He took her hand, and they wandered through the brightening woods the same way they wandered here in the first place. Would she walk back down that hill as though nothing had happened? No, she was forever changed. Her very flesh carried the imprint of his touch. His juice trickled down between her thighs and sent surges of ecstasy through her. His sizzling hot essence spread from her deepest core, coursed through her veins, and reorganized her body to its purpose. She no longer had to speak, to him or to anyone else. She knew her place in this world, and nothing and no one could take that away from her.
Her friends and relatives would see a different person from the woman who came from the Lycaon. How could anyone look at her and see the same person, even if she still wore the same clothes? Her hair hadn’t grown, but she no longer carried a hard warrior shell around her soft living center. Anyone could see that.
Piwaka only walked a short distance before he stopped and faced her. He drew her to him and kissed her long and slow and deep. The sun broke above the trees and lit up his feathers. Aimee didn’t notice. She stared in his eyes as long as she could. This pleasure, like the others, would be over soon enough. Who knew how long she would have to carry these treasured moments with her before she experienced them again?
At last he tore himself away and set off again, but he didn’t make it very far before he stopped again. His eyes searched her face, and his mouth sought some certainty in her lips. The third time he stopped and lost himself in her embrace, he sank into a resigned solidity with a sigh. He wouldn’t stop again. He would deliver her to the Divide, and he would go back to the Avitras.
A dozen questions flooded her mind, but she quieted them. He knew best how to handle Aquilla and his people. She had her own side of the bargain to keep, and a long walk back to camp in front of her. She would tell the simple truth to anyone who asked. She wouldn’t hide herself anymore.
He compressed his lips and nodded without a word. He started to turn away. Then he gave her one last long, tender kiss, but at that moment, a branch snapped and Aquilla flew down through the canopy. He landed right in front of Piwaka. Aimee drew back in alarm. She pulled her hand out of Piwaka’s grasp, but Aquilla paid no attention to her. He rushed at Piwaka. “Where have you been? I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”
Piwaka opened his mouth to answer, but Aquilla cut him off. “How could you offer them those concessions? Do you know what this will do to us? You’ve left me wide open to attack from three hostile factions.”
Piwaka tried again to answer. “Did you see the other Alphas.....”
Aquilla waved his arms and spun away. “Did you see them? Did you see the look on Donen’s face? He gloated all the way down the hill. You sold me out. How can I trust you again?”
Piwaka listened with his usual calm. “The other Alphas think they gave you concessions, not the other way around.”
Aquilla cocked an eyebrow at him. “What concessions did they give me? I gave more ground than I should have. I should have walked away without giving anything instead of giving in.”
Piwaka’s shoulders relaxed. Maybe only Aimee noticed. “All the Alphas caved to your demand to re-examine the borders. That will take months—maybe even years. They won’t go any further with their peace process until they do it. They’ll give in to any obstacle you can throw in their path. You hold all the power here, and they know it.”
Aquilla’s eyes blazed. Then, to Aimee’s surprise, he wilted in front of her eyes. His chin fell down on his chest, and his shoulders slumped. “I don’t want all the power. I don’t want any of it.”
Piwaka raised his eyebrows. “What do you mean? What could you want if you don’t want power? You want the other Alphas eating out of your hand, and that’s what you got. They won’t move a muscle without your permission.”
Aquilla shook his head. “I’m no good at this political stuff. You’re the one with all the ideas. You should negotiate with them instead of me.”
Piwaka shrugged. “You’re Alpha. It’s your job to negotiate with them. I’m your Captain. It’s my job to give you ideas and support you.”
Aquilla looked away. “I don’t want to be Alpha. The pressure is killing me. I want to spend my time with my mate and my family. You’ll make a better Alpha than me. You take over.”
Piwaka shot a glance at Aimee. It was the first time she’d ever seen anything catch him off guard. “I can’t take over. You know that. You’re Alpha by inheritance through your father and your older brother. My family has always been Captains. We can’t change that now.”
