He turned her in his arms and held her, stroking her hair and back until she was cried out and went limp in his arms. He needed to find some way to make her understand, but he knew she never would, and he could not blame her for it. What he had done could not be forgiven. She sniffled and buried herself in him. He had never before realized the gravity of the decision to let the explorers take the females. He was rather ashamed that he hadn’t even considered it much of an issue at the time. He was fighting a war and there seemed so many other pressing matters, he hadn’t given this issue the thought it most definitely needed. For that, he felt quite ashamed.
“I profoundly apologize.”
He had not meant to speak aloud, but when she put her head up and pierced him with her blue eyes, he realized he had. He released her. She seemed over whatever had happened before, and he didn’t think she planned to run away again, at least not at the moment.
“Naveenah, I have done you a great disservice.” He shook his head, all the ways he had altered her life spilling over his mind. “I could make excuses. I have excuses.” He reached out and grazed her cheek with his fingers, quite possibly seeing her for the first time. “But you deserve better.”
Whatever he would say next had to be exactly right. He needed her to know that he was sincere. Not because he wanted to mate with her or because he wanted to manage her so she would not attempt to run again, but for his own soul. He suddenly needed her forgiveness to go on at all.
“My apology before, at the camp, it was just so you’d do what I wanted, but now I see how wrong I have been. You have humbled an arrogant man.”
He dropped down on one knee before her, taking her hand and looking up at her.
“Naveenah, I should not have given my consent to the council. Not because it was a bad idea, because I am still convinced that this can work, but because I changed the lives of a large group of females and the people who knew and loved them. That decision should have weighed heavier on my mind and heart than it did at the time. A good ruler gives more thought to life-altering decisions, and in that, I failed you. For this, and for every night you spent cold, alone, scared, and for every night anyone who loved you cried for you, I give you my abject, but sincere, apology and pray you will deem to forgive me.”
He bowed his head to her and hoped he would hear the words he needed from her. He prayed for absolution.
Chapter Eight
Some moments in life seem so surreal and so out of the ordinary that you find yourself wondering if dreams can intrude into waking life. Naveenah recognized this as one of those moments.
She had completely lost it moments before and still felt drained. Perhaps that had caused her to hallucinate, but the meltdown had been a long time coming. Surprised at how much better she felt, she placed her hand on the king’s head as he bowed before her. In all her life, she could count the number of apologies she’d heard on one hand. None had been like his, however.
The pain in his eyes, the remorse in his tone—these things had captured her attention from the beginning, and she hadn’t been able to ignore him or just push his words away like the last time he made his fancy speech of an empty promise. This man, this king, bowed before her, awaiting her pardon for his crimes. She could not give it easily. She thought of that first night when they had all arrived here. She thought of how frightened some of the women were and of the women who died who, had they been left alone, would probably live to this day. She put her palm beneath his chin and forced him to look up at her.
“Their deaths are on your head. How can I possibly forgive you that?”
He stood and looked at her with an intensity that commanded attention. “I cannot be forgiven this. But I am king, with many deaths on my head. I must bear them best I can. You must, however, understand that there is often no solution that does not involve someone’s demise. Life is a fickle thing and the best anyone can do, the best a king can do, is look out for the welfare of as many as he can.”
He scrubbed his hand over the light beard growing on his chin and turned from her.
“Naveenah, I love my people. Their care rests on my shoulders. I have taken on the responsibility of leader, and I take that seriously, and more, I treasure the position.” He turned back to her, his eyes lit with a fire she hadn’t seen before. “I wanted to be king. Since I was a child, I wanted to rule Vaturia. Of course those were boyhood dreams that my father took great pains to point out could never come true as the Vraigor had wiped out the royal bloodlines and at the time our society was run by the Hruang council. None of it mattered to me though, in my soul, I knew one day she would be mine to lead. She’s been through hell and she’s nearly destroyed, but I see life in her still, and I want to bring that life back, but I don’t want it like it was before. I want to build a world where people and planet both thrive. We built up our cities and supported our people’s convenience while destroying our planet. I intend to do things differently this time.”
He rushed to her, grabbed her hand, and pulled her along the cliff’s edge. She should have wondered if he’d gone mad and was about to send them both over the cliffs to their deaths, but she felt oddly safe with him now. The ocean roared below, white caps breaking on the aquamarine water. The salt in the air filled her with wonder. She’d read about that smell, but never actually experienced it before.
“I believe this planet has come back to support us. I intend to honor her. I intend to build a kingdom that respects the soil from which she came. It is my destiny.”
She looked up at him as he looked out over the ocean. He truly believed everything he was saying. The passion dripped from every word. This was not the man she had thought he would be. All the years she’d been kept in the camp, she assumed their ruler was heartless. A beast! Listening to him speak of his love for his people and the planet they lived on showed her a man who, though flawed and whose decision had hurt her desperately, may have in fact been a good man. A strong man of conviction and passion and determination to do whatever it took to save his people…even if that meant callously changing the lives of all the women taken by his people.
