Radiant

by Naomi Lucas

  Their lips touched. The word kiss appeared bold and hot in his head.

  Galan tore off her clothes, ripping the dirty and frayed material down her chest, dragging her cut up pants off next.

  She released him and leaned back into the crystalline water until her hair flowed out like black silk, ashen obsidian around her head. He leaned over her and dipped them both under the chill water, taking her lips again for his own.

  They came back up for air sputtering and a soft, subtle, beautiful sound filled his ears. His mouth twisted into a grin when he realized she was laughing. It was low but it was there and unmistakable. But he wasn’t about to point it out.

  With one arm around her middle, he dragged her to the side where a bowl of molten liquid light sat. A scoop of it was enough food for days, a cure for all illnesses, and a cleansing agent.

  “I’m going to take care of you,” he told her again. Her countenance faltered but she stood up in the pool as he let the liquid slide out of his palms to drop slowly over her head. Watching the dew glisten over her black as midnight hair did something to him. It reminded him of the Shadowed valos but it looked like conquest in its rawest form.

  First, he scrubbed her hair, touching, and testing, flicking and smoothing every tendril there was. Her eyes closed and her lips parted but he didn’t stop except when he would press his lips to hers. His fingers left her hair to trace over her pulse, the patter of it wild yet in control. The air that escaped her lips working in tandem.

  He drank her in.

  Galan hovered in front of her jittering pale body, and his damp wings curved in a thick arch around them. Now and again a lost feather would float by her hips and she’d play with it with her fingers.

  ‘Let us join you.’

  ‘Isn’t she perfect?’

  ‘She smells like the sun right before it falls to night, and right before it reclaims the morning.’

  He ignored his brothers who had joined them in the bathhouse but kept their distance. They acted as sentinel protectors that watched with poignancy on the outskirts. They were aware of everything else while he was only aware of her.

  Liquid light dripped down her skin in beads of gold, staining her body in its path. His lips followed what he could and licked up what fell behind.

  ‘She’ll die if you don’t mate with her.’

  He knew the truth and smirked, burying his face into her neck. His fingers spread the gold down her back, over her rippled spine, and to the crux of her buttocks. She’s pliant and trusting. She wants only me.

  Galan lifted her up and out of the water, watching her eyes open in question as he placed her legs back over his hips.

  Thoughts and images flashed before his eyes. Earth traditions and fetishes. Love making and sex. Mating. He blinked them back and reached down to tug his sodden pants below the hook of his dick. He took her breaths while her fingers gripped his shoulders and her nails dug into his skin. Lusheenn created him in a state, perpetually in need, and yet his self-control was hammered over every fiber of his being like an unbreakable diamond.

  His female wiggled over his pulsing tip, breaking whatever restraint he had left into a million fragments. Galan surged deep into her with one uncontrollable thrust.

  “Curve your lips for me,” he breathed over them. When he felt the twitch of her cheeks, with his arms hooked behind her back, he began to move.

  He vibrated with sensation and her sex gripped him tight while she moved like a wave that he crashed into each time. I waited my whole existence for her.

  Yahiro gasped and moaned, titillating his senses, driving him toward the edge, locked on him and still retaining a control that made him want to press her into the cold stone ground and use violence.

  “Galan...”

  He plunged as far as he could over and over again, taking it all.

  “Galan!” Her voice was more frantic. He moved faster. The tight walls of her wet sex. Pussy. Cunt. Quim. It demanded his ending. And with a roar he gave it to her, his wings shooting outward and away from his body, bladed with a thousand razor-sharp knives. She wrapped her body around him and rode out his release as he held her in place.

  They didn’t move for some time until Sundamar ventured into the water and took Yahiro from his arms. Galan gave her up with a final squeeze, knowing she was beyond the throes of tired and well into sleep. He watched his brother take her away and up into the aerie where they slept. When they slept.

  He stayed behind and forced his body down from the high it had sustained; it was difficult, knowing he could climb the steps to the top of the throne and find Yahiro to sate him again.

