Fritz blinked again. His voice piped high and echoed down the canyon. “Peace, is it? Peace!”
Turk bared his teeth. “Is that so hard for you to believe? The Aqinas never profited much by peace.”
Fritz cocked his head the other way. “The Aqinas desire peace more than any other faction. We have done more to promote peace than anyone. You know that, Alpha Rufus.”
Turk let out a menacing growl, and the hair stood up on the back of his neck. “I am not Rufus. I’m Turk, Rufus’ son, and you won’t jerk me or my brother around ever again. We know the Aqinas and their tricks. You’re surprised we would meet here to negotiate peace without consulting you, and now you know why. We won’t have the Aqinas undermining the peace we’ve won here today.”
Faruk laid a hand on his arm. “Let him look. That’s all he can do. Let him look and see us united. Then let him go back to his water hole and leave us alone.”
Fritz smiled. It was an innocent smile, but it didn’t soften the tension. If anything, it made it worse. “I would never undermine your peace. No, never. The Aqinas want peace. That’s all we’ve ever wanted.”
Turk snorted and turned away. “Yeah, right.”
Donen said something under his breath to Turk.
Fritz waved his hand at the line of Aqinas behind him. They didn’t move from the river bed, but kept their bare feet in contact with the water at all times. Chris muttered softly to the others so no one else heard. “What do they communicate to each other through the water?”
In answer to her words, Fritz turned toward the women. “I come to seek you and your kind. I come to communicate with you.”
Chris frowned. “What could you have to say to us?”
He waved toward his companions, and for the first time, Emily noticed one figure that stood noticeably shorter than the rest. The same ropey hair and the shimmering skin made the figure blend in with the crowd, but the longer they looked at it, the more they noticed it wasn’t like the rest at all.
The figure stepped out of line and up onto dry land. It blinked the way Fritz did, but something in its face made Emily start back. It wasn’t Aqinas at all. It was human, and its hips curved too much to be male. Its shoulders were slender and shapely, and its hair was twisted into thick strands rather than individual solid ropes like the others. It was a woman.
She moved toward the group, and Emily took a step back. The strange woman stopped and regarded them with a blank stare. She scanned their faces one by one before she stopped in front of Chris. “I came to speak to you.”
Chris stared at her with her mouth open. Then she gasped out loud. “Sasha!”
Emily and Carmen exchanged glances, but Chris rushed toward the strange woman and took hold of both her shoulders. She didn’t hug the woman, but she stopped just short of doing it. “Do you know this woman, Chris?”
Chris didn’t turn around. She gazed into Sasha’s face in amazement. “I only met her once, but I thought she was dead. What happened to you, Sasha?”
Sasha looked around. The Aqinas stood perfectly motionless in the water behind her. Only Fritz showed any sign of listening to their conversation. “I thought I was dead. I don’t remember exactly what happened.....”
“The Romarie strangled you,” Chris told her. “It happened right in front of me. One of them was crushed by a piece of debris from the crash. Do you remember the crash?”
Sasha blinked. “The crash....”
Chris nodded. “You told me all about the Romarie, but I didn’t believe you until you showed me one of them in the wreckage. You told me not to go too close to it, but when the Lycaon appeared to help us, you got distracted and it grabbed you. Don’t you remember?”
Sasha looked around. “I don’t remember that.”
“What’s the last thing you do remember?” Chris asked.
Sasha hesitated. “It was raining.”
“It rained the night you were killed…..” She paused. “I mean, after you were strangled. I checked your pulse, but you must not have been dead. You don’t know how upset I was to lose you.”
Sasha stared at her, but she didn’t react. It was Fritz who explained. “She washed into the river in the rain. That’s where we found her.”
Chris frowned. “I don’t understand how a woman's body could wash into a river in the rain, but it doesn't matter. You're alive. I still can't believe it.”
Emily moved forward. “Are you coming back with us? Is that why you’ve come?”
