Dane: A Scifi Alien Romance: Albaterra Mates Book 3

by Ashley L. Hunt

  I slipped and slid across the snow as I meandered down the mountain, not paying attention to where I was going or how to get back. I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to get back at all. In the heat of the moment, staying in the dormitories with grungy soldiers and the lecherous General actually sounded preferable to staying in a comfortable, gorgeous little cabin with an alien who would soon want me dead.

  But would he?

  I brushed a hand across my eyes and realized I was crying. The coursing adrenaline and winter chill had numbed my nerves, and I hadn’t felt the tears streaming down my cheeks, but, as I drew my hand away, I felt moisture on my palm and saw a sheen on my fingers. Part of my weeping was, I knew, from the sheer amount of rage I felt, but I also felt sorrow and grief. It was like I’d lost the Dane I’d become so infatuated with, like he’d been an illusion and now the real Dane had been presented to me in bitter fashion. How could I have ever harbored such feelings for someone that could consider wiping out my entire species for no other reason than fear?

  Then again, he’d expressly said he didn’t agree with the Council’s decision to attack Earth. And everything he’d said in their favor had been regarding their desire to ensure the safety of the A’li-uud, which, in and of itself, wasn’t a bad thing. Plus, he’d also told me he’d do what he could to get the Council to consider the peace treaty. Perhaps I was simply overreacting because of the high energy of the argument.

  I looked around and realized I’d descended most of the small mountain already. The sun was still high in the sky, but the valley in which I stood was surrounded by mountains on all sides and seemed shadowed. I was standing on a path similar to the one we’d walked from the ship—maybe it was the same one, but I couldn’t be sure—and wooden huts and houses were visible a short way away, arranged like a small town. Part of me wanted to venture toward them, but the logical side of my brain told me the A’li-uud there likely wouldn’t respond favorably to a human suddenly appearing in their midst, so I turned and proceeded in the opposite direction.

  It simply didn’t make sense to me that the highest authority of a race that proved itself to be intelligent, advanced, and worthy fighters could have made what Dane referred to as “a poor and uncompassionate decision.” Attempting to end an entire species was not a whim, a small error in judgment. It was cold, calculated, and bloodthirsty. Frankly, it reminded me of the Holocaust. The parallel was painful to draw because it reinforced Dane’s assertion that humans had done equally egregious things many times to other humans, but I couldn’t deny he was right. Then again, it didn’t justify the actions of the A’li-uud.

  What was more, I couldn’t have an outburst like the one I’d just had when I went before the Council. I had come to Albaterra solely to propose the peace treaty and convince the Elders to coexist in the universe with humans. Of course, since speaking with Emily, I was toying with the idea of bringing up cultural integration as well, but that was second to the treaty. Maybe—

  “Roxanne.”

  The voice stopped me in my tracks, and I whipped around. Snow flung from my boots in miniature arcs and landed in piles on the feet of another. I looked up and saw Lokos’ eyes staring back at me, his brow dropped in confused surprise.

  “Hello,” I said uncomfortably. “Sorry.”

  “What are you doing out here all alone?” Lokos asked, sounding slightly suspicious and equally concerned.

  I shifted my weight from one foot to the other and tried to avoid his gaze so he wouldn’t catch me lying. “I just needed some fresh air.”

  “Does Elder De’inde know where you have gone?”

  “No,” I admitted.

  Lokos straightened up and reached for my arm. I pulled back, but he was faster than I was and snagged my wrist before I could move out of reach. “You must return at once,” he said sharply.

  I tried to tug myself free of him and said, “No, really, I just want to be alone right now.”

  “You may be alone inside where you are watched.”

  “If I’m being watched, I’m not alone,” I pointed out.

  There was a split second in which I was certain Lokos was going to smirk, but his serious face remained serious, and he tugged on my arm. “Come. We must go back.”

  I sighed and resigned myself to allowing him to bring me back to Dane. We trudged side-by-side down the same path I’d just traversed alone in silence. Finally, I couldn’t bear the quiet. “Did you get the soldiers settled?” I asked, trying to sound conversational.