  He unclenched his hands and tempered his desires as he waded to the edge of the pool where Quist perched with narrowed eyes.

  The stone had gone with Sundamar and Yahiro, and the light had dimmed between them into a tenuous strain.

  “Lusheenn is near.”

  Galan rolled his jaw. “He’s not coming back.”

  “He’s already back.”

  “Quist... he’s not here. He’s never coming back. What you feel...”

  “Hatred. I feel hatred.” The way his brother said it threw him. Galan exited the bath and pulled up his soggy pants, watching his brother the whole time. Tension radiated off of him. He’d forgotten what it was like to be in Quist’s presence and the amount of feeling the younger valos contained. Even when they were dead inside, a spark had always remained active inside him. Now his eyes flared with it.

  “You’ll frighten our female if you remain like this.” You’ll frighten me.

  Quist’s eyes lightened some and the points of his feathers relaxed but his countenance remained. “I don’t want to but I won’t leave her side.”

  “Does that mean you’re staying in the city?”

  “Unless she leaves, yes. I’m staying. I promised her no harm while she is within my sight.”

  “And yet, she’s not in it now,” Galan said, glancing at the way Sundamar had gone with her. Already, he was being pulled in her direction. His stomach knotted and he took a step toward her before he remembered his brother.

  “I don’t know what to do, Galan.” Quist’s voice held a plea.

  “About Lusheenn or about Yahiro?”

  “Both!” His brother rose and his wings arched out, tense again and scrapping the stone floor. The sound of a hundred tiny screeches filled his ears. “He’s here!”

  Galan’s jaw ticked.

  “Even if you don’t believe me, he’s here and I want him nowhere near her!”

  He approached Quist and placed his hand on his shoulder. “Let’s go to bed, brother. She’ll be safe between our bodies, and once we’re back on the trail and following Sonhadra’s endless dawn, we’ll figure out a plan.”

  Their images mirrored in each other’s eyes. Galan squeezed Quist’s shoulder and took his hand back, not liking what the younger valos was making him feel.

  Afraid. Quist made him feel afraid.

  LATER THAT NIGHT, AFTER Quist and Sundamar had fallen asleep upon the pillowed aviary above the throne on either side of Yahiro, Galan paced back and forth. The paper image of Yahiro was bunched up in his hand.

  He’d stare at her, sleeping, like a wilted flower, so beautiful it made him hurt, and then he would remember the picture of her, half-destroyed by the horrors of her life. Galan would go from her present to her past feeling at a loss for what he should do.

  Maybe if Lusheenn is back... It could be a blessing. His eyes narrowed on the bright stone resting on her chest. I don’t feel him. He looked back down at her picture.

  She wasn’t a valos. He knew a lot more about her than his brothers did and knew that she could be killed in a thousand more ways than they could. He hadn’t thought about it, not until Quist had approached him, but he did now.

  The rapidly fraying picture of her crinkled further in his fist. The molo took another giant step toward the world-path.

  “Everything will be better come dawn.” Galan forced himself to
take his own advice and steeled his resolve. With one final look at the picture, he chucked it over the side and watched until it was lost in the night.

  Chapter Twelve

  YAHIRO

  “There’s only one sun, otou-chan,” Yahiro stated more in reassuring herself.

  “Then what do you call that?” He pointed before them and she followed his finger. She blinked but only saw grey clouds. But behind those clouds was a golden orb that was barely there, although it was obvious it was the sun.

  She knew it was a trick question. Her papa was a trickster, and yet she always liked his tricks. It was fun, he was fun. “The sun. Taiyou. Sol. Star. It’s a star.”

  “Very good. And is it the same one you saw yesterday?”

  Her eyes traced the shape of it behind the clouds suddenly realizing that a storm was about to hit. The trees no longer sparkled in the breeze and she wrapped her arms around her middle, fighting off a shiver. “No,” she said at last.

