The Last Dryad: The Complex

by Sarah M. Cradit

  Wezlei nuzzled against his mother’s chest, hungry, exhausted. The sound of her voice, on and on, had lulled him into relaxation. He was tired… so tired. Maybe not so hungry after all.

  Wezlei awoke drenched in layers of sweat. His pillow was soaked, and he thrust it aside, then flung the blankets in a heap on the floor.

  He had never had a dream so vivid. It hadn’t seemed like a dream, not the way most dreams felt where everything was far enough from reality that his mind could separate truth from fiction.

  This time, he hadn’t been dreaming. He knew that now. Embracing this particular reality might still be outside his capabilities, but he couldn’t deny it anymore, either.

  He drew a glass of water from the metal sink and drank it in a single quaff. His reflection in the mirror accentuated the drawn lines of a determined face.

  There was only one thing left to do.

  Wezlei tapped furiously against his wrist, waiting for the screen to light up. When it did, he commanded, “Pull up my personal files.” From there, he scrolled through the list but cursed when he couldn’t find what he was looking for. “Birth records,” he snapped.

  Finally, the specific request produced the result he needed. His record appeared on the small screen. He pressed the button to project it onto the wall, so he could better see.

  He didn’t breathe. His eyes scanned the fields, one by one, his heart racing with each line.

  It didn’t take long.

  “Father,” he read aloud, as he came to the field. “Record stricken on request.”

  XIV- Tariq

  September 29, 4 AS

  Tariq lay awake in the darkness. He should be sleeping. He’d been running himself ragged, and the four hours of sleep he garnered each day was the recharge required to continue at the grueling pace. Without it, details or items of importance would slip. And yet, he could not sleep.

  Aerwen, again. This was not the first time she’d given him pause and thrown him off schedule. It would, however, be the last.

  He knew. She knew, as well, but she did not realize the extent of his knowledge, and he intended to keep it that way. What Tariq did not know was how.

  How in hell his Dryad wife had managed to get herself with child.

  None of the clients he’d brought in had been Dryads. Tariq was certain of this, because Dryads could smell Dhampir miles away and stayed as clear as possible. And had a dumb Dryad somehow stumbled his way without realizing, Tariq would have chained him up before he even knew what was happening. Dryads were solid gold in his world. Not a single chance he’d let one out of his sight.

  But there was a child growing within Aerwen, and it didn’t get there via magic. Only another Dryad, or one with Dryad blood, could fuse their seed with her egg to create life. How many times had Tariq assured his clients that their entertainment with his wife was safe in every way? Even he had fucked her hundreds of times without a single ounce of worry.

  He rolled to his side, peering into the dark room. While he lay on his bed in turmoil, Aerwen was out there, somewhere, enjoying her life without a care in the world. Pregnant. The selfish, stupid bitch.

  Tariq knew her altered behavior was tied to her condition. He’d chosen to ignore the change initially because it was good for business. And then it wasn’t. Tariq had demonstrated to Aerwen precisely what happened when she couldn’t control her insubordination. He doubted she would make that mistake again.

  But where did she go during the day when he worked or slept?

  There were few things he cared about less than Aerwen’s trite proclivities, but while he’d allowed her this modicum of freedom, she had used it against him. Now, he was forced to take action when he had far more important matters to handle.

  She would pay for that.

  Tariq’s body clenched tight into a ball. Anger pulsed off him in repeated waves. He would have her followed, beginning tomorrow. Whatever she was up to, and with whom, he would get answers.

  The father of this child would die. His death would be one of such proportions as to define Tariq’s reputation for years. He smiled even to think of it.

  Aerwen, though… hers would be a life of chains. No more dallying around during the daylight. Darkness and manacles would be her only existence. Entertaining in the dark, all day, all night. No sleep. Enough food only to sustain her life.

  Her child would know the same plight.

  XV- Aerwen

  September 30, 4 AS

  Wezlei’s hand danced lazy circles on the slight bulge of Aerwen’s belly. His smile was the purest expression she had ever seen.

  “Will we go to your mother first?” she asked. Her eyes darted around the low ceiling. She imagined them lying like this in the field where Wezlei was raised and had played all the years of his childhood.

  “She would love that. She was so mad when I left,” Wezlei said with a sigh. “I thought I’d at least be able to write her. I really didn’t know what I was getting myself into with the Complex. I didn’t pay enough attention.”

  “We can leave at any time,” she reminded him. “We just forfeit the money.”

  “The money is what will allow us to start a life together.” Wezlei’s voice was sad. “I don’t want you or our child living in poverty.”

  Aerwen didn’t tell him she didn’t mind living with or without because she knew completing the contract was important to him. His own upbringing had informed his view on what life should be, and her words wouldn’t change that. “We can find money in other ways.”

  Wezlei shrugged and kissed her forehead. It was clear he didn’t agree, but as with any time that happened, neither of them said anything further, not wanting to use their limited time together to disagree. “If we can’t figure out how to get Tariq to leave you alone, we might have to leave without the money.”

  “We will,” she assured him. “Find a way.”

