“What?” I squirmed. “N—no. Nothing is wrong.” There wasn’t, was there? Nothing I could really think of. I had been going about my normal routines, working with Maggie as usual and helping around the Kamani compound whenever necessary. Shaking my head to emphasize my point, I hoped that this would be the end of it, but Maggie just hummed to herself and continued to stare at me; her blue eyes fixed on my face as if she could somehow psychically ferret out whatever the problem was inside my soul.
“You know, come to think of it…” Shay frowned.
“This isn’t really necessary, ladies,” I said, hoping against hope that I could put an end to this right then and there. I loved Shay and Maggie, especially after everything that they had done for me—for all of us—but I didn’t want to be the center of their attention like this.
Maggie sighed. “All right. Then just know that if there is anything wrong, you can talk to me, Clara,” she said.
“That goes double for me,” added Shay quickly, with that particular spark that she had about her.
They didn’t let it go right then. They continued to fuss over me for another hour, going through the past couple of years and everything that had happened. When they finally let me go, my head was a mass of confusion and I didn’t really know what to think. The only thing I did know was that I felt like something changed in my world, though I didn’t know what that something was.
Chapter 3
When Argaram Castle fell, the Kamani took a great number of Ak-hal prisoner. Maggie and I had been among the few willing to interact with those prisoners. They had been put to work restoring the broken Sky Jewel—a task that would no doubt take ages, something that the Ak-hal and the Kamani both realized. But as both races were immortal, they had nothing but time to complete the task.
Walking through the wing with the daily meal for the prisoners with Maggie, I watched the Ak-hal prisoners go about their work and thought again of Kypher despite myself, wondering what he was doing. The Kamani hadn’t managed to capture all the Ak-hal—a great many had gone free and still wandered somewhere on Aman, no doubt biding their time, plotting some other attack against the Kamani. But at present, the Kamani had the upper hand. The Ak-hal had been left without their castle, without their ships, and without their mates. I would almost feel sorry for them if it weren’t for all that they had done to me and the other human women in the time that they had enslaved us.
It was only because of the nature of the Kamani that the Ak-hal had been treated with such kindness in their imprisonment. They certainly received much better treatment than I had received in my time as Kypher’s mate. Though I had been bedecked in fine gowns and jewels, I had been little more than an ornament at my mate’s side—something to warm his bed at night. The thought made me shiver. Perhaps the jumpsuits that the Kamani wore weren’t beautiful, but they were comfortable and warm. The Kamani made sure to provide their prisoners a comfortable and safe place to sleep, and they even allowed Maggie and I to give small lessons about the outside world to those who were open and willing to learn.
This was another thing. Though some remained loyal to the old ways—the old ideals—some of the Ak-hal seemed to change after their time spent amongst the Kamani. I didn’t know whether it was just forced modesty due to their position, or if it was simply because it was impossible not to become kinder when someone showed you so much kindness. Either way, it had given Clara back a little of her faith to see that even the Ak-hal weren’t inherently evil. At least, she hoped this was true—that what she saw wasn’t simply an act put on by those prisoners until such a time as they could fight back against their captors.
“Are you finished down this way?”
“Oh, yes,” I said, picking up the pot I’d been carrying. I hauled it back down the path toward Maggie’s voice, turning when I spied the older woman and making my way toward her. We followed this routine every day without fail. On this particular day, we were a girl short—one of our regulars had recently found a mate amongst the Kamani, and though she’d promised to come back to work with us among the prisoners, we ler her enjoy a ‘honeymoon’ period with him.
She wasn’t the first to find a mate amongst the Kamani—in fact, many of the women who had come with us from the castle had found mates. Shay used to tease me that it was only a matter of time before I found mine, but it had never happened. Eventually, the teasing had stopped. I didn’t mind, though. I was content, and after everything that had happened with Kypher, the idea of having another mate honestly scared me. The Kamani may be kinder than the Ak-hal by far, but a lot of expectations still went into being a mate—at least, there were in my mind. So, living my life on my own terms was good enough for me.
Even so, it did make me happy when one of the girls found her own personal ‘Barbearian,’ as Shay called the Kamani. It was an appropriate term given their uncivilized nature, though I hardly missed the luxuries of castle life after the things that had happened in my past. I had found it easy enough to trade in silken sheets for woven blankets and the soft, furred jumpsuits of the Kamani in exchange for the luxurious gowns I used to wear if it meant having my freedom handed to me.
Why was it that I felt so strange lately, then? After Shay and Maggie had pointed it out, I had realized it myself, and felt it weighing on my heart. It wasn’t sadness, exactly. It just felt that something was missing from my life, and I didn’t know exactly what it was. I told myself that it couldn’t be loneliness, or that I wanted a mate after all. I had decided that this was something I didn’t need way back when I first left the Ak-hal. My friends and my freedom were good enough for me. And yet the strangeness lingered, and I couldn’t shake it no matter how much I tried.
Perhaps I should ask Maggie about it. Actually talk to her instead of pushing it away, like I always had a tendency to do. Coming up next to her, I cleaned up my things. “Anything else you need me to do?”
