Straddling the tree branch, Laos sat knee-to-knee across from Brishen and leaned in close. “Brishen? Are you staying behind because you intend to defect to the Nayak?” Her voice was barely audible above the rainfall.
“Where did you hear that?” Brishen said defensively, his face flushing.
“Karlyn told me you went into their camp and spoke to them,” Laos said, keeping her voice even and her expression neutral.
“Perhaps you should send Karlyn to Deer Cove. She’s clearly a superior scout,” Brishen said bitterly.
“She’s not a leader.” Laos touched his hand, but he jerked away. It was all he could do not to shove her out of the tree and holler at the top of his lungs for her to leave him alone. Even that mental image—Laos injured and lying in the mud—ignited his protective instincts and inner conflict.
“Answer my question,” she ordered, her eyes on her hands.
Shame flooded from Brishen’s heart, too fast for the cold rain to wash away. “I can’t have children. I’d be a drain on their food supply. I’m of no use to them.”
Laos took his hand again, and she did not let him pull away. If he could have moved, he would have fought. He would have wrestled with her until they were shivering and covered with mud, but then the pain would be gone. Her hands trembled, and she bounced lightly on the branch, as though she needed the sparring match, too.
“I am. If I go with you . . .” She choked on the words, too frightened to finish the sentence, but when she lifted her eyes he saw that she was committed to going. She’d sacrifice herself to the Nayak for his sake. Brishen’s jaw quivered in horror, his mind flashing to the old man with the whip. Even he hadn’t realized the implications of defecting until he’d looked that man in the eye.
“You wouldn’t last a day in their camp,” he said, forcing a smile through his terror and waving her offer off like a joke.
“I’m not afraid,” she said defiantly.
Brishen touched the Occ on her brow. “You’d miss your toys too much.”
Laos turned her face toward his hand and closed her eyes. “All I need is you.”
Pulling her close, Brishen embraced her gratefully and protectively. “You’d be of no use to them either. I’d kill anyone who touched you,” his voice catching in his throat.
She laughed and hugged him, the tension and fear in her giving way to relief. She pressed her cheek to his, dancing her fingers through the stubble on his chin. It was an intimate gesture, and not something she allowed lightly.
“I can’t be your primary. I can’t,” she said, pulling back, her eyes downcast again.
“I know,” Brishen said, cradling her chin. She hooked her hand over his, rocking introspectively.
“I love so much. I love you more than anyone. But even thinking the word—I can’t breathe,” she gasped, her body starting to shake. “My father was under so much pressure to couple. He never wanted to take secondaries, but at least he could feel desire for them. I never will. And if I don’t have a choice in the matter, then we may as well be with the Nayak and with your children—”
“Stop it, Laos. We have a choice!” Brishen interrupted. “We always have. I’m sterile. I can’t have secondaries. And if I can’t have you as a primary, then I just won’t take a primary. Your father proved it’s not a requirement.”
“He’s moving in,” she murmured. “I’ve wanted him to live with us for so long, but it doesn’t feel right anymore.”
“Because he loves Adita?”
“Because he makes me feel broken.”
“I feel that way every day,” Brishen confessed, scooting closer to her, hooking her ankle with his. “At least you were born asexual. I did this to myself.”
“You did what you had to in order to survive,” she said, swinging their entwined feet, taking comfort in the intimacy they’d grown into over the years.
“You could always come to my tent, if you get tired of listening to your parents get frisky,” he offered. “Or we could just live together.”
Laos’ breath hitched.
“Don’t look so shocked,” he smiled. “How many nights a week do we wake up in the same bed?”
“These days? It seems all of them,” she said hesitantly.
“Nothing would change if we both called the same tent home,” he said. “We’d still wake up next to each other.”
“We’d both have night clothes in the same tent.”
“We’d have the rations of independents. We’d both have our own mats and pillows,” he pointed out. “Wouldn’t have to share or steal someone else’s.”
Laos smiled bashfully, warming to the notion. Her fingers entwined with his as she rolled the thought through her mind, and Brishen waited eagerly, hoping for a yes, but bracing himself for another rejection. Thunder rolled, eliciting a few panicked cries from the children’s shelter. The drivers shouted to each other about making space in the covered vehicles for the youngest ones and distributing rain gear to the teens.
“You wouldn’t think it cruel? Being so close and not having me as a primary?” she asked, conflicted. “I don’t want to keep you from finding someone who can love you properly.”
“Now that I know what you want, I’ll find a way to move on. One day at a time,” he promised her, his eyes welling with tears. She still didn’t grasp what the mutilation had done to his body. His throat closed up at the thought of the conversations ahead and he squeezed her fingers hard. “There are things you should know about me. Things that happened when the Nayak took us.”