Aquilla waved his arm. “Who says we can’t change it? If one man makes a better Alpha, why shouldn’t he hold the reins? I never wanted to be Alpha. I never wanted any of this.”
Piwaka stared at him. Then he sighed and laid his hand on Aquilla’s shoulder. “You’re tired. We’ve traveled two hundred miles, and the pressure of the negotiation is wearing on you. We’ll go back to the village where you can rest. Then you’ll be ready to face another round with a clear head.”
“I’ve felt this way for a long time,” Aquilla told him. “It started long before we came here, even before we took that Ursidrean hostage. It even started when my father was still alive. I never wanted the Alpha position. It was only bad luck that my brother died and I had to become Alpha.”
Piwaka’s eyes flew open. “As long ago as that? You never said anything.”
“If I said anything,” Aquilla replied, “you would have been as startled then as you are now. You would have told me I had no choice but to become Alpha whether I wanted to or not.” He glared down at the ground. “You’re doing the same thing now.”
Piwaka opened his mouth and shut it again. Then he sighed again. “I had no idea. I’m sorry I didn’t give you a safe harbor to confide in me. I know now.”
Aquilla’s head shot up. “But you still think there’s nothing we can do. I’ll continue to be Alpha, I’ll keep making mistakes like I always have, and I’ll still be miserable. I’ll never be free and happy as long as I’m Alpha. My family will suffer. I’ll live a life of isolation and hardship on the frontier, away from the village and my mate and children, the same way my father did. I’m doomed.”
Piwaka smiled at him. “Don’t worry. We’ll find a solution to this one way or the other.”
“There is no solution,” Aquilla shot back. “I’ll never be happy as long as I’m Alpha.”
“You said that,” Piwaka murmured.
“I’m terrible as Alpha,” Aquilla went on. “I can’t make good decisions like you can. Kidnapping that Ursidrean seemed like a good idea at the time. Why didn’t you tell me you objected when we brought him back from the frontier?”
Piwaka hesitated. “I did tell you. I told you you shouldn’t beat him the way you did. I told you to feed him and treat him well, or Donen would never have anything to do with us.”
Aquilla threw up his hands. “All the decisions I make turn out to be disasters. I can’t do anything right.”
Piwaka squeezed his shoulder again. “That’s not true.”
“You know it is,” Aquilla returned. “You should be Alpha. I resign. You take over.”
Piwaka snorted. “And what about the negotiation? What will the others say when I show up to negotiate with them and you aren’t there?”
Aquilla brooded for a moment. Then he straightened up, and a weight lifted off his shoulders. “We won’t tell them. We’ll keep it a secret.”
Piwaka started back. “What?”
“You’re already doing all the negotiating,” Aquilla pointed out. “You already do most of the talking, if not all of it. I’ll come with you to the negotiations, but you talk to them. You make the decisions. I don’t want to have anything to do with it anymore.”
Piwaka frowned. “Are you sure?”
Aquilla nodded. “You do it. I don’t want to be Alpha anymore.”
Piwaka studied him. Then he nodded, too. He clapped Aquilla on both shoul
ders. “Go back to camp. Your mate is still here, isn’t she? Good. Go back to your mate and try to rest. I’ll call you when we have another negotiation to attend.”
Aimee waited until Aquilla disappeared into the trees. “Are you sure about this?”
Piwaka turned to her with a smile. “He is. That’s what important.”
“So what are we going to do?” she asked.
He guided her by the elbow away from the Avitras camp toward the Divide. “This is the best thing that could happen. I can steer the Avitras toward peace.”
Aimee couldn’t suppress a smile. “Wait until the other Alphas find out.”
He stopped short. “You heard what he said. You can’t tell anybody about this. He could take back the Alpha position at the snap of his fingers if anybody finds out. Let him save face, and keep his secret. I’ll negotiate with the other Alphas, and we’ll come to a peace agreement—at least, as solid a peace agreement as we can come to at short notice.”
“And then what?” she asked.
He started walking. “Then all bets are off.”
