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Striding through her starship she went to the last place anyone would look for her. Slapping her hand to the door, her seal opened it without hesitation. P’draic looked up and blinked, clearly lost in his work without an inkling of what had just happened.
“Show me what you’ve discovered again,” she demanded.
P’draic instantly obeyed her command, moving before he even fully understood what she wanted. Then the display came up again with the statistics and formulas he’d worked on for days, showing her just a few hours ago the solution to the horde.
The solution she hadn’t been able to stomach so she’d shelved the idea for a safer one.
The practice run ran again and she watched the absolute destruction with grim satisfaction.
“You’re certain I will have time to get the females and babes out?”
P’draic shrugged as he watched it go through the steps again. “Theoretically, but much can happen in ten minutes. The window of opportunity will be very small. They get past this line and we’re through.” He pointed and Adelina filed that away with everything else.
“Make it happen,” she ordered. “Set it up here and here. You have two hours. Tell no one. You and only you will set this up. If someone discovers what it is we have planned it’s your life, P’draic.”
The male simply looked at her, not fazed by her new title or rank or tone. “This is something they’ll want to have,” he told her quietly.
Adelina studied P’draic. He was as familiar and comforting to her as Ian was – she’d known him for a decade now. They’d been friends and she hoped that they could still remain friends despite her new title. After all, he was the only one who didn’t treat her any differently if other than to do as she asked – gladly since she’d given him the resources and freedoms he’d always dreamed of.
“This weapon…I have to share it,” she told him. “I promised honesty.”
He tilted his head and narrowed his eyes. “Is that wise in this case?”
“It won’t matter if we don’t use it,” she said quietly, watching the program run again. “And if we survive, then perhaps we will all think twice about using it again.”
Without another word she took the key he handed her and turned to leave.
“Lina,” P’draic called out.
She paused at the door, having no idea where she would go or what she would do until that beacon lit and she could release her unending fury on her enemy. “Yes?”
“You’re making the right choice. Sacrifices have to be made to make room for other things to grow. If we don’t cut back the tree, the roots will choke the life from something else and all we will have is that tree.”
Adelina nodded.
Sacrifices had to be made.
And she wouldn’t let Giselle’s go to waste.
Chapter Seventeen
Kaita
Planet Khara Prime
The Khara System
Kaita kept her hood up as she walked the familiar streets of the capitol on Khara Prime.
It was nothing like what she remembered. So few walked from place to place and Neprijat patrols were on every corner. The marketplace was quiet and those of her people who had not been enslaved or eaten reeked of fear.
And they were all males.
She didn’t know where all the females had gone, and Kaita didn’t really want to know, but she had a sneaking suspicion they’d been rounded up like chattel and examined. Everything she saw reinforced her worst fears. That she’d been able to get in contact with Prince Valdis at all was a miracle in itself.
Adelina had created disguises for all of them and hers made her look like a male, if a short one. But if the Neprijat saw through her disguise then her cover would be blown. They would throw her in one of the pens to be presented to the king, and if he chose someone else she would be sent to join the other breeders if they deemed her attractive enough.
If not…then she’d be classified as food.
