by Viki Storm
I buck my hips, pushing myself against him, using his length to satisfy the deep craving inside me. I scream out as waves of pleasure overtake me, coming again and again, until they finally start to subside.
Ayvinx grabs my waist and pushes me farther onto the bed. He climbs on top of me, pressing his body against mine. Our legs are intertwined and I wrap my arms around his back, feeling his muscles tense with the exertion. “You are mine,” he says. “And I am yours.”
He groans as he releases into me, giving a little shudder before he collapses on the bed. He pulls me close and I let him. I’ve never been so exhausted in all my days. I get one of the furs from the foot of the bed and pull it up, covering our bodies underneath its cloaking warmth.
And before either one of us can say anything, we sleep. For a very long time.
I’d never thought that I’d want to be back on Zalaryx after all the times I swore that I was leaving—but I’m glad to be back. The opulent and ornate Fenda did not suit me—and suited me less after much of the capitol was reduced to a pile of ornate, opulent rubble.
I’ve asked Xalax for a temporary room in the Imperial Palace.
“So I can be close at hand for all the hearings and council meetings,” I told him. But that’s not the reason. The real reason is that I can’t bear to bring Jula to my dwelling, to have her meet my father and my sister. What would she think of me, coming from such a rotten family tree? She’d claim not to mind, and she’d compliment my prowess and noble heart, but she’d always have second thoughts about breeding with me. She would always wonder if her son would be weak to the drink like my father, or weak of the flesh like my sister.
We’re in bed, where we’ve been spending most of our time. I’ve had to give an accounting of my time on Fenda almost every day since I’ve been back. Every day it seems, some new blowhard in the capitol needs to hear once again what happened.
But we’re all back to normal. Mostly. There’s only one more piece of business I need to attend to.
There’s a knock at the door and Jula jumps. I put a hand on her arm and she relaxes. The wound on her wrist is healing well. She was attacked by a creature that could have only been a graboid when she was trying to escape the locked storeroom. The High Healer treated her himself and—after Jula was out of earshot—said that he’d never seen a graboid survivor before. They latch onto their host and can drain the blood from a full-grown Zalaryn in a matter of moments.
“I’ll get it,” I say.
I scour the ground for my breeches and find them across the room near the bathtub. Did I fling them over there? Or were we overtaken by passion while we bathed last night? I try to remember as I lace them up—and it comes to me. Jula was getting out of the bathtub and her hair was wet, clinging to the swell of her breasts. I was grabbed by the urge to put her nipple in my mouth, to suck the water from her hair. And after I did that, another funny idea struck me, as I saw the beads of water in the fluffy nest of her red pubic hair. I took her to the bed and parted her legs. I licked every drop of water from her lips, from her opening—from everywhere except her clit. I let that little part of her anatomy grow and swell from my teasing. Only when it had noticeably increased in size, and I could see it throb with the beat of her heart, did I finally draw it into my mouth and swirl my tongue around the protuberance. She was cursing my name for cruelty, but Jula relented fast enough when I started to lick.
I finish off the knot on my breeches—not wholly surprised to see that I’m more than halfway-hard from the memory of Jula laid out on the bed, nude and wet from the bathtub. I open the door and it’s a member of the Imperial Guard. “You are summoned to the abdication of King Xorba.” He holds out a small scroll, sealed with the imperial crest of the King.
“I know that,” I say. Snatching the little paper out of his hand. What a waste, to use an actual piece of paper to remind me of something I already remembered.
“Um,” he says. He looks very young, and I imagine he’s afraid of facing the wrath of Droka, the Commander of the Imperial Guard. “It started ten minutes ago.”
“Voidspawn,” I say. Time has been a slippery thing lately. “Okay. Thank you.”
I rush Jula out of bed and she quickly shrugs on a gown she’s made for this event. She looks so beautiful, right out of bed—as natural as the sunslight.