“Not right now,” she said. I looked over at her. She had changed so much in the time since we’d first met—grown older, of course, since she’d lost both her mates and her immortality—but yet still retained the beauty that had made the Ak-hal capture her in the first place. Being beside her like this made me think back to those days when we worked together in the castle kitchen, and brought me mixed feelings. Sadness for those days of captivity and happiness for the friendship we had shared. “Maggie…”
She looked over at me. “Hmm?”
“Never mind,” I said quickly. Maybe I really couldn’t talk about it.
“Speak your mind if you’ve got something to say,” she urged.
“Well…” I paused for a long moment, then finally sighed. “It’s just that…I know you must miss your mate terribly. Doesn’t it feel like…like a part of you is missing?”
Maggie’s face fell slightly. She looked uncharacteristically crestfallen for just a moment before smiling softly. “Clara… it’s easy to feel like something’s missing from your heart, but when I’m here among the Kamani, I remember all the times that we shared. It’s difficult that he’s gone, but I’m just glad that we had a chance to be together. It even makes the time I spent in captivity with the Ak-hal seem almost worth it. It brought the two of us together.”
“Hmm.” That hadn’t been the response I expected, but coming from Maggie, it wasn’t altogether surprising, either. Maggie certainly had a different outlook on things than most people I had met, and the time she had spent with the Kamani had changed her as well. She had embraced their positive outlook of the world around them and their connection to nature. “Okay…”
“Clara, what’s on your mind?”
“What?” Startled out of my thoughts, I realized she had her gaze fixed on me. “It’s nothing,” I said quickly, hoping she wouldn’t question me further, especially after what she and Shay had already put me through the other day. But it seemed that she was ready to give me the runaround. Stopping what she was doing, she turned around, crossing her arms over her chest.
“It’s not nothing. There really is something going on with you.”
“I… that is…” Stumbling over my words, I tried to form a cohesive thought, but it was impossible. There was just no way to say what I wanted to say, or to express exactly what it was that was inside me. Eventually, I just exhaled slowly. “It’s… complicated,” I managed. “And I’m not exactly sure what I’m feeling. That’s all I can really say.”
“That’s fine,” said Maggie. “Just so long as you know I’m always here to speak with—”
The sentiment was interrupted by an eruption of sound. Maggie and I stared at one another, and then in one swift movement, ran outside.
I would never know how they came upon us so quickly. They must have spent ages planning the attack, taking care to ensure that they weren’t seen as they moved in on the compound. All I do know is that in one swift moment, the blissful peace that we had enjoyed ever since the fall of Ak-hal was shattered. We had known that they would make their move eventually, but we hadn’t known when it would come, whether it would be months or years or centuries. Now that instant was here and I felt my world, my peace, being torn apart. All I could do was stand in place as the Kamani flooded the compound’s center, where the Ak-hal who had come to fight had landed, at the ready. What did they want? Why were they doing this? Confusion reigned in my thoughts.
“Clara! Go!” shouted Shay. Now I found myself pushed along and back to safety as Khofti barreled past and out into the fray, shifting, his form becoming furred and developing mass until there was no longer man but an enormous white bear facing the Ak-hal. However, Shay still pushed me along, and that was the last thing I saw before I was pulled inside somewhere hopefully safe. “Khofti thinks they’ve come for us,” she said. “The women,” she clarified.
“What are we going to do?”
“Khofti will make sure I know what’s going on down there. I’ll make sure all the women are safe and accounted for. Clara, you have to help me.”
I nodded. There was no way I would let them take back anybody, not after we had finally found our freedom. Knowing that our time was limited, Shay and I eased back out and along the edges of the pathway, making sure to stay as far away from the fighting as we could as we searched the rooms for any and all human women that we could find.
Already, it was evident that we weren’t moving fast enough. I saw from the corner of my eye one of the Ak-hal shifting into his monstrously beautiful dragon form, his scales gleaming in the arctic light a pale, powdery blue as he took her into his claws and lifted off into the air with her. Shays screams filled the air and it was all that I could do to keep moving to find the others and help move them to safety.
“Nora? Caroline!” I shouted their names, looking for them in the chaos. Finding a couple, I urged them to head toward the area that Shay had designated as a safe spot and then continued in my search, listening as I heard yet another shriek—the mournful wailing of another free woman doomed to return to captivity. “No, no, no,” I murmured to myself as I raced along my way, doing my best to move as quickly as I could along the paths and not watch what was happening on the ground.
And then, a familiar sensation of fear, of dread, a presence that had haunted me for years swept over me. I froze where I stood and my eyes swept up over his lithe body and to his cold, hard face, to those eyes that glowed with such an unnaturally bright light, like fire.
“Kypher,” I exhaled in one breath. As I took in another, he moved forward and swept me up with one arm, pulling me to his chest. I was frozen in terror, despite that I wanted more than anything to get away from him.
“I’ve come to return you to your rightful place. By my side,” he said, his voice gliding over me, as if I was enraptured yet again. Though I knew in the back of my mind that I was free, that I need not listen to him or obey, I still let myself be led along as he moved, and stood still, doing nothing but watch as he shifted.
