by Vi Voxley
Isolde moaned, feeling a warmth spill inside her, both of them remaining twisted around each other for a long minute, coming down from the euphoric height they’d just reached. Lying there, complete and sated, before untangling themselves from the mess of limbs they were.
“That was amazing,” Isolde said then, breathing heavily. “Wanna do it again?”
Her now very real alien husband laughed though his heaving breaths, but his eyes were alight with passion. He rolled over on top of her, smirking. “Oh yes,” he said, making Isolde shiver and smile in return. “Whoever said you needed to consummate the binding only once?”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
Isolde
They had thoroughly exhausted themselves, as she’d wanted. Isolde had to admit that even though her body presented her with some really conflicting arguments of wanting to get some rest and to never, ever get out of Diego’s bed, she was quite happy.
She was eating breakfast, a bit of a girls party. On Terra, she would have joked and called it an engagement party, bachelorette party and wedding all rolled into one. Other than Eleya, no one knew that the binding had only happened the night before, but that didn’t matter. Very few things seemed to on that day.
They were still in the palace. Aneya and Eleya had come to join her in celebrating Diego’s victory in the arena. Aneya was serving them drinks and even Deliya had agreed that it was a special occasion where it was okay to cut loose a bit.
“It seems everything is going as we hoped,” Aneya was saying. Isolde thought that now that she was truly Diego’s gesha, it was better to start making friends with the ones he held close, although she would have gladly lived without Aneya. Deliya had been right. That woman did not like her, but so far she hadn’t said anything particularly mean either, so Isolde let her be for the time being.
She didn’t have time to make friends with the whole intergalactic danger hanging over their heads, especially with someone she doubted wanted to be her friend in the first place, but any friendly or familiar face was good. And for Diego’s sake, she would try, later.
“My family reports that several generals who sided with Eren before are now reconsidering. Two already changed their minds, although if rumor has it, they sent emissaries to tell that to Faren and Diego.”
Isolde shared in the laugh. Listening to Diego’s victories on the arena and out of it made her glad. He was hers now, she felt entitled to be proud.
Eleya nodded, agreeing. “I hear the same here. Senators come to me, suddenly very doubting and unsure. Telling me how Eren misled them. Vipers, the lot of them. I cannot stand them. Even the ones who stubbornly still stand by Eren’s side are better, at least they do not change their minds every time the wind turns.” She shrugged then. “All the better for us. Faren informs me that the Elders appear to be ready to emerge soon. Once they set this right, Diego and Faren can march up to Eren and kill that bastard traitor as he deserves.”
“And you can be off to Rhea,” Deliya said, turning to Isolde.
“Yes, I suppose,” Isolde said, lifting her cup, refusing to think of the lies she was about to tell to the galaxy. “A toast! To Diego and to putting this ugly mess behind us soon.”
They all drank to that. Relief filled the room, but Isolde sensed it was a bit expectant. Narath still guarded the room, allowing a break for Deliya and both Eleya and Aneya had brought their guards as well. It wasn’t over yet.
“So how does it feel?” Aneya asked, bringing Isolde back from her musings – mostly of Diego and their bed.
“How does what feel?” she asked, confused as she’d missed a part of the conversation.
“Being Diego’s gesha,” Aneya said.
Deliya and Eleya both glared, but she didn’t pay them any mind. Isolde was floating on a happy cloud and couldn’t be brought down.
“It’s amazing,” she said. That made the other two smile and Aneya frown, but Isolde didn’t care. Jealous exes and all that petty stuff was music for another day if she had any say in that.
Aneya surely seemed to think so, because she simply got up and left, with a stomping that told Isolde that if Briolina had had doors to slam, she definitely would have. Well, there was certainly one person who would be glad when she left for Rhea.
“Do not mind her,” Deliya said. “Diego always thought she would get over her disappointment, but I do not think she ever will. Something really messed her up when it was clear she was not going to be his.”
“I suppose some take their disappointments better than others,” Eleya remarked, and Isolde only narrowly caught herself from a conspiratory giggle. She was growing really fond of Eleya. Now that she had passed the point of no return, Isolde felt glad she had at least two people she could call friends.
When Deliya returned to her post, Eleya was finally free to talk.
“Without Aneya’s spite behind it, how is it really?” she asked.
Isolde smiled, enjoying her alcoholish drink, thinking she should really find out what it was actually called. “It really is amazing,” she said. “Like finally being complete.”
She realized what she’d just said and hastened to apologize, but Eleya didn’t seem upset.
“Relax,” the senator said. “I do not hate others because they get to be happy when I did not. Fate deals us the hand it thinks is right.”
“Do you…” Isolde began. “Do you hope that when they kill Eren, you will be matched again?”
Eleya shrugged. “Of course. But I do not make any illusions about that happening. All I want is to be free.”
Isolde had no words to respond to that. Her cloud drifted slightly lower out of compassion, wanting a happy ending for Eleya.
“Is Faren bound?” she asked, then.
Eleya snorted. “No. But very nice of you to remember me pouring out my foolish childhood dreams. You suggest that to him.”
