But he’s not just some commoner—he’s an off-worlder, a little voice in her head reminded her. What about an heir? What about having a Sacred Blue girl-child to carry on the line and one day take the crown?
Ellina knew the little voice was right but there was something nagging her about it—some piece of information she might have heard at a time when she was too young to fully understand it. She had a feeling that if only she could remember it, they could resolve this last difficulty and Ty could stay on as her consort.
Except he doesn’t want to, the relentless little voice pointed out. Tisa was right—there’s something else—some other reason he doesn’t want to be with you. And whatever it is, it’s so big as to be almost insurmountable.
It seemed a hopeless business. Ellina knew she ought to give it up and stop being ridiculous. After all, just a few days ago she’d thought of her Kindred bodyguard as stiff and unapproachable and the idea of him being her consort and forming a binding and life-long bond with her would never have occurred to her.
How she wished she still felt and thought that way! Instead, her heart ached like a sore tooth—a dull, constant throb that wouldn’t go away no matter how she tried to make it.
Ty wants to go—he wants to leave me, she told herself sternly. I always knew that his assignment here was temporary. I need to get over it—need to let him go.
But it was much easier advice to give than to take.
“Here we are, Your Highness,” one of the guards said and Ellina looked up and saw that she was standing in front of a heavy iron-wood prison door.
The entrance to the dungeons.
“Let me make sure it’s safe, Your Majesty,” Ty said with a frown, stepping in front of her as the door swung open. “I don’t like this part of the palace—it’s too isolated.”
Ellina doubted they were in danger—Ty had insisted on taking the entire company of Chorkay soldiers he had trained to be her new Royal Guard. Her new guards were now seasoned veterans who had proved both their loyalty and bravery in the “Battle of the Grand Promenade,” as the assassination attempt was being called. Surely surrounded by such competent warriors they would be safe, even deep in the dungeons.
But she found she didn’t care enough to protest. Instead, she nodded dully and stepped aside, letting the big Kindred go first.
Ty did so, watching carefully to make certain the way was clear before she came behind him. They descended a steep flight of stone stairs lit only by glowing torches, until at last they reached the bottom.
“So you admit to planning the attack upon the Potentate?” A familiar voice floated through the echoing stone corridors of the dark, dank space.
“Why should I deny it?” hissed a sibilant voice and Ellina recognized the unmistakable accent of someone from the Southern Continent.
They rounded the corner and found themselves looking into a stone cell with a wooden table in the center. The table was bolted to the floor and the prisoner, in turn, was chained to the table with Lord Kikbax sitting across from him.
The High Priest was glaring at the prisoner, who was indeed from the Southern Continent—Ellina could tell just from looking at him.
There had been dissidents and rebels on the Southern Continent almost from the time it was first settled. Ellina thought it was probably because there was no shelter there, to speak of. Rather than being a vast desert, like the Northern Continent of Helios Beta, the Southern Continent was a great swamp.
The marshy landscape didn’t allow the inhabitants there to burrow under the ground and build beneath the surface, as the Chorkay had been doing for generations. As a result, the people who lived there were constantly exposed to the harmful radiation of the blue giant sun Helios Beta orbited.
The damaging ultraviolet rays turned Chorkay skin from shades of blue and green to an ugly, brownish-purple and also blinded the third eye. Even the chewchies of the Southern Continent were affected, having lost all their fur and grown scales as a defense against the merciless heat and destructive radiation.
Ellina’s grandmother had tried to get the settlers on the Southern Continent to come back to the Northern Continent, where it was safe and protected. But her offer of peace had been soundly rebuffed.
“Why do you think we left in the first place?” the leader—Azurel Ekopane had demanded of her grandmother. “Because we can’t stand being ruled by a woman!” He had spat on the ground at her feet—an insult to the Potentate which could have meant death if her grandmother hadn’t been lenient. “Better to stay in the South—to be baked by the heat and ruined by the radiation than to live one more minute under female rule!” he had declared.
Grandmother had let him go back to the Southern Continent—though perhaps she shouldn’t have been so merciful, Ellina thought now. For there had been nothing but trouble from the Southern Continent ever since.
It wasn’t known for certain, but it was suspected that Ekopane had been behind the assassination of her parents. And since it had been an assassin from the Southern Continent who had attempted to kill both her and Grandmamma at her coronation ceremony, Ellina wasn’t exactly inclined to feel lenient when she looked at the prisoner chained to the table in the interrogation room.
“Your Majesty!” Kikbax exclaimed, getting ponderously to his feet when he saw Ellina in the doorway. “Only see what we have found—the mastermind behind the plot to kill your most royal and noble self at the Grand Promenade!”
“And kill her I would have—and still will—when next I get the chance!” the prisoner spat. His brownish-purple skin looked like a wound that covered his entire body, Ellina thought with a shiver of revulsion and his third eye was shrunken and cloudy—clearly he could see nothing with it. The chewchie which screeched his hatred at her from the prisoner’s head was scaly instead of fluffy, as a proper chewchie ought to be. Its coloration was somewhere between mud and refuse and it seemed to radiate all the hatred the prisoner from the Southern Continent felt for her.
