“A bad one,” he said with sadness in his voice. “I just wanted to see the world. You were right. I am soft.”
A tear formed in the corner of his eye, but I wiped it away, mesmerized. This wasn’t the frantic crying of a whimpering boy, but the true emotion of a man who had lost his way. I thought he might have been willing to find a new way, if someone would show him. “Softness may be a weakness on land, but here your gentle touch is prized above any hardened cruelty you could perform. I admire a kind man, not an evil one.”
He grinned a sunny grin and dropped his head back, sliding his hands over me with abandon. The gift of empathy let me see what he saw, my light green hair floating around my reddened face, the blush of arousal that had spread into my chest and quickened my breath. I saw his gaze on the dip of my belly button and upswell of my breasts, made more sensual by the blur of water all around us.
More magickal energy poured into Chris as his touch became more sensual. He dropped both hands to my thighs, kneading the muscles there and coming ever closer to my engorged pussy. At last he found my slit and ran one thumb over the opening—the wetness there was slick and hot, unlike the cool water that surrounded us. He probed further, running his fingers up and down until I was gasping for breath. I wanted more, wanted his cock inside me right, then, but I held back. The process had to be a slow one or the healing wouldn’t be complete.
I raised my buoyancy a bit and floated off him, using the current of the water we had stirred up to float toward his gorgeous cock. I licked the tip, tasting his essence. He thrust his hips upward forcing himself into my face. Shoving his arse back on to the bed, I lowered my mouth to him. A low moan escaped his lips and he fought to stay still—empathic desire flowed through me like the strongest tidal wave. I traced the head of his cock with my tongue, slowly letting energy leak into him as I coaxed him into a frenzy of pleasure. He could not control the bucking of his hips as I sucked and licked, drawing him deep into my throat and releasing again, clutching his thighs tightly to keep him still. I could sense his release approaching and drew him right to the edge before I stopped, withdrawing. He let out a small cry of frustration. I grinned. I did love this part—the teasing. But now time had come to finish the job.
By now every bit of me was quivering with need. I had to have this man, had to give him my magick and my body. I wanted him to be well, to live. I pulled him upward, increasing his buoyancy along with mine until we floated above my bed. I put my arms around him and guided one hand to my pussy once more. Using his thumb he sought out my clit and traced circles over the engorged spot. I gasped and shuddered, as did he. Locking my legs around his waist, I lowered myself on to his waiting cock, every hardened inch of it was a gift as I plunged downward. He filled me completely and I held myself still, savoring the heat of our combination.
“God you feel good, my lady.”
“God has little to do with it,” I managed as I pulled back and thrust again, a burst of magick flowing into Chris as we moved.
At some point, he took over, thrusting deeper and faster inside me, all the while stroking that place, so sensitive that a jolt of energy followed each brush of his fingers. Flesh slammed into flesh until we sent waves of water away from us in all directions. The scent of our lust was that of land and sea mixed together in a salty, redolent flavor. I could feel his release upon us alongside my own until all became a blur of magick and sex.
We spent ourselves, in one whooping cry between us that unleashed all my magickal power. As he emptied his seed inside me I emptied my energy into him, in pulsing jets until I had nothing left to give. I collapsed against him, all but lost to the pleasure and intensity of it all. I couldn’t speak or move, just floated in the embrace of my now-healed lover. Just as the Goddess willed.
* * * *
One hundred and one nights later, we floated above my bed once more. Our naked limbs were entangled and Chris supported my spent form. This time though, I was not helpless as I had my full strength back. We floated down until we were laying side by side in my soft bed, surrounded by the gauzy seaweed curtains I had hung for privacy. It was a very busy hundred nights.
“Well my wayward pirate. Did I make good on my promise to heal you?”
“And you showed me wonders that I have never seen before, my lady.”
