“How long have you been here, anyway?” Sophie asked.
Carmen looked at the ground, and Penelope Ann gazed toward the trees. Marissa answered. “We have been here for years. We have families and children here. We’ve been very happy here.”
“That’s lucky for you,” Sophie replied. “I hate to think of the other women the Romarie must have taken from Earth. Who knows where they ended up? But you all must have families and friends back on Earth. They’ll be wondering where you are. They’ll be happy to get you back.”
Marissa glanced at Chris and Aimee. Carmen stole a glance at Renier, and Emily took Faruk’s hand. “I don’t know about my friends, but I’m staying here. I’ve got all I need here. Thanks for the offer, though.”
Sophie turned to the others. “What about the rest of you? Does any of you want to come back to Earth? This could be your last chance.”
No one moved. In the end, Aria took a step forward. “We’re all happy here. We’ve made lives for ourselves here, and we’ve worked hard to make this planet our home. We’ll stay here.”
Sophie let a puff of breath out through her lips. “I don’t understand it, but I won’t try to argue with you. I never expected to find humans out here in space, but I can see your minds are made up.”
Aria shook her hand. “Thank you. I hope you have a quick and easy journey home.”
Sophie shot her a grin over her shoulder. “I don’t suppose it would do any good to tell anybody back on Earth where you are or that we’d seen you.”
Aria smiled back. “I don’t think so. If I was you, I would find a way to get back so no one knows you were gone. The fewer questions asked the better.”
Sophie nodded and hefted her gun onto her shoulders. She kicked the nearest Romarie corpse. “You don’t mind if we leave them here, do you?”
Marissa waved her hand. “Leave them. They’ll be dust in a few days, and no one will know they were here.”
Sophie and her friends strode back to the ship. They waved to the friends, and the door slid down in front of them. The black outer panels slammed into place and sealed them inside. A whine of machinery burst out of the hull, and the ground quaked. In a moment, the whole hulking vessel lifted out of its crater and levitated into the air. It hovered overhead for a long moment, turned, and sailed away over the eastern horizon.
The friends watched until the ship faded to a speck in the sky and finally disappeared. Anna sighed. “They’ll be having pizza for dinner in a few weeks.”
“They’ll be shopping for bikinis and talking to their friends on their cellphones,” Marissa added.
“And they’ll be spending Christmas with their families,” Aria put in. “That’s the part I miss the most.”
Donen eyed her. “You could have Christmas with your family here—whatever that is.”
She smiled up at him. Her eyes glistened. “You’re right. There’s nothing stopping us.”
“What about the cellphones?” Chris asked. “None of us will ever see one again.”
Aimee tore her gaze away from the patch of sky where the Romarie ship disappeared. “We all chose to stay here. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m happier here than I ever could have been on Earth. I won’t regret the decision I made today.”
Anna took her hand. “None of us will. I just never expected to have the chance to go back, and now I’ve turned it down, just like that.”
One by one, they turned away. “We’ve got the future in front of us. We’ve got homes to go to and people who love us waiting there. None of us has anything to complain about.”
They hugged each other all over again. All the pain of past flew away with those women and left them glad and bright. They laughed and kissed and chattered about the future. The unexpected visit lifted the pall of tension from the men, too. They talked freely about the future and made their plans. In the end, they clasped hands.
“Good-bye!” Emily and Faruk led the way east, with Anna and Menlo behind them.
Donen and Aria followed. “Come to us soon, Aimee. We’ll have a team ready to trace the border and draw up new maps. Then we’ll send copies of the maps to all the other factions.”
Renier and Carmen set off after their own column toward the west. “Good-bye! See you in a few weeks.”
Caleb and Turk set off running south toward their own territory. Chris watched them out of sight. Then she turned to Marissa. “We better go, too. Are you ready?”
Marissa nodded. “Let’s go.”
Chris clasped Aimee’s hand. “I sure wish you were coming with us.”
Aimee laughed. “I don’t.”