She would never say it was okay that he’d done it, but now she thought she could be coming to understand why he’d done it. She closed her eyes. She could see that there might come a day where she would give him the absolution he craved, but first she would need to release from her soul the pain and the hatred she had stoked for him, and that would take time.
“I know what I ask of you is not fair. And I know I can never make up for all you have lost.” He turned, cupping her face in his hands, searching her eyes with his. “But if you can forgive me, I will make your happiness my every concern. I will go to the ends of Vaturia to fill your every want or need. I will do anything within my power to earn your trust and, if I may be so bold, your respect.”
She choked back tears, surprised by the emotion she felt and the tenderness.
“Will you take me and the others home?”
She knew the answer to the question before she even asked it, but it seemed a question that must be asked. What surprised her was that if she hadn’t been so certain of his answer, she was not so certain she would have asked the question. Now she held her breath awaiting his answer.
“I cannot.” He released her and took a step back. “Our situation remains the same. We need your help to restore our race.”
“That’s so idiotic. I mean, if we were somehow able to bear your children, they wouldn’t be Vaturian, they’d be half human, don’t you see that?”
“I do. But half Vaturian is better than none at all. Naveenah, don’t you see?” He took her hands in his and held them tight. “Together we can build a new race. One that learns from the pasts of both our people. Together, we can build a utopia for our descendents. Your children, Naveenah, will be leaders of this planet. You must admit, it has such beauty. It is not a bad place to live. I can show you such things. The Falls of Nureen. The lightning fish in Suron Lake. The delicate petals of a meadow
full of wildflowers. Let me show you wonders. This place is not bad, Naveenah. If you would dare consent to call it home, I would find a way to make you happy—I swear it.”
He made such a zealous plea that she nearly fell into the fantasy without thought. However, what of her mother, her friends, her job?
Her mother might very well be dead now. She hadn’t been well, and time had passed. Her friends consisted of some online game players and a cat named Rufus, and her job…pushing buttons on a machine that did the real work for ten hours a day. So maybe those weren’t good arguments, but what about simply what was right?
She did not belong on his planet. She belonged on hers…but then she looked around her. The ocean, the mountains, the trees, the grass—she had never seen grass before, only heard of it. Earth had once claimed many natural wonders, but nearly all had been destroyed before her birth and she’d been born and raised in the ancient city of Chicago where the river flowed with mostly mud and trash, and the water had to be died a deep blue so as not to be a deep sludgy green from all the chemicals pumped into it.
“It is beautiful here.”
She thought of home. In a year she’d be back in her little apartment. As crazy as it sounded, she wondered if she would think of this moment with the same melancholy she’d been feeling about home for the past four years.
“I was merely an infant when the occupation ended, but as I grew and I heard the stories of longing for a way of life that no longer existed and I saw the cruelty being unleashed by the council put in place to lead us, I knew in my soul I had to save her. Yes, I may have been too bullheaded and narrow focused, but she needed me in a way…”
He drifted off, and she could tell from the expression on his face that he was no longer there with her, but lost in a memory. Though she could see his side of things, even empathize, she wasn’t sure she could commit to what he asked of her.
“To be clear. You are asking me to stay forever?”
He turned to her, his head tilted to the side. She saw the moment when Antares became the king again. It was shocking the change in him. He was hard, fortresslike in his stance.
“I could never allow your children to leave. You would need to understand that.”
He was a fascinating man, both tender and compassionate, yet strong and unbending. She could see his vision with such clarity, but to give him what he wanted, she would have to let go of everything she’d been clinging to all these years. What if she could never make it work? What if her unhappiness made him and any children they might have miserable as well? There just seemed to be too many undetermined factors.
“I will agree to consider what you have asked. That’s all I can do right now.”
He brought her hand to his lips and pressed a kiss to her knuckles. “You honor me. I will see to it that you never regret it.”
She hoped he could, but she had always been one to believe that a person had to be responsible for their own happiness, so she sure as hell wasn’t going to wait on him for it. She did, however, have one last thing to give him. She drew a breath, for despite all that had transpired between them, this was still not easy.
“And, Antares,”—She hesitated, but then saw it through—“I will forgive you.”
She said it with her lips, but did not feel it yet in her soul and prayed the decision to release him would not be the biggest mistake of her life, but she didn’t see how they could go forward from here without it. He went down on bended knee before her again, bowing his head.
“I will see to it you never regret that, either.”
He got back to his feet. Her nerves were wound tight. She was about to start on completely uncharted territory and had no idea where she would end up. She was putting all her faith and trust in a man she knew little of, but in her heart, it truly felt the only option.
“Come.” He held his hand out to her. “We should continue on our journey.”
He gathered up their supplies and led her back to the horses. When she had mounted, he caressed her thigh as he looked up into her eyes.
