Sons of Lyra: Slave Princess (7 page)

She looked around at the
thick stone walls and the paintings of his ancestors that hung on
them, and then noticed some chairs against the wall behind her. She
sat down in the middle of the three and hummed to herself while she
waited. It was a lullaby that her grandmother had always sung to
her. Apparently it had once been the united anthem of her home
world. It was a haunting melody now and she wondered if only she
remembered it. How many Terrans were left in the
universe?

The minutes wore into
hours until she lost all track of time. She wondered what Balt was
saying to his parents. Whatever it was, it was taking a long time
and she was beginning to feel uncomfortable sitting alone in the
corridor. Several guards had passed her and given her strange
looks.

The door opened and she
was instantly on her feet.

“
Balt?” she
said as he stepped out.

He smiled at her but there
was fatigue and worry in his dark eyes. She stepped towards him,
tempted to take his hand and offer him comfort, but then thought
the better of it. She still wasn’t sure how things stood between
them. He’d shared her bed more than once in the journey here, but
never had he made it clear how he felt. Until he showed her his
feelings, she was going to guard hers with her life.

“
Come with me,”
he said in a gentle tone and held his hand out, gesturing towards
the open door and the room beyond.

She swallowed her fear and
stepped past him into the room. It was expansive and richly
decorated in sky blue and gold. She waited for him to close the
door before walking any further. She needed him by her. For some
reason, he gave her courage and confidence when he was close to
her.

He placed his hand against
her back and ushered her into the room. She raised her eyes to see
a late middle-aged man and woman in front of her. The woman had
light brown hair piled up on top of her head, held with shiny gold
pins that had cascades of pearls falling from them, and features
that said she had been beautiful when she had been younger. Her age
showed in the lines of her face though, everywhere except her
aquamarine eyes. There was a youthful spark to them. Kayla didn’t
like the look of it. To her it said that this woman could be
ruthless and stubborn. The woman shifted, turning slightly to the
side on the couch beside the man, and smoothed the skirt of her
long sky blue dress down over her knees.

The man was different. His
grey hair was soft and wavy, his eyes dark but kind. He had a nice
face, one that said he held compassion and understanding in his
heart. His figure was slim, encased in a dark blue jacket and
trousers that were a similar colour to Balt’s flight suit. He
leaned back in the highly decorative couch.

“
Mother,
father, may I present Kayla,” Balt said and nudged her
forward.

She didn’t know what to do
so she bowed her head.

“
She has little
breeding,” the woman said in an unimpressed tone. Kayla frowned at
her. “I had thought more of the Terrans.”

“
You must
understand, mother, that she has not had an education worthy of her
position... she has—”

“
Yes, yes...
you’ve said all this,” the woman cut Balt off and raked her eyes
over Kayla.

She didn’t look at all
impressed.

“
Will you
consider my request?” Balt said. “Now that you have seen
her?”

“
I know we must
make amends for what our forefathers did to her people, but you
must understand that we cannot simply hand over a planet,” the man
said.

A planet? She looked at
Balt.

“
Lyra Five is
unpopulated and on the outer rim of our system. The climate is
perfect for Terrans and they would be—”

“
You have said
all this too, son,” the man said and then looked at her. A hard
look entered his eyes.

She got the feeling that
they didn’t like the idea of handing over a planet to her people.
She looked at Balt, unable to contain her smile when she saw the
frustration in his eyes and realised how hard he was fighting for
her species. He wanted to make amends for what had happened, to
repay the debt. It was so romantic and noble of him. She didn’t
even think about what she was doing. She just reached out and
touched his hand in a light caress. He looked down at it and then
at her, right into her eyes.

There was a flicker of
something and then he grabbed her hand, bringing her forwards with
him.

“
Then give the
planet to me and I will give it to the Terrans. When I turned
thirty, you promised me something...” He sounded nervous now. She
could feel his hand shaking in hers. What had his parents promised?
“You swore that I could have any gift I wanted... anything... you
swore.”

The man stood and the
woman followed suit. There was shock on their faces.

“
We promised
you that as a wedding present.”

Kayla’s heart jumped into
her mouth. She looked at Balt. He frowned at his
parents.

“
It will be a
wedding present,” he said in a calm and measured voice.

She couldn’t believe this.
She tried to form words to ask him if he’d gone insane or if he
really loved her enough to marry her for the sake of giving her
species a new home but they wouldn’t come.

“
Balt,” she
whispered, afraid that if she spoke any louder this illusion would
shatter.

He turned and looked at
her. His other hand claimed hers and he held them tightly. His eyes
were full of so much emotion and affection. Perhaps he did love her
enough to marry her.

“
Kayla... I
only have one way of saying this...” He removed the translator from
her ear and then his own. She stumbled when he placed his hands
around her waist and drew her close to him. Her hands pressed
against his chest and she stared into his eyes, too stunned to say
anything. “Yoi aishin.”

She didn’t need a
translator to know what those words meant. The horrified gasps of
his parents and the tenderness in his eyes and the passion in his
voice translated them for her. His kiss confirmed it.

She leaned into it,
kissing him with as much ardent desire as he was showing
her.

Someone cleared their
throat and she broke away from Balt. Her cheeks blazed when she saw
his parents were staring. She took the translator with shaking
hands and tried to get it back into her ear. Balt smiled and helped
her, his fingers brushing her cheek as he trailed them off
her.

