The Artistry of Love

by C. J. Scarlett

  No pet names!

  As you wish. It felt good to complain, and for my complaints to be acknowledged with warmth and understanding. It had been a long two weeks with the Ak-hal.

  It wasn’t much longer after that when what appeared to be an outcropping of rock appeared on the horizon. As we grew closer, I found that it was a wall, built of stones set one on top of the other. Two great white bears guarded the entrance. Khofti and the other Kamani, whose name was Toki, paused, and they all seemed to converse with each other. We were allowed to pass, and we entered a courtyard, filled with white bears, as well as Kamani in their mahogany-toned humanoid form. They all seemed busy doing some sort of task. A few cubs tussled to one side. They were silent; everyone was focused, a little tense.

  What are they doing?

  Preparing for the siege.

  Siege?

  The Ak-hal will come.

  A rock wall loomed where the courtyard ended, with an arched entrance to it. Khofti walked inside. I squinted, my eyes adjusting to the dimmed lighting.

  You can get down, now. We are safe here.

  I jumped down off his back, landing a bit roughly on my feet. I stretched, trying to get the blood back into my limbs. I looked around me. It was another ice cave, but this one was enormous, with many walkways built into the sides. Kamani walked along them, busy going to and fro in preparation.

  “Come with me,” Khofti said, holding his hand out to me. I was so in awe of my surroundings that I took his hand, unquestioningly following him wherever he led. We walked across the expanse of the cavern, winding through a massive crowd of Kamani. They were all so similar, and yet, so different. He led me to one of the walkways, leading me up an incline, and around. I noticed many doorways. It reminded me a little of an anthill.

  “Where do they lead?” I asked.

  “That’s where the Kamani live,” he replied. “When we need to, we can all fit in here. We could block off the entrance, and stay here for many years. The Ak-hal cannot burn stone.” He brought me to one of the doorways. I didn’t know how this one was different from the others. Inside, a fire burned low, a hole was carved into the ceiling to let the smoke out. Beside the fire, a woman sat. A human woman. She looked up. Seeing me, she smiled widely.

  “Hello,” she said. She was older—her hair was white, and her face was lined. She was still very beautiful, though. She had doe eyes—a striking blue color. Her hair was neatly coiffed, although she was dressed in the Kamani jumpsuit. She sat cross-legged, her posture straight and graceful. My mother would have said that she had “aged gracefully.”

  “Hi,” I replied, not sure what to say back. She looked to Khofti.

  “Are there any others?”

  “No,” he replied sadly. She nodded grimly and sighed before turning her gaze to me. Her smile was kind.

  “I’m sure that you have many questions for me,” she stated warmly. I nodded. “What is your name?”

  “Shay.”

  “Pleased to meet you. I am Maggie.” She stood, taking some things down off some shelves that had been carved out of the stone. She fixed something, placing it on a rock in the fire. It smelled good—my stomach ached as I realized that she was cooking. “When the Ak-hal took me, it was 1918.” She turned to me and squinted. “What year did they take you?”

  “2020,” I replied. She nodded.

  “I’m older than I ever thought I’d be,” she mused.

  “How did you escape?” I was dying to know, since it seemed that the Kamani had never before attempted a rescue—or else the Ak-hal would never have let them enter during the mating ritual. She smiled, pride evident on her face.

  “I kept my eyes open, and acted the moment I saw my chance. One night, my Ak-hal mate made a mistake.” She looked at me, leaning forward. “When I went out into the courtyard, it was empty. No one was around; they were at the presentation ceremony. I ran. And I kept running. I was half dead from exhaustion and the cold when the Kamani found me wandering out in the snow.”

  “She was the first to alert us that the Ak-hal were kidnapping women,” Khofti explained. “We immediately began preparations to stop them.”

  “Last night, they were supposed to get as many of you as they could,” Maggie looked at Khofti questioningly, her brow cocked.

  “Shay was to mate the crown prince,” Khofti said. “Taking her caused them to burn their castle.” Maggie closed her eyes for a moment, a pained look crossing her face. She paused a moment before turning to me. “I didn’t know that mithrim could burn. I thought that was the point. So, I assume that you have met Sarita.”

  “I have.”

  “She’s a snake.”

  “I agree.” She nodded. I had passed some sort of test there. She placed the food that she had made into a wooden bowl and handed it to me.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  “You’re welcome.” Lacking any tableware, I ate with my fingers. It was some sort of spiced vegetable mixture. It was delicious.

  “How long have you been free?” I asked her.

  “On this planet, fifteen years. In Earth years, it would be ninety. We are far from the sun here.”

  “So we can age?”

  “I can age.”

  “How?”

  “My Ak-hal mate died.”

  “How?” I repeated, squinting. She smiled, although it didn’t reach her eyes.

  “I killed him. When I escaped.” She gave me a moment to let that sink in. “I don’t have a Kamani mate, so I didn’t retain the immortality.”

  “So…” I pointed at Khofti. “He thinks I’m meant to be his mate.” She nodded.

