by Ivy Sparks
I smiled, picking up my skirts before walking around the long table toward him. I held out my hand to him and cocked my head to the side. “Then we have a deal.”
Chapter Eight
Vorian
I leaned forward, trying to focus on the hologram before me, hovering around as a translucent orb displayed the forests of Lanua. The twelve board members watched the orb float between them, their gazes moving in unison like a flock of idiots.
I didn’t understand why they were needed. All they ever did was agree to whatever Valk said and cower before me, whispering behind my back about the rumors swirling around about the war.
I wondered what the latest gossip was. That my father gave me these scars? That I willingly gave myself up to the Lorinians, allowed them to destroy my wing in order to spare my life? Last time I heard such abhorrent whispers, I threw the ingrate out the window. After firing him, of course.
He survived, so I heard. But thankfully the taunting whispers seemed to come to an abrupt halt. At least in my presence.
I was the war hero. I was the one who made peace with the Lorinians. I was the one who sacrificed not only my wing, but my family, and yet my own kind treated me like this. They treated me like I was defective, broken. All over one stupid wing. If I wasn’t in what Valk would call a “highly important meeting,” I would spit on the table now.
Instead, I sat in this uncomfortable chair, waiting for Valk to stop rattling on.
“If we entered from the…” Valk continued, pressing a button on his remote. Areas on the orb glowed, displaying locations to gather resources. I didn’t understand why he insisted on this meeting. The Lorinians would never agree to such a deal.
Why did I bother with this charade? I was the CEO. I was putting myself through needless suffering all because of some tradition of running the family company. I was set for life, the royal family saw to that. I didn’t need to keep up pretenses with my father’s business. I could burn the whole thing to the ground and be fine with the aftermath.
It hadn’t always been like this—at least, not this insufferable. Valk had “stepped up” while I was busy with the war. Now it felt like he was running the whole thing, and I hated to admit, part of me had let it happen. The business had never been my true passion. Developing technology and medicine—that was where my mind was most days. These meetings just felt like a necessary chore, something I had to do to keep the funds rolling in for my side projects.
“We know the Lorinians are sitting on a goldmine, almost literally,” Valk prattled on. “We just haven’t done a good enough job conveying how sustainable our mining techniques are. This isn’t the old days, where we’d destroy vast swaths of forests.”
Yeah, we’d only pollute most of their water sources instead. I knew what a joke so-called “sustainable mining techniques” were. We didn’t have to live in those forests, and that was why it was of such little concern to us.
Most of us, anyway. I cared. And I thought I had fought on the right side of the war, and that we finally were making efforts toward peace.
No. We had simply agreed to not take the forests by force. Now, it seemed, we were trying to take them through sleight of hand.
Valk’s voice was terribly irritating. I looked over at the other board members, all leaning forward, watching either the orb or Valk.
Idiots, all of them.
My mind shifted, taking me to the other night in my dining hall. I remembered Ellie’s form sitting across from me, her blonde hair reminding me of the sun rising high over the peaks of Adonia, her eyes wide with enchanting wonder. She looked so clean, so refreshed, the dark circles under her eyes lightened from days of sleep. The dress she wore hung off her frail frame. She still needed more weight, but it was a start.
My mind kept thinking of the way she sauntered toward me at the end of our meal, with fire in her eyes and a quirk of her lips, the way her tongue darted in her mouth. Her lips were painted red. They looked so soft and plump at the time. I wondered if I’d ever feel her luscious lips against mine again.
I imagined her hands on my wings, stroking me up and down. The memory of it sent a shiver down my spine. Her tongue had danced with mine, her teeth tugging at my bottom lip. If I could just relive the time we had in that room once more, just for five minutes, even one minute…
My pants felt uncomfortably tight, the room stuffy and hot. I looked at the time on my watch, desperate for relief.
Not even fifteen minutes into the meeting. It had felt like hours.
