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Chapter One
“Don’t you want to come to dinner?”
Ardol looked up from the screen of the database computer in the Freight Coordinator’s station.
“Oh, hey, Kamau. Save me something decent.”
“Decent?!” Kamau, the Servali chef, looked as though he might slap the much larger Leopardine, his enormous ears flattening. “All of my food is exquisite.”
“Yeah, yeah. I have to open some communications from home. Just don’t let Rupex’s Queen eat everything.”
“She is nursing two cubs. And her name is Layla. She is also the Information Officer and the captain’s bride-to-be. You should address her with far more respect.”
Ardol waved a dismissive paw and held his tongue. “I do when she’s around, okay? Don’t you have soup to make?”
“Yes... I’m not sure you should eat it, though.” Kamau gave him a dark scowl and left.
“Touchy.” Imagine. Being talked back to by a cook.
Ardol turned back to his screen. At home on Leopardine-One, the most lush and opulent of all the large, verdant planets in the Leopardine System, no mere servant would dare to critique the eldest and heir.
But no one knows I’m the son of a District Lord, or that I’ll be District Lord as soon as Father steps down and Cala and I are wed.
Ardol’s heart gave a happy, somewhat smug thump. The last unopened communication on the screen was from his betrothed.
“Aren’t you coming to dinner?” Talos, the hulking Tigerite security officer aboard the Comet Stalker, was suddenly leaning into his office.
“Why are you here?” Ardol was equal parts shocked and irritated. He supposed that he should be flattered that the taciturn Tigerite was even speaking to him when it wasn’t strictly work-related—but then again, Talos had warmed up a lot since he had taken a human Queen.
“Wendy made me check on you.” Talos crossed his arms and spoke in a gruff voice, but his face took on a dreamy look. “She’s so small... but has such a big heart. You know, Ardol, when we dock on Lynx-Nineteen, you should see if there are any unattached human Queens. A few dozen have settled there, looking for work.”
Ardol held his tongue with an effort. Queen Fever had hit all of the Felix Orbus Galaxy hard, but Leopardine planets were some of the worst. Leopardine Kings tended to have several wives in their Prides, with sons and daughters being raised separately once they were a few years old. When the virus struck and spread through females of cub-bearing age, entire Prides fell in a matter of cycles. Even after radical surgical treatments were offered in hopes of saving adult Queens, many refused to pursue the option, believing they were as good as dead to their husbands and families without the ability to bear cubs.
There were very few exceptions—and Cala was one.
“Ardol? I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t have spoken. Was there... someone?” Talos’ voice softened further, and a massive paw fell on Ardol’s shoulder.
The unexpected kindness did it—and the chance to boast. Hadn’t he kept quiet for cycles aboard the long-haul freighter? Hadn’t he watched a Leonid and a Tigerite fall for puny human women—and dare to call them Queens?
“I’m engaged. Have been since I was sixteen.”
“You—are? Or were?” Talos blinked and withdrew his paw.
“My father is... important in our district. As soon I was sixteen, he made sure my first bride would come from an equally influential family, the Leopardine Diplomatic Representative to the Avian Alliance. He had a daughter a few years younger than me. She and her mother survived because they were traveling with her father when the quarantine began. She’s been there for the last seven years. Now that the galaxy has opened up, we’re just waiting until my leave occurs to return home and wed.” Ardol rose. He would read his messages in private, in his quarters. “My father would naturally prefer that I have three or four Queens, as is customary, but under the circumstances, having one will suffice.”
“Suffice?” Talos’ voice was a deep growl. “Surely that is no way to speak about the Queen you love?”
Ardol hesitated for just a second. He didn’t love Cala.
He didn’t think most Leopardine Kings loved their wives. They cared for them. Treasured them. Showed them off as assets and a means to produce larger, stronger families. It had been decades since feuding families waged turf battles to see who would control tracts of the steppe-like terrain (now terraformed into lush paradises), but history was an excellent motivator.
Love was not required. “I’m so lucky to have her.” That much was true. Out of all the Knights he went to the Leopardine Institute of Management and Business with, he was the only one who had a surviving bride—thanks to the fact that she’d been literally out of the galaxy at the time.
“Ah. I know how you feel. You know, my father tried to arrange a marriage for me, too, with one of the few surviving Queens near my age. She’s actually little more than a child—and perfect for my younger brother. I’m so glad Wendy came into my life.”
“You—chose a human over a Tigerite Queen?”
“Thankfully, yes. I didn’t love Laxmi—but my brother does. My, look at us, standing here talking.” Talos’ face took on a sour expression like he’d just bitten into a rotten crayfish roll. “I must go.”