“The camp is moving. We’re supposed to be ahead of the drive,” she said evasively, backing off the branch. She tugged his hands, expecting him to spring from the tree so they could race playfully out of the camp and outrun the difficult conversation.
Brishen was too stiff to sit forward. Raising his shirt, he showed her the puncture wound under his rib cage. “Bed rest,” he explained. “Chanti skirmish. I really am stuck in this tree for awhile.”
Laos cocked her head, then laughed, finally understanding why he’d been so stingy with his embraces.
“Well, then. I suppose I should find someone else to send to Deer Cove,” Laos said matter-of-factly, her whole manner shifting. She swung down from the branches, heading back to work.
“Laos! Send a nurse,” he called, laughing.
“Nag, nag! I’m not your primary,” she teased, giving him a wink. He smiled, watching her slide in the mud, skating her way to the medical tent. There would be nothing traditional about their friendship. But they had each other.
Saskia sat alone on the upper catwalk of Oriana’s cargo bay, her favorite romance novel called up on her Virclutch. She’d been reading the same page for the last hour, but her attention was on the distracting live display of manhood down below. Danny and Tray were shirtless and sweating, working out hard in the small corner of the bay they’d managed to clear out. Pushups, pull-ups, crunches—they taunted and egged each other. Sometimes they chased each other, and they called it ‘running laps.’ It was a comfortingly normal sight for Saskia. Whenever they were in Quin, two hours of their twelve-hour layover had always been allocated for a full-gravity workout. Saskia never joined them because she knew Tray needed that one-on-one time with his brother.
Danny was still weak from the illness and today Tray was running circles around him. Tray had taken the splint off his wrist, but Saskia had a feeling he’d be wearing it again tonight if he kept pushing himself. Saskia ducked behind a bulkhead as the two started chasing each other up the stairs, but they only made it halfway to middeck before Tray leapt over the railing and circled behind the ‘sled.
Hiding a smile, Saskia shut off her Virclutch and laid on the catwalk, watching. Tray peeked over the wing of the glider and winked at her, startling her. The distraction cost him; half a second later, Danny pounced. The successful tackle earned Danny the right to play drill sergeant while Tray did twenty push-ups. Saskia watched in amusement, absently cradling her right hand and brushing
her thumb along the length of her fingers. The memory of Tray’s touch sent tingles through her skin. She would be alone out here were it not for him.
He’s the captain’s brother. They’d spent five years working together, and had always maintained a professional distance. Aside from meals, they’d rarely spoken socially on the ship, and they’d never spent time together in port. Most men Saskia had been with accepted her as a hard-shelled warrior, had their fun, and left when they grew tired of the infrequent trysts in port. Tray knew how to prepare her favorite foods, always wanted to see her smile, and when she thought sure she’d die alone in that infirmary bed, he’d held her hand.
He was her friend. The notion was so foreign, she could barely entertain it. Protecting Tray had always been part of staying in the captain’s good graces—being able to stay on the ship. But the relationship she had with Tray, awkward and uncertain as it was, had become something worth protecting.
Hawk entered the bay from middeck, clambering down the stairs and interrupting Tray’s latest display of athleticism with a request to join the workout. Danny’s smile widened, but Tray’s disappeared. The chin-ups and crunches started anew. Tray only lasted five minutes before politely excusing himself, claiming that he needed to go easy on his wrist. Grabbing his shirt, Tray trotted up the stairs, pausing to look back at his brother, but Danny didn’t notice. The sad look on Tray’s face made Saskia hurt inside.
“Tray,” Saskia called quietly from the upper catwalk, not wanting to draw the others’ attention. Tray looked up at her, a smile masking his disappointment. Mopping the sweat from his face with his shirt, Tray climbed just far enough up the stairs to be at eye level with her. Saskia propped herself on one elbow and scooted closer to the edge of the catwalk.
“Do you need a pillow?” he joked, reaching for her, but at the last moment, hooking his fingers over the edge of the catwalk.
Saskia touched his fingers for a split second, then retracted her hand and fiddled nervously with the zipper of her coveralls. “I’m tired of reading. Do you want to play cards?”
“I want to take a shower,” Tray answered, then froze, his face flushing. “I mean—I—cards sounds good.”
Saskia covered her mouth, suppressing a chuckle at his embarrassment. Maybe he would have liked to hear me laugh. Letting a small smile show, she glanced at him, then looked quickly away. She wasn’t sure if she reached out first or he did, but their hands met again, their fingers laced, and she didn’t know what to do. It felt weird, and she wasn’t sure how long to hold on. Twisting her hand, Saskia broke the connection and sat up, balling her hands into fists and hiding them in her lap.
“Sorry, my hands are still sweaty,” Tray murmured, wiping his palm on his shorts. “Give me ten minutes to clean up?”
“Okay,” Saskia agreed, watching him go. Her hand was tingling from Tray’s touch and her chest was filled with butterflies. Saskia rubbed her chest to smooth away the tingles and smiled to herself. For the first time in years, she had a friend.
