Lyric studied her eyes for a moment more than nodded. Go with your mate, I will get us where we need to go and then we can all work it out.
Ember would have expressed her surprise at the trust implicit in that statement but Farin lost patience and pulled her into his arms, catching her gaze as he finally pushed into her mind.
Ember? His quiet question was not as forceful as she was expecting, and it had her softening her automatic angry response at his pushiness. She patted his chest again, almost rubbing it with her motions.
"It's fine," she said out loud. "Just needed a moment of private conversation with my sisters. Let's just get clean and clothed and we can deal with the rest."
She could use some real sleep as well, but she had a feeling that would take a little longer to accomplish. If she could manage it at all without nightmares threatening. After her last bout with the labs she had barely slept and still years later she occasionally had sleepless nights. She had a feeling this last influx of badness was going to make it ten times worse.
She led her mate to her cabin and all it took was the sight of her naked mate in a room with a bed for her mating heat to rush over her again. She ignored it as best she could, even when he felt it and reacted with a growling purr that made hers worse. She closed herself into her small bathroom cubicle before he could make everything else obsolete with his touch.
She used the sonic cleaner for speed, even though she always preferred the water, but she was still glowing with power and was in too much of a hurry to bother. She just wanted to be clean. Needed to smell like herself once again and not the nightmare that was the labs. Every inch of her skin seemed to reek of her captivity, and even the scent of her mate could not counter it.
Once she was cleaned of even the smallest particles she allowed her now clean hair to flow and wrap into a braid at her back, then she let it go. She had been exercising so much control just to stay covered it was no wonder she did not have more of a headache than she did.
She needed sleep, but knew without asking that there was more to do before that could happen. For now being covered, even with just the thin drying cloth, and smelling of only herself was enough. Though she could admit that she missed the scent of her mate on her skin, and as soon as he was free of the stench of the labs himself she would do her best to rub herself all over him to get it back.
When she felt the purr of approval flow across her mind, she realized her mate was still deep in her mind. Instead of making her mad, she felt the last of her tension ease and walked out of the bath.
Farin passed her with barely a brush of fingers across the bare skin showing at her hip, then with a flash of celestial eyes he closed the bathroom door. There was both a promise and a threat in the eyes that branded her as the door closed between them.
It seemed she was not the only one who wanted nothing between them but clean skin and mating heat.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Farin did not bother to leave his mate’s mind while they were separated by the thin walls of her bathing unit. So he was not surprised when he walked back into her cabin and found his clothes and weapons had been delivered. Including full shields. He scented Aos on them, but thankfully his warrior was smart enough not to have entered his mate’s’ cabin. Aos was honorable, he knew that without a doubt, but the predator inside of him would not have cared if his scent had been in his mate’s personal domicile.
You act as if I would be in danger from your warrior, when we both know that is not the case.
Farin snorted at the flash of his mate’s dangerous purr through his mind. He turned from his contemplation of his armor beside the portal to find her with arms crossed and her eerily beautiful lavender eyes on him. She had her own clothes laying on her bed but she still wore the thin cloth she had left the bathing room in.
"I do not think facts will change what it is I feel, or how I react where you are concerned," he answered mildly enough. Though he knew she could see the warning in his eyes. And feel the growl in his mind. "It would be best for all concerned if you kept a..." he searched for the right word. "Distance from other males."
She tilted her head in that way she had that reminded him that, like himself, she was not fully civilized. He could feel her thinking of what he was saying, and not saying, and then her stance relaxed, but her words and thoughts bombarded him with emotion. Frustration, understanding, worry. He did not have to wait to find out what was causing her thoughts. She told him without him having to dig for them. "I always keep my distance from males. But they rarely do the same."
He growled at that, this time it slipped out through tight teeth, but she was not finished. "I am a siren, men will be drawn to me, it is not something they can help. They only react to my lure. It would hardly be fair to kill them for something they can't control."
"Fine," Farin the Dark said even as his beast reacted with a snarl. His eyes he knew portrayed his implacable resolve. "I will only kill those that need killing."
He prowled closer to his mate, his eyes taking in all that stood before him wrapped only in a thin damp cloth. She was still glowing with power and he marveled that such a creature belonged to him. He saw humor flash through those incredible eyes, along with frustration.
"And who decides who needs killing?" she asked, though from her ironic tone it was clear she already knew the answer. She did not back up and he did not stop until he was close enough the silky strands of her hair wrapped around his arms and lashed softly at his naked thighs.
He growled when it fluttered like a teasing caress around his jutting cock. They stood close enough that he could feel her heat. And see the way her skin flushed with the same need that was driving through his blood. Her eyes, this close, almost pulsed with the heat gathering between them. Farin reached up and threaded his hand into the silky hair flowing at the side of her face.
"I do," he said finally answering the question, and felt no small satisfaction when her head tilted in confusion, as if she had forgotten her question.
