by Maia Starr
“Then you can see why that would come as such a shock to us,” she snapped.
“Chloe, no one was taken from there.”
She shook her head, red curls bouncing against her shoulders. “Are you lying to me?”
“No, of course not,” I said with a frown.
She looked at me, searching: a hollow stare with light brown eyes that looked so empty. She was dissecting me.
Good. I hoped she found exactly what she was looking for—because I wasn’t lying.
“You’re lying,” she decided, though it sounded more like a bluff than anything else.
I reached into the recesses my mind. There had been no missions to Yazir… ever, as far as I could remember.
“Chloe, I’m not. If she was taken it would have been in the groups we took during the L7 war. No one has been sent to Yazir. Trust me, I would know before anyone else.”
… wouldn’t I?
“Then she’s…” Chloe hung her head and let out a small, haggard breath. “No, that’s impossible.”
“Maybe it was someone else?” I offered, wishing I could help her.
“Her husband,” she said, sitting on the desk by her window so that she was facing me. I took a couple steps closer, and she continued, “Her husband told me it was a Parduss.”
I shrugged. “Maybe he was wrong?”
“He wasn’t,” she said, overly defensive. “And if you’re keeping something from me, your best bet is to tell me right now.”
I scowled at her. “Chloe, I’m trying to help you. Don’t you think I would do anything to…” my words fell away.
I blinked, and my heart began to speed up.
She swallowed audibly and bit her lip. “What is it?”
“I love you,” I said.
After I’d said the words to Pash, I never thought I’d say them again. How quickly I went against my own words.
Chloe’s face beamed, but she didn’t say it back.
“It’s fast,” I said. “But I know when I know.”
She nodded unsurely at me.
“I love you,” I said again, “And you can trust me. But I need to know… is this real between us? Is your friend the only thing that’s holding you back from me? Because if that’s the truth, then I will spend the rest of my life trying to find her.”
A broad smile cracked across her stoic visage, and her eyebrows cupped: a beautiful, earnest expression spilling over her pale skin.
“Come here,” she said, reaching her hand out toward me.
I shook my head. “Is this real?” I asked. “Because I’ve been fooled before.”
“Not with me,” she said. “I’m sorry… about all this.”
“I don’t need you to be sorry,” I laughed. “I just need you to say you want to be with me.”
She laughed too then and wiped a tear. “I want to be with you.”
I licked my lips, stuck somewhere between picking her up and spinning her around and collapsing with relief.
“Then,” I said lowly. “There’s something I have to do, and you’re coming with me.”
I made my way to the Adoranthe plenk: the market district. Drinks, food, fighting rings. Anything titillating or necessary for daily life could be found in Adoranthe. It was our most humanized district and also happened to be where most of the captives from the L7 days had made their homes.
It was also where Fenris lived.
My wings drew in, and I shifted halfway, keeping them spread broadly as I approached his strange property. I didn’t have to knock or let myself in. My brother was waiting for me.
“Funny to see you outside of the council room, brother,” he said, watching me carefully from his porch, descending several steps but never taking his eyes off me. “Guess you’d rather not go there these days considering…”
He splayed out his hands to me and began to smirk as he confirmed, “Because of Pash.” Then he finally took notice of Chloe, and he smiled at her curiously.
“Funny,” I said, “I didn’t need the clarification.”
“Being with child, and all,” he mocked and then expelled a throaty laugh.
“I get it,” I sneered.
“We all get it,” said his lover as she leaned against their front door frame. She wore a flowing dress in the style of the council and had her black hair pulled up. She gave me an ‘Oh, Fenris’ exasperated expression and I felt my pulse quicken.
I grabbed Chloe’s hand and pulled her forward, letting her get a better look at the woman. She stared at her curiously, inspecting her. I leaned into her ear and whispered, “Is that her?”
“I… I don’t know,” she said, tilting her head, but looking back up at the dark-skinned woman and seeing the way she looked at Chloe, I knew we’d found Alecia.
Fenris was the only one who had ever gone rogue after the truce. For weeks he’d disappeared. He lusted after the humans like no other: he was one of the champions of bringing so many back from the Earth. And when my father denied him a breeder for himself, he set out to find one.
And when he came back, he was with her.
No explanation.
No trip back to Earth.
“Why are you here?” Fenris demanded, taking a step toward me. “What do you want?”
“Did you kill Amlodesh?” I bared my fangs, nearly twitching as the words came out.
He gave a mirthless laugh and set a hand on the beam of his porch-rail. Tensing his shoulders, he seethed, “Why would I do that?”
“You know why,” I snapped, and Chloe gripped my hand. Now she knew.
“No,” Fenris said, incredulous: insulted. “Because it would take a madman to understand your logic, so perhaps you’d care to explain it to me?”
I smirked, despite myself.
“Did you hurt her?” I fumed. “Conspire to hurt her? Are you trying to kill our father?”
“Why would I do that?” Fenris shouted, throwing his hands into the air.
“To become Dendren!” I screamed back with matching emphasis.