  “If you accept him, you will be immortal. If you don’t, and your Ak-hal is killed, you will begin to age. Slowly, but regardless, you will age and then die.” She smiled at me sadly.

  “I have a choice?” Khofti knelt down beside me, gently taking my chin between two fingers.

  “You always have a choice, little one.” That’s when it really hit me—I was free. I had escaped the Ak-hal. I might never go back to Earth, although, what reason would there be to return? Everyone that I had known was dead. But, if I threw my support behind the Kamani, I would never go back to the Ak-hal. If I died with the Kamani, I died a free woman. I nodded. I looked into his beautiful golden eyes and touched his cheek with a finger.

  “I’ll think about it.” I smiled brazenly at him. He laughed. It was a bright, bubbling sound. It made me feel light inside.

  “They certainly didn’t break your spirit, little one.

  “I must go. I will return.” He walked out of Maggie’s dwelling. Maggie returned to the work that had been in her lap—some sort of weaving. She seemed at peace. She glanced up at me with a smile.

  “You might do well to bed that one,” she said bluntly. I frowned.

  “Why?”

  “The Ak-hal won’t want you back if you are mated to a Kamani.” She looked at me pointedly. “You know why they took you, don’t you?”

  “Because I’m beautiful,” I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm. She laughed.

  “Because you’re a virgin.” It was, what I had thought, my secret. That I had gone through college (albeit a commuter college) and several boyfriends without turning in my v-card had been my little thing. That, you know, I’d take care of when I met someone who wouldn’t be a jerk to me afterward. And I always dated jerks.

  “I had a feeling,” I said thoughtfully. “But then, I’d thought, you know, that how would they know? I mean, they haven’t been following me my entire life, have they?”

  “How does a predator know what is prey?” She shrugged. “That is one of the few things that I don’t know of the Ak-hal. I do know that they want virgins. The ones of the batch that they find aren’t, they use for their sacrifice. They probably checked while you were in stasis.” Things began to click into place. “They are hunting you down as we speak because they want to get to you before Khofti can claim you as his own.”

  “This planet is so�
�� barbaric.” I frowned. Maggie looked at me, questioningly. “I mean, on Earth, we had made so much progress. I had a job, and I owned my own home. I didn’t need a man to complete me.”

  “There’s been no reason for them to progress,” she said. “The Ak-hal are so male dominated since all their women were killed. The Kamani are a little more equal, though. You’ll see. They respect their women.”

  Khofti returned a few hours later. I had begun to help Maggie with her weaving. It was calming work—we made cloth for the jumpsuits. It involved a lot of tugging. My fingers had been clumsy at first, but they learned the method by rote.

  “Preparations have gone well,” Khofti commented as he walked in. Evidently, “hello” wasn’t a part of Kamani culture. They seemed to just begin speaking without a greeting. It wasn’t blunt—it just felt like a continuation from where they’d left off. “The chief and the others have returned. They are all safe.”

  “Good,” Maggie said firmly. “We can’t afford to lose anyone. I just wish that you had been able to rescue more women.”

  “Me too,” I agreed wholeheartedly. I hadn’t really gotten to speak with many of them due to my schedule as the future crown princess, but I ached for them. They might all be dead by now.

  “Come with me?” Khofti asked me. I looked to Maggie, and she waved me off.

  “It’s time for an old woman to rest,” she grumbled good naturedly.

  I went with him. He took me by the hand, holding mine with both of his. He looked at me sideways as we walked.

  “Where are you taking me?” I asked.

  “To my dwelling. Regardless of what you decide, we are to pretend that we are mated,” he explained. “So the Ak-hal will no longer want you.” I nodded. He let me know that we were still on the table. But he wouldn’t forcing me to do anything. It was up to me to decide, but he was all in, evidently.

  We entered his dwelling on the topmost tier of the cavern. Inside, the ceiling was a large dome of pure blue rock. The late evening light shone through it, lighting the room with a bright blue glow.

  “What is it?” I asked, transfixed.

  “That is what the Ak-hal are after. It’s part of a gem,” he looked up at it. “It covers these caves.”

  In the center of the room, there was a large bed, filled with blankets. I sat down on it. It sank down deliciously. I lay back on it, feeling all the aches in my limbs. I realized that I had been awake for more than a day. He sat down beside me, leaving enough space between us.

  “Do you have any books?” I asked him. They were the one thing that I missed in all the universe. The Ak-hal didn’t seem to have them. He looked at me, frowning.

  “I don’t know that word.”

  “Stories?”

  “Ah. I know many. Which would you hear?”

  “I want to hear about you.”

  “What about me?”

  “What has your life been like?”

  “Nothing really to speak of.” He thought for a moment, studying me with his steady gaze. “I grew up here, living among the Kamani. We are a peaceful sort of people. When the Ak-hal came, we had our first real struggle.” I frowned. How old was he? He didn’t look to be more than twenty-five, at best.

  “You were alive when the Ak-hal came?”