The appearance of Xalax’s assumed-dead father has complicated the royal dealings in the palace. I couldn’t give a heap of dung who the void-damned High King is, but apparently this is a deal of some consequence, as Xalax was already rightfully coronated.
Xorba, however, chose to abdicate. There’s some precedence for it in the lore of our planet, but I never could stay awake during my studies to learn the details.
Turns out, the party of raiders that Xorba led wasn’t killed. They merely got lost. They happened upon one of the fabled wormholes—the nexus of the universe where space and time merge, and one can travel great distances in the blink of an eye. Xorba claims that he commanded his navigator to pass through and when they came out the other side, they were in a hence-undiscovered quadrant of the universe.
(Though Xorba is now fond of referring to it as a quintrant rather than a quadrant.)
“There are at least five portions of the universe now,” he tells us, “at least that we’re aware of. Probably more. There are probably infinite strings of reality.”
I don’t even know what that means, but it’s best not to get him going on a tangent.
Xorba’s ship traveled and visited many other civilizations, but soon found that they couldn’t get back to our quadrant. Sorry, quintrant. The problem with melding time and space is that it can un-meld—and then the gateway is lost.
But Xorba found an advanced society who claimed mastery over the wormholes. They taught him many of their ways and how to wield a powerful new element. An element we never knew existed—a green, glowing element. He calls it xorbanium, because he’s a pompous ass and couldn’t help naming it after himself, but our most brilliant chemists have no idea what it is—though they’re eager to study and find out.
The xorbanium not only can fuel a spacecraft, but it can summon a wormhole. It can take that fabric of space and time and cut it up, stitch it together, and grant you passage. The whole thing makes my head hurt. It takes matter and the dark matter and antimatter and everything else and fuses their particles together on a level so small we don’t have names for it. “Even the particles have particles,” Xorba says, “and then those particles have particles.”
To hear him tell it, there’s this whole invisible world, so small and infinitesimal, that it almost drove him mad in his quest to understand it.
He studied with this civilization for over twenty years. Then he knew it was time to come back. The xorbanium could fuel their ships and be used as a weapon. When it fuses particles, it can travel great distances. When it splits the particles, the energy released is massive—as I saw first-hand in the mines.
But when Xorba returned, he was startled to see that less than a year had passed on Zalaryx. Imagine that? To be gone for twenty years, but only have it last a few months. No wonder he has that haunted, faraway look in his eyes.
But it delighted him. He wasn’t too late after all. Because he didn’t just bring back xorbanium.
He brought back a cure.
- - -
Half the planet of Zalaryx is packed into the throne room—and the other half is overflowing into the streets and adjacent walkways. Everyone wants to hear Xorba recount his strange journey. He tells it in a superbly dramatic fashion, but most of the Zalaryns are unconcerned with wormholes and the sub-sub-sub particles that make up the universe.
They want to know about the healing draught.
“To be distributed immediately,” he says, pausing while the entire crowd erupts in excited chatter, then quiets down almost as fast as they started talking—this is what everyone wants to know, after all. “Is a series of three doses of healing draught to every female Za
laryn.”
I have to cover my ears—the roar of the crowd is so loud. I look at my side and see that Jula’s eyes are filled with tears. This means a lot to her too. No longer will young women of Earth be Marked and sent to Zalaryx for breeding.
“The Sickness is cured!” he proclaims, and then bathes in the crowd’s approval. “Physical deformities, sadly, will remain—but the reproductive side-effects of the qizo minerals will be reversed—usually after the first healing draught.” More cheers from the crowd.
This means so much for us. We can thrive again. We can be self-sufficient again. Generations of males will not be excluded from siring children. Generations of females will not be locked away like a family’s shameful secret. Females now will hold much power in our society—there aren’t that many of them, since the healers give our pregnant Marked women draughts to ensure a male child. But it doesn’t always work, and at least twenty-five percent of our population is female. Now they’ll have their pick of the eligible male bachelors. Good for them.