“The only one who’s going to die is you, scum!” Lord Kikbax thundered, pointing a finger at the prisoner as his chewchie jumped and screeched on top of his head. “How dare you speak so of the Goddess in the Flesh?”
“Lies!” the prisoner spat. “Y’res the Fourth, is nothing but an imposter! Everyone knows a female can’t rule effectively or well! Helios Beta should be ruled by a male—by my master, Azurel Ekopane! Long may he live!”
Ty leaned in close, his fists planted on the wooden table, his eyes glowing red with rage.
“I’ll tell you who’s not going to live very long and that’s you, you filthy bastard,” he growled. “Keep my Lady’s name out of your mouth if you don’t want me to gut you here and now!”
The prisoner flinched back but glared up at Ty unrepentantly.
“Who are you, off-worlder?” he spat. “Some foreign mercenary the ‘Goddess’ here hired because she can’t trust her own guards? Well maybe that’s because they know that real males ought to be ruled by another male! Not a weak, diseased whore of a female! She—”
But before he could finish his hateful words, his head suddenly exploded in a splatter of purple and red and gray that made Ellina jump and gasp.
At first she was certain it was Ty who had shot him but when she looked closer, she saw that it was Lord Kikbax holding the blaster.
“Forgive me, Your Majesty,” he said, when he saw her looking. “But I could not allow that filthy scum to speak so of my Potentate.” And he bowed low, as though he had only been doing his job.
“That was really fucking foolish,” Ty growled, turning to glare at the priest as he wiped the prisoner’s brains off his cheek where they had splattered. “What if he had cohorts? You should have saved your righteous wrath, priest, until we had all the information we could get out of him!”
The High Priest drew himself up indignantly.
“How dare you?” he exclaimed. “Do you not know that speaking in such a disrespectful way to the Potentate is a crime punishabl
e by death? I was only carrying out the miscreant’s rightful sentence. Besides, we did question him—most thoroughly,” he went on when Ty opened his mouth to protest again. “He was the last remnant of the band of assassins who attacked during the Grand Promenade—and he was the one who tried to poison the Potentate’s wine twice. The guards caught him trying to sneak out of the kingdom by a side way which leads directly to the Southern Continent and he confessed to all of it. His guilt could not be more clear.”
Ellina thought he was probably right. But standing here in the same room with a headless body which still had blood trickling from its ruined stump of a neck made her feel ill.
“I thank you, High Priest, for neutralizing this threat to my royal person,” she said formally to Kikbax. “Truly, you have done me a great service today.”
“Of course, My Potentate.” Grinning widely, the High Priest bowed. As he came up, he shot a triumphant glance at Ty, who returned the look stonily.
Apparently the High Priest was looking to outdo her Kindred bodyguard and, in killing the assassin who had sought to take her life, he clearly thought he had won this round.
Well, that’s one worry gone, at least, Ellina thought dully. Two, actually. We know the source of the assassination attempt and the last assassin has been caught and killed.
And also her High Priest, rather than plotting to overthrow or subvert her, had apparently decided the best way to get along was to curry favor. That was certainly better than an attempted coup, Ellina thought.
I ought to feel glad, she thought. Kikbax is falling into line and now I know I’m safe.
But of course, this meant that Ty could go. That his mission here was done.
I wonder if I’ll ever hear from him again? she thought as she watched him from the corner of her eye. Or if he’ll leave and never return?
The latter seemed much more likely, she couldn’t help thinking. And as they all marched back up the stairs, out of the dungeon, she felt as though she had left her heart behind in that dark, damp, cold place—felt like she had left it behind and it would never see light again.
Thirty-Six
“Your Majesty, thank you for granting me an audience.”
Ty stood there awkwardly before the golden throne where Ellina was sitting in state. He supposed after their fight he couldn’t blame her for wanting to keep things formal between them, but it still hurt that she wouldn’t see him for even a moment in private.
Instead, she had surrounded herself with her ministers and was wearing one of her finest Court dresses—a stiff, jeweled one he knew she hated because it was so uncomfortable.
But apparently not as uncomfortable as being alone with him.
“Of course, Commander Ty’rial. You are always welcome in our royal presence.” Ellina inclined her head gracefully, her face perfectly blank. “Was there anything you wished to tell us before you go? We are listening.”
She’s even using the royal “We,” Ty thought sadly. Truly, Ellina was putting every barrier between them that she could. Probably because he’d already hurt her once and she didn’t want to be hurt again.
“I just wanted to say…”
Just wanted to say that I DO want to be your consort—that I want to love you and hold you and keep you safe forever. That I never want to leave your side.
But what came out of his mouth was,
“I just wanted to say that it has been a great honor and privilege serving you, Your Majesty.”
“We thank you for your kind words, Commander Ty’rial. And we wish you a very safe and happy voyage home.” Ellina nodded regally once more. “Please give my thanks and regards to your superior, Commander Sylvan.”
“Of course,” Ty said dully. “I will indeed, Your Majesty.”
