Nash peered out the window as they approached the factory’s coordinates. It was on a moon at the edge of the system near the border, but also between any Drakesthai or Kharan planets. It was the perfect location for a warehouse – a moon with a long orbit that was hidden from view for most of the cycle.

Perfect.

But as they scanned the factory after cloaking he wondered what they’d gotten themselves into. It was supposedly abandoned. They could take what they wanted without resistance.

Nash hoped that was the case, but it would be too easy.

Nothing was ever easy anymore.

So he waited while Varan scanned the factory and Kaiden read whatever they’d scrounged up on the place for the millionth time.

Studying the factory Nash glanced at Varan again.

What had happened between them…it was something he hadn’t been sure he’d ever be able to do. To share a female and not rip the other male to pieces was what he’d been most worried about. It was in his people’s nature. They fought for everything, and he’d thought this would be no different.

Had their mate bond eased that part of him? Would it make him weak, or was it only applicable to his sexual relationships?

And then there was the way Kaiden had been eyeing him and Varan. The male was interested, but understood Nash wasn’t.

There were so many possibilities, but more than anything he was still shocked he’d listened to Adelina ride Varan. And instead of going in there to rip him limb from limb, he had gotten aroused again.

Nash shook his head and focused. What they were about to do would be dangerous. They could not afford to die on this mission. Adelina would never forgive them for being so stupid.

“It does appear to be abandoned as reported,” Varan stated. “But I don’t believe these readings. Not when we’ve never been able to detect the Neprijat before they attack.”

“I agree,” Nash muttered. “We should land on the far side of the moon and infiltrate the factory, make a visual assessment and if there are Neprijat we can regroup.”

“The logs here state it was fully functional up to a cycle ago, and then nothing,” Kaiden said. “There is no explanation as to why or where they went. There is nothing about the supplies being redirected or any warships that were completed despite detailed reports previously.”

“You think they just…left?” Varan asked, looking up at the moon before them instead of the scanner.

Nash snorted. “And I can grow wings and fly.”

Kaiden glared at him. “While I disapprove of the sarcasm, I agree with the sentiment. It is highly unlikely it was abandoned if the factory still has supplies.”

“Then where were those supplies coming from?” Varan asked. “This moon, or is there another supply station? Maybe a mining colony?”

The prospect was promising. If they could take it for themselves it would increase their chances of succeeding in the upcoming battle. Nash knew the risks were high, but he would not leave his kingdom to slavery. Even if he had planned to give it up for a female he’d discovered he couldn’t live without.

“Let’s send some scouts, and when they report back we’ll make a decision.” Varan pulled out his simulcast and sent off messages to the warriors.

A moment later a small ship detached and Nash watched it on the scanner, otherwise invisible to the naked eye. “It’s only visible to our ship’s scans, correct?” He wanted to double check. Nothing could be left to chance anymore.

Varan nodded. “But the Neprijat have tech that fools even your own Nash. We have no idea what we’re really up against.”

Wasn’t that the awful truth? Nash growled in irritation and checked his weapons in their holsters again.

He didn’t like waiting. He didn’t like not leading the scouts and seeing the situation with his own two eyes. But he was prince consort now. Adelina would not be pleased to know he’d done something dangerous when there was no reason for him to do so.

Glory wasn’t a concept that was revered in Draga – not the same way that it was in Khara. It was why they had the fighting arenas. Nash had been worshipped like a god until the Neprijat had descended on his people like a disease.

He would never forgive himself for being on patrol that day. There had been no way to know, but Nash would never stop thinking that if he’d been there, maybe he could have done something to save his family. At the very least gotten his little sisters out.

What had been done to their bodies, he didn’t know either. But Nash planned to make the Neprijat pay. They owed him a debt and he would take it with interest.

“Your majesty, there are Neprijat here, but not many. And there don’t appear to be any of those monsters,” the warrior said over the encoded transmission for everyone to hear.

Nash shared a look with Kaiden. No hounds meant the factory was mainly run by robotics and tech. They simply needed a few Neprijat to oversee and without any hounds the resistance would be minimal. The real question was why had it been reported as abandoned to their own people?

“Are you sure about the hounds?” Varan asked, no doubt thinking the same thing Nash was – it could be a trap.

“Would you like us to infiltrate the factory?”

“Can you do another scan?” Varan asked, considering the moon before them.

“The Neprijat I see with my own eyes still aren’t showing up on the portable scanner. I don’t know what they possess to hide so efficiently from our tech, but I can only confirm numbers in person.”

There was some muttering as the small squad on the surface considered the different entrances.

Sending them in without backup could be suicide. Nash crossed his arms over his chest and glared at Varan.

“Have something to say?” the other male snapped.

