At last, they broke out of their trance and followed her. At first she walked slowly. They didn’t want to move away from the village. After a while, though, the clouds covered the sky. She walked faster. She kept hold of Reina’s hand and tugged her along. The path sloped downward into dense forest where no light penetrated. The strangers tried to hang back, but Tara urged them onward. “Just a little farther.”
A clap of thunder rumbled across the sky. Taman and Allen jumped, and Reina clutched Tara’s hand. “It’s okay. It’s only thunder, but we have to hurry.”
She hauled on Reina’s hand and broke into a run. The boys crashed through the undergrowth. They broke branches and tripped over fallen logs, but Tara continued murmuring, “Come on!” They followed the sound of her voice.
The first spattering of rain bounced on fallen leaves, and a misty smell rose from the soil underfoot. Tara ran faster. The others barely kept up, but she couldn’t slow down now. She barreled down the path, through a stream bed, and up the other side to a massive tree trunk blocking the path. She jumped over it and dragged Reina with her.
She let go of Reina’s hand to pull Taman over. Allen scrambled down after them, and Tara pushed all of them into a hole in the ground behind the tree. Aeifa, Ari and Taig waited for them in the cave. No sooner were they all inside than the storm broke with deafening fury. Lightning streaked down to the ground, and the noise of thunder and rain made conversation impossible.
Taig and Aeifa squatted near the back of the cave. Reina and the Ursidreans stood at the opening and stared out at the tempest. Ari laughed, but his voice fell hollow on their ears. “Haven’t you ever seen rain before?”
“I’ve seen rain,” Reina replied, “but never like this.”
Tara touched her shoulder. “Come inside and get warm.”
The newcomers turned around and saw for the first time the fire Taig and Aeifa kindled deeper inside the cave. The light dazzled Reina’s eyes. “Where did you get the wood for that?”
“We keep it here in case of emergencies,” Tara told her. “There’s food, too, if you’re hungry, but the most important thing is to keep warm and dry. You’re all frozen to the bone.”
Chapter 3
The cave filled with warmth and the group filled their bellies with food stored in the cave. Everyone started to relax. “How long do we have to stay here?”
“The storm will be over by morning,” Ari replied. “Then we can go back to the village.”
“Have you stayed in this cave before?” Reina asked.
“All the time,” Aeifa replied. “That’s why we keep it stocked with everything we need in case we get stuck out overnight.”
“We even stay here when we don’t get stuck,” Taig added. “Sometimes we stay here just for fun.”
“So we don’t have to go home,” Tara chimed in.
“Who wants to go home?” Ari asked.
Everyone laughed. Tara turned to Allen. “Tell us about your home. What’s it like? Is it true you live in caves all the time?”
He looked around. “Our caves aren’t like this one. They’re enormous. The cave at Harbeiz is as big as that cliff you jumped off at the swimming hole.”
Tara eyes widened. “Really? How can that many people live together in one place? Where do you get food?”
“The store chambers and transmogrifiers make the food,” he replied.
“What’s that?” Tara asked.
“They’re machines that create food by realigning the molecular matrix of organic substances,” he told her. “We mine rock from the center of the mountain and feed it into the transmogrifiers. They....well, they transmogrify it into food.”
Tara stared at him with her mouth open, but she couldn’t answer. Taig spoke up. “We hear about the Ursidreans’ technology, but we’ve never seen anything like it. It sounds amazing.”
“It’s not amazing when you live with it all your life,” Allen replied. “It’s normal. I’m amazed how you live out here without it. Do you really hunt and gather all your food from the forest?”
“Where else would we get it?” Taig asked. “No one hands it to us on a plate.”
“I heard,” Reina broke in, “that the Ursidreans have technology that can heal wounds and cure diseases. Is that true? I wonder any Ursidreans ever die.”
“We have technology to treat some diseases,” Allen replied, “and we have bone repair sonofiers and organ repairing nano-robots, but we can’t cure every disease. We can’t stop people from dying. Their bodies get old and worn out, and sometimes someone gets so badly hurt, they can’t be repaired. A lot of people died in the wars. We couldn’t save them.”