  “Why is that?”

  “Cause I’m not the same person I was yesterday,” she answered with a sigh. “And because today it’s obscured.”

  Papa laughed and took another sip of his tea.

  Her mother’s voice called from inside the house, “The party’s about to start! The guests are about to arrive and I can’t do this all on my own!”

  Yahiro sighed further and looked at her otou-chan. “Can we skip it?”

  “Your mother would never forgive you—forgive me—if we ran off. Sophia is excited. You don’t want to break her heart now do you?”

  “No.” She frowned anyway but got up when Papa set down his tea and a servant came rushing forward to take it. He placed his arm around her and gave her a much needed hug.

  “Look at the sun for a moment longer, Yahiro, because tomorrow it’ll be different and it’ll never be as beautiful as it is today.” He let her go and walked into the house.

  She couldn’t stop the tremble this time when it went through her hearing the glass door shut, suddenly dousing her world in silence. Even the rustle of leaves and the wheeze of the wind had vanished. Her eyes found the sun regardless and she tried to lock it in her memory.

  But it was gone before she had a chance to say goodbye.

  Someone grabbed her from behind and thrust her to the ground. Her face slammed into the lacquered wood of her family’s porch, sending sling-shot spikes of pain through her head. She grappled in shock but it didn’t stop her vision from going black, or the blood pouring out of her nose.

  The sound of her voice filled the air, calling out for her papa, but it sputtered shut when her mouth was pushed to the ground. Her legs were spread wide and her arms were yanked back. Suddenly, without knowing how or why, she was naked and burning, a searing pain filling her chest.

  She flailed about, fighting, kicking and screaming, not feeling anything but the adrenaline-amped pain in her lungs flooding every vein. The hands released her, and she was immediately able to move, but she didn’t get up, didn’t run, couldn’t even stand on her knees, instead clawing her fingers over her chest, and feeling hot blood catching under her nails. It was too much. Too much. And it only grew worse.

  Her body fell into a state of shock, twitching with the last bits of effort she had, and when even that faltered, oblivion finally came to take her away.

  Yahiro lost consciousness with a cry.

  She woke up, screaming, sprawled across the floor and Sundamar poised over her. He held her down, his weight on top and pressing her into the cold floor. Cold floor. She continued to scream and thrash but the chill at her back anchored her and the sweat on her brow cooled her skin enough to pull her back into the realm of the living.

  “I’m not burning,” she gasped.

  “You’re not...”

  Yahiro sagged and loosened her muscles slowly, Sundamar let up on her limbs. He pulled her into his arms and she burrowed her face into his chest.

  “What happened?”

  He tilted her head to the side and Quist came into view, the heartstone in his hand. It was fractured and she could see the seams clearly. The light seemed to be dripping out of it like blood, through the cracks of his fingers, and onto the floor.

  Yahiro pushed away from Sundamar and looked down at her chest. The same liquid was splattered all over her chest. She clawed at it, tried to rub it off, but it only smeared and sizzled, sinking below the surface of her skin.

  “Get it off me,” she wheezed through the building anxiety, projecting her pain. “Get it off me!”

  The next moment she was picked up and brought back to the baths, her body submerged in the water. Hands held her from all sides. She wasn’t aware of where her valos were, only that the gold wouldn’t wash off, and when Sundamar scrubbed it with a soapy substance, it remained. The light was inside her now, she knew it, and it wasn’t going away.

  She watched in abject horror as it spread through the water, dying the reflected light of the double moons gold and darkening to grey-gold as the light waned and thinned. A hand yanked her out of the pool but it was far too late to stop the alien substance from infecting her.

  Because that’s what it felt like, an infection.

  “He’s here,” Quist growled from beside her, his eyes staring deeply at the cracked stone.

  She could only nod and flinch. Somehow reminding her of her dream-turned-nightmare and her papa walking away, leaving her confused. She clutched her chest and the burn returned, but with it, a numbing sense of calm. I’m still confused.

