by V. K. Ludwig
And he’d rode the plains as well, I could tell by his tan. “I’m fine.”
He hugged me even tighter. “Katedo said that… rebel didn’t harm you, but I need to hear it from you.”
“Toagi would never harm me.” My stomach roiled at the accusation alone, but Dad’s concern was only natural, so I took my time as I freed myself from his embrace. “He’s no rebel, Dad. Don’t call him that. Toagi cares deeply for all of his kind, and his claim to the tribe is substantial.”
Those wrinkles around the corners of his vibrant green eyes deepened. “How can you say that? He captured you, Ceangal.”
I held his gaze when I said, “Desperation is often the root of poor choices. I’ve heard of a male who invaded an entire planet once because his race was going extinct after they lost all females. So he captured those on Earth.” When his chin dipped to his chest, shoulders slumping, I added, “If anything, Toagi freed me.”
Reaching my hand out between us, I let nanites form in the shape of vines. They ran up along my arms, growing tiny buds that first bloomed into flowers before they closed into black armor, sitting a bit tight around a chest swelling with pride.
“Impossible,” Dad mumbled, stroking his hand over the scales on my arm. “For ten years, we tried to help you gain control over your nanites. Why now?”
“For the longest time, I couldn’t explain why.” Because Toagi was not only a strategist but also a master of psychological manipulation. “Once my bond showed, he asked me to lift nanites on specific parts of my body. Then he stung himself where his body mirrored them, causing my nanites to lift in reflex to the discomfort that came through the bond. He fooled me into thinking I did it, breaking through that self-doubt.”
“Resourceful, but still a rebel in the eyes of Katedo and Razgar.”
Those words sunk in and dragged my posture down with their weight. “Honor. Duty. Family.”
Dad cocked his head.
“The motto of the house da taigh L’naghal,” I said, my voice sounding thin. “Toagi is honorable. He did the dutiful thing and surrendered to save his tribe. And he’s family. My family. He’s my soulmate, and I love him.”
He stared at me for a while but eventually nodded. “I will see if I can somehow get involved. Luckily, the other warlords showed no interest in getting tangled in this mess.”
I squeezed his hand and rose, forcing my feet toward the door no matter how much they wanted to stall. “I’ll go check on him.”
“The corridors are stuffed with reporters.”
A familiar restlessness tightened my chest. I ignored it. Wouldn’t give it my attention and let it turn into a problem.
The door opened at my approach, but all I saw behind it were Solgad’s plains. Those flashes blinding my eyes? Solar flares. The storm of voices whipping around me? Nothing but rocks rolling down a ravine, each question little more than grit blowing against a mother tree in my ears.
Two of Katedo’s warriors fell in step beside me while the others blocked the reporters from following. They accompanied me along the black walls of Noja, the city carved into stone. Stone that emanated a kind of cool I hadn’t sensed in so long, my goosebumps didn’t flatten until I stepped into Toagi’s room, the air yeasty even against the astringent sharpness.
They’d cranked up the heat to combat his drop in body temperature. He shivered anyway, probably because one arm had escaped the soft pelts that wrapped around him. His arm was propped underneath his head, tip of his nose pressing against his biceps, where his skin flaked at each slow exhale.
“Kunozay,” I whispered so as not to wake him, and sat at the edge of his bed.
Compared to what I’d seen with Mayala, he was in decent shape. Only a few areas of his body had peeled into weeping wounds, mostly around his chest. I stroked the dark silver strands of his hair, and frowned at his busted lip where Katedo had likely punched him.
As if my mind had conjured him, the warlord stepped up on the other side of the bed. “Torin told me I’d find you here.”
He pulled himself a chair and sat, but not without giving a tug on his pants as if to avoid wrinkles in his black uniform. Once again, he looked every bit like what his title suggested, although his blue gaze had lost some of its calm as it flicked between Toagi and me.
A sudden inhale, and his low baritone resonated the scarcely furnished recovery room. “Did anybody ever tell you how I lost my mate?”
