Allies (Warriors of Karal Book 5)
Read Allies (Warriors of Karal Book 5) Online
Authors: Harmony Raines
Tags: #Romance, #Multicultural, #Science Fiction, #Science Fiction & Fantasy, #Alien Invasion, #Colonization, #Exploration, #First Contact, #Galactic Empire, #Genetic Engineering, #Multicultural & Interracial, #General Fiction
Allies
Warriors of Karal
(Book Five)
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Note from the author: My books are written, produced and edited in the UK where spellings and word usage can vary from U.S. English. The use of quotes in dialogue and other punctuation can also differ.
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All rights reserved. This book, or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written consent of the author or publisher.
This is a work of fiction and is intended for mature audiences only. All characters within are eighteen years of age or older. Names, places, businesses, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, actual events or places is purely coincidental.
© 2016 Harmony Raines
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Petra never wanted to go to Karal, but when her mother becomes the new President of Earth, thanks to the Karal, she is part of the deal. Never having entered the lottery, she feels used, but soon begins to appreciate the huge Karalian who is her mate.
Sent into deep space with him, their bond grows, as they race to find a new planet suitable for a human colony. But after a terrifying journey through a wormhole, they are told to abandon their mission. Instead they are being sent to join an alien alliance, in a bid to destroy the Hrokili.
Niko is sent to Earth to pick up his female. He isn’t expecting much, after all, these humans have no real advanced technology and had brought their species to the brink of extinction by breeding too much. Yet when he meets Petra, she intrigues him. And so begins their journey, one of discovery, both in each other, and the universe around them.
A journey mirrored by the Karl themselves, as they learn that they can no longer be isolated. Instead, they form alliances, that will put an end to the threat of the Hrokili, and will change them for ever.
“And what if I don’t want to go?” Petra asked her mother.
“We all have to do things we would rather not do.” Her mother sat behind her desk, looking uncomfortable, as if she was an impostor. But then she was, wasn’t she? Because only five days ago the desk belonged to somebody else.
“But usually
we
still have a choice, don’t we?” Petra sat down in the chair opposite, feeling as if she were in a business meeting rather than having a conversation about her actual future, with her own mother. “So this is where all of the decisions are made. This is where you will rule from.”
Her mother sighed. “I wish things could be different, Petra. I don’t want you to go to Karal, any more than you do. But it was part of the deal. And without that deal the President would still be in charge.”
“And we couldn’t have that, could we?” Petra asked sarcastically.
“No, Petra, we couldn’t. He needed to go; the Karal understood. And that’s why they helped us.”
“So I am being sold to an alien race. That’s the price you put on your victory.” She saw her mother’s reaction, saw the fleeting expression of regret pass across her face before it was smoothed out.
Petra wondered if the woman in front of her was still her mother, or whether there was no room left for a daughter in the new President’s head, or heart. Petra understood how desperately the human race needed someone in power who was dedicated and single-minded in pursuit of their survival. But Petra didn’t feel like being altruistic; she wanted a mother who would be there for her, to hold her when she was sick and to comfort her when she was sad. Not a mother who used her as a bargaining chip.
“It was the price the Hier Ruler put on my victory. I expect he sees it as an insurance policy. With you on Karal I’m hardly likely to start a war, am I?” Her mother sounded tired.
“No,” Petra said, rising from her chair, needing to get out of there. “You’ve already done that, haven’t you?”
“No, Petra.” Her mother’s voice rose, and she sounded like she had when Petra was a child, shouting at her to put her clothes away or do her chores. And in that moment Petra knew that her mother was still there, and always would be, even if hidden under layers of bureaucracy. “What I’ve done is
prevent
a civil war. A war that we couldn’t afford. The human race is clinging on by its fingernails, and a war would have sent us tumbling into a dark abyss from which we would never have recovered.”
“And you think we have a chance to recover now?” Petra asked, her hand on the door knob, wanting to get out of there, to go and say goodbye to everything she had ever known, before the space cruiser arrived to take her to her new life.
“Yes I do. That’s the reason I’ve done this. I will live with my regrets for the rest of my life. I only hope that one day you will understand, and one day I might see you again.”
“That’s not going to happen though, is it?” Petra turned back to her mother. With tears in her eyes and her voice choked, she said, “No one ever comes back from Karal. Once I get on that cruiser I will never see you again, I will never see my friends again, and I will never see Earth again. I hope the sacrifice is enough.”
Her mother rose from her desk and came towards her. Her face showed open anguish, and pain. Pain that Petra knew ran deep, piercing her soul. In that moment, she understood the great sacrifice her mother had made too; but she couldn’t stand there and offer her any sympathy. For Petra, it was all still too new, too raw.
No matter how she looked at it, Petra felt betrayed. The humans on Earth might have a new chance, but she was being sold, her freedom given up, and she wasn’t big enough to accept that sacrifice with a smile. So before her mother reached her and offered her comfort, she pulled the door open and walked out of her mother’s office, and out of her mother’s life.
The guards outside straightened up as Petra walked by. She knew her mother had followed her into the hallway, and was now watching her walk up the stairs to her room. But her mother didn’t follow Petra, because they both knew there was nothing more to say.
Petra walked as fast as she could. She would have run, but she knew that that would have made people talk. And no matter what she thought about the situation, she didn’t want anyone to know how unhappy she was about going to Karal. She didn’t want it to cast a shadow over her mother’s role as the President.
Perhaps if it hadn’t happened so quickly, she might not feel as bad about everything, but she was still reeling from having her old life ripped away from her. Five days ago she had been a normal girl, in a normal college, living a normal life. She had no idea of the secret life her mother lived, the secret meetings she had with aliens from Karal. Only when Petra was unexpectedly removed from college by two security guards sent by her mother, did she know that something was happening.
Happening? That was an understatement. Her mother had somehow contacted the Karal, and they had helped her overthrow the President.
The President of Earth
. How did you even begin to arrange something that big? Although the part the aliens had played was a secret. One Petra had sworn to keep to herself.
And so, when she left Earth today, to be the breeding female of some Karalian warrior, she was supposed to appear as if she were excited. As if it was what she wanted, as if it was an honour to go to and live on a strange world with a strange alien.
It was made worse because this was something she had never craved. Even when she had become old enough to enter the lottery she had never taken part, unlike the rest of the female population of Earth. She liked it here, she liked the Earth and the memories it held for her, and she loved her friends.
Of course, her mother explained what was expected of Petra: not only was she to go to Karal as a breeding female, she had also been given the honour of going on a deep space mission with a Karalian warrior to find a new Earth for the human race. That was the only part of this whole ridiculous charade that gave her a glimmer of hope, that her sacrifice was not just so that her mother could sit in the President’s chair, but that humans, her friends even, might have the chance of a new life on a new planet. That the human race might find a new planet to call their own.
Reaching her room, she dragged the battered suitcase out from under her bed. She hadn’t even bothered unpacking the small collection of things she had hastily thrown in there when she was collected from college. A few clothes, that was all, and some sentimental rubbish she now felt belong to somebody else. Belong to a girl who no longer existed.
She opened it up, and tears flowed down her cheeks as she looked at the framed picture of the young girl, smiling so happily, sandwiched between her mother and father. She wanted to throw it across the room, to let the glass break into a million pieces, to match her heart.
Those three people were gone. Her father killed by the President, over two years ago, sentenced to death because of some stupid rally he had attended in support of an opposition leader. At the same time the mother she had known died too, only to be resurrected as a woman bent on revenge. And the little girl, she had been sent to boarding school and then on to college, pushed aside while her mother changed the world.
