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Part I

Prologue

The Krinar walked down the street in Moscow, quietly observing the tee human masses all around him As he passed, he could see the fear and curiosity on their faces, feel the hatred e from some of the passersby

Russia was one of the countries that had resisted the most – and where the toll of the Great Panic had been the heaviest With a largely corrupt government and a population distrustful of all authority, many Russians had taken the Krinar invasion as an excuse to loot at will and hoard whatever supplies they could Even now, more than five years later, some of the storefronts in Moscoere still bare, their taped-over s a testament to the tumultuous months that had followed their arrival

Thankfully, the air in the city was better now, less polluted than the Krinar re hung over the city, irritating him to no end Not that it could hurt hi air that didn’t contain too many hydrocarbon particles

Approaching the Kremlin, the K pulled the hood of his jacket up over his head and tried to look as hu careful attention to his raceful He didn’t delude hi him at this very moment, but no one in the Centers had any reason to suspect him He’d made it a point in recent years to travel asin major human cities for one reason or another This way, if anyone cared to profile his behavior, his latest expeditions would not cause any alarm

Not that anyone would bother profiling him As far as everyone was concerned, those Krinar who’d helped the Resistance – the Keiths, as they’d been called – were safely in custody, and poor Saur had been bla their memories It couldn’t have worked out better if the K had planned it that way himself

No, he didn’t need to conceal his identity frooal was to fool the human cameras stationed all around the Kremlin walls – just in case the Russian leaders became alarmed before he had a chance to visit the other major cities

S more than a human tourist as he did a leisurely lap around Red Square, the soles of his shoes grinding into the pave tiny capsules that contained the seeds of a new era in human history

Once he was done, he headed back to the ship he’d left in one of the nearby alleys

Toain

Saret could hardly wait

Chapter 1

“Oh my God, Korum, when did you have a chance to do this?”

Mia stared at her surroundings in shock All the faone, and Koruun to think of as her ho now, co planks and clutter-free spaces The only thing that re – a Krinar feature that Koru

Her lover grinned, showing the faht’ve snuck away for an hour or so while you were sleeping”

“You went all the way fros?”

He laughed, shaking his head “No, my sweet, even I’m not that dedicated I had to take care of a couple of business matters, and I decided to surprise you”

“Well, colorin a circle and studying the strange sight that had greeted her upon their arrival back in Lenkarda

Instead of the ivory couch, there was now a long white board floating a couple of feet off the floor From what Korum had explained to her once, the Krinar were able toa derivation of the say that protected their colonies Mia knew that if she sat down on the board, it would i as co planks were visible near the walls, with a couple of theht pink flowers

The floor was also different – and unlike anything Mia had seen in any other Krinar houses She tried to remember what those other floors had been like, but all she could recall was that they were hard and pale, like some type of stone She hadn’t paid theone would find in a huht now had a very unusual texture and an ale-like consistency Iton air