Chapter 14
Aimee and her friends stood inside the tree line at the top of the Eastern Divide. Sunlight streamed through the canopy and twinkled on the water flowing over a little waterfall into a sparkling pool.
Caleb sniffed the air. “Well, this is all very charming, but where are our friends?”
Aimee shifted from one foot to the other. “Piwaka said they would be here.”
Caleb grumbled under his breath to Turk on his other side. “Piwaka said.”
Turk snorted. Chris fidgeted. “Maybe it’s a trap.”
“It’s not a trap,” Aimee snapped. “Just wait a minute. They’ll be here.”
“We’ve waited a lot longer than a minute already,” Renier added. “We’ll look like fools if we waited any longer.”
Carmen touched his hand. “Just a little longer. Then we’ll go.”
Rustles and clicks echoed through the trees. Donen scanned the surroundings. “I don’t like the location. I wish he’d chosen to meet at the big rock. At least there we could see what’s coming.”
A rustle of feathers broke the silence, and Piwaka and Aquilla flew down through the trees. Aquilla held Penelope Ann around the waist and set her on her feet next to him.
The other Alphas started back, but when they saw so few Avitras, they relaxed. “Where are the rest of your Guards?” Faruk asked.
Piwaka nodded to him. “We don’t need them, do we? You didn’t bring your soldiers, and we don’t need ours to have a civil conversation.”
Donen frowned. “Is that what we’re having?”
“I hope so,” Piwaka replied. “It’s a shame we’ve had so few, don’t you think?”
Donen stiffened. “I don’t like this.”
Anna spoke up. “We can trust Piwaka. We won’t lose anything by talking to him.”
Caleb crossed his arms. “All right. What do you want to talk about?”
Piwaka shrugged. “After due consideration, we are willing to postpone the inspection of the borders. Each faction can arrange the inspection, together with their neighbor factions, at their own convenience.”
Turk frowned. “What brought on this change of heart?”
“Does it really matter?” Emily asked. “As long as it doesn’t stand in the way of peace, we’ll be happy to go along with it.”
Caleb grumbled under his breath. “We’ll be the ones to decide what we go along with, not you.”
Somehow, no one heard him, and Piwaka went on. “And as to the numbers of warriors and Guards and patrols guarding the borders, this, too, can be negotiated individually between factions. If the Ursidreans and the Felsite agree to reduce their patrols to twenty individuals on each side, why shouldn’t they do so? If, on the other hand, the Avitras choose to maintain the numbers of Guards along their borders, no one can speak against it.”
“What’s the point of negotiating peace then?” Chris snapped. “If all the border patrols remain the same, and the level of hostility remains the same, we don’t have peace. We’re in exactly the same situation we were in before.”
Aimee dropped her voice so only her friends could hear. “I think he means we can choose to make peace with our neighbors if we want to. The Ursidreans and the Felsite already agreed to reduce their patrols over the next five years, eventually reducing them to nothing. Once the threat of war disappears, the Avitras will do the same.”
Piwaka waved his hand. “The relations across borders affects no one but the factions involved. No one should dictate to anyone what they do. Such matters are better handled privately.”
“Are the Avitras willing to enter into private negotiations with their neighbor factions about the borders?” Donen asked. “How can I reduce my border patrols if the Avitras maintain theirs? The Avitras might invade my territory at any moment if I left the border unguarded.”
Piwaka’s eyes flashed. “As I understand it, the Ursidreans have already unilaterally reduced their border patrols out of necessity, and the Avitras have not attacked. As long as the Ursidreans and the Avitras agree on the exact location of the border, neither faction has any reason to attack the other. The Ursidreans could reduce their patrols to nil, and the Avitras would not attack.”
“We have only your word for that,” Donen replied. “You could be luring us into reducing our patrols so we couldn’t repel an attack if it came.”
“The Avitras would not attack,” Piwaka replied. “We don’t have the numbers to attack. We suffer the same population strain you do. If you reduce your patrols, we will reduce ours.”
Donen shook his head. “You’ll excuse me if I don’t trust you.”
