Sarazen's Hunt

by Isabel Wroth

  *****

  Avoiding Kalix was becoming almost impossible. He was on her like a bad rash. In her face constantly, following her everywhere like she needed a guard dog.

  Kalix had discovered how Zee brought all Alec’s meals and invited himself to join them.

  Alec could only sit there and fume while Zee asked Kalix a million and one questions about anything his now fourteen-year-old brain could think up.

  At least he had stopped asking her questions about every damned thing. Now he was getting his information from Zhenya.

  Alec couldn’t decide if that was better, or worse.

  Alec’s pelts were finally finished curing and had been tanned by one of the more experienced warriors in the fortress.

  The skins carpeted the floor of her room, and every time she got out of bed to sink her toes into the soft fur, a mix of delight and triumph filled her.

  And speaking of fur, she had yet to make the change from human to Sarazen cat.

  Almost three weeks had gone by since the day Kalix had given her his blood to heal her wounds. Three weeks, and Alec hadn’t so much as popped a claw out from beneath her fingernails.

  She couldn’t feel the cat the others claimed spoke to them. Didn’t feel fur on the inside of her body or the pressure of a wild thing needing release.

  The inadequacy ate at her.

  Especially this morning as she had stood on the fortress walls and watched Kalix strip down with a handful of other warriors to patrol the woods in their fur.

  His beast was magnificent. Bigger than the rest who moved to patrol with him.

  Where the other males had pelts in varying shades of brown or red, Kalix’s fur was a mottled silver, just shy of dusty looking with vivid streaks of magenta around his eyes.

  More of the bright purple striped up his legs, though there wasn’t a single stripe on the bulk of his powerful body.

  “Alec?”

  She blinked out of her sightless staring into the trees. She turned to look down at Zee, hoping her smile looked somewhat genuine.

  His pale blue gaze tracked over her face for a moment before he went on, hooking his thumb over his broadening shoulder. Zhenya was almost as tall as she was now, and still growing.

  “There’s a call for you inside.”

  Alec ruffled his hair in thanks, when she should have just told him to take a message.

  Clary was waiting for her in the small holo-room, her smile lighting up the space and making Alec want to turn right around to go back to staring at nothing. Too late now.

  “Asho’na. To what do I owe the pleasure?”

  Clary rolled her eyes, “I told you not to call me that, Alec.” She had indeed, stating they were practically family and didn’t need to stand on ceremony.

  “I’m on my way to get you. We’re going to the market.”

  Alec frowned at the redhead, confused as to what they could possibly need to go to the market for. “Why?”

  “I need some things, and we need to talk.” Clary’s tone had hardened to clue Alec in to the fact that this was not a request.

  Alec licked her lips, wondering if it would be rude of her to ask if Clary was going to be bringing her kids. Though spending time with the kids might be less painful than this ‘talk’ Clary wanted to have with her.

  “Be there in five.”

  Alec took one step up into the transport, having thought maybe this whole ‘talking’ idea might be a good thing. Some time away from Kalix and the stiflingly constant guard he had on her.

  Yeah. No such luck. One step, and Kalix was right behind her, shrugging into a tunic. Alec almost growled in frustration.

  “Ready to go?” Clary asked with a big smile, getting right in Alec’s space to hug her tightly.

  Alec hated it. The only person who had ever hugged her so tight or with such meaning had been Meg. Thus, every time Clary hugged her, Alec thought of Meg.

  Alec also loved it, because Clary wasn’t afraid of her. Clary didn’t look at her and see an executioner: she saw Alec, the woman Clary’s mother had helped to raise.

  Alec forced herself to smile. “Sure.”

  “Good, come sit back here with me. Commander Kalix, why don’t you catch up with the warriors and discuss security.” Clary was not asking a question as she started to draw Alec toward the rear of the ship.

