Night Quest

by Susan Krinard

  Garret followed her gaze. “That’s what Daniel is trying to save,” he said. “He’s doing what my former colony failed to accomplish—protecting children like these, providing the only kind of settlement where civilized Opir and humans can live in peace without the constant fear of attack.”

  He took her hand again and led her to the couple with the infant. The female Opir glanced up with a smile of such open welcome that Artemis was astonished all over again.

  “You must be Garret,” she said, “and Aresia.”

  “Welcome,” the human father said, standing to greet them. “I’m Johan, and this is my wife, Deineira.”

  “And this,” Deineira said, lifting her squirming baby, “is Sophia Johanna.”

  “Quite a mouthful,” Johan said with a grin. He offered his hand to Artemis. She took it gingerly. A flush of heat raced up her arm, carrying the human’s emotions into her mind: pride, contentment...and love, powerful enough to breach her empathic barriers.

  While she was recovering from the intensity of Johan’s feelings, Deineira abruptly pushed Sophia Johanna into Artemis’s arms. Artemis had no choice but to hold the squirming, blanket-wrapped bundle, cradling the round head and swaddled bottom against her chest.

  She looked down into the chubby, wide-eyed face, and the memories she had fought so hard to contain came rushing back. Holding her own infant in her arms, only days before the first Opir she had ever met had nearly killed her. The infant she had lost because Kronos had saved her life by converting her, forcing her to leave her human life behind. Her life, and everything she had loved.

  With the greatest of care, Artemis bent to return Sophia Johanna to Deineira’s arms. “Your daughter is beautiful,” she murmured.

  The Bloodlady beamed, no trace of Opir reserve in her eyes. “She is, isn’t she? She will grow up to walk in daylight, like her father.”

  Artemis’s vision blurred, though there was no physical reason for it. She looked for Garret, who was eating what humans called a “sandwich” and talking to Johan between ravenous bites. Artemis realized, with a twinge of guilt, that she hadn’t given enough thought to Garret’s physical needs. Now, at least, he had decent food and a real chance to rest.

  He couldn’t have known what seeing Deineira’s family and holding the infant would do to her. He’d asked her about children once, and she’d evaded his question, as she’d evaded so many others.

  Garret had wanted to make a point, and he had succeeded.

  “Lady Aresia,” Johan said, briefly touching her arm. “You are ill.”

  “No,” she said, overwhelmed by his genuine concern for her. “I’m only a little—”

  “Hungry,” Johan said. “I know the signs. You have not been feeding.”

  Artemis knew that she couldn’t lie to Johan. There was a quiet wisdom in him that defied any attempt to deceive him.

  “You need not tell me why you have not taken your husband’s blood,” he said. “It is none of my business. But let me help you. I have not made a donation in three days and will not suffer for it.”

  Startled, she stared into Johan’s eyes. “You would give me your blood?”

  He lifted a brow. “It cannot be so different in the colony you came from, surely?”

  “No,” she said quickly. “No, not at all.”

  “Then, please.” He gestured to three doors in the back of the hall.

  “But your wife...”

  “She suggested it.”

  Artemis felt faint. There was clearly nothing sexual in the invitation, and it was possible that taking blood from another human would solve the problem she had been facing since Coos Bay. If it did, she could honestly tell Garret that she was well and did not need his blood. There would be no need for dodging his questions again and again.

  She looked around for Garret. He was nowhere to be seen. What would he think if he knew what she had done? Would he consider it a betrayal?

  “Come, now,” Johan said. He nodded to Deineira, who smiled at Artemis, and started toward the back of the hall. Half in a daze, Artemis followed him into one of the small rooms, comfortably furnished with a couch and a pair of chairs.

  The entire procedure was almost clinical, and she felt not the slightest arousal or any sense of real intimacy, in body or mind. Johan’s mind seemed focused on pleasant thoughts that matched his mellow personality, and all Artemis felt was profound relief.

  When it was over and Johan was rolling down his sleeve, she thanked him and hesitated at the door.

  “I envy you and Deineira,” she said softly.

  “Our Sophia?” he asked. “I have no doubt that you will have a child of your own when the time is right for you.”

  Unable to bear his sympathy, Artemis fled the room. She still saw no sign of Garret. She returned to the cabin and lay on the cot with her arm over her eyes. The door opened, and Garret’s boots crossed the floor. Wood scraped on wood as he drew the desk chair close to the bed and sat down.

  “What is it, Artemis?” he asked. “If I’d known seeing the children would upset you so much...”

  “I’m not upset,” she said.

  “Sometimes you’re very good at hiding your feelings,” he said, “but this isn’t one of those times.”

  “I know why you took me to see them,” she said. “You wanted me to understand what it was like with you and Roxana. And Timon.”

  She felt the movement of air as he reached toward her and then dropped his hand before he made contact. A profound ache filled her body.

  “It was like that, for a while,” he said. “But not at the beginning. It wasn’t until we escaped Erebus that we could live as equals and try to give Timon a good life.”

  Artemis swallowed. “What happened to Roxana, Garret?” she asked.

