His hearts thundered, his skin tingled with want, and his shaft screamed in protest at its confinement, but he would not allow it to emerge. If Larkin was not ready, he would respect that. For now, her pleasure was enough.
As he continued stroking, a suction cup caught on a hard pebble at the apex of her sex.
Larkin’s body stiffened, and she threw her head back. “Oh fuck! Dracchus!”
Her words gave way to desperate, breathless moans, and she squeezed her eyes shut as liquid heat flowed from her slit. He inhaled her scent, tasted her sweetness, and yearned to have it on his tongue.
Biting her bottom lip to quiet her release, she clung to him. Dracchus didn’t relent until her trembling ceased and she sagged in his arms.
He reluctantly unwound his tentacle from her leg and trailed it down the outside of her thigh. “Are you pleased, female?”
Larkin tensed. She drew back quickly, glancing up to meet his eyes for an instant before she ducked out of his arms and snatched up her towel. She moved beyond his reach and hastily covered herself, holding the towel in place with an arm across her chest.
“We shouldn’t have done that,” she said.
Dracchus ached with need; he craved release almost as much as he craved the feeling of her body reacting to his touch, almost as much as he wanted another taste of her. Larkin’s inner thighs glistened with the evidence of her own desire.
“Why?” he asked, trying unsuccessfully to ignore the throbbing behind his slit.
She clenched a fistful of the fabric over her pelvis and pressed her lips into a thin line, cheeks paling. “This is moving too fast. I just found out that krakens existed and now I’m practically having sex with one.” She spun away from him. “What the hell is wrong with me?”
“Nothing.” He moved closer but hesitated as he reached toward her. Humans touched often, but he’d seen enough of their interactions to know they didn’t always want to be touched. He wished he knew how to tell when that was the case.
“There is plenty wrong with me,” she said. “I’m not what you want, Dracchus. You just haven’t realized it yet.”
He moved closer still, extending an arm, but she shrugged away from his hand.
“I’m getting back in the shower.” She tugged open one of the dresser drawers and rummaged through its contents.
Dracchus stilled, heartbeats stuttering. He took her by the shoulders and forced her to turn toward him.
“I don’t know where they are,” Larkin said with a glare, “but I will kick you square in the balls if you don’t let go.”
“Are you so disgusted by my touch that you must wash yourself again?” he demanded. His lingering, painful arousal had mingled with the hurt of her words, turning into a jumbled, nauseating mess in his chest.
Any anger she’d displayed vanished within the next instant. “No. That’s not what I… Fuck.” She looked away. “It’s not you, Dracchus. I’m not…disgusted.” Her grip on the towel tightened. “I just need some space to figure this out. I’m not…good with this kind of thing.”
He was uncertain of whether he felt reassured by her answer, uncertain of whether she’d meant to be reassuring. At his core, he understood he wasn’t good at things like this, either. He didn’t even know what exactly this was, apart from totally new to him…but he wanted it nonetheless.
Dracchus released his hold on her shoulders and moved back. His limbs felt oddly heavy and unstable; if a body could be strengthened by rage, it made sense that it could be weakened by sadness or doubt. Still, it was an unfamiliar sensation, and that unsettled him. Had Jax and Arkon gone through similar feelings? How had they coped?
“I will grant you space,” he said. “At least for a short while.”
“Thank you.” She offered him a small, grateful smile and turned back to the dresser.
For a few moments, he watched her, unable but to notice the curve of her backside against the fabric covering it. Then he forced himself to turn away and move toward the door. He’d only just returned to their den, and he’d no desire to leave it — to leave her — but if it was what Larkin needed, he’d grant her request. It was for the best. Despite this exchange, his blood was still hot, his desire still overwhelming.
He could not trust himself around her. Could not trust himself to ignore his desires and respect her wishes.
He entered the corridor and leaned beside the doorframe after the door slid shut. The hallway was silent save for the gentle, familiar, barely perceptibly hum present throughout most of the Facility. Arkon called it the whirring of hidden machinery.
Dracchus didn’t care about machinery, hidden or otherwise. Larkin’s taste lingered on his suction cups, her scent clung to his skin, and his shaft ached. She was driving him dangerously close to casting aside all the ways of their people. He needed to have her, had never wanted anyone or anything more.
But he knew now, more than ever, that he could not make the choice for her, and he could not force her to choose. She needed to come to him of her own free will.
Chapter 15
Larkin wrinkled her nose and looked around the large room. Lockers stood along two of the walls, and various pieces of equipment — most of which she didn’t recognize — were stacked beside a third wall. In the center of the room was a huge pool of clear water; it had to be at least sixty meters from one end to the other, and half that across.
“What is that smell?” she asked.
Dracchus shrugged. The gesture was almost comical given his size. “Chemicals, Arkon says. I am not sure what that means, but he insists that is the source.”
“Chemicals for what? Are they dangerous?” Their smell sure as hell implied they were.
“I do not believe so.” He stared into the pool, one corner of his mouth turned down. “Kraken have entered the water before, and none have come to harm for it.”