  “Yes,” Lokos answered. He glanced at me out of the corner of his eye. “Your General Morgan is very ungrateful.”

  “He’s not my General Morgan,” I immediately snapped.

  This time, I was sure I saw Lokos’ lips twitch. “Of course not. You belong to another.”

  “What?” I spun without warning, taking him by surprise and managing to twist my arm from his grasp. “I don’t belong to anyone!”

  “I meant no offense,” he said calmly. We had stopped walking and were standing several feet apart, facing one another.

  “I know what you meant,” I retorted. “You meant I belong to Dane.”

  Lokos said nothing, but the corners of his mouth continued to twitch, and his eyes seemed to grin mischievously. I had never seen him look so…human. He had always worn such a stiff mask of sobriety that to see any emotion from him was like seeing an entirely different A’li-uud.

  “Look, what you walked in on was just something that happened,” I hotly insisted. “We were caught up in the moment, I guess. I don’t know. We’re not together, though. We’re not a couple. There’s nothing between us. Okay?”

  Still, Lokos didn’t respond, and it infuriated me, but I also felt hot blush where my tears had been just a brief while ago. I sighed heavily.

  “Let’s just keep walking,” I said.

  He nodded in agreement, and we resumed strolling back toward Dane’s mountain. He allowed me to walk without his assistance, which I appreciated. Silence fell between us again, but my mind had suddenly become so occupied that it didn’t bother me. Thoughts tumbled through my head like clothes in a dryer, and I was struck with image after image.

  Dane’s set, angry face.

  Sparkling purple aspex.

  General Morgan’s nose gushing blood.

  A strong, muscled, pale blue body hovering over mine.

  I breathed in a quiet, sharp breath. No matter the state of our relationship, that was an image I could happily replay over and over in my mind. The feeling of my nipple in his mouth, the way his hand had so expertly pushed my buttons, the exquisite scent of him filling my senses…

  “No!”

  Lokos’ shout startled me so severely that I actually slipped to the ground, my leg curling beneath me at an unnatural angle and my hands scraping over ridged ice. A loud snap cracked through the air, instantly accompanied by shrieks of panic I recognized as my own. In front of me, Lokos was crouched in a strange, hunting-like pose, and he was looking around wildly at the sky like he was trying to locate a tiny bug. I tried to hoist myself up, but the ice was too slippery, and I fell back as more shrieks spilled from my throat.

  “Lokos!” I cried weakly, reaching forward to cling to his pant leg and get his attention. Before I could clutch the fabric in my fingers, however, I was yanked backward by an unseen force, and everything went black.

  23

  Dane

  She had been gone for hours. The sun had long since dipped beneath the horizon, and I’d scoured the immediate area around the cabin and nearby villages at least a dozen times. I’d been able to follow her footprints down my little mountain to the main path and even a short way after that, but the prints had become muddled by others, and some snow had drifted with the breeze, which made tracking more difficult. I had returned to my cabin only in hopes that she would show up there looking for me.

  She hadn’t, and now I had a thick ball of fear in my stomach that nothing seemed to ease.

  I paced the floor of my l
iving area repeatedly, my boots stomping against the hewn wood, leaving damp tracks of melted snow. The fire I’d built before our argument was still crackling, and I resented it for its cheerfulness. Nothing should be cheerful right now. Roxanne was missing.

  My ears pricked as I heard a noise outside, and my heart leaped into my throat as my front door burst open. Almost instantly, my elation collapsed back into despair again as my gaze fell on Silah. He was slightly out of breath and looked more than a little worried.

  “What?” I demanded in A’li-uud, my pulse quickening. “What has happened? Where is she?”

  “You have been summoned to Forum,” he replied.

  I blinked at him. “What are you talking about? I cannot go to Forum right now; Roxanne is gone!”

  “Elder Du’ciact said Roxanne was brought to P’otes-tat Ulti. Lokos was with her,” Silah explained, trying to sound reassuring in the midst of my panic. “He said you are to report immediately.”

