by TylerRose.
“Have you slept yet?” he changed the subject.
“I was asleep and woke up to the sound of the torpedo blast and the men being afraid. I don’t want to go to sleep,” she admitted with a reluctance and sadness that struck him deep.
“I’m here now. Let’s go lie down and we’ll talk. If you fall asleep, you fall asleep,” he said, knowing damn-well he would talk her to sleep.
He asked her to tell him about it, promised he wouldn’t tell Shestna anything she didn’t want told. She talked until she started to drift away, then startled awake hearing it again. He reached into his pocket and took a charge from the crystal. The energy field surrounding her silenced the universe. Exhausted mentally and physically, she sighed out her troubles and finally went into a proper sleep.
She wouldn’t let him call for anyone else, allowed only him on the property until her husband arrived. Shestna came directly to her home, took her into his arms to hold her close and apologize for hurting her. Dorn swept through the building on his own security check with Pisod.
“I do not remember doing it, Femina. Dorn told me. It happens sometimes. The Crystal energy, when bonded to the person’s life force, can become too much and overwhelm them. They do things they normally wouldn’t, have reactions they otherwise wouldn’t. Sometimes it is subtle and takes a long time. Sometimes it is drastic and immediate. Dorn was watching. He had been prepared all along to intervene if needed. I’m glad he did.”
“Me too. Am I in trouble for leaving?” she asked.
“No, my dearest love. You did exactly what I would want you to do in that situation. Where is Volf? Why is Pisod here?”
“Because Earnol is dead,” she lied. “It’s been on the news. He killed himself.”
“An assassin can’t as easily find her within my own sphere of crystal energy,” Pisod took up, having already returned.
“I had heard he took his life, which makes no sense. We do have good news. Baener is preparing to move the Congress back here to Gamma quadrant. There will be no more traveling for days to get there. It will be here, where it belongs. The Balnaatrus are going to teleport it to its new location orbiting within the Deek’Traiian system two days from now. Otherwise, it would take weeks to get there. Ercoli is too far and defeats the purpose, so the compromise is a Deek’Trai orbit.”
Which meant he had a few days to continue apologizing to her and making up for any harsh treatment of her that he was unaware he had committed.
“We should keep secret the fact that you don’t have the Crystal energy anymore,” she said while they lay together quietly in her bed.
“It already was secret, more or less. Or, at least, was not common knowledge. Father knew. Dorn and Pisod.”
“Mankell,” she reminded him. “Volf.”
“Both of whom are part of the team and I’m not worried about,” he assured her. “Now I’m going to ask you a question.”
“No, I didn’t kill Earnol.”
“How did you know that was the question?” he asked.
“You may have permanently lost your own telepathic abilities; but now you don’t have the Crystal power anymore, I can read you. You’ve been wanting to ask since you heard he was dead. I was in meditation in the temple next to the library. I lit all the candles and knelt on the pillow as long as was necessary for me to not kill him.”
“Why? What more did he do that I don’t know about?”
“I guess it doesn’t matter anymore, since it’s destroyed. A long time ago, someone who knew I was coming created a temple for me on Ercoli. Temple of the Immaculate. It was in the side of a mountain, tended all these thousands of years, waiting for me. I found it a few months ago. The night you hit me, that’s where I went. I saw it like I saw Untrock’s barns burning. It was instinctive. I didn’t focus on it. I was in a panic, with the Crystal power hurting so much, and that is where we appeared. Then last night, I woke up hearing a weapon fire and feeling men in fear. We went to the source of the fear and the temple had been destroyed. The dust cloud was still settling. I was so angry, I could easily have killed him. I could have reached across the galaxy to Sistair and strangled him but I knew I would be the first suspect. So I went to my temple here. I lit every candle. I knelt and breathed until I was no longer furious enough to kill him. I eventually sent Volf back to K’Tran. Against his will, I might add. If someone is willing to destroy that many people specifically to hurt me and take away my refuge, then I don’t want any guards. I don’t want anyone else dying for me.”
