Ayrie: An Auxem Novel

by Lisa Lace

  "I wish," snorted Eden.

  Thiago found himself staring as she gathered her unruly mass of copper hair over one side of her neck, exposing a thin sliver of her porcelain flesh. She started up the song once more. This time, she kept her eyes closed, allowing her head to rock back and forth to the music.

  "This is a Louis Armstrong classic called 'West End Blues.' It's one of only two songs I know how to play on a guitar," Eden explained. She stopped playing abruptly, smiling as she turned back to face him. "And that's all I know. What do you call this instrument?"

  "It's a theremin. Ironically, it's a device from Earth. I believe a Russian physicist created it. I'm not sure how it made its way from Earth to space, but I retrieved it from an old junkyard and tinkered with it until I got it to work."

  "Interesting," said Eden slowly, rising to help Thiago dismantle the device. She ran her tongue over her lips thoughtfully, clearing her throat as she handed him the pieces to stow away behind the arsenal. "Thanks for the food, by the way. It was tasty despite the appearance. I'm not sure if the burnt edges were intentional, but it was just like Dad used to make it."

  "No problem. I followed a recipe I found from your home planet. It wasn't yellow, but I did what I could."

  "It tasted fantastic," said Eden gently, playing with the wrinkled creases on her elbows. "It was sweet."

  "I'm pretty sure it was meant to be a savory dish."

  "I meant, what you did was sweet. You know, like all the 'garbage' sodas you bought for me in the fridge."

  "I ordered everything in one sitting and had it delivered," Thiago said hastily. He had hardly ever received praise from those around him and he was growing increasingly uncomfortable. "Besides, you're too stubborn to drink anything other than that toxic swill. I didn't want to come home to find you starved to death and staining my floors."

  "Oh, right. Sure," laughed Eden, punching him playfully on the arm. She fell back on a large cushioned armchair. Thousands of microscopic alien creatures in individual bean casings shifted under her weight. They swarmed together, massaging the tension out of her back through the fabric of the chair. "I think I'm growing on you."

  "You're welcome to think whatever you'd like," said Thiago tonelessly. He grabbed a jug of Pasquin ale from the cabinet above him and poured a shot into a clean goblet.

  As he guzzled down the bitter liquor, Eden looked up. She crossed the kitchen and moved to the kitchen countertop next to Thiago. He was facing away from her. Wordlessly, she inspected the aged scars on the side of his neck. One ragged scar appeared to stretch down his back, disappearing from the neckline of Thiago's hooded jumpsuit. Biting down on her tongue, she traced the mark with her fingertip.

  Thiago shivered at the unexpected contact, turning back questioningly. "Hey!"

  "Did you get this from the warehouse, or is it an old battle scar?"

  "I guess you could say it was my first. It turns twenty-four this year," said Thiago glumly.

  "Can I see it?" said Eden, her mossy-green eyes widening.

  "What? What for?" Thiago asked. Noting the adamant expression on Eden's face, he grudgingly agreed. He unzipped his jumpsuit from the waist, shedding off the top half of his outfit and casting it aside. Eden was taken aback by the ripples of muscle in his naked upper body, sculpted naturally by years of strenuous bounty hunting. Her diverted eyes roamed back to his scar. The flesh-toned wound stopped halfway down his spine.

  "Hang on a minute. Twenty-four years ago? You were just a kid."

  "I was nine."

  "The bombing from the Noxx territory wars was twenty years ago," Eden whispered. Her chest tightened. "What happened?"

  "Like you said, it happened over twenty years ago. There's no sense in bringing it up now."

  "I'm not going anywhere."

  "Fine, if you insist. We used to live out in the countryside, in an area called Myron Plains. There were a few hundred or so families, mostly similar to mine – husbands who'd fallen for their human mail-order brides and decided to start families of their own. Our unique family dynamic wasn't accepted or tolerated by society, which was why we were living in the country outskirts."

  Eden listened intently. She watched as she saw a fleeting look of vulnerability cross Thiago's steely composure.

