by Celeste Raye
I rubbed my hand up the side of my face to warm it and then reached for my laser rifle, gripping it firmly at my side.
The water before me bubbled up and snapped with loud pop, water sprinkling everywhere. I could see creatures in the depths of the blackness: vague shapes that slurped and swished under the base of the lake.
They scared me.
I swallowed and stepped back from the water’s edge as a tentacle crept out of its depths. It slithered on the land in a desperate search and when it didn’t find any sustenance, it retracted back into the watery deep.
I was accustomed to changing environments: as excited to explore a new planet as I was watchful of the enemies that might surround my crew. But all at once, I missed Earth. I missed the ways the trees would bend and grow in the direction of the wind.
I looked up at Dobromia’s trees as if trying to recall my own world, but the vines and branches were all smooth and slick, like oil.
They stood their ground against the breeze: immovable as a hard heart.
My skin shivered at the sight and I quickly walked back to our camp.
To my great annoyance, Vaikrand was awake and standing outside the tent. I walked up close to him with my hands on my hips, my teeth chattering.
“Coming in?” His voice needled in my ear as his hand lazily held open the fabric of the makeshift tent. His hot breath hit the side of my face like it had real weight behind it. So much so that I exhaled as he passed. He stepped into the tent and disappeared out of sight and I narrowed my eyes scornfully.
I would rather freeze.
But then the thought that freezing to death might actually happen to me crept in and I sighed in relent.
“Just for warmth,” I said as a warning as I crawled inside the tent. It was unbelievably warm, as though his body was a personal furnace of heat and sweat.
I curled up on the furs he’d laid out on the floor and reveled in their warmth. Vaikrand curled up behind me, spooning my body against him and wrapping his arms around my breasts. My heart sped up at the touch and I realized I hadn’t been touched in years. Literally.
The closest was the kiss with Aurlauc, and even then… a ‘thank you kiss’ was hardly the same as a full body envelopment.
I could feel Vaikrand’s breath hit my neck like a comforting wave of heat and soon our bodies were basking in an unseen fire that we had created between us.
My eyes drifted and dozed for the rest of the night, waking every so often and grinding my backside against Vaikrand’s body to make sure he was still there.
His hands were splayed across my breasts. I would have been offended if I weren’t so freezing without them there. My nipples hardened against the cold and the strength of his hand and I wondered if he was awake too. If he could feel them there and if he felt any certain way about them.
I could feel his length harden against my backside. I ran my tongue across my teeth and moved further into his body, trying to feel its thick girth. From his breathing, I could tell he was still sleeping: a biological reaction from the warmth and touch to become erect.
I timed my movements to the sounds of his heavy, sticky breaths and slid my hand over his for warmth and then pulled away suddenly, arching my back so the hardness I felt was removed from me. I didn’t want to be that girl.
When I let Marina go, let her leave us all, I thought I’d stayed behind as a savior… but the girls didn’t want saving. They were quick enough to give their identities away all for the chance to be with one of the shifters.
But not me.
It was on that thought that I finally drifted into a restful slumber, free of my thoughts, finally.
I awoke the next morning curled up tight against Vaikrand, my face pressed into his chest and his arms fixed around me. His hands splayed across my back and I could feel him stir as I did. Or, perhaps he was already awake.
I could feel the heat radiating from the outside, the tent now providing shelter from the immense rays instead of shielding us from the cold. The tent had become so warm that sweat was glistening between us, covering every inch of our bodies like we had run through a sprinkler.
Looking up, I caught Vaikrand’s eyes and he looked down at me with a tired gaze, the drain of no sleep showing in small bags under his eyes. I took the silent moment to watch the matte yellow scales as they scrawled across his face.
“Good morning,” I said finally; my voice barely sounding out through the coat of sleep that still sat in my throat, heavy and dry.
The yellow shifter nodded his greeting to me and sat up quickly, peeling me from his chest and then vigorously wiping the sweat from his forehead. He’d probably been waiting hours to move. I could imagine the dots of moisture slipping down his forehead with annoyance, and it made me laugh.
“Off to find your friend, then? Get our partnership started once you see he’s a no-show?”
I scoffed in jest and walked past the yellow shifter. “He’ll be there,” I said certainly. “But sure, let’s go.”
Vaikrand wasted no time informing me he would be flying us both to Westfall within the hour. I protested several times, but of course he got his way. His wings folded out like a yellow and black canvas of splattered paint: so beautiful and strong they looked like they should be housed behind a velvet rope. Something that said they were too special to touch.
We traveled to the edge of Westfall quickly, with me safe in his grasp. And though I would never say it, I preferred flying to walking. We landed in a smooth wind and he set me gently on the ground. Westfall was full of endless rock and orange soil and nothingness: red rock cities abandoned. Its previous inhabitance taken underground, no doubt.
I looked around into the endless shades of orange and red sand and Vaikrand gave me a smug look, as though he’d already won our little bet. My face stayed hard as a stone.
“He’s coming,” I said surely. My tone was so rich with joy and determination that I was almost certain I’d made him doubt himself.