  “She died fighting rogue Freebloods, defending our colony. Timon never got a chance to know his mother.”

  Remembering how she had berated Garret for not telling her about Roxana in the beginning, Artemis felt a terrible remorse. She swung her legs over the side of the cot and brushed his hand with her fingertips. Emotion overwhelmed her, and sensory images flooded her mind: two kindred spirits bound together, bright lights in a great darkness, gathering other lights to themselves, projecting warmth and hope and joy.

  And then the sundering, the unbearable loss, one of the bright lights extinguished in pain and fear. And the other soul...crippling bereavement that altered everything—more devastating than slavery or any other ordeal, save one: the disappearance of the child he and his mate had created.

  Shuddering violently, Artemis fell back on the cot. “I see why you would despise us, those of my rank. I, too, would hate.”

  Garret knelt beside the cot. “I blame myself for what happened to Roxana and Timon,” he said. “When we founded Avalon, we were too idealistic, too invested in the philosophy of peace to take the necessary precautions. We accepted nearly everyone who came to us from the Citadel and Enclave, human or Nightsider. That was a mistake.” He laced his hands together, gripping with such force that his fingers turned red and his knuckles white. “Some of the bad ones, the humans, were only troublemakers, antisocial. But others, especially the Freebloods, assumed that they could simply take what they wanted without giving what was required of them in return. Still, we believed they could be taught to discard their old ways. Roxana was the biggest idealist of all of us, and she had the courage to stand by her convictions. She had faith. But she was wrong.”

  Barely able to endure the bitterness of his grief, Artemis covered his rigid hands with hers. “The Freebloods betrayed you,” she said.

  “They betrayed all of us. They opened the gates to rogues. We killed nearly all of them. But even afterward, the council didn’t do enough to make certain it never happened again. When the raiders broke through to steal Timon, they
got away with it because too many of the colonists wouldn’t compromise their principles.” He laughed hoarsely. “I should have taken Timon away from that place long ago, before...”

  “But you still want what they did,” she said, “or you would not have protected me from the militia in the south, or taken me to see Deineira and Johan tonight.”

  “I believe in a philosophy that doesn’t destroy itself,” he said, his jaw so tight that the words seemed barely able to escape.

  Daniel’s philosophy, she thought. No wonder Garret admired this colony for protecting its citizens as his old one had not.

  How could she blame Garret for doubting Pericles...or for expecting her to abandon him after he’d saved her from the militiamen?

  Slowly and carefully, she withdrew her hands. “Perhaps you would like to be by yourself now,” she said. “I can—”

  “No,” he said. “I wanted to tell you all this because there’s no more need for secrets between us. It’s all in the past.”

  But it is not, she thought. The distress was still there, raw and throbbing. She could give him comfort with words, but beyond that...

  She was afraid of where such comforting might lead. Afraid to let down her guard, lower the gate, cross the moat she had dug around herself. Now that there was so much more between them than the empathy and their mutual desire...

  But she was well fed now. There was no danger that she would slip. If she didn’t reinforce the bond again, surely it would continue to fade.

  Stripping her mind of all thought beyond the moment, she put her arms around his shoulders. He stiffened, sighed and buried his face against the curve of her neck. His anguish flowed into her like blood, and her body seemed to absorb it, striving to heal the wound that refused to close. Garret held her as if he believed she was the key to his mortal salvation, and she pulled him down onto the cot, the wish to heal and the need to feel flesh against flesh blending to become one overwhelming compulsion.

  “Are you sure, Artemis?” he murmured. “You don’t have to do this, just because I—”

  In answer, she kissed him. After a moment he yielded, slipping his tongue inside her mouth. She took it gladly, hungrily. He eased himself over her, resting his weight on his hands, grazing her breast with his chest. Even that slight contact brought her nipples to aching peaks. Everything they had done in the woods returned to her in a burst of light and lust.

  His lips left hers, brushing her cheeks and teasing the lobe of her ear. He suckled ever so gently, tugging, awakening a sympathetic response in her nipples.

  “Garret,” she whispered.

  He withdrew. His face was flushed, his eyes unfocused.

  “Touch me,” she said. “Touch me.”

  He rolled onto his side, watching her face as he rested his palm just above her breasts. Her heart felt as if it would leap right into his hand. He teased loose the uppermost button of her sturdy, shapeless shirt and parted the plackets. His fingers slid into the gap and traced tiny circles, sending wild shivers along the length of her spine. Garret was not so hesitant after that. He undid one button and then another, discovering that she wore no bra. He grazed one nipple with his fingertip. She arched and gasped. He lifted her and slipped the shirt back over her shoulders. Then he eased her back down and began to stroke her breasts, the calluses on his fingertips only heightening the erotic sensation. She bit her lip and closed her eyes.

  “Am I too rough?” he asked.

