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“Ten years ago, you fought for the side that was campaigning for freedom and democracy for all. Where did it get you? You were trampled beneath the current government’s feet. Liberty and justice have been thrown out. Now your government rules with an iron fist and persecution is their middle name.”

“I don’t want to hear anymore of this. You are needed on the bridge, remember?”

He gave her one last penetrating look. She shivered.

“We have lots of time to work out the kinks in our relationship. I shouldn’t be long on the bridge. My crew is going to make damn certain they make short work of this latest obstacle.”

“Obstacle. Well, you’re going to find yourself dealing with a hell of a lot more of those in the very near future. You’ve knocked on grief’s door, and they’re answering.”

He scowled at her. She blinked. He actually looked as if he wanted to yell at her.

She hoped he would.

As soon as he left the room, she leapt into action. Walking to the nearest wardrobe, she opened the door and searched for something that would fit her. She grabbed what looked like a long tunic with leggings. Or was it a dress of some sort with tights? It looked as if it would fit her, Talia must have helped Aries prepare for her presence in his life.

She slipped into the strange looking outfit and turned to the door. “Damn.” She didn’t realize she’d spoken aloud until she heard her own voice. He’d locked the door behind him. She glanced around the room and smiled when she saw the glass of pink water. Her head still throbbed, and, if she hoped to be able to break the locking code on the door, she needed to be able to think straight.

Dashing over to the table, she picked the glass up and gulped down the pink water. It tasted remarkably sweet and slightly refreshing. If it was indeed poison, it tasted like heaven. She bit her lip, now for the security console. She made her way toward it and had almost reached the door when some sort of force rocked the ship. Screaming, she was knocked off her feet. She went sliding and hit the far wall with a loud cracking noise.

“Ouch!” Rubbing the back of her neck she looked up. They were being attacked. Panic rose inside of her. She was being attacked, and she had no power whatsoever over her fate.

A klaxon started to ring off in the ship, making her ears hurt and her eyes water.

She could smell smoke. Her side of the ship must have taken the brunt of the attack.

“Freya?” Someone hammered on the door. She couldn’t recognize the voice over the ear splitting sound of the klaxon.

“Hello?” She called back.

“Captain?” She recognized that voice.

“Talia? I’m trapped in here, the door is locked, and I’m pretty certain that I smell smoke.”

“You probably do. We’ve taken one hell of a hit. Just hold tight, Mathias is trying Doorway to the Stars by Marly Mathews 36

to break the code on the door.”

“Get an ax and just break the damn door down.”

“We’d do that except the door is lined with a force field. It activated when Mathias hammered his fist on the door. He was lucky he didn’t get fried like an egg.”

She forced herself to her feet. Something wet trickled down the back of her neck.

Placing her hand to the nape of her neck, she felt it connect with the wet hot substance.

Going by the way it felt, it had to be her blood. “Shit.” Her vision clouded and then cleared. Whatever substance she’d drank was probably the only reason why she was still awake. Under any other circumstance, that force of a blow would have knocked her out.

Drawing in a shattering breath, she made her way toward the door. She knew who she needed. She
needed
Aries. He’d know how to get her out of this fix she found herself in.

“Freya? Are you okay? You sound kind of weak.”

“I’m fine. I was thrown off my feet when the ship was hit, and I’ve got a pretty big gash at the back of my head.”

“Oh, no! Try to stay awake until we can get in to you. You’re probably got a concussion.”

“That goes without saying. I know I’ve suffered a concussion. I feel sick to my stomach.”

She grabbed onto a nearby chair to keep from falling down. Her legs had turned to pure jelly beneath her.

“Hang on, Captain. Mathias is working hard to get in to you. I don’t think we’ll have to worry about another hit. We took the ship out when they hit us the last time.

They were pretty bold buggers.”

“Earth ship?” She forced the words out. She knew she wasn’t making much sense, but Talia had always been able to understand what she meant without her actually having to voice her worries.