A hush fell over the group. “I suppose,” Tara murmured, “we should be grateful our parents are working for this peace agreement. I’m glad we’re growing up in a world where we can be friends instead of enemies.”
“My father says,” Taman added, “everyone in Harbeiz knows someone who lost a family member in the war. He says every family in the whole Ursidrean faction lost someone. The Avitras killed helpless children and defenseless old people.”
“That’s the Avitras,” Ari countered. “Not everyone is like them.”
“All the factions fought in wars,” Tara pointed out. “No one is innocent.”
“Except the Aqinas,” Taig countered. “They never fought in any war.”
Aeifa broke in. “They got others to do their fighting for them.”
“My mother says that’s a lie,” Allen argued. “She says every faction has old prejudices against all the others, and that no one ever bothered to make sure they knew exactly where the borders were. That’s what caused all the wars. Everyone fought everyone else, and everyone suffered.”
“Well, we won’t,” Reina declared. “We won’t continue these horrible wars. We’ll keep the peace our parents worked so hard to build for us.”
“You’re right, Reina,” Tara replied. “Let’s all agree right here and now to stay friends, no matter what. We’re three of the five faction sitting right here. Our parents are Alphas, and they have the influence to overcome all these obstacles. We’ll do the same thing. We’ll make sure their efforts aren’t wasted and Angondra doesn’t fall back into turmoil.”
A murmur of agreement went around the circle.
“That’s all very well,” Taig pointed out, “but you can’t just wave your hand and make those prejudices disappear. We might be friends, but no peace will become real until the factions start interbreeding and become one people again.”
“How likely is that to happen?” Ari asked. “I mean, here we are. We’re three factions right here in one cave. You don’t see us throwing ourselves at each other.”
They exchanged glances, first one way and then the other. Then Taig snorted with laughter. The Ursidrean boys stole glances at Reina and Aeifa. Allen dropped his eyes to the ground.
“That proves nothing,” Taman remarked. “We hardly know each other.”
“That never stopped anybody,” Aeifa pointed out.
“You can’t tell me peace is impossible just because we haven’t fallen into each other’s arms and nooked,” Reina argued.
Tara’s head whipped around. “Nooked? What does that mean?”
Ari paced around the cave. “It must be a Felsite word for scroggin.”
Reina frowned. “Scroggin?”
Allen looked up. “My mother says scroggin is a mixture of nuts and dried fruit. It’s something you eat.”
Ari waved his hands. “Scroggin is sex. Don’t you know that?”
“Obviously we all have different words for it,” Tara pointed out.
“All I meant,” Reina replied, “was that the factions will start interbreeding over time once the old hostilities break down. That should be obvious to anybody.”
“Why shouldn’t it happen here?” Ari asked. “We’re not hostile to each other. We’re all mature and in the prime of our youths. If the factions are goi
ng to interbreed, why shouldn’t we?”
Tara threw a stick at him. “Sit down and shut up. These are our guests, and you’re talking about corking ‘em when they just rolled into our village. You should be ashamed of yourself.”
Ari batted the stick away. “I’m just saying....”
“Don’t say,” she snapped. “I’m telling you to sit down and put a plug in it, or you’ll answer to me.”
He glared at her for a moment. Then he sank down by the fire with a sigh. “I’m just saying....” He didn’t finish his sentence.
The others stared into the fire, too. No one dared to speak until Taig muttered under his breath. “We could do a little experiment to find out if he’s right.”
Everyone rounded on him. They all talked at once, but he only sat there with the firelight glowing on his face until they quieted down.
“We’re not experimenting,” Tara told him. “These are our friends and our guests. The least you can do is treat them with respect. Save your experiments for the four of us.”
“We can’t experiment on the four of us,” he replied. “We’re cousins. This could be the only time we get a chance to try something like this. We’re from different factions, we’re not related to each other, and we’re isolated for the night.”
