Yes. That was the truth.
Eyes black as the depths of space, he ran one trembling fingertip down the side of my face. The most incredible sensations of pleasure surged through me, arcing, teasing, racing.
“God, Sully!” My voice was barely a whisper.
So was his. “This is Gabriel,” he said hoarsely. “Let me love you.”
I reached for him, wanting the heat of his body against mine, but that damned electric fingertip kept up its journey. He pulled off my pants and left no part of me unexplored. Then his tongue retraced the path and when I was writhing, delirious and completely incoherent, he entered me, stroking, plunging, fire cresting, blazing under his skin.
I clung to his shoulders, the feel of his slick, heated skin under my hands the only way I could tell where he ended and I began. He groaned, shuddering, his mouth on mine, his frantic kisses interspersed with whispered confessions of desire, of wanting me beyond all reason, of loving me beyond all measure. Then his control snapped, the overwhelming sensations of pleasure pushing him—us—over that final edge. He cried out my name as he plunged harder, deeper, taking me with him through the forceful explosion of his release. And for a moment lightning raced under my skin too, and a limitless power filled my veins, hotter and sweeter and more potent than a thousand bottles of Lashto brandy.
He kissed me fiercely, his heart still pounding. Trembling, I brushed my hands up the sides of his face, threading them through his short-cropped hair. He angled his head, nipped at my ear, and I could feel the energies of the Kyi wrap silken cords around us like a heated blanket of star-filled clouds.
I peered over his shoulder through fluttering lashes, momentarily mesmerized by the sparkles. He levered up on his elbows. My hands slid down to cup the sides of his face. He looked at me, his dark gaze searching. He was breathing hard, the glow under his skin just now beginning to fade, the jagged streaks of energy not quite so intense. One danced past my fingertips. I tried to touch it but it was gone.
I knew I should be exhausted, ready for sleep. But just like the last time, I’d never felt more alive.
“Extraordinary,” I whispered.
“Yes,” he rasped, his lips curving into a familiar Sully-grin. “We are.”
I woke a few hours later to the smell of coffee. I sat up in bed, clutching the sheet against me as Sully walked into the room, large mug in his left hand, bowl in his right. I took the coffee from him, sipped it. God. Chocolate and…cinnaspice?
It dawned on me he was fully dressed. I was still naked. I didn’t remember his leaving the bed.
“How long have you been up? And who made this coffee?” I took another sip and let the sheet slip through my fingers. Stars, this stuff was good.
His eyes darkened as a small smile played over his lips. And I remembered that Kyis are highly motivated by pleasure. Even mine with the coffee, apparently.
“It’s Del’s recipe,” he said, easing down onto the bed. He dipped the spoon into the bowl, bringing up something steaming, lumpy, and I knew from experience, wonderful. Dorsie’s hot fruit compote. “Eat. You need the fuel.”
I let him spoon-feed me, then took another sip of coffee. And thought about what he’d said. Del. Not Regarth. “So you and Del have stopped pissing on the bulkheads?” The fact that Del saved our lives notwithstanding, I’d still sensed a wariness in Sully about our new pilot.
Sully sighed. “It’s instinct, two Kyis, probably more so with males. I’d read about it, but I’d never had it happen firsthand before. Fortunately, he knew how I’d likely react, though he only had minutes at meetpoint to process what I was. So we were both a bit off.”
“You trust him?”
“Besides the fact that he took out those two ImpSec agents? He’s been working against Tage for much longer than we have. We knew more about Burke. He knows more about Tage. If I’d met him six months ago, things would probably be radically different in the Empire right now.”
“But do you trust him?”
I felt Sully’s presence sweep my mind. “You don’t because he teases you.”
“I grew up in a military family on a military base. Men being rowdy or bawdy don’t bother me. Believe me, I’ve even out-bawdyed a few. But there’s a line you don’t cross when it comes to someone’s spouse.”
“Ah! So you finally admit we’re married.”
“Sully.” I wanted to smack his arm but I might spill my coffee. That would be a sin.
“He’s a Kyi, Chaz. They’re—we’re—very sensual. Your being ky’sara to me brings you into the realm of our energies. In a way, it’s like being part of a large family.” He raised the spoon again. “Eat.”