“Yes. It was an Earth ship, and before you start fretting about how we killed our own, they fired on us first. It was a ship filled with mercenaries. You know how they are

… they’re driven solely by profit. Don’t you remember how some of them sold out members of our side during the war?”

She closed her eyes. She felt sluggish. Had she come this far only to die of a bloody head trauma? She’d taken her fair share of battle wounds in the past, and she’d even cracked her skull a few times. This time was different. She was bleeding quite a bit, and she felt as if she were floating.

“Get out of the way.” She could hear Aries voice. She smiled. At least he’d be able to see the fruits of his labors. He’d kidnapped her only to watch her die. She slid down to her knees, still managing to keep a hold of the chair.

“Aries.” She could feel herself falling into the deep abyss that beckoned to her.

Her life force was draining away. She didn’t want to die--she hadn’t won her side of the argument.

“I’m coming, Freya!” She could hear the heightened urgency in his voice. Could he feel how near to death’s doorstep she was? Her mouth had gone dry. She’d had so many brushes with death in the past, and now, death had finally claimed her. She’d wanted to escape from Aries, but she’d never thought of this path.

“Help me.” She didn’t want to die. She didn’t want to go down in the history Doorway to the Stars by Marly Mathews 37

books as a woman that kept getting beaten down no matter what she tried to do in life.

She had never been able to conquer her demons. In the past, she had always just remained one bloody step ahead of total destruction. And, now, her time had finally run out.

“I’m coming, Freya. Just hold on. Listen to my voice and feed off my strength. I can keep you alive through the sheer force of my will!”

She shook her head. “I’m just so sick and tired. I think I’m going to welcome my own final curtain call.”

As she closed her eyes, she heard the door crash open. Strong arms pulled her up.

He rested her head against his chest. “Hang on. I’m taking you to the doctors. They’ll be able to save you.”

Talia skidded into the room. “Oh, my God! I’ve never seen so much blood come out of one person.”

“Mathias, you have to take control. Get us into Gaian Territory, my patience has been broken. I am openly declaring war. Make sure the Empire knows. My father will be most pleased that I have finally decided to fight.”

“Your father?”

“Yes. My father. He’s the Prince Consort of the Gaian Empire. My mother is the Empress, and I am the Prince Regent.”

“Let me die now.” She let out a shaky breath and fell into a deep black hole.

Doorway to the Stars by Marly Mathews 38

Her head felt tight. Opening her eyes, she met Aries’ gaze.

“What day is it?” Her voice sounded raspy. She still felt so tired. Her eyelids felt as if they weighed two pounds each.

“You’ve been unconscious for almost two weeks. You almost died. I can’t believe how close I came to losing you.”

“I wish you had.” The look of fright mingled with anger in his eyes made her inwardly cringe. She didn’t know if she really wanted to die, but compared to her life with him as his captive, it seemed like a welcome adventure.

His eyes hardened. “If it means anything to you, you only survived thanks to my own personal doctors.”

“Thank you. I’d like to just take this time to point one thing out to you, since you seem to want me to be in your sainted doctors debt. Here’s my little zinger. I wouldn’t be here if you didn’t kidnap me. Hence, I wouldn’t have been caught up in your little battle and I wouldn’t have had my head almost knocked off.”

His eyes glinted again. “Not that you care … but I think you should know anyway. It would seem that you had a small price on that beautiful head of yours. The ship of mercenaries wasn’t after me, they were after you. They wanted your head on a platter—literally. I’m sorry I took offense to that. The next time, shall I hand you over to them?”

She looked away from him. “Why do you always make me feel like I’m two inches tall? Every time I try to gain the upper hand on you, you make me feel miserable.”

“I didn’t think I’d have to make you feel miserable. You already look as white as a ghost.”

“I’ve been dodging those head hunters for quite a long time. During the war, I killed someone that had quite a lot of money … it was in self-defense, but his relatives have been after me ever since. I’ve managed to kill the other two bounty hunters that came for me, I didn’t know I still had some of them on my trail.”