Isolde laughed so hard she coughed. “I don’t even dare to look at him,” she said through the coughing fit. “I swear he sees through my soul. The first time I saw him –”
Eleya laughed too, until her face turned serious. Isolde kept coughing. Stupid of her to catch a cold now, wasn’t she in the middle of her honeymoon or something… she put a hand in front of her mouth and then drew it back, startled, when she saw red.
Eleya jumped to her feet as Isolde slid down from her couch, all strength gone from her limbs. The coughing subsided slowly, but her vision swam and she thought she felt blood trickle down the corners of her mouth.
“Deliya!” Eleya screamed. “Send for Urenya, now!”
The senator caught her before Isolde’s head could hit the floor. The weird thought going through her head was that it was some bloody heavy cold she’d caught. A nasty Brion flu?
The last thing she saw was Eleya holding her, the senator’s features twisted with fury. Isolde heard Eleya snarling, “That fucking bitch…” before it all went black.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Diego
“It seems too easy,” Atren was saying.
Diego had to agree. With the Elders almost ready to emerge from their meditation and some of his generals abandoning him, not to mention Crane dead at Diego’s hand, Eren seemed to take it all rather well.
“Eleya reported that she believed he actually thinks he will be confirmed to have done everything according to the Elders’ wishes,” Atren went on. “Even so, I find it hard to believe he does not have a trick up his sleeve somewhere.”
“Me neither,” Diego said, pensive. “What is the situation on the space station? Is Sphere buying it?”
Atren shrugged. “The GU ambassadors seem to think it was all just posturing. You returning home, showing off your gesha and challenging the upstart. I am sure they are not all fooled, but with no proof of what else it might be, they seem to be playing along.”
That worked quite well for them. The Brions had used their vicious, bloodthirsty, even uncultured image for a long time to hide some serious issues. Like Rhea. Now they wer
e on the brink of it all being thrown into their faces. Which brought him to their main concern.
“The blockage,” he said simply.
“In place,” Faren replied. “Unclear whether it would actually stop Eren from getting a message out.”
“Better than nothing,” Diego said. It wasn’t as if blocking communications channels was easy in the first place, and as Faren had pointed out, with enough skill you could always find a way. They just had to hope that they’d get to Eren first before he found a way to bypass the blockage and expose Rhea’s secret to the galaxy. Should they be proved correct by the Elders.
“When this is done, we should conduct an investigation into those who sided with Eren,” Diego went on. “I am sure Eleya will be more than thrilled to carry that out. Find out who was truly fooled by him and who really agreed. If they were threatened, or lied to, or not.”
The others nodded. Diego was pleased. It was good to have allies he could count on to agree with him about important matters.
“Will you accompany your gesha to Rhea after that?” Atren asked.
Oh, he’d have loved to. The binding had been transcendent for Diego. He had always thought it would be a moment in time when he’d actually feel the bond be made whole, but it wasn’t. The moment lasted, the feeling of being made whole, the peace it brought.
No, he didn’t want to part with Isolde. Wanted to bury himself into her soft body every night and feel their binding made complete over and over again. However…
“It would not be wise,” he said. “Rhea is a touchy subject right now. To see the Triumphant in its orbit would not send a very good signal. I will make sure Isolde has her guards with her as she goes. The sooner we wrap this whole thing up, the better. She can do her part on Rhea and we can deal with whoever remains after dealing with Eren.”
The screens around them showed Briolina slowly returning to normality after his fight with Crane. The Brions were pleased, Diego knew. Justice had been done. There should be no more and no less generals than fifteen. Crane had been one too many, and, well, he had been Crane. Diego’s match was already lauded as one of the most incredible wins in the arena. He knew young warriors would remember the day they saw him fight. He remembered some days like that from his own childhood.
Most of the screens showed the mighty unbreachable temple in which the Elders resided during their meditation. It had become known that they would emerge, and although the Brion people didn’t know why they were waking, it was still met with joy. Having the Elders speak and instruct them was the Brion way and everyone wished to hear them. The matter of Rhea would be settled in private, though, Diego knew. It was better if the Brions remained oblivious to it, just like the Galactic Union.
They watched as the Elders emerged from the temple to meet the cheering, overjoyed crowd. Not all of them, of course. Not all had the calling to ever emerge from the meditation they’d entered voluntarily once their time was up. Next to losing Isolde, it was the single thing Diego dreaded. The knowing, it was said, deep in your heart, that it was time to join the Elders in their temple. Only those who wished emerged, even if they had a collective duty to appear every once in a while.
A few Elders left, off to give lessons in healing centers or on the other side of Briolina. All according to who they’d been in the public part of their lives, the Elders returned to pass on their wisdom and listen in turn, to return to meditate upon the matters of the world later. Diego was certain that Faren at least felt the same dread of once becoming an Elder as he. But that was not an issue for long, long years, and with the lives they led, they could both be dead by that time.