He was so enchanting, never called me anything but his lady, like a prayer. I lay my head upon his chest, listening to the beating of our hearts as one. Despite knowing this night would come, I was sad. I had always tolerated my charges, but I never truly missed them when they left. Now, with Chris, my heart ached. I had fallen for this one, hard. I had made a young Sister’s mistake, one I hadn’t made in fifty years or more. Silently I chastised my own foolishness. No twenty year old boy would want to live at the bottom of the sea. “When you leave Atlantis, you can never return. You must be more careful with this lovely body of yours, Chris. Find happiness on land, a safer trade and a woman who can appreciate your gentle soul.”
“Leave?”
That was all he said. I held my breath, willing myself not to cry.
“My lady,” his voice was barely there at all.
“Chris.”
“I should like to stay.” All at once the words came out, as if he was afraid I’d say no.
I sat up and gazed into his warm, earnest eyes. “Are you certain? Leave the life of humanity behind?”
“I escaped the boredom of a farm life only to find myself abandoned on some sandy shoal. All I wanted was adventure. I’ve found that, and more, here with you. Every day I awake thanking your Goddess this isn’t some wonderful dream. I want to stay.”
“This is no dream, my wayward pirate. I want you to stay.” I could hardly get the words out. The Goddess had rewarded me, at long last, for my years of service with this lovely gentle soul. My thanks go to her every night he slept by my side. We might not have been a perfect match, him being from land and so very young. But I had no doubt our life would be an interesting one.
ATLANTEAN WOLVES - Alphas
Tianna Xander and Bonnie Rose Leigh
Tara Morgan sat upright in bed, gasping in the darkness. Putting her hand to her racing heart, she looked wildly around the darkened room. There were no monsters lurking in the shadows. No were-beings trying to eat her up. She shook her head and ran a trembling hand through her hair, knowing she’d never get back to sleep after a fright like that.
Standing, she made her way to the window to look out over the excavation of the property next door to her home. The old house was gone now. There was nothing left of it, but a pile of rotted, worm eaten wood and an empty dirt hole that had once been the foundation. Construction equipment sat idle next to the hole. Quiet and unmoving it seemed sinister in the dark of night.
The nightmares started as soon as they began tearing down the old house. It was almost as though it was haunted and the spirits blamed her for the intrusion on their solitude. She’d talked with her grandmother, asked her why the destruction should affect her the way it had. The old woman knew something, she could tell. But she wouldn’t say. She just shook her head and told Tara not to worry about it. Then she’d done the strangest thing. Laying a trembling hand on Tara’s arm, she’d practically begged her to leave town for a few days.
“Go away, Tara. Leave the house.” Her grandmother’s cloudy eyes filled with tears. “Please promise me you’ll go away. Quickly.”
Tara shook her head. “I can’t, Gram. I have a deadline looming for the new art project. Silman and Silman want it for the lobby in the new hospital next week. I can’t leave.” She patted the older woman’s hand. “Maybe after I finish.” She smiled. “I know! Why don’t we both take a trip then?”
“By then it will be too late,” her grandmother groaned as she rocked back and forth in her chair. “They will come for you before the end of the week.” She shook her head. “Don’t you understand? They can smell you. You must leave this place!”
A shiver of apprehension skittered
up her spine at her grandmother’s expression. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t believed any of her gram’s prattle. She just couldn’t leave now. Silman and Silman were her best customers. She couldn’t afford to alienate them. They kept her business afloat almost single-handedly.
A glimmer of soft light caught her eye and she stared down into the cavity left by the construction workers. The light from the moon shone down upon something. Something big. She frowned, thinking. Had someone driven their car into the unprotected hole? Was that what woke her up?
Donning her robe and slippers, she rushed down the stairs, grabbed a flashlight and headed through the back door. She ran to the backhoe and slowed. The last thing she wanted was to fall into its darkened depths. Turning on her flashlight, she shined the light down into it and gasped.