Chris waved her hand. “You know what I mean.”
“Yeah, I do,” Aimee replied. “See you later.”
Chris and Marissa set off on the trail along the canyon toward Lycaon territory. Aimee turned northwest and found Piwaka waiting for her. “Where’s Penelope Ann?”
“She went on ahead,” he replied. “She’s meeting Aquilla, and they’ll be gone from the village when we get back.”
Aimee sighed. “Do they really have to leave? She’s the only person I know among the Avitras.”
“You know me,” he pointed out.
She took his hand. “You’re right. I know you. I know all I really need to know.”
They passed into the forest shadows, on the road home.
THE END
The New Angondra Preview
Book 1: Taig and Tara
Chapter 1
Taig and Tara crouched behind the bushes and peered through the foliage at their Lycaon village home. A scattering of leaf huts dotted the clearing. Men and women, children and old people worked, lounged, talked, and walked back and forth to the stream beyond the trees. Pointed ears stuck up through their fur on their heads, necks and shoulders. Their lithe bodies twitched with every sense alert to the forest around them.
“What are they doing here?” Taig asked.
“You know as well as I do,” Tara replied. “They’re friends of Mother and Father.”
“They’re Ursidreans,” Taig pointed out. “They don’t belong here.”
Tara smacked her lips. “You know better than that. The Ursidreans are our friends, and these people are ambassadors from the Ursidrean Supreme Council. They’re the first of many Ursidreans who will cross our borders, so you better get used to it. Look. There are the two young men Mother told us about.”
A group of Lycaon assembled in the middle of the village. One tall man with black fur and another, shorter man with chestnut fur stood side by side at the center of the group. Two women with no fur and no pointed ears flanked these two men. They were human—Earthling.
Another group emerged from the trees and approached the Lycaon group. The heavyset Ursidreans lumbered when they walked and their thick shoulders swayed. Their leader towered over the Lycaon, but his dark eyes danced his heavy brows when he clasped the Lycaon leader’s hands in friendship. He threw back his head and his laugh rang through the trees.
“That’s Faruk,” Tara whispered. “He’s the one responsible for this peace agreement.”
Taig snorted. “It’s Father who’s responsible for it, if anybody is.”
Tara paid no attention to him. “Look at the woman next to him. She’s human, just like Mother and Marissa.”
A small woman with straight brown hair hugged the two Lycaon women one after the other. They laughed and wiped their eyes. “I wondered when we would ever see you again. How are you, Emily? Tell us everything about your life and Anna and Menlo and all our old friends.”
Emily stepped aside and waved her hand and two more Ursidrean men with dark hair and heavy shoulders stepped forward. The two Lycaon women gasped. “Are these your twins?”
Emily nodded. “This is Allen, and this is Taman.”
The woman standing next to the Lycaon leader lowered her voice. “Are they really only seven years old? They look like eighteen.”
Emily smiled. “Angondran children develop so much faster than human children.”
Chris frowned. “Allen. That’s not an Ursidrean name.”
“It’s my surname,” Emily replied. “Taman isn’t an Ursidrean name, either. It’s Bulgarian for ‘garden’. Where are your children, Marissa?”
Marissa looked around. “They’re hiding here somewhere.”
“What about you, Chris?” Emily asked. “Where are these twins we keep hearing about?”
“They disappear whenever we want them to make an appearance,” Chris replied. “You can’t keep them out of the forest.”
The shorter Lycaon man, Chris’s companion, pointed to the foliage where Taig and Tara hid. “They’re right over there. They’re listening to every word we say.”
The three women craned their necks to see. Chris shrugged. “Just ignore them, Turk. They’ll come out sooner or later.”
“Nonsense” The man called toward the bushes. “Come out of there and show your manners.”
“We better go,” Taig murmured. “You know how Father gets when we try to hide from him.”
Tara nodded, and the twins stood up so the whole party could see them. They came to Chris’s side, and she smiled up at them with a mother’s pride.
