Perhaps because he was thinking of home, and how his kin were faring, he missed Berrick’s approach. The big B’Kaar dropped into the seat opposite, sliding a tray loaded like Cade’s onto the table.
“Hey,” he grunted by way of welcome.
The B’Kaar second in command didn’t often join him to eat, but it wasn’t unknown. A quick glance around the dining hall said they were alone apart from the human staff.
“Mornin’.” Berrick shoveled some small yellow cubes into his mouth, chewing as he looked at Cade thoughtfully.
“What?” he asked, pausing in the middle of his own meal, fork halfway to his mouth.
“How’d you manage to fool the tests?”
The blunt question took Cade by surprise. It shouldn’t have. Berrick B’Kaar was not a politician like some Latharian clan senior warriors. He was a blunt instrument who ignored the verbal games others played and got to the heart of the matter.
This, though… struck at the heart of the secrets Cade and every Vorr carried.
“What do you mean… fool the tests? I’m just a farm kid. I don’t know anything about fooling any tests.”
He did. He knew exactly what Berrick meant. Those like him were trained from the cradle to suppress their abilities so the empire’s testers didn’t pick them up. They must be the only younglings in the empire who were taught to meditate before they could walk. Covak had taught him.
“Yeah, right. Do you think I’m draanthing stupid, kid?” Berrick snorted, downing a pint of orange juice in a few gulps.
Cade didn’t blame him. He’d become partial to the human fruit juice himself. He just had to be careful because it gave him acid reflux. He was a predator so his digestion was more suited to meats. It didn’t stop him drinking it, though.
“You’re a B’Kaar,” he pointed out. “Even if your IQ was subnormal, it would have been boosted by your uplink to the freaky hive mind you lot have.”
Berrick stopped chewing and looked at him, deadpan. Without a smile on his lips, he looked scary as draanth. Like he’d just as soon murder a male in his bed than look at him. Berrick’s ke’lath wasn’t active, though, the wiring under his skin dormant, so he wasn’t actively linked to the other cyber warriors.
“Cards on the table, kid. I know what you are. What I want to know is how you’re fooling the tests.”
Cade looked at him, his best innocent expression plastered over his face as sweat dripped down his spine.
Sure, Berrick had covered for him, and he didn’t seem to have the same prejudices as the other Lathar, but this was big… probably the biggest secret in the empire. Bigger than that rumor about the emperor’s indiscretion with that bodyguard way back when.
If it got out that the Vorr knew how to recreate the empire’s greatest weapon, all Vorr were all dead. Deader than his home planet.
The Cabal had been so terrified of the Vorrtan returning that they’d left death machines in place… The empire would react no differently.
But it was worse than that. The Vorr hadn’t recreated the empire’s greatest weapon… they couldn’t, because they’d never died out. They lived within the Vorr, and on their own hidden colony planets. They were Vorrtan, and they were the bogeymen of myth and legends.
“I have no idea what you’re on about,” he said coolly, rising to his feet. He’d lost his appetite. “Please excuse me, I have a prior appointment.”
He had to get out of here before Berrick figured it out.
Because he was Vorrtan. Hiding in plain sight. And if they worked that out, they’d rip him limb from limb.
Elise’s morning was filled with back-to-back meetings with barely a break in between. So by the time lunchtime rolled around, she was desperate to escape the confines of the base. Unable to find Cade, she’d queried the nearest B’Kaar warrior about his location and discovered he was training with the humans on the Parade Square up top. So she grabbed a selection of food from the canteen and headed up there.
The day was warm and pleasant with a slight breeze, much as it was yesterday for the trip to the zoo. A chill ran down her spine as she emerged into the sunlight, but she shook it off. They were on base, and no animals were here… What could possibly go wrong?
A smile curved her lips as she spotted the training group over on the other side of the parade ground on the grass. Not a large group considering the size of the base, only around ten or twelve people, but enough to be a small crowd. She didn’t interrupt them but merely settled herself on the grass under a tree nearby. It was out of the sun and she could relax while also watching the training in front of her.
Cade was the only alien among them, but she recognized Jay Stephens, the major who had the dubious honor of being the only male human to have spent time with and been accepted by the Lathar. He and Cade sparred as a team against the others. She lifted her hand, squinting as she shielded her eyes to watch them.
It was obvious Jay was human. He moved totally differently than Cade or any of the other Lathar she’d seen, and he was well-trained in hand-to-hand combat.
But it was also obvious that somewhere along the line, he’d picked up nonhuman fighting techniques and was using them liberally against the human team that attacked him and the tall alien who fought at his side.
The humans circled them, working as a group to try and bring them down. She caught her breath as she noticed the glint of a dagger in the sunlight, but then she realized all of the humans were armed as they attacked the two in the center. It made no difference.
Cade and his companion repelled them all with ease, the alien warrior doing most of the work. He moved like nothing she’d ever seen, faster than a man that big had any right to be. But even as he threw them out of the hastily arranged "ring," there were laughs of amusement and good-natured teasing.
The banter reassured her this match wasn’t serious. And he even seemed to be gentle with them—a fact proven as he spun one human in the air, arm around his waist. It was the kind of move she’d seen in wrestling rings on entertainment vids. It usually ended up with the victim crashing into the mat and sustaining spinal injuries.
However, instead of slamming his opponent down, Cade altered his grip and somehow managed to lower the guy to the ground at the same time blocking the attack of another. She’d never seen that kind of next-level fighting before, both from the level of skill required to pull it off and the awareness. Most men she knew didn’t gain that type of awareness until at least their late thirties. Before that they got carried away with testosterone and aggression when fighting.
Perhaps aliens didn’t have testosterone and that was why? She mused, tilting her head to the side and studying Cade as he stood with the others, chatting after the sparring session had wound up.
No… they definitely had testosterone. Or something like it. There was no way they didn’t, not after the way she and Cade had been last night. Her gaze wandered over his tall, leanly muscled form, her mind calling up memories of the night before.
Heat hit her, simmering through her veins to settle low in her stomach. She shifted in place, pressing her thighs together. He’d been right… he might have been a virgin but he had not been innocent. Not by any stretch of the imagination.