Gron pushed down the uncomfortable feelings that question raised in him. “I don’t know. I chose you first. I cannot explain what I am doing, but maybe she will figure it out eventually. If she likes you, she will Bond you, I am sure. She must want more males, to be safe.”
“Gron...”
“Please. Kranu wants her. He came to me just now. He implied that if I stood in his way, he would find a way to dispose of me, so she would need another. I will not allow that to happen. The more males Gruth has, the safer she is from him.”
Troii looked pained. “Perhaps you should just let Kranu approach her. It would solve your problem. Perhaps being Bonded would calm him, give him something other than himself to care about.”
Gron growled. “I will not share my life with him. He is not good enough for Gruth, he has proven that by threatening us.”
“I do not want to get between you two, I do not want to become Kranu’s target next. You are brothers, you have managed to live your whole lives in peace, why now must you plot against each other?”
“It was always easier for me to give him what he wanted than to fight him, even if I did not want to, but I will not give him Gruth. Never. He must understand that I am different now. Bonding has changed me. I will not let him disregard that.”
“So what do you want me to do? I cannot talk to Gruth. How am I supposed to convince her to choose me?”
Gron looked to his Queen. She had stayed silent this whole time, quietly trusting him. He knew his confrontation with Kranu, and then Troii’s obvious agitation had worried her. She knew something was upset around them, but she trusted him to fix it for her. He used that confidence to strengthen his resolve to share her, as much as he simply wanted to gather her to his chest and steal her far away, where they could live alone again in peace. But he couldn’t do that, because Kranu was right. This was about her survival. His feelings had to be put aside.
“I will leave her here with you for now. I don’t know what else to do. I wish I could explain, ask her preference, but I can’t. I can only wait and abide by her choices,” he said, stroking Ruth’s hair.
“I can see your pain on your face, Gron. Does it truly hurt that much?” Troii asked.
“I have never left her willingly. We have never been separated since we met. I have always been there for her. I am concerned what she will think of me if I leave her now. It feels like a betrayal.”
Troii pulled a face. “If it hurts that much perhaps I don’t want to be Bonded. What will I say if anyone comes across me with her? Grasta could see it as disloyalty against her.”
“Tell them I asked you to keep her safe while I gathered food. You will keep her safe, won’t you? If anything happens to her while I am gone, I will never forgive myself, or you.”
“Of course, Gron! And what could possibly happen to her? She is safe here.”
“If Kranu comes, keep him away from her,” Gron said as he stood. Ruth followed him up, looking at him, clearly expecting them to leave together. “Gruth, no, you must stay.” He put his hands on her shoulders and attempted to force her down gently.
Her expression changed to something wild, and she resisted him, staggering under the pressure he was putting on her rather than sitting back down. She said his name questioningly and took hold of him, one hand gripping his arm, one sliding into the pelt on his stomach, clearly intending to keep him with her.
His heart hurt.
She looked at him with confusion and fear. She wanted to go with him, to follow him as she had always done. He stopped trying to push her down and instead tried to make her understand.
“Gruth... Troii...” he said, pointing to her and then to Troii, who stood uncertainly to one side.
Ruth looked at the other male, considering. “Ruth, Gron,” she replied, turning back to him.
Gron could not stop himself from stroking her arms and face. He wasn’t strong enough to do this, but he had to be.
“Gruth, Troii,” he said again. Ruth looked at Troii again, and Gron could see her trying to puzzle out what was going on, why he wanted her to stay, to leave her behind.
“Ruth, Gron,” she said, sounding sad this time, like she was pleading rather than telling, and he knew he had got through to her. He gently pulled her hands out of his pelt and pressed his lips to her forehead.
“Gruth, Gron,” he rumbled against her hair, unable to deny it. Then he steeled himself and pulled back again. “Gruth, Troii,” he insisted, stepping away meaningfully, and Ruth let him go with a baleful look. He forced himself to turn and walk away, getting a good distance into the woods before he let himself stop.
