A Son for the Alien Warrior (Treasured by the Alien Book 2)

by Honey Phillips

  “Where you been, Daddy? Devi said you was never coming back.”

  The boy scowled at the young girl, who was still staring at Cestov as if she’d seen a ghost. No wonder, if she thought he was Bratan. But where was his brother? Had he compounded his sins by abandoning his slaves in this desolate location? He couldn’t—wouldn’t—believe it, but the alternative was even more painful. His heart ached and he hugged the little boy closer.

  “Charlie. Charlie, do you remember me?” Mariah said urgently.

  The little boy shook his head and buried a wet face back in Cestov’s neck.

  “Devi—is that your name?” Cestov asked.

  “Devoji,” she corrected, still staring.

  “Where is my brother? Where is Bratan?”

  “Your brother?” She swayed a little on the doorstep and Mariah reached for her. The young girl turned to thank her, and her mouth dropped open as she took a second look. “You—you’re related to Mistress Judith, aren’t you?”

  “Yes, I am. She’s my sister. Can you tell me where to find her?”

  “I… I think you’d better come in.”

  Devoji led the way into the house and they both followed. The boy was still clinging to his neck, his small arms almost strangling him, and his tail came up to pat his back soothingly. Inside, all the windows were shuttered, but he could see well enough to notice that the house was in much better condition than the outside, sparsely furnished but clean and well-tended.

  “Where is he?” he demanded as soon as the door shut behind him. “Where is my brother?”

  “And my sister?”

  Mariah stood next to him, her hand on Charlie’s small back. The little boy finally raised his head and looked at her.

  “You look like Mama.”

  “Yes, I do. That’s because we’re sisters. I knew you when you were just a baby.”

  “Not a baby. I’m a big boy.”

  “Yes, you are. So big.” Her eyes filled with tears. “Did your mama ever mention me? My name is Mariah.”

  He tilted his head, considering her. “You’s the singing one?”

  “Yes, that’s right. I used to sing to you, too.”

  “Sing for me,” he demanded.

  “I will, but first we need to talk to Devoji.”

  Mariah’s eyes flicked up to meet his and he saw the same dread that filled his heart in hers. If what he suspected was true, Charlie didn’t need to hear the discussion.

  “Charlie, can you show Mariah your room?” he asked.

  “No.” Charlie’s arms went back around his neck. “Don’t wanna leave you, Daddy.”

  “Why don’t the two of you go?” Mariah said softly. “I’ll talk to Devoji.”

  “You should not be alone, my miri.” He couldn’t stand the thought her hearing the news he dreaded alone.

  “I’ll be fine—”

  A baby cried. The sound echoed through the silent house and Devoji jumped.

  “I’ll just go get her,” she said in a rush and disappeared through a passageway at the back of the room while they stared at each other.

  Mariah frowned. “She looks too young to have a baby.”

  “Not Devi’s baby.” Charlie scowled at them. “My baby.”

  “Your baby?”

  “That’s what he says.” Devoji smiled as she came back into the room holding a tiny bundle swathed in blankets. “This is his sister, Claire.”

  Mariah’s eyes filled with tears. “That’s my middle name. Can I hold her?”

  “She don’t take much to strangers…” Devoji began, then went silent as Mariah reached for the baby.

  As she picked her up, he watched in shock as a small green tail emerged from the blanket and curled around Mariah’s wrist. She looked down at the baby and turned to him so he could see. The baby was completely and indisputably part Cire.

  As Mariah gathered the baby into her arms, her heart swelled with emotion. The pale green skin and tiny little tail were undoubtedly Cire, but those big blue eyes looking up at her so seriously—they were her sister’s eyes, her own eyes.

  “Hello, little one,” she whispered, even as the tears began to fall. There was no force in the universe that would have caused her sister to leave her baby behind. She looked up at Devoji and said softly, “She’s gone, isn’t she?”

  The girl nodded, tears in her own eyes. “Not long after the baby was born. She caught a fever, but she kept saying she was fine, and we were all so worried about the other business that we didn’t realize just how sick she really was. When Master Bratan figured it out, he took off for town with her.” She glanced at Charlie, then dropped her voice. “He never made it. They were ambushed somewhere on the road.”

  “Ambushed?”

  “They found the wagon overturned on the side of the road. Marshal Zakon tried to say it was an accident because Master Bratan was driving too fast, but he drove that thing like it was a part of him. I know it wasn’t an accident. Especially when the Dhalecs started showing up.”

  “The Dhalecs?” Cestov had joined them, although she noticed he had his hand covering Charlie’s ear as he cradled him against his body. The little boy watched her thoughtfully, his thumb in his mouth.

  “Yes,” Devoji said. “They want the ownership papers for the ranch.”

  “Where are the papers?”

  “I don’t know, but they told me to find them or they’d start searching.”

  Mariah looked at the young girl, remembering the monstrous aliens she had seen in town. “I’m very impressed you stood up to them.”