  The subtle pitter-patter of rain started outside. Aerwen had always connected to the showers, as she did all things in nature, but this was artificial weather, the way everything here was created for their benefit. Even the sound had a lulling effect, and her eyes fluttered as she slipped into deep relaxation.

  Wezlei’s hand traveled south from her belly. A chill of pleasure trailed down her spine as it arched in response. Her eyes flashed open.

  Aerwen reached for him, but he pressed her hand back to the bed with a gentle admonishment. “For you,” he whispered as he worked his fingers. “Close your eyes.”

  She did as he’d asked, letting the desire sweep over her like a lush, protective blanket. Wezlei’s breaths escalated with hers. He grew harder and harder against her leg, the closer she drew to climax. When, at last, she bucked her hips in complete surrender, he shuddered in tandem.

  They lay together in the stillness. An hour passed in blissful silence. Then two.

  “We should re-open the store,” Aerwen said. It had to be her suggestion. He would always keep it closed for her, but she couldn’t allow him to forsake his livelihood, especially with his concerns about money.

  “Yeah, yeah.” Wezlei pushed up off the blanket, but Aerwen had already risen.

  “No need to move.” She smiled back at him as she slipped through the small doorway and made her way to the front. The rain outside gave her pause as she turned the sign on the door. Real or not, she had never so much wanted to feel the drops on her flesh, to press her face toward the sky and experience the water against her cheeks.

  Aerwen stepped outside the store, and her heart soared as the first drops landed on her arms. She opened her mouth to receive the delicious drops. They tasted no different than the rain in Arda. However the Ama Seldova had re-created this phenomenon, they’d done it well.

  She brought her head back down and froze. A creature stood at the corner. His eyes were fixed on her. She knew him.

  Across the street was an Intra she recognized as one of Tariq’s men as well.

  Her heart stopped altogether.

  So it was do
ne. It was here. Their secret was no longer secret.

  She fled back into the store, forgetting the lock, thinking only of Wezlei and getting him far, far away. We have to hide. We have to go somewhere. They found us here, they found us, they found us! She screamed his name in high shrieks as she ran toward the back, only a few feet away but it stretched ahead of her like an endless corridor.

  Aerwen pulled to a halt to see three Intra with their hands gripping a struggling Wezlei. He yanked and threw himself around, but their hold was iron. They hardly moved even though he thrashed like a wild animal.

  As she gaped in fear, cold metal snapped over her wrists and ankles. Several more Intra appeared at her rear and flank. They pulled the bonds tight, and she fell to her knees, gasping. One of them laughed.

  “Tariq will be most pleased,” one, a Necromancer, hissed. “Or displeased, depending on your perspective.”

  “I am going to kill every last fucking one of you.” Wezlei’s eyes flashed. He spat at their feet and earned a kick to the face. Blood flew in a wide, splattering arc against the shelves holding his empty bottles. Aerwen screamed.

  Then she was dragged away, kicking, yelling, crying, watching Wezlei grow smaller and farther from her as she was pulled through the store and back into the rainy street.

  The last thing she’d seen before the hood came down was one of the Intra kick the back room door closed. Wezlei disappeared altogether.

  XVI- Wezlei

  October 1, 4 AS

  Tariq stopped inches from his face. So close the odor of greasy sweat hung between them, and Wezlei wrinkled his nose in disgust before he could think better of the gesture. Tariq gave no sign of noticing. Spittle dripped from his canines.

  “You aren’t going to die today, Human.” The collective gasp from Tariq’s followers was nearly comedic, but Wezlei was too stunned to laugh.

  “Or should I call you Half-blood?” Tariq bent his head in examination of his captive as if by looking closer he would find evidence of his claim.

  “Call me what you want, just don’t call me late for dinner,” Wezlei managed through his aching jaw.

  “You flatter yourself if you believe I’d ever share a table with you!” Tariq roared, tossing a pointed glance to each of his lackeys. He appeared more confused than angry and seemed to know Wezlei was having fun with him but didn’t understand the joke. Taking his words at face value and shaming the Dryad with them was Tariq’s defense.

  Wezlei had hoped instead it might push his captor over the edge and end this charade. He didn’t believe for a moment Tariq wasn’t going to kill him. You aren’t going to die today only meant the torture would be dragged out another day. Or two. Or twenty. Tariq had it in him. His endurance for architecting misery in others was legend.

  “We’re on shift soon,” the Necromancer said, growing impatient. He adjusted his stance in annoyance.

  “Then go. And see how well that works out for you,” Tariq said without turning around. He waved a hand in dismissal. The Necromancer grunted but stayed put.

  Wezlei closed his eyes in a half-hearted attempt to steady the rise of pain building from the base of his spine. The rest of his body came together in a chorus of competing injuries. He was dying. Soon. That shouldn’t be a consolation, but it was. Whatever Tariq had in mind, he would be disappointed.

  Tariq nodded at one of the Dhampir, who scampered off toward the front of the store like an obedient dog. “As I said, I will not kill you. What a waste that would be, when you have the blood of the Dryad line running through your disgusting Human veins?” He looked past Wezlei who couldn’t stop himself from following Tariq’s gaze.