“
I love you,
Kayla. Be my wife.”

He was insane.

So was she.

She nodded and grinned,
barely containing her desire to bounce on her heels. “I love you
too.”

He kissed her and there
was another cough. They broke apart again and both looked at his
parents. His mother looked sour. His father sighed.

His sigh became a smile
that gave Kayla the impression that he was happy to see his son in
love.

“
Lyra Five is
yours, to rule together.”

***

Kayla stood on the
colourful tiled balcony, the warm breeze tousling her hair and the
strong sun heating her skin. She listened to the waterfall
thundering to the ground almost one hundred feet below her. The
hills of this new world, her new Earth, stretched out before her,
rising to mountains in the east and lowering to the sea in the
west. This was her favourite place to be in all the world. She
loved nothing more than to stand here, passing the hours and
watching the ships as they came into port in the city
below.

Another freighter landed,
blowing dust up into the air. It had been six months since the
Lyrans had given her species this planet, and people had been
arriving every day. The population was growing steadily.
Settlements had been given to those who knew how to farm, and the
Lyrans were instructing others on how to tend to the land and how
to work metal and other materials.

A smaller ship entered the
atmosphere and passed the palace. It had been four months since
she’d seen that one, and she’d been waiting every day for its
return.

She smiled as she heard
quick footsteps in the room behind her and sighed when his hands
claimed her hips. He always knew where to find her. He stepped up
close behind her, moulding her back against his front and placing a
kiss on her neck. It felt like eternity since she’d seen him. She
closed her eyes and leaned into his kisses, savouring his touch and
how good it felt to be in his arms again.

His hands shifted to her
stomach and he tensed. She couldn’t contain her grin as he turned
her in his arms and stared down into her eyes, his own full of one
question.

She placed her hands over
his where they rested on her swollen belly and he smiled. She’d
never seen him look so happy.

“
How long?” he
said, a tremble in his voice.

“
A little over
four months. I didn’t realise until you were gone.”

“
Why didn’t you
send word? I would have come home.” He frowned at her now, deadly
serious again.

She raised her hand to his
face and brushed her fingers across his cheek. “It’s far more fun
to surprise you with these things. You get so wonderfully
serious.”

“
I do not,” he
said, his frown intensifying. She moved her fingers up and smoothed
the frown away. He smiled. “Perhaps I do... but this is worthy of
being serious.”

She shrugged and ran her
hands over her stomach, staring at it. The first few weeks of
knowing she was pregnant had been hard. She’d wanted to break down
and tell him, wanting him to come straight back to her and tell her
that he loved her like he had that day on Lyra Prime. It was more
fun this way though. She did love to surprise him.

“
I think this
is something to smile about rather than frown,” she teased him, a
smile still fixed on her lips. She covered his hands again with
hers, keeping them against her stomach. “Perfect for Terran-Lyran
relations.”

He frowned again. “Our
child is not an instrument of improving—”

She cut him off with a
kiss. It had been too long since she’d seen him and there was far
too much talk for her liking. He kissed her a moment and then
gently prised her off him.

“
Does everyone
know?” he said, a little breathless.

She kissed him again, her
tongue tangling with his this time. She didn’t want to talk about
all the formalities of having a baby now that she was truly
royalty. She just wanted to stay here in the palace with him and
drink her fill of him.

“
Kayla,” he
said and pushed her off him again. “Do they know?”

She shook her head. “I
wanted you to be first... do we have to talk about this right
now?”

He looked serious for a
moment and then his eyes darkened with hunger. “What would you like
to talk about?”

She grinned and pulled him
back to her, peppering kisses across his cheek as she spoke. “I
don’t want to talk at all. I want to kiss you until the sun sets
right through to when it rises again.”

He reclaimed her lips and
she parted them, allowing his tongue to enter and tangle with hers.
It felt so good. She’d missed this so much. She’d missed him so
much.

She sighed into his mouth
and he wrapped his arms around her, holding her close but so gently
that she had to smile. He was treating her as though she was
breakable. Something told her that he wasn’t going to let her out
of his sight now, definitely not until the child was born and
possibly even beyond that. He would want to stay close, not just
because he wanted to share the experience but because of the
dangers. She’d had months to think about the things that had
happened since meeting him. If the Minervans heard that she was
pregnant, they would target her in their attempt to get money from
Balt’s parents. From now on, they would have to be increasingly
careful. If their child were a boy, it would be an heir to the
throne.

She leaned back to avoid
his next kiss and looked up into his dark eyes. They were full of
curiosity when she stared into them for a long time, saying
nothing.

“
What is it?”
he said at last.

She ran her fingers into
the shorter hair at the back of his head and smiled up at him. He
frowned when she took the translator from his ear. She wanted him
to hear this in his own language and from her, not from some
device. She removed her own.

“
Yoi aishin,”
she said, a little nervous about speaking his language and getting
it wrong.

He was still for a moment,
his expression unchanged, and then a smile curved his
lips.

“
Yoi aishin
do... amo tatui sem.”

She frowned and put her
translator back in before pushing his back into his ear. “Say that
last bit again.”

“
I’m always
yours,” he whispered against her lips. “It was nice to hear it in
my own language. Is there anything else you’ve learned to
say?”

“
A few things,”
she said with a mischievous smile. “My tutor says I am doing
well.”