  “Well, the first time my brothers were here—and I have a lot of brothers.” She flashed a quick smile. “A lot of relatives really, and so far, the Dhalecs haven’t out and out threatened anyone. Even though we all know it’s coming. They’ve been back twice but someone has always been with me. Today, my brother Devorat had to go help with our family’s harvest and won’t be back until tonight. When I heard the bell, I thought it was them.”

  “But you really don’t know where these papers are?”

  “No.” Devoji shook her head again and then looked as Cestov. “But I know what they say. He left the ranch to you.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  “He doesn’t want it,” Mariah said automatically. They had never even discussed the possibility of settling down in one place. What they needed to do was to get these children far away from this dreadful place. The baby in her arms cooed and she smiled down at that sweet, non-human face. There was no question of returning to Earth now. But no matter the circumstances of her birth, this was her niece and she was going to make sure she never doubted that she was loved.

  “Just a minute, my miri,” Cestov said.

  “What? You don’t honestly want to stay here? After everything that has happened?” She shuddered to think of what Judith had been through, sold to an alien who appeared to be nothing like his brother. Forced to have a child…

  “I do not know what happened,” he said slowly. “And I want to find out.”

  He looked down at Charlie, half-asleep now as he sucked on his thumb and nestled against Cestov with every appearance of contentment. Maybe his brother had been good to the child, she decided, but it didn’t excuse his treatment of her sister.

  “He was my brother, Mariah,” he continued. “I owe that to him.”

  “Owe him? After he fuc—freaking bought my sister to be his slave?”

  “What?” Devoji looked shocked. “I do not believe you. I have never seen a couple more in love.”

  “Love?” she snorted. “Somehow I doubt that.”

  Anger surged through her veins and even though she suspected that it was partially a response to her grief, she welcomed the fiery burn.

  “When will your brother return, Devoji?” Cestov asked.

  “Late this afternoon. He said he would be back in time to milk the robedas.” She nodded at Claire. “The little one has taken quite well to their milk.”

  Her throat threatened to clog
with tears. “How long has it been?”

  “Just over a month now.” Sadness crossed the girl’s face. “My oldest brother sent a message to Ciresia to try and contact you, but we hadn’t heard anything yet. Devorat was Bratan’s foreman so he’s been taking care of the herds. I’ve been staying here so that the house is occupied—and to make it easier for Charlie.”

  Mariah looked at her nephew again, fully asleep now, his body sprawled against Cestov’s with the easy confidence of a child who has no fear that he will be harmed. In spite of her rush to leave, she understood Devoji’s point. Maybe it would be easier for Charlie to have a chance to get to know them both. She sighed.

  “Why don’t you put him to bed and then we can talk?” she asked Cestov.

  He hesitated, seeming reluctant to part with her nephew, but then he nodded. “Where is his room?”

  “This way.”

  Devoji led the way down the long hallway and Mariah followed along. One side of the wide corridor had windows that would open onto the courtyard, although they were all shuttered now, with rooms lining the other side.

  “This is my room,” the girl said as they passed the first door. “That is, if you wish for me to stay…”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes.”

  They both spoke at the same time, then Mariah added, “Please.”

  During the time she’d spent with Judith and Charlie, she had always been the aunt, not the mother, and she wasn’t at all sure what to do with both an infant and a toddler.

  “Of course,” Devoji said with a warm smile. “I would hate to leave the little ones. And this is Charlie’s room.”

  She opened the second door and Mariah almost burst into tears again. The room was a sparser version of Charlie’s room at home. She still remembered Judith fussing about the right shade of blue and carefully hand-painting the train border—the same border that ran around the top of these walls.

  Cestov carefully lowered Charlie into the little bed, his tail lingering as if reluctant to part from the little boy before he stepped away.

  “Would you like to see the rest of the house?” Devoji said softly as she pulled the door half-shut.

  “Yes, please.” Would there be other signs of Judith’s presence?

  There were. Claire’s room was decorated in pale yellow with another hand-painted border. Another design she remembered Judith discussing with her, even though she had thought it rather silly at the time.

  The master bedroom was the worst. A huge bed, heaped with pillows—not quite as many as Judith had liked at home, but enough to show the unmistakable stamp her sister had put on the room. Curtains in Judith’s favorite soft green draped the windows and there was even a small dressing table. Could she possibly have misjudged Cestov’s brother? It didn’t seem like the room of a slave; it looked like the room of a woman with an indulgent husband. She wandered over to the dressing table, and this time there was no restraining her tears. The woven friendship bracelet that matched her own was lying next to a wooden brush.

  “Hush, my miri,” Cestov’s arms came around her. “You are upsetting the little one.”

  “I… I can’t…”

  “I’ll take her,” Devoji said quickly. “You two take some time.”

  As soon as the girl left the room, Cestov picked her up and carried her over to the big chair in the corner, cradling her in her arms as she sobbed. When her cries finally died down, she looked up to see that his eyes were wet with tears too.

  “We were too late,” she said.

  “I know. How can I ever forgive myself?”

  “He was the one who left you.”

  “Because I did not listen to what he wanted. Because I thought it was a foolish, impossible dream. He wanted a mate and I thought such a thing could never be. Yet, now I have you and now I know it’s possible.” His eyes closed for a moment. “At least he had a chance to discover that for himself.”