He smiled then, a baring of teeth that held more dark satisfaction, than humor. "I decide who needs killing," he reiterated. And smiled when her eyes fluttered back into focus through the desire building between them.
He watched her throat move as she swallowed. She shook her head, and it caused his hand to tighten so that the silk strands he held could not escape. She licked her lips and he could not stop another growl from slipping out as his eyes zeroed in and locked on the wet moisture she had left behind.
Her eyes closed and he could feel her struggling to ignore both his naked length before her and the heat of their mutual need that swirled between and through them both. "We need to talk about that, and about what happens now."
He figured she had about thirty seconds to say whatever she was struggling with before her had her beneath him again. She choked and he found her in his mind, hearing his thoughts. He did not mind. She was his mate. He would have them connected in every way possible, until there was no way for her to ever be free of him.
He felt the siren purr across his dark thoughts, even as the woman shuddered in visceral reaction.
He raised a brow in question when he felt her willingness to argue the fate of some stupid weak willed male who, in the future, would try to touch what was his. "Would you react any differently to a female near me?" His growl was met with one of hers as an angry siren suddenly looked out at him through Ember’s eyes.
He did not think she was even aware of the way her hair was now wrapped around his cock firmly enough that it could not be mistaken for anything but a claiming.
He very carefully stood as still as he could while he watched her teeth elongate between those soft lips and felt that silken grip turn into a stranglehold. It was as hot as it was dangerous. After a long snarl he watched Ember beat back her own predator and force out her tension.
"Point made," she finally said. Her eyes softened and her teeth shrank back down to their usual small size.
The silk wrap
ped around his cock loosened marginally, but did not, he noted, release his hard length. He did not complain, but he did close his eyes to the sight of his mate long enough to try to get himself under control.
He knew she understood they would not be talking for much longer when she asked in a hurried way. "Neither of us will kill anyone...unless absolutely necessary," she said. With a small touch of dark humor in the last. Then her tone went completely serious and he opened his eyes to find her eyes studious and dare he say, suspicious on his. "But where do we go from here? You are the Tellox Commander, and my sisters and I have obligations and enemies I am not willing to leave them alone to face."
Her mind locked down tight. He could have forced his way inside to see what she was thinking but he had a pretty good idea from the sudden agitated flicking of her hair around them. "I would not ask you to abandon your family."
She tilted his head and licked those luscious lips again. "And I would not ask to abandon your people," she finally answered. "But where does that leave us? We cannot be separated for long periods; the bond will not allow it."
He growled in displeasure at even the thought of it, and his hand tightened in her hair to hold her in place, even as he gripped his arm around her waist and yanked her hard against him. "We will not be separated at all," he finally hissed. Making no effort to curb the snarl in his words. It was with no small satisfaction that he saw his mates’ shudder of pleasure and longing at their sudden closeness. It was only that look and the way her hair wrapped around him tight and pulled him closer that allowed him to speak without just taking her to the floor and forcing her to accept his claim again. "Your family will be safe with the Tellox," he said while he could still form the words. "And I will always put your needs above all others. The details we will work out. Later."
He willed her to trust him and felt when her mind opened to him again. She searched his thoughts for the truth of his intentions. He did not try to hide anything from her. Finally she dropped all her guards, and he closed his eyes at the feel of her relief and need. With another growl, this one of satisfaction he palmed her ass and yanked her high in his arms. Her arms and legs wrapped around him. He had her against the wall and his cock buried inside her in another breath. Eventually he hoped to have enough control to take her softly, taking his time and tasting every inch of her first, but today was not that day. He took her with a primal rage he could not control.
Ember, instead of fighting off the suddenly feral beast taking her against the wall, gasped and buried her teeth into his shoulder with a shudder of pleasure and relief.
Farin did his best to leave his own mark, inside and out, in every way he could.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
The only place that was big enough to host everyone was the ballroom on the Star Caravan. Tellox ships were advanced with both weapons and defense but they were designed with small crews in mind. Whereas the cruise ship Ember and her sisters had weaponized was made for large crews and guests for long journeys. And with the size of these Tellox and in these numbers, Ember thought, it needed to be.
They had left most of the crews with the other ships watching over the few they had managed to save from the labs. But even with just Farin’s calvern, Brax, his mate and his crew, and Ariel, her sisters, their mates, calvern and offspring it was quite a gathering. Charm and Lyric she noted were both looking around at the assembled barbarian horde with different degrees of admiration and unease. None of them were used to strangers. Certainly not on their ship.
It did not escape Embers notice that Farin and his men had very carefully maneuvered, not just Ember, but her sisters so that they stood with Farin and his calvern between them and the other males. All of whom seemed to have the same idea with their own females. She might have taken offense if it was not so clearly an involuntary response. Farin knew as well as she that she could take care of herself and still he stood as if he would guard her like a fragile treasure.