“Some of them? That ship was a battle corvette fully loaded. You made an awfully big enemy when you killed that man. I take it you didn’t kill him in the heat of battle?”

“No. He was on my side. He tried to rape me, I killed him.”

“Rape you?” His face became mottled with rage.

“When he came up behind me to attack me, he didn’t know I was cleaning my old fashioned revolver. He didn’t get too far before I gave him a nice little hole between his eyes.”

“I will kill every last member of his family for his crimes against you.”

“
Almost
crime. I killed him. I think he’s paid in full. I didn’t count on the fact that he had influential family members. They run an organized galactic crime syndicate. I don’t think they’ll ever stop coming after me. I thought they’d give up when I killed their last two hired men, but they aren’t going to stop.”

“Oh, they’ll stop. Even if I have to keep killing them as they come.”

Doorway to the Stars by Marly Mathews 39

She was touched by his loyalty and his concern. She loved the way he moved into protective mode whenever she mentioned someone that caused her harm. She liked having someone there that would watch out for her, but there was a fine line between protector and control freak.

“No. I don’t want you to kill people for me. There has to be some way to reason with them. I just don’t understand why they didn’t know what a dirty rotten bastard he was. I wasn’t the first woman he attacked, and he was just an asshole with anyone he met.

They had to know he was bad right down to his bone marrow.”

“It sounds as if he was one of those two faced types. Haven’t you ever met one?

You know, someone that only shows their true colors to one part of their life and hides them from the other part of their life.”

She bit her lip. Her head had started to ache. She wished she could loosen the bandages.

“I’m having trouble remembering a few things about my life. I suppose I’ve really been knocked senseless. I’m trying to think of his last name, but I keep drawing a blank.”

“The doctors say that will return in due time. I wouldn’t worry about it. At least you remember me.”

“Oh, please. I wish you’d been totally wiped from my mind.” She almost regretted her choice of words when she saw the hurt look in his eyes. Her eyes wandered around the room. They weren’t on a spaceship now.

“Where are we?”

“We are on the Gaian home world.”

“Nice. I guess there’s a snowball’s chance in hell of me ever going back to Earth, huh?”

“My mother has seen you. She approves. Apparently, she thinks you have a sweet soul. I don’t know where she got that idea from.” The feinted cynicism in his voice would have been more believable if he wasn’t smiling when he said it.

“A sweet soul?”

“My mother prides herself on being able to judge other people simply by reading them.”

“Reading them? I don’t like the sound of that. Is she telepathic?”

“I guess you could say she’s telepathic. My mother has talents that are beyond me. She was crushed when her female subjects turned against her.”

“Do you mean your mother is the real person that had a hand in banishing all of the Gaian women?”

“Not all. I never said every single Gaian female was exiled. I only said that some of them were … namely most of the women that were young enough to still bear children. The more mature women were intelligent enough to recognize Earth as our silent enemy … but the younger population believed our ancient civilization had to listen to the forward thinking Terrans. They were wrong. Your people were the wolves in sheep’s clothing.”

“You told me your Emperor had banished the Gaian women. You lied to me.”

“I never lied to you. I simply didn’t want you to know my entire family history until I was ready for you to have that knowledge. Knowledge is power, you know.”

“I feel sick. Here I was thinking you were a chauvinistic society filled with machismos. Instead, you are an empire run by a woman. How very unexpected.”

Doorway to the Stars by Marly Mathews 40

“My mother does have the final say in all matters of the Empire, but in recent years, she’s given me full control over our foreign policies. Waging war with another Empire falls in my reign of power.”

“Earth isn’t an Empire. We are a commonwealth of Planets united under one Government.”

“A totalitarian and fascist government, to my way of thinking. Earth is more of an Empire in your way of defining Empire than the Gain Peoples will ever be.”

“You’re serving me up with a generous portion of fast-talk, Aries.”