The Reprisal
Page 22
“Always negotiating,” She pressed her lips to his, sighing as he held her tight and kissed her right back.
Just like the first time, just like every time. His arms and his lips were her favourite place in the world, and none of these places they’d gone to would have been anything without him there.
* * *
“Ro!”
Romy heard Elara’s scream all the way across the packed Jimboomba settlement. They’d landed in Australia last night, but Atlas said she shouldn’t wake everyone at three in the morning.
“Ellie!” Romy squeezed through the crowd, dragging Atlas behind her and ignoring the disgruntled looks.
There was a huge turnout for the occasion.
Elara hit her running and took them both to the ground, despite Atlas’s efforts to save her. Romy’s knotmate peppered kisses all over her face. “I’ve missed you so much.”
The worst part of travelling was being without her knot. She cried each time she saw them, and every time they left.
“You, too.” Romy assessed their position and decided the timing was perfect. She licked Elara’s eye.
She screamed. “That’s sick!”
“Yeah, well, that’s what it feels like when you do it to me,” she shot back. Romy’s revenge was slightly ruined by the happy tears she was shedding.
Strong arms picked her up from behind. “You made it!”
“I wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Romy said, turning to give Phobos a hug. “Where is she?”
His green eyes danced. “Aren’t you just happy to see me?”
“Where is my niece?” Romy gave him a flat look.
He reached down to where a crawling golden-haired child was clinging to his legs. “Jane, your Aunty Romy is here to see you.”
Romy sobbed like crazy, holding her arms out. “H-hey, Janey.”
“You gotta stop crying when you see her, honey,” Deimos said, slipping behind them. Romy turned and gave him a kiss on the cheek, which he returned.
“I can’t help it,” Romy sniffed. “She’s just so adorable. She’s our Knot 27 baby.” With golden ringlets, Elara’s pixie features, and Phobos’s green eyes. This child would get whatever she wanted, when she wanted with that combination. And her name, nothing like their mythological names. Jane. Such a unique name.
“Babies,” Elara corrected.
Deimos glared at her. “Ellie.”
Elara gasped. “Sorry, I forgot.”
He disappeared briefly and reappeared with Charlee. “We have some good news, Ro. Char and I are having a baby.”
Romy calmly gave Jane to Atlas, who began tossing her in the air. She then screamed as loudly as she was capable of.
She threw herself at the couple. “How far along are you? Are you feeling okay?”
Charlee placed a hand over Romy’s mouth. “I’m a doctor.”
Relief coursed through her. “Oh yeah.”
The doctor snorted and added, “I’m six weeks along.”
Romy groaned. “I hate waiting for babies to come. It’s the worst.” She glanced at Atlas holding Jane upside-down. Jane was howling with laughter.
He glanced up and waggled his dark eyebrows at her.
“Uh-oh, that’s a ‘reproduce with me’ look if I ever saw one,” Charlee whispered.
Romy laughed, her cheeks warming. “Yeah, he wants kids. I told him he can wait until we travel the world.”
“Good on you.” Charlee pulled her in for a hug. “And hello, how are you? You were at Machu Picchu, yes?”
Romy launched into a recount of the last month, one eye scanning for their last knot member. Someone tapped her on the shoulder.
“Thrym!” she shouted, turning.
He covered his nearest ear and hugged her tight. “It’s so good to see you, Ro. What do we need to do to convince you to stay here?”
“You’re one to talk. I hear you and Nancy will be in Sydney for the next six months running a space soldier integration course.”
“Sydney is a lot closer than. . . . Where are you off to next?”
“Antarctica.”
His sky-blue eyes danced. “I can’t believe you’re actually travelling Earth. It’s what you always wanted.”
She nudged him with her shoulder. “Never thought we’d get here, huh?”
“Honestly?” he asked. “At one point, I wasn’t sure if any of us would make it. You were bonkers, Deimos was a dick, Phobos was being tormented by the others, Elara wouldn’t get off her ass as usual, and I couldn’t see straight.”
“Is that what you call it?” she teased.
He made a face. “Don’t be gross. You’re my sister.”
They grinned at each other.
Atlas passed a wriggling Jane back to Romy. “I’ve got to go up now.”
He still spoke at gatherings such as these when asked. Romy suspected Atlas could only last so long on his ‘indefinite break’ before he was lured back into some kind of lesser commanding role. Whether from the meticulous grooming he’d gone through or because of who his parents had been, the drive to lead was in his blood, and Romy truly didn’t think he would be satisfied in any other job.
“Ba ba ba,” Jane said, reaching after Atlas.
“Why doesn’t she ever do that to me?” Romy asked Phobos.
He raised both brows. “Because you cry every time you hold her.”
Romy sniffed, wiping her eyes with one arm. “She’s just so cute.”
Phobos rubbed Romy’s back as she played with her niece.
The crowd quieted and faced the front as a microphone was tapped.
