Emily smiled for the first time since she left the Avitras. “I might just come with you sometimes.”
He put his arm around her shoulder. “That would be great, and we wouldn’t have border patrolling to interfere with our time together. We could just enjoy ourselves.”
She settled into his embrace. “It sounds perfect.”
They listened to the fire hissing through the logs. The stars blazed overhead, but there was no aurora. “What do you think you’ll do back in the city?”
Emily shifted her weight. “I don’t know. I haven’t given myself a chance to think about it. I’ve got a lot of skills. I suppose I’ll show up to the labor pool like everybody else and see what they have available for me. I’ll do just about anything as long as I’m not in the military.”
“That rules out practically about every job on their books,” he told her.
“Aria works in the infirmary,” Emily pointed out. “I’m sure there are plenty of civil jobs I could do. Young people need teaching, budgets need balancing—it’s a regular city full of people trying to live their lives. That takes work.”
He breathed into her hair. “You’ll find your place.”
“And you’ll be there,” she went on. “I won’t be alone.”
“You wouldn’t be alone either way,” he pointed out. “You made friends with Aria and her family. You have a base to start with. In a way, you have more waiting for you back in Harbeiz than I do.”
“What do you mean?” she asked. “You’ve been living there all your life.”
“I’ve never had a home of my own there,” he replied. “I’ve been in and out like a vagrant. I don’t have any real friends there. Maybe that’s why I never wanted to go back. All my friends are on the border patrol.”
She wrapped her arms around his chest and held him close. “I’ll protect you.”
He chuckled under his breath. “Thank goodness for that. I couldn’t handle it if you didn’t.”
She lifted her face to him, and they shared a long kiss. The fire warmed them against the crisp night air at their backs.
He pulled away. “We should go to sleep. We have a long hike ahead of us tomorrow.”
Emily pulled their blankets around them, and they stretched out next to the fire. Faruk took her in his arms again. The pleasant warmth of the fire and his protective presence made her drowsy. She closed her eyes and floated into a dreamy haze.
She gazed down from above over the whole territory she’d covered. Lycaon territory with its low huts and its welcoming fires lay to the southeast. Avitras territory, where Aquilla and his men still searched for Frieda, lay to the west. And Ursidrean territory, with its vibrant city, lay to the north. Harbeiz blazed in the distance with a thousand electric lights, and a beacon of hope and contentment called her back to it.
Her future beckoned to her, with children tumbling around her feet and meaningful work drawing her into a community of purposeful people. And the whole blessed vision came from Faruk. It stemmed from the fountain of her love and connection with him. He fed it and nurtured it and gave it life.
She opened her body and soul to him, and embraced him and the vision and the life that came out of him. He planted the seeds of it in her, and between them, it became real.
Chapter 14
Chris shaded her eyes from the sun. She gazed over the trackless expanse of forest all the way back into Lycaon territory. “There it is. It’s good to be home.”
“We aren’t home yet,” Turk replied. “We have some long miles to put behind us before we get back to the village.”
Chris started forward. “Then we better get moving. The day’s not getting any younger.”
Emily wasn’t looking that way, though. She fixed her eyes on the horizon to the north. “Somebody’s coming.”
Chris spun around. “Where?”
Emily pointed. “It looks like they’re coming from Harbeiz.”
“What?” Chris asked.
“The Ursidrean capital city,” Emily explained. “And it’s a lot of them coming. Look at the dust cloud.”
Faruk squinted into the distance. “It looks like the army coming out, and they’re heading toward the west.”
Emily stiffened. “That’s Felsite territory.”
“They’re invading again,” Turk growled. “I always knew they would.”
“They can’t be,” Emily exclaimed. “Donen swore off attacking other factions. I heard him say so himself.”
Faruk shook his head. “It looks like he lost out to the Supreme Council after all. I wondered if he would have the power to stand against them, but I guess every Alpha has a limit. He can’t contravene his own people.”
Emily whirled away. “This can’t be happening, not when we’re coming home with the news that peace is possible. We have to do something to stop them.”
Faruk walked after her. “What can we do? If the army is set on invasion, they won’t stop for two people.”
Emily waved both arms. “We can’t let this happen. We have to intercept them and tell them what we know. If they invade the Felsite again, one or both factions could be utterly destroyed. Maybe the Supreme Council doesn’t know it, but Donen does. He can’t let the Ursidrean people fall like this, and we have to do what we can to stop it. This could be our only chance.”
Faruk caught up to her and caught her by the hand. “Wait a minute, Emily. Stop and think.”
She rounded on him. “I am thinking. If we don’t stop this, there won’t be a Harbeiz to go back to. There won’t be an Ursidrean faction. We’re the only ones who can carry this information to them in time to stop the invasion.”
Chris stepped forward. “I’m coming with you. We can tell Donen the Lycaon are in the same boat. If we convince him all the other factions have the same shortage of men, we could stop the war before it starts. We could be the only ones who can convince him.”
