For almost three years Dtimun, the enigmatic and mysterious Cehn-Tahr commander of the Morcai Battalion, has been at war not only with the Rojok Dynasty, but also with his feisty Medical Chief of Staff, Dr. Madeline Ruszel. Now a surprising visitor from the future has charged them with the rescue of the enemy Rojok, Field Marshal Chacon. To ensure success, both Madeline and Dtimun must make personal sacrifices and attempt a dangerous mission behind enemy lines. Sparks fly as each twisting turn throws them closer together than they’ve ever been before—can they resist acting on desires they have long denied?

      If their plans are discovered, they face exile by their own governments and possibly even execution. But if they do not act, the future will see the end of civilization itself….

      To all the fine professors at Piedmont College in Demorest, GA, who taught me to look at the world in a new and different way. Especially to those I haven’t mentioned in previous dedications, who were my mentors in history and other subjects back when I was a college student in the 1990s: Dr. Ralph Singer and Dr. Al Pleysier in the history department; in anthropology, Dr. Max White; in Japanese, Dr. Jeanne White; in Spanish, Dr. Joe Palmer; and in English, Dr. William Smith, among many others.

      This science fiction series also owes much to Dr. Rob Wainberg, my mentor for the biological aspects of the Cehn-Tahr (and, I rush to add, any mistakes in interpretation are my own, not his). The idea for the combination of human/Cehn-Tahr genes to restructure Ruszel was his. Hope I got it right, Rob.

      This novel is also dedicated to my family: my husband, James, my son, Blayne Kyle, my daughter-in-law, Christina, my granddaughter, Selena Marie, my sister, Dannis, and her daughters, Amanda Belle Hofstetter and Maggie Cole, my other nieces, Helen Hunnicutt, Valerie Kyle, Kathy Thomas, my nephews Bobby Hansen and Tony Woodall, Rodney, Paul and James and all their families; my best friend Ann Vandiver (who forced me to take all my manuscripts out of the closet and market them in the first place), my brothers-in-law Doug Kyle and Sonny Merck, my sisters-in-law Kathleen Woodall and Victoria Kyle, my great-nieces and great-nephews, great-great-nieces and nephews and the rest of my wonderful in-laws. And to my extended family, my readers, who keep me going with their affection and loyalty. Love you all.

      CONTENTS

      CHAPTER ONE

      CHAPTER TWO

      CHAPTER THREE

      CHAPTER FOUR

      CHAPTER FIVE

      CHAPTER SIX

      CHAPTER SEVEN

      CHAPTER EIGHT

      CHAPTER NINE

      CHAPTER TEN

      CHAPTER ELEVEN

      CHAPTER TWELVE

      CHAPTER THIRTEEN

      GLOSSARY & CHARACTERS

      CHAPTER ONE

      Silence, Madeline Ruszel thought, was overrated. In the darkness, all alone, she heard nothing outside the room. It was obviously soundproof. She wondered if the Cehn-Tahr needed perfect silence in order to sleep.

      The thought made her curious. Memcache, the home planet of the Cehn-Tahr, had become her home since her rescue from a crash on the planet Akaashe with her military unit. Her former Holconcom commander, Dtimun, had defied his government and her own to save her life. She was recuperating from her injuries, but also facing a new and dangerous challenge once she healed. It was hard to sleep with the most momentous decision of her life hanging over her. She had agreed to a procedure that would change the very structure of her body, and to a mission that might mean her death.

      She heard the wind stir outside. She wondered if her former commander had as much trouble sleeping as she was having. This place, this stone fortress, was his home. She was still amazed to find herself here, instead of back on the Tri-Galaxy Fleet’s planet, Trimerius, where wounded military with life-threatening injuries such as hers had been were customarily hospitalized.

      She hoped Dtimun wasn’t in too much trouble with his government for pulling the Holconcom out of the Tri-Galaxy Fleet in order to rescue her. She, and all the humans aboard the Cehn-Tahr ship Morcai, were now under threat of court-martial and spacing. The Terravegan ambassador, Aubrey Taylor, had mandated the return of all human military back into Terravegan units, thus forcing the Holconcom’s human component to return to its own base. The humans, all fond of Madeline, had refused to comply with the order, which also forbade any attempt to rescue her from Akaashe. So now they, and she, were fugitives from justice. She wished, not for the first time, that ambassadors had less power. They were the equivalent of world leaders in the totalitarian society to which Terravegans belonged.

      She drew in a slow breath, delighted to notice that it was not as painful as before. Her injuries would have been fatal, but she’d made a friend during an earlier mission. She saved the life of an elderly Cehn-Tahr soldier. It was he who had come with the Holconcom to Akaashe to get her. It was his powerful mind that had healed her. She owed him a lot.

      She shifted in the bed, restless. She wasn’t used to inactivity. She’d been in the military since she was very young. At the age of eight, she’d been divisional champion marksman in the sniper company where she’d first served. Her career as a soldier had been satisfying. So had her career as a doctor, a field that paired diagnostic and surgical functions and specialties in one individual. She was an internist, dealing with Cularian racial types such as Cehn-Tahr and Rojok. She was also medical chief of staff for the Holconcom ship Morcai. Or she had been, until Ambassador Taylor had transferred her to a commando unit in the all-female Amazon Division and put her in harm’s way.

      It had been a move she hadn’t fought. Her helpless attraction to her commanding officer had resulted in a behavior he couldn’t control, one which had almost cost him his career. The Cehn-Tahr had mating behaviors which were violent and quite noticeable. When a human was involved, the consequences would have been deadly. The Interspecies Act forbade any mingling of genetic material between Cehn-Tahr and non-Cularian races, such as humans. Dtimun had often hinted that the Cehn-Tahr—genetically modified to be vastly physically superior to any other race—had many feline behaviors.

      Which raised a question in her mind. Did the Cehn-Tahr sleep at night, like humans, or did they subsist on catnaps? She knew they could eat small mammals whole, owing to the striated muscle in their esophagus. But they also had a detached hyoid bone. That meant that they should be able to purr, like the small cats that occupied space on Terravega. That was an interesting idea. She’d heard the commander growl. She’d heard what passed for laughter among the Cehn-Tahr. She’d never heard one of them make a purring sound. Well, just because they had the anatomical structure to make it possible didn’t mean they did it, anyway. The commander had intimated that there were still secrets about the Cehn-Tahr that they’d never shared, even with their human crewmates. She wondered what they were.

      She got up, a little stiffly, and walked to the window. With a soft sigh, she opened the shutter-like wings and let in the night breeze. It carried warm breezes with the scent of the same flowers that occupied pots in her bedroom. No cut flowers here, she’d noticed, and smiled as she decided that Caneese had been responsible for that. Dear Caneese, who took such good care of her. It was comforting to have a woman’s touch. Especially for Madeline, who had been raised in a government nursery on Terravega.

      She was so unlike Cehn-Tahr females. Madeline was independent and spirited, a capable soldier, a competent doctor. Cehn-Tahr women were forbidden to join the military at all, much less operate as combat soldiers. It had been a point of contention between Madeline and Dtimun. Their battles had become the stuff of legends. And now she was living in his home, about to be bonded with him in preparation for the creation of a hybrid child.