“Even if there are hounds we can take them,” Nash said as calmly as he could despite Varan’s tone. “But they cannot. Not alone.”

Kaiden nodded his agreement, wings flaring a bit. After weeks among them Nash could read those wing movements like he could facial expressions. The Drakesthai prince was indignant. He would not let those warriors go in alone to their death when something else could be done.

Varan ran his fingers through that blond hair of his and considered.

The movement flashed through his memory. He’d watched as Adelina had done the same when she’d climbed on top of Varan. It hadn’t angered him, but caused an ache in his chest. She’d done the very same to Nash only moments before.

Having Adelina tell him she could love them all had been difficult to believe, but he’d taken her word for it – knowing he’d rather have a piece of her than nothing at all. But seeing it? It was something Nash was getting used to and even…enjoying.

She was so happy. How could he begrudge her that?

“We cannot divide and conquer if there is a chance that the hounds are on that moon,” Varan muttered. “Our numbers would not be enough to survive waves of them. But we can go in all together. If we enter in through the factory where the completed warships are, we could potentially commandeer one, or at the very least use its weapons.”

“And you believe there are weapons on this rock?” Nash asked, studying the factory again as he contemplated. It was a sound plan, but he still didn’t like all the unknown variables. It was asking for trouble.

But there was no other way. Not if they wanted those ships, supplies, and any possible weapons.

“They may or may not be made here, but if they gave out false reports…at the very least some weapons were brought to this location so those ships are ready to go the moment they’re completed,” Varan said, clasping his hands behind his back, shoulders straight; strong. “But the falsified reports make me wonder what they were hiding here.”

Nash studied the king consort in his periphery. The male had taken to his new position far better than Nash would have guessed. His experience as prince of thieves no doubt had helped. And Varan’s time as a criminal gave Adelina an edge – an advisor who knew how to get things done. One way or another.

“Kaiden, what do you think?” Varan finally asked.

Nash turned to the winged male and admired the way Varan handled the situation. He was the dominant of two other strong males – dominants in their own right. Yet, he was willing to concede to them when and where he could. Varan was including them and ensuring they knew he valued their opinion.

Some of the weight and concern Nash had held close about the relationship with the other males eased at that realization.

“We all go in and leave one person behind on this ship to inform Adelina of what happened in case things go very wrong,” Kaiden said softly, but he wasn’t weak. He was grim but determined. “Then we take the factory and anything else we can find and get back to our queen as quickly as possible. I don’t like having all three of us away from her.”

“And you?” Varan asked Nash.

He huffed a sigh and tied back his long hair. “Kaiden’s plan is solid. But things will be different once we get down to the surface. If it is a trap, we will lose more of our warriors, but we can still take this factory. As long as we have one person running the mission. There can be no question who is leading. It could cost all our lives.”

Varan’s green eyes sparked and Nash nodded. The king consort wasn’t a warrior by trade, but his ability to strategize was nothing short of amazing. “I will obey every command you give down there.”

The king consort grinned. “I appreciate your faith in me, but you should lead this mission, Nash. It is your area of expertise.”

Kaiden’s wings rustled again – agitated. “I may not have known this factory was here, but I should lead this mission. This is my system and I can speak the Neprijat tongue.”

The words made Nash tense and he waited for Varan to argue, but the thief simply grinned and shrugged a shoulder. “Figure it out between the two of you, but do it now.”

Normally the Drakesthai prince was content to follow them, but he wanted to lead here. Nash considered the winged male. Kaiden was more than capable and he was right about speaking that language of theirs.

“Kaiden can lead, but on one condition,” Nash said, crossing his arms over his chest.

The Drakesthai male stiffened but waited patiently, as did Varan – another excellent trait in a leader.

Nash couldn’t hold his grin in anymore. “When you’re making love to her tonight, I want you to tell her something nice about me. Anything you can come up with.”

Varan’s sharp laugh eased the tension and even Kaiden smiled slightly. “I believe I could tell her you don’t smell as bad as I thought you would.”

Nash snorted. “You can come up with something better, I’m sure.”

Then Varan chuckled and tapped the scout’s encoded transmission. “We’ll be down shortly.”

“Hm, how about your cock is bigger than I assumed based on your personality?”

Nash barked a laugh and then activated his helmet. “You were looking at it long enough to know.”

Kaiden didn’t deny it. He simply smiled and activated his own helmet.

This game Nash had started…he could have handed over point to Kaiden without requesting anything at all, but it wouldn’t have made the impact he needed it to. Nash knew he had to make up for lost time – for making Adelina wait for a response to her proposal.

She’d forgiven him, but her other two mates were still working on it.

And if they were all going to spend a lifetime together then Nash needed them to start liking him. This…game, it would help.