“If you approve, you are about to see your new home. The home where we will raise our children and begin our legacy.”
She had no words for him. What he said seemed so enormous, there could be no proper response, so she simply smiled. As they rode off down the path she wondered, though, if it could be true, and as the fortress he’d been speaking of finally came into view, her heart nearly stopped. On the edge of a cliff, a large stone castle that looked as if it had been rotting for a millennium rose out of the ground. It was a scene straight out of Camelot, and it took her breath clean away.
They slowed their horses as they came near. Now she could see the people working—stones being piled, logs being cut. With all the activity, it resembled a well-choreographed dance.
“Very impressive.”
Antares helped her down from the horse, but she had a hard time pulling her gaze away from the castle. It sat on a cliff, very much like the one she’d just stood on with him where they’d made their strange pact. She ran to the edge, and this time when Antares ran right behind her, it wasn’t because he was chasing her. It was more childlike enthusiasm, and she felt so free. The ground beneath her feet was damp, and her boots sank into it. When she reached the edge, the view was even more stunning than the last one. Bold, jagged rocks played in the turquoise water below, causing it to swirl around them and erupt into splashes of white water high into the air. The sound was beautiful, and the spray nearly reached where they stood. Naveenah started to get a feeling for how momentous what she was agreeing to really was. She began to feel contrite for her previous attitude.
She looked around, seeing the people for the first time. There were two men working together to raise buckets to the second story using a pulley, and a group of women sat on the grass weaving fabric through a large wooden structure. A scattering of other men had formed an assembly line to haul stones from a rubble pile into the structure. Their clothing was rudimentary, dull in coloring, and they didn’t speak much, except to call out what sounded like needs and orders, in a language she didn’t comprehend. Each person she saw represented even more. Families whose long, rich history was dying out and whose king had been so desperate to save, that he’d resorted to kidnapping. His crime really didn’t seem as heinous when viewed from his side. Still, she had valid feelings, and as of this moment, she was the only voice left for the others. Nothing was as simple as it had seemed a mere few hours before. A tear slipped down her cheek. Her soul felt drained from fighting. In the end, she realized she was not a victim to a superior race. She was, in fact, their savior.
Could she let this go? Could she step outside of the pain and fear of four years and trust this man? After the day they had just spent together, she could see him in an entirely different light—not as a dictator, but as a man. A handsome man that, if he’d been a human male on Earth, any woman in her right mind would have wanted—dark, thick, wavy hair, ripped biceps and enormous chest. Knowing his brother’s endowment, she wondered briefly if that was a genetic trait the two men shared. Something told her it probably was.
She stepped into him, running her hand along his chest to his shoulder. She cupped his cheek in her palm, feeling his heat seep into her. She stared up into his eyes and felt the spark of desire kick her. Conceivably this could work for them. Her head spun. It was too much. To go from prisoner to being with Nikolai, and now Antares, it didn’t make sense, but oh, she was so lonely, and bone tired of being angry and afraid. Was it wrong to want to just fall into a man’s arms for a while and stop being lonely? Maybe it was only wrong if the man in question was Antares.
The things he said back in the meadow still played on her heart and mind. He seemed to have a prejudice against her race, despite how desperately he needed her. Regardless of how she felt or how her head was spinning, she needed some answers from him, and she wasn’t going to let him get away with not answering, either.
“Antares, my feelings are…conf
used—to say the least—but if I agreed…Do you think you will be able to find me attractive? Despite the fact that I’m not Vaturian, do you think you can find being with me pleasurable? Can you desire me the way you would another mate? I need to know, Antares. And I need the truth, because I will not simply provide you with a body to slake your needs or a test tube to incubate your young. I require more.”
Chapter Nine
Antares could not understand how he had missed seeing this moment coming. From childhood he was known for refusing to see things any way other than how he wanted them to be. Then something would force the issue and he would be stuck staring a truth in the eyes that he never wanted to deal with.
The fact of the matter was, from the very first moment he laid eyes on Naveenah, he had gone hard and half-crazy with lust and desire for her. Every night since, he had wakened from erotic dreams, so aroused that he had to take care of himself before he could sleep again.
He supposed he could tell her all this and give her exactly what she wished for, but it was more complicated than that. His rampant lust for a human mortified him, so he had avoided her. Ashamed that not a single Vaturian had ever excited him the way she did, he felt like a traitor to his race and every female he had been with before her. This sense of dishonor drove him to keep the human female as far away from himself as possible and to constantly remind himself of all the ways she was inferior to his own race.
Now here he was, the time of reckoning, and he had to decide how he would answer her. It felt, though, like his choice was either to honor her or honor his own people—not a great spot to be wedged in. He needed her, but how could he live with himself if he told her how he truly felt? He worried about what would happen if he ever kissed her, ever allowed his fingers to trace over her creamy skin or allow his tongue to taste her.
To Love a King [The Reformation 1] (Siren Publishing PolyAmour) Page 8