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I’d only made out a few words from the Toad Lord’s conversation, but with my strange new grasp of the Toad language, it was enough. My gut is telling me – screaming at me – that after this next shipment, Lord Oblog is done with the Aurelians. Whatever’s going on between the Priesthood and the Toads, Lord Oblog knows news of it can’t afford to see the light of day. We’re loose ends, and our loose tongues could trigger a galactic conflict that might wreak havoc.

He’d rather murder us than risk it.

Unless we kill him first.

Wewillkill him first.

The moment I feel that, I see the three men change.

They straighten their spines, and harden their resolve. They’re instantly battle ready. The decision was made in an instant, and that’s all it took for the warriors to slip into that mindset.

Stay behind us.Marcel’s voice is cold steel in my mind.We have one chance to get you off this ship.

He knows that if the triad leaves this ship without me, he’ll never see me again. Once they leave, I instantly become useless to Lord Oblog. From that moment on, he could kill me at any moment – and deliver a swift death to my unsuspecting triad when they return with his final shipment.

Marcel weighed the odds, and he’d rather we take a dangerous path, than risk what could happen if we’re separated again.

As I watch them, the three warriors stiffen like predators tasting blood. It’s in the way they stand – the wide stance of their feet, and the stretch of their massive shoulders.

These magnificent aliens were built for fucking and fighting – and have stores of pent up energy ready to unleash on either.

I feel pity for all who will stand in their way.

Marcel, Lucius, and Quint are going to cut their way through an entire mothership full of Bullfrogs, Sentinels, and Toads.

And, with the power of the Bond, they might just make it.

Marcel telepaths a layout of the ship to me, showing me the fastest route to the hanger. It’s going to be tight. If we sprint…

…I reach down, between my thighs, to tug that tiny Orb-Knife out of its hiding place. I know it’ll be less than useless against a huge Bullfrog, or the deadly aim of Sentinels – but it will make me feel like I havesomecontrol.

I touch the entrance to that hidden place…

…and then the doors hiss open.

I freeze.

Four Sentinels loom behind a massive, Bullfrog guard. He’s got his slimy, webbed hand on the hilt of his Orb-Axe, ready for a fight. The Sentinels have their guns half-cocked. A few inches higher and they’ll be aimed for center mass. I’ve seen how fast my Aurelians can move – but they can’t movethatfast.

“She comes with us.”

The Bullfrog’s eyes never leave Marcel’s. He’s ordering me to separate from my triad, and I think we all know it will be a coin flip how the Aurelians respond.

The three warriors stand there like statues, their hands hovering above the hilts of their own weapons. I know they’re ready to activate their weapons the instant Marcel gives the command.

I narrow my own eyes. My Bond-Enhanced sight shows me every detail of the wart-covered beast in front of us – his thick skin impervious to bullets and blades. Only an Orb-Weapon would slice deep into him.

Behind him loom the hulking, dead-eyed Sentinels – ready to cut us down with a hail of high-velocity slugs and turn us into chuck meat. Their eternal vigilance is even more terrifying than the barely-restrained, brute violence of the Bullfrog.

Stop!

I scream the word into their mind, desperate.

Lord Oblog should have sent a single man – five means he suspects us already. It means he’s still a step ahead.

It was my insistence that Tessa board the Aurelian’s Reaver, and not a Toad shuttle, that tipped him off.

He’d realized I suspected him. He’d realized we might try something – and his instincts had been right.