“It’s coming from the water?” Larkin stepped to the edge and looked down. Her eyes widened at what she saw.
The bottom of the pool was covered by countless little stones, their differences in color creating intricate, swirling patterns that flowed into each other so naturally it seemed impossible.
“Who made that?” she asked.
“Arkon, over many weeks. I used to think that was time wasted.”
“It’s beautiful. Why would you think it’s a waste of time?”
“Because it did nothing to contribute to the survival of our people,” he replied, shaking his head. “But you are right. It is pleasing. I cannot decide what its value is, only that it is of some value.”
Larkin tilted her head, tracing the patterns with her gaze. “We’d spend days, sometimes weeks, out in the jungle, tracking our prey. It was hard work. Tedious work. And the whole time, I knew in the back of my mind that most of our food came from farms, anyway. But when we got back into the fort with our fresh kills, there’d be music, and dancing, and a feast to celebrate. People were happy because of what we’d done. Even if the farms produced more food, we’d added something more to their lives.
“That’s what this is. It’s about making people feel something, about…entertainment. A full belly is great, don’t get me wrong, but people need more than that sometimes to be happy. Life needs to be lived, and there is value in the small things, the things that might not seem important, like this,” she waved at the stones. “You gain pleasure, just from looking at it.”
Dracchus folded his arms across his broad chest released a slow breath. “For the kraken, it has been survival. For generations, that is all we’ve known.”
“That’s not so different from us,” she said, facing him. “Humans have had to work hard every day since the colonization to carve out our place on this world. We just have the tools and experience to make our survival more efficient. But even when things are rough, we take time to enjoy life.”
“So I have seen since our humans came,” Dracchus said.
The tone with which he’d said that — our humans — was so affectionat
ely possessive that Larkin couldn’t help but smile. Whatever their differences, Dracchus had accepted the humans in the Facility as his people. Would it really be so bad to be part of that?
To be his mate?
Larkin fought a shiver as she recalled what he’d done to her last evening. She’d stood in the shower for at least half an hour afterwards before her body finally came down from the heights of pleasure to which he’d raised her. Even then, it hadn’t been enough. She’d craved more.
She’d wanted him.
This isn’t about what I want. It’s about what I can’t give him.
Her smile fell, and she cleared her throat. Better not to think about it. She forced her thoughts elsewhere, focusing on the tour Dracchus was giving her.
She’d seen more rooms than she knew what to do with, and she’d had few good guesses as to what most of them were for. Before they’d gone anywhere else, he’d taken her to a small chamber that had once been some sort of office, where he’d opened a hidden panel on the wall to reveal an assortment of rifles, harpoon guns, pistols, knives, all neatly stored. At least ten diving suits lay on the shelf below with their accompanying masks.
He’d shown her the button to open the panel, handed her a belt, and directed her to take a blade and a pistol. The trust he’d shown her in that moment was almost flooring, and the quality of the weapons — their condition — was astounding.
“So we’ve seen offices, labs, an infirmary that puts the one at Fort Culver to shame, the mess hall and the kitchen, a room full of functioning computers, and this place.” She looked back into the pool and narrowed her eyes; its walls were lined with windows all the way around. “What was this place used for anyway? This building is surrounded by water.”
“To train human divers and test their devices.” Dracchus turned his head to look at her. “The open ocean was too dangerous for those functions. This was a…” His brow dropped as though in deep concentration. Larkin found it endearing. “Controlled environment. They tested their suits and equipment near bits of halorium. Arkon said it was to learn how to prevent halorium from disrupting their electronics.”
“What is halorium?”
He looked at the pool and raised his arm, extending a finger. “In the center.”
Larkin followed his gesture, shifting her gaze to the pattern on the floor of the pool. She wasn’t sure what he intended for her to find — all the stones were small and only varied slightly in color — until her eyes caught on the middle of the design. The center stone no bigger than any of the rest, but where the others were smooth and rounded, this had sharp, crystal-like planes. It glowed a steady, soft blue; the same glow she’d often seen from jungle plants after dark.
The same glow Dracchus had emitted.
“That rock?” she asked.
“Yes. It makes old human machinery fail when it is near.”
“Why did they want it, then?”
“Because it holds great power. It is what has kept the Facility alive for all this time.”
“Krullshit,” she said, looking back to Dracchus. “That little thing?”
“Not that one. There is a… I cannot recall the word Arkon used. Some machine at the heart of this place, in the Underneath, that harnesses the energy in halorium. It is why the kraken were created.”
Larkin arched a brow. “Humans created you…for that?”
“Halorium is safe to touch,” he said with a frown, “but it turns off the diving suits when they are too close. My kind can collect it safely. Yours cannot.”
“So, what happened?”
“The kraken were treated like slaves by the humans here. We were not people to them. So my ancestors rose up and seized the Facility by force.” His frown deepened, but there was no apology in his expression. “They killed all the humans and claimed this place as their own.”
