I look up at him, hesitant and guarded, but I don’t say no. How can I, when he’s asked me a question?
Without hesitation, he pulls a white slippery-looking staff from the row. “Helos,” he says, handing it to me. “One of the hardest stones, it will abrade your skin if you wield it without gloves, but it is light and lethal. Even the lightest stroke to your opponent will break the skin. A harder hit will tear through the plates of a seasoned warrior. This is a training staff, so it is dulled, but given that human skin is more delicate than ours, I encourage you to keep your gloves on and your hands on the holds.”
He hands me the staff and I’m surprised that it doesn’t weigh me down too much. It’s still heavier than my old grabar and just about as heavy as the clunky training staffs Jaxal trained me with. I look at it closer and see that it’s not smooth, but striated with something pebbly and dark, like microscopic droplets of black water, or the crusted in the smallest black onyx. I pull off one of my gloves with my teeth and press just my middle finger to it. Sure enough, I pull back and my finger is dotted with little droplets of blood.
I feel myself smiling as I look up into Okkari’s frown. “It looks good.” I clear my throat. “I mean, I’m not used to it, but it’ll be fine.” I pull back on my glove and stand back with the weapon, tilting it from side to side, testing its weight. It fits me perfectly. And he knew. I was drowning and once again, he threw me a lifeline.
Okkari takes a staff of his own, this one as black as the walls around us and longer than mine by several feet. He leads me away from the wall, away from the other warriors and where they’re practicing. But not too far away. Not far enough for them not to watch us — and many of them are watching us. I can see their surreptitious glances tossed not so surreptitiously our way. I ignore them, keeping my chin up. I’ve practiced for this. I’ve trained. I know what I’m doing. They’re not better than me.
“Have we started?” I say.
“Hexa.” He comes to a stop and turns to me, weapon held aloft. “You will attack first.”
I make a show of struggling to untie the pelt Kuana secured around my shoulders as I murmur my assent. My heart is beating fast, my stomach is a kettle of beetles writhing, and still all I can think about is the last training session I had. The last session I remember. Jaxal coming at me with everything he had. Me beating him back. Me winning. I’d never felt better than I did in that moment, and if I ever did, I don’t remember it. I felt invincible.
I can do this. I’ve practiced. I won’t humiliate myself. “I will offer you assistance,” he says, right on cue. He starts forward and when he gets within striking distance, I let go of my pelt, wrench up with the staff and let it fly.
The weight of the staff is new and disrupts my center of gravity. I’m slightly off as a result, and don’t strike where I mean to. I hit him in the chest, right where his thick plates are, and I can feel their resistance at the same time that I hear their soft crunch.
He looks down. I look down at the space between our bodies. About two feet. Close enough to feel the pall of his heat roll over me like the sun obliterating the shade. He glances up at me and is wearing another one of his small pleased expressions, droplets of blue swimming across the space above his eyes.
“Xhivey,” he says quietly. “Give nothing to me.”
With one swift pull, he dislodges my staff and tosses it back so hard I have to take three steps to find my balance again. He wipes one hand across the leather on his chest and I’m pleased to see that it’s torn just a little over the left breast.
“I won’t.” I start to circle him, eyeing his movements, checking for weaknesses. “And what do I get if I don’t?”
“You will explain yourself.”
“If I win this fight, what do I get?” He still seems deeply confused by my request, so I elaborate. “My trainer on the human colony and I would make bets like this all the time. It made it more fun.”
He doesn’t answer immediately, but when I suddenly switch directions, he does too, so quickly it’s as if he’d anticipated it. I must have tells. I must be giving away something. No one’s just that good.
“You will tell me what it is you would like.”
It hits me all at once and I slow, lowering my weapon just a hair. “Your name.”
“Verax,” he says and I can tell he means for me to repeat the question even though the word itself doesn’t translate.
“Your real name. Not Okkari. Not Va’Raku. The name your mother gave you.”
His ridges flash. He nods slightly. “I accept.”
“And what do you want, if you win?”
