Chapter 2

She sat alone at her table, in a courtroom threatening to burst its seams. Humans occupied spaces that shouldn’t have been occupied. Fharezhan lay in front of her table, wings folded at his sides, not projecting any thoughts at the moment. Sitting at the table to her right, Aaron Farrow, the prosecutor, looking at his notes. They called him the Perry Mason of Westover, a fictitious lawyer on a long-running television show that could still be seen on stations indulging in nostalgia, respected as an astute lawyer, a human who had won a lot of cases, lost only a few he measured by the number of fingers on one hand.

The main library in the city had been an excellent source of legal information. With Verdis helping her, several books caught her attention, but she couldn’t check them out because her place of residence lay to the north, too far to the north. She told the librarian she would return the books within a few days, but the human told her it was policy not to lend out books unless the borrower lived in the city or the municipality. She had told the truth, but Sendrhea felt her appearance had something to do with the librarian’s decision.

She didn’t argue, didn’t have time to argue. The trial was less than three months away, and she had to prepare her defense.

She and Verdis spent as much time as they could, reading, turning pages, taking notes. One constant item that caught her attention was the lawyer, whose job was to represent his client. One of the police officers who had arrested her had mentioned a lawyer, but at that time it ran past her ears, and disappeared. Now she thought about it a little more, but the more she thought about it, the more she realized she couldn’t appoint a lawyer, or an attorney, to give him another designation. She had no legal representation when she attended her bail hearing, and she wasn’t about to change that when her trial came up in a few months.

When the soft feminine voice announced that the library would close in ten minutes, she and Verdis waited until the last possible moment, replaced the books on the shelves. She’d come back the next day, and the next, sometimes on her own, sometimes with Verdis, sometimes with her mate and Šhedrhen, reading, learning, digesting.

A trial wasn’t that complicated, was it?

The judge glowering from the bench sat up, chunky frame filling his chair with little room to spare. His thick mane of white hair hugged his head like a helmet. Daniel Kingsley adjusted the microphone in front of him, smiled at Farrow like an old friend, sweat caressing his forehead. He reached for a small towel, wiped his brow before settling his eyes on her. She worried that if the courtroom remained this warm it wouldn’t be long before she panted.

Six male humans, six female humans, sat in the jury box, awaiting Aaron Farrow’s opening statement. They ranged from two nervous-looking young men in their twenties, one nibbling his nails, the other probing his left ear, to several middle-aged women who might have been more confident at a quilting party. At least a few were paying attention, staring at her fox-like appearance, probably convincing themselves that she wasn’t what she appeared to be.

‘The Tereskàdians’ lay to her right. The thick book, written by the humanoid species called Alharhanians, aliens who lived on the third planet in their solar system, had been donated, along with numerous other items, to the humans to make them aware of the complexity of an alien species.

Lana Northwood, sitting at the front of the gallery, ready to testify, would never understand what this trial meant, but if it wiped that confident smirk from her face the young alien female was prepared to go through with it. On her home planet, Tereskàdhar (Tĕ’ rĕ skay’ dahr), and the planet Alharhan (Ah’ lah rahn), where she, her mate, and their cub had lived before traveling with about fourteen dozen family members and friends, the government decreed that Tereskàdians, because of their nature, could not be prosecuted for any crimes.

But she wasn’t on either planet orbiting the sun called Orovha (ŏ’ rŏ vah). On this planet called Earth they dismissed her protests that they couldn’t arrest her, couldn’t bring her to trial. Of course they could. She had assaulted, allegedly assaulted, a college student named Lana Northwood. A jury would decide her fate.

When he stood Aaron Farrow, neatly attired in a navy-blue suit, resembled a stick with arms and legs. If he had been prey, she wouldn’t have bothered with him. Not much meat on the bones.

Humans were never on the menu, but the thought stuck in her mind. Fharezhan reminded her to keep her mind on the trial.