“What do you think, Master Vorian?” Valk asked. The way he said my name sounded as if he were mocking my title. I wouldn’t put it past him.
I looked up from my watch, the quirk of his lips letting me know he had noticed my boredom, or at least that I was distracted. If I could fire anyone, I would fire Valk first. The only reason I didn’t was due to the centuries of business dealings and alliance our families shared. “I stroke your wing, you stroke mine,” was the mentality behind our houses, and it had worked swimmingly for generations.
Now I wasn’t so sure.
At one point it was arranged for me to marry his sister, Bermuda. However, that quickly fell through due to my… deformity. It didn’t matter. Valk’s sister was spoiled and haughty. She treated Zoe as more of a thing due to her parentage, and looked down upon any creature she deemed inferior. Dravak was completely invisible to her. I didn’t think anyone had the ability to treat someone as if they didn’t exist, but somehow she was quite capable. And me, well, I had money, so apparently that was good enough for her.
Until the war.
Our engagement falling through was a blessing in disguise.
“Master Vorian?” Ghalla, a board member, once an advisor to my father, placed her hand on mine, drawing me away from my thoughts.
I had no clue what we were discussing.
I stood, my watch reading twenty minutes past. I had stayed long enough. “I’ll have to make my decision at a later time, after I’ve calculated all the possibilities.”
Valk arched a brow. He unnerved me, the way he looked down his nose, as if his house were better. “Over our next meeting?”
The board members stared at me as if both my wings had fallen off.
I cleared my throat, tapping my chin, trying to keep myself cool and collected when all I wanted to do was fly far away. My eyes narrowed on Valk, hoping I looked intimidating. “Yes,” I said, crossing my arms in front of my chest and straightening my spine. I was taller than Valk, but he always found a way to make me feel smaller than him.
Valk nodded, tilting forward in a curt bow. “Very well then, Master Vorian.”
I turned on my heel, thankful to return to my office for some peace and quiet. Maybe I’d even leave early, invite Ellie for a midday flight before the ball. She might enjoy the fresh air…
Or maybe that was a stupid idea. Humans weren’t accustomed to flying and with my faulty wing I couldn’t fly as high as I used to, nor as long. She probably wouldn’t be interested. She only flew with me from the Orion because she needed to escape from there.
What activities did humans even enjoy? She didn’t like dancing, she couldn’t fly, she probably didn’t know how to fight…
“Vorian.”
Oh, great seven hells of Lucious why couldn’t I catch just one break today? I scowled over my shoulder, finding Valk’s smug, punchable face gazing back at me, leaning casually against the wall. I turned back to my office, the door beckoning me. I was nearly there.
I inhaled deeply, counting to ten before turning back to Valk, saying a silent prayer to the heavenly gardens of Solaris that today wasn’t the day I’d make a complete ass of myself. “What is it, Valk? I’m very busy.”
“Of course you are,” Valk said, stalking toward me. “I just wanted to ask about how your new pet is faring?” He threw his arm around my shoulder.
“My pet?” I knew exactly who he spoke of: Ellie, with her mystical green eyes and her golden hair. She was a beauti
ful visitor, an enchanting guest. She was many things, but a pet she was not.
“The human girl you bought,” Valk whispered in my ear. “Have you had the chance to taste her?” My hands fisted at my side. “Is human flesh as delicious as they say? Does she get wet easily?” I fought the urge to slam him against the wall. “Would you mind sharing her some time? Perhaps when you’ve used her up? I don’t mind leftovers.”
I grabbed him by the collar of his tunic, a growl escaping me. I bared my fangs, dragging him toward me so he was at my eye level. I nearly threw him when I saw his smirk, his eyes laughing at me, knowing he was able to get a rise out of me. Quickly, I released him, shoving him away.
“My apologies, Master Vorian,” he said, his voice steady, not the least bit frazzled. If only he knew I didn’t break his neck purely for the sake of tradition. “I had only assumed that since she’s just a human girl, she couldn’t mean that much to you.”