I had no doubt that Aurlauc would come for me. And even after two days of camping out with Vaikrand in the dry, unbearably hot north, I remained vigilant. I would traverse the ground below and he would fly up to the aqua sky and search for any signs of a shifter in the distance.
I began to wonder if it might all have been a trap set up by The Tower guards. Set me free and then kill me in the wilderness. That perhaps my trust was foolishly placed. But I just couldn’t see that from Aurlauc; a funny thought, considering all his people had done to betray us and lie to us.
And then it occurred to me: Aurlauc may not be alive at all anymore. If I was as sought after as Vaikrand claimed, perhaps they’d found out Aurlauc had let me go and then killed him, or locked him up. Maybe they would torture him the way they did the men on our ship back on Ceylara.
Maybe they would break him.
Vaikrand must have read the expression on my face because he approached me sadly and said, “He’s not coming, is he?”
“Yes,” I said surely.
“You sure?” he asked. It was said as more of a statement than a question, but it hung there just the same.
“I am sure,” I enunciated.
“He’s not coming,” he said.
“He’s coming,” I argued, straightening my back against the rock and trying hard not to let the heat of the day wear me to sleep. The smug look on his face sent a tinge of frazzled warmth through my body and I tilted my head back and announced, “It’s not like he gave me a timeline or anything.”
He scoffed. “He probably didn’t think you would live past the boneyard.”
I acknowledged his sentence by giving him a subtle flick of the eyes and then we both waited in a flirtatious silence. “He didn’t set me up,” I argued out of nowhere.
“Either way,” Vaikrand shrugged, tossing a careless palm through his blonde hair, “a deal’s a deal.”
I stared at him, my spit thick and heavy in my mouth as though I was about to eat my words.
“Oh, com
e on!” he said with annoyed laugher at my defiance. “You’re that sure? You’re that certain that the Weredragon’s aren’t worth your sympathy?”
“They’re not,” I snipped.
“Haven’t you ever stepped back to wonder why we are doing this in the first place? Why the Weredragons went to such great measures to secure your ship?”
The way he phrased my past with such ease, such ignorance, sent an icy first through the center of my stomach. I could feel it spreading outward as I snapped, “I’m assuming when you say secure my ship you actually mean slaughter my people?”
The cocky alpha male shifter spread his palms to me as if to say ‘meh,’ and it was at that moment I forgot why I was ever attracted to him.
“What about your friend then?” Vaikrand asked suddenly. “Doesn’t he warrant your sympathy?”
“My… friend?”
“Yeah,” he sloped his shoulders in a lazy shrug. “The one who let you out of The Tower?”
I matched his shrug and his brows shot up with a bemused, surprised expression.
“What if he died for you?” he continued. “That doesn’t fall under the category of ‘redemption’ for you?”
“He knew what the risks were when he let me out,” I said coldly.
“You’re so sure it makes me insane,” he said with an exasperated sigh. He took his leave from the wall and walked out further into the field. I followed hesitantly behind.
“Care to prove me wrong?” I asked with a slight smile.
“I do, actually,” he said.
I felt a rush of confliction rise up in me as soon as I registered the look on his face. I knew what it was like to be a competitive person, and the fact that his determination seemed to resemble mine left me in no small amount of panic.
“Fine,” I said, toneless.
“Really?” he dared. “In fact, I will prove you wrong. I will take you on a tour,” he said, pantomiming with his hands as though he were displaying an armful of riches to me. “A tour of Dobromia.”
“Oh, you will?” I teased flirtatiously.
“Give me one tour across the provinces and if you’re not the least bit sympathetic…” He paused and gestured with his pointer finger and thumb, squeezing them together as he continued, “Not the least bit moved by the end of it, I will surrender my soul to you and give you my ship.”
“You will?” I repeated incredulously.
“I will make it my life’s mission to get you home,” he grinned.
I raised a brow and considered his offer. He had been yammering on about his ship this whole time, I certainly wasn’t going to question a great offer. Then I asked, “And what if I do? Feel sympathetic, that is.”
He offered me a playful wink and spun on his heel. “Then I can die satisfied.”
Vaikrand
I had spent with Athena what she called three weeks, gauging her moods and convincing her on a daily basis not to abandon our partnership. Her pessimism was almost too much to bear sometimes, and her constant suspicion of me had me growing more and more annoyed with her.
Some days she was charming and sexy and fun; it was all I could do not to take her those days: to whip her down into a tent of furs and take her. To grope her breasts and take them into my mouth until they were hard mounds against my tongue.
Other days I wished for death. Her unresolved fury against the Weredragons was nearly relentless and her constant need to show up my physical strength with her weapon was infuriating.
Still, she had agreed to go on a tour of Dobromia with me. This would be a difficult tour for us both, but a necessary one, I kept telling myself.
Difficult for me since I was banished; should another Weredragon see a topsider he had every right to engage him physically. Difficult for Athena because she was also on the run, so to speak. Though, if the D’Karr wanted her, it would be a great bargaining chip for me if I happened upon a soldier.
Today would mark the beginning of our tour, but we had yet to leave the shelter of our tent for the morning. I knew it would be a dead heat with no humidity. Just a dry, cracking blaze. I had no desire to leave the shade of our bed just yet.