“I understand, Femina. Dying in the protection of someone who is more important is the way of life for a soldier. They know the possibilities when they take the job.”
“Doesn’t mean I have to like it. Doesn’t mean I personally have to accept that price. I don’t like it. I don’t accept that price. To me, losing their lives is not worth saving mine.”
He lifted her chin, kissed her gently. “That is what will make you the most beloved of goddesses. It is worth it to them and to me. You, your survival, are the entire purpose of everything for us. You will eventually see what we do.”
“Don’t hold your breath,” she smirked.
“I recognize this pattern in you. When things are going well, you are confident. When there is an incident, you doubt yourself. My dearest love, will you please hear me? You should feel the reverse. When they are trying to stop you is when you can be assured you are doing right. When they are trying to stop you is when you are ruffling the most feathers. That is when you are making them the most uncomfortable and they are compelled to act against you. To put it in your Earth vernacular: When you are pissing them off most is when you are scaring them the most. That is how you know you are doing it right.”
She couldn’t help but smile, seeing he was correct. So long as she wasn’t making waves anywhere, no one tried anything. The minute she raised her head, the enemy freaked out.
“I do love you, Sta,” she said, sliding her arm around his waist.
“It pleases me immensely to hear you say so. Now. I’ve not made love to my wife in too many days. Let’s make a baby.”
She burst a laugh. “Wouldn’t it have been better to do that before you lost the Crystal power?”
“Maybe. Who knows what our children would have been. Why didn’t you want me to know there was a temple on Ercoli?”
She balked, not wanting to tell him.
“I will not be angry, Femina. If you are afraid to tell me something, the fault is mine, not yours,” he said.
“You’ve spoken about hiding me away from the galaxy. I was afraid if you knew about the temple, you’d take me there and do exactly that.”
He took her answer in stride. “I must admit the idea has crossed my mind more than once. However, if you object so strongly that you feel you cannot tell me about a temple made just for you, to be a sanctuary away from your enemies, then I must heed your wishes. I have no desire to keep you as a captive, Tyler. That’s not the point of anything. Seclusion is about safety and your own peace of mind.”
“I want that seclusion, but based on my personal need for it,” she said. “When I need it, I seek it. Or I create it. Not as a matter of course.”
“That will be our agreement going forward. That’s what this home is for. But I must insist you have guards with you when you leave it.”
“No. I want to be me. Me doesn’t need a guard. I don’t want any of that.”
“This is not about a want, wife. You are apparently oblivious to the fact that you cannot live as you did before, when you were the Earth girl that fascinated the natives. You are not anonymous anymore. People know you, as 1st Daughter and my wife if not for your psionic abilities. You cannot be as you were, free to go anywhere on a whim without a care for your personal safety. Even if you weren’t the Immaculate, I would insist on guards. Assassins do try to kill our princesses and children sometimes.”
“We are going to have to agree to disagree on this for now. I don’t want guards. There isn’t an
ything you can say to me that will make me agree to put good men in danger for no good reason.”
“You are an exasperating woman,” he said, turning on top of her to get down to business.
“Thank you,” she smiled up at him.
While the sex was still wonderful, she noticed his was significantly weaker than he had been with the Crystal energy. He was not even as strong as he’d been before taking it from Jerome. He could not last as long. He did not recover as quickly. He fell asleep before she did.
A stab in her heart, like she’d felt when she saw Gramma, told her she might only be married for ten or fifteen years.
Awake and unsated, she left the bed and pulled on her robe to go outside into her garden. Dorn was there, exercising quietly on the small square of walk next to the bench. She sat to watch as she had watched Demitrius. Voranian fighting was rather similar to Tiger style Kung Fu in many ways; but since they had real claws, tearing, slicing and ripping skin and eyes with them was a real tactic.