  "My mother was making sweet bread in the kitchen. My father was out in the yard sharpening handmade tools he traded with other villagers in Myron. I'd just completed one of the passages my mother assigned to me, so I ran outside to play. I went to a creek I visited every day. I remember leaning over the bank of the river, playing with a couple of baby anuras. Out of nowhere, a blaring sound filled the air. All the anuras swam away from me for cover faster than I'd ever seen them move before."

  "Oh no," Eden breathed, her stomach twisting as she braced herself.

  "There was an explosion of course, but I barely remember it. The next thing I knew, I was washed up on the bank of a creek about thirty miles south from where I'd started. I still don't know how I managed to survive the blast. I wandered for days but eventually hiked back to my town. Everyone I knew was dead. They completely obliterated Myron. We made it into a graveyard shortly after."

  "The Land of the Fallen," said Eden morosely, tugging at the sleeve of her robe.

  "Right," said Thiago, averting his eyes. He cleared his throat, downing the rest of the ale and chucking his goblet into the sink.

  Thiago hadn't thought about the incident for over two decades, but it was always lurking at the corner of his mind, waiting to take over his thoughts. The memory started a wave of dormant emotions flowing through his body. Like everything that discomforted him that wasn't a physical problem, he tried to flush it out of his system. Thiago took a deep, revitalizing breath, swallowing a tickle building up in his throat.

  "I'm sorry," Eden murmured, her voice thick with emotion.

  Her fingers gingerly scraped down the length of his scar, feeling his shoulders tensing up under her wandering touch. There were no more words to say, but her chest swelled with the burning desire to ravage his deliciously firm body and take away his pain. She resisted her urge. Instead, she closed in on his rigid back, planting a line of softly sensual kisses along the length of his scar.

  Thiago spun around without warning, his hands smoothly circling her waist and pulling her close to him. Eden's surprised giggles trailed off timidly as the distance between his strikingly handsome face and hers dwindled. He cupped his hands around her chin and kissed her, delicately dragging down her bottom lip against his.

  Eden moaned, sinking into the kiss. As their lips collided, her hands traveled up and over the back of his head. The patterns on his shaved head felt bristly against her palms. His groping hands slid down her back and found their way to her butt. He smirked, awarding himself a hearty grab as he hoisted Eden off the floor and wrapped her legs around his waist.

  The pair continued to kiss as he carried her past a napping Hercules asleep in its nest. They teetered up the flight of steps, knocking sideways into the wall and railing before making it up the landing. Thiago gently placed her slender frame onto his bed. Eden's robe came undone as she toppled backward, the globes of her milky, bare breasts jiggling into view. She made a face, rubbing on her bandaged waist.

  "Be gentle. I'm injured, remember?"

  "Sorry." The impish grin on Thiago's face weakened Eden's legs. He climbed into bed and crawled on top of her. The back of his hands graced the supple bottom curves of her pear-shaped breasts. With his intense gaze steadily fixed on hers, his lips latched onto her nipple. She moaned, feeling herself hardening in his mouth as his tongue swirled around her.

  "When I was bandaging you today, it took all the restraint I had to refrain from looking at your body."

  Her appreciative whimpering was stifled while she chewed her lip. Squirming against the wrinkled sheets, she snatched his taunting hands and slapped them roughly onto her breasts. With her fingers interlaced through the gaps of his fervently kneading hands, she positione
d her legs around him. The sole of her foot moved against his cock bulging through his jumpsuit. Her toes wriggled as she pressed down and began to move her foot in circular motions.

  "You better do something about that before I do."

  Eden flashed him a quick wink, deliberately licking the ruby red of her lips. Thiago stripped off the rest of his jumpsuit and flung it behind him, sending the pair of pants flying over the second-floor railing. As he stood at the foot of the bed, Eden crept toward him, her breasts swaying slightly from side to side. She wrapped her fingers around the thick girth of his cock and steered it into her mouth. As his tip touched the back of her throat, she gagged slightly, titillated tears springing to the corners of her eyes.

  Eden pulled away from him, discarding her bathrobe and panties onto the floor. She climbed back into bed on all fours, turning away from him. With her fleshy, bubble-shaped ass ready and poised in midair, she shifted her legs further apart. As Thiago eyed the moist gleam of pink blinking at him from her shifting legs, his cock pulsed in her hands. Slathering a palmful of spit over his erection, he mounted her from behind, teasing the tip of his pole with the slickness of her invitingly warm crevice.

