Page 54 of His to Worship

“None that don’t involve Kuvier and Enikk ending up fighting their whole clan,” Samra retorts with a grimace.

That fact is why we’re stuck in this damn hut in the first place. When Junq declared that we would be separated from our guys due to ‘fairness,’ Enikk and Kuvier were ready to set fire to the whole thing. But, I could see it in Junq’s eyes, that’s exactly what he wanted. He wanted an excuse to put them in a situation they couldn’t win, so I made Kuvier let me go. It was a hard sell, and an even harder pill to swallow. The only thing that made him finally back down was reminding him that if he tried to take on his whole clan over it and lost, he’d lose me.

“We can’t even run away with all the damn eyes they have on us,” Xiomara laments from her place on the ground with an arm covering her face. She’s admittedly the most calm of us. Likely because this pales in comparison to being an alien slave for decades.

“So, basically, we just get to sit here and be fought over like scraps of meat.” Krissy’s voice is going for disdain, but falls short, landing a little too close to dejected.

“Sedona, do you have any ideas?” Everyone turns to look at me and I feel like I want to cave in on myself. Right now, I don’t want to be the leader. I didn’t sleep a wink last night, my mind won’t shut the hell up, and my heart just…hurts. Right now, I want to break down. But I can’t.

Heavy is the head, right?

“No,” I answer honestly, my voice flat even to my own ears. “I’m still thinking.”

“Don’t worry about tonight,” Sabrina says, shooting me a sympathetic look. “Kuvier is huge and he loves the hell out of you. He’ll win.”

In some ways, the girls know I have it the worst. I’m the only one who has someone to lose that I’ve built a connection with and grown feelings for. I give a strained half-smile, but can’t muster a decent response. Everyone falls silent after that, each of us spread across the small hut’s floor.

None of us know what to do with ourselves. They stuck us in here, and besides bringing servings of food, no one has come back for us. But I wouldn’t doubt that they’re around, waiting and watching. Renata had peeked her head out of the hut earlier and found that we were surrounded by clan women. She’d reported that our guys were nowhere to be found.

Our fitful peace is interrupted a long while later when the flap on the hut parts and Tiqii plus two women I do not recognize walk into the hut. They’re carrying things in their arms and I don’t have to question long what they’re here for.

“You,” Tiqii points at me, “come here. Our atan wishes that you be prepared for the Rites in the proper way.”

I stay right the hell where I am, waving her away and saying in her language, “No, thanks.”

“It was not a request,” she sneers at me. “What the atan says is to be followed.”

“Yeah, for the people of your clan.” I glower at her. “If you cannot treat us with the same respect allotted to the other females in your clan and let us pick our own mates, then why should I follow what your atan says? He’s not mine.”

The additional women look scandalized, but I give them my back.

“Very well, I am sure that your lack of respect for our rules will not impact the atan’s judgment of Kuvier at all.” My back goes ramrod straight and for the first time in my life, I want to commit a violent act.

I turn slowly, my jaw clenched. “What do I need to do to prepare?”

***

- kuvier -

We should have never come back.

This is the thought that plagues me. We should have never come back. I knew it in my very being that returning would lead to trouble, but I could not have fathomed this. I was well aware before coming back that Junq would do a great deal to try to undermine my claim to Sedona, but reviving a practice that has not been used in several generations just to spite me? That is more than even I could have imagined.

“Kuvier, you must eat,” my mother says, cutting through my never ending spiral of thoughts.

“I am not hungry.”

“You need your strength today,” she replies gently. Her words carry the weight of today’s impending events.

With a heavy sigh, I hold my hands out accepting the portion of oftii and mala she has brought me from the communal dinner I chose not to go to. I stayed at the fire pit for ages this morning, ate breakfast at the fire and everything. It had been in hope that at some point they would bring Sedona out of Tiqii’s hut and I could at least glimpse her. But when I realized that they would keep her confined to that hut until the Rites began, being anywhere near Junq no longer felt worth it.

Eating no longer felt worth it. Sleeping no longer felt worth it.

To appease my mother, I pick apart my meal, roughly swallowing. This action, as every other action, makes me miss my Sedona. After many meals spent with her, tasting the amazing flavors she created with the same ingredients, this meal falls flat.

“Is this female, this human, truly your bonded?” Her question hangs heavy in the air, and for a moment I do not feel like answering, but I muster the energy.

“Yes, I knew it the moment I smelled her,” I answer, setting my food aside. Lieq do not waste food, but today I do not feel like a Lieq.

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