“Please just tell me why I have to go all the way back to Krase. Can’t we handle whatever it is out here?”
Honor kept his back to Noah for so long he figured he just wouldn’t answer him at all. And then, something seemed to soften in his posture. It was difficult to say what, exactly, but something changed and he turned, facing Noah.
“You will be set free and granted Krase citizenship.”
“Okay.” Noah wanted to again ask to be taken back to Thand, but he had a terrible premonition there was much more going on here. “Why?”
Honor looked around the room, but they were alone and had been since they arrived. The little shuttle had a pilot, but Noah hadn’t been introduced to him or her. Once they were docked to the bigger ship, Noah had been taken to this room without seeing another creature. When he asked, Honor said he was determined to limit the number of warriors exposed to Earthlings. Noah didn’t understand why, but he didn’t really care. The only thing he cared about was getting back to Mingor.
“Slaves are common in the Krase empire.”
Noah barely managed to stifle a long-suffering sigh. He didn’t want or need a history lesson. He just wanted Honor to do what he needed to do then take him back. However, if he pushed him to hurry, it was unlikely he would be sympathetic to Noah’s needs. So even though it drove him crazy to keep flying in the opposite direction, Noah cooled his heels and listened.
“Slaves can only fall to their fate by their world being conquered or by attrition.”
Noah nodded as if that were common when he had no clue how most beings went about enslaving others. The only thing he knew about slavery was that it was fundamentally wrong. Still, if he hadn’t been enslaved by a brutal tiger guy, he never would have met Mingor, and that would have been a true shame. Mingor was a good companion, and he was genuinely concerned with the welfare of his people. That he would sacrifice his own happiness to protect them was very telling indeed.
“You were stolen before your death.”
“Wait, what?” Noel had been working securing huge shipping crates when he’d suddenly found himself on a stage being sold.
“An unscrupulous slave trader plucked your body out of the time-space continuum right before your death.” Honor polished off another drink but didn’t refill his glass.
“I’m supposed to be dead?” Despite a sudden wash of cold sweat, Noah asked the terrifying question that came to mind. “Are you taking me back so I can be put to death?”
“No.” Honor made a face, but Noah wasn’t certain what he was trying to convey. “You are being set free.”
“Then let me go back where I was.”
“There are documents to sign and pledges that you must make.”
“I’ll sign anything, and I’ll repeat whatever vow you want, just let me go back to Mingor.”
“You have no desire to return to Earth?”
“No.”
This time, the look on Honor’s face was quite clear. He was surprised. “You don’t care that you will never see your home world again?”
“I care, sure, but there’s no one there I can’t live without.”
“Do you not have a family?”
Noah thought of his family but didn’t feel much toward them. He was somewhat close with his sister, but he’d only seen her once in the last five years. His father was a docile doormat for his domineering mother to wipe her feet on. “They think I’m dead, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then that’s okay. I don’t want to sound cold, but we weren’t that tight. I guess I’d feel bad if they didn’t ever know what happened to me, like if I just disappeared, but as long as they think I’m dead, then I can live with that.”
Honor’s eyes narrowed. “You will give up your family, your world, everything just to be with an alien that you have known for only a few days?”
The word Honor used wasn’t days, but that was what it was translated to for Noah, so he nodded. “I don’t need a lifetime with him to know he’s the right man for me. Or the right Thandling for me. Whatever. Mingor is my…husband.” It sounded slightly odd, but then again, it was the best word to express what Mingor was to him when he couldn’t very well say that he was everything to him. Well, he could, but he didn’t think a being named Honor Vengeance would understand. “Now will you please take me back?”
* * * *
Just as Aido had predicted, Noah was too late. He’d been gone less than three hours, but it was too long.
“I am so sorry.” Honor Vengeance’s commiseration barely registered.
Rather than the grand homecoming he expected, where he and Mingor would run toward one another with their arms outstretched, Noah discovered that Mingor was dead. As soon as he’d seen him from high up on the landing pad, he’d known he was gone. Someone had removed his crown but left on his blue robe. His body rested on top of a solid block of ice. His faithful worshipers had laid him out carefully, decorating the area around his body with the night-blooming flowers that he loved. Their petals were closed up tight now, but he believed that when evening fell, they would open, releasing their scent and marking the passage of the gentlest person Noah had ever known.
“How? Why?” His questions went unanswered as he was escorted into the place where he and Mingor might have lived together in such bliss but now only echoed Noah’s sadness. Honor stayed with the shuttle, offering to wait until Noah had said his good-byes. At first Noah didn’t understand, but then he realized he simply couldn’t stay here. With Mingor gone, there was nothing for him on Thand anymore. It seemed he was going to end up going to Krase after all.
Noah was escorted into a utilitarian elevator that would take him down to where Mingor was. Where his body was. The thing that made Mingor who he was, his soul, was long gone. Noah tried to hold back his tears, but he discovered he didn’t care if anyone thought he was less than manly for expressing himself in such a way. His heart was shattered, and he would never again feel the same way toward anyone. He might love again, but not like this.