Emily gasped. “They must have grown as fast as my boys. They’re fully mature.”
Chris nodded. “Taig stopped growing last year. He’s taller than Caleb now. That must be my grandfather’s genes coming through.”
Turk slapped Taig on the shoulder. He leaned back to look up at his son. “He doesn’t take after his old man at all.”
Taig blushed. Tara looked the two Ursidrean boys up and down. At close range, she noticed their brows didn’t overshadow their eyes the way their father’s did, and they moved more smoothly than other Ursidreans. Their mother’s human blood dampened the brutish effect of their father’s heritage.
Tara caught Allen studying her back, and she dropped her eyes to the ground. Emily murmured in Chris’s ear, “She’s beautiful. She looks like you.”
“She’s all Lycaon,” Chris replied. “She likes nothing so better than running through the woods. That’s all she and Taig ever do.”
“It is not!” Taig argued.
Another deep voice boomed through the forest. “Where is he? Let me at him.”
The Ursidreans parted, and a huge man with a shaggy orange mane around his head shouldered his way through the crowd. He held out his arms. “There you are, Caleb. It’s been too long.”
He threw his arms around Caleb and lifted him off the ground. His laugh rolled through the treetops and up to the sky, and the others laughed with him. Caleb laughed until he coughed, and the big man set him back down on his feet.
Marissa clasped his hands. “Welcome to our village, Renier. We’ve waited a long time for this moment.”
“The honor is all mine.” Renier bowed and kissed her hands. “Any village would be a royal one with you in it.” He looked around, and when he saw the young people, he frowned. “Are these who I think they are?”
Marissa nodded. “These are Faruk and Emily’s twin boys, Allen and Taman, and these are Turk and Chris’s twins, Taig and Tara.”
A short woman with cropped black hair appeared at Renier’s side. The women embraced her. “Carmen!”
“It’s so good to see you again,” Carmen exclaimed. “You’ve all been working so hard to open up the borders, but this was our first chance to come visit. Renier has his hands full taking down the village near the Avitras border and constructing a new one deeper in our territory to take its place. It’s been non-stop work for five years straight.”
“None of this would be possible without Aimee carrying our communications back and forth,” Chris replied. “She’s the lifeblood holding this peace agreement together.”
“I wish she was here now,” Emily remarked. “She should share this moment.”
“Has anyone heard from her recently?” Turk asked. “I haven’t seen her in months.”
“She hasn’t stopped running since we sealed the peace agreement with the Avitras,” Emily replied. “She should take some time to rest with her own people.”
“Maybe that’s why we haven’t seen her,” Turk suggested. “Maybe she took some time off.”
“I wouldn’t blame her if she did,” Marissa added.
“She’s not pregnant, is she?” Chris asked.
“When would she have time to get pregnant?” Marissa asked. “We’ve seen her every couple of months since this peace process started. I think we would have noticed if she got pregnant and had a baby.”
Marissa’s hand shot out and she shouted across the village. “Stop right there!”
Two tall figures slipped behind a hut on the opposite side of the village and blended into the shadows. Marissa darted forward and dragged them into the open. “Not so fast, you!”
She hauled them back to the group. “I’m really sorry. They do this every time.”
She let go of a young Lycaon man. He brushed himself off. He stole glances at the group, but mostly he kept his eyes on the ground. He stood as tall and square-shouldered as Taig, but he had black fur instead of chestnut. “This is Ari.”
A young woman jerked her arm out of Marissa’s other hand. “Let me go!”
Marissa compressed her lips. “You’re not going anywhere. You’re going to meet these friends of ours and show their young people around our village. You’re responsible for making sure they have a good time while they’re here. Is that understood?” She faced Emily. “This is my daughter, Aeifa.”
Emily smiled at the twins. “They’re lovely. I’m sure all of you will have a good time together.”