Fenris’ eyes went wide, hurt, and then furious once more. A shock washed over him and then seemed to settle there. His words came out just above a whisper as he said, “And you would think I was that desperate?” He let out a miserable laugh.
“You know the Dendren wouldn’t pass the torch to you so long as you are with her,” I said, eyeing his lover.
“Ah, yes!” he mocked, gesturing toward Chloe. “And what's this I hear about you harboring your own little fugitive? Miss Quinn? What kind of person do you think I am?”
The hairs on my neck prickled and I looked over at Alecia, locking eyes with her. “I know exactly who you are and I know that nothing is beneath you.”
“Is that right?” he said.
“You took her,” I said, nodding toward Alecia. “Didn’t you?”
Chloe squeezed my hand, frozen in place. Fenris looked at the woman, and there was an unspoken exchange between them.
Fenris flapped out a wing and kicked the dirt up with its gust before running toward me. I half-shifted, letting y wings out as well. Just as I could feel my joints expanding Fenris grabbed the bones of my forming wings and gripped them hard, sending a shock-wave of pain through my whole body.
I let out a rumbling bellow: a deep, reverberating growl as the throbbing force twisted through my body. I tried to jerk away from him, but he had dug his claws in, blood spilling down my back as he stopped my wings from fully forming.
Whipping to get away from him I finally felt the release as my wings finally emerged, feeling limp and weak.
“You murdered her crew on Yazir and took her back here for yourself!” I yelled. “You violated the truce!”
Again, my brother didn’t answer. Instead he took to the air and swooped behind me, whipping me down with his thick, spiny tail.
I had forgotten what a skilled fighter Fenris was. Before I had even had the chance to move or fight back, his heavily armored foot was cracking down on my neck, stealing the air from my
lungs.
“Stop!” Alecia finally yelled, screeching at us both. She looked over at Chloe and was suddenly overcome with emotion. Turning back to Fenris, she darted a finger to the air and furiously yelled, “Leave!”
I stared up at him, sweating and already in agony and shuddered with relief as his foot slowly lifted from my neck.
He looked down at me with cold, pale eyes. He leaned in, barely kneeling down and whispered, “The next time we meet, one of us will die.”
Chapter Eleven
Chloe
She was real.
My eyes filled with tears as I held the friend I had so longed for. When she spoke, she sounded familiar, but her once young features seemed older now despite how little time had truly passed since I had last seen her. She looked harder now: stoic.
But then I saw the hint of a smile, and I knew. It was her. Alecia.
We ran to one another and stopped the men in their tracks, stopping their quickly-turning-deadly fight.
She told Fenris to leave, and he stared at her with such hatred for daring to give him an order that I knew when he said he wanted to kill Scashra, he meant it.
Now alone with her, Scashra waiting outside like a loyal guard, I studied her house: the square bay window that overlooked a waterfall that fell cliffside and down into the unknown below. I took in the strange little life she had made for herself, here, with Fenris.
“That was… crazy,” Alecia said of the fight from outside.
I nodded, unsure what else to say.
“I can’t believe it’s really you,” she said smoothly, crossing her arms and watching me with fascination as I traipsed through her home.
I fingered the edge of a table, thinking of the life she’d planned Jack and how different this world seemed in comparison to the home she’d always wanted.
“Yeah,” I said breathlessly.
“You were one of the ones in the truce?” she said, and I nodded. “Sounds so unlike you,” she said with a smile and a shrug.
I stared out the window, suddenly melancholy, watching Scashra as he limped and studiously watched the skies for any trace of Fenris.
I studied her, my friend, the one who I had needed so badly all those years ago. The one whose face kept me up at night. I reached out to touch her like she might disappear if I focused too hard.
She grabbed my hand and met it with a wide grin. “I’m real,” she laughed.
I shook my head. “It doesn’t feel like it.”
Alecia squeezed my hand and brought me over to the sitting area, and we sat across from one another, still holding hands.
“I came here to find you,” I said, finally meeting her eyes.
She smiled suggestively. “And Scashra found you.”
My mouth suddenly felt dry as I said, “Something like that.”
“We have all night, Chloe,” she laughed. “You don’t have to skimp on the details!”
“It just feels so unreal to be here with you, like I’m about to wake up or…” I could hear my emotions overwhelming my voice: my throat feeling tight. “Shit,” I breathed.
“Yeah, I know the feeling,” she agreed. “Where do we even start?”
“What happened?” I asked, frowning at her as all the memories of her came rushing back to me.
She blinked and then squeezed my hand before releasing it. “We’re starting at the beginning, I guess!” she teased.
“I heard your ship was sabotaged,” I immediately began to rattle off. “That your crew was killed by the Parduss.”
Alecia swallowed uncomfortably and searched the room with her almond-shaped eyes. “Then,” she shrugged. “You know the story already.”
“They thought you were dead,” I said.
She smiled. “But not you.”
“I never, ever stopped believing you were still alive.”
“And you were right, as always. That feels like so long ago now. I missed you so much,” she shared.
We both cried again then, looking each other over and letting the gravity of the moment overwhelm us. I grabbed her hand once more, squeezing it and whispering, “It almost killed me.”
