His nape felt itchy when he thought about the LOANER written across the back of it.
The coach trundled onward, on track, only shaking them a little as it swooshed around curves and over bridges, outside of the city of Quill. The city had taken an hour to leave due to the low speed limits allowed but now this bullet transport was humming along. Fast enough for practicality and to arrive at the siren enclave in good time, slow enough to let them glimpse the green countryside.
Silently, the foliage whipped by, blurring when one focused past it to the blue-topped mountains. The trees here must not be chlorophyll based at high altitudes or the snow was weird. He hadn’t looked up Lura’s flora and fauna yet.
Might not ever.
They weren’t likely to go trekking across country.
The finishing inside this bullet coach was exquisite and of a fineness he’d not seen before. Lord Zarblu might’ve afforded such luxury, but stoneshifters weren’t into frippery, though he had collected antiques. Black trim, gold scrollwork and fanciness in the corners of the ceiling. The taps in the small bathroom were gold-plated, and these red, plumply upholstered seats were on a comfort level with clouds.
Led huffed and shifted, found Thorn studying him from her opposite seat. “How’s the stasis headache?”
“Good. Painkillers worked well. You?” She quirked an eyebrow.
“I’m good.” And she had such startling eyes.
“You know what I want to ask.” Her face slipped into what might be termed a pained expression.
“I can guess.” Led crossed his legs and pulled straight the cloth-covered buttons on his jacket. Black pants, shirt, boots, and jacket, of course. It was his way of grounding himself no matter what species he wore.
“Why? Why that?” Raising her hand from her lap, she flicked open her fingers in his direction. “Anything but a dalk surely?”
“Hmmm.”
Every time he saw her she grew more beautiful to him, more female, more unattainable for someone like him. Her white hair had been styled to perfection, and she’d placed some artwork onto her suit design today. Pink flower blossoms that rained down upon a subtly toned background that blended from the faintest gray to a green, then to a mild golden yellow at boots level.
The more you knew someone, the closer you became, yes? It had the opposite effect on him. Maybe because he saw how different they were.
“I didn’t choose a dalk for prettiness. There wasn’t much in Quill. The bodies were few. This is still in the same corner of the galaxy as BART, and the space-faring races are limited.”
“It’s the teeth.” Thorn pulled a pained face.
He couldn’t help smiling at that, though the long teeth must look fearsome when framed by a grin.
“You look like you’re either going to eat me.” Thorn shuddered. “Or chew down a tree.”
“Trees are good nutrition,” he said dryly.
What he hadn’t told her was that he could’ve picked a plainer man, a more standard human type, but the dalk had...double dicks. And he’d seen her reaction to the smaller thrassian one. His curiosity had grabbed him and said take the dalk, with a few exclamation points on top.
Because, he hoped.
“Anyway, thank you for coming. I needed someone with me. My mother...is a stranger to me.”
There she was thanking him again. Weird. He inclined his head. “She may be just as nervous as you.”
Thorn grimaced and let her gaze drift to the window beside her, where the countryside was still blurring past.
No weapons, bots, or AI were allowed in the siren enclave so Smorg and Jocelyn had been left in the city – hopefully they would be able to purchase some of the suppression drug that Thorn wished to try.
“I’m not the nice man you seem to be thinking I am.”
Warning her was stupid. And there was the niceness, but did this count if he was subsequently vile?
“Am I thinking you are? I guess? Are you sure you’re not? Don’t downgrade yourself.”
“A few charitable acts do not make one an angel.”
She peered down her nose at him, elbow up on the window, thumb underneath her jaw.
He imagined his own thumb there and felt those double dicks twitch.
“Neither does a life of villainy make one a villain if one chooses to change.”
Slowly, he shook his head. Being willing to forgive was a weakness. It left her vulnerable to males like him who wanted to do bad things to her.
“You disagree?” she asked.
Today was not a day for bad things. Mothers should be venerated, he assumed. It was the humanoid way.
He stood, beckoned to her to join him then was surprised at what his mind suggested. “Come. Let me show you what a dalk can do.”
Her wariness amused him, but she did stand. “Yes? Is this a safe thing?”
“It’s safe.” He searched through the coach’s sound database and selected an ancient waltz. The dalk had known how to do this, and now he did too. Which was so very wrong. The hairs on his back prickled alert. “Take my hand.”
There was ample room in here between the facing seats to dance – the central table could be summoned but was currently locked away into the floor.
The music began and he took the first slow step then swirled her and dipped, in an impromptu move. She went with him, smiling at him from where he’d bent her backward.
“You’ll have to lead.”
“Of course I will.” Of course he would.
This ex-cyborg knew nothing of dances.
As he swept her smoothly through the elegance of the waltz, Led was surprised at how it all came to him – he knew this like he did the heft of his two dicks, could feel the weight of past dancing partners in his hand.
Mixing dicks and hands was probably a sensory disaster.
But these muscle memories...
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
Loaners did not leave traces of the past user’s memories. They were wiped clean. He should only have his own memories.
Yet, there was more – something he’d dismissed.