  Kalix took a step to follow them. “Asho’na, I have been instructed—”

  Clary interrupted Kalix with a cool glare. “I am fully aware what you’ve been instructed. Tarek told me all about it. Discuss the security plan with the others. I’m sure you want nothing untoward to happen in the marketplace.”

  With that, Clary escorted Alec into a private compartment. Alec sat when Clary waved at her, somewhat confused, and wondered what it was that Tarek had instructed Kalix to do.

  “So, how’s things?” Clary asked, settling in to her own chair as the transport lifted off.

  Alec arched a brow at the other woman. “Tense. What’s going on?”

  “How about we start with why you’re avoiding Kalix?”

  “I’m not avoiding him,” Alec stated stubbornly, going with it despite wondering why Clary was speaking Russian.

  Alec felt smothered. Almost like she had done something wrong to have Kalix constantly so close to her.

  Alec had not experienced the closeness of the ‘magical Sarazen bond,’ only the aggravation and inadequacy of its absence, and the way Kalix hovered just made her feel even more agitated.

  “Our translators learn languages, so we won’t have long before Kalix can understand us. I shamelessly eavesdropped on a conversation he had with Tarek. Apparently Kalix feels as though you’re ignoring him due to his implication that you were less than capable as a warrior.”

  A pang of hurt made her twitch.

  Alec fanned the fires of her anger to do her best to disguise whatever scent the pain might put off.

  Several times over the last few weeks, Alec had been tempted to let her pain run rampantly free, like a toxic perfume, in the hopes Kalix might go away.

  “I am neither ignoring nor avoiding him. I simply find it ridiculous how he has to be on my ass, everywhere we go.

  “I can’t leave my room without him popping out of the shadows like a ghost to haunt my every step. I swear, it’s like he’s waiting for me to have a nervous breakdown or something.”

  Clary made a casual sound, her foot bobbing up and down “You’re not wrong. Tarek was concerned by how angry you are all the time.”

  “What?” Alec scoffed incredulously.

  “You constantly skim the surface of what Sarazens consider bloodlust. Always on edge, ready to fight, angry. Now that you have a beast of your own, the danger becomes a little more intense.

  “You could shift in a fit of rage and basically turn into a blood hungry monster. With so many kids around, the warriors are on edge. And Kalix,” Clary sighed around a far too patient smile. “He’s doing his best to protect you.”

  “You’re joking, right?”

  Clary snorted, falling silent for the remainder of the short trip to the market, letting Alec simmer in her juices.

  When they landed, Clary got up and hooked her arm through Alec’s leading her out and into the market.

  The smells assaulted Alec with their complexity, the sounds of merchants advertising their wares loud and distracting. Her pulse jumped every time another voice boomed out from somewhere around them.

  “Tarek and Kalix think I’m a danger to the children, because I’m angry?” she clarified.

  Clary made an affirmative sound while asking the merchant how much a bolt of green fabric cost. Once Clary had purchased the entire bolt, they moved on and Alec tried to formulate a response.

  “Tarek shouldn’t worry. I haven’t felt the urge to do anything other than kick Kalix in the balls every time he gives me that condescending look when I strap on my knives before leaving my room.

  “Like he’s giving me this grunt of disapproval for
not having met his stupid expectations of how a human female should act.”

  Clary burst out laughing. So hard in fact that tears slipped down her cheeks.

  “It’s not funny.” Alec huffed.

  “It IS funny, because I promise you that’s not at all what he thinks.” Clary bumped her shoulder against Alec’s, and another twinge of pain hit Alec in the belly.

  Alec wanted to be here with Meg. Share all this with Meg.

  She pushed the pain down into the anger. Fueled her fire instead of giving in to the grief. She wanted to laugh at Kalix’s worry that her anger would cause her to go on a rampage.

  Her anger is what had kept her alive. Kept all the others alive on Moika. If anything, it would be happiness to cause a hypothetical breakdown. Alec didn’t know what that felt like. Wouldn’t know what to do with it if she did feel it.

  “You should talk to Kalix.” Clary murmured gently, “He is your mate, you know. Forever.”