“Welcome,” Atlas’s voice rang out, “to the first Peace Memorial Day. I am honoured to join you all here in Jimboomba to remember our fallen, and remember what they fought for.” Cameras zoomed around his face and the crowd. Romy spotted one camera trained on their knot. Knot 27 usually made an appearance at events.
Jane spewed down Romy’s front.
Phobos laughed. “Hilarious. I hope the cameras got that.”
“Can you get her a towel instead of just standing there?” Elara snapped, rifling through a nappy bag.
Romy smiled at Jane. “I don’t mind. She can spew on me.”
Deimos and Thrym shared a disgusted look.
Elara patted down Romy’s white blouse and took Jane to clean her.
“For the last nine months, our new computer system, the Tina 2000, has been running smoothly, distributing resources around the world—”
“That name gets me every time,” Deimos wheezed.
“She’d hate it.” Romy grinned.
“That’s why it’s so amazing,” Charlee said.
“—A poacher has not been sighted in several months,” Atlas said. “This means we are resettling in North America, and our armies have largely been disbanded.”
A cheer went up.
“Do you remember wondering what Earth would be like if we ever got here?” Romy asked her knot.
“No one did that but you,” Thrym reminded her.
Romy sighed happily, glancing over her family. “I thought it would be like this.”
Smiling, Deimos wrapped an arm around her. “We got there in the end, honey.” He squeezed her to his side.
“This brings me to mention one person in particular who is not with us today,” Atlas said, dropping his voice. “There is no one on Earth that doesn’t know her name. The person I speak of was once the commander of this very settlement. She would have been a Mandate member one day, if she hadn’t possessed an inherent self-need to do what she believed to be right. This saw her enter the ranks of the Amach after suffering greatly at the hands of the Mandate. Many of you respected her, or at least respected what she’d do to you if you didn’t respect her.”
The crowd laughed quietly.
He peered down at the podium for a long beat. “In Tina Lyons’ last days, she did more to consolidate peace than any person on Earth. The groundwork she put in back then formed the foundations of our future.
She carved the beginnings of a path that allowed the peoples of Earth to begin to understand each other. One year ago, we won a war. One year ago, Tina Lyons put plans in motion that would win us what we really wanted: happiness. I once said to Tina that there was no one I trusted to get a task done more than myself, but that wasn’t true. If a job was humanly possible, Tina Lyons would get it done. Today, as we have five minutes of silence for our lost loved ones, I want you to spare a moment to remember a woman who possessed a heart as large as any I have ever seen.”
Romy closed her eyes and thought about Tina. About all the good times.
. . . And that time Tina told her she was useless at everything she did. Romy frowned. Or that time she punched her in the throat for not paying attention. Or that time she’d said men only liked her because she was genetically enhanced.
Romy snorted through her fresh tracks of tears, drawing a scandalised look from those around her.
“Sorry,” she wheezed at them, going bright red in a bid to contain her laughter.
Thrym cracked an eye open. “You okay?”
A hysterical giggle escaped, and Romy said with as much serenity as she could, “I just remembered what a bitch Tina was.”
He barked a laugh and hastily covered it as a few people hushed him. “She was the meanest damn person I ever met.”
The five minutes finished and Romy let her laughter out, finally.
Recovering a minute later, she nodded to herself. Tina, you were the meanest, but you were also one of the best. I’m honoured to have known you.
All of her favourite people were right here. Thrym, who had finally loosened up and had someone he loved more than duty—Nancy would keep him honest. Phobos, who had returned to his plants with glee, and Elara, who was the settlement mechanic and driver when she wasn’t chasing Jane. And Deimos, the founder of Co-exist, a massive organisation which worked alongside Thrym and Nancy to ensure prosperous peace for all.
She looked across the crowd at Atlas, who was watching her, grey eyes very rarely like hard stone these days and more like the soft rainclouds she loved. The right side of his mouth tugged up into a half smile, and he held her gaze as he leaned back to the mic and said, “Now, let’s party.”
The crowd erupted and Knot 27 shifted back as tables were brought out and piled with food and drink.
“Hi, Commander Cronus.” Elara greeted him as he came to get some food. “How are you?”
Cronus looked up with surprise. “Eh? Oh, it’s just Bill now, soldier.” He paused. “Knot 27, isn’t it? You were always one of my favourites.”
Something came back to Romy, and she found herself asking. “Comm— uh, Bill? When you first came to the Amach, you mentioned something about our knot. . . .”
“Yes, you went from one of our top teams to the worst,” he said sadly.
Deimos and Phobos shared an evil look.
“Do you know why it happened, uh, Bill? There’s no doubting our knot is different from others. Dr Charlee said it might be a naturally occurring mutation?”
Cronus barked. “Science! They always have the most complicated answers. I’m always telling people, why look for a zebra when you should be looking for a horse.”
Knot 27 stared at him.
“No, soldier. I don’t believe in mutations, science, and whatnot. I remember it well because I’d been waiting for your team to be harvested so I could put you to use again.”