He slows, but only for a beat, then his pace picks back up again to match my own. “I will take no prize. The date is prize enough.”
I roll my eyes. “You’re so lame.”
He comes to a complete stop at that, holds out both arms, looks down at his legs. “Lame. You can see perfectly well that I am not.”
I snort unattractively and resume circling him. “Yes, I can see that. But it’s just another expression. It means you’re boring. Pick a prize. It can be anything you want from me. I don’t have much to give but I’ll give it gladly — if you win,” I offer, hoping to high hell he’ll pick the thing I hope he does. And that I’ll lose.
He circles me a beat more, feet moving seamlessly right over left, right over left. He moves like a sand cat, deadly and huge. My stomach lurches. My heart beats harder and faster. I inhale strength — the strength that he leeches — and exhale nerves and fear — those that I felt before at the prospect of ever fighting any alien. But I’ve done this before and when we fought then, it felt incredible.
“I would like to experience a kiss with you.” The request is so unexpected I trip — actually trip. I haven’t tripped in combat since my first training sessions with Jaxal.
“You want to kiss me?”
“I have read about this kiss in Svera’s manual. According to this manual, the kiss should come before the act of mating in human culture. Xiveri mating took precedence in our case, but I would not like to deprive you of this ritual all the same. Deprive either of us.”
I lick my lips automatically and the rumbling I’m familiar with oozes from him to infect the air. “I accept. But only if you win.”
“Of course,” he says, and even though I don’t know him that well, I know he isn’t condescending me. He speaks to me as if I haven’t already seen him fight, as if I wasn’t already prepared to give up something I knew I might lose, as if my winning is a distinct possibility.
And because he believes it, I believe it. And I fight like it too.
I cross the space in a few long strides, legs eating up the distance. He is utterly sure of my movements, I can see that, so I know that I need to do something to catch him off guard. I transfer my spear to my left hand and feint right, waiting until he follows before I kick.
I aim for his thigh, and as he uses his own to swipe my foot aside one elegant sweep, I bring my helos down hard. As I move, I catch sight of white in the ridges dotting his wide forehead. Though the slope of his high cheeks remain unmoved, his wideset nostrils flare and his jaw clenches. He still manages to block with his forearm, but that’s to be expected of any halfway decent warrior and he’s far more than halfway decent.
I hit the ground and spin, the staff’s weight throwing me off but I quickly make the necessary corrections and when I turn to face him, I hit him in the thigh, stroke meeting another one of the thick patches that he’s got growing all over him. I grunt in frustration.
Stupid plates. I accounted for the ones on his chest and forearms, but I forgot the legs. Ribs then, neck, shoulders — groin if I have to. With a quick flick of his staff, he pushes mine away. I spin out of his range, but he isn’t fighting back. Not yet. He’s giving me time to adjust to the weapon. To adjust to fighting him.
I thrust forward. He blocks with his staff, the two distinct pieces of metal and stone coming together with a loud, unceremonious clack. The
re’s a moment of silence. Grace. His scent swirls around me, making it hard to think. I’m in the oasis. What am I doing fighting here? I shake my head and shrug my shoulders and dive in again. Another effortless block, perfectly timed.
We dance like this for some time, staffs thwacking against one another. Every time I start to find a rhythm, he forces me to break it again and again, until finally, after my dozenth attack, he initiates.
He charges forward, swinging his staff over his head in a wide arc as he moves. It leaves his chest exposed and I dive for it, but he moves faster than I anticipated and brings his weapon around to tag my left side. Blunt though it is, it’s still hard enough to knock the wind clean out of me. Swallowing asteroid gunk would be easier than taking another hit from him. I bounce back on the balls of my feet, struggling to stay light and agile as I avoid the next blow. But it doesn’t land.
He freezes, falling out of position. “Did I hurt you?” He says in a low, demonic cadence before he starts circling me again.
I shake my head. “Not a chance.”
“Xhivey.”
“Was that all you’ve got?”
