“But you’re not over here to hold it.”
I knew I was being whiny, but I was frightened. The wall was at least fourteen feet high, and there was no way I was going to be able to make the trek back to the hospital if I broke my leg or something else.
His eyes flashed dangerously, and, again I saw the shadow of that smirk. “Phoebe,” he said threateningly, “if you do not climb down, I am going to come up and get you, and you are going to be sorry you did not do it yourself.”
A shiver raced down my spine, and heat burst between my legs right where the wall was pressed against the apex of my thighs. If that wasn’t motivation, I didn’t know what was. Part of me actually wanted to stay put just to see if he would follow through, but the other part of me knew we didn’t have time to mess around. So, I hooked my foot over to the opposite side, leveled it onto a rung, and started to descend.
Chapter Forty-Three
Zuran
“Why didn’t you tell me you have a sister?”
Phoebe was perched on the end of the bed, her hands clasped in her lap. We were in a nomads’ inn, the same we had stopped into for rest on our way to Ka-lik’et, in a tiny village on the outskirts of the city. Last time, I had ensured we had separate rooms. This time, however, having already slept in the same bed, we had agreed to share a room, and she was now sitting on the bed I would soon be in with her.
I was stunned to hear her ask about Ola. She looked a little apprehensive, as if she expected the question would anger me, but it did not. I was merely surprised. “How do you know about Ola?”
“Your mother,” she said. The answer had already struck me before she responded. Why my mother had brought Ola into conversation at all, I did not know, but she would have been the only source through which Phoebe could have learned about my little sister.
“I did not intentionally omit Ola from our conversations,” I said. “I simply do not think about her. It is a waste of time.”
“What did she do?” Phoebe pressed. “Oraaka said you and Venan haven’t spoken to her in years.”
I nodded. “We have not. She is not someone with whom we wish to associate.” Phoebe raised an eyebrow, and I grinned. “I know. It sounds hypocritical coming from me, having the past like the one I have, but it is my belief Ola crossed a line that is irredeemable.”
“What did she do?” she repeated. I could see the curiosity burning in her cheeks, and her teeth closed over her bottom lip with intrigued interest.
“It is a long story,” I returned. “The short version is Ola was in a relationship with an A’li-uud from another kingdom. I became friends with him, but we both discovered she was having an affair with a local Dhal’atian. I was accused of urging her to commit the adultery, which I did not, and the friendship between her significant other and me was broken. At the time, I allowed Khrel to believe I had indeed encouraged her to seek another relationship because I knew that was what he needed to heal from the pain of her deceit.”
“That was big of you,” Phoebe remarked, sounding impressed.
With a shrug, I idly replied, “Perhaps, but the fact is I lost a friendship over it, and my sister hurt someone I considered to be a good A’li-uud. I cannot forgive what she has done. Adultery is the greatest betrayal.”
While I spoke, Phoebe’s face changed from curious to surprised.
“Why do you look at me so?” I asked, now interested to hear her answers.
She tipped her head thoughtfully. “I just…” She paused. “I guess I didn’t take you for the kind of person who’d have such strong feelings on cheating.”
I stared at her. “Cheating?”
“Affairs. Adultery,” she explained. “I mean, humans don’t like it either, but it happens so frequently nowadays that it’s pretty rare to never meet anyone who’s been cheated on or did the cheating themselves.”
“Well,” I said dryly, “perhaps it is common practice on Earth, but it is not on Albaterra, and I have no desire to have my sister in my life after she proved herself so self-serving and unvirtuous.”
She nodded and looked at her hands. “I’m sorry for bringing it up if it bothers you to talk about it,” she apologized.
I studied her momentarily. She did, indeed, look quite sorry, though she had no reason to be. Talking about Ola was far from painful for me. I strode across the room to her, dropping my belt with my dagger sheaths to the floor as I did, then placed a hand on either side of her body and leaned down until we were just inches apart.
