by Loki Renard
Slowly, I start to settle down. I did not notice it at the time, but he must have loosened the vines as I was crying heavily because they are still around me, but they are not holding me back from touch the way they were before. I can move my arms at least, I can wrap them around his big, muscular frame. I can cling to him as if he is my one and only chance at ever being truly human.
His big hand moves over my back and down over my bottom, he cups me close to him and he rubs and he soothes and he takes such tender care of me that it is hard to believe he ever whipped the same flesh he is now making feel so good.
My eyes are growing heavy. I am tired in a way I have not been tired in the longest time. The exertion of the day, the crash, the beating, the sex, the fear, the tears, the food, they have all caught up with me and left me utterly exhausted.
Cradled in his arms with the warmth of the fire glowing against my back, I fall into a tearstained slumber.
Chapter Five
Zion
The beast is speaking.
“Tselia! Tselia Icaria! Where are you? Answer me this instant!”
I am standing at the sight where the star girl crashed to the ground. I left the girl in the cave, well tied up and came down here at first light. I knew I needed to attend to this thing. It cannot be left out here. It will only draw rage from the tribe.
The metal beast she rode down is calling out for her. I step inside the outer shell of its skull and listen.
“Tselia! This is the Patron! You will answer me when I speak to you! You are in breach of your orders. Immediately return to your point of origin and submit to the guards for your hearing. You have gone too far this time, girl. You were warned what would happen if you breach protocol...”
So many words pouring out of the metal animal’s mouth. None of them make sense. It speaks to the star girl as if it owns her, as if it is angry at her. I do not like that. The voice crackles as it raves, becoming increasingly agitated.
It is crippled. I should put it out of its misery.
I take the heaviest rock I can find, and I begin to hit the buttons and lights with hard blows, crushing and smashing the remaining life out of the talking metal animal machine.
“Tselia!”
Bash!
“Tse...”
Crash!
“T...”
Crunch!
Finally it falls silent. It is slain.
I brought a tool with me, a sharp piece of metal attached to a sturdy stick. With this I will dig a hole, bury the star beast, and let it rest in the earth. It will be covered over with grasses and trees and soon there will be no trace of it left. I will keep my star girl here with me. She is mine now. My mate. She has taken my seed and she will swell with my child.
Before I can attend to the rest of my task, a shout emanates across the clearing. I straighten from the work of hole digging as a pack of nearly a dozen young huntresses comes charging across the plains. They have their spears at the ready, sharpened stone tips and long handles adorned with white plumage. Their faces are painted with bright red and pink stripes, which do nothing to make them blend into the background better. That doesn’t matter. They do not hunt by stealth, but by endurance. They run their prey down, whooping and shouting until it is exhausted. A hunting party in full voice is a fearsome beast to behold.
They come down on me as if I was an antelope, but I do not move. I stand my ground. More than one of them has lain with me. Their pussies have slicked my cock, and they have not forgotten that. They are the hunters, but I am their leader.
“Where is she?”
Tyna, the leader of the pack, addresses me a great deal too sharply for my liking. There must be something in the stars to make these females misbehave so badly. The arrival of my star girl has caused disruption throughout the tribe, and perhaps even further beyond.
I fold my arms over my chest and glower at her. She shifts her posture and looks down, lowering her eyes and her tone.
“Zion,” she says. “Please, where is our prey?”
“She’s mine.”
Tyna lifts her eyes to mine. They are dark like the earth, rimmed with black charcoal and full of a venomous look. “We must kill her, Zion. She must die.”
“No.”
That should be enough of a response for them, but it is not.
“Bring us the girl!”
“She must die!”
More voices join with demands as the huntresses cluster around me, short, but fierce. These women are worthy of respect in spite of their feral intentions. They provide the tribe with its food. They suckle the young. They are the life of this world. I would never, ever hurt one of them. But I would likewise not allow them to hurt the girl herself.
“She is like you,” I say. I am not a frequent speaker, and I am even less of an arguer, but they must be convinced not to hurt the girl.
“She hunts?”
“She is female. She should be protected.”
“She is tainted. She is of star flesh. She will bring death to us all. She must die and be buried with this thing!” Tyna points to the beast I have slain with the rock.
“The beast we will bury,” I agree. “The girl is mine. Help me in this task.”
The huntresses grumble, but they set to work. The soil is soft and pliable and with dozens of hands we create a large enough pit to push the star mount into in a matter of hours. By the time the sun is at its greatest height, there is little evidence that anyone fell from the stars. We breathe collectively with relief as we place the last of the grass sod back into the place from which it was taken when we began digging. The roots will knit back together and make a blanket under which the mount will become part of the earth. This is the proper way of things. That which is buried, does not rise.
“You should let me kill her,” Tyna says as the huntresses begin to trail back to their homes.
“You should go home, before you anger me.” My voice is rough. I will not tolerate that speech. With Tyna, angry words often become angry actions.