Turk came to Chris’s side. “If we’re going to do this, we have to move fast. At the speed they’re moving, that column will cross into Felsite territory before the end of the day. We won’t get there in time by walking.”
“What can we do?” Emily asked.
Chris smiled. “We can run.”
Emily stared at her. “Run—there? It must be fifty miles.”
“We can make it,” Chris told her. “We’ve done it before.”
“You might,” Faruk replied, “but Emily and I can’t. For one thing, I’m too big and heavy to move that fast and Emily hasn’t had the physical conditioning to do it. You’ve built up to it over months of practice, Chris, and Turk comes to it naturally. But we can’t do it. We’ll have to find another way to get there.”
“We could go ahead of you,” Chris suggested. “We could run there and stop the column and you could catch up.”
Faruk shook his head. “It won’t work. If you and Turk tried to reason with Donen, you could make him even more determined to carry out this course of action. No, the information has to come from an Ursidrean, an Ursidrean who has been inside Lycaon territory and Avitras territory and seen the situation for himself. Donen has been a close friend of mine for years. I’ve advised him on the border situation dozens of times, and now I’ve personally spoken to the Lycaon Alpha and with the Avitras Captain of the Border Guard. He’ll listen to me.”
“You still haven’t explained how you’re going to get there in time,” Turk pointed out.
Emily gazed over the countryside. Then her arm shot out. “There!”
Her friends followed her pointing finger to a black line chiseled in the landscape. Faruk sucked his breath between his teeth. “You’re not serious!”
“It’s our only chance,” Emily told him. “We have to try it.”
“Excuse me,” Chris interrupted, “but what are you talking about?”
“Look,” Emily told her. “There’s a pass cutting between Ursidrean territory and Felsite territory. It leads to that escarpment betwe
en the two territories. We can follow the pass and intercept the column before it crosses the border.”
“Are you sure?” Chris asked. “How can you tell from here?”
“Emily is right,” Faruk told her. “I know all the Ursidrean borders, and this pass does cut through the two territories. It will lead us around in front of the column so they have to meet us before they cross the border.”
“Let’s go.” Emily started forward, and Faruk fell in at her side. He took her hand.
Chris called after them, “Hey, wait a minute!”
“We don’t have a minute to wait,” Emily called back. “If you’re coming, let’s go. We can’t run there. This is our only option.”
Chris and Turk exchanged glances. Then Turk shrugged and he and Chris caught up with them. They walked two by two down the hill. “I sure hope you know what you’re doing. I was looking forward to going back to the village.”
Emily called over her shoulder. “You don’t have to come. You can go back if you want to.”
“This is Angondran history in the making,” Chris replied. “I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”
They wound their way through the trees. “How can we find the pass in this forest?” Emily asked. “We won’t know if we’re heading the right direction.”
“I know how to find it,” Faruk told her. “The river that cuts through the pass has its headwaters at the bottom of this mountain. All we have to do is get down this mountain and follow the water down. It will lead us to the pass, and the river cuts through Felsite territory on its way to the sea. The column won’t be able to enter Felsite territory without crossing the river.”
His hand gave Emily all the confidence she needed. She picked her way down the mountain with a light step, but after an hour or two, they couldn’t walk side by side anymore. She let go of Faruk’s hand and would have fallen behind him, but he hung back and let her take the front position. This was her mission. She struck out through the trees.
The forest crowded thick around them so they had to turn sideways to squeeze between the trunks. They ducked through tangles of shrubs until the hill fell away at their feet in steep ravines. Faruk gazed down into a dark canyon. “You wouldn’t run down that.”
“What now?” Chris asked.
Emily cocked her head. “I can hear water down there.”
Faruk waved his hand. “This way. We can follow the ravine until we find a place to get down.”
“The pass will only get steeper,” Emily pointed out. “We could see that black cut from all the way at the top of the mountain. That means the walls were pretty high.”
“They are,” Faruk replied. “But that’s a way’s off. We can get down to the water farther along.”
Emily dropped behind him. He knew the terrain better than anybody. He kept to the ridge until, sure enough, the ravine softened and sloped down to the river through rolling hillsides. The party found a well-made path running by the water’s edge.
Turk tasted the water and smacked his lips. “Good. I guess the Ursidreans can’t be all bad if they have territory like this.”
Faruk laughed. “What did you think? Did you think our territory was all caves and rotting logs?”
Turk shrugged. “Something like that.”
“We all have a lot to learn about each other,” Faruk replied.
“What will we do if no one listens to us and our people are torn apart by war again?” Turk asked.
Faruk looked away, but the two men kept walking side by side. “We won’t let that happen. As long as Alphas like Caleb are willing to listen to reason, there’s always hope. We just have to convince Donen and Renier.”
“And Aquilla,” Emily added. “He hates the Ursidreans more than anything. He could be the hardest to convince.”
Chris came to her side, and they walked shoulder to shoulder behind the men. “I’ve been thinking about what you said.”
“What did I say?” Emily asked.
“You said that we, the human women, had the best chance of bringing peace to this planet,” Chris replied. “We’re neutral in all these petty wars and conflicts, and we’re in every faction.”