So many times, I had seen him shift, and yet every time, it was something wonderful and terrible to behold—the process of becoming as his entire being morphed into something larger than life, a dragon with pristine white scales the same color as the frozen tundra that stretched all around us on this icy planet.
Move, I told myself. Cry out for help. Do something. Fixing my eyes on the far-off fight, I willed someone to come and save me. But no one came. Nobody could hear my silent pleas. No one came to rescue me, and I couldn’t rescue myself. I didn’t even scream as he took me up into his claws and swept me away. All I could do was weep.
Chapter 4
In the time that had passed since I found freedom, I had thought often of Kypher. This was despite the pain that he had brought me—the long days and even longer nights in which I had been a slave to my Ak-hal mate and his whims. It wasn’t that I had ever wanted to see him again, or that I desired him. A part of me still could remember those early days of the mating when I had seen him as my savior—as a beautiful, alien creature that had rescued me from a life of drudgery back on Earth.
Though the reality would hit me hard later, it was impossible not to regret my naiveté. Perhaps, if I had been better prepared for what was to come, I could have escaped the many, many years of hardship that would follow. At least, that was what I often told myself.
As Kypher flew with me over the stretches of ice on Aman, it occurred to me that I hadn’t changed much at all—not since I was first brought to the planet, and not since I was freed. I had still allowed him to take me without even attempting to fight. But other things had changed. The ruins of the castle scarred the landscape as a harsh reminder of what I had been through, and I gazed at it as we passed by, remembering all those long years spent under Kypher’s harsh hand. And soon, I could see other objects in the distance—the new home of the Ak-hal where they had rebuilt their civilization.
Kypher settled down on the ice, and I stumbled down beside him, trying to get my bearings. I watched as he transformed back into the shape that I knew so well—the shape that still haunted my memories even after the long years that I had been away from him.
“Finally, I have you back where you belong, Clara,” he said, approaching me and gripping my chin in his strong hands, pulling it up so that my eyes met the flaming wheels of his own blazing gaze. My heart thudded in my chest, so hard and fast that I felt dizzy as I stood there. Instinctually, I tried to turn my head away, but he was too strong and I was helpless to do anything but stand there as he held onto me, reaching out and taking me by the hand. “You should have come with me when you had the chance. Why go with those savages?”
As if it were impossible for him to understand. I finally managed to break myself free from his grip and took a hesitant step back. “They’ll come for me,” I said. “They won’t let you and the other Ak-hal keep me prisoner here.”
“Prisoner?” His voice was tinged with disbelief, as if he really couldn’t understand what it was that I was saying. “You are my mate, Clara. I am taking back what was stolen from me.”
His mate? I was astonished that he really thought that, after all the time that had passed and everything that had happened. But the truth of it was, a ‘mate’ to him wasn’t a partner. A mate to him was an object—a possession. Hence, his feeling that I had been stolen away when really, I had found my freedom.
Shaking my head, I tried to formulate a response to what he had said, but it was impossible. My head was still muddled. I was confused and afraid, and above all, couldn’t believe that this was all happening to me. It didn’t seem real, like this was all some sort of hazy dream. If I were lucky, I would wake and go to hash things over with Maggie. Maybe we would laugh about how wild my imagination was while we started on our morning chores.
But already, I knew there would be no waking from this. It was all too real, from the cold that bit at me to the hollow feeling already growing inside me as Kypher forced me to walk alongside him toward the base that the Ak-hal built up over the years since they h
ad fled the castle.
Because their old home had been such a point of pride, I knew that having to downsize their base must be a sore spot for the Ak-hal. While they had still managed to create something of beauty in this new base out in the arctic wilds, it was nowhere near as elegant and striking as Argaram Castle had been. Mithrim spires shone in the light, rising high in individual, protected towers. I could see other Ak-hal circling in and around these towers up above, in a strange sort of ballet. These towers all ranged in height, creating a shimmering backdrop against the whiteness. The highest of them stood at the very center, where it seemed to garner some protection from any potential threats. I assumed that this must be where the royal family lived.
Kypher led me to a smaller tower at the edges of the base, near to where we had landed. Several other Ak-hal turned our way when we entered, their eyes sliding my way and fixing on me as soon as Kypher pulled me in beside him. And in addition to the Ak-hal, there was a single human woman in the tower, whose face paled when her gaze fixed on mine. If it weren’t for protocol, I think she would have gasped in recognition. However, I did gasp when I saw her, for it had been a long time since last we met.
“Libba!”
I hadn’t known the woman for long before we parted those many years ago. She had just come to the Ak-hal, on the same ship that had brought Shay. I hadn’t liked her then. She had been a cold, ruthless woman who had jumped at the chance for immortality and who had done everything she could to betray those around her to gain an upper hand for herself. Though perhaps the reason I disliked Libba so much was that she reminded me, just a little, of myself in those early days of my life with the Ak-hal, when the idea of immortality—when the beauty of those beings—had enticed rather than repulsed me. However, seeing her now, it was obvious that something about the woman had changed.
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