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Chapter One
Patrick Smith heard the fight before he saw it.
He raced between the rows of squad tents toward the sound of hollering and jeering, his boots pounding on the dirt path. The frazzled private that had burst into the armory with his nostrils flaring hadn’t told Patrick anything other than that there was a fight and to come quick before the two soldiers killed each other. He had only focused on Patrick because of the captain’s stripes emblazoned across Patrick’s shoulder blades, but Patrick’s stomach still worked itself into knots as he swung around the corner.
He hoped that for once, just once, he wouldn’t find his own misfit squad at the center of the chaos. Maybe this time some other group of hotheads would be the source of the trouble. Maybe. But probably not.
Patrick forced his legs faster as a chorus of yells went up from the other side of a row of tents. “Come on, guys, not this time, not again, just—”
But when Patrick skidded to a stop on the edge of the dusty courtyard between four large squad tents, he saw exactly who he expected to see.
Fal’ran.
Of course, it was Fal’ran.
He and Tar grappled in the dirt in front of Squad M’s tent. The kid had Tar’s back—his legs wrapped around Tar’s waist and his arms around Tar’s neck. He’d have Tar in a full choke if it weren’t for the fingers the bigger klah’eel had hooked around Fal’ran’s forearm and the bulging muscles and raw strength that allowed him to hold Fal’ran's arm off his windpipe.
“Enough!” Patrick yelled as he pushed through the crowd of soldiers. He gestured at the fourth member of their squad—the small-boned klah’eel man leaning against Squad M’s tent pole. “Bar’in, help me—”
“Fuck no.” Bar’in waved a delicate hand. “I’m not getting in the middle of that.”
If Patrick knew his squad, Bar’in had started this fight, but before he could yell at Bar’in for insubordination, Tar arched up and smashed the back of his head into Fal’ran’s face. The younger man roared as he reared back, and Tar took the opportunity to roll onto his stomach and shake Fal’ran off him.
Patrick saw him cock his elbow to smash it back into Fal’ran's jaw a second too late. “Stop—”
But Fal’ran ducked the blow.
Patrick took half a second to be impressed—damn, the boy was fast—before launching himself at Fal’ran and yanking him back.
“Enough!” Patrick clung to Fal’ran as the kid tried to shake him off. He ignored Tar. The older klah’eel had enough maturity to let Patrick finish the fight, unlike the hot-headed young man thrashing in Patrick’s arms. “I said enough!”
Fal’ran’s fists clenched, and Patrick braced against his next struggle. “Get the fuck off me.”
“Sir,” Patrick snarled. He twisted Fal’ran’s arm behind his back in a move that never failed to take a klah’eel who underestimated him by surprise. “Get the fuck off me, sir.”
A tremor of fury shivered up Fal’ran’s muscular frame and Patrick could only imagine the smell of rage pouring off him. A few of the surrounding klah’eel lifted their noses and he figured it must be potent stuff. But when Patrick dug his fingers into the man’s arm and twisted harder, Fal’ran's fists unclenched, and he submitted with a growl. “Sir.”
Satisfied, Patrick released him.
Fal’ran ripped himself away as soon as Patrick’s grip loosened, but Patrick let that go. He was going to hand them all their asses for this shit anyway.
He put his hands on his hips and glared at each member of his squad—Squad M.
Bar’in still leaned against the pole with his arms crossed and a smug expression on his dainty features. He didn’t have a speck of dirt on him, but Patrick didn’t doubt he’d been involved. He’d been nothing but snide comments and trouble since he’d arrived.
Tar dropped his eyes when Patrick looked at him and hunched his huge shoulders as though that could make him small enough to miss. He was as huge as Bar’in was small, with a mess of black hair tumbling over his shoulders, and the tip of his right tusk broken off. Despite not having said so much as five words since arriving in Klah, he’d been in five times as many fights as every other soldier.
Every other soldier, except Fal’ran.
The younger man glared openly back at Patrick, his burnt-orange eyes bright and furious. Patrick didn’t think he’d ever seen them any other way. Tall, broad, muscular, and handsome—his only blemish a small scar through his right eyebrow that gave his face an even more eye-catching touch of asymmetry—Fal’ran cut the perfect figure of a young klah’eel soldier. He was as fast as he was strong and clever on the battlefield from what Patrick had seen so far, but the damn kid had a raging fire in him and no idea how to direct or contain it.
Even now, with his commanding officer staring him down, Fal’ran had the gall to lift his upper lip and bare a canine in a taunting snarl.
Fucking kid.
Patrick bared his teeth in return and built a growl in the back of his throat. He’d been dealing with klah’eel who thought they could dominate him his whole life. They’d always thought they could walk all over him because he was human, because he was smaller and scentless, and they’d always been wrong.
He’d put Fal’ran in his place like he’d put every arrogant soldier before him.