He snarls or smiles or both when I reposition my feet into a fighting stance. Hip-distance apart. Right foot in front of the left. Body angled to present a smaller target. Hands positioned just wider than shoulder-width apart on the staff to give me better control as I learn this new weapon. It’s incredible. Like wielding a blade made of water. My thoughts flick back to the wall of wonders and fleetingly I imagine that he just might let me try them all, even the dagger bow.
I charge and we spar, beating one another forward and back. “Again,” he barks when I finally manage to connect my spear end with his shoulder. “Faster.”
I try again, unsuccessful in hitting him this time, but I do manage to block him three times more and stop him from striking me in the stomach, back, arms and thighs — all places that on the coming solar are sure to be bruised and sore.
“Xhivey,” he says. Then, “Pick up your feet.”
I didn’t realize I’d been letting my arches fall flat and quickly correct the stance. He’s training me. He’s training me and he’s an alien.
And we’re on a date.
We keep going. I fight harder and faster, wanting to prove to him that I’m something of worth. Wanting to prove it to myself too.
My arms are heavy and I’m sweating even though he doesn’t look like he’s winded in the slightest. We’ve been at this for eons and that little tear on his vest is all he has to show for it.
“Kiki,” he says quietly in between two resounding thwacks. “We should stop. Training is winding down. Soon the warriors will tire from simply watching us.”
I can see a dozen or so warriors milling about in my peripheries. Done with their own training, they drink from water skins and flasks and speak out of earshot with one another. About me. They’re all watching. Wondering if I’m just the pathetic girl who couldn’t beat Bo’Raku, who cost them the life of one of their own, who thinks she’s fit to lead. I’ll prove it to them. Prove to them who I am. That I’m a warrior. That I’m capable of anything. That I’m not lesser because I’m human. That I’m not weak.
I spin and swing and Okkari is forced a half-step back. He pushes me away from him, spear-on-spear, and I can’t stand up against the alarming pressure. He’s too strong. Much stronger than I am. I stumble and have to use my spear to stop myself from falling. I hear Jaxal’s voice in my head screaming, Don’t ever let your sword touch the ground! I wince and lurch upright. I attack again and again and again.
“Humans require sustenance three times a solar,” he says between grunts and lithe spins, liquid movements that make him look more like a dancer than a warrior. “You need your final meal…”
“If you don’t tire, then I don’t tire.”
“This is not your last opportunity to train. Do not fight like this is your final battle.” But that’s what it feels like, doesn’t it?
I swing harder the next time and he edges back, pulling me in a circle, forcing me to give chase. I spin and kick up pebbles and earth from the packed ground, thinking to use the same distraction I did the first time, but as I’m learning, so is he. He isn’t fazed by the pebbles and when I bring my staff down, too late I realize that he’s just standing there waiting.
He maneuvers his staff in a figure eight and it’s like he’s turned the piece of metal to rope, knotting it around mine. When he pulls, my spear flies. Never drop your weapon! Jaxal’s voice in my head rages like an angry tide.
I lunge for my helos staff, diving to the ground where I land hard on my knees. I grab it, but a heavy, booted foot is there already, kicking it out of my reach. The spear skates over the floor, landing next to two males clustered, talking probably about me and how I lost. How humans could never fight against aliens. How I could never outrun Bo’Raku. How I could never hope to win against the Okkari.
I’m panting now and it has nothing at all to do with the fight, well fought and well lost and everything to do with the voice in my head spitting vitriol and poisoning the well that my encounter with the hevarr and Re’Okkari’s death purified.
I clutch my chest. The Okkari is a beast above me. He can sense how weak I am. Hide it! Just hide… I try to pull back, but all at once, he drops to one knee, falling damn near right on top of me as his entire body curves over mine, hiding me. Protecting me, even if only from myself. But I don’t need protection!
I lurch up, but one gigantic hand slides around the back of my head as he arches over my body and presses his forehead to my forehead.
