Free Finding Jess (First Wave) by Mikayla Lane Page A

the conference room. His fear for his mate and daughters
had not diminished at all, and he was concerned for the crew of the Adaria as
well. If she stripped the engine room or the weapons room, they’d all be dead.
    Ivint turned to his son, surprised
at his request; and disappointed as well. He had expected more compassion from
his son since his own mate had been saved by the girl.
    “How can you say that? She’s one of
our people. She was robbed of her parents, tortured and sentenced to death for
nothing more than being born of us. And in between those horrors, she still
managed to try to save more Valendran daughters. Potential mates to our people,
like Cari was to you.”
    “Yet you would ostracize her and
punish her further for a gift that she never had a chance to understand or
control? For forming an alliance with the only person who tried to protect her
from the brutality she faced daily?”
    Ivint paused for a moment to see if
what he was saying was sinking in not only to Scaden, but Reven as well. He was
not going to have that poor girl treated this way. Fortunately, both Scaden and
Reven looked suitably chastised, so he continued more calmly.
    “Obviously we are going to be faced
with more of our children who have been horribly traumatized by their
captivity, and we have to find a way to help them; we can’t just abandon them.
No matter how damaged they are from their abuse, they are treasures to us, and
we need to remember that.”
    Scaden felt terrible for being
selfish and unreasonable; however, he still wasn’t happy about it; and still
thought that she should be moved somewhere else. Even so, he agreed that she
shouldn’t be held responsible for what her gift had done.
    “I understand Father; I’m sorry.
I’ll go see about getting all the females to the other ship.”
    Ivint and Reven watched as he
walked out the door, before Reven decided to speak his mind. Ivint knew it was
coming and braced himself for it.
    “You’re out of your mind, and I’m
tempted to take a Fasnotia to the damn council!” Reven said in
frustration as he paced the room.
    Ivint knew that Reven would never
use the law against him, especially not in this instance. A Fasnotia was
only used when a ranking council member was emotionally, psychologically or
physically compromised and unable to perform their duties. The law had been
used in the past to allow the election of another council member if the current
one was dying. The threat only served to let Ivint know just how upset Reven
was with his decisions.
    “You may not like it, but it’s the
right course of action to take my friend. We have to get our bearings and
figure out what is going on. And we have to find Balduen. I’m not the least bit
convinced that it’s a coincidence that he disappeared right when the Relians
had planned to kill Jess.” Ivint knew it would do nothing to placate Reven
regarding his safety, but he hoped that Reven would give him a different
perspective on what was happening.
    “I don’t like any of this Ivint. I
don’t think we have enough information for you to be rushing out to meet
anyone. And Balduen going missing only solidifies that. If you’re going to go
through with it, then we need to pick the meeting place ourselves and get a
team in place.” Reven knew there was no talking Ivint out of the meeting, but
he was going to do everything he could to make sure it was as secure as he
could make it.
    “See to it, Reven. Let me know the
details when you have them worked out.”
Knowing he was being dismissed and having work to do, Reven left the room to
set up the meeting place.
    Ivint turned back to the window and
stared out at the stars, deep in thought.
    *****
    Amun helped Jess lay back down on
the bed and got her resettled while he reran the abnormal scans from earlier.
He tried to use the familiar activity to calm himself. The thought of them
taking Jess away had scared him much more than he had ever been before. He knew
if he had to