Queen's Ransom: The Golden Bulls of Minos

by Isabel Wroth

  Jared possessed such a mind for military strategy many had often asked if James had downloaded every training exercise ever performed by the human military into his brain.

  Jade could look at DNA and viral bacteria, and decode it's mysteries with such skill, at twenty years of age she had become the foremost bio-chem scientist in the UC.

  Jeremy and Joseph, adventurous as the day was long, had wanted to go where no other man or beast had gone before, and make it habitable.

  Their business acumen was startling in its elegance, and they had built a terraforming empire the likes of which had never before been done.

  They bought and sold worlds, custom made for the individuals with coin enough to purchase them. And if the individuals didn't have the coin, they signed contracts to support the UC as part of their loan repayment.

  But Jalia, the unexpected surprise, possessed the combined talents of her siblings. Her ability to solve puzzles, to memorize, to repeat, to create and plan, had been extraordinary, but unlike her siblings, she neither needed nor wanted someone to tell her how to utilize her gifts best.

  She wanted to explore that on her own, to decide for herself who was worthy of those gifts and who was not.

  At every turn she fought for independence, so stubborn and rebellious, James had reacted the only way he knew how. As a military man first, and a father second.

  Jaclyn had always been his guiding light when it came to Jalia, doing her gentle best to make him understand their daughter was a dreamer, not a soldier.

  It had taken him sixteen years to realize and understand what his wife meant, and by the time he finally managed to grasp a better idea of who his youngest was, she had disappeared. Stolen from them by a son James hadn't realized despised him.

  As a soldier, James could say he understood Jared's actions. There was no place in a military unit for a rebel, for someone who didn't follow orders and fall in line.

  There was no room in a military unit for anyone who forged their own path instead of working as a single entity for the betterment of that unit. It's how wars and lives were lost.

  But Jared's actions and Jalia's accusations had opened his eyes to an ugly truth. A family was a unit, but it was not a military unit. A family did not survive on orders and battle strategies, or on perfect behavior and rigid rules.

  A family did not make a unique, special, beautiful little girl feel like an outcast because she did not conform or match the rest of them.

  James had run his family like he ran everything else in his life. On a precise schedule that did not deviate or disobey. There had been rules, regulations, punishments, and so very little reward or praise. He loved his children.

  He could not exist without his wife, but he could not recall a time where he had told any of them they had his love. That he was proud of them.

  His son who was the ultimate soldier, who did everything by the books and lived his life by regulation and code, had taken it upon himself to see to it a rogue agent did not disrupt their militarized family unit, and he'd done it thoroughly with a plan so solid, no one had suspected.

  Not even him.

  His youngest child, the one who continually defied expectation, had faced him after ten years as a queen. Regal, fierce, so strong and proud, it had been a struggle not to allow his emotions free reign in the faces of strangers.

  Jaclyn hadn't had any such qualms, crying joyfully to know her baby was alive and safe and had held her tight when Jalia had accepted her mother's embrace.

  He looked back on his life and realized, not once had he ever held any of his children.

  He had assumed they knew they were loved, that he was proud of them, but he hadn't given hugs the way Jaclyn did. Listening to Jalia express her feelings of displacement, of abandonment, to hear the absolute belief in her voice that he hated her enough to send her away and be brutally abused, James hadn't ever felt such shame in his life.

  To know his son had fueled the flames of such a soul-crushing fire, James hadn't ever felt such rage.

  Regret was an animal, clawing and gnawing at his insides.

  If a king with a reputation for bloodthirsty ruthlessness could touch Jalia with gentleness in plain view of those who served him, say without words to all present she was precious to him, beloved, what did that say about her father?

  "Jamie? Are you alright?" Jaclyn's voice was soft in his ear, just like the kiss she touched to his throat as she wrapped her arms around him from behind, resting her chin on his shoulder.

  "You were such a good mother, and I believed it was enough."

  "What was enough?"

  "Every night, when you tucked them into bed, you always said, 'have sweet dreams. Your father and I love you very much.' When I reprimanded them or told them they were not performing to the best of their abilities, they would turn to you, and you'd always say, 'your father and I love you very much. We only want the best things for you,'

  "I assumed it was enough. That they knew, because you gave them those words when I was too busy to tuck them in or unwilling to soften the seriousness of my lectures by telling them I loved them and wanted only the best things for all of them.

  “Was it enough for you, Jaclyn? Did I assume too much and not tell you how I couldn't breathe without you?"

  Jaclyn sighed gently, holding onto him as tightly as she could,

  "Honey, I knew the day I married you, you were a man of action and very few words. You might not have professed your love for me in flowery sonnets, but not a day has gone by I didn't know to my toes that you loved our children and me.

  "You were born and bred a military man, and you're a hardass. I think you came out of your mother with boots on, ready for orders,"

  that was his wife.

  Making him smile even when it felt like his oh so carefully crafted world was coming down around his ears. "You like order, rules, and regs, schedules, which when I met you baffled me to no end, especially because I couldn't get anywhere on time if my life depended on it.