Her eyes narrow. I see jealousy written plain on her features. I have never chosen a single mate among the tribe. I have been free to take each of them as they please and I desire, tasting the delights of a dozen sexes. It is understood that is how it shall be. They came to me willingly, but some did not use their bodies as vessels of pleasure. Some of them hoped to make their sexes a snare. Tyna is one such huntress.
“You were supposed to be mine,” she says bitterly. “Until the star girl fell, you were going to be mine.”
“I am not prey for you to hunt and claim, Tyna. I choose my mate, not you. Go home. Now.”
She pouts, her fearsome face falling into a scowl. It is not love that attaches her to me so, it is pride. There are few unclaimed warriors in the tribe. Most men have chosen their mates and established their hearths. There are new boys growing to age, of course, but I have remained solo longer than most. It has become something of a matter of pride for one of the huntresses to capture me. Most of them know that is not going to happen, but Tyna has never given up hope. I like her, but she is not my mate. I do not feel the heart-call for her. I do not feel the way I did the moment I laid eyes on my girl from the stars. There was more than an attraction then. There was a knowing. The moment I saw my star girl, my heart began to beat only for her. That is how a mate bond feels.
Tyna obeys me and leaves. She needs to find a mate of her own, one worthy of her heart. And I need to return to my little captive.
I do so in a good mood. Her mount has been slain and buried. The connection to the stars has been severed, and so the ill-fate that might otherwise have followed has been repelled. Now she can begin to live her new life, to look upon the stars as we do, and to become one with me.
Chapter Six
Tselia
He must have tied me up before he left me, because when I wake up, the fire is out, I am alone, and I am secured to a ring in the floor by those damn vines that seem to work so perfectly for the purposes of
restraint. It’s as if this planet has deliberately evolved to capture me.
I am hungry. I am thirsty. I need to pee.
Fortunately, it is not too long before he returns. Seeing him in the morning is like seeing him for the first time. I forgot how big he is, how his bulk fills the cavern and makes everything, especially me, seem small. I forgot how every part of him is muscled and ripples when he moves. There is no softness to him. His skin covers pure power and bone.
“Morning.”
His voice rumbles through me. Those blue eyes lock on me with a gaze of pure possession. I feel something in my stomach clench. Anticipation? Fear? Desire? All of the above? He makes me respond in ways I don’t completely understand.
“I need to go to the toilet,” I say. It’s embarrassing, but if he leaves me tied up here one more minute, I am going to soil this cave.
He nods and crouches down, pulling the vines free of my naked body.
“Come,” he says.
I still cannot work out how sentient he is. He seems intelligent. When I look into his eyes, I feel a mind very much like my own, but he does not present himself the way I do verbally. He doesn’t seem to feel the need to speak. He hasn’t even asked me my name. For that matter, I haven’t asked him his.
“I’m Tselia,” I say, following him. “What’s your name?”
“Zion.”
It sounds like a growl.
“Toilet,” he says, pointing to a hole in the rock that is sort of hidden round the back of a little outcropping deeper in the cave. The area around it has been smoothed by what I imagine must be thousands of years of human feet squatting around it. I have no idea where the hole leads. I don’t precisely feel inclined to investigate too deeply at this point.
He stands and he watches, his brow raised expectantly.
“Well, you can’t look at me.”
He keeps staring.
“You really can’t.”
“You tell me what I can’t do, and you will find out what I can.”
“Wow, a whole sentence! Let’s throw a party,” I snap sarcastically. My bladder is aching and I just want to pee and he’s holding the whole process up by finally deciding to speak to me.
His expression slides into a glower and I realize two things: antagonizing him is not a good idea, and if I want to toilet, I’m going to have to do it with him looking. No doubt it is not a shameful thing here on this planet, but in my world, excretion is not a group activity.
I have no choice. I try to work out how to squat over the hole so as not to splash myself. This was not made for women. Women need a seat of some kind. Or more bendy knees. I don’t know. I end up awkwardly perching, my hands on the rocks as I finally relieve myself.
He mercifully does not stare me down the whole time. He seems to be more inclined to watch the area around me, scanning the darker corners of the cave. This place feels bigger today than it did last night. I get the sense that is much deeper, larger, and older than I suspected.
When I am done, he hands me a leaf to dry myself with. It is surprisingly suited to the task, soft and pliable and almost as good as the ship’s tissue.
“You don’t need to watch me.”
“There are beasts.”
“I know. I’m looking at one.”
He ignores that jibe.
If anyone else was this reluctant to speak, I might begin to find them boring, but not him. He is far too intense to be boring. He leads me back to the relatively well lit, cozy place we slept the night before and once again he feeds me.
“I need to get back to my ship,” I explain. “I have to get back to the... the stars. Because there is a star lord looking for me, and he will be very angry if he doesn’t find me.”
“You’re mine.”
Two words that apparently erase all threat. He doesn’t understand. He’s just a simple backwards brute of a man. It’s up to me to try to make him comprehend.