  A sensation unlike one I’d ever felt before filled me from my littlest toe to the tip of my scalp. Relief, bewilderment, and indignation were the most recognizable of the emotions, but there were others mixed in to create a cocktail of incomprehensibility. I found myself thanking the Grand Circle over and over in my mind for allowing Lokos to be with Roxanne when she was brought to P’otes-tat Ulti, because, in all likelihood, she would be terrified.

  “Thank you,” I said to Silah.

  He nodded and left, and I followed him out. Before I’d taken more than two steps outside, I turned my face upward and jumped.

  P’otes-tat Ulti was the Elder City located at the single point where every Albaterran kingdom met. It was a sacred place meant exclusively for the Council. Forums, trials, and Elderhood ceremonies were held within its towering walls. It was also the location where the order for the attack on Earth had been given.

  I had only been to the Elder City twice: the first time for my father’s coronation into Elderhood, the second for my brother’s. Ceremonies were the only circumstances under which civilians were permitted into P’otes-tat Ulti, with the exception of trials when defendants were brought in for questioning and sentencing. It had always seemed an ominous, foreboding place to me as a young A’li-uud. Even in the midst of the afternoon, it had a darkness to it that I’d never liked. Now, as an adult and an Elder designate, it was no less foreboding but certainly less intimidating, and I approached the massive gate with squared shoulders.

  “Elder De’inde—” I began, addressing the guard who stood at the gate’s hinges.

  “I know who you are,” he interjected, staring me dead in the eye with a less-than-friendly expression. “And you are no Elder yet.”

  The animosity I received from him was so unexpected that I didn’t even have time to respond to him with the scorn I ordinarily would have. Instead, I gaped wordlessly at him as he opened the gate and motioned me inside with a broad sweep of his arm. When I walked past him, he slammed the gate behind me and resumed his post, his chin tilted upward imperiously.

  P’otes-tat Ulti had one particular feature famous around Albaterra: its grand entrance doors. They were two of the finest constructs ever to be seen on the planet, and they were, perhaps, the greatest symbol of our race’s unity. Standing well over twice my height, they towered over the path leading to them like imposing faces, leering at any who approached. I was fascinated by those doors, no less so in my highly anxious state as I approached them than I had been during my prior visits. They were made of materials from each Albaterran kingdom, giving them an asymmetrical appearance that added to their magnificence. Swirling, flourished wood from the rainforests was lined with brooches of sparkling aspex.

  Hicorn horns from Campestria curved in elegant arcing frames. Beads of shells from Maquaria glittered in uneven increments, offset by the dull, rich tones of serpent bones from Dhal’at. If I hadn’t been under time constraints and desperate to know Roxanne’s status, I would have been happy to stand and admire those doors through the night.

  As I reached for one, however, a short, slender A’li-uud appeared from the side of the great stone building. “You are to enter this way, please,” he said in a high-pitched voice. Had it not been for the fringe of facial hair along his chin, I would have thought him to be a child.

  I followed his motioning hand, and he led me to a side door I had never seen before. It was a simple, ordinary door, nothing to rival that of the front, and it opened into a room I didn’t know P’otes-tat Ulti contained. The walls were made entirely of stone and seemed to curve in a circular shape, giving the room the illusion of smallness when, in fact, it was actually rather expansive. There were several chairs, all hard-seated with tall backs, and bookshelves that bent with the walls. The ceiling was extremely low—I could have reached up and touched it without effort—but it didn’t add to the cramped feeling of the space.

  Opposite the door I’d entered was a second door, this one just as simple and unimpressive. I walked toward it and wrapped my hand around the knob, but it didn’t turn. There were voices speaking A’li-uud on the other side, though, and I held my breath to hear them more clearly.

  “…have lost control of everything. Nothing has been…”

  “…cannot possibly believe we would consider…”

  “…do what we should have done from the beginning…”

  “He will never allow it.” I recognized this voice. It was Duke, his deep, coarse timbre cascading throughout the room and pressing through the separation of the door to my ear. “He would die before he would permit her death.”