I let my eyes lock with his and shook my head. If I wanted Toagi to live, I needed to convince two warlords, Katedo being one of them. “No.”
“Freeraiders…” One word, and his voice trailed off as he shifted on his chair, features distorting into those of agony before he spoke again. “Freeraiders attacked my tribe when our females were in heat. A common occurrence, it shames me to say. It is how they claim them since they otherwise have little access to females outside of the daughters born within their collective.”
Once more, I was reminded of the control Toagi had imposed onto himself all this time. “Your mate died during the attack?”
“I sent all of the females and children to seek safety on a plateau, along with my mate, Yara. A group of the raiders already waited for them, leaving them no escape route. When I spotted them up there, seconds from being attacked… the dread I sensed that day, the utter helplessness…” His lips pressed into a white slash, and his gaze dropped to a speck of dust he brushed off his pants. “The night Toagi stole you was a painful reminder of my failings.”
So it wasn’t just honor that drove him to pursue Toagi relentlessly, but perhaps old guilt as well. “I’m sorry you lost her.”
“She was a fantastic warrior. Killed three of the raiders, but not the fourth. When our bond severed… goddess help me, the burn sears to this sun.” He pointed at the bed. “I rested right there, unconscious for almost a moon. My son had lost his mother, and I had almost followed her with the lack of distance between us. When I woke, it was as if I’d done so in the wrong body. My chest, arms, lungs… everything felt… strange. Wrong.” A thick swallow ran down his throat, and his voice returned thin and brittle. “Empty.”
“Mayala told me something similar. Yelim, one of Toagi’s warriors, stung her when she was close to dying.”
“Yes,” he said with a curt dip of his head, which caused the end of his black braid to fall off his shoulder. “My shimid informed me. Your father was… kind enough to send one of his stargazers to collect the sick. Mayala is among them, along with her mate who insisted ferociously to accompany her. She is much improved, from what I’ve been told.”
A smile hushed across my lips. “She never struck me as someone who would die easily.”
Katedo joined in my smile and scoffed, the expel of breath so close to a laugh it eased the tension in the air. “No, Mayala is not one for resignation. One of the reasons I chose her for you.”
When the muscles in my face eased, and the last traces of a smile faded from Katedo’s lips, I said, “Thank you for searching for me so tirelessly.”
“Never in my life did I expect him to take the tribe this far out, into an area that’s infested with freeraiders. Urizayo Razgar and I kept wondering how he survived, dodging them for such a long time, almost thriving if you take the conditions into account.”
“He’s quite inventive,” I said. “Studied engineering in Noja.”
“Oh yes, he was the one who helped redesign the air vent system as a graduation project. Needless to say, I ordered a couple of changes to the security measurements.” His nail tapped the metal frame on his chair a few times. “We assumed his plan was to get you with child to force us to recognize him as a warlord.”
“You assumed correctly.”
“What changed? My shimid told me females of your kind come into heat once every moon, so it’s safe to say you’ve gone through one out there.”
I thought on that for a moment before I said, “He didn’t want to repeat his father’s mistake, putting a child into this world that w
ould forever be dubbed as the rebel’s son.” When he said nothing to that, only pursed his lips, I added, “What can I do so you will spare his life?”
His long inhale instilled little confidence as he once more shifted on the chair, fingers rubbing over his chin. “I hesitated, you know. Even before he made me aware of your presence, I’d eased away my dagger. You have come to a strange world to live among even stranger people. From what Torin told me, you volunteered, which earned my respect, perhaps even admiration. As much as Toagi deserves death, you don’t deserve the hardship of a severed bond.”
“Does he? Deserve death?” When Toagi shivered again, I tugged one of the pelts higher before returning my attention to Katedo. “Telkem tried to kill Toagi during the trial, which inevitably led to his own death.”
He tilted his head, eyes narrowing for a fraction of a second. “His mother was no urizaya.”