  “You mean he had the chance to buy a mate,” she said bitterly.

  “Stop that, Mariah. Have you seen anything in this house that indicates your sister was a slave to him?”

  “Maybe he was a nice slave owner,” she muttered resentfully.

  “You are forgetting something else.”

  “What?”

  “Claire. Bratan would not have been able to get her pregnant unless he became fertile, and he would only have become fertile if he had found his mate.”

  She thought of the baby, of Judith’s eyes in that pale green face, and sighed. “So it really can happen.”

  “Yes.”

  “But not for me, not for us.” Why did that hurt so much?

  “My miri, we have only been together for a few weeks. Does it always happen immediately on your planet?”

  “No, of course not.” She buried her head in his chest, remembering the sorrow that had swept over her when she realized that she wasn’t pregnant. For once, she was actually envious of Judith. Was this longing what had originally led her sister to decide to have a baby, even without a husband? Had she been happy to have another one? Remembering the way Judith had doted on Charlie, she suspected that she had been overjoyed.

  “What do we do now?”

  “I need to find out what happened.” He frowned. “Devoji mentioned trouble with the Dhalecs. I need to know why they are here and if they were responsible for his death.”

  “And if they were?”

  “Then by Granthar’s Hammer, he will be avenged.”

  Her heart lurched. “Cestov, please—”

  “Daddy!” Charlie’s mournful sob echoed down the hall.

  “I’ll go to him,” he said, lifting her quickly to her feet.

  “You have to tell him,” she said softly.

  “I know.”

  Cestov opened the door to find Charlie sobbing into a small stuffed animal.

  “Do not cry, Charlie.”

  “Daddy!” The woebegone little face looked up, then he launched himself at Cestov.

  He caught him easily as the small arms tightened around his neck once more. His heart ached as he wrapped a protective tail around the boy’s back, wishing he could spare him pain.

  “I thought you was gone again, Daddy,” he said indignantly.

  “No, Charlie, I’m not going to leave you. But I have to talk to you.”

  A dirty thumb crept into the boy’s mouth.

  “Charlie, I’m sorry but I’m not really your daddy. Your real daddy was my brother. We just look alike.”

  “Daddy…” Charlie insisted, scowling.

  “No, I’m your uncle. But that is somewhat like a daddy too.”

  “Daddy too?” When Cestov nodded, a smile appeared on the little boy’s face for the first time and he held up his hand, counting on his fingers. “Daddy one. Daddy two.”

  The word settled inside of him, filling his heart. “Yes, Charlie, I will be your Daddy two. Shall we go see your Aunt Mariah now?”

  Charlie looked thoughtful, then held up his fingers again. “Mama two.”

  His chest ached. He suspected that Mariah would be thrilled. “Yes, Charlie, Mama two.”

  The little boy squirmed to be let down, then raced out into the hallway yelling, “Mama two, Mama two!”

  A startled Mariah appeared in the bedroom doorway, then knelt to gather Charlie in her arms as he flung himself at her, still chanting “Mama two.” Her eyes filled with tears again and he suspected that his own were not completely dry. Clearing his throat, he went to join them, gathering his family in his arms. They clung together until he forced himself to let go.

  He helped Mariah to her feet, Charlie still wrapped in his arms, and forced himself to focus on practical matters.

  “I need to contact the Wanderer and let them know what has happened.”

  “Are you going to bring her closer?”

  “I do not think so. Not yet. I want to find out more about what is happening here. I’d like to talk to Devoji’s brother. But I think I will ask Maldost to join us.”
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br />   “I’m hungry,” Charlie announced, and a surge of panic shot through him. The child must be fed, but how?

  He gave Mariah a helpless look and saw that she looked just as uncertain.

  “What do you usually eat, Charlie?” she asked.

  He gave her a speculative look, then said, “Cookies.”

  From the way Mariah laughed, he suspected that the boy had asked for some kind of treat. He resolved to find out about these cookies as soon as possible.

  “Why don’t we go see what Devoji thinks about that?” Mariah said firmly.

  They found the Granican in a spacious room obviously devoted to cooking, although he did not see any of the machines with which he was familiar. Mariah looked almost as befuddled.

  “Is that a wood-burning stove?” she asked.

  “No, it burns robeda dung,” Devoji said.

  “And my sister cooked on that?”

  “Yes. She was an excellent cook.”

  “Well, I can assure you I’m not.”

  “Charlie says that he is hungry,” he announced, determined to provide for the child’s needs.

  Devoji laughed. “He always says that. But perhaps he could have a snack now?” She raised her eyebrows at Mariah.

  “Uh, sure?”

  “Mistress Judith didn’t like for him to spoil his dinner.”

  He saw Mariah’s hand clench, but she gave a determined smile. “Yes, I remember she was always pretty strict about that. But I think we could all use a little something. And maybe a cup of tea?”

  “Certainly.” Devoji moved over to the “stove” with an odd-shaped container.

  “Devoji, did my brother have an office?” he asked.