“This man, he controls many star ships. He has an entire army of them. He will send them for me.”
“If you were his, he would not have sent you so far. You were alone.”
Good point, I suppose.
“I was alone, but we can speak at great distances. He knows where I am. And he wants me back.”
“He is your lover?”
“No. My father.”
Zion nods. “Your father may visit.”
I let out a laugh at the notion of the Patron deigning to set foot on land. He hasn’t been inside a planet’s atmosphere for hundreds of years. He certainly wouldn’t do it merely to see me. He is a busy man, occupied with the affairs of many millions of entities. I am one among them, due little more favor, and hardly more thought.
“I don’t think he’ll be visiting.”
“Then why worry?”
“Because just because he won’t visit, doesn’t mean he won’t send a fleet of warships. It’s like, you know when you don’t want something, but you don’t want anyone else to have it either?”
Zion looks at me blankly. “No.”
“Well, of course not, because you’re perfect.”
He chews his meat and nudges more toward me. I’m not hungry. Thinking about the consequences of all of this is making me feel ill. They keep compounding in my head. I have gone from thinking that I would be recalled and put into stasis to wondering if the punishment could be somehow worse. I have almost certainly lost all favor with him—and the truth is, I was never in his favor. The Patron, of all people, was supposed to eschew reproduction. My birth was a shameful accident. One he vowed not to repeat. I live in the distant depths of the stars because I am a reminder of his failings. My failures only compound them. If I am ever going to make things right, I have to get back to the ship.
“Please,” I say. “Take me back to my craft. Please.”
He gives me a long, searching look and nods.
I can’t believe he has agreed to this so easily. Maybe I am going to get off this planet. Maybe I am going to make it up to the Patron. Maybe... I don’t even know.
I get up and I pull my suit on. He doesn’t stop me. I get my boots on and I follow him out of the cave. Is this it? The last time we see each other? I feel strange about that. There is a pang in my stomach at the idea of never getting to be near him again, but I push it aside. My feelings don’t matter. Obeying the Patron matters. Not being turned into a frozen meat treat matters.
He leads me down the mountain. It is a much longer walk now that I have to undertake it on my own two legs. Zion’s silence makes me nervous. He seemed so eager to keep me, but perhaps now that he has gotten his sexual pleasure from me he is ready to see me go.
That thought upsets me.
“Are you taking me to my ship to get rid of me?”
He stops and looks at me, his blue eyes quizzical, his dark brows drawing down over them in a way that indicates he understands, and does not like the question.
“You’re mine.”
Those two words are reassuring. Even as I plan to leave him forever. What the hell is wrong with me? I am behaving in a totally erratic manner, thinking and feeling things that are utterly at odds with each other. I want to go. I want to stay. I want to be his. I want to be free.
We come to a halt in the middle of a field.
“Here.”
“Huh?” I look around. This spot does look familiar, but there is no sign of my shuttle. It is just... gone. There is some bare earth here and there where I think it scraped along the ground. Did they drag it away? It didn’t get up and fly away on its own, that’s for sure.
“Where’s my ship?”
“Dead,” he says. “We buried it.”
“What do you mean, dead?”
“Was wounded. Finished it off. Buried it.”
It takes me far too long to work out what has happened. He doesn’t know what a machine is. If something moves, it must be alive. Oh... no. My stomach churns as my anger rises and flares.
“Oh... you... blazing idiot!” I curse. “I
t wasn’t dead! Machines can’t die! I can’t believe you. I can’t believe what a stupid rock-headed caveman you are, how dumb can you be? You came from people just like me, people with technology. How do you not know the difference between machine and animal? That was my one chance to survive and escape this place! Now I’m going to be stuck here with you cretins until... ow!”
He wasn’t listening to me. He was walking away toward a tree. He was taking a branch from the lower boughs and he was stripping the leaves from it. And now I know why. It was for me.
For a second time, he peels the suit from my body, all the way to the boots. He renders me utterly naked before the punishment begins. My cursing and wriggling does nothing to help the situation, and then it begins, a brutal punishment that only serves to enrage me further. Insult to injury, the whipping is fierce and fast. The lash of the branch catches my skin time and time again, welting my flesh.
I scream, but he persists, lashing my bottom with that infernal switch that bites my skin over and over, sending harsh heat coursing through my veins.
* * *
Zion
She will learn her place. She will scream and cry and she will beg for mercy, but I will not stop until I see she understands what it means to be a woman. Her displays of temper are shameful. Her words of rage are thoughtless. She has no sense of respect.
“This is not about you,” I growl, forced to speak because she seems unable to make the necessary connections between her behavior and what happens to the tribe. I buried her beast because it will draw the ire of the stars. We know well enough what our ancestors told us: to destroy anything that comes from above. This star girl should be included in that commandment, but I will not allow harm to her, even if the huntresses are right and she should be destroyed with it. She fancies herself intelligent, but she learns very slowly.