  Slowly, Thiago eased himself through the tightness of her folds. Eden whipped back her head, her fiery hair cascading over her shoulders. Her pussy nursed him as he pumped in and out of her. She tightly gripped the sheets to keep herself standing upright and her knees from buckling underneath her. Thiago had his hand fastened to her waist, the other caressing the jumping spheres of her soft breasts.

  Beads of sweat poured down the canvas of Thiago's back like raindrops racing to the bottom of a windowsill. As he reached around to tweak the delicate pearl above her folds, her back arched on the rocking bed, a look of turbulent delight unfolding across her face. She felt her toes curling as her juices gushed over Thiago, who was still drilling in and out of her.

  Sensing the closeness of his release, Thiago dismounted. Eden's lanky, feminine physique crumbled across the bed, a sensation of numbness crawling up her legs. She watched as Thiago guided his creamy emissions onto a pile of his clothes on the floor. A golden glow flickered across the arrows intersecting the U-marking on his forehead. As quick as the light came, it vanished, disappearing at the end of his release.

  Thiago rolled his head around his neck as he picked up his clothes and stuffed them into the congested hamper, which was in danger of exploding at any minute. As he moved to the steps, intending to fix himself another snack, Eden hemmed loudly behind him. He turned back to face Eden, her glistening, naked body nestling under the covers of the bed.

  "Where are you going?"

  "Downstairs, to get something to eat. Sorry. Are you hungry, too?"

  "No." She patted the space next to her.

  Thiago was baffled but decided to play along. In his previous sexual encounters, there had never been a need to stick around after the deed. He didn't understand how Earth girls would be any different, but he thought it wouldn't hurt to humor the touchy-feely human.

  He lifted the sheets and climbed into bed next to her, laying perfectly, awkwardly still. Eden lay her head on his warm chest. His heartbeat intensified under her weight. Thiago could feel his tough exterior begin to soften. Slowly and carefully, he slipped his hand around her neck and held her close to him. He began petting the side of her head, threading her coppery curls through the spaces between his fingers.

  Within moments, the pair was fast asleep and snoring in each other's arms.

  Chapter Twelve

  "Are you sure you want to go through with this?"

  Thiago clipped a pair of aviator sunglasses onto the bridge of his nose, shielding his eyes from the glaring rays of the sun. Eden stood opposite him, clad in an all-black jumpsuit. Her flattened curls peeked out the bottom of her full-head helmet, bunched to one side in a long, tight ponytail.

  She craned her neck upward, gazing through the blue tinted visor of her helmet. Five heavy sacks of millie flour painted with bullseye targets hung from the branches of a strapping, leafless tree. Thiago moved behind the trunk and prepared to change the positions of the sacks. Eden grunted, wielding a powerful weapon on the ground next to her.

  The steel rod glinted as it caught the sunlight. The top consisted of a foul metal ball fitted with serrated spikes and the thick, upturned ends of screws and bolts. As she raised it high above her head, her sore arm hurt from repeatedly lifting the weapon.

  "I'm sure. Bring it on."

  The sacks of flour began dropping sequentially at varying lengths, with Thiago orchestrating the flow from behind the tree. Eden swung forward, her arm burning with fatigue and the repeated exertion of force. She missed the sack to her left on her first try. Her blow fell flat on the target behind it. As she froze momentarily thinking about her failure, a sack in her blind spot swung directly at her. The bag smacked Eden in the visor, knocking her backward and onto the ground.

  "Do you still think the helmet was a bad idea?" said Thiago slyly, extending his hand.

  "Gloating's unattractive," Eden snapped back. She accepted his hand, allowing him to help her off the ground. Dusting off the dirt from the legs of her jumpsuit, she removed her helmet and held it against her waist. "I think I may have bitten off more than I can chew. My legs are sore from running with you every morning this week. I've fallen on my ass more times than I can count. I feel like I've got the brittle bones of a 90-year-old. What was I thinking?"

