Even their transports were radically different. Her people traveled in grou but the Andarion vehicles seemed designed for speed and few occupants. Yet what struck her most was the lack of toys and children on the street.
“Where are all the kids?”
Caillen stepped over a fallen limb. “Probably in training.”
“You mean school?”
“No, training. School is attended at night and usually online. They spend the daylight hours in physical and martial training. I cannot emphasize the point that they make your people look like wimps enough. While you’re a warrior culture, you’re female dominated. Andarions are male dominated and vicious to an unfathomable level.”
“They subjugate their women?”
“No. The only thing more dangerous than an Andarion male is an Andarion female. Their women, as a rule, aren’t very feminine in anything they do. There are exceptions to this, but very rare ones. All of them are tough sons of bitches.”
She didn’t know what he meant until they left their cover and started walking down the street, toward an intersection.
Caillen cleared his throat before he spoke. “Don’t meet anyone’s gaze. Keep your head down at all times.”
He, however, didn’t follow that advice. In fact, he stared down every person they passed as if daring them to speak. It was like every passerby was sizing him up for an opponent and he was begging them to try something.
At the biggest intersection they found, Caillen paused next to a red-marked pole and hailed an autotran for them. He allowed her to enter the small egg-shaped vehicle first, then he got in and closed the door. She started to lower her cowl, but the fierce look he gave her made her pause. He cut a sharp glare to the corner. She followed his line of sight to see a camera there.
So she pretended she was only adjusting it while he swiped his card and entered their destination on the electronic keypad. When he didn’t explain the language or his actions, she took that to mean that they also had a mic in the car that was monitoring them.
True to her suspicion, a deep voice spoke to them in what must be the Andarion language. Caillen responded, his tone calm and even. They talked back and forth for several seconds until Caillen, his tone never showing any stress, jerked his blaster out and shot the camera in the car and the one on the street.
He moved so fast and unexpectedly that she gaped. “What’s going on?”
“We’ve been made.”
14
Caillen growled in the back of his throat. “I seriously underestimated their tech. Bastards have a face and retinal scanner that notified them that I wasn’t who I claimed.”
Terror filled her. “What do we do?”
He answered by kicking the electronics panel in front of them so hard that it broke open and exposed the wires. Desideria was dying to know what he was doing, but didn’t want to distract him while they were in a crisis situation. The most important thing was for them to get out of here as quickly as possible.
Caillen cursed in a language she couldn’t identify as if everything was hopeless.
She started to open the door to run for it, but he caught her arm and held her inside.
“On foot, we’re dead. If you want to escape, stay with me.”
But did she trust him enough for that? He hated her mother and he didn’t seem to think all that much of her.
What if he was lying?
For all she knew, he might be. All of this fiasco and drama could be caused by his fear of them killing him. Maybe the Andarions wouldn’t do anything more than set her free and let her go home. They might honor her diplomatic immunity.
But what if he wasn’t lying? What if they did imprison her like her mother had done her father? Then she’d be trapped here forever. Or eaten alive.
That would be bad and her mother would be dead.
At the end of the day, she didn’t know Caillen at all. Didn’t know his moral code or really much of anything about him other than he’d been raised as a commoner who had some impressive thief-like skills…
And he was a wanted felon to the Andarion government.
None of that gave her a reason to trust him even the slightest bit.
But if she had to choose between devils, she’d rather choose the one known than the one not. She was too ignorant of other races and cultures to even begin to argue against Caillen about the Andarions and their customs. They could have fat flying spiders who lived on cake trained to capture her for all she knew.
Hoping she wasn’t being stupid or fooled, she grabbed his blaster and readied herself for the fight.
Sirens blared and drew nearer as he rifled through the wires and tore out connections only to make new ones. He glanced at the blaster in her hand. “FYI, don’t shoot the Andarions with that. It’ll only piss them off.”
Great. What were they supposed to do if they couldn’t fire on them? “Then what…”