“I have another meeting,” I ground out, turning on my heel and stalking toward my office door, slamming it behind me. I ran my hand through my hair, hitting my head against the wall behind me. I groaned, scowling at the window in front of me.
Unfortunately, today was indeed the day I made a complete ass out of myself.
Ellie
It wasn’t something I wanted to admit. It wasn’t something I thought I would ever experience in a grand castle such as this one.
But I was bored.
So impossibly bored.
Sure, the first couple of days were wonderful. I loved spending my time reading outside on the balcony, the breeze blowing all around, with a blanket wrapped around my shoulders. Sometimes I would take a break to gaze upon the clouds floating around Adonia, the waterfall cascading into the pool below, the various reptile-looking creatures flying around. And if I wasn’t out on the balcony, I was busy lounging in the bathtub for hours.
Yeah, it was all very great.
For those first two days.
By day three I couldn’t stand it anymore. There was no struggle. There was nothing to fix. Food was always at the ready. I didn’t even need to cook it. Hell, if I ordered her to, Zoe probably would’ve chewed the food for me.
No one was arguing over shifts or bartering over food prices. There wasn’t the constant scramble to prepare for work. There wasn’t the unending grind that left me with no time to myself. I spent my mornings in bed, staring up at the ceiling, wondering what there was to do, making a list of all the potential activities.
1. Sleep
2. Read
3. Look outside
4. Talk to Zoe… again.
I would sleep in if it weren’t for the glorious sunlight assaulting my eyes every morning. Reading was becoming monotonous. I already explored the castle. I would allow myself to get lost if it wasn’t for Zoe following me around, asking me questions about the Orion, over and over and over again.
“Do families on the Orion have portraits made?” she asked as we walked through a high-ceiling room covered in large pictures of what I assumed was the Zhora family.
I sighed, her questions becoming annoying after these last few days. At first it was cute, answering her questions about what humans did during a typical day, what school was like on the Orion, what food we ate. But now? Not so cute. Not so cute. At. All. “No, we don’t have portraits made. Maybe photographs if there’s money for it. But even that’s rare.”
I could practically hear her thinking, ready to ask another question. I massaged my temples, waiting for her to open her mouth. “Do you have any pictures of your family?”
I thought of the family picture on my nightstand back home, my sister and I hugging each other, making the biggest and cheesiest smiles, my mother standing behind us. The face of my father ripped out. “Yes.”
“Do you have many?”
Seriously, what was there to do? At this point, I’d be ecstatic to perform hard labor if only because it’d keep me busy.
I turned and forced a smile. “Zoe,” I said sweetly. “Don’t you have a bunch of work to do?”
I ground my teeth at how confused she looked. “My work is to care for you.”
Kill me now. I could care for myself. I did it my entire life. “Would you like me to help you with anything?”
The look on her face made me think I gravely offended her. She looked so appalled, even going so far as to gracefully place a slender hand on her chest. “No, not at all, miss. I couldn’t bother you.”
“Please bother me.” I almost lunged at her, grabbing her hands as if I were begging her for money. “I need something to do. Having all this time to myself is driving me crazy.”
Zoe frowned and pulled her hands away from me. “You could help me with one thing.”
“Anything.”
Zoe led me down to the elevator and into the med lab, her hands wringing themselves. I had expected she would have me do some sort of flower arranging or needlepoint. I never expected I would end up back in this place. Gazing at her now, I wondered if she was nervous, if Vorian gave her specific instructions while he was away.
I could see him, leaning toward Zoe, his hair falling delicately over his eyes, telling her to make sure I remained in bed, where I’d be safe. I imagined him pushing her hair gently behind an angled ear.
The thought irritated me.