“I’m not coming back with you,” Sasha replied. “My home is with the Aqinas. Fritz….” She waved over her shoulder.
Chris nodded. “I understand. I guess the Aqinas Alpha has a human mate just like the others.”
Sasha smiled for the first time. “You can’t understand how comfortable and warm it is with the Aqinas. It's so comfortable and warm…..”
Chris and Emily glanced at each other. “What else can you tell us about the Aqinas?”
“There are no questions there,” Sasha told them. “There’s no fear or wondering, and everyone embraces you in a warm, loving embrace. I never felt anything like it before on Earth.”
Chris sighed. “I’m glad you're happy there. Is that what you came to tell us?”
Sasha shook her head, but Fritz spoke up again. “There is another.”
“Another what?” Chris asked.
“Another human woman,” Fritz replied. “She came to us four days ago.”
“How did she come to you?” Emily asked. “Did she fall out of the Romarie ship like I did?”
“She came through the river, like Sasha,” he replied. “I don't know how she got into the water, but we found her at the mouth of the Borlass River.” He waved his hand toward the south.”
Faruk frowned. “The Borlass River? That’s more than five hundred miles from here.”
Fritz shrugged. “It is nothing for the river. This woman is known to you, and she cannot rest until her people know where she is. She dreams every day and every night that her people are frightened something happened to her. She wants them to know she is safe.”
A shudder passed through Emily’s being. “What does the woman look like?”
He held his hand up to his chest. “She stands about this tall. She has small hair, like this, around her head in small black curls.”
“Frieda!” Emily cried. “Where is she? Is she safe? Is she all right?”
Fritz nodded and smiled. “I see you are her people. She sent us here to tell you she is safe and happy. She is with us.”
Emily took a few steps toward him, but Chris held her back. “When can we get her back? If she’s worried day and night, we should get her back.”
He shook his head. “She is only worried for you. She worries you will worry about her. She is safe, and she will stay with us in the water.”
Emily narrowed her eyes at him. “How do I know she really wants to stay with you?”
“We wouldn’t keep her if she didn’t want to stay,” Fritz replied. “As Sasha said, it’s a very warm and comfortable place in the water with the Aqinas. Anyone would want to stay.”
Chris squeezed her arm. “I think we can believe him. The Aqinas are Angondrans like the other factions. They value hospitality and care of strangers. They wouldn’t keep Frieda against her will.”
“How did she get five hundred miles away from here then?” Emily asked.
“The Borlass River flows through Avitras territory all the way down to the sea,” Faruk told her. “It has its delta in the heart of Aqinas territory. If Frieda fell from that balcony into the river, or into any of its tributaries, she could have washed out to Aqinas territory in the water.”
Sasha nodded, and Fritz smiled, but Emily wasn’t satisfied. “How can I see my sister for myself if I want to hear this from her?”
“You are always welcome to come to our territory to see her.” Fritz waved his hand over the company. “Any of you would be welcome.”
Turk growled under his breath again. Ch
ris turned to Emily. “What do you say? Do you want to go see her?”
Emily shook her head. “Not now. Another time maybe.”
Chris nodded and took Sasha’s hand. “Are you sure you don’t want to come with us? There are other human women in our factions. You wouldn't have to be alone with the Aqinas.”
Sasha shook her head, but her eyes already drifted back toward Fritz and the river. “No one is alone among the Aqinas. Everyone knows your thoughts and feelings, and everyone loves you with a pure open love. It’s nothing like the way people live outside the water.”
Chris let her go and turned away. “I guess no one can understand it who hasn’t experienced it for themselves.”
Sasha nodded and took a step back. Her feet touched the water, and the faint light of human comprehension evaporated from her face. She took her place in the line of Aqinas and became part of them again. Chris’s shoulders slumped, and she and Emily moved away from the water.
The black stain rippled out of the water to envelope the Aqinas, and in another moment, they vanished into the foaming turbulence of the river.