“Well then, if there is nothing else, you may be dismissed.” Was Ellina’s voice slightly choked? Ty didn’t know but he did think her third eye or umlu looked suspiciously bright. He remembered her telling him that only when a Chorkay experienced great sorrow and loss did tears come from the third eye.
Tell her! shouted a little voice in his head. Tell her how you really feel!
But how did he feel for her? Was the desperate love and loss that threatened to overwhelm him only due to his altered DNA and rigorous early training? Did he only wish to pleasure and serve her always because he was thinking of her as his “Mistress”—one who must be served at all costs? Such blind devotion caused by his own genes and background couldn’t be true love, could it?
Ty wished he knew. And he also wished he could tell what Ellina herself was feeling. If only he still had their chewchie-guided link, he would know. But since Tisa had put the barrier between their minds, he couldn’t feel anything coming from the Potentate.
In fact, he didn’t even know where Tisa was at the moment. Hiding, he suspected, somewhere back in the royal apartments. Hiding so she wouldn’t have to go with him.
His heart was torn at the thought—never had he formed an emotional bond so quickly with another being—not even Ellina. But he couldn’t blame the little chewchie for wanting to stay on her native planet and be with her mate. At least she would have Lor. And maybe she could help ease some of the ache of his leaving for Ellina.
He bowed once more, silently, and turned to go. With every step towards the grand gold double doors at the end of the audience chamber, he wished she would stop him. Every step he took that put distance between them was like another stone piled on his already-heavy heart.
But even if my past didn’t stand between us and she asked me to stay, I couldn’t, he told himself. For how could I ever give her what she needs to rule successfully? How could I give her a Sacred Blue daughter—an heir?
The answer was he couldn’t, of course. So Ty made himself keep going until he had passed through the tall golden doors and heard them close behind him. When they did, he knew he was really leaving—knew there was no longer any going back.
His throat burned with regret but he kept his head high as he walked away, leaving the female he had sworn to protect alone.
He supposed he would never see her again.
Ellina waited until the golden doors to the audience chamber clanged shut before she practically leapt from the golden throne. She had to get out of here now—before she lost it! Her eyes were burning—all three of them—and her throat was tight with unshed tears.
“My Lady, are you all right?” It was Captain Kiyda—the head of her new Royal Guard and he had a concerned look on his face.
“Fine, I’m fine,” she managed to get out in a choked voice. “I just need…need to go back to my apartments for a little while.”
“But Your Majesty, we have much business to get through this morning,” one of her ministers protested. “Why the paperwork alone—”
“I said I must go!” Ellina exclaimed, too upset to be properly decorous, as she knew she was meant to be while in the Court. “I…I will return shortly,” she added, to the shocked minister who was looking at her as though she’d grown a second head. “Forgive me. I am…unwell.”
“I will escort Your Majesty,” Captain Kiyda said diplomatically.
“Yes…yes, of course.” Ellina nodded distractedly. “Thank you, Captain.”
“It is always my pleasure to serve the Goddess in the Flesh,” he responded as he escorted her from the audience chamber and back towards the royal apartments.
It was a proper response—formal and respectful—but his very presence at her elbow reminded Ellina of what she had lost.
She missed having Ty in that place by her side—missed his tall form and the comforting muscular bulk of his big Kindred body. She missed having to look up to talk to him and having him bend down to her to speak back. She missed his scent—that dark, spicy masculine musk that made her think of home and safety for some reason. She missed his deep voice in her ears and the feel of his arms around her as he told her he cared for her, that he would keep her safe and never leave her…
No, he never prom
ised that, she told herself fiercely as she stepped into the royal apartments and was, at last, alone. He was always up front about having to leave me—about having to go when his mission was finished. He never lied to me.
He had never loved her, either. Not really. For if he’d loved her, how could he leave?
“How could he leave?” Ellina whispered, repeating her thought aloud as she sank down on the couch before the fireplace—the very place where the big Kindred had held and comforted and pleasured her so often in the past days. “Oh gods and goddesses, how could he leave?”
She put her head in her hands and wept, her heart aching as it never had before. Dimly she was aware of Lor howling mournfully on one shoulder while Tisa, who had been hiding in her hair during Ty’s exit interview, cried piteously on the other.
They had all lost him, Ellina thought to herself. The three of them—the big Kindred had walked out on a bond so sacred it was meant to be broken only by death.
How could you leave us this way? she thought as fresh sobs wracked her. Oh, Ty—how could you?
Thirty-Seven
The corridor that led upward to the above-ground Docking area seemed very long. Ty had already packed his things and his ship was prepped and ready to fly. The rest of the Kindred guards who had been stationed here had already left. The Chorkay seemed to have their situation well in hand now, with no further need for help from their Kindred allies.
I suppose Commander Sylvan will send someone else—some diplomat—to stay here and continue the political relationship between our peoples, Ty thought dismally. Someone who doesn’t know Ellina like I do. I’ll probably be asked to brief him.
But what could he say to his replacement? Be respectful and follow their customs. Watch out for the High Priest—he’s a slippery bastard. Oh, and make sure you don’t fall in love with the Potentate.
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