When he’d traded bodies at the LoL premises in Quill he’d felt an urge to tell the pog, who seemed a twin brother to Tewel, that he knew something vital about Fellen Zed.
Finding secrets had been part of the deal made on BART, though telling this strange information about Fellen to the pog was as appropriate as divulging a dream.
He couldn’t really know that Fellen Zed was doing something illegal and dangerous and immoral. It was impossible. Yet he did know it.
He could dance when he never had before, and he knew Fellen Zed had cloned himself and had bodies hidden throughout the galaxy. That would explain why he was willing to let strangers loan out his body.
It didn’t explain why he needed to, however. There was a need hidden somewhere in Fellen Zed’s actions, and if he examined those he might see through them to the answer.
The dance took them across the small floor and around again. His boots hit the floor in perfect rhythm, and he had a girl in his arms. Her breasts pressed on his body when she moved the right way, her legs brushed his, and her face was merely a second away from a kiss.
If he leaned down.
“You shock me Led. I didn’t think a cyborg would learn to dance.”
And he hadn’t.
“Does it compensate for the teeth?”
She sighed and he felt the surge of her breasts as they bulged above the top of her artistically uploaded uniform. “It might.”
“I have something else that might appeal more.” He had her in his arms and the temptation was extreme. Bad things were stirring.
“Let me hazard a guess.” Her eyes narrowed. “Is it in your pants?”
“Answering you might incriminate me.”
“Oh my.” She released his fingers and he let her go as she stepped back. “I’m not into sex. I told you this.”
He dared to extend his arm and then, when she rocked on her feet but stayed
in place, to lay a hand on her. His thumb did indeed slide along her jaw, his hand cupping beneath it, and he raised her face a little so he could look directly into her somewhat startled eyes.
He’d surprised this little starship captain with his boldness.
“Then why has your breathing hastened, your cheeks flushed, and your uniform begun to look like a surreal mess of pixels?”
It was true. The art was no longer.
“I –”
“I imagine most males would love women to signal their needs so clearly.” He left his hand where it was, watching her intently. At the slightest opportunity he would bend her over, rip open the suit, and try out these new cocks.
Perhaps he should, even minus an affirmative from her.
That would be bad.
He was bad.
But she drew a ragged inhalation then found words. “No. Not here. Not now. Maybe not ever. I told you...”
She had.
For now he would refrain from force. Even if his dicks might explode from their engorgement. Two definitely felt worse than one when frustration was involved.
“Very well. I will leave you alone.”
Then he stepped outside and into the adjoining passageway, to ease his pain by leaning into the transparent wall with his hands flat to the surface and cursing silently.
In the distance, the multi-colored turrets of the siren enclave were visible above the trees and the coach was curving toward them. For the best. If he was going to fuck Thorn again, he wanted time to do it well.
What had happened to mostly needing her for a purpose in life?
Chapter 14
Led’s insistence weighed on her as they exited the coach at the terminal. She set it aside.
The siren enclave was clearly designed to hit the right notes for rich clients seeking sensual delights and mind-opening experiences. Everything here spoke to the senses, from the fluttering pink-winged insects on the overhead arching branches, to the sprays of tiny white blossoms and the perfectly soft grass underfoot.
The natural perfume of flowers and growing vegetation sifted through the air.
Though quiet, this was the quiet from a lack of thronging masses of humanoids coupled with the chirrup of bugs and crack and rustle of leaves. A light patter of rain fell as she and Led followed a floating drone.
She’d bet they monitored the temperature and corrected for deviations.
The coach hummed as it reversed, then accelerated to speed back to the city or some waiting area.
A white drone hovered ahead of them; the active ON light on its surface blinked green amid a delicate geometric pattern. The decorations on the pillars they passed matched the walls and contrasted perfectly with the ceilings and even the paving stones they traversed. The sounds of their boots on the paving seemed comforting. Solid. Safe.
“It’s flawless,” she whispered.
“Yes.” The low tone Led used and his high-intensity glance sent her thoughts scurrying. He had deeper inclinations than the architecture. Was he casting back to what had happened in the coach? Some of his swear words had carried to her.
She knew she was remembering. Being twirled and swirled in a dance was a novel experience. She’d never...ever danced. Had never felt aroused by the touch of a male’s body on hers, into hers, the pressure of muscle on parts of her that plain liked it. His scent... That is excluding those other times. They didn’t count.
She wasn’t even cycling, she was certain of that.
Perplexing. And damn this uniform for being so corruptible by these psionic powers of hers. Might as well write, please fuck me, on it in red capitals. Worried, she glanced down.
Thank the gods, it only showed randomly glitching pixels. If she ever started texting on her clothes she was truly doomed.
The drone led them onward. Grand stairways were climbed, grand double doorways were entered.
This building they’d been brought to was a palace. Sirens must live opulently and want for nothing. More hallways and stairs, then, your mother awaits, the drone announced in a soft feminine voice.
Cautious, excited, she walked in.
“Felicitations, my dear.” The woman in the blood-red gown that flowed forever down her body turned to Thorn. “I have been waiting. We do not have long. You cannot stay for that would mean your death.”