  "The 90-year-olds on this planet are at the height of their physical abilities. What other excuses do you have?"

  "I know, I know," Eden said miserably. She looked around at the makeshift training arena Thiago had meticulously constructed over the past few days. "When I asked if we could do a little one-on-one training session, I was expecting a couple of punching bags. Maybe I could run through some tires while you cheered me on from the sidelines."

  "Are you giving up so soon? I knew it would be difficult for you, but I thought you'd last a little longer."

  "I didn't say I was giving up," Eden interjected with a raised eyebrow. Her face glowed with determination. "I just need a little break."

  "Good," said Thiago, a knowing smile settling on his lips. He handed her a flask filled with water from a satchel strapped across his back.

  "Thanks," said Eden as she started taking huge gulps of water. She tipped the container back and splashed the rest of the water over her sweaty face. "Did you go to a bounty hunter training academy? Where did you learn to do everything?"

  "Most bounty hunters are self-trained. I hauled in my first captive when I was fifteen. I've grown accustomed to being alone all my life. I guess I figured it was always better to be safe than sorry. I observed and learned from watching others – how to swim and scale obstacles. I've never needed anyone else. Hercules was sufficient company. He's taught me more than anyone else could."

  "I can believe that," said Eden. Her heart warmed at the glisten of affection in Thiago's eyes every time he mentioned the name of his beloved companion.

  "You need to be vigilant. You can never be too prepared for whatever's out here. Even the most out-of-shape schmuck on this planet has twice the upper body strength than that of a 'fit' human."

  "Does this mean you're going to let me tag along on your next mission?"

  "No," said Thiago bluntly. He was unmoved by the disappointed expression on Eden's face. "Your training is in case you ever have to defend yourself in the spaceship. You'd be more of a burden than a help to me right now."

  "Thanks for the vote of confidence," mumbled Eden. She glared at the sacks of flour hanging above her. They were all completely intact. "What am I doing wrong?"

  "You need to adjust your stance," said Thiago, enclosing her in a half-embrace from behind. He placed his hands gently over her fingers, closing them properly around the weapon. He guided her hands forward in a straight, swinging motion. "Raise the windsor above your head and strike down for the most powerful strike. For you to hit the targets, it
's important to be aware of the placement of the windsor's head at all times. Do you think you can try again?"

  Eden exhaled deeply, nodding. Thiago went around the tree and picked up the loose ropes off the ground, looping them around his fingers. Eden pulled her helmet over her head, her breath fogging up the visor. As she counted down internally, she made a thumbs-up sign with her hand.

  "Ready!"

  The sacks began dropping, taunting her as they dangled in front of her. An uninhibited war cry sprang from her lips as she charged forward, the weapon raised high above her head. Her eyes were glued to the sacks like she was a hungry predator. In swift, hacking motions, the spikes of her windsor pierced through each and every one of her moving targets. Adrenaline sizzled through her veins as she jumped up the tree. The ridged soles of her boots locked into the trunk. She lifted off the ground for only a moment, yet it was enough to bludgeon the last bag of millie flour to oblivion.

  Eden landed on the ground, gawking at the scene around her. Coffee-colored grains leaked out of perforated holes in the bags and covered the ground in pools. Deflated sacks lay in the dirt like they'd been vigorously trampled by a stampede of horses. Thiago emerged from behind the tree, pride bursting from a toothy grin on his face.

  "Not bad for a beginner. I'm impressed."

  "Not bad?" Eden repeated giddily, breaking out in a victory dance. "I was magnificent! I didn't know I could do that! What are we going to do next?"

  "Don't you want to take a break? Maybe get some lunch?"

  "No!" Eden's eyes darted around the clearing of the training arena. "Let's do one more thing, and then I promise we can break for food."

  "Whatever you say. Your shooting skills need a lot of work," Thiago agreed. He looked back at Hercules, who was chasing a couple of avians around the parked spaceship. "I'll be right back. I need to pick up some practice targets and fix Hercules a meal."

  Eden placed her helmet on the ground and slowly wandered off to a cliff at the edge of the clearing. She unzipped a few inches from her jumpsuit, fanning her hands and welcoming a fresh draft onto her body.