Page 18 of Taken to Heimo
Silently —painfully— I slip out of her nest and gather her things. I pack clothes for her, what I think she’ll need, anyway. I make sure to grab multiple scarves for her hair.
I grab everything out of her washroom. I even pack the gifts she bought for her kinswoman and the new kit and, when everything is ready, I pack Svera up, too.
I cradle her in my arms and let her sleep as I issue the order for the xub’Ixria to fetch us from my home in a glider and take us to the transporter so that Svera does not miss the birth of the hybrid. Not because I feel any differently towards the Rakukanna and her new kit, but because I know that my Xiveri Mate would not want to.
6
Svera
We’re together in one of the domes. I know we shouldn’t be, but I pretend that this is okay. I haven’t been given leave to stay in other quarters on Qath, so I’m not sure I should even try here on Nobu for such a short stay, and I’m not willing to risk Krisxox’s wrath. Not on this lunar. Not after so much war has been worn across the bright white cold that blankets Nobu. Not after so much bloodlust has been sated.
Inside the dome, it’s cold despite the flames gathered in the stone pit in the center of the small, cozy space, casting heat. It’s cold despite the layers and layers of furs bundled around me. It’s cold and still Krisxox sits shirtless on a short stool in front of me. He wouldn’t let Nobu’s healers stitch him, but when I pressed, he said it would be alright if I did it. I told him I’d never stitched skin before and he told me he didn’t care.
Ordinarily, Lemoria would have passed a healing torch over the wounds, sealing them quickly and painlessly, but because this was a trial and Krisxox interceded when I should have been allowed to choose my own champion freely, he is being punished. It feels as if I am, too.
I work silently, sticking the pointy end of the curved needle through his skin again and again, trying to blink past the pain I feel seeing another creature in pain. Even one as deplorable as Krisxox. We don’t speak at all. I’m still furious with him and he doesn’t care.
The longer he goes without speaking, the angrier I get. I want to yell at him. To scream. I want to pound on his back with my fists. My fingers start shaking with that desire and I finally drop the needle, let it dangle from a single black string sticking out of his back like the forgotten noose of a victim long dead.
And then he says evenly, glibly, like it doesn’t matter at all, “If she were not Xhea, I’d be tempted to invite your human to train with the warriors on Qath.”
The words I’d been prepared to launch like lances shove back into my mouth, down my throat and into my belly where they stand rooted. Tension deflates from my shoulders. They sink down my back. I didn’t realize my face was all screwed up until it releases. A small smile flickers over my mouth and I look up into the long mirror leaning against the wall in front of Krisxox. His ridges are brightly colored again, but when he meets my gaze, the color cuts and a sensation bubbles in my chest that I haven’t felt before.
He says stoically, “She has a warrior’s heart.”
The bubble gets bigger, swelling until I feel like it’s about to take me off of my feet. I have to catch myself on something and the only thing near is Krisxox. I place a single hand on his shoulder and his ridges go wild with color, but only for less than a blink.
I swallow hard and my voice is teeny tiny when I say, “What are we doing, Krisxox?”
“Nothing,” he grunts, avoiding my gaze.
“I mean, what arewe?”
“Ruined,” he grunts again, though this sound is tainted by humorless laughter.
I nod, understanding, and return my fingers to the slender needle. “There is a proverb that says, ‘When I am with you in the ruins, I am in the garden, but when I am without you in the garden, I am in the ruins.’”
More humorless laughter. Krisxox shakes his head. “What is this? Some ode to your precious Tri-God?”
I smile, but it does not fill me with pleasure, but with sadness. Perhaps a touch of both. “Nox. My grandfather used to say this to my grandmother. It is a proverb about love.”
I wake from the memory confused. Not just because it’s the first dream I’ve had in rotations that hasn’t featured Nondah, but because I’m lost and I’m not in the garden.
Where am I?
I tense against the sheets, my heart battering around in my chest. I try to inhale and exhale deep breaths, but they don’t come to me easily. I’m scared. Terrified.
And worse than all those things…I’maroused.
Flame. It rips through my sternum, like a struck match, and sets fire to the patch of hair between my thighs. I squeeze them together.Where am I?All I want is the answer to that question. All my body wants ishim.
The sensation doesn’t belong here and is so out of place, I feel a blooming headache in the front of my skull and no matter how I twist and turn in the pallet beneath me, it won’t let me go.
“Krisxox,” I whisper, needy in a way I don’t recognize.
I reach up and thread my fingers through my hair. There’s a head scarf lying next to me on the pillow, but it must have fallen off.
I pull the band out of my hair and shake my curls free, hoping that satisfies the headache. It doesn’t. Instead, the bubble in my gut swells, threatening to tear through my skin. My cheeks fill with fire and likely color, too. I wonder, do the Voraxians think I’m angry all the time?