Piwaka inclined his head. “I don’t ask you to trust me. I don’t trust you, either. Go along as you have been, and see if the Avitras exploit your reduced border patrols. In a few years, when the Avitras haven’t attacked and no further incidents take place along the border, reduce your patrols again and see what happens. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.”
“You haven’t attacked,” Donen returned, “but you did kidnap one of our people off the border. What’s to stop you from doing the same thing?”
“Reducing your patrols would prevent that. There would be no people along the border to kidnap.” Piwaka waved his hand. “I can give you as many assurances as you want that it won’t happen, but the truth remains that none of us can trust each other. We can only judge by future actions. If you agree to peace with the Felsite, you can only watch your border and see if they attack you over the next few years. They can only watch and see if you do the same thing. That’s as good as this peace agreement is to any of us.”
“We still have one problem,” Caleb told him.
“What’s that?” Piwaka asked.
“The Aqinas,” Caleb replied. “No one has consulted them.”
“We don’t have to consult them,” Renier added. “They don’t dictate terms on Angondra.”
“The Aqinas have arbitrated every peace agreement in Angondran history,” Caleb replied.
“They’ve also instigated every war in Angondran history,” Turk grumbled.
“We don’t know that for certain,” Emily argued. “That’s an old prejudice that might not be true.”
“Either way,” Chris added, “we should consult them about our plans. They might have something to contribute.”
“They might undermine us,” Carmen suggested.
“They travel through the water,” Emily told her. “They can touch every inch of Angondran territory in an instant. They might be able to help us in ways we can’t foresee.”
Chris took a step forward. Aquilla stiffened and moved back, but Piwaka held up his hand for calm. Chris took another step forward. “I have an idea.”
Turk put out his hand and tried to grab her, but she moved away toward the spring. She squatted beside the water and put her fingertips into the foaming curr
ent.
“What are you doing?” Marissa asked.
“I’m calling Sasha,” Chris replied. “All of us—all of us women—came along on this mission to help make peace between the factions. There’s a human woman living with the Aqinas. If we can bring her here, she can help us negotiate with the Aqinas.”
The group watched her in silence. She trailed her fingers back and forth through the shimmering water. Then Emily stepped forward. She squatted at Chris’s side. “What are you doing?” Anna asked.
“I’m calling Frieda,” Emily replied. “Sasha isn’t the only human woman living with the Aqinas. Frieda’s our sister. She can help us, too.” She dipped her fingers into the spring water. No one moved or even breathed.
All at once, a mighty explosion shot the spring water out of its bed. Chris and Emily stumbled back, and a curtain of water showered down on the grassy bank. A wall of black figures rose out of the spring and formed a line across the surface of the water.
The Avitras drew back in horror, but the others stood their ground. The film of black slime fell away from the indistinct shapes to reveal well-formed people of every age and sex. A young man with angular features and long black hair hanging in ropes down his back stepped out of the water up onto the bank. He surveyed the group. “Alpha Caleb. Alpha Renier. It’s been too long. And Alpha Aquilla, if I’m not mistaken.”
Aquilla bared his teeth at the Aqinas. “I don’t know you.”
Piwaka stepped in front of Aquilla. “But I do. You’re Fritz, aren’t you? I knew your father. I am Piwaka, Captain of the Guard.”
Fritz bowed and smiled. “I remember you now. Happily met. To what do we owe the honor of your call?”
Emily stepped forward. “We called Sasha and Frieda. Frieda is my sister, and Sasha is our friend. We need their help to finalize a peace agreement between all the Angondran factions.”
Fritz waved his hand toward the line of people behind him. “They are here. They will speak to you if they wish it.”
Emily glanced toward the line, and Aimee followed her gaze. She didn’t recognize anyone. All the Aqinas looked the same. They wore long white gowns with long ropey dark hair hanging down their backs. None of them had Frieda’s short crop of curls or her sharp black eyes.
Optorio Civil War Complete Series Box Set (Books 1 - 6): A Sci-fi Alien Warrior Invasion Abduction Romance (Optorio Chronicles Book 2) Page 81