Every instinct he had was screaming at him to go back. His Queen was in danger. Terrible things could be happening to her. Troii or Kranu or any other male could be touching her, scaring her, carrying her off. She needed him to protect her, no one else would, no one else could. He needed her, to be able to breathe and stop his chest from hurting and see colour in the world.
She would hate him for this. She would reject him now, never let him touch her again, leave him cold at night, let the fire of his primed maleness burn through him with no relief. He knew on the surface of his mind that what he was doing was not so bad. Bonded mates did not spend every second together, and he would not leave her for long. She would forgive him. Maybe.
But he still felt like he deserved to die for leaving her scared and with a male she didn’t know. A male Gron intended her to Bond with.
Taking a deep breath, Gron launched himself into the branches of the trees, moving fast in the hopes of making it a quick trip. He was going to look for a suitable place to build Ruth a home outside of the tribe. And then he was going to come tearing back.
Chapter 12
Ruth watched Gron leave her behind with apprehension. She didn’t understand why he had done it. She had faith that he must have a good reason, but she was also pretty sure he’d understood she didn’t want him to, and that worried her. He’d always taken such good care of her, always been there, trying to make her happy. So what had changed?
She turned to the other male Gron had left her with. What had Gron said his name was? Troy? An oddly human name, considering. But then, he had pronounced it with a rolling, growling bass that she could never hope to imitate.
The poor guy looked just as uncomfortable as she probably did, his tail flicking nervously. He was slighter in build than Gron, with an intelligent-looking face, and of course, naked. Ruth was used to that by now, but she still tried not to look.
His fur was the same colour as Gron’s, there didn’t seem to be much if any variation in shade among the Gandry, other than the older ones who were starting to grey. Troii’s fur was in a slightly different pattern than Gron’s. The stripes were at the back of his arms and legs, rather than the side, and the fur on his chest was more oval than the defined inverted-triangle of Gron’s. He also had more fur on his back, which sat on his lower back in a diamond shape below the spine stripe.
She got the distinct impression that he would be putting his hands in his pockets if he had any, as they evaluated each other in awkward silence.
Ruth sighed. The simplest explanation was that she was in day-care. Gron probably had some errand to run that he could do much more efficiently without his deaf, mute, and feeble human dragging behind him. Hopefully he would at least be back soon. She wouldn’t consider that Gron wasn’t coming back, that this hand-off was some kind of Gandry divorce. That would be extreme. But for now, she assumed this guy was her caretaker or guard.
She recognised him from when they had arrived the day before, he had been the one to step between Gron and Kranu when they had been snarling at each other so much. Hopefully that meant he was a nice guy, though he could have been nicer in Ruth’s opinion.
Ruth’s eyes fell on the basket Troii had been weaving when they found him. He still had a pile of ferns to work with. Maybe Ruth could do that. Learn a skill, make herself useful. Maybe that would make Gron happy, show him he d
idn’t have to leave her behind in kindergarten if he had a job or something that he did during the day. She couldn’t talk to anyone, but she was smart and she could learn. She’d been a temp after all. Picking things up quickly was a necessary skill.
She’d already had the idea to try to make a rope or find a vine long enough to enable her to get up and down from the platform in the trees without Gron’s help. That was important, and she thought it would be the first step to showing him she wasn’t completely dependent and he didn’t have to worry about her so much. She was going to make her life here, and she wasn’t going to do it as a burden.
Ruth moved towards the ferns and knelt beside them. Time for step one.
She looked at Troii and pointed between the ferns and the basket, looking hopeful. He looked suspicious at first, but then he came over and showed her how to get started. Smart guy. And quiet. Not particularly nice so far, but then none of them smiled naturally, so how was she to know? He was teaching her how to make a basket instead of snarling or growling or just walking off, so it could be worse.