  Alec shoved her hair out of her face and glanced sideways at Clary. “Instant husband, no divorce. I remember.”

  She ignored the weighty look Clary gave her next. Ignored the weird sensation of bugs marching over her skin and chose to focus on her surroundings instead.

  The marketplace was situated in a sparse forest, tents and temporary structures set up for easy breakdown.

  A merchant selling beautifully crafted swords and blades caught her eye, but she was distracted when Kalix moved into her line of sight.

  Naturally, he was frowning at her.

  “How are you and your beast getting along?”

  “Getting along? We’re not. I don’t think I have one.”

  Clary moved with her through a throng of people. Or rather, Clary moved with her into the protective knot of six muscle strapped warriors.

  Kalix and the others literally made a wall around the two of them until they got to the other side of the crowd, and then moved back to a more respectful distance. Alec was impressed by the warriors’ seamless ability to act as a single unit.

  “Of course you have one. You haven’t shifted yet?”

  “Nope. Not even so much as an abnormal amount of hair has sprouted.” That feeling of her flesh crawling and prickling intensified again.

  A roil of her stomach, like she was nervous, or about to vomit. Neither feeling was fun, but a shake of her head and the weird sensations disappeared.

  *****

  Kalix understood the frustration Alec must have felt when he had spoken over her head in a language she couldn’t understand.

  The entire time he had escorted his mate and the Asho’na through the market, the females had conversed in Alec’s native tongue.

  Kalix hadn’t been aware Clary could speak it, but the two went on in the strangely guttural language for hours, the volume of so many others speaking in the market making it next to impossible for him to hear all the words.

  It was infuriating, and as he had caught only pieces of their conversation, his language converter hadn’t had enough time or data to learn the complexity of the dialect.

  The few things Alec had touched in the marketplace he had purchased, hoping he might surprise her with them later. Maybe use the items to entice her to speak to him in more than just clipped one word answers.

  It had been three Earth weeks since the attack at the lake, since Kalix had given Alec his blood to heal her, and in not one single way had she seemed to have physically changed.

  He could smell his beast inside her, but it was faint. Almost no trace of it to speak of. They hadn’t developed a bond, no telepathic link to connect their thoughts and bring them closer. Yet his beast was constantly seeking his mate, still rabidly restless, pacing back and forth inside him.

  Alec’s scent was dominated with anger, yet every now and again he would catch a subtle whiff of her grief.

  Kalix had caught it twice today, the cloying smell of dying flowers. First when Clary had hugged Alec, then again in the market when the Asho’na had bumped her shoulder against Alec’s in a friendly way.

  Twice, Clary had carefully prodded at Alec’s slumbering beast.

  Twice, Kalix prepared for the worst, ready to leap on his mate at the slightest hint of her change, but Alec remained unaffected.

  That told him either Clary hadn’t pushed very hard, or Alec was in possession of a beast equal to Clary’s.

  He worried the latter was more likely. Worried such a thing might upset the delicate balance of their place within the pride.

  Kalix made weekly reports to Tarek on Alec’s progress. Or lack thereof, as it were. She had lost her temper several times over the last three weeks, and her beast hadn’t manifested once.

  Not so much as a claw had appeared. No fangs. No pupil dilation. No increase in scent to even hint her beast was roused. Tarek seemed as baffled as Kalix and had ordered a meeting with Ga’rae.

  Which was why a few hours later, Kalix was hesitating at the threshold to Alec’s quarters.

  He was uncertain what her reaction would be to the orders Tarek had given for an examination to determine why her beast hadn’t manifested itself yet.

  Alec glanced up from where she sat at her loom when he pushed the door open. Just a glance and then went right back to moving her fingers over the ancient machine that dominated an entire corner of the space.

  Alec had spools of costly ore threads at her feet, more intricately wrapped around the wooden frame. Zhenya had informed him Alec was in the process of creating some kind of curtains from the ore to hang in the windows. It was her wish to have the blast doors removed so she could see the sky, the cub said.