“Was she not?” Keeping his gaze, I paused for a moment, putting emphasis on the words which followed. “The day I arrived, you told me that I would be your urizaya, even without zovazay. That’s a double standard right there. How could I be an urizaya without a sting, and she wasn’t although she carried the scar to prove it?”
He averted his gaze, his upper lip peeling over his fangs. “I said that, didn’t I?”
“I won’t pretend I know much about how things work between warlords. What I do know is that Toagi’s care goes beyond the borders of his tribe. He could have left the dying behind and brought the rest to safety. He could have killed the scouts he captured—”
“He killed one of Razgar’s scouts.”
“I killed him.” The words sunk heavily onto my stomach, weighted down by how his eyes snapped to me, fangs gnashing. “He attacked Toagi. Strangled him with his tail until I couldn’t breathe anymore. I panicked and did the only thing I hoped would stop it. Toagi only took the blame because… because he knew I might end up back at Noja, and couldn’t compromise myself like this.”
“I see,” he ground out, but a roll of his shoulders eased the tension from his jaws. “Who knows?”
“Toagi. Potentially Nafir and Yelim.”
“That detail will remain between you and me. For now, it is best to let Razgar believe Toagi killed his scout. It will work in your kunozay’s favor once we… adjust the truth some for the sake of peace.”
A not-so-small amount of surprise washed over me. “Are you saying you’re sparing him?”
“If it was that easy, I would kick him into the plains and tell him to wait his turn before he can occupy Noja with his tribe. I will forever loathe him for how he played me for a fool, but I cannot deny that he has led the tribe well given the hardships. He surrendered them to spare our people pain. Besides, I cannot bring myself to break your bond. Mostly because I… I cannot offer you to replace it.”
“I don’t hold it against you.” Not with how I witnessed Mayala’s reluctance, perhaps even fear over making herself this vulnerable once more.
“And yet, it complicates things,” he said. “Razgar demands retribution for the dead scout. Toagi’s death will not void the agreement between us warlords and the Empire or the expectations it places on you. It would be cruel of me to marry you now without offering a bond.”
A hollowness spread at my core. “So… you’re saying Razgar might do it.”
He scoffed. “Oh no, he won’t. Razgar harbors such hate for your kind, he would gladly sever the bond just to see you suffering. The day he bonds a female from Earth to him will be the day the universe comes to a standstill.” He leaned forward, propping his elbows onto his thighs as he searched for my eyes, not speaking again until I held his gaze for several seconds. “And that is exactly where our only solution to this lies.”
Our solution?
My pulse picked up at that, and I rose from the bed, turning fully toward Katedo. “You’ll help me?”
“I’ll try,” he said. “Luckily, the other warlords want no business with this. Razgar, however… I had to involve him and employ his help to cover the vastness of the plains more efficiently. I cannot deny him being part of this decision. Solgad suffered many sun cycles of civil unrest, and warlords are only now starting to work together again, as we used to before the wars.”
“Would he strain the political relationship with the Empire for it?”
“Razgar wants peace,” he said. “However, as much as he would curb his hate for the Empire enough to ensure it, I don’t expect him to actively contribute to it. Four warlords. Three unmated. He was the only one refusing to marry a female from Earth.”
Rubbing my hands together, I paced beside the bed, my stomach a nervous, bubbling mess. If we cornered Razgar, putting him into a position where he needed to decide between Toagi’s death and marrying me, my kunozay might live. With a bit of luck and proper deception, he might even gain a seat among the warlords.
There was only one problem.
I folded my hands in front of my chest, the next question bittering the back of my tongue. “And what if Razgar agrees to marry me? If only to witness my suffering?”
Katedo’s cheeks hollowed as he sucked on them, deep frown lines furrowing his forehead. “Pray to Mekara he won’t.”
Twenty-Five
Toagi
It took me two suns of rest before I managed to stand for longer than ten minutes. Now I paced the recovery room butt-naked, sparing the blisters on my chest and thighs the agony of wearing clothes.
That strategy worked until Katedo strolled into the room, tossed a folded uniform onto the bed, and said, “Get dressed.”
I eyed him warily. “What for?”