Fragile? He asked catching her humor filled thoughts. No. But treasure? That I cannot argue.
Before Ember could say anything to that, he stepped forward and immediately commanded the attention of everyone in the room. The small conversations that had been peppering the space stopped instantly.
Farin did not even need to raise his voice to be heard, and the sheer presence he managed to convey, even among what Ember knew to be the elite of his warriors, was awe inspiring. She could see very easily why he had been chosen as their leader.
He looked back at Ember and she understood his look and sighed, but took the steps required to stand at his side. His eyes gleamed with more than a little satisfaction and a whole lot of possession.
Before she could do more than give him censoring eyes for that look one of the men that had been introduced as Celo spoke. "We have communications broadcasting to the rest of the Tellox as you requested." Ember looked a question toward Lyric who shrugged, so Ember did not bother opening telepathic communications between them. She would find out soon enough what had transpired between the Tellox and her sisters to make them trust them to this extent. So Ember turned back to the talk between Farin and Celo.
"You have called in the troops?"
"All the calvern who were not already in space have assembled and await your orders," Celo assured him and then with a short head bow he stepped back. Ember knew Celo was her mate’s second in command and part of Farin's calvern, though she only had a vague idea of what that meant.
A calvern is a group of men who band together to protect a male’s present or future family and mate when he cannot. It is a high honor to be considered worthy. At Farin’s explanation she studied the men of his calvern with new eyes. Celo, Dig, Aos and Nox all stood in a circle around her Charm, Lyric and Farin. What she knew of the men was only what she had seen in the smattering of Farin's memories, and her own brief meeting with them in the market and the ship here. She would have to get to know them in her own right but for now she felt marginally comforted by the fact they seemed to be as protective of her sisters as herself.
She would have to get her friends’ opinion of the Tellox as they had dealt with them longer, but she liked that her friends were not excluded from the meeting that was happening, or the protective instincts of the warriors for their people in general and females in particular.
She did not bother to ask Farin any of the hundreds of questions she had, there would be time enough for that later. For now he was speaking to his people and what he said would go a long way in telling her how she and her own would be reacting.
"First," he waved his hand around him, his eyes going over all the females and young in the room. "See the hope of the Tellox. Not only mates but a new generation of our people. And..." He pulled Ember closer to his side. "Another mate found among the stars. She is Ember a warrior of the Siren people. And she is MINE!"
Ember nearly jumped out of her skin when a roar went over the Tellox assembled. She was not the only female who jumped at the unexpected sound, but she was the only one whose hair began to whip about them in agitation. Farin rumbled at her with a soothing purr. At the feel of his hand caressing down the agitated mass of her hair she relaxed and then nearly groaned in embarrassment when the bulk of her hair, instead of returning to its braid wrapped around Farin, the wide muscle of his arm, his thigh, anything that it could reach.
The silence that followed was deafening and Ember felt all eyes on her and what could be seen of her mate. Not that they had not been before, but clearly living, and hugging, hair was an attention getter. She sighed, Farin chuckled clearly not at all perturbed by either the blatant claiming or the fact that he was now wrapped up like a gleaming silver and gold gift.
Ember dropped her head and closed her eyes in embarrassment, then used her hands and will to untangle the Commander of the Tellox from her misbehaving hair. She was only marginally successful.
Farin, the arrogant, chuckled again. The sound clearly all kinds of pleased male.
It was not the first
or last time she wished it were possible for Sirens to cut their hair.
That random thought was caught by Farin because his chuckle turned to a growl of warning. Don't even think such blasphemy.
Ember would have rolled her eyes, but she was now under the eyes of the entirety of the Tellox army. Even if it was a little late to make a good impression.
If you think the impression you make is not a good one you do not know what you speak. There is not an unmated male among my warriors who is not now wishing for a mate who would not only stand beside him as a warrior, but also wrap him up in silken hair, both at the same time.
Farin spoke again his voice going hard as he got to the bad news of the broadcast. "A people called the Galais have proclaimed themselves our enemies. They take what is not theirs and would have given my mate to another for the sake of experimentation if she had not been the capable warrior that she is. They would return the Tellox to nothing more than lab rats to be bred and killed for the sake of their survival. It is a history we are all familiar with and one that will not be repeated." Another roar, this one of rage that Farin let settle down before he continued. "We have destroyed one lab. My mate and these two females escaped another one long ago, destroying it as well. Now we the Tellox will hunt down and destroy any that remain. Along with this broadcast we will send you all the information we have on our enemies and the atrocities that they are capable of. Today we return the survivors to their homes. We will not stop until all are liberated and the threat to my mate and her family is destroyed." He stopped then and looked around at all the assembled Tellox. "You have your orders. Celebrate what we have gained, look for your mate, and find me the Galais."
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