“Pagh! That’s not what I mean and you know it. These things are a nuisance. I have too many other things to worry about besides going through…” My voice catches. I can’t get the words out past the barrier of my teeth.
“The change?” Reyna, bare-chested, offers impishly.
Bebette giggles. Tana flat out chokes on laughter. Merquin offers nothing. The female — my female — looks like she’ll say something, which floods me with a lethal combination of both panic and yearning, then she flays me alive when she decides against it.
“Don’t call it that,” I huff, feeling more exhausted even as an unfamiliar energy zips and zings through me. “I hate it.”
“It is a change,” Tana insists and then her pitch gets softer and infinitely more evil. “I can already see your whites peeking through.”
My stomach drops and my bones harden. I think about what I saw in the reflector Merquin held up to me when I cornered her in the hallway. She’d said something similar. Your whites are showing through.
All Lemoran are born with dark grey horns that remain that way until the solar their big blocky bodies die and they get burned up in pyres built atop kintarr sands that, when lit, bring about bright, colorful flames.
Unless…
They find their true mates. We’ve taken to calling our mates Xiveri, in the Voraxian fashion. We don’t believe in Xana and Xaneru, their deities, but we do believe in the universe and we understand the power of our horns. The power of true affection. Because when our Xiveri Mates come along, the dark coating that sheathes our horns flakes off and white horns are what’s left beneath.
Merquin is the only mated clan chief and she wears her white horns with pride, even if they are dulled with age at this point. She and her Xiveri found one another rotations ago, before it had ever occurred to me to run a clan. I hadn’t wanted to, then. I hadn’t wanted a mate either, or white horns, or the responsibility that is said to come with it.
But something happened in that room with the Egama — and I don’t mean that sniveling Igmora’s perfectly designed altercation that was all but guaranteed to end in a fight. I mean, something happened in me and I just…snapped.
The Egama stepped into the room and made his challenge to me and I didn’t care about that. The Egama stepped into the room and made his threat to her and I cared…I cared a lot. More than all the Walrey honey in the Walrey’s central hive, I cared about that threat and when the Egama came towards me, two things became absolutely clear.
I would never let him hurt her.
I would never let anything hurt her.
And also, as an aside, my horns ohring hurt.
Merquin may no longer be the only mated clan chief now…
As if I said something out loud, her stare widens and flicks up to my horns. “Don’t look there, female!” I shout at her. I reach up to grab my horns and block them from her view only to realize that I’m already holding them. “Pagh!”
I don’t know what to do. Should I get up and go to the void room and hide there for the rest of the trip back to Lemora? Nob, then I won’t be able to see her and I can’t stand that. Should I…get closer to her? I inhale deeply, panicked and exhilarated at the thought. Oh nob, nob nob nob…beneath my trousers, my typically silent cock begins to chirp.
I jump to my feet but just when I’m about to stomp angrily to the void room, I’m arrested by the sound of her voice. “Essmira.”
I blink down at her, lost. So utterly lost I can’t breathe. “WHAT!” I gasp.
She flinches from the volume of my voice and I take a half step back and then another half step when Bebette growls up at me, “Calm down, Raingar.”
HOW CAN I CALM DOWN? HER VOICE SOUNDS LIKE WALREY HONEY AND IT’S NOT POSSIBLE FOR IT TO SOUND LIKE THAT!
Something flashes behind her gaze. The same thing that flashed instances before she grabbed that stupid sculpture and lobbed it at my head. I flinch, looking around as if expecting an assault. Finding nothing she could use to throw at me, I’m left with no other option but to look back into her eyes. But that’s too hard. She’s too stunning. We’re all just rock creatures. Nothing on Lemora has and ever will look like that.
I stare at her hands as Bebette finishes wrapping them, instead and bark, “What?”
Some of the fire in her voice dims. She clears it. “Apologies. I did not mean to speak…out of turn.”
I growl, hating this voice. Hating it a lot. It’s the same voice she used on Igmora and Tyto — on me — all but that one time when she pushed me and hit me in the head. Does she view me as a master, just as dreadful as her previous two? Or is she…upset that she didn’t escape? My jaw works and rage builds in my chest. I’m not used to it and it overtakes me quickly.