  "The first time I saw you smile, I thought the universe would split in two. When you laughed, I expected the apocalypse, because you looked so startled to be expressing your emotions.

  “I fell in love with you that very first time you smiled at me, and every time I told you how much, you'd grunt, and your eyes would light up, but you never said it back.

  "It exasperated me to no end the first year we were together, thinking I must be doing something wrong that you couldn't say three simple words. And then one day you came home with a leather-bound book from Daijiro.

  “A book all about the culture and rituals of the planet, and you told me you'd picked it up while you were there working with the Admiral on that heinous peace treaty because you thought of me.

  "You brought me another book, a collection of legends and heroic tales during a trip to Lostos while coordinating the Battle of Trees with their military.

  “Each time you put a book or an artifact in my hands when you came home, you weren't bringing me a gift. You were telling me how much you loved me, by showing me you knew who I was, and you wanted me to understand even when we were apart, I was on your mind.

  “You didn't have to tell me you loved me, Jamie. You showed me. Every day, no matter where you were or what you were doing, and it's always been more than enough.

  "Jared loved his soldier toys and wearing his school uniform so much he never wanted to take it off so I could wash it. You took him to work with you and introduced him to cadets who inspired him and taught him to fly with you.

  “Jade loved biology and chemistry, so you made sure she always had the tools she needed for her experiments, no matter how they destroyed my kitchen.

  “The twins wanted to see the universe, so you brought them treasures from your travels and helped them get summer jobs on the freight deck so they could hear stories from the merchants about the new worlds they'd just been to.

  "Jalia wanted something more every day. More stimulation. More color. More c
hallenges. More change. Every day was chaos with her, and you—Mr. Order—had a tough time keeping up.

  “I had trouble keeping up. I'd take her to work with me to try and engage her, and she'd wander off to look at the reptile exhibits, then decide she wanted to see the holo-verse where every planet recorded could be touched and examined.

  “Then she wanted to be in the library, then the map room. I'd spend hours trying to find her because she never stood still long enough for me to catch up.

  "She ran around with those friends of hers because they were chaos like her, and the more we tried to force her into our mold of orderly life, the more difficult it was for her to fit in.

  “We were trying, you were trying, and sometimes it wasn't enough, but it wasn't because we didn't love her. We just didn't understand her."

  "She thought I sent her to that school," he rasped, still unable to believe what she had been through.

  That Jared had knowingly put her in a place like Telantes and worked hard to make her think it was her fault.

  James wanted to believe he was at guilty of all the things Jared accused him of, but he hadn't raised his son to speak that way, or to be so...cruel.

  Had he?

  "She knows better now, and it was a hard blow, honey. It's going to take us all time to come to terms with the truth. We can't change the past, Jamie. All we can do is go forward and do our best to make sure we don't make the same mistakes. Hm?"

  James lifted his arm and drew his wife around to hold her, noticing the gray carefully camouflaged in her hair, the lines just starting to form around her eyes, and how time and grief over the baby they thought they'd lost had etched a few wrinkles into her forehead.

  Even with his dominant genes having stamped their mark on all of them, he saw her face in each of his babies, the woman he'd loved from the moment she had slammed into him at the commissary.

  He'd seen her coming and tried to get out of the way. He'd shifted left, she to her right, and they'd collided like a pair of rogue asteroids.

  Her books and actual papers flying everywhere, so disorganized she'd had on two different shoes. A beautiful mess, he'd thought, with the most beautiful eyes he'd ever seen.

  Warm, kind, sparkling as she'd laughed and apologized while she crawled around with her heart shaped ass in the air to collect her papers.

  She'd brought absolute chaos into his life, and he hadn't ever thanked her for it.

  "I love you, Jaclyn."

  She smiled, slow and sweet, with her heart in her eyes and gentle tears rolling down her cheeks.

  "I know,"

  "Our daughter is a queen."

  "Yes, she is," Jaclyn murmured, and slowly the tightness in his chest eased, pride the likes of which he hadn't thought possible taking its place.

  "With purple hair." His wife laughed so hard she nearly brought him to his knees.

  *****

  Dhega had a delicious armful of his woman, his body hummed with satisfaction, but his heart was heavy. Jalia had been distracted, distant when he'd come back from the host of meetings and successful pilot simulations.

  A few of the Golden Bulls were touring the ships, walking around like wide-eyed children, exploring and enjoying the wonders of space and the might of their new ships.

  Even Tyro had seemed impressed, climbing inside the simulator to try his hand at piloting. The Prince of Darkness had died six times before he'd finally managed to get his simulated jet out of the flight bay of the Kallisto.

  The princes engaged in a competition to see if any of them had the skills needed to fly the simulated fighters, and Dhega had finally been able to get away.

  He'd come back to the suite he shared with his queen, glad to find her still reclining where he'd left her, but she was staring morosely out the large viewing window with drying tear tracks on her cheeks. Zavir had been immediately summoned to find Dr. Jade Justus and blast her out the nearest airlock.

  The only thing that had stayed his hand was the way Jalia had looked up at him with wide eyes and spiky wet lashes and laughed hard enough to send another round of tears down her face. Zavir seemed genuinely disappointed when Dhega rescinded the order.

