The Captain then cuts the feed, before bringing his smart-watch to his mouth.
“Fire on my signal,” he orders calmly – apparently more than ready to start the diplomatic incident Hoplan had warned him about, and all over an insult, no less.
I watch his performance with both awe and terror. Aelon is fearless and unpredictable – and apparently, he doesn’t back down. Admirable traits in a starship captain, but not the sort of person who I’d want to be holding me prisoner right now.
“They’re turning around.” A voice emerges through Aelon’s watch, just loud enough for me to catch. Aelon rolls his eyes in disappointment.
“Of course they are, the cowards. Toads only fight when they outnumber you.” He presses a button on the watch, abruptly cutting the feed.
The confrontation over, the towering Aurelian steps towards me.
I’m standing there, stunned. Just like that, the threat of violence is gone. Captain Aelon sent three Toad assault ships screaming off into the distance like dogs with their tails between their legs – without having to fire a shot.
And then, just like that, Aelon’s entire persona shifts from the intense focus of leadership back to the infuriating, cocky attitude he’d displayed earlier. Within just a second, he’s demonstrated two sides of the same coin.
“Now that’s dealt with,” his slate-grey eyes turn to me, “we’ve got the small problem of our little thieves to take care of.” The towering Aurelian snorts. “My mother always warned me that if you invite a thief into your home, you deserve everything that’s taken from you.”
The cocky smile widens.
“At least, that’s what she would have said, if I’d had a mother.”
The smirk is plastered across his face, as cocky and confident as though that confrontation with the Toads had never happened.
If I’d had a mother.
I remember something else Sawoot told me about Aurelians – none of them have a mother.
Well, maybe a few hundred out of the entire species do – those born by the rare human females who are Bonded to a triad of the species.
I might not know as much about Aurelians as Sawoot – our resident expert – but after what she’d told me, I’d done my research. The only way Aurelians can father children naturally is via a human female who is genetically compatible with them – and just one woman, out of the billions stretched across the universe, can give that gift to one specific triad.
They call such a woman their Fated Mate – and finding her is the overriding purpose of every Aurelian, whether they’re aligned to the Empire, or they’ve gone Rogue.
It doesn’t excuse the disgusting way the all-male species lust after human women, but it does explain it. It’s why Aurelians collect their huge harems of women – hoping each new addition will be the one woman they’ve spent their lives looking for. It’s why some Aurelians have gone Rogue – acquiring women as slaves if the ones they lust after don’t join their harem voluntarily.
That’s what they say, anyway. Sometimes, I think it’s just an excuse they use – justifying their obnoxious, misogynistic behavior as necessary in the search for their Fated Mate.
Without that fabled Fated Mate – the one woman who can bear a triad natural sons – the Aurelian species is forced to reproduce through cryo-chambers. That’s where they spend their last moments – carried into a cryogenic cloning chamber when they’re at the brink of their thousands of years of life. As one Aurelian dies of old age, a perfect genetic clone is created as an infant – or, at least, as close to perfect as possible.
But the process itself is far from perfect. Each generation of Aurelians is making a copy of a copy… of a copy. It’s said the Aurelians born of a Fated Mate are stronger, healthier, and more powerful – while those born of the cryo-chamber are a consistently weaker version of the Aurelian who came before them.
That’s offered as an explanation for why Aurelians of ancient legend were described as standing eight-feet-tall or more, while specimens like Captain Aelon are a smaller – though still impressive – seven-feet in height. The species grows smaller and weaker with each subsequent generation.
But the bigger problem? Simply that cryo-chambers can’t be brought into battle. For an Aurelian to be born, one must die – but not all Aurelians live long enough to make it to a cryo-chambers when they kick the bucket. Their warlike species wages a constant battle against Scorp, pirates, and occasionally even Toads – and each time an Aurelian dies in battle, rather than a cryo-chamber, their number is lost forever.
Their species is – was – slowly, but surely dying out.
Only the Bond can save them.
The Bond – the curious connection between a Fated Mate and a specific triad of Aurelians – had remained dormant for eons; until people spoke of it almost as legend. The Aurelian species itself was losing hope; slowly dwindling as Scorp and other menaces reduced their numbers.
Then, centuries ago, one human woman ushered in a new era for the Bond.
She was called Jasmine.
Born from nothing, Jasmine was the Fated Mate of a triad of brave, brilliant warriors. The leader of that triad, Reagan, became Emperor, and as his Fated Mate, Jasmine was crowned Queen. Since then, she’s sired the Aurelian race dozens of vibrant, powerful sons.
Today, she’s hundreds of years old – but she looks the same age as me, if the holo-vids are to be believed. In addition to allowing a human female to bear the sons of Aurelians, the Bond grants a Fated Mate a lifespan equal to that of an Aurelian; so she can live out