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Hybrid: The New Dawn Book 4
Preview
There was a trick Liza had been doing since before she could speak—she could enter a mind and see through a person’s eyes. It was a delicate process, different from sorting memories, and often more overwhelming as nothing was filtered.
Reaching out her mind, she saw six visitors on the ship, and she found the one at the ship’s controls. There was a projection in the Spirit Realm that seemed like it should be coming from the eyes, but Liza couldn’t make heads or tails of what she saw. She’d never been on a ship.
Finally, Liza recognized a human face. She must have done something wrong if she was seeing a face instead of hands. It was a pale woman with brown, wavy hair and bright green eyes. Maybe they were looking into a mirror. The woman had a creepy frown, and it felt like she was staring directly at Liza. Liza tried to see around her. They were in a kitchen with a large window. It didn’t look like a ship; it looked like a memory. It looked like one of the houses in Boone, but from years ago before everyone died. There was a table and chairs, and windows made of glass. But outside the window, the land was gray.
“You’re in my head,” the green-eyed woman said.
Liza gasped. Something wasn’t right.
“You don’t belong here. Leave.”
A wall formed around Liza, blacking out the view of the woman and the world, but Liza fought to stay connected.
Open your eyes, Liza commanded. Speaking directly into a person’s mind rarely worked with common humans. Everyone had their own head language, and while she could understand others with relative ease, other did not tend to understand her. Kerris said it used to be like that with them, but Liza was too young to remember.
“This is my space,” the woman insisted, giving Liza a stern eyebrow raise.
“Come west and find my city,” Liza asked, trying to mimic the language she heard. She tried to project an image of Boone, but she did not know what the world looked like from up in the clouds.
“I cannot change course,” the woman responded. She understood! The black wall came up, dividing them again.
“Wait!” Liza cried. “Are you like me? Is that why we can talk? Please, I want you to come! Show me where you are.”
There was a flash of images—a control panel, dials, gauges. Liza couldn’t read the writing. It vanished in a puff of smoke.
When the mist cleared, Liza was in a dark cavern. A grotesque beast with the face of a horse, the teeth of a snake, and the body of a man snarled at Liza. It had dark skin, long talons, and leathery wings. The beast dispersed in a flash of light and the green-eyed woman came flying toward Liza. Raising her hands in defense, Liza splayed her talons and snarled. In this realm, she looked more like the beast than the woman, but she’d never fought. There was nothing solid here; only dust and blood.
The green-eyed woman was weak and human in this realm—no claws, no teeth, no wings. With one powerful swipe, Liza ripped off half of the woman’s face. The woman cowered, black dust misting from her wound. The image of the dark cavern persisted.
Ruthlessly, Liza dragged her talons across the cave of the wall, kicking up more ashes, dust, and memories of the same. The green-eyed woman did not stop her. Liza did not know if she’d be able to get to the real memories, or see out of this woman’s true eyes. She couldn’t escape the woman’s mind. She was trapped!
Read from the beginning… Hybrid: The New Dawn Book 4
The Qinali Virus
An ancient warning. A new threat.
Amber’s astral projection ability is rare…
… and it’s everything the Council of Highmere has been waiting for.
Trained in astronomy, Amber is bored by her tedious, Council-appointed job. When her mind wanders, so does her astral body, and always to the same place – a meteor-flattened crater in a forest with an ancient metal sign poking up through the dirt.
The sign warns of Sudden Death.
Decades ago, a silent, but deadly virus had decimated the population of the planet, and left in its wake the seeming utopia Amber’s people enjoyed. But with the warning, Amber starts to question her world like never before. Her quest to unbury the past makes her a threat to the Council.
And they will use her family against her.
Can Amber uncover the truth behind the ancient warning sign before the Council enacts their plan?
/> You’ll love this sci-fi thriller, because you can’t protect your family if you don’t know what’s out there.
Get it now!
Also by Valerie J. Mikles
The New Dawn Series Novels
#1 The Disappeared
#2 Sequestered
#3 Trade Circle
#4 Hybrid
#5 The Gray Market
#6 The Confluence
#7 Premonition (coming soon)
Standalone Novel
The Qinali Virus
Short Stories
(free to newsletter subscribers)
Second Chances: A Reason to Walk
Second Chances: The Lost Ingredient
Invasive Species
About the Author
Valerie J. Mikles is a PhD astronomer who defected from academia to pursue her dream of being an out of work actor in L.A. She is active in community theater as an actor, choreographer, costumer, and stage manager. She frequents sci-fi conventions as a science/author guest and a fan/cosplayer. She currently lives in Maryland with her three cats and works on weather satellites for NOAA.
Trade Circle: A Space Opera Adventure Series (The New Dawn Book 3) Page 28