“Enough,” he says and there is so much in that one word that it hollows out my insides. I close my eyes. I follow his deep, even breath with my breath. “He cannot harm you. Nothing can.”
I nod, unable to speak. The rumbling gets louder, forming a shield around me.
“You do not fight for survival, not anymore. You are a warrior now and you fight for the tribe, for the hunt.” His breath smells like anise and an ocean breeze.
I nod again and when I exhale, I shake just a little bit.
His hand on the back of my hair kneads the nape of my neck. “My warriors know better than to overtax themselves in a training. To be overeager is to be reckless and reckless warriors do not join the first hunt after the thaw. I will take no exception to you simply because you are Xhea. I am Okkari, responsible for all warriors, and if I feel you will not be able to adequately defend yourself and your fellow warriors, then you may train with them but I will not allow you to hunt with them until you have mastered this anger.”
I’m not allowed to go out with the hunters on the human colony. I train with them, but all our hunters are men. I’ve never even been considered. “You…you want me to go with you on a hunt?” I squeeze out the words.
He blinks, eyelids gliding over the round orbs of his eyes. He blinks from the side, reminding me of his alienness in a way I’d forgotten during our fight. “Of course. You are our warrior Xhea. If not fighting at my side, then you will tell me now where else you would rather be.”
Where else would I rather be? Among all the places I’ve been and all the ones I have only imagined, I cannot think of one.
I pull back just enough to see him. To really see him. Purple skin. Black hair streaked with just one flash of white, a tease of years to come. Stoic and regal and utterly unlike anyone I’ve ever come across. And maybe the first being to truly see me in return.
I lurch up — not to fight — but to crush his mouth to mine. I pull at his lips with my teeth, suckling them one at a time. They’re hard, much harder than a human man’s, but they’re smooth, like polished stone. I lick a line across their seam, feeling powerful as he sucks in an inhale, gasping at the promise of me. Of more.
His hand tenses around the back of my head while his other comes between us. He wrenches forward on the buckle across my chest and my whole body tumbles against his until we are pressed together, chest-to-chest, my thighs straddling h
is hips, my knees punching into the hard ground below. My fingers spear his hair and when he finally reacts to kiss me back — lips parting, tongue meeting mine hesitantly, teeth nipping at my lips hard enough it hurts just a little bit — I moan.
The sound echoes through the front half of the cave and even I can hear the sudden splash of noise that his warriors make in response. Okkari pulls away from me suddenly and wrenches us both to our feet. My body is limp until he kicks my feet apart, forcing me to plant them. Still, I hold onto his arms to keep myself steady.
He leans down and whispers gruffly against my mouth, as if wanting more, but denying himself — or as he put it, depriving us both. “I cannot share you with my warriors. Not even your moans. And I cannot let them see what you do to me. I am unraveled.” I glance up and see his forehead full of light, but it’s nothing I haven’t seen before. Maybe more color. More purples. Brighter.
I reach a hand up, ignoring how it shakes. Or trying to. But this is uncharted territory. I’ve never done this before. I’ve kissed boys, sure. I even had sex with a couple before the Hunt, before, when I thought that sex meant a few passionate seconds in a field or some dark closet with a cute colony boy who traded whatever pennies he had for a few extra rations so he could treat me to real meat in the hopes that this would happen. They were nice, those times, quick and quickly forgotten. But this is new.
I’ve never touched a man before with intent, with promises unspoken. Never suspended my fingers and traced his face, started at his temple, dragged that touch across his raised ridges and then down the bridge of his nose. Watched him close his eyes and lose the strength in his torso, smiled a little as he gently swayed. Watched his lips open and his ridged tongue slide between them. Pressed my fingertips to his tongue, feeling its warmth and wet roughness, watched him inhale and exhale my name…
“Kiki.” His eyes open and I pull away. Closing my hand, I can feel electricity fire through it and I know that even if I were never to see him again from this moment forward, I’m sure that the touch of his skin would be branded to mine for life.
Taken to Nobu: A SciFi Alien Romance (Xiveri Mates Book II) Page 15