Chapter 17
The Ursidrean column crossed the rocky steppes leading back to their own territory. Chris paused on the ridge and laid her hand on Emily’s arm. “This is where we separate.”
Emily stopped. “Do you have to go?”
Chris nodded. “This is the last place we can turn off to enter our own territory, and we’ve been gone too long already. If we wait much longer, I won’t be able to travel at all.”
Emily squeezed her hand. “I wish you didn’t have to go. These weeks we’ve spent together have been so precious to me. You can’t imagine....” She broke off.
Chris gazed into her eyes. “I feel the same way. You don’t know how grateful I am to you for bringing us out here.”
Emily glanced around. “Really? I don’t know why you’re grateful for me dragging you away from your family to stop a war that was never going to start.”
Chris shook her head. “If you hadn’t, our factions wouldn’t be talking peace right now. Because of you, we’ll spend the next hundred years working together to make Angondra a better place for everyone. I know Turk is grateful, too.”
Emily tried to laugh, but she had to swallow the lump in her throat just to talk. “He says he doesn’t want to be Alpha, but now he’s on his way home to take over the negotiations. He’ll be more Alpha than Caleb.”
Chris smiled. “That’s why he’s grateful. He always thought he was happy by himself in the mountains—with me, I mean. But now he has a new sense of purpose. He has more hope for our future, and he’s inspired to lead our people into a new era of peace. I’ve never seen him like this before. He’s a different person.”
“What about you?” Emily asked. “Are you going to be happy in the village, being the Alpha’s wife?”
“I’ll have Marissa to commiserate with,” Chris replied. “And I’ll have the rest of my family, too. It’s you I’m worried about.”
“Me? Why?” Emily asked.
“You’re going back to Harbeiz,” Chris replied. “Faruk will be just as mixed up in politics as Donen. Donen is making him his right-hand man renegotiating the borders between the three factions. You might not see much of him, and he was always unhappy in the city. He loved the mountains as much as Turk loved the forest.”
“He may not have liked the city much,” Emily agreed, “but his heart was always on the border. Now the border means something different. It doesn’t mean war and conflict and destruction. It means cooperation and friendship. Faruk is as excited about the future as the rest of us.” She laughed. “I’m as excited about the future as the rest of us, too.”
“Do you think you’ll see Frieda again?” Chris asked.
“I don’t know,” Emily replied. “But in a way, I found her the way I wanted to. I know where she is, and I know she’s happy and settled there. If I really need to see her and talk to her, I know where to find her.”
“Traveling to Aqinas territory would be a much bigger trip than this one,” Chris told her. “It’s a lot farther away.”
“Going into the water and finding out how the Aqinas live would be a much bigger challenge than traveling there,” Emily replied. “I still don’t understand half of what Fritz and Sasha told us.”
Chris nodded. “It sounds like the water dissolves all the barriers between people we take for granted. They know everything everyone else is thinking and feeling, and there’s nothing to separate anybody from everyone else.” She shivered. “It's sounds scary.”
Emily shrugged. “Sasha said it was wonderful, and they were most insistent that Frieda was happy there. Maybe once you get used to it, it’s better than being separate the way we are. It wouldn't be as lonely, anyway.”
Chris gazed at the horizon. “I like it the way it is. If we weren’t separate, coming together with other people wouldn't be so precious and wonderful.”
Emily touched her arm. “You mean like you and Turk? I understand what you mean.”
“And you, too,” Chris replied. “I wouldn’t give up the connection between you and me for anything.”
Emily gave her a hug. “Me, too.”
Chris took a step back. “Promise me we’ll see each other again. In a few years, when your children get older, you'll come and find me, won't you?”
Emily laid her hand on her cheek. “I promise.”
“Faruk will come to Lycaon territory to negotiate the border with Caleb and Turk,” Chris went on. “You’ll come with him, and we'll spend some time together.”