I glance over my shoulder at Merquin for help. She’s frowning at me. Very subtly, she shakes her head. I wish I knew what it meant, because the motion feels significant, but I don’t know, so I ignore her entirely and round on the female. “What did you say?”
The fire flashes. She closes her hands into fists on top of her knees, which she keeps clutched quite close to her chest. “Essmira!” Her voice is a shout that makes Bebette flinch back. She’s smiling as she plops onto her rear.
“Essmira, nice to meet you. I’m Bebette.” She touches the center of Essmira’s forehead with two fingers.
Essmira blinks quickly before her gaze swivels from me to Bebette. I don’t like that, but I like the smile that tilts the wobbly corners of her mouth up. Oh nob, maybe I don’t. Because my cock. My ohring cock! Need blasts through me and it’s a crippling, beautiful thing. I massage one hand across my bare chest and when her gaze drops to my fingers I stop breathing.
Essmira lifts her hand and touches the center of Bebette’s forehead with two fingers. “Thank you, Bebette. It was kind of you to fix my hands. I hope there might be some way I can repay you — repay all of you — for the kindness you’ve shown me. I still don’t…understand…what happened. I know you all said that…”
She swallows when her voice gets stuck, like emotion is lodged there and it hurts her. It brings me pain. My hand on my chest stops rubbing and starts clenching, like I might dig through the skin, tear out my upper heart and hand it over to her. Will that help?
“Apologies.” Her eyes flutter. She must be exhausted. Is she tired? Does she want to sleep? Is she… “I don’t mean to put pressure on any of you. Please, don’t think that I am…”
Movement behind me pulls her attention up and over my shoulder. Merquin is suddenly there, pushing me out of the way. She waves away Bebette and drops down to one knee in front of my female. Merquin is a good, strong female but in this moment I tense, prepared to intervene if she…if she what? I’m not sure. But I hold my breath, anyway.
“Hello, Essmira,” Merquin says, voice kinder than it’s ever been when she’s spoken to me. She greets Essmira by touching her forehead. Essmira does the same and it seems to ease her. Not by much, but enough for her to stop shaking so violently. “My name is Merquin.”
“Hello, Merquin. It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m sorry if I’m asking too much. I promise that I am deeply grateful for everything you all have done for me so far. I…” Oh nob. Nob nob nob nob. NOB! She sniffles. Just once, but it’s enough to ruin me. Merquin, say something! Stop this! But she doesn’t. She just nods along and allows Essmira to continue.
“I promise that I will work very hard and perform whatever tasks that are required of me. I only ask that, if there is occasion for you to sell me, that it not be to an Oosa or an Egama or an Oroshi.” Her voice cracks again and she sniffles three times consecutively and then…nob! A tear falls from each of her eyes, tearing pathways over her brown cheeks.
I drop dead. I black out. My horns…the pain that’s hurting them cuts through the rest of me. I reach out and grab something only to feel Tana on my right arm, supporting my right side. I need to go to her…to touch Essmira…only she can take this pain away…but when I move forward, Tana yanks me back. I
try again, but her grip on my arm is fierce.
“Nob,” she hisses under her breath. “This isn’t about you.” I shake my head, rage and confusion and a deep, deep sadness making me feel unsure. I’m flayed.
I’m about to yank away from Tana for good and ignore her completely when Essmira tightens the hold she had on her tears and whispers. “I thought I was ready…Igmora ensured that I was ready…but seeing them in person was so much more overwhelming than I thought it would be. The thought of mating with that Egama was…hard.”
Her voice gets smaller and smaller. “And the Oosa delegation was very…” She shakes her head, flicks her gaze to me, breaks it just as quickly. “I know I have no right to ask anything of you all, but if you are displeased with me, I would accept any punishment happily other than being sold back to Tyto or a pleasure house where Oosa and Egama frequent.”
Everything about her is coiled so tight. She looks so close to the edge. Like she might shatter into one trillion pieces and if she does, there will be nothing left. Not of her. Not of me. I grab onto my right horn but the outer shell is so abruptly sensitive that I have to hiss. I drop my hands and fist them by my sides while Tana continues to hold me in place.