“You need not apologize,” I murmured. “There is no question you might ask I will not answer.”
She looked up at me through her lashes, and I felt an immediate physical response. Pressure blossomed in my lower region, and my fingers twitched. Bending even lower, I kissed her. She returned the kiss eagerly, slipping her tongue into my mouth before I could slip mine into hers. I started easing forward, pushing her down onto her back on the bed. Her arms lifted to wrap around my neck, and she pulled my chest down to hers. The temperature of her body, cooler than mine, sent a shiver throughout me.
She was delicious.
I scooped a hand beneath her to the small of her back and lifted, raising her hips to meet mine. She moaned slightly, and I immediately felt the hot tension in my groin. I became urgent, hungry. I slid my lips from hers to her jawline, and then lower to seek out the softest part of her neck where it curved into her collarbone. She mewed and rolled her head back, her fingers clutching my hair like a lifeline. I lapped my tongue from her shoulder to her earlobe, drowning myself in her flavor. Her skin tasted just as divine as her mouth.
She groaned in response, and she lifted her hips of her own accord then, pushing herself against my hardness. I wanted her. I would have taken her in an instant, too, had we not been in a village inn with nomads in the rooms on both sides of ours.
“Please,” she whispered, voicing my desires in that one, single, simple word.
I suckled on her ear for a moment and listened to her needy whines before humming softly, “Do not tempt me.”
With a measure of defiance I had not believed possible of her, she shot her hand downward and palmed my firm girth. It was I who groaned now, loudly and hoarsely with frustrated restraint. I seized her wrist and pinned her arm above her head.
“Do not test me, laaka,” I growled dangerously. “You do not know the steps to this dance.”
“If I’m a laaka, isn’t it your job to entertain me?” she breathed.
I smirked and rolled off of her, pulling her with me until she was on top of me and I was on my back. “Absolutely,” I agreed. “But I do not have enough money to pay for the damage we would do to this room.”
Chapter Forty-Four
Phoebe
I never imagined I would be happy to see the hospital again. It had felt so isolated from society, almost like I was being punished for something even though I was there for a noble task. However, after the experience in Ka-lik’et, I was more than happy to be isolated.
The moment I walked in, Antoinette nearly pounced on me. It was day, and I guessed it was somewhere around noon, but she was already looking exhausted.
“Oh my god!” she breathed. “You’ve been gone for so long!”
She reminded me so much of Edie at that moment that I was suddenly hit with a bout of homesickness, not for Ka-lik’et but for my hut. “How long was it?” I asked. “I lost track of time.”
“You were gone for two weeks,” she exclaimed.
“Really?” Even though the trip had been far from fun, minus the night in the hotel with Zuran—which, to some extent, was a bit of a disappointment given how much I wanted to go further than we actually did—it hadn’t felt like two weeks. In fact, it hadn’t even felt like a week, though I logically knew it had to be more than that. I looked around the hall. Just like we’d left it, doctors and A’li-uud healers were scattered throughout. Some were bending over Novai while others were talking, while others yet were individually looking over notes and data
.
“Yeah, you’ve missed a lot,” Antoinette said a little accusingly.
I looked over my shoulder. Zuran hadn’t followed me in, which surprised me because I didn’t know what on Albaterra he could be doing outside, but I felt like I needed to get back to work as quickly as possible, so I didn’t bother going to fetch him and turned back to Antoinette. “Like what?” I hopefully asked. “Have you found something?”
I wanted to hear they had come across some kind of treatment, if not an entire cure, in my absence. Two weeks wasn’t necessarily a long time, but, as Petas had acknowledged in our last meeting, physical symptoms often meant we would be able to pull new information that would lead us to an answer.
Antoinette shook her head, and I felt a rush of disappointment. “No, we haven’t made any progress,” she mourned. “I wish we had. Unfortunately, the Novai have progressed in their conditions.”