  The hairs on the back of my neck stood up as I realized what they were talking about, and fresh waves of anger rolled through my stomach. I clenched my teeth and cupped my hand around my ear to better hear the conversation.

  “…against us, what other choice do we have? If his loyalties are with her, he must face the consequences that come with such a commitment.”

  “You are talking about my brother!” Duke’s swell of consternation flooded hot in my ear, and I immediately felt a surge of gratitude toward him. Our fight had clearly done nothing to splinter the bonds of brotherhood between us. “I do not know if his loyalties are with her, but, even if they are, my loyalties are still with him! I will not allow him to be harmed, no matter the reason!”

  “You speak out of bias, Du’ciact,” said another. I recognized this voice as well; it belonged to Vi’den, one of the oldest and longest-reigning Elders on the current Council. He was known as a kind A’li-uud and widely respected for his wisdom. “You, yourself, did not fulfill your duties for the love of a human.”

  I gripped the knob and tried to turn it again, determined to get into that room and say what needed to be said, but it still wouldn’t give.

  “Emily has never compromised my love of the A’li-uud,” Duke retorted. “As I am certain Tabitha has never done of Rex, nor Roxanne of Dane. I know my brother, Vi’den. His priority has always been and always will be the safety of our people. The love of a woman, human or not, could not change that.”

  I tried rattling the knob, infuriated by everything I was hearing and incensed by the last part. Never had I said I loved Roxanne, but here they were, the entire Council, holding a Forum in which my supposed love was evidently an important topic.

  “We can argue about this all night long, but we have gathered here with a purpose,” Vi’den said sagely. “We are here to address the humans’ request for a peace treaty.” There was a pause. “Please bring in our guests.”

  I heard footsteps, and bumps rose on my skin as I recognized the sound of Roxanne’s light gait. She was so near, but I couldn’t get to her. Then, I heard something that made my stomach drop to my knees.

  “Council,” Vi’den announced, “we welcome tonight Roxanne Rigby, Ambassador of Alien Relations, and General Rodney P. Morgan.”

  24

  Roxanne

  The room I was escorted into by a young A’li-uud was completely round and very dark. The ceiling was noth
ing more than a large glass dome, allowing an exquisite view of the abundant star-scene above, and the walls were of the same stone as the holding room in which I’d been kept. Eleven chairs more reminiscent of thrones than normal seats were placed in a perfect circle at exactly even increments from one another, and a tall torch with a bright, flickering flame was featured between each chair. At the very center of the room was a platform that looked like it could have served as a pit for a bonfire, but atop it, there was a sturdy piece of something akin to concrete. It was on this platform General Morgan and I were told to stand.

  It was eerie to be in the middle of a strange room with white eyes on every side of me. It was even stranger to try and figure out which direction to face. That question was quickly answered, though, when an aged A’li-uud with hair longer than any I’d seen thus far said serenely, “Please bring Elder designate De’inde Et’Petrum Montem’tribus in, as well.”

  I stopped breathing for a moment as the A’li-uud who’d brought me in left the chamber by way of a different door. I’d had no idea Dane was here as well, but the knowledge instantly alleviated my nerves. In their place, however, rose anger, bitter and hot on the back of my tongue.

  General Morgan stood beside me. He was very tense, his muscles flexed, and his jaw jutted forward in such a way that it made his lower lip appear to be pouting. While we’d been waiting to be summoned, he’d made several attempts to speak to me, but I’d ignored each one. I had no interest in conversing with him, especially when he made it known he was the reason I’d been brought there in the first place.

  After everything had gone black, I’d felt myself flying through the air the same way I did when Dane wind traveled with me. When I’d landed, the mask had been removed from my face, and I’d been brought into the holding room without explanation. Morgan was already there, but they took Lokos elsewhere, and I hadn’t heard about his whereabouts since. For what felt like many hours, I’d been left to sit in the stone room with the General and no explanation. Now that I was able to glance up at the transparent dome overhead, the velvety black sky made it evident I'd been kept waiting for nearly half the day.