“Except the Aqinas,” Emily returned.
“But the Aqinas aren’t at war with anybody,” Chris replied. “Marissa told me they usually act as negotiators for peace when the other factions are fighting.”
“Aria told me,” Emily countered, “the Aqinas are the instigators of the wars sometimes. She said they can start a war without anybody knowing, and then they intervene to bring about peace in a way that favors their interests. She spent some time with the Felsite before she mated with Donen, and Renier told her the Aqinas benefited the most from the other factions staying in constant conflict. If it’s true, they could be our biggest problem, especially since they have no human women among them.”
Chris frowned. “If that’s true.”
“Do you know anything about the Aqinas?” Emily asked.
Chris shook her head. “No one knows anything about them. It’s the same problem of ignorance and prejudice. Everyone imputes motives to everyone else because they know nothing about their motives. Everything you just told me could be prejudice against them by the Felsite.”
Emily shrugged. “Maybe.”
Chris sighed. “I don’t understand why we all can’t live in peace. It’s bad enough living so many miles away from your friends, but when our factions are fighting and hostile border patrols are keeping you even farther apart, it breaks my heart.”
“Me, too,” Emily replied. “I feel at home with the Ursidreans and I want to go home to Harbeiz with Faruk, but not until I’ve done everything I can to keep us safe and secure—and I mean all of us, all of Angondra.”
Chris pressed her hand. “I feel the same way. I don’t want to go home and rest until I’ve done everything there is to do to make this world the best it can be for my children.”
Emily gazed straight ahead. “You’re lucky.”
Chris stared at her. “Why am I luckier than you? You’ve got a good man to go home to. You’ve got good people who will welcome you back. You have everything I have.”
“You’re living the dream,” Emily replied. “I have everything to look forward to, but you’re already doing it. You’re pregnant, you have a family waiting for you back in the village, and you have a dozen or more human women to live with.” She sighed. “You have Aimee.”
“You’ll have all that and more,” Chris told her. “You’re going through an uncertain time, but it will pass. When you’ve been living in your city a while, you’ll have a network of friends. You’ll have your mate and your children, and you won’t even notice the difference between human and Angondran anymore. You’ll only know people.”
“It sounds wonderful,” Emily murmured.
“It is,” Chris replied. “We got lucky when we crashed on this planet. We couldn’t have asked for a better home.”
Chapter 15
The sun set by the time they entered the pass. Chris and Emily couldn’t see anything, but Faruk and Turk led them on into the dark. “We don’t have time to stop. With luck, the column will stop for the night, and that will give us time to get in front of them.”
Anxiety kept Emily focused. She kept her eyes on Faruk’s hulking back against the dim starlight overhead. If only the aurora would come out to give her some light to see. But it didn’t come out. Her feet found their place on the smooth rock, but she couldn’t see where she was going.
Black stone walls rose up on either side and shut out what little light there was. The river whispered at her side and ran on down its stone bed to the sea. As long as it lay there and kept her company, she could rest assured she was heading in the right direction.
Once they entered the pass, though, there was nowhere else to go but down. Emily gazed up at the sky and let her feet lead her. Chris and Turk marched behind her. No one said a word to disturb the quiet. Emily lost a
ll track of time. The night dragged on and on in an endless dream of tromping feet and murmuring water.
Then all at once, the sky exploded in a blaze of gold and silver and violet. Emily gasped out loud, and her eyes popped open. She thought the aurora had come out at last to light their way, but when she took a closer look, the lavender highlights edged the clouds. Their round bases brightened to green and grey. The sun was coming up.
Faruk arched one eyebrow. Then he bolted toward the canyon wall. “Up here! Quick! We don’t have much time.”
Emily scrambled up after him. “Where are we going?”
He didn’t answer. He found a foot path in the rock and climbed up the wall to the top. Emily clawed her way up after him. She caught her breath at the top and looked around. That’s when she understood what he meant.
In the distance, the cloud of dust raised by the Ursidrean column rose against the dawn colors. Individual people rode the enormous siege machines and battle guns. The soldiers’ armor glittered in the sun, and the engines’ motors growled across the land.
Emily caught her breath. “We’re just in time to intercept them before they cross the border.”
“Not quite,” Faruk replied. “Look.”
Emily turned around, and her heart sank into her shoes. Her knees almost gave out. Another column, just as big, came the other way across the Felsite plains. It didn’t raise a cloud of dust like the Ursidrean column, but hundreds of warriors clustered in its ranks. The sun lit up the manes of hair around their heads, and their weapons reflected the pastel colors in the sky. They were armed for battle.
“Now what are we going to do?” The words died on her lips. There was nothing she or anyone could do to stop this. They could only stand and watch Angondra’s hope for the future die on the battlefield along with the last of its men. Faruk took her hand, but the warm confidence he always gave her didn’t set her alight the way it usually did. He’d lost all hope, too. They would be going home to a dying place.
Rohn (Dragons of Kratak Book 1) Page 39