The trip down to the valley felt like it took an eternity, but Noah had no one to turn to and share his sorrow with. His escort was clearly one of the advisors’ older children, judging by the way he was dressed in light-blue robes. He showed no emotion at Noah’s sorrow or Mingor’s passing. Noah had never felt so alone. Even if Honor had come with him, it was doubtful the massive warrior would have understood the depth of Noah’s despair.
Had Noah been here, this wouldn’t have happened.
That was a truth that would haunt him to the end of his days. Mingor had chosen wisely in selecting Noah, but neither one of them could have anticipated that the Krase were charged with the arduous task of hunting down all the illegally enslaved Earthlings. Noah didn’t blame Honor for what had happened. After all, he was simply doing his job. Noah placed the blame right where it belonged on Mingor’s advisors. There was no question in his mind that Aido and her followers had killed Mingor.
“Where are Mingor’s advisors?” For a moment, Noah didn’t think the boy would answer, and perhaps he tried hard to be indifferent to Noah, but it was clear he wasn’t old enough yet to become emotionally vacant.
The boy’s gaze softened as he lowered his head. “They are blessing the new water bearer.”
Well, that explains where Mingor’s crown is. Noah wondered how that could be when Mingor did not leave any children behind, but then he realized that was a gross assumption on his part. He had no idea how they selected their water bearers. It didn’t have to be through choosing descendants of the current one.
Summoning his courage, Noah asked, “Who is the new water bearer?”
The boy said something that was translated to brother for Noah. When he asked, the boy told him his brother’s age and the words translated to six years. To Noah, it was the perfect age to begin indoctrinating a child to follow the path that had been set by so many before him. Only if he thought independently would the boy draw the same conclusions that Mingor had.
�
��Sege will keep to the true ways.” The boy lifted his head in praise of his sibling, but Noah knew that the real powerhouse behind everything was Aido. As the top advisor, she didn’t want to lose her status. That she had killed Mingor just so she could keep her finery enraged him. Noah wanted to go back to the mountaintop and rail against her, but what was the point? Aido would mock him as an outsider, and nothing would change. Worse, Noah realized he was trying hopelessly to mask his grief with anger. It was so much easier to feel rage than to feel crushing despair.
“Mingor would have changed everything.”
“I know.” The boy’s voice was very soft.
Noah realized this young man was torn between supporting the old way and opening his eyes toward something new. Clearly, his struggle was over fearing that the new way would hurt him in some fashion. That realization softened Noah’s heart toward the young man. None of this was his fault, either. He was right at the cusp of being old enough to start making decisions for himself, and the prospect probably terrified him. Noah knew when he stood on the threshold of becoming an adult he’d been scared shitless.
When the interminable elevator ride ended, the doors opened, and Noah stepped out alone. Hundreds of Thandlings lined a pathway that went from where Noah was to the block of ice. All of them bowed their heads as Noah walked past, their respect for their god’s chosen partner clearer by action than words could ever be.
Noah kept moving even when he didn’t want to. Somehow, if he didn’t see Mingor lying there, unmoving, his death wasn’t really real. But that was a foolish mental game. Mingor was gone, Noah was now a free citizen of the Krase empire, and he was utterly alone.
When he reached the edge of the platform, he realized that the block of ice was a long slab lifted up by layers that were raised from the center of what was probably a courtyard. Since land was at a premium, it was clear the area was fashioned for many uses. Sadly, today, the use was for a funeral.
It had only been minutes since Mingor had been placed on the ice. His body was still warm enough to melt it slightly, creating small trickles of water to run over the edges like tears.
Noah climbed up the series of platforms until he was near enough to Mingor that he could have touched him. He didn’t, because he was afraid if he did, he wouldn’t be able to let go. A hundred cries filled Noah’s head, but nothing came out. He had no words to express his pain, and it seemed the Thandlings were too overcome to say anything, either. Holding onto his fragile emotional state, Noah knelt beside Mingor.
Silently, the Thandlings moved closer, making several rings of people around the laid-out body of Mingor.
When Noah looked around, he discovered that all of them were looking at him, not Mingor. Noah wondered if he was supposed to say something. He opened his mouth, but the only thing that emerged was a strangled cry of anguish.
And then, he felt a hand at his back.
Noah looked and discovered a young woman. Her face was etched in misery as she knelt beside Noah.
“Mingor was a generous soul.”
Unable to speak through his tears, Noah nodded.
“He loved you beyond words.” She clasped Noah’s hand. Her hand was cold against his, but her touch was surprisingly comforting. “Just as you showed him how much you loved him by undergoing the trial by fire, he proved that he believed in you by undergoing the ritual of propitiation.”
Noah was baffled. Had Mingor’s death been an accident? “What’s that?”
She explained that when a water bearer could no longer reproduce due to age or the loss of a sephir, the water bearer was chained to the bottom of the water changing pool.
Noah remembered walking past that part of the house and Mingor explaining it was where he performed his miracle of separating the salt from the ocean water.
“If the ocean gods still find the water bearer worthy, they save him. If not, he returns to the ocean.”