We had taken to spending the nights together, which drove me crazy in more ways than one. I never slept when we shared a bed: just waves of drifting in and out. Athena moved a lot.
Plus, her body pressed up against mine was driving me to the brink. I could feel myself hardening against her backside and I wanted nothing more than to thrust into her. Become the wild, outlaw mates. Claim a criminal as my own. An escapee from the D’Karr’s vicious tower.
But then she would open her mouth and complain or berate me and my anger would seethe anew.
This morning she had her head resting on my chest; still breathing slow with the syrupy haze of sleep. I could feel her heavy breasts pressed up against my body and for just a moment, it was all bliss.
Then she sniffed suddenly and, once realizing I was awake, she rolled off of me.
“We have three stops,” I said to her as I sat up.
“Doesn’t sound like much of a tour,” she teased sleepily.
“Oh, it is. And don’t forget.”
“Yeah, yeah,” she waved me off and began throwing her ration containers, all empty at this point, back into her satchel before slinging it around her arm. “Partners for life if I feel even one teeny tiny spec of sympathy for the murderers.” She looked at me pointedly and traced a finger over her lips; smiled. “Sorry, did I say murderers? I meant Weredragons.”
“Ha-Ha. They teach you that humor on the Earth?”
“Nope,” she said loudly. “All Dobromia, that one.”
“Super,” I said and we began packing up the tent. “You know, not all of us are murderers.” She looked at me sharply and I shrugged. “Most, but not all.”
“Didn’t you say you’re a fighter? Isn’t that like, your ‘thing?’?”
“Didn’t you say you were a soldier?” I spat back and she smiled proudly. “So, what’s the difference?”
“I’m sent on missions to protect my people–”
Before she could finish I shook my head and raised an intrusive hand to her mouth. “So am I. Do you really think we kill for no reason?”
“You don’t care about human life,” she said intensely. “That’s what I know.”
“And you can’t fathom why they might be willing to take such dire action? Never occurred to you that perhaps things are that bad that we would sink to such a level?”
“Nope,” she said, her lips popping at the end of the word. “But, I guess I’m about to find out, aren’t I?”
I rolled my eyes. “I guess you are.”
Our first stop was the deadening fields: our empty crops. The most logical venture to start off my little tour of Dobromia.
The T'nemtar were fields where the Weredragons used to find the lushest greens to feast upon. The bodies of water interspersed like a net of liquid flowing alongside diamond-shaped plains. Greens would grow in the plains: plants and sprouts and vegetation. And sea swimmers would gather in the ponds and we could pick them clean and be satisfied for cycles without returning.
From above, the pattern of T'nemtar was unmistakable. It was where feasting began.
It was also where the suns shone brightest and hottest.
I brought my wings in and turned sharply with Athena in my arms until we both skidded to a halt on the ground. She pushed away from me and shielded her eyes from the sun.
“So, if this is where you grow your food…” she looked around in confusion and then back to me with her eyes narrowed.
I knew the reason for her confusion. After all, the fields were still green. They looked perfectly viable for consumption.
“Pick it up,” I said and gestured toward the tall vines with their pink blooms. They would taste gritty and soothe the bellies of the Weredragons; an undeniable treat.
“It’s not going to… come to life and eat me, or anything. Is it?”
I laughed.
“Just pick it up.”
She kicked at the ground momentarily before grabbing the vine and pulling it gently. Even with her ginger movements the vine crumbled into dust, raw and brown on the inside.
Athena pursed her lips and looked up at me, her eyes perfectly blue. “Ah,” she said with a nod. “And it’s all like this?”
“Every bit,” I said.
“And there’s no…” she gestured to the waters and leaned far over to get a better look, “protein?”
“The waters are drying up,” I explained and then pointed up.
“Double suns,” she said, giving a mocking salute. “Gotcha. Well, yep,” she set her hands on her hips. “That’s pretty bad. Not exactly feelin’ sorry for you yet but, yeah, that’s a doozey.”
I frowned at her sentiment and pulled her further into the fields. “This is where we would all gather,” I said wistfully. I could still remember us gathering as partial shifters, a vast array of color flooding the field. Here we would graze and hunt: utilize our speed and strength to help gather meat.
When the famine began and all the greenery became dust, we began making quick work of hunting the creatures that lived below sea level. And soon enough, they were gone too.
Dobromia was nearly picked clean of sustenance and there was nothing we could do about it.
Tredorphen and I used to go out on missions together, to hunt for food on neighboring planets. But that was many moons ago. Now I was a bastard, outcast and enemy to the king.
“It gets worse,” I said lowly. My heart sank as Athena looked up at me and I realized where I would have to take her next. The mating caves.
I didn’t tell her the name of it, in case she began to get any ideas. And even though she told me she’d been locked up for the better part of two full turns, her face sparkled with recognition at the entrance of the cave.
Aquamarine eggs hung from the top and bottom of the deep cave, many having lost their glow over the cycles: dead. The eggs were roughly the same size as Athena, and a spark of nerves flew into a flurry in my stomach as she traipsed through the caves.