Merquin lets the silence linger for just a breath before she speaks and, when she speaks, her voice is calm, a balm that soothes everything in the blast radius. “You are a brave female, Essmira, to survive what you have. You were stolen from birth. Your parents, wherever they are now, would not have given you up. They loved you.”
Essmira’s eyes widen and her voice hitches. “How…do you…” She swallows and when water starts to accumulate on her lower eyelids, I can’t breathe through the agony of this moment. “Do you know of them?”
Merquin shakes her head. “Nob, I don’t. We had never heard of your species before this solar, but we know Igmora and Tyto and their nefarious ways. They stole you because they have a good sense of beauty and you are beautiful. That’s clear to everyone. But we didn’t purchase you because of your beauty. We purchased you because we don’t support the buying and selling of beings and we wanted to liberate you.
“Our hope is that, even though we aren’t your species, we might serve as an acceptable substitute for companions and maybe, even, if we play our tokens right, family to you. Lemora is a diverse planet filled with many different types of species. My mate, for example, is Hypha. She was exiled from her community for rejecting the mate proposed to her and she knew Lemora to be an accepting place — wild and rugged, certainly, without the gadgets of the Niahhorru pirates or the rigid governance structures of the Voraxians — but a good place. An easy place.
“She came and when I saw her at the market, I knew immediately that she was the female for me. We have been together nine happy rotations. Likely the length of your entire lifetime. And if she ever found out that I purchased a living being for fourteen tuns of kintarr with the intention of using her, abusing her, or selling her, she would leave me. And there is no kintarr in the world and no amount of beauty that would ever cause me to risk what I have with my mate. She is everything to me.”
Essmira’s shaking has gotten so violent that she can’t speak even though she’s trying. She covers her face with her bandaged hand.
Merquin reaches for Essmira, but curls her hand into a fist before she touches her leg. Then she says words I certainly wouldn’t have thought to ask. “May I touch you, Essmira?”
“Yeffa!” The word blasts out of Essmira’s throat and a moment later, Merquin’s arms come around her. She forces Essmira to untangle her arms from her legs and removes her hands from her knees so she can wrap Essmira fully in a hug. Bebette, who I’d forgotten was so near, suddenly fans her face. She’s got tears on her face, too.
“I want to join!” She drops to the ground and wraps her arms around Essmira’s back, hugging her from behind.
“Out of my way!” Tana shoves past me and goes and wraps all three of them up in her arms, her exposed breasts swinging wildly as she lunges for them and doing absolutely nothing for my cock.
“What am I missing?” Reyna shouts from the front of the ship. “Raingar, move your giant butt out of the way. I want to see!”
I shuffle to the right absently, dumbstruck by the scene. Gobsmacked. Essmira belts out a sob. She breaks down. Falling into pieces. Into little fragments of pieces. I wonder what she sees as she falls apart. What she feels. Because what I see is enough to make me want to fly this ship back to that atrocity of a planet, find Igmora and Tyto and rip their hearts out through their mouths. What did they do to her?
I watch her cry in the arms of my clanswomen for an eon. Long enough that the pain in my body recedes into the background — not gone, never gone, it seems like, but reduced to a dull throb.
Finally, she starts to breathe a little easier and in between the broken cracks of her voice, she manages a whisper, “If you all don’t…don’t like flesh peddlers…why did you buy me at all?”
Merquin pulls back, disentangling herself from the bunch. “Raingar.” She jerks her thumb at me over her shoulder and I clutch my chest again, with both hands this time, to defend against the dagger she just lobbed at my heart. “He told us that it was the right thing to do.”
Essmira looks up at me and I feel like dung. Merquin makes me sound like an ohring hero. Because that might be what I said, but it wasn’t what I meant. I meant that it was the right thing for me. I couldn’t stomach the idea of leaving her. Nob, I couldn’t have left her. It would have been like trying to leave both my legs behind and walk on outta there.
But I should have been thinking of her. I should have been.
I hadn’t been, but I should’ve.
I’m an ohring bastard and a piss poor excuse for a mate.