Something was in there, half buried and covered with dirt. She stared down into the pit. The light from her flashlight reflected off the surface. Her hand trembled as she stared at the cylindrical shaped object. What was it? A strange noise came from below her. She watched the thing shudder and pitch as though trying to free itself from the soil. Tara bit her lip and leaned forward to get a better look when her foot slipped on the soft dirt and the ground gave way. Before she could call for help, she fell head over heels into the cavity.
Soft, moist earth cushioned her fall on the way down. She landed a bit haphazardly on top of the large, silvery shaped object. It was hard, obviously made of some kind of metal. Her landing on the cool, shining surface would most likely cause bruises. Scrambling to her feet, she hurried away from it, attempting to climb back up to the solid ground above. Clods of moist clay crumbled in her hands as she repeatedly attempted to pull herself up into her back yard.
Tears of frustration wet her eyes as she thought of how much she wanted—needed—to get away from the strange coffin-like thing, which was way too close for comfort, especially since it still continued to pitch and rattle next to her. She screeched with fright as the thing made a god-awful noise and the top suddenly came apart. Her mouth opened on a silent scream as one of the monsters from her nightmares emerged.
“Tyne githa du brag?” The creature spoke.
Impossible. She tried to convince herself that what she saw couldn’t possibly be real, even as colorful spots danced before her eyes and the blessedly soft ground rose up to greet her.
* * * *
Rhyne Calama sighed when the woman slumped to the ground. It figures he’d finally break free of his prison to meet a non-Shial human. Jamming his fingers through his hair, he glanced around, trying to get his bearings. Where the hell was he? He finished changing his form back into that of a full-looking human.
Glancing up at the sky, he frowned. Where did the extra stars come from? They reminded him of the satellites surrounding Shialal just before they’d left. He turned, and for the first time, noticed the beam of the light she’d carried with her. When the hell was he? He’d been stuck in that pod longer than a few years, he’d known that. He reached up to rub the back of his neck, trying to remember the circumstances of his crash. It had been that major land shift the elders had talked so much about. Shock waves from the ensuing earthquakes were strong enough to knock his craft to the ground. He bent to examine his ship and determined it was still capable of flight. Even after…he paused, his hands shaking.
“Impossible,” he murmured. Turning he glanced up at the large machinery circling the outer edges of the hole and sighed. “I guess I should be thankful to be alive.” It shouldn’t matter that so much time had passed. He should be glad he was still able to draw breath. Otherwise, his family line would have ended when his craft crashed into the river that had been here.
Bending down, he picked the female up and carried her to the craft, tucking her in the small cargo space behind the pilot’s seat. He couldn’t leave her until he knew how much the Earth people knew. His last memories of them were of a barbaric race barely able to stand upright. The last thing he needed was to have to do major damage control his first day back. Better to take her with him. Besides, he thought as he climbed into his seat and prepared for flight, there was something about the way she smelled…
The flight back to his home was uneventful, right up to the time he reached the coordinates and found the island missing. He could have sworn his heart sank to his feet when he reached his destination, only to meet countless miles of churning, white crested waves. Where was his home? Had the turmoil from the large continent breaking up caused its destruction as so many of them had feared? Certainly he couldn’t be the last of his kind?
“Atlantis, this is Rhyne Calama please respond.” Silence greeted his call and his stomach began to roil. Everyone, every thing he had ever known was gone. A lump formed in his throat and he swallowed thickly as he flew over the gravesite of his lost world.
“Atlantis, please respond. This is Rhyne Calama. I have been trapped below the surface of the Earth in my pod. I require coordinates. Please respond.” He sounded desperate now, he knew. What would he do, where would he go? And how would he ever explain his existence to the woman behind him? If she reported her find, he could very well end up in a real prison. They would look upon him as a human animal hybrid and use his body for experiments. How did he know the rest of his people weren’t already in such a predicament? A bit of static broke over the COM and he jumped.
“Rhyne Calama, This is Atlantis. Please find your coordinates embedded within this message.”
He sighed with relief at the familiar language. The response had been given in oddly accented Atlantean, but the reply still came in his native tongue. Rhyne extracted the coordinates and frowned.
