by Presley Hall
If Jade were one of my men, back when I was a prince with men to command, she’d have been soundly punished for doing something so foolish and dangerous. But Jade is my Irisa, not a soldier, and I don’t think I’d want to give that particular fight a try anyway.
There’s a good chance you might not win, I think with a rueful chuckle under my breath. I’ve never seen any woman fight as fiercely as Jade. It was both surprising… and strangely arousing, all at the same time.
A picture comes into my head as I manipulate the bones of her ankle—one of Jade and me sparring outside my house in the woods, practicing to keep us both in fighting shape. In the fantasy, she’s accepted that she’s my Irisa, and there’s a playful light in her eyes as she parries my blows and strikes some of her own, her lightly sweating body coming into contact with mine as I wrestle her down onto the ground… but only for a moment before she manages to throw me over onto my back, straddling me as she sinks down onto…
My cock lurches painfully, and I tear myself out of the daydream as I hear Jade clear her throat lightly. I can feel her gaze on me, and I look up to see her looking down at me with a furrowed brow and concern in her eyes.
“Is there a way out of this cave?” she asks simply.
“I’m not sure,” I tell her.
It’s the truth. And that’s at least half the reason I’m angry, not just at her, but at myself as well. Because even if there isn’t a way out of this cave, even if I’m going to die down here because of some stupid deshing quicksand after everything else I’ve survived, I’d still do it all over again. There’s no scenario I can see in which I wouldn’t have gone after my Irisa, no matter how reckless she was being, no matter the consequences.
No scenario where I wouldn’t have gone after Jade.
She’s quiet for a long moment, and then she says in a soft voice, “I’m sorry.”
I glance up sharply, surprised. I wasn’t expecting her to apologize. I haven’t known her long, but it’s been clear from the moment she woke up in my healing pod that she’s both extraordinarily stubborn and extraordinarily strong-willed—traits I can appreciate, as I have them both in great supply as well. I just never realized how deshing infuriating they can be to deal with.
It gives me a new appreciation for everyone who’s ever cared for me in the course of my life.
I didn’t expect an apology. I expected her to be cursing me for following her, or fighting me off again, or trying to break down the cave walls in an effort to escape. This muted response is startling.
“I’m sorry,” she repeats. “I know I got us into this mess. I shouldn’t have run off like that. I feel awful.”
I don’t say anything, only let go of her ankle and lean back on my heels. Her ankle isn’t broken, just a little twisted. Maybe a slight sprain, but there’s no swelling and everything feels as if it’s where it should be.
“On earth… this sort of thing doesn’t just happen,” she continues, as if trying to explain. I’m not entirely sure what she means, but I don’t say anything. I just let her speak at her own pace.
“The mate bond,” she clarifies. “This… Irisa thing that you mentioned. If all of that is truly real, it’s foreign to me. That’s not how we do things. It just… it scared me, Brele.”
She whispers the last words, and the sound of my name on her lips sends a shock of emotion through me.
She leans back a little, her eyes sad and tired. “When you found me… that alien that was dead in the ship? He and his men abducted me from Earth. I walked into a building back home, and there was a light that came down from the ceiling. It knocked me out somehow, and when I woke up, I could hardly move and was being dragged by two awful-looking creatures. They gave me to another man, someone in charge called Alkul. They said I…” She swallows hard, looking disgusted. “They said I was going to be his bride. He was going to… do some kind of mating ceremony with me, after the battle.” She laughs, a short, tight sound as she looks at me. “So maybe you can see why your saying something about ‘mate bonds’ kind of freaked me out.”
For a moment, all I can feel is white-hot fury burning through my veins. It floods through me, and suddenly I’m the one who wants to claw through the cave walls until we can get out. I want to break apart every stone between us and the outside world just so I can get my hands on every last filthy Orkun until they’re all drowning in their own blood.
“I’m not surprised that the Orkun are abducting women,” I say tightly, my anger bleeding through into my tone no matter how hard I try to restrain it. “They have no care for anyone other than themselves.”
Jade watches me carefully, her gaze flicking over my face as she takes in my mood, noticing the reaction her story has aroused in me.
“They’re greedy, disgusting, and brutal,” I continue, my voice rising with every word as I stand up suddenly, hands in fists at my sides as anger courses through me.
Every moment I’ve spent around the Orkun, every terrible thing they’ve done, everything they’ve taken from me—all of the anger and pain and useless, impotent rage that I’ve kept bottled up these past fifteen years is leaking out, suffusing my voice and movements.
And then I bring myself to a halt, trying to master it so that I can tell Jade the most important thing, what I need her to understand above all else.
“I would never take a woman by force,” I tell her, meeting her gaze.
She says nothing, only studies me with those bright green eyes, listening to what I have to say. Truly listening, I realize, and it strikes me that this is my chance to make her understand what this really is… what it means.
“Never,” I repeat. “Especially not my Irisa. That bond… Jade, it’s something sacred and special to us. And if it’s taken by force, it’s meaningless. For the bond to be completed—for a mate to be truly claimed, the bond must be entered into willingly by both. It doesn’t matter how much I might want it if…”
I swallow hard, the next words almost impossible to speak.