“Effective immediately,” Xorba says, “we’ll cease to Mark and procure females from Earth—and any Marked female living in Zalaryx is required to leave our planet. They’ll be given safe transport back to Earth. Males in possession of such a female will be fairly compensated for the full market value of their loss.”
My stomach feels like it just filled up with hot oil. All Marked females are required to leave? I’m sitting close enough to the dais to see Xalax and Droka. Queen Resa’s face is a calm mask that gives away nothing. Droka and his mate, Aren, exchange a worried look, and I see him put his arm around her shoulders and draw her close. He puts a hand on her belly, and she seems to relax.
Me? I’m not worried a bit. There’s not a royal edict in any quadrant or quintrant that’s going to keep me away from Jula. I’ll go with her to Earth if I have to.
“No,” Xalax says. He’s risen from his seat at the right hand of the throne. He is technically not King, and currently has no authority, so I’m not sure what he plans to do, but he announces: “It will be the choice of the female if she wishes to stay.”
The crowd is confused. Most of them do not have a human female to breed with, so this is just all a bit of lovely drama unfolding on the stage for their amusement.
“This is absurd,” Xorba says. “It’s not their choice. They are our property and they are still our property. Those are the terms of the treaty with Earth. They don’t get to choose anything. We will breed with our own proud females and restore pure Zalaryn families.”
“We will restore Zalaryn families,” Xalax says, “but no female will be forced to leave.”
Just then, the Obsidian Queen stands and addresses Xorba. She might technically not be the Queen right now, but I don’t think the crowd knows it. Her manner and bearing are as royal as it gets. “I will not leave my mate,” she says directly to Xorba. “Our bond will not be broken by a ghost.”
“Nor will ours!” Aren stands and bores a look of defiance straight into Xorba.
Jula looks at me and I shrug. I know she can’t turn down an opportunity to stick it in the eye of authority. She stands and takes a few steps forward. “I, too, am no one’s property,” she says, her voice loud and clear as a bell.
And a strange thing happens. The crowd begins to cheer. I think we’ve known all along that using humans for breeding was wrong—we just felt like we had no other choice. Now that we’re presented with an alternative, we seek to repudiate the old ways. Disassociate ourselves from the atrocious behavior.
Jula slinks back to my side and I take her hand. “That was a lie,” she whispers to me. “I am your property.”
“Like the hellish void you are,” I say, but I can’t wipe the smile off my face. Not now—and I fear, not ever.
- - -
Gunga’s office looks smaller than I remember. Gunga too. Could I really have been afraid of this male?
I suppose it’s different now, since I have a satchel full of coin.
Jula is with me and I’m glad of it. I want her to see this. To know about why I’ve done the things I’ve done. I don’t fear Gunga’s reprisals. I don’t fear that he’ll take her from me—what a foolish thing for me to worry about. Did I really ever think that he posed a threat to her?
It’s hard to believe how much things have changed, but they have.
“Ayvinx, please tell me that this stunning creature is your offering to me. I would have males lined up out the door to take turns with her. They’d take her three at a time, just to have the chance to spill their seed inside her.”
I clasp the edge of the table and tip it over. His comm-panels and piles of coins crash to the ground. I take two strides and I’m at his throat. I dig my fingers into the soft, flabby flesh of his neck, feeling for his throat beneath. “The next word you speak ill about her will be your last. I have come to settle my debt.” I unhook the satchel and throw it on the ground. The coins spill out and roll everywhere. “I would just as soon not pay you, but I am a man of honor and I pay my debts—even if my father doesn’t.”
“I haven’t seen him around lately,” Gunga says, his voice a bitter rasp. “Is he doing well?”
“He is,” I say. “I’ve moved him and my sister outside the city. They’re raising livestock.”
“How quaint,” he says, “but how long until your father needs a drink? How long until your sister needs a little thrill beneath her robes?”
“She has been mated,” I say, “to the owner of the farm. I think she’ll be too exhausted every day to need much in the way of thrills.”