She said nothing. He saw her on a turn but continued through the form until it was done.
“Is it normal for him to be so much…weaker? Without the Crystal power?” she asked.
“Yes. Jerome no doubt experienced the same thing.”
“Do they ever regain any of the strength lost?”
“Ever?” he echoed. “I don’t know. It’s not often that it happens. Now and then one of the younger recruits becomes overwhelmed if they have to hold a charge for too long. They discharge and rest for a day and they’re fine. It’s different when the power is bonded to the person’s life force. I took only as much as I had to. There is a point when I’m taking the person’s own life force and have to stop. If I don’t, I’ll kill the person. Same thing as Shestna did with Jerome. Is his lack of strength that noticeable?”
“Yes. He fell asleep. I’m usually the one who does that,” she joked.
He took her by the hand, pulled her to standing. Kissing, his finger slipping past the robe to stroke her wetness. The robe opened too far and she caught it to keep her breasts covered.
“No one can see you,” he said, hands rising to her shoulders to slide the silkiness down her arms to bare her back and use as binding to hold her in place against his chest. “Even if they did, so what. If I want you to be nude, nude you will be and they will be envious of us both.”
Snap and crackle of a static shock and her breath rushed in. Body responding to the familiar energy within him, heart pounding like it had that night with Jerome. Her mouth on his intensified with needs she could not name, that whirling swirl filling her head to buzzing. He placed a hand on her chest plate, feeling her heart slam hard and fast against his palm. Hand sliding upward for finger and thumb to encircle the base of her neck. Breath heated and metallic, beady dot of pulse beneath his finger.
“I feel it too,” he said. “Calm yourself. There’s no need to rush. Don’t let the energy cloud you.”
She struggled within to gain control over the pounding, the rushing, the slamming. Letting the potent energy carry her away was instinctive.
“He may be Apogee for now, but he will die long before I do whatever it is I’m supposed to do,” she said. “How am I supposed to know who should--?”
He stopped her with a strong thumb under her chin, forcing her jaw up and closed. “You doubt yourself far too much, Rabbit. Let it go. When the time comes, an ally will fill that void as naturally as he breathes. He will be an ally. No enemy could hope to reside in your closest presence for long without being discovered for what he is.”
A small breath released her tension. He dropped the robe to make her stand nude in the moonlight for a moment.
“You are married to him. You and I both know you really belong to me now. The signature of the energy says you belong to whomever possesses that energy. You can’t help it.”
Turning to head up the walk, he pulled her hand. She wouldn’t move. He stopped to look back at her.
“Come on. My room.”
“But—“ She cut her own self off, not able to refuse. Door to the last guest room opened, the shaft of light spilling onto the walkway, he stepped through. She halted on the threshold, unable to go in.
“What?”
Blinking, eyes darting to the door of the bathroom, unable to say it. He remembered.
“Mariah’s room. Have you been in here even once since that night?” he asked.
She shook her head. He drew her in with great deliberation, closed the door gently.
“It is your home. You have to come in at some point.”
He saw the pain play out on her face, the suicide death of her friend still grieving her.
“I can feel when you do that,” he said.
“Do what?”
“When you have a wave of sadness like this. Your energy interacts with my energy and I feel the change in your emotional state. Do you feel yourself distancing from Shestna already, since he does not have the energy anymore?”
She wasn’t prepared to admit that yet.
Dorn smiled. “Doesn’t matter if you say it or not. I felt it.” He pinned her against the wall, smile gone. “Did you kill Earnol?”
She looked him straight in the eye. “No.”
Long, slow blink as he tried to figure out what he was feeling between their energies.
“Maybe not. But you wanted to,” he accused.
“Wanting is not doing. No one has ever been convicted of thinking about or wanting to do something,” she said.
“Unless they spoke it out loud and the person they wanted dead was an emperor or a king. Treason, you know.”
