Born of Defiance

“Hon?”


She glanced over to her husband. At six foot nine, Hadrian was one of the few men she looked up to, and was the only one she’d ever dated she could actually wear heels with. A warrior of fierce skills, he kept his brown hair cut short around his gorgeous face. And those silvery-blue eyes betrayed his birth race that had been hunted to the brink of extinction. It was why he was more than happy to stay home and voraciously protect their babies from the assholes of the universe, while she risked her life fighting against the very tyrants who’d slaughtered most of Hadrian’s family and left him an orphan in hiding. “What is it?”

“Nero wants us to buckle in. We’re about to break atmosphere.”

Nodding, she pulled at the straps and secured herself. Her thoughts wandered as she glanced between her husband and his older brother, Nero. At first glance, they bore little resemblance to each other – something that had served them both well while Hadrian, unlike Nero, had grown up alone and in relative safety.

With blond hair, Nero was supposedly the spitting image of their father. Hadrian with his darker hair color took after their mother. Because they were two of the last of their hunted species and the sole survivors of their royal house, they were rarely seen together. The risk to each of them was too great.

No one outside of this ship knew Hadrian had lived through the massacre of his family. He’d been barely eighteen months old when they’d been executed. Narrowly escaping that so-called cleansing himself, Nero had hidden Hadrian among loyalists and surrendered himself to his enemies to make sure that his baby brother lived and grew to manhood in total safety.

For that alone, Jayne would have loved and adored Nero. But he was a decent male, with a loyal heart and humorous, dry wit. When Hadrian had called his brother about Talyn, Nero had instantly appeared to help them find him. No questions asked.

But that was how Nero was.

And as a professional tracker, Nero was the best in the Nine Worlds. Not to mention, he and her husband were full-blooded Trisani – some of the last of the full-bloods. A psychic race with skills of unfathomable psionic abilities. It was why their race had been extinguished. Fear and greed. People either wanted to control the Trisani and use their powers for their own petty purposes, or they were too terrified of them to let them live in peace.

Hadrian took her hand into his. “We’ll find him, Jaynie. Have no fear.”

“I know, baby. I just hope he’s still alive.”

Hadrian and Nero exchanged a quick glance. “He’s alive,” Hadrian assured her. “I can feel his life force. But he’s… angry.”

She smiled at the one truth of Talyn’s character. “Ever full of fight.”

Hadrian nodded before he buckled himself in beside her.

Her heart aching, Jayne turned her link on and pulled up the old photo she kept of Talyn from back in the day when he’d been in her class and she’d first met him and Galene. It’d been her first year as a student teacher at Brunelle Academy. Nervous and unsure, she’d kept waiting for someone to recognize her as the daughter of her nefarious father, and throw her out.

Or have her arrested.

But no one had. And as the class had filled with students on that first day, she’d just begun to relax.

Until Talyn had walked in. The moment he did, a fissure of friction permeated the air so thickly that she could have sliced it with a dull spoon.

Only eight years old, he’d held his chin high and walked in alone, unlike the others whose parents had brought them in and helped them to find their seats. Without a word, and acting like a full-grown adult, Talyn had ignored the sneers of the Hyshian students and parents who didn’t want an Andarion male in the mix, and had gone to his desk. He’d been so adorable with his caramel skin and bright white eyes. Since his black hair was longer, per Andarion fashion, than the rest of the males in his class, Talyn had worn it under a dark-colored religious Azukarian cap, which he continually tugged at to make sure it didn’t expose his hair.

“Gah, why am I stuck with that in my room?”

Jayne had arched her brow at her senior teacher’s derision. “Is there a problem?”

She’d jerked her chin in Talyn’s direction. “I can’t believe the administration allows him to go here. He’s no business in this room with our kind. Imagine a universe where they mix freely with us.”

By the sudden tenseness of Talyn’s jaw and hurt look in his young eyes, she knew he’d heard the older teacher. But rather than call her out, he’d unpacked his bag and kept his gaze on the floor in front of his desk.