But I have to say them.
“…if you don’t,” I finish, my voice quiet now, the rage gone.
Her brows pull together, a small line appearing between them. I want to reach out and smooth it away, to erase all of her fears and worries. I know that such a thing is impossible, but I hope I can at least ease them a little.
“Fate has decided that we’re perfect for each other,” I tell her quietly. “The bond has chosen you for me, and me for you.”
I take a step closer to her and kneel in front of her again, my hands resting on my raised knee as I look into her eyes, enough space between us that she won’t feel threatened or coerced.
“I already know this, deep in my soul. And I promise, if you give me a chance, I will prove it to you too.”
16
Jade
I blink down at Brele. He’s on one knee in front of me, as if he’s proposing marriage. I suppose, in some outlandish, never-before-heard-of way, he is.
His words resonate with me—I can’t help it. No man has ever tried to prove anything to me before. They’ve certainly never vowed anything like what Brele just said to me. Words that sound almost archaic to my ears, but are full of a bone-deep sincerity that I can tell he truly feels.
In my experience, the things men say are usually empty lies, meant to get you into bed and then string you along until they’re tired of you. My strategy has always been to assume they’re lying, and to keep my walls up so that their lies can’t hurt me. Over the years, there have been a few I almost started to believe—men who made promises that they were different, not like the others. But in the end, they always proved themselves to be liars too. Assholes who put themselves first, who would say anything to get what they wanted until it wasn’t what they wanted anymore.
So why do I feel like Brele is sincere? Like he’s telling the truth?
I don’t entirely know what I should do. The one thing I do know is that I feel like one hell of an asshole for getting us trapped do
wn here. I’ve never been the type to run away from my problems or from the things that scare me. I fight back, always. But this time I ran… and now it’s gotten not just me but Brele into an incredibly dangerous situation.
I don’t have the slightest idea what to do about this Irisa thing, this mate bond that Brele has described to me and vowed to prove is real. It feels impossible to believe, so far removed from anything I’ve ever known. Maybe I just haven’t had good examples in my life, but I’ve never seen any married couples or even long-term ones who didn’t seem to dislike each other after a few years.
And yet Brele, who for all other intents and purposes seems to be a rational, intelligent man, believes in something that’s basically love at first sight… and a love that lasts.
But the idea that some cosmic force has chosen us for each other is ridiculous. Isn’t it?
The truth is, I can’t explain the way I feel around him. It’s so different from anything I’ve ever felt before—too intense and powerful to chalk up to mere sexual attraction or a natural reaction to an incredibly hot man. I’ve never wanted anything the way I want him, and it feels deeper than just lust, as if it couldn’t be sated by one night together, or even a few. It feels deeper than that.
Either way, even if he is crazy, do you want to be responsible for him dying down here?
The answer to that is a resounding no. That much, I’m certain of. I don’t want him to die because of me, whether this belief of his is insane or not—or even if he made it up just to get me into bed. And I don’t want to die down here either.
If one of us is getting out, both of us are. I have no idea how we’re going to manage it, but as I gaze down at him, I resolve to help him try.
Everything else can be figured out after we get out of this godforsaken cave.
Brele seems to be in complete agreement with me that the most important thing at the moment is to figure out if there’s any path out of here. There are several small tunnels in the walls of the cave, and the cave itself is massive, big enough that we spend what feel like hours exploring it and trying to figure out if there are any passages that would lead us up and back outside.
The silence in the cave makes my skin crawl, and the last thing I want is to sink into my own thoughts, where my confusion about Brele and this supposed mate bond is currently living. So instead, when he casually mentions that he’s rarely seen a woman fight as well as I do, I jump at the chance to change the topic.
“It’s a sport, back on Earth,” I tell him. “There are different divisions for men and women. I was unbeaten in my category so far,” I add with a hint of pride. “Do you have sports here?”
I glance over at him curiously. My eyes have adjusted enough to the dim light of the cave to see his face pretty well.
“We fight for sport too,” he says with a smile. “And there are some sports children take part in.” He hesitates, and I notice a faint shadow pass over his face for a second, although he quickly shakes it off. “But fights in the contest ring are the primary form of sport for adult Kalixians.”
“The only sport? Huh. We have a lot of them.” I wrinkle my nose. “But fighting is the only one I really enjoy, either as a participant or a spectator.”
“So that’s why you learned to fight, then?” He shoots me a curious glance as we turn around, giving up on one dead-end tunnel and heading to try another. “In order to compete?”
I hesitate. I rarely tell anyone about my past. In recent memory, it’s only been Emma that I’ve confided in. But something about Brele makes me want to tell him. Part of me wonders if he might give up on this whole idea of us being mates if he knew how much baggage I come with.
And after all, I tell myself, if he’s so convinced you’re perfect for each other, how can he really know that unless he knows everything about you?