Ari slapped his thigh. “By jingo, he’s right!”
Tara lashed out at him with another stick. “Will you knock it off? No one’s experimenting on anybody. We’re spending the night here until we can take these kids back to their parents. If you want to experiment on somebody, find one of your friends in the village and see how willing they are to go along with your lunatic experiment.”
Aeifa turned to Taig. “What did you have in mind?”
“Aeifa!” Tara exclaimed.
Aeifa held up her hands. “I’m just asking. It can’t hurt to hear what he has to say.”
Tara groaned. “For pity’s sake, don’t encourage him.”
“I’m only suggesting,” Taig told her, “we find out if our factions have any chance of overcoming their past hostilities. If I’m right, peace won’t be possible until members of the different factions can consider members of other factions as potential mates. Am I right?”
“All the factions can consider others as potential mates,” Allen pointed out. “Our mothers came from another planet and mated with Angondran men.”
“They came from another planet,” Taig pointed out. “They didn’t come from another hostile faction that engaged in war and genocide. That’s the difference.”
Taman squared his shoulders. “Who are you saying engaged in genocide?”
“So how are you going to experiment?” Ari asked. “How are you going to find out if we’ve overcome our hostilities?”
“We could play a friendly little game of Point,” Taig replied.
“This is insane,” Tara burst out. “Forget it.”
“What’s Point?” Reina asked.
“Forget it,” Tara snapped. “We’re not playing.”
“You want to play as much as the rest of us,” Aeifa told her. “Don’t you want to find out whether Allen feels the same way about you as you feel about him?”
In a flash, Tara was on her feet. She cut the air with her hand. “You take that back!”
Aeifa laughed out loud. “You see? She does want to play.”
“Of course she does,” Taig replied. “She’s itching to.”
Tara stared at her brother and her cousins. Then she stole a sidelong glance at Allen and found him watching her. The blood rushed to her cheeks and she turned away.
Ari rubbed his hands together. “Right. Now, here’s how you play. We all sit in a circle and take turns tossing a stick in the air—like this.”
He picked up a stick from next to the fire and flipped it into the air. It landed on the ground and bounced. It came to rest, and the whole group looked down at it.
“Whoever it points to,” he explained, “you have to kiss that person. See? It’s pointing at Reina.” He smiled at her. “So I have to kiss her.”
Reina stiffened. “But the other end of the stick is pointing at Aeifa. How can you tell who you’re supposed to kiss?”
“Aeifa’s my sister,” he told her. “It should be pretty obvious who I’m supposed to kiss.”
“What if it isn’t obvious?” Allen asked. “What if someone throws the stick and it’s pointed at two people? How do you decide who to kiss?”
Ari waved his hand. “What difference does it make? Let’s just play the game.”
“I have an idea.” Taig picked up the stick. He picked up a rock from the ground and notched the end of the stick. “There. Whoever this mark points to is the person you kiss.”
“What if one of the boys throws it and it points to another boy?” Reina asked. “Or what if it points to your brother or your cousin?”
“Then we’ll throw again,” Taig replied.
No one said anything. They looked around at each other, and more than one of them shifted back and forth in their seats.
“So what about it?” Ari took a step toward Reina. “I get first kiss.”
Reina held up her hands. “That was just a demonstration. We haven’t even decided yet if we’re going to play.”
Taig scanned the faces surrounding him. “Does everybody want to play?”
Chapter 4
Ari hefted the stick in his hand. “Let’s get started.”
Taig snatched it out of his hand. “Not so fast. You had your toss. Now it’s my turn.”
“That was just a demonstration.” Ari tried to grab it back. “I didn’t get a kiss out of it.” They tugged the stick back and forth.
Tara leaned forward and snatched the stick away from both of them. “How can you idiots be so rude? One of our guests should have the first toss.”
She started to hand the stick across the fire to the Ursidrean boys when Taig guffawed with laughter. “Look at her. She’s dying for a kiss.”