A few Elders made for the senators’ palace. Diego, Faren and Atren kept watching the screens calmly, unconcerned. Either they were proved to have been right or they were going to be declared traitors and hunted down without mercy. It was out of their hands, which meant it was no use worrying over. Instead, they watched their brothers and sisters listen to every word the Elders were saying in the huge arena before the temple, paying attention themselves as was proper.
It wasn’t that long after the former senator Elders had entered their old palace when the door to Diego’s rooms burst open. He turned, ready to punish the one who had intruded, only to find two messengers, both out of breath and clearly both bearing bad news.
“Report,” he commanded.
The messengers exchanged a look, hesitating. Then the braver began.
“Forgive me, General. I was told to inform you immediately. The Elders have confirmed that you were right to oppose Senator Eren.”
Diego had believed he was right, but he couldn’t have claimed he knew he was. His expression never changed, but relief washed over him in waves.
“I do not know what that other part means, General, but I was told to tell you and your brother generals that Senator Eren got through. They said to tell you ‘the GU knows’.”
And just like that, they had failed. Diego wondered if he had just ceased being grothan.
“And you?” he asked the other messenger.
“Senator Eleya sent me,” he said. “Forgive me too, General. It is your gesha, she – She’s been poisoned.”
Diego stood, unmoving, fearing what he might do if he did, in the ashes of everything he’d fought for. He had just failed the Brion people. Had he lost Isolde too?
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Isolde
So far, Isolde Fenner was surprisingly okay with her space adventure. Sure, she’d been practically kidnapped and someone had tried to kill her, but she had found Diego and with her life suddenly having a center, the rest seemed to matter less with every passing hour.
It was, however, true that she could have lived without being poisoned.
When Isolde came to, she was in a familiar room aboard the Triumphant. She knew that by opening her eyes, taking in the contours of the room, and thinking: safe. It meant home. Distantly, she registered the presence of others with her, but while she drifted in and out of consciousness, Isolde could barely understand who they were. Her heart knew Diego was there, which was enough. Through voices and glimpses and scent, the picture on him formed in her mind – close, solid, strong. Angry?
The first face she finally saw was Urenya’s. The healer was standing by the bedside, checking the cannulas running into Isolde’s arms. Sleepily drawing conclusions, Isolde deduced that if the healer didn’t look too concerned, she was probably still alive, though her body seemed to be in slow motion.
“Diego,” she murmured.
Her general appeared so quickly from the other room Isolde’s sleepy eyes only took in a blur before he was sitting by her side, face contorted in fury and relief. He kissed her gently making her sigh happily at the taste of his lips on hers. That made Diego smile at last, even if only for a moment before his expression was stern once again.
“Is she in the clear now?” he demanded from Urenya, while Isolde was still trying to piece together what precisely was going on with her.
“I believe so,” the healer said. “Lucky and alive.”
Diego growled, making Isolde giggle for some reason. “Why… what happened?” she asked, her hand idly stroking Diego’s, almost without her conscious will.
“That…” Diego began, following with an array of Brionese words that Isolde couldn’t follow in her drugged state. She assumed they weren’t exactly polite expressions judging by Urenya’s face. Whatever they had given her made Isolde snicker again, causing Diego to stop and snarl, “Do not worry about her, she will not live long enough to regret this.”
Urenya took over. “Isolde,” she said, catching her attention, “you ingested a poison. Do you remember being on Briolina, with Eleya and Deliya?”
Things started to come back to Isolde. “Yes. We were celebrating… Diego’s victory,” she said. “Aneya was with us as well.”
“Yes,” Urenya said. “You drank alios, but yours was poisoned. You collapsed, do you remember that?”
Alios. So that’s
what it’s called.
“I thought I had the flu,” Isolde said. “I fainted, I think. Eleya caught me.”
Urenya smiled. “Good,” she said. “It is good that you remember. That is a promising sign.”
Isolde felt Diego relax a fraction, though he still growled like a huge predator ready to jump at any provocation.
“Who – who poisoned me?” Isolde asked, sensing Diego immediately tense up again.
Her general seemed about to speak, but Urenya was faster. “A desperate person,” she said. “She is no danger to you anymore. You are on the Triumphant, safe, and Aneya will pay for her actions.”
Aneya. So Deliya was right after all, Isolde thought. She was too tired and mellow to properly conjure up any meaningful hate, but a part of her raged along with Diego. That bitch tried to kill me… On Terra, that would have been a horrible courting move. With the Brions, it might have been even worse, given how serious they were about their fated.
The next question was obvious. “Am I alright?” she asked. “What did Aneya give me?”
Urenya hesitated. “A sneaky little concoction. Practically undetectable even if you are familiar with it. If it had been in my cup, I might have smelled it, but even that is not certain. You thought you were with friends, or at least allies, and even if you had knowledge of such poisons, you were not watching out for them. At least you did not drink much.”
Diego was still making predatory noises, which Isolde found oddly charming, but clearly Urenya wasn’t in agreement.
“Could you leave us?” she asked.
Isolde wondered if anyone else would have dared to ask that of Diego, but she was slowly coming to the conclusion that Urenya took many liberties with her general that would have sent most others running scared. Diego glared.