“You’re going to be his heir now, aren’t you?” she asked, walking backwards as he directed her toward his bed.
“Probably. What better heir to have than one permanently bonded with the thing they worship?”
The edge of the bed pressed against the back of her legs, making her sit. Satisfied she was where he wanted her, Dorn took a step back to undress. Watching without embarrassment or shame, she lowered to lie on her side across the foot of the bed. His coloring was so much more dynamic than Shestna’s. Golds and reds rather than peach and gray. Streaks more than spots.
“Turn onto your stomach,” he said, lowering to his knees at the end of the bed.
Hands warm and knowing, he rubbed her back until she was exhaling long and deep.
“Why are you doing this?” she asked as his fingers worked over the twin hard nubs that were her tension centers.
“Because someone has to. You are with him for now. I will be patient. When he has gone, you will be mine.”
“You so sure about that?” she taunted.
A flicking zap of energy pulsed down her labia to settle on her clit.
“I am. I know how to do things. Shestna worked with the power enough to take it from someone, but he never really learned how to use it. Turn onto your back.”
She rolled farther onto the bed and his fingertip touched that spot of energy and drew it up to her bellybutton and around. She laughed with the tickling sensation.
He slinked up between her legs and over her, settling into place so easily and naturally.
“The person who holds this energy might be the greatest man in the universe. Or he might be the worst abusive asshole. Whomever he is, you are his. The signature of this energy has marked itself on your own energy. It has branded you. Claimed you. You cannot help but give yourself to that person. A mean man will use it against you to get what he wants out of you. I may have to publicly appear to uphold the traditional ways, but I do not want to be mean with you. I want you to come to me because you want to, not because you need to.”
“It wasn’t that long ago that you were telling me you would make my rules and enforce them and my husband could do nothing about it,” she said.
“All of that is still true.”
“So what changed that you’re all tender and patient?” she asked.
“Now you are more mine than you are his, Rabb
it. You will yield to me before you yield to him. You will look to me for your approvals. You won’t be able to stop yourself. You will be with him a couple more decades. Maybe? You and I will be together literally for eternity. I mean to see you through to the end. Whatever it is you become, I will be there with you and go through it with you. We need to be nice to one another and I need to take more personal care of you.”
Her expression visibly melted, so unexpected was his sentiment. Only then did he finally fill her and give her what she needed. She got his tremendous strength and power, pushed to the extreme by the Crystal energy. She got what she needed in order to be sated and drained. Nearly exhausted by the extent of his endurance, she lay languid over his thighs for one of those vigorous spankings like he’d given her before the public wedding ceremony.
Hard and fast wallops of his hand to drive out the last vestiges of the negative energy that was causing her troubles. When she was as languorous as she was going to get, he carried her across the walkway and into her own bedroom. Shestna was completely zonked out. He didn’t budge as Dorn laid his wife down beside him.
“You can go to bed now,” he said, passing Pisod in the living room on his way out.
No fault of Dorn’s, but that permanent charge of Crystal energy was far too potent to be near them during their intimacy. Their two energies combined during sex to fill half the house. Only Crystal Warriors would feel it. The shard in his pocket throbbed in time with them. Lesser men would not be able to stand it. Guards for inside her house would have to be chosen carefully.
Chapter Sixteen
Four Voranian months of travel, enjoying the company, learning about other planets, Tyler read voraciously on every issue Shestna had to deal with. She sat in Congressional sessions whenever it was allowed. She listened to the Congressmen and Ambassadors on all sides, to better understand everyone’s point of view. Sitting quietly in a chair, observing treaty and trade negotiations, she silently fed Shestna bits of information when he needed it to get one side or the other to either move or capitulate.
After that last night alone with Dorn, Shestna kept her much closer. Dorn was allowed into their bed only a few times, and not allowed to have her vaginally. Shestna was getting more serious about impregnating her. He went with her to doctor visits for the test every two weeks.