“But we’re together now!” she sparked up. “And that’s all that matters.”
“We have two years committed to Cadir,” I said hastily. “And then we can go!”
My smile was met with a shocked, uncomfortable expression from Alecia. I tilted my head to the side, confused as I assured her, “Back to your family.”
“Right…” Her eyes went wide, and she gingerly splayed her fingers out over her eyes, touching her skin ever-so-slightly. “I don’t even think I could face his family, Chloe.”
“Why?”
“When I left, I was…” she swallowed. “I watched him get attacked. I couldn’t save him, Chloe.”
It took me a minute to realize that Alecia thought Jack was dead. I shook my head vigorously, putting up a hand to interrupt her speech, “Alecia!” I announced. “He’s alive!”
“He… what?”
“Jack!” I cheered through excited laughter. “He’s alive, and he’s been waiting for you this whole time, Alecia! He’s the one who told us what happened in the first place!”
For a moment it was as though I could see Alecia’s heart expand: her mind filling in the blanks about her long-lost love. Relief draped over her features and then… something else?
“What?” I said quietly. “Alecia, talk to me.”
She shook her head. “You’re overstepping, Chloe. As usual.”
I blinked in surprise. “I thought you’d be happy that he was okay.”
“You can’t just come in here demanding that I throw my life away!”
I snapped, “I’m not demanding anything, Alecia. Your life is with Jack, not here with the man who tried to kill him!”
“You don’t know a thing about him,” she fumed.
I scoffed. “I think I know enough.”
“How can you come in here and condemn my life when all you’ve done since you’ve gotten here is fuck around with Scashra?”
My heart skipped, and my face went a furious shade of red. I looked her over with sudden disgust and spat, “I didn’t leave someone behind back home to be with Scashra.”
“And I didn’t expect to fall in love with Fenris!” she argued through a frustrated laugh.
“Alecia,” I snapped, now standing from the hard, uncomfortable chair and pointing a finger down in her direction, “Jack is your husband.”
She set her jaw, glaring up at me. “That was a long time ago, Chlo.”
“It was two years ago!” I shouted back in frustration.
“Yeah? Well, it feels like a lifetime.”
Suddenly, I felt sick. Alecia was like a sister to me—Jack was like a brother. After she went missing, both Jack and I made a nearly permanent home at Alecia’s parents. Sometimes it felt more like they were consoling us than the other way around.
He was a good man, and he had been waiting for her.
“So, what am I supposed to tell him?” I scoffed. “Uh, hey Jack? I found your wife; she’s alive—yay!—oh shit, but guess what? She’s in love with someone else because she caught a case of Stockholm syndrome!”
“You’re one to talk,” she laughed spitefully.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
She crossed her arms, “You think Scashra ever paid attention to me before? He couldn’t give a shit that I was taken from my life, my husband, my dreams!” Alecia was yelling now. “I was just the human his brother was sticking it in. Then he captured you and your crew, and you’re exactly the same! You fell in love with him, right?”
She was pleading for me to be on her side, but I just couldn’t.
“So, what’s the difference?” she asked, broken.
“The difference is that Scashra is a good person, and Fenris isn’t.”
She laughed and shook her head, walking away from me.
“That’s it?” I shouted.
Alecia turn
ed to me. “I’m not going back, Chlo. Get it out of your head.”
“You’d throw away five years with Jack for two with Fenris?” My eyes went wide as she offered an indifferent shrug. “Would you throw me away too, Alecia?”
“That’s the wonderful part,” she said. “I don’t have to. You’re right here, and I’m glad. When this all settles… I’m going to be the happiest girl in the world to have my best friend and the man I love in one place. But, I’m not going home, Chloe. I’m just not.”
Chapter Twelve
Chloe
I walked by the water’s edge and watched as it rippled and twisted from beneath the surface as though a small tornado had settled under the pond.
Alecia’s words kept raging through my mind: I’m not leaving. I’m just not.
I had gone home with Scashra that night, heartbroken and furious as ever. Never in all the time that Alecia had been gone did I think that if I ever saw her again, the first thing we would do was have an argument.
Rain fell from the sky, and great cracks of thunder bellowed in the distance. It made me wonder what the Parduss did if they were out flying in a storm. Would they retreat or was it some form of bravery to stay out?
Honor and bravery seemed to be a consistent theme of the Parduss. As a warrior race it was part of their honor system to infiltrate other planets: send in spies and then take them over.
That was what Scashra’s job was. Or, what it used to be, anyhow. He was a spy.
In fact, he was one of the first to go to the Earth. He shifted and became like one of us before helping the Parduss plan their attack.
“Not crazy about that,” I whispered to myself.
In-between taking and researching samples, I would leave the facility and go out into the wilds of the mainland. It was nearly fluorescent in color: vivid green grasses and endless ponds of seafoam blue.
The Parduss didn’t go into the wilds except to hunt, so they said, but I’d never had trouble out here. Save for a few smooth-skinned birds and some other unknown creatures about the size of a rabbit, I hadn’t seen much of anything.
But the scenery was beautiful.
WOMP. WOMP. WOMP. WOMP.