Varan clapped him on the back as Kaiden passed. Somehow Varan knew what he was doing – the crafty bastard. And he approved.

Nash didn’t know what to think about that as he followed after the other two males.

And for the first time in his life he didn’t care that he was third.

“What do you see?” Kaiden asked – his voice barely more than a whisper.

Not that they needed to with their helmets up and the squad all using the same encrypted channel. But it was instinct to do so when their enemy was only a few hundred meters away.

Nash looked again and scanned with Kharan tech. “Nothing showing up on my scanner, but I can physically see five Neprijat on this floor. There are probably more, but how many I’m not sure.”

“Are they warriors?” Varan asked.

They didn’t move like warriors, but they had the build and muscle mass to imply they weren’t weaklings. “Maybe not to the level we’ve seen so far, but I wouldn’t expect them to go down easy either.”

Nash wondered why the Neprijat were so…fanatic. He couldn’t think of a better way to describe their obsessive intensity.

After what he’d seen so far and what he’d witnessed on the battlefields he knew there was something strange going on. Reports coming in from all over had said much the same. Nash would have to ask Kaiden how they were when they’d ruled the Hai System.

Kaiden turned to their squad of fifty warriors. “On my mark I will create cover and then we will fan out. Cover the bottom and once everyone’s reported in we will head upstairs until we’ve cleared the factory. Got it?”

Fifty warriors and Nash studied each and every single one of them. A third had wings and the rest were Dragan. Nash wondered if they’d been thieves and assassins, but it didn’t really matter to him. The sheer impossibility of this only a few months ago is what had him shaking his head.

And all for one female.

She was an extraordinary female, but Nash hadn’t thought Adelina capable of compelling so many to fight and die for her. He’d seen a glimpse of it when she’d led him on that tour around her palace when he’d first arrived.

The way the servants and other wait staff responded to her, the spidersilk factories she’d commanded…it had all been there for someone willing to look hard enough, but Adelina had hidden it all from them. She’d hidden her true beauty.

Nash wondered sometimes if they even deserved her.

He’d strive to earn the right to have a queen willing to do what she did for them all – willing to give herself up to a monster if it would save her people. If that was what they wanted from her.

“On my mark,” Kaiden murmured, watching the factory floor where the finished warships were.

The place was massive and Nash worried what waited for them in the dark corners. They could take this, he reminded himself. Ignoring how much bigger it appeared from the surface was how they’d all survive.

One step at a time.

Kaiden rolled a smoke grenade into the factory and waited until it was in the center of the massive hanger before activating it. The smoke covered everything in moments and Nash knew the design would soon permeate most of the factory.

He pulled up his rifle and the muscles in his shoulders tightened as he waited for the command.

“Now,” Kaiden said, heading into the factory first.

Nash cursed as he followed closely, the imaging on his helmet’s glass showing him where each warrior in the squad was. If something happened to Kaiden while on this mission Adelina would never forgive him.

He shot a Neprijat about to fire on the Drakesthai prince and then the white smoke was filled with bright flashes as the plasma shots went off. But their squad was well trained. No one spoke aside from stating where they saw the enemy, who would take what.

The way the Drakesthai worked to protect their Draga brothers and sisters was a wonder in itself. Adelina was accomplishing something no one had been able to do since they’d all split off from the Ancient humans. For the first time they were working together.

That the Neprijat were somehow brothers as well wasn’t something Nash was ready to consider yet.

Then an enemy burst out of the smoke and attacked him head on. Nash fired without thinking – a lifetime of training taking over.

Again and again he fired as they came at him.

His body moved as he entered that perfect calm. Nash kept firing until they got too close. Then he whipped out a plasma blade and sliced as they kept pressing forward through that endless smoke – the factory seemingly going on forever.

He lost all sense of time as he kept shoulder to shoulder with Varan, right behind Kaiden to protect his back. As the Neprijat moved, they did as well. Despite all their problems with each other, their competitions, and squabbles – the three of them fought seamlessly together.

Nash didn’t need to be told, and neither did the other two. They simply knew where the other was at all times, moving to protect each other’s backs.

Kaiden sliced through the front while Varan and Nash took the sides, trusting their blind spots to the warriors behind them.

Moving from rifle to blade and pistol made the close quarters smoother and it became nothing more than a dance as he spun around Varan to get the Neprijat the other male couldn’t see.

Then Kaiden stopped when there weren’t any more enemies waiting to take the place of their fallen brothers. He breathed heavily, wings out in that aggressive stance that made him appear twice as large. “Report.”

The two scouts appeared out of nowhere. “We’ve covered the bottom floor—” A black Neprijat blade sprouted from his chest and Nash fired on instinct.

Then the roar of more Neprijat surrounded them.