The method turned out to be simple, but the handling of the ferns was tricky. They kept springing out of place, making Ruth feel like she needed an extra set of hands, or a tail of her own, to get anywhere. She kept going though, just for lack of anything else to do, slowly forcing the ferns to weave together and hold in a fragile bowl shape that was full of holes. It was good to have something to focus on, so she didn’t tie herself in knots over Gron, and Troii, and Kranu.
As she worked, she replayed the day in her head, trying to interpret just what the hell was going on. She thought the day had started off pretty well. Last night had been beautiful, with the rain. She hadn’t realised how much she had missed it, the chill in the air, the quiet music of it. It was romantic, and Gron had tucked her in against his fluffy self and she couldn’t have been happier. She’d felt like this was a good place, that they had a real chance here, and that was saying something after the reception they’d had.
Then when she had woken up that morning, okay, she’d had a scare when she saw Gron asleep. She’d been watching him sleep for the last two weeks, and it just gave her a bad feeling seeing him like that. It reminded her of watching him fall unconscious in the cave where he had almost died, and seeing him surrounded by machines in the medical bay of T’Lax’s ship.
But they’d kissed and made up, and he’d shown her just how alive he was, and she’d felt much better. Their relationship was still in place. It hadn’t changed when they’d met his family, and everyone tried to pick a fight with him, and she’d been made to give him an erection over dinner. That was still really weird, and she’d been afraid it would mess something up between them. She still felt uncomfortable thinking about it, though it didn’t seem to have bothered him at all. He still wanted her.
And then he’d taken her to a little pond for a bath, and brought her breakfast. The pond was a little dark and shallow, with some dead leaves in it, but considering they were in the woods on an alien planet, she wouldn’t turn up her nose. She missed T’lax’s ship for the technology, but she was infinitely glad to be away from the little green creepers and the way they talked about her and Gron. T’Lax had given her a bottle of improvised shower gel which theoretically dissipated into nothing and would have no discernible effect on the environment, so she could have some of her luxuries but it would be like she was never there. She had a lot of stuff like that.
Unfortunately, just when things had been getting good again with Gron at the pool, Gron’s brother had shown up. She really didn’t understand what stick was bothering that guy’s ass, presumably the fact that his little brother had brought an alien home to meet the family. She’d hidden in the cold water while Gron and Kranu had had another snarly show down. She didn’t like it, and apparently neither did Gron, because after that, playtime was over. It was out of the pool and off to meet this Troii character.
Ruth had changed into a black T-shirt that was long enough to be a dress, and underwear, thank God. She only had two sets, and she was saving them for when she really felt she needed them, and she was glad she had. The atmosphere had changed, and she wanted her loins to be girded. Everything she wore had been synthesised on T’Lax’s ship, and she’d rinsed out the red wrap-dress after having sex in it made it kind of gross.
She had a limited supply of clothes, but she was trying to keep it simple anyway. The more revealing her clothes were, the less likely the Gandry were to object, she rationalised. If she went around in jeans, boots and a parka, she’d look even more like an alien. She did have one pair of trousers and shoes, just in case she had to make it on her own, and being naked was no longer the done thing. She also had a bikini, in case she got really comfortable around her new in-laws.
Gron had clearly been upset by whatever he’d fought Kranu about. He’d held her hand and led her through the forest with none of his usual care or playfulness. He hadn’t hurt her, or rushed her, or ignored her, but she could tell he was in a hurry and moving somewhere with a purpose. It troubled her that he was upset by something and she couldn’t even ask what it was, let alone help. That wasn’t what a relationship was about. As it stood, it might just be sex and survival between them, and now Gron had his family back, maybe the shine was wearing off.
Hence, baskets. She would fit in, and Gron would have no reason to dump her. She was one of only three females after all, one of whom was his mother, and she was exclusively his. That must hold some appeal.
Anyway, they’d found this Troii guy, Gron had chatted to him, presumably in response to what Kranu had said. Gron had still been unhappy. He looked really... torn up. Sick, almost. Ashamed. Afraid. Remembering what his face had looked like then, and how his voice had sounded, Ruth had a moment of real fear. What the hell was going on?