  Aerwen sagged against the floor. All the light had gone from her, and she was even more withered than Wezlei remembered from the first day he’d taken her into the store. No. Not this. Anything but this. His shackles clanked together as he twisted and yanked at his bindings.

  The Dhampir dragged her by a chain. Her head bounced off the cement tiles. For a brief, terrible moment Wezlei thought she was dead, but then he saw her lips move ever so slightly. She was alive, but about the same distance from death’s door as he was.

  What had he thought Tariq would do? Kill him and leave her alone? That was never a possibility, and Wezlei had once again allowed the daydreamer within him to run wild.

  He was about to die, and Aerwen would be kept alive, just enough, forced into a life of servitude that made her last two years seem like a vacation.

  What have you seen, this past twenty-four hours, my Aerwen? I would give what’s left of my life to take all of it with me, to wherever I’m going.

  “You wanted to be together?” Tariq snapped the chain from his lackey and pulled Aerwen across the room, into a heap at Wezlei’s feet. “Now you will! You’ll rut like animals all you want, and your children will be mine. The profits I’ll make… not that you care about that. Nor do I care if you care, for you are both mine now. Do you hear me? I own you… every last inch of your body, and I will do with it as I please.” Tariq kicked at Wezlei and laughed. “Some pirate you are, Wezlei of Raxu. Yes, I know who you are. I remember your sniveling on the deck of my ship, begging for my approval.”

  “You and I have different recollections of that day,” Wezlei said. He strained against his bonds. He had to get to Aerwen… somehow. “I never wanted your approval. I wanted everything you had.”

  Tariq’s laughter bounced off the bare walls. His followers joined in, but they sounded tired and ready to be done. “You have it now, Human! Though, I doubt this is what you had in mind. Was she worth it?”

  Wezlei pulled his head back and looked his captor in the eyes. “A day with Aerwen is worth a thousand years of your bullshit.”

  He didn’t dare look directly at her, but he still caught glimpses of her momentarily. When he saw her begin to change, he tried harder to look at her, but still feared drawing any attention other than his own to what he was seeing.

  Aerwen was healing. The light he came to know as her glow had returned. Slowly, but it pulsed now, struggling to come forward. Moments before, it seemed to have died out forever.

  He was healing her.

  And, through his distraction, he hadn’t noticed the small changes in his own circumstances, but his body was mending as well.

  Her eyes met his. Stall for time, they seemed to say. What he saw there, beyond that, stirred him above all else. Aerwen had not given up. There was fight left in her, despite that they had never been at a greater disadvantage.

  “Tell me more,” Wezlei said, swallowing a mouthful of blood. “I’d love to hear all about your plans for us.”

  XVII- Aerwen

  October 1, 4 AS

  She wouldn’t let her mind even begin to travel toward the dark and terrible acts that had been done to her in the preceding hours. One day, maybe. Or maybe not. If her experiences with Tariq and his reign of terror had come with one single important message, it was that dwelling on every measure of torture he had brought upon her was akin to experiencing it twice. He had already taken far more than he’d earned.

  In any case, her life, and Wezlei’s, had never hung in a more tenuous balance. There was no room for thoughts or analysis that didn’t somehow contribute to saving them both.

  Aerwen didn’t even consider a plan that would save only one of them, for she knew neither of them would survive that loss. Neither would want to. They would live together or die together. The way of the Dryad.

  Wezlei’s presence seemed to have a multiplicative effect the longer Aerwen was around him. In the beginning, being near him had slowly restored her, but as their relationship continued, she bounced back each visit with startling resiliency. She was sure the phenomenon had caused Tariq’s suspicion to begin with, no doubt, but that was another subject, for another day.

  For Aerwen was coming back to life. Back to herself. As Wezlei baited the vainglorious Tariq, an easy challenge given how much the Dhampir adored the sound of his own pompous words, Aerwen stayed
perfectly still to allow Wezlei’s healing presence to stretch further, deeper.

  Tariq was too caught up in his diatribe. Foolish Human. Prancing around space like a juvenile not yet weaned from his mother’s teat. Desperate to play with the older boys who want nothing to do with him. Now who’s playing? He hadn’t noticed the changes in Wezlei. Compound fractures sliding back into place, interlocking bone against bone once again. His crooked jaw righting itself. The flow of blood slowed to a trickle of leftovers from the earlier beatings.

  She dared not make eye contact with her love. Even if Tariq missed it, the other minions in the room—eager to be the one with something useful for their master—would be all over it. His mind was open, courtesy of Tariq’s horrific removal of the device in Wezlei’s ear, but transferring a thought would create a new danger, as Wezlei was not trained to clear his mind. Everything she sent, he would see… they would see.

  No, she couldn’t draw his attention with her gestures. And she couldn’t speak to his mind.

  But Aerwen could speak to his heart. The true language of the Dryad race.

  She had never tried this with Wezlei but didn’t doubt the capability lived within him, as did many others. So far, he had only shown a capacity for healing, but he had just learned of his heritage. Knowledge was integral to surfacing one’s true self. She had to believe he could do this now, when it mattered. She had to try.