by Maia Starr
His eyes went wide.
"I've never supported Fenris," he hissed.
"But would you support a new Dendren?"
I could see the panic in his demeanor, his eyes roaming down the hallways just as frantic and nervous as I was.
"Yes," he said, and I felt my spirit's rise.
"Gather anyone you know who's willing to support a peaceful union," I instructed quickly. "Tell them to go to the badlands, north of the glowing forest."
He stared at me, eyes flicking back and forth from mine.
"Do you know it?" I asked desperately.
"I know it," he nodded. "I'll gather as many men as possible."
"I've seen their numbers," I said, gesturing toward the council chamber. "Seventy, maybe."
"I have more," he assured me.
"You're sure?"
He gave a deft nod. "Positive."
"Go now and gather anyone you can," I said. "Let's end this."
Chapter Twelve
Kaayde
I stood in the badlands, overcome by the siccus, the same spot I had been waiting in for days. My body was rigid with the blackness as my men perched all around me. We hadn’t eaten since we’d left.
Our wait finally came to an end as the sky began to overshadow with Gilds shifters. They found us. Ivy led us to them, just as she promised she would.
"Kaayde!" Ivy had yelled, screamed, as I turned to leave the room just nights ago. "I do love you," she said with a choke in her voice.
Her words rang out in the small entranceway and my eyes went wide at the sound of them.
I didn't question whether they were true. I only questioned whether she'd said them too late to make a difference.
I had let our Dendren die for her, and she didn't seem the least bit thankful. In my mind, there were no other options. I couldn't live without her, but my addiction to her was starting to become a plague on my mind. She was all I thought of... I just needed to know I wasn't alone with my feelings. That this fight was worth something.
"Do you?" I said evenly.
"I..." she breathed. "I love you. And I can prove it."
"I don't need you to prove it," I said, calmer now, "I just need you to mean it."
Ivy nodded slowly, blazing furious, sad eyes at me. "I mean it," she enunciated. "And I can prove it.”
She told me she could lure the Gilds to the badlands if I was willing to use the siccus to destroy them.
I was ready now.
The Gilds swooped in, not expecting the black death to rain hell upon them. The siccus leaped up from the land in waves of black tentacles, ripping at the Gild warriors and pulling them from the sky.
"It was a trap!" one of the warriors screamed, and I stood, letting the siccus use my mind to command it. To save my people.
A host of the shifters turned to flee, but it seemed as though half of them created a barrier, fighting for us. Just like Ivy had told me they would.
Some even chased their own people down and dragged them toward the siccus.
As if the siccus could truly read my mind, it left those Gilds fighting for the Atherien alone, fully aware of its mission.
I watched as Fenris, their leader, shot a ball of fire at me and saw the shock on his face as the siccus came up and snatched him from the sky. I made myself watch as the blackness burrowed into his side, the way he had once used it to kill his sister, to poison his father in order to become the Dendren.
His mouth filled with darkness and he let out a great dragon's cry. The last sound that ever came out of him.
The great and mighty black shifter came plummeting to the ground, and I watched him fall before me, never moving to fight him, knowing that the siccus would finally make it up to me and end this once and for all.
When Fenris fell, his warriors came to aide him, only to be scooped up into the black sea of tar and destruction.
Within a breath, the battle was over, and suddenly a haze of silence crept over the land.
I swallowed hard, breathing heavily and finally realizing what was happening.
The sky was filled with Gild warriors and Atherien Parduss: the ones who had fought together. I didn’t know how she did it, but Ivy came through, and she had brought an army with her.
Down across the land, the siccus crawled over every body that lay limp. Every Parduss warrior who tried to cross me was now blanketed in darkness. There was a great echo of the siccus: a high-pitched ‘Zmm, zmm!’ as it feasted.
When the black goop crawled back and retreated to its cave, not even the bones of the Gilds were left to mourn.
That was it. The war was really over.
I swallowed and turned around, the darkness leaving my body, for good, I hoped. And then I saw her.
Ivy was wearing battle armor meant for a Parduss. I wasn’t sure how she was even holding it up on her slender frame. She met my eyes and then offered me a weak smile.
She came up next to me, pale and tall and perfect. I raced to her, slipping my hands around her waist in the familiar way I'd grown accustomed to and pulled her into my arms.
“You did it,” she said, swallowing back her emotions as she wrapped her arms around my neck.
“I… can’t believe what you did,” I said, breathless.
“Hey, aren’t I supposed to be complimenting you right now?” she laughed.
“You brought them here, all of them,” I blinked in surprise before taking another look at the myriad of Parduss who flew above us, casting shadows down on the ground and flapping their wings: causing a great gust to sweep through the badlands.
“You saved us,” I said in surprise.
She grinned at me, biting her lip before rolling into a wry expression. “I’m uh,” she began, trying to mimic my voice, “still waiting for my thank you.”
I laughed and squeezed her tightly. “Thank you… for coming back to me.”
"I love you," she said, craning her neck to look at me and sounding utterly proud of herself. "I hope you believe me now."