“What do you mean?” When I had left, they’d just been entering the second stage.
“All of them have lost the skin over their eyes now,” she explained. “And most of them have begun displaying signs of skin discoloration.”
I turned my eyes to the nearest Novai, who was unattended at the moment, and even from the short distance, I was able to see what she meant. His skin was no longer as white as ice; it looked more dingy and gray, almost like ashes from a cigarette. I motioned to him. “Can I take a look?”
“Of course,” was her reply, accompanied with a roll of her eyes. “You’re part of this team too.”
I crossed over to the Novai and bent over his arm. My vision hadn’t been distorted by the distance. His skin was, indeed, gray, but there was something else too. His veins were beginning to show through as well. It was like his skin was thinning, atrophying. What was underneath, though, I didn’t know. Was the grayness showing through muscle? Was this some sort of flesh-eating virus?
“You know,” Toni said in a low voice. I didn’t look up at her, still deeply focused on the Novai. I moved toward his head to examine his eyes. They were open and bright, bloody red. Slits ran through the centers, sharp and vertical and pointed, like a snake. They were terrifying, the kind of eyes you would expect to see as a child when you looked under your bed for monsters. Antoinette continued as though I was acknowledging her. “An Elder came by.”
That got my attention. I whipped upright and whirled around to look at her. “What? Who? When?” My series of questions came out in a rush, blending, and my heart began to palpitate.
“A couple of days ago,” she answered. “It was the one who did all the talking when the Council was here. The old one. Vi’den, I think.”
“Yeah. Vi’den,” I agreed. Suddenly, my hands had become clammy. I felt beads of sweat beginning to form on my palms, and I was instantly cold even though the day was an uncomfortably warm one. “What did he want?”
“He wanted to talk to Zuran.”
Now, I was even more nervous. I looked back again at the door, hoping to see Zuran striding through so he could walk over and hear what I was hearing. Still, he was not there, and I was doomed to bear this news alone.
“Did he say what he wanted with Zuran?” I pressed. I hoped it had nothing to do with our trip to Ka-lik’et.
Toni shrugged and crossed her arms. “He said it had something to do with Zuran’s brother, but he didn’t go into detail. I didn’t want to ask too much, you know?”
“No, I understand,” I replied quickly. I was surprised because Antoinette was notoriously nosy, but I was grateful she didn’t demand more from Vi’den and raise questions from the Elder.
“I tried to cover for you,” she said, the accusing note injected back into her tone.
Again, I felt my pulse begin to race, even faster now, and a slight pain of stress began to develop in my chest. “Cover for me?” I repeated. “Did he ask about me?”
“Well, he asked where Zuran was, and then he noticed you were gone too. So, yeah.”
She was looking at me probingly, like she wanted to ask more about our trip, but she seemed to know I wasn’t willing to divulge any information.
“Did he buy whatever you told him?” I prayed he did.
“I guess,” she said indifferently. “I just said that Zuran needed to go back and check on the colonists and that you were making sure there were no symptoms over there. That’s what you told us.”
It was obvious she knew that what I’d told the team hadn’t been the truth, but it was also obvious that she wasn’t going to demand the real story. I was glad. I didn’t want to have to lie any more than I already had.
“Well, I appreciate that,” I told her honestly. “Did he just let it go after that?”
“Pretty much. He didn’t ask any more questions, and he basically just said he'd come back.”
I nodded and glanced once more at the door. Zuran needed to know about this right away.
Chapter Forty-Five
Zuran
I stared up at the sky. The sun was so hot and so white that it was not even visible as a geometric circle. A faded aura had bloomed around it as if the sun had imploded and sent a mist of light into the atmosphere. The day was too warm, and I was glad we had made it back to the hospital before the hottest part of the day came upon us.