“My best customer and my best fuck—both gone in one fell swoop,” he says. He’s being defiant, but I don’t care. If my father and sister don’t respect themselves, I can’t expect anyone else to respect them either. Just as long as he leaves Jula out of it.
“If I ever see you again,” I say, “I will not be so kind.”
I take Jula’s hand and lead her out of there. It’s a long while before she can ask me what I know she’s been dying to ask.
“You borrowed money from him?” she asks.
“I did,” I say. “Several years ago. But it was my father’s debt. He has a drinking problem. And a gambling problem. And a whoring problem. He bet my sister’s virginity to a Ghenghari pirate in a game of blackstone. She was only fifteen. And he lost. I borrowed the money from Gunga to pay off the pirate. That was five years ago. Ever since then, I’ve been scrambling to pay it back—but my father keeps adding to the tab.”
“I thought… I mean…” She looks confused. “I thought that you said you spent your free time in taverns and brothels.”
“I did,” I say. “Trying to keep tabs on my father, trying to minimize his vice.”
“But you weren’t…?” And then she understands.
“Are you disappointed that I’m not the degenerate that you thought I was?” I say, and that smile is back.
“You keep surprising me,” she says, “and every time I can’t believe how lucky I am to have you.”
“It wasn’t luck,” I say. “Fate. Fate alone could be responsible for something so pure—something so much more powerful than any mortal being.”
I take her in my arms and give her a slow, luxurious kiss.
And I think that maybe Xorba is right—that time and space are one, and that every once in a while, we can get the particles to fuse—because when Jula’s in my arms, time stands still. Space does not exist.
It’s just us.
And forever doesn’t even begin to come close.
“Just a second,” I yell over my shoulder. That damned bell has been ringing all day. Though, as much as I feign annoyance, every time it does, it’s music to my ears.
“I need to place an order,” the voice says. “Leather breeches for a six-foot tall alien.”
“How about a shirt instead?” I say, taking my foot off the pedal. It’s Ayvinx. He still refuses to wear a shirt, even in the cold weather
“I don’t care what
planet we’re on,” he says, “It’s unnatural to wear a shirt.”
“Wait until January,” I say. I start up again, pumping the wheel of my sewing machine. Winter is coming and I have to get a lot of merchandise on the store’s shelves. My store. I actually have a store. The idea is so preposterous, I can’t believe it myself.
“What’s January?” he asks, and I have to laugh—mostly because I’m not sure if he’s joking or not.
We decided to leave Zalaryx. Not because the last royal edict of Xorba—that got overturned the second Xalax took back the throne. But because I felt the pull back to my home. Despite everything that’s happened, I still feel like this is my home. I’m not like Resa or Aren, who were able to finally feel like they belonged somewhere on Zalaryx.
I could have been happy on Zalaryx—the peace and contentment I feel with Ayvinx would exist no matter where we settle. But I don’t think he could have been happy on Zalaryx. That was a place he never felt like he fit in. Coming from such a horrible home life, he never thought he was as good as the other warriors—even though he proved that and more with his deeds on Fenda. It’s best for him to start anew—and there are plenty of opportunities for him on Earth.
Since the disintegration of the Marked breeding program, Earth has entered into an alliance with Zalaryx. Xalax has sent many ambassadors, chemists and healers to Earth, to help bring our planet up to more modern standards of civilization. Ayvinx is the commander of the Eastern Regional National Guard. He trains regimens of human and Zalaryn fighters side-by-side. Not that there’s much talk of war—but in this universe, you always have to be prepared.
“Are you ready?” he asks. “I have to leave early tomorrow morning, remember?”
“I know,” I say. I hate it when he travels, but it’s never more than a night or two. He needs to visit the other National Guard outposts from time to time. Sometimes, I even go with. But not now—I’m not up for a long train ride right now.
I tie off my thread and hold up the piece I’m working on. It’s small—only about three feet square. But it’s exquisitely soft. And pink.