“For the sake of our image in the face of interstellar broadcasts, mostly.” The chair legs screeched across the polished concrete floor as he pulled it away from the wall before he sat. “For decades, the Empire slandered our race, calling us savage, vicious. Not an impression we should encourage right this moment, after you kidnapped the media’s darling.”
“Am I to stand trial before all warlords?”
Why else was I still alive? Even before Ceangal showed up, Katedo’s blade had angled away from my throat. He’d flinched when I’d confessed my love for Ceangal. Was it possible this warlord hid compassion underneath an armor of rigidness?
“You will explain your actions to us,” he said curtly. “The bond… complicates all this, adding a whole new dimension of issues. Issues we need resolved before information leaks into the wrong hands. There is only so long we can keep this under the covers.”
For a moment, it sounded like he wouldn’t cut my throat after all, but I didn’t get my hopes up. Even if he spared me, the alternative of a cell in the lowest parts of Noja would burden Ceangal just the same. Perhaps even more.
I took the pants first and slipped into them, hissing each time the black fabric tore across patches of raw skin. After such a long time in the plains, several solar cycles, the tightness of the uniform pebbled my skin. Worse were those silver metal buttons on the shirt since the backside seared against wounds barely crusted over.
Katedo crossed an arm in front of his chest while the other reached up, thumb continuously brushing across the scars on his cheek. “I meant to ask, how did you manage to dodge the freeraiders out there? Over the sun cycles, many tribes suffered attacks while settling not nearly as far out as yours. Yet you remained unbothered, from what I’ve heard.”
“When I was young, I often disappeared into the droughty plains. Nobody cared. Probably didn’t even notice, so I stayed there for several suns.” I slipped into those black boots he’d dropped by the edge of the bed. “If you pay attention to their movements, you’ll see that there’s a pattern to how they travel and rotate. They’re not stupid.”
“Clearly not, considering how long warlords have tried to eradicate them, or at least gain some sort of governance over them.” He made a sound at the back of his throat and lifted his chin slightly. “You played me for a fool once, but it will not happen a second time. Jal’zar ice fe
ver has been well under control among the tribes. Such a massive outbreak among your people would not have been possible…” He put a warning pause there. “…unless you were in direct contact with the freeraiders, where the infection risk is greatly increased.”
Of course, he’d figured that out. I might have tricked Katedo once, but a warrior didn’t become warlord over the largest tribe, leading them successfully for over a decade if he were a true fool.
“One of my elders, Nek’sha, offered himself as a traveling teacher to their hordes,” I said, my knuckles aching when I tied my boots. “In exchange, they left us alone.”
“But that was not all, was it? The com cube you had in your possession was stamped with an ID at the bottom. Freeraiders ransacked Razgar’s tribe two sun cycles ago and stole it.”
“And I bought it from them with three hand-drawn blueprints for gravity water pumps.”
Katedo gave a curt nod, and something akin to an approving smile curled on one side of his mouth. That… came as a surprise, but the words which followed hit me in the guts.
“When I was, um, I do not remember. Perhaps thirty sun cycles old?” His eyes flicked toward the ceiling for a moment before he nodded. “My tribe occupied Noja at the time you finished your higher studies. On the sun when you received your honors, your father leaned against one of the columns by the gathering area—”
“My father was not there when I graduated,” I snarled, and old pain swelled to the surface. “Neither was he there when I killed my first ushti. Hunted my first tendetu. Rode my yuleshi for the first time.”
Katedo exhaled with a sigh. “He was there. I only saw him in passing on my way to consult with my shimid, but he was there, watching you from afar.”
My throat narrowed, thickened until I had no other choice but to swallow. “Why are you telling me this?”
He only shrugged and leaned deeper into the chair. “You know, I never quite understood the relationship between you and your father. But then, you stole Ceangal, and I realized I may retrieve her pregnant with your child after killing you or after you fell off a cliff. And then what? After I married her, would I raise the child? Love it? Would it be a bastard or the heir after my first son?”