  He had only intended to kiss her tears away, but one kiss was never enough between them, and like it always did passion ignited too hot to be ignored.

  So now here they were, replete, their bodies cooling, heartbeats slowing as they caught their breath, and as of late Jalia's pregnancy had pushed her to sleep after such pleasure, but not this time.

  This time she lay awake, tracing circles across his belly, lost in thought.

  "What troubles you?" he asked softly, not wanting to startle her.

  Jalia's soft sigh washed over his chest, followed by the caress of her lips as she sat up and tucked the bed sheet beneath her breasts, which was the sign he had learned meant they were in for a long talk.

  Whatever she intended to say was forestalled as she watched him reach up to pillow his arm behind his head, her tongue touching the corner of her lips with her gaze fixated on his bicep.

  Jalia never failed to show him just how much she enjoyed his body, and when she caught him grinning she tried to scowl like he'd distracted her on purpose.

  Dhega couldn't say he hadn't, but the hand he slid beneath the sheet to cup the soft, warm cheek of her ass was definitely purposeful. He found in times of stress his touch helped steady her, helped remind her of their connection.

  "I was hoping to hang on to the resentment I felt for a while longer," Jalia answered, staring at his stomach without looking, unconsciously shifting her weight to allow him more room to touch her.

  "I spent my whole life feeling so displaced and unloved, and the last ten years so sure my father had thrown me away, and the rest of my family didn't care.

  "I held onto it, the resentment to get me through, you know? And then I faced him—or my mental image of him—in the Maze of Two Souls, and I got it all out.

  “All the things I wanted to say to him, how he made me feel, things I knew I'd never have the courage to say to his face, but that wasn't the point of the maze, was it? It was about me, and still, deep down, as soon as I made a commitment to you, to being queen and helping move Minos toward some technological progress, I knew this would happen. That my family would somehow be involved, and I'd have to face them.

  "I prepared for it, planned it all out, then Jared comes out of nowhere as the villain of my story and all my plans go right out the window. Nothing is what it seemed to be.

  “Jade had a very reasonable explanation for what she did, and my arsecake brothers blew it way out of proportion, so now I'm stuck between telling Nivir the truth and making it better or taking the chance my judgment is skewed because Jade is my sister and I'm emotionally compromised on both sides.

  "Then I met with my parents, and between the drama with Jade and Jared, my dad's career is probably in the toilet. Mom talked about his retirement, dad didn't say anything, but he asked questions about our battle simulations, the style of military training on Minos—"

  "You met with your parents also?" Dhega heard the dangerous drop in his tone, but the idea of Jalia having to face her family alone did not sit well with him.

  "I wanted it over with. " Jalia gnawed on her thumb nervously, her eyes a bit too wide for his peace of mind, the physical distance between them far too much.

  "How would you feel, what would you do if you went through life certain you were alone? That you had no family, and then someone came along, told you it wasn't true and made you change your whole outlook on life?"

  Dhega gave a deep hum as she voiced the root of her heartache. Without relinquishing his hold on her backside, he tugged the sheet away to ensure not an inch of her skin was hidden from his gaze.

  Her body had just begun to ripen, her breasts becoming more than a tender handful, her belly swelling enough for them to not fit as perfectly as they had only a few weeks before.

  There was nothing in the world more beautiful to
him than her, and he had spent countless hours sitting beside her while she slept, just watching her, reassuring himself she was not a figment of his most fevered dreams. That truly, after so long alone, she was real, and his.

  "If you're referring to my little brothers and the secret they believe they're keeping from me?" Jalia looked slightly guilty, hesitantly asking how long he'd known. How long he'd known that she knew about Nivir and Zavir.

  "I knew before they did. Persis brought Nivir to Antaeus when Nivir was a boy, made him watch the spectacle Daegana always made of those who ran the labyrinth.

  “Nivir was hiding behind a planter, sick after watching it all. I brought him water, some stale bread. We just sat together for a while, and I knew.

  "When they first declared themselves willing to serve me in whatever way I would allow, I considered their deaths.

  “I wondered if perhaps they were their mother's sons and had merely been waiting for the right time to catch me unaware. I kept them close, just in case, and then I began to wonder if they were ashamed of me, or perhaps of our father and feared I would reject them.

  "I suppose I felt betrayed by their silence, I questioned whether or not they would want someone like me for a brother, and in defiance, I did everything I could to ensure they were never confused about who I was.

  “They had ample opportunity to move against me, but they never did. So, I let them keep their secrets until they feel safe enough to share. And I was aware when you figured it out, because you get this look in your eye when you're solving a puzzle."

  Her eyes flickered between deep brown and soft blue, her teeth catching at her lip in concern,

  "Are you upset I didn't say anything?"

  Dhega reached for the hand she chewed at, kissing her abused fingertips before pulling her down to lie across his chest.

  Jalia threw her leg over his hips without hesitation and lay her cheek on his shoulder, her soft lips finding their home against his throat.

  He smiled because she could not see it, swirling patterns across her back, finding all the places that made her shiver and her breath catch,