I took a mouthful, chewed, swallowed. “That would mean every Ragkiril on Stol trusts every other Ragkiril. Sorry, don’t buy it. I’ve read some of their history. Doesn’t work that way.”
“It does within clans. Del’s been explaining this to me. He was raised knowing he was a Ragkiril. He’s been trained for years as a Kyi. I have a twenty years of learning to catch up with.”
“Ren never told you any of this?”
“Ren told me a lot, but he was cast out of his clan as a child, and the church orphanage on Calfedar is not going to teach a blind Stolorth about Ragkirils. You know this.”
“I just assumed since he knew so much of his people’s history—you do know Del’s some kind of deposed prince, don’t you?”
Sully chuckled softly. “Yeah.”
“Anyway, I just thought Ren knew a lot more about Ragkirils. He did explain the basics to me when I met you.”
“Ren knows what he’s studied since leaving Calfedar. Del’s lived it. Still lives it.” Sully shook his head, his expression suddenly serious. “I don’t know if I can completely describe what it’s like to finally meet someone who is like me, after all this time. It’s a little frightening but, God, it’s also such a relief.” He glanced almost shyly at me. “I don’t feel like such a freak.”
Ah, Sully. My heart constricted at his pained admission. I put my coffee on the nightstand and, framing his face with my hands, kissed him gently.
He licked his lips. “That is damned good coffee.”
“And?” I prompted.
He grinned. “Damned good kisses too. Now, open that beautiful mouth of yours again and finish your breakfast. We have work to do before we hit Dock Five. Del and I have some plans.”
Del and Sully. I was glad that someone could finally help Sully be at peace with the beast within, as I knew he thought of himself. He needed training to understand what he was, use what he was. Del could do that for him. And they were, not surprisingly, similar in age, outlook, and temperament. Del was the deposed prince. Sully was the deposed heir. I could see them as friends.
But it was the things I couldn’t see but only feel on the edges of my mind that worried me. Things that I sensed when I first met Del. Captain Regarth. His Royal Highness, Prince Regarth Cordell, Serian-Prime, Blessed of Delkavra.
He was trouble.
Sully left the cabin for the bridge, where Del was sitting in as first pilot. I went down to the galley for another cup of that chocolate coffee and to thank Dorsie for making the fruit compote. She knew it was Sully’s and my favorite breakfast.
We had a little under an hour yet to the exit gate.
“My God, he’s gorgeous! I’ve never seen eyes that deep color of blue. And an honest-to-shit prince!” Dorsie was rearranging perishables in one of the two large refrigerators in the Karn’s galley. Good thing for her to be doing. We were discussing Del and she was overheating rapidly. “And do you know he gives the most heavenly back massages?”
No, I didn’t. I didn’t want to know. But he was Kyi, motivated by pleasure—which meant, to a great extent, giving other people pleasure so he could experience it too. Dorsie had learned to enjoy Ren’s warm rainbows. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know what Del had done to her.
I could guess. Sully did it to me.
But did that mean Dorsie had…been
intimate with him? I snorted back a laugh at my own silent euphemism. I was a grown woman. But “fucked him” didn’t seem quite right for the experience a Kyi could provide. And “had sex” didn’t quite cover it either.
I didn’t even know if I could ask such a personal question, but she obviously read it in the expression on my face and snorted out a laugh of her own. “Oh, God, no. I didn’t bed the man. Yet.” She winked. “I was working down here and, you know, he reads those rainbows like Ren does. He told me so. He could feel that my shoulder bothered me so I sat at a galley table while he worked his magic.” She sighed. “And such magic! It’s those six fingers. Must be.”
She turned back to the shelves, pushing some containers to the side.
“What about Ren?” I asked her. Was it only a day or so ago she was ogling his ass? And it was worthy of ogling.
Three small boxes went into the open space. She shut the unit’s door then leaned against it. “I look at a lot of things like I look at food. Ren’s the uncultivated berry you find growing in the woods. Sweet and sun-kissed. Rare. Del is…” She paused, pursing her lips thoughtfully. “Del is triple chocolate fudge from one of those high-end confectionaries. Someone made him exactly what he is and spared no expense in doing it. Does that make sense?”