I’m a mate. I’m her mate. My horns choose that moment to vibrate. I cringe. Behind me, Reyna yells, “Alright. We’re home.”
What?
I turn around and outside the world is dark, illuminated only by floating orbs we buy from the Eshmiri. In the lunar, they light our winding dirt and tarnished-yellow cobblestone roads. Several other ships are docked here on the circular, mossy ledge. Ringed in lights, the glow of the Eshmiri orbs gleam on the outer hulls of the other ships. They sparkle in all the colors of kintarr, while beyond them the ledge drops off. Only the height of a body, the elevation still makes the world below seem darker and more sinister. And Essmira’s here now. My mate is here. And I will have to defend her against all of it. My stomach hollows. I feel so empty. Nob — so full, but it’s alive, what’s inside. Alive and terrified and hungry.
I hear shuffling behind me on the ship and the sound of the ramp lowering to touch the mossy floor of our dock. Cold air billows into the space. Too cold for me without a cloak, but for Essmira it must be freezing. I turn to shout at someone to give her their shirt, but I already see Merquin draping a blanket over her shoulders and guiding her down the ramp and off of the ship.
“Pagh! Merquin! Where are you going?” I bumble after them, feeling tension ripple over my bones and then ripple some more when her scent wafts to me over the clean, mossy scent of my home. She smells just like it. Just like it, only stronger. A thousand times more. Like moss and wet dew and silk and Walrey honey and also like the bloodstone we harvest deep in the mines that, at their cores, hold small droplets of water. She smells like the Dark Flats, too, wild and rugged. There, where kintarr sands ripple with constant colorful explosions. She smells like the sweet stalls at the markets.
I crash into Tana’s back and when I back up, I crash into Reyna. “Opf,” I grunt, trying to shake the other clan chiefs free and reach her. I end up standing facing all four of them, Essmira tucked slightly back, Merquin’s hand on her shoulder. Essmira’s perfect face looks slightly swollen around the nostrils and mouth. Her eyes are also puffy and red. It makes my knees hurt and I have trouble not giving in to the urge to collapse.
“Where are you going?” I bark at her.
She blinks at me with round eyes.
Her lips part. They’re dark brown on the outside, but on the inside, they’re the same blood red that parts of her skin are. Ohr, I want to know how far the red goes. I want to know badly.
She looks up at Merquin who pegs me with a glare before softening to a female I don’t even recognize as she looks back at Essmira and says, “If you’re comfortable, I have a room and spare clothes you’re more than welcome to. There’s no time limit on this invitation either. You can stay as long as you like.”
Essmira bites her bottom lip and I feel my heart hammer towards her again in that sickening habit it’s developed. She nods. “Thank you.”
“Good. Then that’s settled.” Merquin looks back at me. “You have your answer.”
“But!” I jerk, whole body rising with anger as she dares to steer my female away. “Merquin, I need to talk to you in private right now.”
“Sure.” She rolls her eyes but follows me back onto the ship regardless.
I shove my finger in her face and seethe as quietly as my rage will allow for, “You have no right to keep me from my mate. She should stay with me!”
“Raingar, I’m trying to help you.” Her eyes are a different color pattern than mine. More blues and purples than browns and pinks. Her lips are fuller and her white horns beam at me with mocking.
“Well, you aren’t!”
“I am. You’re not using that thick appendage you call a head. Can you not see the obvious? Maybe you can’t. Maybe I didn’t either.” She huffs out a laugh and her eyes get all twinkly and distant. I hate it!
“When I first met Librida, I knew she was my mate instantly because of these.” She taps her right horn with two fingers. “But guess what? Librida doesn’t have horns. She looked at me, saw me and saw straight through me. It was a difficult moment, but I wasn’t going to give up on her. I couldn’t. So, I had to woo her.”
Woo her. Woo her?
My jaw drops and I stare at this female, aghast. Horrified. “You can’t possibly expect me to wwwww…wwwww….” I can’t get the word out. “I CAN’T WOO THIS FEMALE! Why should I have to? I paid for her!” Merquin’s stare is incriminating. My heart beats like a gong. Pain in my horns pulses and surges. “I…I didn’t mean…”
Taken to Lemora Page 6