My mouth gaped open, and I went to speak but couldn't quite find the words. I looked around the black, rocky field at the devastation that she had brought for me.
"I think I can say with certainty," I began with a laugh, "I will never doubt you again."
She smiled. "I'm going to hold you to that."
Epilogue
Ivy
“I can't believe that stuff is still floating around Cadir,” Kaayde said, limping over to me. He gestured toward the cardboard box filled to the brink with bags of coffee and made an over-exaggerated shiver.”
“Whenever they send girls up, I always make the request for a few boxes of it!” I teased.
It had been three years since the end of the war.
“Boxes?” He laughed and shook his head, palming over my swollen belly and leaning down to kiss it. “This one's just going to jitter his way out of there.”
I smiled and ran a hand through his fiery hair as he knelt down in front of me. “This one had better come out soon, or mama's going to lose it.”
“Patience,” he said, looking up at me with bright eyes. “You know it's not going to be just the two of us anymore after he comes.”
“Ah,” I waved him off, teasing, “I was getting a little sick of you anyway.”
“Is that right?” he said, tickling my sides and eliciting a yelping laugh as I batted him away.
He chuckled at the gesture and stood, walking toward the kitchen with the massive box in his arms. I watched him walk, noting how the daylight highlighted the shimmer in his wings and the deep aqua and purple scales that studded his sexy body.
There was so much gained from the battle now known as the Journey to the Darklands. After hundreds of years of war, the Parduss races were finally united.
Titan was all but abandoned, the Atherien finally getting to come to live their lives in peace on the lush and fruitful plenks.
Atherien hunters more than made their place in the new culture, heading into the mainlands
to catch game and supply the plenks with an abundance of food.
While the wilds were still a place to be feared, no Gild Parduss ever had to face the mainlands without an Atherien at his side.
In time, new races emerged. The Atherien mated with the female Gilds, creating a new breed of dragon, as well as humans starting families with both races.
With the planet restored to peace and well populated with female dragons and halflings that were more than capable of getting pregnant, there was soon no more reason for the humans to come to Cadir.
After three years, myself and the rest of the human females were given the opportunity to leave.
No one jumped at the offer, least of all me.
Kaayde never took his place as Dendren and so the position of power stayed empty for two years after the battle. Once peace was restored, Merenora’s son Orylis returned to Cadir and resumed his role as Dendren, leading alongside his human wife.
Soon humans became a rare mate to have on Cadir, and every one of us knew that the way we’d been touched by these Parduss was something we could never explain to anyone.
“Thank you,” I said suddenly.
Kaayde turned and looked at me, setting the box on the counter and cocking a brow with amusement. “For what?”
“For believing in me,” I said, meaning every word of it.
“Weren't you the one who said you wanted people to know that when they came to you, you'd always get the job done?” he teased.
“Yes,” I laughed.
I was a better person for knowing Kaayde. He made me… real.
Saying ‘I love you’ wasn’t a hard thing for me anymore. I didn’t have to wear a mask, play a role, or report back to anyone. There was no more fear that made me look over my shoulder.
Just love.
“I just never thought...” I shook my head. “I'm just, lucky.”
“Yes,” he smirked. “You are.”
Then he strode back over to me, confident and beautiful and mine. Leaning down, he kissed the top of my head and added, “I'm lucky, too.”
The End
Vitohn Warriors Box Set(Sneak Peak)
(An Alien Abduction Romance)
By Stella Sky
Book 1-Savage Alien
(An Alien Abduction Romance)
By Stella Sky
Chapter One
Sidney
I’m a good listener. So when Karen started screaming, “Run, run, run,” I took off like a bat out of hell.
I didn’t even turn around to see if she was alright.
Instead, I listened to the sounds that were echoing behind me, a ‘THWOOP THWOOP THWOOP’ siren that reverberated through the ground. The sound of the creatures. The aliens.
I hadn’t seen streetlights in so long that they were almost blinding as I ran down the dampened streets of the abandoned city. Snow bit against the ground under the beams of light and quickly dissolved as it hit the pavement.
The backstreets of my old neighborhoods twisted in sudden darkness like a maze. If I could make it to my old house, I would be able to escape through the woodlands behind my backyard. Back to safety.
The vibrations of the aliens who were no doubt still chasing me grew stronger. So strong that I thought I might lose my footing, but then I saw it. My old front door. If I had a moment for my brain to catch up with my sight, I might have cried then. But I just wanted to get into my backyard and hide.
I raced past the old wrought iron fence, a rotting black, and found myself in the middle of the wet back lawn, still covered with heavy rotted fallen leaves, freshly snowed on.
My breath was barreling out of me as I knelt down and pressed my back up against the shed, shaking against the wriggly metal. I heard a loud scream in the distance; down the road maybe. Something foreign. One of them.
I felt my teeth chatter violently and gripped my sidearm, waiting for the beast to come at me.
Make my day, bitch, I thought. But nothing happened.
Then suddenly ice-cold fingers were on my arm, and I flinched back, falling hard against the shed siding.
