up wormhole,” she answered. It left her with a sick feeling. If the Dragaar had the technology to punch holes in the fabric of space at will, it was game-over. Burst after bright burst caught her eye as friendlies were destroyed. Friends…squadron-mates, killed. “We’ve got to do something. We’re getting our asses kicked.”

  “We must deny them their jump gate. Close it off.”

  “Wormholes can’t be opened and closed like that.”

  “Do not forget—I can make the impossible possible.”

  She almost laughed. He used that same dumb line the last time he tried to get her to go out with him. His propositions were hilarious, and she shot every one of them down. It was a game—their game. They were friends with no benefits. But even she couldn’t deny that Rornn had a brilliant tactical mind. He was scary smart with a fresh way of looking at things that she admired. If he had figured out a way to turn this battle around, she was all ears. “Talk to me, Charming!” She strafed a crippled Dragaar fighter. It blew up, followed by the enemy knocking off two more friendlies.

  “I read a research paper on the intentional disruption of small wormholes.” He targeted another Dragaar. The enemy fighter exploded in brilliant fireworks. They barely escaped the debris. “It concluded that it is scientifically possible.”

  “On paper. By scientists sitting at nice safe desks stringing together a daisy chain of equations. Even if we lobbed all our R-bombs through the gate, the best we can hope for is transient instability.”

  “Yes. The R-bombs. See? Your mind is perfection. One relativistic bomblet salvo coming up. Cover me, Firefly.” He wheeled away from her and accelerated into the invasion.

  “Wait!” Shit. “Charming!” She used to think that “Charming” was a fitting call sign for the alien prince. Now she was convinced “lunatic” was a better fit. He was the constant instigator, the devil-may-care hotshot; she was his goal-driven, play-by-the-rules best friend who couldn’t help getting swept off her feet by the riptide of his charisma. But if he had figured out a way to turn the tide of this battle, she wanted in on it.

  She transmitted their intentions on the common frequency and took off after Charming, guns blazing. The HUD—heads-up display—was filled with Dragaar fighters coming straight at them. It was like driving on the wrong side of the freeway, except the oncoming cars were shooting at you. Ahead, the wormhole whirled and wobbled in the Gap, space distorting at its edges.

  “Arming R-bombs. You are still covering me, Firefly?”

  “Affirmative!”

  “Excellent.” He rolled his starfighter and dove for the jump gate.

  Suddenly her screens lit up and her pulse tripled. “I’ve got two bogeys locked on—No…four.” Four enemies had her in their crosshairs—four evil, heartless Dragaar targeting one human. A hollow feeling in her chest followed as alarms blared and lights flashed, her starfighter’s systems warning her of what she already knew. She was dead unless she shook off her pursuers.

  “Coming about,” Rornn said.

  “Negative! Negative! I’ve got this. Fire your R-bombs into the Gap.” It might be their only shot at saving the station, and maybe Planet Earth. But Rornn ignored her. She could picture his pale golden eyes narrowed in determination, his lips peeled back over white perfect teeth as he sped to save her. But as soon as he got within range, the Dragaar turned on him.

  Rornn managed to destroy a Dragaar fighter and she got two more before his starfighter was hit by the fourth. A dramatic spray of fluids erupted from his starfighter’s shattered hull, freezing instantly. She watched his ship spinning out of control. Headed for the rings.

  He was going to hit.

  “Rornn!” she screamed. Then everything went dark.

  “Okey dokey. I’ve seen enough,” said a voice in a Texas accent over her headset. “It’s Taco Tuesday, and I’m starving.”

  Their examiner’s voice shattered the moment, the horrific, wrenching moment, and yanked Trysh back to reality. She pulled off her earpieces and VR goggles, tipping her head back against the headrest in the suddenly dim and quiet simulator pod. That did not go well. Not at all. Being evaluated in simulated missions was part of keeping flying skills sharp. The virtual-reality-enhanced scenarios concocted by the instructors were not
oriously difficult, designed to test you in ways you never anticipated. She had been confident she would do well today, keeping her perfect record unblemished. But that was before she let her wingman talk her into a crazy stunt turned suicide mission. Not only had she likely earned a bad grade, she’d shrieked Charming’s given name like a lovesick middle-schooler.

  Rornn, I’m going to kill you—I swear it—this time for real.

  It was complicated enough being the daughter of General Zeke Milton—war hero, fighter-pilot extraordinaire, and friend of presidents—without raising doubts about her having won this assignment flying starfighters for the First Space Wing on Bezos Station on her own merits. Competition for the slot had been fierce, but she’d earned the right to be here fair and square. The irony was people thinking she used her father’s help to get ahead when he probably couldn’t pick her out of a crowd. For all the attention the Milton name got her, she’d never met the man.

  When she earned her flight wings she worked up the courage to contact him, hoping her achievement would give them something in common besides their DNA. She would finally be able to tell him how she wanted to follow in his footsteps. Then he would say how proud that made him, embracing her as his own. Two attempts yielded no response. He was the Chief of Off-World Security. Her attempts to reach him may have been blocked. Or, maybe his staff didn’t pass along the message. It was harder to think of the third possibility: He didn’t want the unplanned byproduct of a long-forgotten affair in his life.

  Her sim pod settled on hydraulic-powered truncheons to ground level. It landed with a firm thump and a hiss of machinery. Throwing open the hatch, she climbed out of her pod as a second simulator settled to the floor. She pretended to be immersed in stowing gear in her locker when Rornn walked up to her. She caught the scent of his skin, the soap he used. He was the only man she knew who smelled this good sweaty. His nutmeg-colored hair was finger combed away from his forehead, and he wore the same blue, silver-trimmed Earth System Frontier Forces (ESFF) flight suit she did. But just as the rings of Saturn looked nothing like they did viewed through a telescope from Earth, the uniform was a wholly different garment on him. There was a reason flight suits were called “bags”. They weren’t designed to flatter. Except if you had a body like Rornn B’lenne’s. Then all bets were off.