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WOULD THEY DESTROY EARTH IN ORDER TO SAVE IT

Conquered by the Jao twenty years ago, the Earth is shackled under alien tyranny--and threatened by the even more dangerous Ekhat, who are sending a genocidal extermination fleet to the solar system. Humanity's only chance rests with an unusual pair of allies: a young Jao prince, newly arrived to Terra to assume his duties, and a young human woman brought up amongst the Jao occupiers.

But both are under pressure from the opposing forces--a cruel Jao viceroy on one side, determined to drown all opposition in blood; a reckless human resistance on the other, perfectly prepared to shed it. Added to the mix is the fact that only by adopting some portions of human technology and using human sepoy troops can the haughty Jao hope to defeat the oncoming Ekhat attack--and then only by fighting the battle within the Sun itself.

Sequel to The Course of Empire

When humans and their Jao overlords joined forces in a desperate battle to save the Earth from the malevolent race called the Ekhat, the relationship between the two species was changed forever. Two years later, humans and Jao are learning to work together in an uneasy alliance. Then, in a distant nebula, three Jao ships detect signs of another sentient species during a battle with the Ekhat. Only one of the ships returns, with most of its crew dead or injured.

Earth's Preceptor Ronz suspects the unknown species was actually the Lleix, a name out of the Jao's past, and an ancient shame from the period in their development when they themselves were still ruled by the maniacal Ekhat.

Ronz sends the Lexington, a massive ship built on Earth and crewed by both human and Jao, to investigate. The Lexington dwarfs any ship ever built by the Jao and even outmasses Ekhat ships, which may enable it to survive the attack that destroyed two of the three Jao ships. But if the expedition does find a surviving remnant of the Lleix, will the survivors trust the Jao? And should they?