  A thundering, glass-shattering crash filled her ears and she flinched away from the sound and pulled from Galan’s hold. His wing curved around her back so she couldn’t go far. Her eyes landed back on Quist and the stone.

  Where he slammed it into the stone ground, over and over, and over again. The fracture had grown infinitesimally and her mouth dried up. The last remaining haze of night was beginning to fade. Her heart raced and filled her throat

  A man formed in the light, coming together from the liquid that endlessly dripped from her talisman. Quist’s hand had grown raw and red with blood. Yahiro jerked forward but was held back. She stilled when she looked up into Galan’s stone-cold eyes.

  “It’s going to vanish!” she cried helplessly. “Galan, it might not come back!” Something she said broke through his awareness and he moved away from her and toward Quist.

  Sundamar stood transfixed, broadsword in hand, as a body slowly solidified into what could be his exact twin. The stone was vanishing, and with it, the way to keep Lusheenn contained. Yahiro didn’t know what would happen once it was but she only cared about one thing; that his return would ultimately kill her valos. Kill Quist.

  If they were the cost, she would see the divinity dead rather than returned. Her heart screamed for it as loudly as Quist crushed the stone into the floor.

  “My... children... have found me.” The wispy voice that filled her ears made her skin crawl and her blood boil.

  Galan dragged Quist away, pinning his feathers back, fighting with him tooth and nail, trying to get him out before it was too late.

  The stone dropped with a thunk on the ground, already half gone. Without thinking, she dashed toward it, grabbing it before Galan or Quist could re-seize it. The moment it was in her palm, it set her flesh aflame.

  The liquid light that poured from it stopped attaching to Lusheenn and instead, it fell unbidden along flesh where it streamed in rivulets down her arm. All she knew was that as long as it went to her, it wasn’t going to her valos’ Creator.

  “My power has been preserved!” Lusheenn’s chilly voice filled her ears.

  Laughter and the sound of struggle came next, the ugly stench of burnt flesh filled her nose, and when her eyes watered from the smoke coming off her skin, she tipped her head back and swallowed the stone.

  The pain was more intense than anything she’d experienced in her life. She hacked and choked, her hands wrapping around her throat as the tip of the giant sun rose above the horizon. S
undamar yelled for her but she no longer understood him, drooling on her melted skin or from the liquid bubbling deep inside.

  All she knew was that she needed to keep Lusheenn in the dark.

  What was lodged in her throat hardened back into the size she knew. Hands gripped and pulled her on all sides but she still fell to the floor, and though she’d managed to slide it down her esophagus, the rock held reign and settled like a weight in the pit of her stomach.

  YAHIRO PAINSTAKINGLY ran her fingers through her hair. She didn’t know how long she’d been out but when she looked around it was full day and the slow sway of the molo’s feet covering miles of distance in one step assured her of where she was.

  The pain. There was pain but it was under a thick warm blanket of numbness. Worst part, she was aware of it and aware of how much alien medication was probably in her system to keep her from screaming and going back into shock.

  But even through the quiet, lulling, fake fog she was under, the stone in her stomach grounded her.

  “Yahero, mana reem?” Sundamar was at her side, his eyes sad, and even though her throat felt like tough rubber and swallowing was near impossible, the way he looked made her ache more.

  “Sundamar,” she barely croaked out, her voice unrecognizable to her own ears. “I don’t understand you.”

  “Naro.” He shook his head, his flowing gold hair falling in beautiful ribbons over his bare chest.

  She slowly touched her fingers behind her ear, already knowing what she would find, already knowing what it meant. My translator is broken. She dropped her hand before it reached its destination. Sundamar leaned into her and shared his breath. It wasn’t a kiss, but it was more comfort than she’d ever received, and the hurt that radiated off him affected her too.

  “I wish I could speak to you,” she whispered sadly.

  “Yahero.” He breathed her name over her lips. It was the last thing she remembered before slipping back into darkness.