“I had… a difficult childhood,” I say slowly as we emerge back into the cave and go right, heading into a new tunnel. This one is a little more narrow than the last, and I talk a bit faster, wanting to take my mind off the close quarters. I’m not exactly claustrophobic, but being underground beneath several tons of rock in a small space isn’t my favorite way to pass an evening either.
Brele says nothing, just looks at me with an open, curious gaze. It makes me relax a little and want to tell him more.
“My father didn’t want a girl.” I shrug. “He wanted a boy, someone who would grow up to be tough and do the things he didn’t get to, I guess. He wanted to live vicariously through someone else. I don’t remember a lot about my mother—she left when I was really young. But I do remember that he was never kind to her, and he never had much good to say about women in general. My teachers, other women in the neighborhood, even ladies we’d see at the grocery store—he always had something negative to say. And when it came to me…”
I take a deep breath, chewing on my lower lip as I look down the tunnel intently.
“It didn’t matter how smart I was, how good my grades were, how much I loved science and space and learning to make things with my hands. I wanted to be a scientist or an engineer, but those weren’t ‘jobs that women do.’ I got into tons of fights at school, and he’d always punish me for it, but it wasn’t because of the fights themselves. It was because ‘girls shouldn’t be fighting.’” I shake my head in anger at the memory, making air quotes with my fingers. “If I’d been a boy, he would have said I was just defending myself. But since I was a girl, he was very insistent that I needed a man to protect me. He said I should always depend on the man in my life, and focus on serving and pleasing him, not trying to take care of things myself.”
Brele snorts. “That’s ridiculous,” he says flatly. “Of course a female should be able to protect herself, to defend herself and her own honor if necessary. And mates should strive to serve and please each other. That’s not only the responsibility of the female.”
I stare at Brele for a brief moment, slightly taken aback. I didn’t expect this alien warrior of a man to be quite so… progressive in his thinking.
“What?” He catches my look and lifts an eyebrow. “Did you think that I would agree with your father?”
“I just didn’t realize you were quite so modern,” I admit with a laugh. “To this day, there are still a lot of people on Earth who would agree with him.”
“Well, Terra has never been known as the most advanced culture in the galaxy,” Brele says with that slight smirk. “So you learned to fight to prove your father wrong? What does he think of it now?”
I hesitate, just long enough for him to pick up on what I haven’t said. His eyes fix on mine for a brief second, and then he nods with understanding.
“Ah,” he says softly. “I see. You learned to fight to protect yourself from your father. And you haven’t spoken with him in a long time.”
“How did you know?” I ask, stopping and looking directly at him.
He shrugs. “Something about the look on your face.”
For a moment, I don’t know what to say. No one has ever seen me so clearly, or understood me so well with my having to say so little. I fight back the urge to close the space between us, to go into his arms and kiss him—to give in to the things that he says are real between us.
I’m still too afraid that it isn’t real, that it’s all a fantasy. And what I’m afraid of, I fight against.
“I like that you’re a fighter.” Brele’s eyes gleam in the shadowy light. “The women of Kalix were very strong too, like you. Most of them were just as fierce as the men, brave and often every bit as stubborn. Much like you in that respect as well,” he adds with a grin.
He’s speaking of them in the past tense.
His phrasing doesn’t escape my notice, and I narrow my eyes at him, suddenly suspicious that there’s something off about this story.
“What do you mean, they were? Aren’t there women on this planet anymore?”
The shadow crosses his face again, and he looks away from me, his features falling as his body rippl
es with tension. Maybe it’s the bond he claims exists between us, but I swear I can almost feel the weight of his pain. It practically seems to emanate from him, as if his body can’t contain it all.
“No longer,” he finally says in a quiet voice. “The women of this planet all died a long time ago. All but a small number of elders.”
“What?” I blink, then stare at him in shock. “They’re all dead? But… why?”
“The Orkun.”
He speaks calmly, but there’s a world of emotion behind those two words. Shifting his gaze away from mine, he strides ahead of me, his jaw set as if he doesn’t wish to talk about it any longer.
I told you about my past, I think with a hint of annoyance, but after all, I remind myself, he didn’t ask me to. I volunteered the information, and it’s clear that Brele isn’t ready to tell me about that particular event in Kalixian history. So I try something else instead.
“Is all of Kalix as wild as this part?” I ask, lengthening my stride to catch up with him. “Or are there larger cities?”
“Most civilized parts of Kalix are smaller villages and towns.” He glances back at me, seemingly grateful for the change in subject. “But we do have one large metropolitan city called Jocia. It’s the capital of Kalix, and the palace is located there. All of the highest-ranking members of Kalix’s society and our military force reside there.”
“So how did you come to be living out in the middle of nowhere like this?” I ask, curiosity burning inside me. “It’s so dangerous out here. Do you just like being away from everyone?”
His lips tighten again. “What about you?” He shifts the conversation back to me, avoiding the question. “Do you have cities on Terra?”
I laugh. The sound echoes around the tunnel as we reach another dead-end, and the two of us turn around to head back and try yet another.