At the last minute, she moved the stick away from the Ursidreans and handed it to Reina instead. Reina weighed the stick in her hand and examined it. She swept the group with a triumphant smile. Then she tossed the stick in the air. It landed on one end and bounced once before it lay still. Its notched end pointed toward Taig.
Ari frowned. “That toss was no good. Toss again.”
Taig jumped to his feet. “No, no. It was a good toss.”
Aeifa laughed. “It’s pointing at Taig. Give him a kiss, Reina.”
“You don’t have to do this, Reina,” Tara began.
Ari rounded on her. “You’re the one who gave her the stick. If she didn’t want to play, she wouldn’t have tossed.”
Aeifa took Tara’s hand. “Sit down. It’s all right. She wants to play, so let her play.”
Tara looked around the circle with wild eyes. Allen smiled at her, and Taman watched the game with quiet confidence. The game didn’t disturb them at all. Even Reina stood poised and ready to kiss Taig. So why did it disturb Tara so much? She’d played Point with other young Lycaon in the village. Getting kissed by some local boy or kissing one of them in an empty hut meant nothing. So why did it mean something now—and what did it mean? Why did the idea of kissing Allen, or him kissing her, give her a squirrelly feeling in her guts?
Reina took a step forward to meet Taig. She didn’t hesitate. She smiled up at him. Her tiny form took up twice the space in the cave it had a moment before. The others stared at her in amazement.
She approached Taig. Her head didn’t even reach up to his chin. He gazed down at her in stunned surprise. He barely recognized her. Tara barely recognized her. Where was the tame little Felsite princess they took from the village that afternoon?
Reina glanced down at Taig’s lips. Then she pushed herself up on tiptoe and planted a quick, innocent kiss on his lips. Her mouth parted from his with a smack. Then she stepped back to her place.
Aeifa burst out laughing. “There yo
u go, Taig.”
The rest of the group laughed along with her. It was the perfect ice-breaker. Ari put out his hand for the stick, but Allen darted forward and grabbed it before he could get it. “I’m next.”
Tara blushed and kept her eyes on the fire while he got up and took a wide stance. He flipped the stick into the air, and the others held their breath. Tara stole a peek at it and found the white tip pointed straight at her.
Her heart skipped a beat, and her head shot up. She found Allen’s eyes fixed on her face, and she couldn’t break her gaze away. He regarded her with a confident curiosity.
“No fair,” Ari muttered. “He did that on purpose.”
“Of course he did,” Aeifa replied. “What did you expect when you suggested the game? Anybody you can flip the stick to point at the person they want it to point at.”
Allen waited. Tara squirmed. “Well?”
He took a step toward her, and his broad back blocked out the fire. He loomed over her with his face in the dark. She couldn’t read his expression. Her breath caught in her throat. Why did a simple kiss bother her so much? It meant nothing in the end. He would go back to Ursidrean territory in a few days, and she would probably never see him again.
He leaned over, and without warning, he swept her up in his arms. One arm cradled her shoulders, while the other hand pressed against the small of her back. He pressed her against him, and his warmth enveloped her. The heat of the fire radiated through her clothes from his skin, and she almost lost her balance.
His mouth closed over her lips, and a delicious perfume rushed to her head. She closed her eyes and sagged into him. He supported her weight, and his lips collapsed against her mouth. Her mouth opened, and his tongue slipped inside. Her body stiffened against him, but she didn’t pull away.
Aeifa’s laugh brought them apart. Allen peered down into her eyes, but she couldn’t see him in the dark. He drew back. His saliva burned on her lips.
He returned to his place across the fire, but Tara couldn’t read his expression. She stole a glance around the circle. Taman took the stick from his brother. “My turn.”
Tara didn’t see where the stick landed. She couldn’t take her eyes off Allen. The rest of the group faded into the cave walls until Taman stepped in front of Allen and blocked her view. Then she looked and saw the stick pointing at Aeifa.
Damen (Dragons of Kratak Book 2) Page 74