  She took his wrist and pressed his palm over her right breast. He bent over her and flicked his tongue over the peak of her nipple. Pleasure radiated outward to every point of her body, and a rush of heat blossomed between her thighs. She tilted her head back, breathing deeply as he drew her nipple into his mouth and suckled more vigorously, moving from one breast to the other until both were thoroughly tender and the smallest touch set her gasping. She was so lost in sensation that she moved more by instinct than thought when he reached down and unzipped her pants. He slipped them down over her hips, leaving her underpants the only physical barrier between him and her naked flesh.

  Her emotional barriers, too, were giving way. His sorrow was beginning to ease. Giving herself, letting him give, was a balm to his grief. And to her own.

  Thought gave way to pure sensation as his fingers slipped inside her underpants and found the slick wetness beneath. She moaned, and he stroked the swollen lips at her entrance, running his fingers up and down the cleft without probing deeper. It was the sweetest torment, unbearable excitement.

  Her pleasure heightened his and echoed back to her. She whimpered as his thumb slid over the nub that could bring so much ecstasy. He pinched and released, stroked and withdrew. Artemis began to shudder.

  It was coming too soon. She didn’t want it, not this way, not with him still outside her. Even when he found her entrance and slid his finger into it, she kept enough of her sense to remember how much she needed to know that he had become a part of her.

  “You’re tight,” he said. “So tight.”

  “Garret, I... I want...”

  He kissed her lips and forehead, and began the caresses all over again. Then he was removing the last of her clothing, and his warm breath was where his fingers had been. His mouth pressed against her, and then his tongue glided over the same moist, plump flesh his fingers had explored. She couldn’t stop the cries of pleasure as he flicked his tongue up and down, licking up the wetness with relish, thrusting his tongue inside until she could think only of feeling his hardness filling her to the brim.

  She didn’t have to find the words. His desire and tenderness filled her mind. When he paused, it was only to remove his clothing and lie naked beside her.

  Almost shyly, she reached down to touch him. He inhaled sharply, raised himself onto his arms and crouched over her, his hips above the cradle of her spread thighs.

  Let go.

  She let him feel everything she had withheld from him since their last sexual encounter. His eyes widened, a look of wonder crossing his face. His aura awakened, shimmering over his head and shoulders. With infinite care he eased down, the head of his cock, hot and full, just grazing her. When he entered, it was like a homecoming, a fulfillment of dreams she had never held long enough to discard.

  The rhythm was gentle at first, testing her readiness. He leaned down to kiss the corner of her mouth. “Artemis...”

  Then he said no more. He tilted back his head and moved more quickly, gliding in and out more forcefully but never so strongly as to cause her anything but the utmost pleasure. She found herself moving with him, arching into his thrusts, joining a dance whose steps she had almost forgotten. Their emotions intertwined, strengthened each other, built toward a pinnacle of joy just as before. The ecstatic tension expanded as Garret’s motions grew more urgent.

  Artemis knew it was nearly over, and she didn’t want it to be. She tried to hold him inside. He paused, breathing fast, and then thrust again, shuddering as he reached his completion. She experienced it as if it were her own. Her hips lifted, and she cried out, waves of indescribable sensation pulsing outward from her core.

  Garret withdrew and rolled onto his side, one arm draped possessively over her waist.

  “My God,” he breathed. “What’s happening to us?”

  Chapter 14

  It wouldn’t be so difficult to tell him now, Artemis thought, gradually settling back into her own body. She ached, inside and out, but the joy was there, pushing the pain and sorrow out of her mind—and his.

  But she couldn’t spoil this moment with explanations that might make him consider the implications of what she—they—had done. If she told him of her empathic abilities and the new bond between them, this peace would come to an end. Even if he accepted, there would be questions. Too many questions.

  So she remained silent. His arm lay heavy on her ribs,
and his breathing slowed into the cadence of sleep. She turned her head to look at his face. So peaceful now, the harsh lines of experience and adversity softened with contentment. He didn’t hear her as she collected her clothes, put them on and left the cabin.

  She was fortunate. There were still Opiri and a few humans about, but they only glanced at her and went about their business.

  After a brief search, she found Pericles in a small building similar to the one in which she had been imprisoned. If there had been a guard, he had abandoned his post. No one saw her break the lock and enter.

  “Artemis?” Pericles said from behind the cell door.

  “Yes,” she said. “Are you well?”

  “They haven’t hurt me.” The door creaked as he leaned against it. “They questioned me. They believe I’ve been involved in stealing other children.”

  “Have you?”

  “No! They have me confused with someone else.”

  She laid her palms flat on the wood as if she could draw his innermost thoughts through the door and feel the truth of his words.

  “We tried to make the commander understand how you saved Beth and helped us take care of her,” she said.

  “It didn’t do any good, did it?”

  He sounded so small and sad that Artemis was racked by a fresh pang of guilt. “Many of the colonists have spoken against you,” she said.

  “I’m not who they think I am,” he said, his voice rising. “Why would I have come anywhere near this place if I thought they would accuse me?” He gulped in a breath. “Artemis, tell them that if they let me go, I can help them. I can make myself useful to some other pack and try to learn more about why they want the children. If I can get to this place in the north, maybe I can report back to you before you arrive.”