Chapter 34

Chapter

Thirty-Four

Vyk

I breathed in the savory scents as I strode toward the banquet hall, scowling despite my stomach rumbling. I did not wish to be heading for a dinner in honor of the visiting captain. I might be hungry, but I was in no mood to dine with the staff and our visitor. I wished to have a quiet dinner in the staff dining room and then retreat to my quarters to await Fiona’s arrival.

“But that will not happen now,” I grumbled.

The quiet dinner was out, and I was not even confident that Fiona would show, despite her assurances. Had she remembered the banquet when she’d said she would come?

I snarled at the thought that this human captain was ruining everything. Not that there was anything to ruin. Not yet. My plan of getting to know Fiona and showing her that I was not the heartless creature she believed me to be had been derailed by the arrival of Earth’s envoy, although I could not blame him for injuring himself on the gauntlet.

Fiona’s irritation at me was entirely my fault, although I would not take it back. Replaying the human captain landing on his face was worth all of her outrage. Even now, a smile teased my lips at the thought.

The golden light from the wall sconces cavorted on the ebony walls as I took the wide, sweeping stairs two at a time to the second floor. There was not the same buzz of hundreds of voices spilling from the tall doors like there was at the weekly academy dinners, but I could tell from the smattering of conversation that I was not the first to arrive.

I drew in a breath, tempered my frown, and walked through the doors. Instead of rows of long, rectangular tables for cadets with the staff and instructors seated on the raised dais, the hall had been set up with tables arranged in a U-shape and only benches running along the outside.

Admiral Zoran and his wife stood at the center of the U as they spoke with the visiting human. He no longer wore the dirty and disheveled clothes I’d left him in, although he was in another military uniform, this one with medals attached to his chest.

A part of me wished I’d donned my Inferno Force uniform with my commander’s sash, but another part knew that would be overkill. Not even the admiral was wearing his dress uniform.

You are an Inferno Force Commander, I reminded myself. You have nothing to prove .

I scanned the rest of the attendees, noting almost instantly that Fiona was not there. The other instructors had arrived, and they had congregated at one end of a long side of the table along with the smattering of cadets who had remained during the break. Volten and Torq glanced up at me, both acknowledging me with subtle nods.

“I guess he survived your tour.”

I swung my head to see Kann walking up behind me. Did every Drexian know what I had done?

“It’s the Drexian Academy,” he added, as if sensing my thoughts. “Word travels fast, and I saw him emerging from the gauntlet looking like he had not been victorious.”

I thought about explaining that the human had expressed interest in the apparatus, but Kann would not believe me. He might be a Blade, but he was no fool.

Kann crossed his arms over his chest as he stood next to me and looked across the room. “I am aware that you outrank me and that you could have thrown me out an airlock for insubordination if we were serving on your battleship…”

“But…?” I prodded.

“But you should not make your dislike for humans so obvious. Especially after…”

He did not need to finish that thought. I knew of my reputation at the academy.

“This had nothing to do with my feelings about humans serving at the academy.” This was true. My dislike of the captain had nothing to do with his species .

Kann tracked my gaze that was locked onto the human envoy. “You just dislike a human you’d never met until today?”

I thought about my instinct about the captain. One of the things I had honed during my time on Inferno Force was instinct. I could size up an opponent almost instantly, and I had assessed the human when I’d seen him with Fiona and when I had escorted him around the academy. I could not say precisely why—and I refused to believe that it was only because of his connection to Fiona—but my gut told me that the man was not to be trusted.

“I do not dislike him,” I said. That would have been personal. This was not personal. This was a warrior’s instinct.

Kann shrugged. “For your sake, I would do a better job of pretending.”

He left me to join his friend Volten, and I turned his words over in my head. The Drexian might be a Blade, but his comment was astute. I could not let the rest of the academy know that I distrusted the human envoy. Not when everyone else seemed to be charmed by him. It would only give everyone another reason to dislike me.

No, I would need to find a reason for my distrust, a reason my gut told me the captain was a danger. Which meant that I would need to spend more time with him, not less. I could not avoid him if I wished to uncover his true motives. I would need to be his shadow.

I steeled myself as I strode forward. Time to make the human into my new best friend.