Yeah, it did. But it also made me wonder what his price was, and if we could afford it.
Sully and Del were still on the bridge. I could hear raucous male laughter in the corridor as I exited the stairwell. Marsh said something, Del answered.
Then from Sully, laughing: “Hell’s ass! She’s even better than that.”
I hesitated for no reason I could rationally define. I was raised on a military base. Epithets, gallows humor, cheap-shot jokes rolled off my back. But there was an undercurrent here that was different.
And no one seemed to notice it but me.
Was I crazy?
Hello, lover. Come join us. A deep, masculine whisper traced the edges of my mind. And it wasn’t Sully.
I turned on my heels and fled back down the stairs.
I stopped at the bottom tread, heart pounding, feeling stupid, foolish. Angry. I wanted to march onto the bridge—my bridge—and slap Del’s regally handsome face.
For what? Teasing me?
I leaned my forehead against the cool metal bulkhead. Sanity seeped back in. I was Sully’s ky’sara. Del knew that, honored that. He’d said so. This was simply a family dynamic I wasn’t used to.
But wasn’t I? Thad had friends at the academy who used to flirt shamelessly with me. Their friend’s kid sister. I was fair game, practice material. Safe. I laughed with them, flirted back, blew it off.
That’s all this was.
Chaz?
Sully. Relief tumbled through me. Just had some coffee, been talking to Dorsie.
You’d rather have that coffee than be with me? I’m crushed, angel. Forty to gate. Get your sweet ass up here.
Slave driver. On my way.
Sully was at communications when I stepped onto the bridge. Del was at nav, augmenting Sully’s databanks on the old smugglers’ gates and routes through slippery space. Marsh was in the ready room, door to the bridge open, composing transmits to send to his mother and family via the first beacon we hit after exiting the gate. The death of his father weighed heavily on him.
I hiked myself into the pilot’s chair, tapped on the armrest console screens. Thirty-five minutes to gate exit, everything within normal parameters.
“Here,” Del said, and data appeared on my screen. “We can use this secondary gate and cut down transit time to Dock Five.”
I ran a practiced eye over the data. “That’s one ugly gate, Captain Regarth.” It was. Ugly and old. The guidance beacons predated my father’s time in Fleet.
“Ignore the beacons. We leave them there because it dissuades most people from using it.”
“We?”
“It’s an old Stolorth transit gate, Chasidah. We were here long before you were, you know. What you call Baris Sector was once part of our dynasty.”
Sully leaned back in his chair. “I’d heard rumors of that.”
And I remembered Del mentioning that, back on Narfial. But that bit of information had gotten lost among everything else: the attackers at the stairs, and the out-of-control freighter dead-eyeing us, weapons hot.
“We were spacefarers when humans stumbled on us, centuries ago,” Del was saying. “But we were explorers not conquerors. We had no military fleet. It’s difficult to hang on to your property when you can’t defend it.”
I nodded. “So what do I use for a gate fix?”
“The intrinsic properties of the gate itself. Each one we built is different. It interweaves with the—” And he stopped. I knew what he was going to say and couldn’t, because Marsh came back on the bridge.
“—spectral emissions of the gate,” he finished. Then, in my mind: The Kyi. Gabriel, only you or I would be able to take the ship in. You understand that?
Completely. This is fascinating.
“More slippery space?” Marsh asked, glancing at the data on Sully’s screen as he passed by.
“Don’t ask, Marsh,” I told him. “You don’t want to know.”
“That’s why I love engines, drives, Cap’n. They stay where they belong. Lower deck, aft. And either they have fuel or they don’t. None of this here, not here, partially here, sometimes here shit.” He shook his head, grinning. “I sat nav early on, then realized I was too sane for the job.”
“Why, thank you, Mr. Ganton,” Sully said. When Sully filled a role on his ship other than owner, it was navigator. I wondered now if he was drawn to it or had a natural affinity for it because he was a Kyi.
Likely, Dell said. Our earliest explorers all were. It was a requirement.
I felt Sully’s surprise.
Marsh was laughing, oblivious to our secondary conversation.