“They drown him.” Noah felt sick to his stomach. He thought undergoing the trial of fire would protect Mingor from the advisors, and in a way it had, but once he’d left Thand, it caused him a whole new host of problems. Since Mingor had claimed Noah as his sephir, he couldn’t claim someone else if Noah still lived. That was why Mingor had compelled Noah to stay with him no matter what. But Mingor had let him go! And then Noah realized that he had because he knew what the Krase would do if he didn’t. The real fault lay with an outdated system of traditions.
“The gods can be harsh, but be assured that a new water bearer will soon emerge.” She glanced up at the mountaintop. When she looked away, her gaze connected with Noah’s. Her eyes were stunning, reminding him of how beautiful Mingor’s were. “He told me something…strange.”
Her voice was very low. It was clear she was trying not to be overheard by those around them. But since they were higher up on the layered platforms, they were essentially alone.
“Did he tell you that you and your fellow Thandlings have the power to do what he did?”
The stunned look on her face said it all.
“He told you the truth.”
“It can’t be true.”
Noah looked up at the top of the mountain where a new water bearer was being anointed. “How do you think they are creating a new one right now?”
“Mingor’s passing caused him to return his ability to the gods. The advisors are calling upon the gods of the ocean to imbue a new chosen one with the ability to purify the water.”
“An ability he or she already has.”
Furrows of concern wrinkled her brow. “You only say these things because you are overwrought with grief.”
“I say these things because Mingor told them to me and I believed him.” Noah finally reached out and grasped Mingor’s hand. He was cold, so very cold it almost hurt to touch him, but then he realized there was warmth left in his flesh. And then, a slow sluggish heartbeat. Noah was so shocked he almost let go. But then he pressed his fingers into his wrist. A long time ago, Noah had learned to take someone’s pulse from a CPR class. Mingor’s was there. Very faint but still present.
Without thinking too much about what he was doing, Noah climbed up onto the block of ice, turned Mingor’s head to the side, ensured his mouth was clear, and then he set to work performing CPR.
The Thandlings edged back, watching him with horrified gazes and gaped mouths.
“He’s not dead.” Noah performed chest compressions and then breathed into Mingor’s mouth. He struggled to remember if it was one breath for five beats, or one breath for four, but then he decided it didn’t matter so much as him just keeping on. Mingor had been technically dead for only a handful of minutes. And during that time he’d been in cold water and then on ice. Hypothermia slowed the systems of the body. Noah was positive he could revive Mingor.
From the shocked expressions on the faces around him, Noah figured he probably only had another minute or two before someone pulled him away. They probably thought he was expressing some kind of alien grief and not desperately trying to save the life of the man he loved.
“Come on. Come on. Don’t leave me. Please don’t leave me.” Tears were streaming down his face as he kept pumping and breathing. Just when he’d given up hope, Mingor coughed up a tremendous amount of water. Noah jumped off him, slid off the ice, but he was back on his feet in a flash. He helped Mingor sit up and then pulled him off the ice as he continued to gasp and spit up water.
“Cold.” Mingor’s teeth chattered as he shivered.
“I know.” Noah’s knees were frozen from kneeling on the ice, but the rest of him was warm. He stripped off Mingor’s sodden robe, then his own. He covered Mingor with his clothing and then pulled him close.
The woman who had touched his back to offer comfort was staring at him, mouth agape, her hands clasped against her chest.
“Please come and share your warmth with him.” Noah pulled her near and several others soon followed her example. Collectively, their body heat warmed Mingor as Noah held him tight. He coul
d not remember a time when he had felt such gratitude and relief.
As the full import of what happened rippled through the crowd, a cheer started softly, almost quietly, and then rose until it must have been heard on the mountaintop.
Noah looked up to find all the advisors and some of their children looking down. Some of his joy slipped away when he wondered what they would do now.
Chapter 14
“You saved me.” Mingor was clinging to Noah while his fellow Thandlings pressed in close. An enormous cheer had gone up but then faded away as they set about getting items for Mingor.
“I had to.” Noah kissed his head. “I swore that I would be your shield.”
Mingor laughed and then spit out more ocean water. “Why didn’t you tell me that you, too, could perform miracles?”
“All I did was CPR.”
“There is no translation for that.” Mingor listened as Noah explained. “You are lucky that my circulatory system is very similar to yours.”
“I didn’t even think about that.” He looked a little embarrassed.
“I was dead, so it is not as if you could have hurt me with what you did.”
“Good point.” Noah kissed his forehead before pressing his forehead to Mingor’s. “But I don’t want to talk about you being dead anymore.”
“Yes.” Mingor puckered up, and Noah kissed him even though he’d been coughing up ocean water. “But what of them?”
Noah didn’t bother to look over his shoulder at the advisors on the mountaintop. “I don’t know. I was told they were anointing a new water bearer.”
“I do not believe there has ever been a time where there were two.”
“But your powers would have gone to the new water bearer, wouldn’t they?”
Mingor looked behind him and realized that it was Nirrab, the soul he’d tried to teach his magic to. He realized he had a grand opportunity that he shouldn’t let slip away. “When I passed into the arms of the ocean gods, I gave my power to all Thandlings.”
“You did?” She looked down at her hands, utterly spellbound.
Enslaved by a King [Sold! 5] (Siren Publishing Everlasting Classic ManLove) Page 12
