Page 27 of Secretly Married To My Monster Alien Boss
Zinny looked up at her with his big eyes and meowed. But through some weird techy magic, his collar buzzed with words. “I no want to scare.”
13
RYNAR
Rynar had to admit, thisbur-gerAlissia had suggested was delectable. She called itscrump-tious. And thato-nionsauce pricked his tongue in a way that reminded him of the Deruzian spices trekked along the Great Desert to the markets. And this was a meal he could eat with his hands. He’d missed that. Humans were so very adamant on eating withutensils.
“Great choice,” he said and took another big bite, the tangy juices coating his tongue.
“Thank you,” Alissia took a much smaller bite out of her meal, eyeing Zinny, who stood on top of the counter. She tore off another small piece of juicy meat and offered it to him.
Zinny smelled it–like he had with every other piece–and finally deigned to eat it.
“Thanks you,” his collar rumbled. “Yummy.”
“You’re very welcome,” Alissia said, then turned to Rynar, eyes glowing with curiosity. “I can’t get over it. You have a talking cat.”
“I do. He’s usually more talkative, though.”
“I is in the room,” Zinny said, eyes wide as his tongue darted out to clean his whiskers.
“Of course, we didn’t want to ignore you.” Alissia chuckled and gave him another piece of meat. “How is this possible?”
“A blend of Nazyn’s technology and Darcy’s human imagination,” Rynar said. “On my home planet, we used similar devices with the zeratops. Huge lizard creatures the Quillons traded with us, which our ancestors rode into battle. It made sense to be able to communicate better with them. Darcy and Nazyn managed to create this collar for Zinny. It functions, but it is less than ideal at translating.”
“I is smarter,” Zinny said, licking one of his front paws.
“Yes, you’re smart and cute,” Alissia cooed and scratched him between the ears. Whatever other retort Zinny had died on his whiskers as he closed his eyes in delight.
“I like yous,” Zinny said between purrs, making Alissia’s smile even wider. She lit up the entire room.
Rynar liked this human, too. Perhaps a bit too much.
After showingAlissia to her bedroom–and everything the adjacent bathroom could do, much to her joy–Rynar retreated to his own room, which shared a wall with hers. And, yes, he very much touched said wall once the door slid shut behind him.
He could hear the soft patter of her feet on top of the plush carpet. Her quiet mutters of “Wow” and “Holy shit”.
Rynar had understood plenty of Earthen customs, but this expression still confounded him. How could human waste be holy?
He slid his palm away from the wall, hearts aching. Alissia brought life and energy into his home. Even standing around eating seemed fun when she was around.
He was glad she was here.
Too glad.
His veins glowing last evening had been a warning sign. One he needed to heed. One he’d promised himself to never succumb to, like his parents had.
Rynar couldn’t forget why Alissia was in his home.
He retreated all his senses away from her–for her privacy and his sanity–and waved his fingers in the air. The holograph appeared in the center of his room, a mere whisper of his valley’s glory.
Rynar stepped closer to it, the heavy responsibility of his homeland weighing heavy on him again.
Deruzia was a magnificent planet of extremes. Half of it was covered by water too acid for anything other than the deep dwellers to survive. What the water hadn’t engulfed, the desert had lain claim to, along with its thorny cliffs and ravaging storms. But between all of nature’s dangerous might, there were small valleys, filled with blooms and rivers. The hills weren’t barren, but covered in the lushest of plants. There were some thorny ones, too, as Rynar remembered from running up them to watch the twin stars set in the evening.
There, right between them, stood his dynasty’s ancestral home. The one he would inherit. It sprawled on the left side of the valley, half of it embedded into the tallest hill in the area. Rynar remembered those tunnels well. Intricately decorated caverns, which held weapons and treasures his dynasty had collected throughout milenia.
The house’s exterior had been designed to blend in with the nature around them. Oval windows flanked by tall, winding trees that glowed in the dark. The sturdy bushes that grew on top of the jagged roof. The mosaic tiles which had been handcrafted by the great Renory, his great-great-great-great-grandfather, after he’d won the war against the Xirians.