Aeifa looked away. Chris spoke up. “Taig and Tara and Ari and Aeifa have a gang of sorts. They run off together into the forest for weeks at a time. I’m sure they would be happy to take your boys with them. Why don’t you take Allen and Taman to the swimming hole over the hill?”
Aeifa scanned the Ursidrean boys. “Can you run?”
Marissa started to say something else, but Tara interrupted. “Never mind, Aeifa we’ll show them the swimming hole. I’m sure we can find something to do while the old people talk.”
Marissa relaxed. “Good.”
Tara addressed the Ursidrean boys. “Unless I’m mistaken, they’ll be talking for weeks, so we’ll have all the time in the world to show them the best spots. Come on, Taig.”
She started to walk away when Renier spoke up. “If you young people don’t mind, I would appreciate if you took Reina along with you.”
Tara glanced back over her shoulder just in time to see a small slight girl step through the crowd. She stopped next to Carmen, and no one could mistake the resemblance. Short hair surrounded her face, but her human inheritance made her features tiny and delicate. Taig, Ari, and both Ursidrean boys stared at her. She had her mother’s black hair instead of her father’s red hair, and her quick black eyes took in every detail of her surroundings.
Chris gasped. “Is this your baby daughter, your little baby who slept in the basket while we negotiated with the Avitras?”
Carmen and Renier gazed on the girl in rapture. “This is Reina.”
Chris took the girl by the hand. “Welcome to our village. Don’t feel any pressure to run off with these rough kids. You’re welcome to stay with us.”
Reina smiled. “That’s okay. I’ll go. I want to see everything.”
Renier laughed. “She’s tougher than she looks, and game for anything. She’s been looking forward to this for ages.”
Tara exchanged glances with Aeifa, and Aeifa pursed her lips and turned away. Tara sighed. None of the others would take the responsibility of making this expedition a success. She would have to do it herself. “Come on, Reina.” She swept the others with her eyes. “Anybody that’s coming, come on. Let’s go.”
She and Taig set off through the trees, but they didn’t take off run
ning the way they always did with Ari and Aeifa. They walked slowly enough for the Ursidreans to keep up. Aeifa walked at Tara’s side and muttered in her ear. “Why did we have to bring them?”
“You heard your mother,” Tara murmured back. “These are honored guests. Their parents came all this way to negotiate the peace agreement. If we can help by keeping these kids amused, we should do it.”
Aeifa glanced back over her shoulders at the Ursidrean boys. Taman eyed her back. “They’re hardly kids, are they? They’re bigger than we are.”
Tara chuckled. “I meant Reina. She looks like she’d break in half if you sneezed at her.”
Reina trailed behind the group. She gazed up at the treetops and kicked dead leaves out of her way. She took barely any notice of the others. “What do you think she’s thinking about back there?” Aeifa asked.
Tara shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe she’s got a sweetheart back in Felsite territory. Maybe she told her father the story he wanted to hear about how excited she was to come out here and see Lycaon territory when she really wanted to stay home with her sweetheart.”
“Not likely,” Aeifa countered. “Did you see the way she looked at Taman? She doesn’t have any sweetheart back in Felsite territory, at least not one she’s dreaming about.”
“At least she didn’t look at Taig that way,” Tara remarked. “That would give me a stomach ache I’d never get rid of.”
Aeifa laughed. Taig and Ari walked behind them and talked in low tones, no doubt discussing the new arrivals, too. The Ursidrean boys came behind them, shoulder to shoulder. They didn’t talk, but inspected the surroundings with direct and curious intensity. When Tara looked back, she found Allen staring at her with a fixed expression on his face. She turned around and didn’t look back again.
“What about those boys?” she whispered to Aeifa.
“Not much,” Aeifa snapped. “They’re so coarse and thick-headed.”
Tara couldn’t help laughing. “They aren’t as thick-headed as their father. They take after their mother.”
“You can have them both, then,” Aeifa replied. “I wouldn’t touch either of them with a ten foot pole.”
Damen (Dragons of Kratak Book 2) Page 72