Her eyes were pools of love and remorselessness. Adore her and weep. Her words were an assault.
Thorn swayed, though she moved not a jot from where she stood at the doorway.
The flying bugs fluttered past in a swarm of pink and blue blotches. She barely looked. They were a designed feature, as was this room that blended tall bookcases and vases of exuberant flowers with an inventively crumbled wall that flowed into a greenhouse. A few insects landed on the woman’s hand, their wings still moving slowly.
The shock died. “Greetings...Mother.”
She dare not ask for an embrace, though Led placed a hand at her back and urged her to take a few steps.
“Fiana.” She smiled. “My name was attached to our messages. “Your companion is Ledderik, previously a cyborg?”
“Yes.” She might have explained his role better but if time was short, why bother? By her side, Led bowed slightly at the waist.
“You expected more from me, I can see this, my Thorn.” Her dark hair seemed alive – the black strands curling and uncurling as if with the tides of an unseen sea. “As my child I suppose one might see this as a right, but sirens are particular about genetics. We have to be. Your father chose an unusual yet apt name for you.”
She paused to draw breath, her brows scrunching together.
Thorn braced herself. She could feel the tension.
“You were a thorn at your birth.”
Great. Her mother was a bitch. Any minute she might just throw up.
“I never knew until then how incompatible are siren and s’kar genetics.” At last she turned and glided toward a desk of honeyed timber, sending the bugs into agitated flight. A few landed again on the sea of her hair.
The red of her dress was so rich it looked as though you could stir it or eat it.
The top of the desk unfolded at her touch and an instrument rose to the height of Fiana’s head, then it sprouted a nest of tubes with lens and scopes. At the base, a panel switched on and glowed a mild blue.
Deftly, Fiana touched a few places on the panel.
“Come. I will help you as much as I can. I require a sample of your flesh – blood, tears, sweat, anything really.” She turned back to Thorn and smiled. “You are past your puberty, despite the drug your father requested.”
“He’s dead.” Another lump of misery joined what already weighed down her stomach.
“I know this.”
“I’m sorry? What is this device?” Thorn nodded at the machine. “I came for help, yes, but also...” She faltered, searching for more words. “I’d hoped to find family, sympathy even. I’ve been told I can no longer call myself a s’kar. You’re my mother. Does that not mean anything?”
“It means something.” The softness in Fiana’s voice went deep, awakened hope.
All the way to Thorn’s heart, perhaps. She touched her chest absentmindedly. Her mother did feel for her but couldn’t say it? Was that it? She might be being monitored. It was the way of life that someone watched you. There was probably a vid of her out there of her most intimate moments. There were drones, lenses, and recording devices everywhere.
“You’re restricted in what you say?” she whispered – as if any halfway decent mic couldn’t record that. Still...
Fiana inclined her head. A yes then.
“Come, my child.”
Just that phrase, those two words – my child – hurt her, made her eyes sting.
This should’ve been a happy occasion. Well, okay, she was in some rather dire circumstances. Still. Fuck her life.
“I said time is limited. I know you’ve reached puberty and your siren half is conflicting with your s’kar g
enes. It’s what I told your father would happen. We sirens always dominate the genetics of the father. Always. Unfortunately, I learned late that the s’kar genes strive for the same result. We never have male children – they are rare, once in a million – and all our offspring are sirens. You are the result when two incompatible species breed.”
A mess, Thorn thought. “What will my future hold? Be truthful.”
“I will never lie to you. Listen to me, please. A blood sample is the quickest way to answer your question. I am a physician to my kind. It’s what I do every day. I need to see the levels of your hormones.”
So, she wasn’t simply some whore who bedded her father then. How horrible that she’d even wondered. It was a relief of sorts. As if that somehow excused her and her father for what they’d done. She heaved in a breath took a step. “What do you need? Arm? Neck? My head severed?”
Fiana grimaced. It was the most emotion she’d shown. “Shush girl. Don’t be ridiculous. Your wrist. Please.”
Up close to her, though Fiana must be trying to remain unaffected, she saw the tremor of her eyelids and mouth. Had she decided it kinder to not let her feel a connection to her own mother?
It was cruel. Crueler than the dull suck as a tiny vial was applied to her wrist and allowed to search out a vein and aspirate a tiny amount of blood. Bright red swam into the vial. The color of blood always bothered her when it was her own.
She looked up and instead met Fiana’s green eyes. Were those unshed tears?
Thorn asked quietly, “Will I ever see you again after this?”
“Will you? Doubtful. I won’t be allowed to arrange it. Unless by some accident we collide...” She cleared her throat then turned and placed the vial against her machine. “This is will only take a few seconds.”
Digits spun into place on the display, and Fiana put her forefinger to the screen. Her abrupt intake of air was loud and alarming.
This was surely not good. Thorn felt nauseous. Did she share some empathic connection with her mother?
“Tell me. You said you’d not lie.”
Led had been keeping back but now he joined them. The fence of teeth stretching hallway up his face made her grimace, again.
Blade (Dark Monster Fantasy Book 3) Page 9