“The lab needs to be cleaned,” Zoe said, walking me toward a closet of cleaning supplies. There was a mop propped against a vacuum. The mop looked a bit strange. There was a button at the top with a water tank attached to the side. “Here is where you can find the vacuum and mop. You can just turn them on and they’ll do the work.”
She showed me the on switch for both, my eyes widening as they hummed and proceeded to clean the room. Dear God, this really was Beauty and the Beast, with autonomous feather dusters and appliances. I never in my wildest dreams thought Adonians were so skilled in technology. They made humans look stupid. “The hardest part is wiping down all the tools and experiments Master Vorian is working on. I have to do that manually.” She handed me a clean blue towel. “Make sure you don’t turn any of his devices on. Some of them are dangerous.”
“Of course.”
“Zoe,” boomed a new voice.
Zoe jerked toward the sound of her name, her eyes widening. I watched her ears become pink as an Adonian approached us in a white lab coat and a visor. He whispered something to her, making Zoe scowl. She stomped her foot, then spun around and stormed away without so much as a goodbye to me.
I faced the male Adonian, wondering what he said to make her so angry. He looked appalled and gazed back at me sheepishly.
“My name is Ellie,” I said awkwardly, holding out my hand to him.
“Dravak,” he said, turning away from me. “A bit odd to see you here, but never mind.”
Well, this was going to be interesting.
I walked toward a vat, thinking that would be a good place to start. I was just about to wipe it down with the towel when Dravak interrupted me in a thick accent.
“That doesn’t need to be cleaned,” he said, slurring the sound “th,” pronouncing it more like an “s.” His tongue sounded heavy as he spoke the English words.
So he just switched over to English for some reason, despite my translator device. “You, um… speak my language?”
“Well, of course I do,” he said dismissively. “But I don’t often get the chance to practice it. Do correct me if I say anything wrong, yes?”
“Uh, sure.” His English was light years ahead of my Adonian, that much was sure.
He quickly busied himself, paying no further attention to me. He was working with a welding torch, sealing what appeared to be a vehicle without wheels. “What is that?” I wiped down the table in front of me, but my gaze was on the vehicle. The metal was tinted blue, and the windows appeared to be blackened, possibly made from a mineral the Orion didn’t know how to mine.
“I guess you humans would call it an airplane,” Dravak said over the sound of t
he torch. “We call it a linek.”
I thought back on the old videos of human technology I had watched in class. I recalled images of jetliners and fighter planes. Never had I seen such technology in person though, as the Orion only had use for small ground vehicles. “It’s really small,” I commented.
Dravak shrugged. “It’s supposed to be compact. Just for one person. Its purpose isn’t entirely certain. Maybe it’d be of use to disabled or elderly Adonians. Humans too, if they ever begin to integrate into our society. Not that it’s likely, at the rate they’re going.” He pushed himself away, the wheels of his chair rolling him toward another table covered in pipes and cables.
He held up what looked like metal wings with wires sticking out of them. “We are working on these as well. However, we can’t get them to fly.” I found myself standing in front of Dravak, not even realizing my body had moved. I reached out to touch a metal feather, the wings reminding me of angels I once saw in a picture book. They didn’t match the dragon-like wings of the Adonians.
“Who are they for?”
Dravak spun away from me, setting the wings back down on the table. “The Lorinians.”
“Why?”
“Because they can’t fly.”
I gazed back at the wings. Their beauty entranced me. I wanted to touch them again, feel the metal against my skin. I wanted to fix them, make them fly, but the technology was above my ability. “Well, I don’t know anything about wings, but I can help with the linek.”
“You? Help with the linek?” Dravak shook his head. He meant no offense though; that much was clear, but I didn’t exactly like being so easily dismissed out of hand.
“I used to fix things on the Orion,” I explained.
“Fix human things. Not Adonian things.” He rolled his eyes. Now, maybe, he did mean offense. Or maybe he was just growing impatient with me.
I leaned against the table, my arms crossed. “You could teach me. Trust me, I’m a fast learner.”