I rapped my knuckles on my small console. “Gentlemen, let’s deal with this gate before we go playing with any others, okay?”
“I’m almost done logging this in,” Del said. “I won’t desert you in your time of need, darling.”
“I’m sure Mr. Sullivan is touched by your sentiments toward him,” I answered back. Marsh snickered loudly. “Just make sure we’re where we need to be when we arrive back in real time.”
He did. The Karn performed, if not flawlessly, very well. There were two minor course adjustments before exit—slippery space takes a liking to you and is reluctant to let go—but Del caught them, leaving Sully and me free to sweep the big wide darkness in a requisite bogey check.
We’d been cut off from the news feeds for over ten hours. We had no idea of the status of Thad or what new tricks Tage or Burke were trying now. Plus, whoever sent the Glorious Perceiver gunning for us had ten hours to know they failed.
They also had no idea where we were headed or where we’d come out of jump—one of the advantages of ditch-and-drop is no flight plan required—but Dock Five had to be high on their list. Acora and the Farosians had to know by now they’d lost their source in Gregor. Last official point of contact for both had been Dock Five. Acora—especially, if Tage told him that Sully was a Ragkiri—had to realize we could get that information from Gregor’s mind. And that a man like Sully would come after him.
Which is why I argued, without mentioning the Ragkiril part in front of Marsh, that we should go to Garno or even Ferrin’s first, change ships, or grab a ride on one of Chalford’s luggers to get to Dock Five. Someone—several someones—would be looking for the Boru Karn and, thanks to Gregor, knew many of her disguises.
They had on Narfial.
Sully took one last look at the scanner sweeps before turning the system back on auto. The big wide darkness was clear for now. He half-swiveled his chair around. “Dock Five protects their own. And we are.”
“No one stopped Lazlo from hunting you there. And no one stopped Gregor from talking to Tage’s people, to Acora.”
“Lazlo learned
virtually nothing about me from anyone on Five. Trel even warned me about him. The only information Lazlo got was from Berri. She was planted there for that purpose.”
“So was Acora. He got to Gregor. No one stopped him.”
“Fivers don’t stop you, angel. They just don’t help you if you’re not one of their own. And we don’t know for sure where Gregor and Acora met up the first time. Dock Five might only be the most recent info drop.”
You should have been able to get that information, Gabriel. Next time, you will.
I glanced at Del. He smiled lazily. I looked back at Sully. “I just think a little caution is advisable.”
“Advice noted.”
“Yes, I know.” I saw the familiar smug smile on Sully’s face. “You rarely listen to your advisers.”
“Acora knows what Tage is planning, I’m sure of it. If we give him too much time, Chaz, he’ll go deep and we’ll never find him.”
Del leaned one elbow on the arm of his chair.” We’re not in a position to make a direct move on Tage or Burke.” He splayed a hand toward me. “They’re too well protected. They’re like the top of the tree. The best way to get them is to start chopping at the roots.”
“I understand, but—”
The data beacon signal sounded. I glanced down, tapped it, opening the newsfeed grab. Marsh rose.
“I’d liked to send those notes to my mother as priority. I’ll pay—”
Sully waved his hand, halting Marsh’s words. “Send them double-priority. And I’ll pay. Your family needs to hear that you and Dorsie are safe. That’s most important.”
Marsh swallowed hard, saying nothing for a moment. “Sully, thanks. I mean that. This is…a really tough time right now.”
I shoved my unfastened safety strap behind me. “I’ll handle that for Marsh when I upload the feeds.”
“Sit, Chaz,” Sully said, then nodded at Marsh. “Marsh knows how to send a transmit. We have to finish this discussion because we have a course change coming up. If we’re altering our plans, I need to know now.”
I knew that. “But—”
“Chasidah.” Del leaned forward, elbows on his thighs, expression earnest. “The trail to Tage and Burke is far more useful than either Tage or Burke at this point. I can guarantee you both men have insulated themselves well. Look at how this Lazlo was never connected to Burke but written off as a renegade terrorist because Marker security handled the incident, and Tage is their boss, though obliquely. Plus you went too high up the tree. Your best evidence is dead.
Shades of Dark Page 19