And Troii had reacted badly. Even through the language barrier, Ruth could translate the looks of someone who was both disgusted and tempted. Troii had been angry, at either Gron or Kranu, or maybe both, and now here they were.
Looking back, if it had been a simple “Can you look after Ruth while I go run an errand?”, Ruth could believe that Troii had reacted with “No way man, how dare you saddle me with your gross alien?”, but Gron’s behaviour didn’t match up. He was off doing something scary and important, and he didn’t want her there for it.
Suddenly afraid, Ruth looked between the trees where Gron had disappeared. What if he was off fighting Kranu to the death or something, and she wasn’t there? That would not be okay with her.
She couldn’t hear anything, no cheering crowd or ritual chanting, but she knew she hadn’t seen all of the tribal village yet. She thought the public hand-job had been the marriage ceremony, but what if Gron had to go and fight an alien mammoth or something?
Ruth looked at Troii, who so far had done nothing but weave his basket and glance at her from under his brows as if he wasn’t sure he wanted to be caught. He looked at her now as she stared at him, with a bit of a deer-in-the-headlights look.
“Gron?” she asked, miming looking around.
Troii seemed to relax, or deflate, and went back to weaving his basket.
“Gron?” Ruth asked again, more firmly this time, letting just a hint of the panic she was fighting tint her voice, hoping he would understand the size of the scene she was prepared to make if she wasn’t satisfied.
Troii looked a little uncomfortable, then made a gesture that she interpreted as “You wouldn’t understand me anyway.” Fair enough, but she was getting to be pretty good at charades.
“Gron Kranu?” she asked, while punching her right fist into her left palm. She mimed punching herself in the face and did some small growls, imitating the way the males pulled their top lips back when they wanted to wave their massive canines around.
Troii looked blank, like he’d just been disturbed by her display. He blinked a couple of times and made a long, uniform sound that was probably an equivalent to “Err...”
This would go mu
ch better if the Gandry used head shakes for no and nods for yes, and shrugs. She’d have to get on teaching Gron that. As it was she just had to wait while Troii figured out how to answer her.
Finally he pointed out into the woods, and said “Gron,” then pointed somewhere else and said “Kranu.” Okay, so they weren’t in the same place, so they couldn’t be fighting. Right.
Next she said Gron’s name and clutched her chest and weaved where she sat, sticking her tongue out a bit and crossing her eyes, finishing with a mini-collapse. She wanted to ask if Gron was, or would be hurt. Troii clearly did not get it, inching back from her. Ruth rolled her eyes. This guy wasn’t even trying.
She sighed. She had to keep it simple, and just hope for the best. She pointed to directly in front of her. “Gron?” She made a few “coming out of the woods” gestures and pointed in front of her again.
That, Troii understood. He repeated the point-to-the-woods, point-to-the-ground cycle, agreeing with “Gron,” that he would come back.
Ruth relaxed. Then she thought why the hell not, and held up her index fingers. “Gron,” she said, indicating one. “Ruth,” she said, and indicated the other one. Then she pulled the two fingers apart making an exaggerated questioning face.
Troii followed her movements, then held up his own index fingers, bringing them back together. “Gruth, Gron,” he said. Then he added a third finger next to Gron. “Kranu, Troii, Drenz...” He listed a few other names in a tone of voice that suggested possibility, not certainty.
Ruth’s blood still ran cold. He couldn’t be suggesting what she thought he was. Was Gron out looking for another male for them? Had he left her here with this guy so they could... What exactly? Bone? Is that what Gron thought of her? Had he promised her to this guy? Well, that just was not happening.
She reached out and snapped down Troii’s third finger, then angrily held up two of her own. “Ruth, Gron,” she said, her expression stormy, making sure there was no room for misinterpretation. She was a one-man woman, and she was not going to start handing it out to anyone who was interested. If that was what it took to be accepted in this tribe, she was out. If that was what Gron wanted for her, he could stay here when she left.
Gron's Fated Page 8