Emily nodded, but she couldn’t speak with the lump in her throat. Her eyes stung, but she couldn’t stop smiling.
“I know Faruk will take good care of you.” Chris tore herself out of Emily’s arms and took another step away.
Emily raised her hand. “I love you. I’ll see you soon.”
Turk took Chris’s hand, and they headed down the hill. They waved at the corner where the path angled into the trees, and then they were gone. Emily turned back to join the Ursidrean column and found Faruk standing behind her. She took his hand and started walking.
He fell in at her side. “We could go with them. We could spend some time in the village with her and Caleb.”
Emily shook her head. “Let’s go home. We've been gone too long already.”
( The End )
Book 4 – The Alien’s Captive
Prologue
At eleven o’clock on the night of April 24, 2043, astronomers at Lick Observatory in the California Coast Mountains tracked the path of a comet through the atmosphere. To their surprise, it seemed to rise through the atmosphere instead of falling to earth, but they lost sight of it over the Pacific Northwest. The mystery was never explained, but in actual fact, the object was no comet.
The astronomers didn’t know an alien ship passed through Earth’s atmosphere that night, and instead of burning up in the atmosphere, it broke orbit and jetted away into deep space with more than three hundred human captives.
The Romarie were notorious smugglers drawn to Earth by huge prices for human females at markets in distant galaxies. An interplanetary plague wiped out the female populations of numerous planets, leaving their male counterparts desperate for mates.
Only one planet resisted the temptation to buy in replacement females. Angondra had a proud history of space travel and advanced technology, but the five Angondran factions put aside their differences to forge a solemn agreement they would have nothing to do with the Romarie’s stolen females. They staked their honor as a people on rebuilding their population without tainting their planet with any such contraband, and they sacrificed their space flight capability to back up their resolution.
On its way to the distant galactic marketplace, the Romarie ship lost power, and during an attempted emergency landing, broke up in the Angondran atmosphere. The ship crashed, leaving the four Romarie pilots dead and the women stranded.
The women found them
selves on a beautiful, Earth-like planet inhabited by one species divided into five distinct subspecies. All Angondrans stood erect on two legs, with two arms, two eyes, one nose and one mouth like humans, and with the aid of telekinetic implants supplied by the Romarie, the women could communicate with the Angondrans easily.
The Felsite faction dwell in cities constructed on the open plains, but besides their architecture, they retained none of Angondra’s advanced technology. The Felsite eat raw meat and use oil lamps only for light. All Angondrans stand several inches taller than the average human, and the Felsite males have manes of shaggy fur around their heads.
Members of the Lycaon faction are not as tall or husky as the Felsite, and they have rough hair covering their heads and running down their necks and backs. They have pointed ears and sharp teeth. They live and hunt in packs in the deep forest on the eastern side of the Angondran continent, and they dwell in temporary shelters constructed of sticks, leaves, and thatch that facilitate their nomadic lifestyle.
The Ursidrean faction dwell in huge caves dug out of the northern mountains. The Ursidreans keep most of the old Angondran technology alive, as well as adding new developments of their own to enhance their quality of life. The Ursidreans have the most advanced medical care of all the factions, as well as the most advanced weapons and war machines. The Ursidreans are the heaviest Angondrans, with rough fur around their heads and shoulders. They move more slowly than the fast-running Lycaon and the powerful Felsite, but they are the strongest of all Angondrans.
The Avitras stand the tallest of all Angondrans, with light, slender bodies and iridescent feathers surrounding their heads in spectacular frills. Feathers running down the outsides of their arms and lower legs enable them to fly short distances in their treetop homes in the western forests. They build light houses in the upper canopy where they cannot be seen from the ground. Though the Avitras have no advanced technology, they maintain a detailed oral record of Angondra’s history, including all the political relationships between the factions. They consider themselves the guardians of Angondra and the makers of laws.
Saved by a Bear (Legends of Black Salmon Falls Book 2) Page 74