  Kalix’s intention to immediately inform her of the examination faded away to his curiosity.

  “I haven’t seen a loom used since I was a cub. Where did you learn to weave?” For that matter, where had she gotten the loom? And who had gotten it for her?

  His beast gave a territorial growl, imagining another male procuring such an item for Alec’s pleasure.

  “Sage. I wasn’t the best student, but since I don’t exactly have the skills needed to contribute around here, I needed something to do. So...curtains. They’re not the prettiest thing in the world, but they’ll work.”

  He moved closer to her, watching her fingers deftly curling a fine silvery thread over and under what looked like thousands more threads stretched across the loom, nimbly and quickly, using a needle carved from bone.

  “We have been summoned to the citadel. Ga’rae wishes to examine any changes made to you after having received my blood.”

  Alec snorted with amusement, her fingers never pausing in their movement through the loom.

  “You mean he wants to know why I continue to show no signs of change? Why I haven’t suddenly exploded into a blood thirsty monster despite constant levels of anger over the last few weeks?”

  The sarcasm in her tone made his lips peel back in a brief grimace. “Is that what you and Clary were discussing today?”

  She shot him an amused glance, one rife with mocking. “Aggravating, isn’t it? When someone speaks over you like you’re not even there?”

  “Yes, mate.” Kalix sighed, “I vow I will not do so again. The times I did so, truly, it was my intent to spare you pain.”

  “I’m a big girl, Kalix. I can deal with pain.”

  “I know this well. I marvel sometimes at your ability to have done so for so long.”

  “Didn’t have much of a choice,” she murmured, the scent of her anger intensifying for a moment.

  “You have a choice now. Such is my point. Such is my desire, to spare you any more pain and give you whatever solace you would have of me.”

  Alec took a slow, deep breath as her fingers paused on the threads of ore, tapping the strands softly before she stood up to face him.

  Kalix could see the tension that rippled through her body, smell the rise in her anger. Her beast made not so much as a huff of sound to make itself known. The strength he saw belonged solely to Alec.

  �
��Really? It’s not because you just can’t stand the way my pain smells?”

  He winced at her accusation, having wondered when she would bring that up again. The conversation she must have overheard aboard the warship and misinterpreted his intent.

  “Alec, it was my failure that I could not stand. I searched a planet I was certain your people were not on and wasted precious time. Time that cost your sister her life.

  “The scent of your pain was reminder that my failure, my choice to search that one planet and not move on to the next more likely location, is why you were alone.”

  Alec looked down, her fingers curling into a fist to touch the crystals at her wrist. Kalix saw a pair of tears escape her eyes before she shook them away, biting into her lip hard enough to make the pink curve blanch white.

  “But I wouldn’t have been alone, would I? I could have...” she stopped, swallowed the words she had intended to speak and shook her head, stubbornly withdrawing back behind the safety of her anger.

  “Doesn’t matter. I’ll be ready to leave in the morning. Ga’rae can run whatever tests he needs to.”

  EIGHT

  Alec was exhausted. Sleep was getting harder to come by these days, and so was the anger she needed to hold onto to keep going.

  The fire was going out, which meant the demons haunting her were getting closer, and there was nowhere she could go to release them.

  Kalix and every other warrior in the fortress were watching her for signs of her beast exploding. If not them, Zhenya was underfoot asking her what it was like now to be a hybrid.

  Alec wouldn’t have made it a hundred yards beyond the front gate before someone noticed.

  Kalix had come to get her first thing to leave for the citadel and every step felt as though another rock had been added to her boots.

  The open transport they took made the wind rush over her face. If she closed her eyes Alec could imagine she was flying free, but the insidious thought that Meg would have loved this yanked her right back down to the dirt.

  Kalix reached over to touch her waist, asked her if she was alright, and she threw a log on the fire of her anger to burn the pain away. He didn’t ask again.