“How was it no one on land knew about you?” Larkin shook her head, unable to wrap her mind around it. “Fort Culver was the central command for the military on Halora. They had to know. They had communications everywhe—”
Realization silenced her abruptly. Though the records were difficult to access now, and most of the computers back home had long since failed, all the rangers knew the final order issued to all military personnel. It was what had defined their mission over the subsequent generations.
Hold the line against anything that might come. Defend the colonists to the last man.
“They knew,” she said, scowling. “The IDC knew what happened, knew what they’d done, and they kept everyone in the dark about it. The final order they issued was about your people.”
“I do not understand, Larkin. What do you mean?”
“Before communication was severed with the Interstellar Defense Collation, they contacted every military base on Halora and…” She sighed and shook her head, glancing at the pool then back at Dracchus. “You know what? It doesn’t matter anymore. Those people are dead, and we’re here. It’s in the past.”
He seemed to search her face for a time, and his unreadable expression made it difficult to determine what he was thinking.
“And it is up to us to shape the future,” he finally said. “To prevent the same events from occurring again.”
“Right.” Larkin lifted one side of her mouth in a half-smile. “We haven’t been doing all that great a job so far, have we?”
“The two of us have done well.” He offered her the ghost of a smile in return. “Most everyone else is the problem.”
Larkin studied him. His body was tense, but his shoulders slumped as though beneath a heavy burden. She’d seen from the beginning how he put his people before himself, and bringing her here had only caused more strife amongst the kraken. That strife was undoubtedly the weight he carried on his back.
She stepped closer to him and raised her hand, hesitating for a moment before settling it on his arm. “There is only so much one person can do. You make the best effort you can, you stand your ground, and you fight for what you believe in. Good people will see that, and it will inspire them to stand with you.”
He glanced down at her hand, and she felt his muscles shift beneath her palm. “Will you stand with me, Larkin?”
“Against the humans?”
“Against anyone who threatens the potential peace between our people.”
She lowered her gaze, watching her thumb as she brushed it over his skin, and furrowed her brow. If she said yes, it meant potentially going against her father and every ranger under his command — people she’d grown up with and had known all her life. But how could she condone the things her father had done? The torture of intelligent beings, of people?
She hoped that, when the time came, her father would listen.
“Yeah. I’ll stand with you, Dracchus,” Larkin said, meeting his gaze.
He raised his free arm and covered her hand with his. The gesture reminded her again of the immense strength he possessed and how much control he demonstrated over it.
“I do not want violence because of any of this,” he said, “but it will come. From kraken, from humans, or from both.”
“I’m prepared for it.” She shifted her hand, sliding her fingers between his and squeezing them gently. Her skin strongly contrasted his in a mingling of light and dark. She also couldn’t deny how right his touch felt.
Cheeks flushing, she pulled her hand away and settled it on the grip of the knife on her belt. She stepped back with a smile. “Why don’t we get out of here? I think the smell is getting worse.”
His nostrils flared with a deep inhalation, and she waited for him to disagree with her; if anything, she noticed the smell less, now that her nose had adapted to it. But he only nodded, and they moved back into the corridor together.
She drew in a deep breath of the clean, filtered air as she walked, detecting only the faintest hint of the chemical odor.
“Where is your room?” she asked.
“My den was in one of the flooded buildings,” he replied.
“You sleep in the water? Does it bother you to sleep in the air, then?”
“Only after long periods of time. Being out of the water for days on that ship was unpleasant.”
Larkin frowned. “I’m sorry. If I’d known befo—”
“Do not apologize. You did what you thought was right at the time.” He turned his head toward her, and his signature frown had returned. “When I first encountered Macy, I thought it right to bring her to my people, to show them what Jax had done. I dragged her into the water, assuming humans could breathe underwater. I nearly killed her. At that point, humans were nothing more or less than my enemy. She proved me wrong when she came by her own choice to face the kraken.”
“Brave of her,” Larkin said. “And she was the first human since the revolt?”
“Yes.”
She shifted to walk partially behind him as they passed into another hallway, careful not to trip over his tentacles. She hadn’t determined the exact layout of the place, but she was sure they were moving back toward the cabins.
“When I told you Randall was here, I took way your choice, did I not?” he asked.
“Well, not really. What would you have done if I hadn’t come here?”
“I would have found ways to make our camp more comfortable.”
Larkin chuckled. “It was a nice little camp.”
“I was interested only in the company, not the place.” His tone was so matter-of-fact that she couldn’t help but laugh again. She’d grown up around gruff, blunt men, but Dracchus’s forwardness and lack of shame made all the others seem sheepish in comparison.
They turned another corner, entering another corridor that looked very much like all the rest. Movement ahead caught Larkin’s eye.
Dracchus halted, extending his arm to bar her passage. He used that arm to gently guide her behind him, but not before she saw a pair of male kraken at the other end of the hall. One was orange-brown with dark stripes, similar to Jax in size and build. The brown one beside him was familiar to her — Neo, the kraken who’d attempted to drown Larkin while the ship burned.
Heart of the Deep Page 16