“Baxley, shit!” I swore and pushed my commander away from me; his black curls and stiff beard looking shiny under the motion-activated lights.
“Where’s Karen?” he said, his gravelly voice difficult to understand when he spoke in a whisper as he did then.
Karen, our lead scientist, was taken by them eight days ago. We being a small group of survivors. The revolutionists who hid and managed to keep out of sight long enough for the aliens to leave us alive; leave us alone, believing there was nothing left of our people. No one left to kill.
And then one day, Karen was gone, and everything changed. Twenty years of hiding all thrown to shit because she had a hunch to test.
Baxley and I went on a mission to get her back, but she didn’t welcome our rescue. Turns out she liked her cage.
“Not here,” I snapped back, pushing Baxley away from me.
“You left her?” the middle-aged man snapped at me, pulling me up and leading me instinctively toward the woods.
“Hey, she told me to run.”
“Yeah,” he said dismissively, raising and lowering his brows quickly. “Way to follow orders.”
I matched his expression and quickened my pace so that I walked next to him. “Hey, that’s what I thought.”
My commander rolled his eyes and held his gun close. “So, what? We just leavin’ her back there? With them?”
I shrugged, pre-annoyed. “She seemed pretty happy to me.”
We made our way into the thicket: a dense wood that sprawled on for miles. It was in here that we were first able to lose the creatures: shake them from us long enough to catch a breath. But that was a long time ago.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked quickly.
“Just what I said.”
Baxley sighed. “Will you stop bein’ snippy and give me a straight answer, for once? You’re the biggest pain in my ass.”
“You love it,” I teased. “B, we have to talk.”
“What, you breakin’ up with me, kid?”
I smiled his way, but neither of us picked up on the conversation offer. We had an odd relationship. Not only for commander and soldier, but for me being twenty-two and Baxley a cool fifty-five.
At first, I thought of him like a… not father. But like a plucky uncle. One that always had great stories and seemed to run into the zaniest people. But by the time I turned seventeen, I began having different feelings toward him. I went through a crisis then. An, ‘if this is all there is, why not?’ phase where I rebelled.
I rebelled within a rebellion, and it looked a whole lot like me sneaking into Baxley’s trailer—that’s where we hide, by the way: an abandoned trailer park on the outskirts of town—and kissing him deeply even as he protested.
Out of either instinct or routine, we both crouched for cover, hearing a distant hum that neither of us could identify as being close or far away.
Baxley drew his gun and traced it along the dark thicket, and I followed suit. We stayed deathly silent then until the hum disappeared for certain.
“When I said Karen looked happy,” I began again, “I meant… she was kissing that thing.”
“Rape?” Baxley asked in a furious whisper, his brows drawing together in confusion.
“He didn’t have her sprawled out on the sidewalk,” I offered in a tone that might as well have been a shrug.
“You know what I mean,” he warned.
“I don’t think so,” I said.
Karen had a theory about the aliens, these Vithohn, that I found disturbing. I’d spent nearly my whole life fighting them. Learning to trap them. Taking cues from Baxley on how to handle myself in a militia. My father was part of Baxley’s militia, and when he died, Baxley took me under his wing. I was cocking guns since I was eight.
To me, the aliens were the ultimate enemy.
But Karen… she had different ideas about them. About ways to control them: c
hange them.
“I’m not leavin’ her,” Baxley said suddenly, stoic.
“Then you’re risking your own life, not mine,” I argued, traipsing further into the wilds. “I’m not going back there.”
“She’s our second in command,” he snapped.
“And you’re first in command, so deal!”
Baxley didn’t like being our commander; he didn’t like others thinking he was in a position of authority. It was all a moot point, anyhow, since everyone revered and respected him. Everyone went to him when we needed someone to tell us how to survive.
“Fine,” the dark-haired man seethed through gritted teeth. “Then as commander, I say we’re going back!”
“B, trust me, she wants to be there.”
Baxley’s eyes darted back and forth from mine in a fury, and he grabbed my arm: the second time he’d ever been aggressive with me. The first time was when I kissed him that first time; he’d shoved me back and grabbed me by the shoulders, shaking me. Then he kissed me again, just to be sure it was wrong.
Before he had the chance to scold me, a crashing came down hard in the distance; tree branches thudded to the ground in a sure signal that we’d been spotted.
I waited to see what Baxley’s play would be: steely silence and an excellent hiding place or pure panic and run. He chose the latter.
We took off, shooting in opposite directions as the Vithohn let out a terrifying shriek. Baxley had just enough time to make eye contact with me to let me know I would be used as bait this time.
The air went warm; even in the cold, the alien’s diamond textured, snake-like skin drew a heat to the surrounding area and I knew he was close.
I dug my spiked boot into the ground and spun on it, running left, breathing in the sharp winter air and feeling it hit my lungs like daggers.
Swerving west, I had a jolt bump up in my stomach as I felt the smooth grip of the creature against my leg. My heart thumped against my chest, and I just managed to get away from his grasp, plucking my leg from his grip like I was watching myself from afar.