When Phoebe had gone inside, I remained outdoors because I wanted to take a minute to think. My mind seemed so out-of-sorts with everything going on, between Kharid’s death, Venan’s arrest, the Novai sickness, and then, of course, my intense feelings for Phoebe. I felt like I was in a whirlwind, like I could not straighten myself out, and I just needed to get my thoughts in order.
I would not have that chance.
The door to the hospital burst open, and Phoebe came flying out with her flaxen hair also flying behind her. Her face was panicked, twisted in alarm, and she was shiny with a sheen of sweat that did not seem to be a product of the heat. I felt an immediate call to action.
“What is wrong?” I demanded before she could even reach me.
She was panting when she finally stopped, and she bent to rest her hands on her knees and take several long breaths. When she straightened up again, the panic had not left her face.
“Vi’den was here,” she said. “While we were gone, he came.”
I understood at once why she was in such a frenzy. If Vi’den had been here, it meant two things: one, we had been gone, and two, he had something to tell me about my brother.
“Why?” I asked. “Did he tell anyone?”
“Antoinette said he came because he wanted to tell you something about Venan,” came Phoebe’s gasping reply. She was now curling her fingers together into a knot and had inserted the thumb nail on her other hand between her teeth with anxiety.
“Is that all?” I persisted. “He said nothing more?”
“She didn’t ask for more, and he didn’t offer it.” Phoebe was speaking a little irritably, and, while I did not take it personally, the stress of the matter stimulated a bit of irritation to ripple through me and match hers.
“I assume he knows we left, then.”
I had intended to continue speaking, but before I could say another word, I saw a form materialize out of thin air. Standing before me and behind Phoebe was Vi’den.
“Hello, Zuran,” he greeted. He did not sound angry, but he was certainly stern. Phoebe spun around with a slight squeak of surprise upon hearing his voice, and he inclined his head to her. “Hello, Phoebe.”
“Good afternoon, Vi’den,” I said politely. I did not yet know how much he knew, and I did not want to offend him in the least should he know all.
“I am glad to see you have returned,” was his response.
My heart plummeted into my stomach. It was apparent he already knew more than I would have liked. “Yes.” I tried to sound nonchalant, as if I had been gone for entirely innocent reasons. “I have heard that you came for a visit during my absence.”
“I did, yes,” Vi’den said with an affirmative nod. “I have news about Venan.
”
“Great,” I said. I waited for him to explain further, but he did not speak. He seemed to be waiting for me to tell him something of my own, most likely what I had been up to. I was not ready to volunteer that information.
“Zuran,” Vi’den finally said, breaking the silence. He sounded as strict as some of the warriors who had trained me at the beginning of my career in the militia. “We need not pretend we are ignorant. I do not know the details of your absence, but I know you well enough to know it had something to do with your brother. While I understand the emotional toll this must be taking on you, I am not going to excuse the behavior.”
I stiffened. For most, hearing a potential consequence would have been frightening. For me, it was almost insulting. It lit the defiant, rebellious seed inside me into a sprout.
“Now, I have not told the other Elders of your absence,” Vi’den went on. “And I do not intend to. I would like to spare you the consequences that would have come had I informed the Council. But do not mistake my sympathy for tolerance. You have been assigned to this post, and it is here you shall remain until commanded otherwise.”
Again, I did not respond well to authority, but I was not foolish enough to think I had a chance at walking away from my excursion to Ka-lik’et without disciplinary action if I were to engage in an argument with the kindest of the Elders.
“Thank you,” I said gracefully.
Phoebe was still nervous. I could see sweat on the nape of her neck where her hair had parted to fall over each shoulder. I wanted to reach out and touch her, to grab her waist and pull her to me for comfort, but I did not want to display my affection in front of Vi’den. So, I simply remained in place and listened while he spoke.
“It has been decided that Venan’s request will be granted,” he said.
Immediately, I felt a hot rush of anger. “You know that is not in his best interest,” I shot furiously.
Zuran: A Paranormal Sci-Fi Alien Romance: Albaterra Mates Book 6 Page 18