Romy wasn’t the only one who leaned forward to hear him.
“There was an incident with your tanks in the early days,” he said. “The trolley carrying you overturned.”
Thrym’s jaw fell open.
“What are you saying?” Elara demanded, switching Jane to her other hip.
“He’s saying we’re different because we had the space soldier equivalent of being dropped on our heads,” Deimos said drily.
Cronus shrugged. “Yes, soldier. I am. Exactly that.”
They watched him saunter over to Atlas’s mother, now his wife, with varying levels of horror and disbelief.
Knot 27 turned to each other.
“That can’t be why we’re different,” Romy said.
Phobos snickered. “Hey, Ro. You don’t have a super brain—you just got dropped on it.”
“Those in favour of forgetting we ever heard that and going with Charlee’s mutation theory, say ‘aye’,” Deimos called.
As one, the five members of Knot 27 chorused, “Aye.”
The End . . . .
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Romy, Atlas, and the rest of Knot 27 came to me on a bus trip from Derry to Dublin in late 2014. These characters waited two years (Romy, Atlas, and Thrym patiently, and Elara, Phobos, and Deimos not so much) to get their turn on the page. By the time I got around to penning The Retreat, I was desperate to start The After Trilogy and sank into the tale with relish. The research involved in portraying their story was particularly enjoyable (such a nerd), and the antics of Knot 27 have never ceased to bring a smile to my face during the last two years.
I would like to thank Deimos for not breaking my heart entirely, Romy for being the nicest crazy person with a residual temper ever, and Atlas for being . . . cargos, eucalyptus, grey eyes, can’t form coherent sentences . . . Atlas.
Thank you to:
My advanced reader team, and to my Barracks group on Facebook who are way too much fun.
My beta team: Michelle, Kayla, and Hayley.
My manuscript team: Melissa Scott (editor), Robin Schroffel (copy editor), Patti Geesey (proofreader), and Jaye Cox (formatter).
To my cover designer for The After Trilogy series, Tracey at Soxsational Cover Design, who I kind of met face-to-face in an elevator recently. Long story.
To my friends and family, thank you yet again for being so very supportive of what I do. If I liked talking about feelings, I would tell you all how much I appreciate your encouragement to your faces, but as it turns out, you just get to read about it with every release.
Many thanks and hugs to Jo. You know who you are.
To my readers, who allow my stories to fill their imaginations for hours on end. What an honour to write books for you all.
To Scott, my husband. Thank you for doing the things you do. Thank you for the being the person you are.
Happy reading!
Kelly St. Clare
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
When Kelly is not reading or writing, she is lost in her latest reverie.
Books have always been magical and mysterious to her. One day she decided to start unravelling this mystery and began writing.
The Tainted Accords was her debut series. The After Trilogy is her latest work.
A New Zealander in origin and in heart, Kelly currently resides in Australia with her ginger-haired husband, a great group of friends, and some huntsman spiders who love to come inside when it rains. Their love is not returned.
Visit her online and subscribe at:
www.kellystclare.com
Or find her on
Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram
BOOKS BY KELLY ST. CLARE
The Tainted Accords:
Fantasy of Frost
Fantasy of Flight
Fantasy of Fire
Fantasy of Freedom
The Tainted Accords Novellas:
Sin
Olandon
Rhone (2018)
Shard (2019)
The After Trilogy:
The Retreat
The Return
The Reprisal
The Darkest Drae (co-written with Raye Wagner):
Blood Oath
Shadow Wings
Black Crown (May 2018)
Fantasy of Frost
(The Tainted Accords, #1)
I know many things. What I am capable of, what I will change, what I will become. But there is one thing I will never know.
The veil I’ve worn from birth carries with it a terrible loneliness; a suppression I cannot imagine ever being free of.
Some things never change…
My mother will always hate me. Her court will always shun me.
…Until they do. When the peace delegation arrives from the savage world of Glacium, my life is shoved wildly out of control by the handsome Prince Kedrick, who for unfathomable reasons shows me kindness.
And the harshest lessons are learned.
Sometimes it takes the world bringing you to your knees to find that spark you thought forever lost.
Sometimes it takes death to show you how to live.
COMPLETE SERIES NOW AVAILABLE
Sign up to my newsletter to receive once-monthly emails with release information, giveaways, interviews, and more at:
www.kellystclare.com
And receive these gifts FREE:
*Chapter extras from Jovan’s point of view
*The Tainted Accords mini colouring book
*Translucents (a paranormal short story) by Kelly St. Clare
For more regular updates, follow me on:
Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram
And if you are a SUPER fan, join the Barracks, for book chats, group reads, advanced reader opportunities, and more.
Kelly St. Clare’s Barracks
HAVE YOU ENJOYED THIS BOOK?
A review means a huge amount to a self-published author like myself. Reviews help my book reach a larger audience.
Your time and effort is greatly appreciated!