“I hope my craft is still waterproof,” he replied to the nameless voice as he began his descent. Water closed over the pod as he made his dive. Strong currents attempted to pull him from his course, but he held fast to the controls. He would leave nothing to chance. This time he would make it home. Ten-thousand years in stasis was enough for him. He only hoped some of his loved ones survived the upheaval so many years before.
His vessel dove deeper and deeper through the water. He programmed the coordinates into the computer and let it take him home on autopilot. He had no idea where he was, or where he was going for that matter. He didn’t want to make any mistakes.
The craft weaved through an underwater cavern, taking him ever lower until he was sure even the technology of his people wouldn’t keep him safe from the pressure of the water. Then, as he passed a large underwater volcano, he saw it—Atlantis—glowing light blue from the use of the shield generator. Everything within the shield took on a blue cast. He’d forgotten how beautiful it could be. Modulating the shields of the pod to match that of Atlantis, he passed through the blue bubble and steered toward a docking bay. Just seeing his home again made him sigh with relief and he smiled.
“Welcome home, warrior,” the Atlantean voice whispered. “We have missed you.”
A greeting party met him when he emerged from the craft. People he didn’t know rushed to him, touching him. They treated him like some sort of royalty.
“Hurry. You must hurry to the council chambers. There isn’t much time.” A short balding man rushed him from the pod, directing the others to care for his things. Things, he noted, that were very old and probably obsolete.
“Not much time for what?” he asked, pulling free of the man’s grasp to turn and remove the human from his craft. He gave her a long look. Was she human? Long platinum hair framed her heart shaped face. Full, pink lips pouted, even in her state of unconsciousness. Her delicate brows arched over her closed eyes and he wondered what color her irises were. Blue, brown? He would bet on blue. Too many humans with her coloring had blue eyes. He would prefer green or even brown over something so common as blue. Nearly all of his people had blue eyes. It was too common and mates with uncommon characteristics were prized.
He made a face and moved to follow the strange little man through the hangar bay and into the rest of the city. Why did he e
ven care? He wasn’t on a mate hunt. And even if he was, the only way he would take a human to mate was if his betrothed was dead and he had no choice. He looked back down at the woman and tried to discern why she looked so familiar to him. She didn’t look anything like any of his people. In fact, he thought suddenly, looking around, none of these people looked familiar. They didn’t even look like Atlanteans. His people didn’t lose their hair and the men were rarely shorter than six feet tall. The men surrounding him were short and the tallest member of the group barely reached his chin. What had happened here?
Had he missed being a part of the normal happenings in Atlantis so much over the years before his crash that he hadn’t noticed a change? But still…he was sure he’d have noticed everyone getting shorter. Had they interbred with humans?
The stranger led him through the city as he droned on about things he didn’t understand and didn’t care to. He’d said something about diluted blood and needing an infusion of the perfect DNA for something. He shook his head, uncaring. He merely wished to go to his quarters, take a long sonic shower and forget that he’d missed out on ten millennia of change.
* * * *
Tara woke in a strange bed in an even stranger place. The mattress beneath her kept changing, moving as she moved. She rolled over and it shifted beneath her, almost as if it anticipated her every desire. She stayed still for a moment. It wasn’t possible, she knew it wasn’t, yet it still got harder and softer as she repositioned herself.
She rolled from the bed and stood up, barely able to keep from screaming and fainting dead away. She watched, mesmerized as the bed shrank and stored itself in a small closet.
“This is sooo not happening,” she said, shaking her head and looking around. The room wasn’t large, though it appeared much larger now that the bed was gone. A small sofa sat against the far wall flanked by two end tables with strange looking statues sitting on their tops. She moved closer to examine them. “Very bizarre.” She shook her head at the half-animal half-man statues and moved to examine the large aquarium to her right. The wall was made up of one large piece of thick glass. The mural someone painted inside—or outside—of the large tank was perfect. If she didn’t know better, she’d think she was underwater.
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