  “I wasn’t more than a cub,” he replied. “When they first arrived, they seemed friendly. Cold. Their smiles didn’t reach their eyes, so we didn’t entirely trust them. It was when they killed Fana, and their king wore her skin without permission that we knew. Surely, they were out to take us.

  “We avoided them. We figured that we could live in peace. But they sought us out, killing many for their skins. It wasn’t until Maggie escaped from them that we found out about the abductions. Back then, they took other kinds of women, as well. Then came the burning. That was before your group arrived.” The more that he said, the more brutal the Ak-hal seemed, and I had firsthand experience with them.

  “Are you going to fight them?” I asked, fully ready to join in that battle, despite my lack of dragon or bear strength.

  “They will come here first.”

  “Because of me.” He nodded.

  “They won’t get in though.” He seemed confident of that fact. He reached over and touched my face. “You are safe here, little one.” My heart raced, but not in the bad way. I leaned in and kissed him. His hand caressed my face as he kissed me back. Our kiss deepened, and I let myself be swept away within the moment with him. Unlike all the others before him, I wanted more from Khofti—not because it would save me, but genuinely.

  Hesitantly, nervously, I reached for his strange, soft garment, pulling it from his shoulders as I kissed him. I guided him gently back onto the bed, opening my eyes to find his golden orbs studying me, curiously. I pulled away, and I ran my hands over his smooth, taut skin. He felt warm. He grabbed me by the wrists.

  “Are you sure, little one?” he said softly. “Your eyes still glow from the Ak-hal. And when Kamani mate, it’s forever.” I cocked my head to the side. He spoke to me indirectly and directly at the same time—forever was a long time.

  “If you’re going to save me, save me now,” I replied. He nodded. “I want you. I don’t think that will change.”

  “Humans are so…” He squinted as he searched for the right word. His English was good, but his education was patchy.

  “Fickle.” I finished for him. “And Barbearians are so steady.” He frowned.

  “Barbearians?”

  “It’s what I am going to call your people,” I explained. “You have no technology, no books, and you are bears. Get it? Bar-bear-ians?” He laughed and shook his head.

  “You have a strange sense of humor, little one.”

  Suddenly, the Sky Jewel above us grew dark. We both looked up just in time for it to shatter. We both shielded our eyes, shrapnel from the jewel cutting our skin. The large, crystalline head of a dragon looked at us. My heart sank—the dragon was a caramel color, with brown-red eyes. Without a doubt, I knew that it was Moranen, coming to claim me for his own.

  He roared in anger, reaching in with a large, taloned claw and picking me up. I reached out for Khofti, who was in the middle of a shift. He was taking too long. I found myself out in the bright late-afternoon sunshine, squinting. Clutched in Moranen’s enormous claw, I held on tightly. The wind blew my hair back as Moranen burst into a run, his great wings making a large, rushing noise as he took off. Many of the Ak-hal were grouped about the Kamani’s compound. As Moranen left with me in tow, they moved forward, unleashing fire and ruin on my Barbearians.

  Chapter 8

  I found, upon my return, that the Ak-hal’s castle still stood. It seemed as though it had been untouched. It was still crowded with human women—they looked at me from their eyes, angled toward the ground. Now, it was with interest, not fear or loathing. Clara was doing my hair. I looked at myself in the mirror—a doll, a toy, nothing more. My eyes, in fact, glowed with the cold light of the Ak-hal. They were still hazel, but strangely fiery. I guessed that it was only for the duration of the mating ceremony, as Clara and Sarita as well as all the other human mates lacked it. I felt utterly defeated. There was no way for the Barbearians to catch up in time to save me. I had been inspected by an Ak-hal doctor. The experience had been clinical and intrusive. Finding me intact, I was declared still suitable as a mate for the crown prince.

  Clara kept silent, understanding how crushing of a blow I had just been dealt. Freedom had been so close that I could have touched it.

  “What are they like?” Clara asked me quietly.

  “They are kind.” I said softly, choking back bitter, angry tears. “They are warm.”

  “I hoped so.”

  “Did you know Maggie?” Clara paused, her eyes wide.

  “Did she make it?”

  “Yes.” Now it was Clara’s turn to hold back her tears.

  “Is she well?”

  “Very well,” I replied. I paused. I needed to ask her a difficult ques
tion. “Were you the one? The one who alerted the Ak-hal that I was gone?” The face that she made told me that she had expected this question. She shook her head as she tugged the styling wand through my hair.

  “No,” she said. “It was Libba.” I felt relieved. Clara hadn’t been the one to betray me.

  “Be brave,” she whispered in my ear. As she did, she slipped something heavy into my pocket. I looked up at her from the chair in which I sat and nodded. She put the finishing touches on my hair—thick brunette waves. The two women wearing black silk entered, slowly carrying in my new crown on a black velvet pillow. It was identical to the one that I had discarded in the ice cave of the Kamani.

  Entering the great hall, I found that it had either been rebuilt or survived untouched. It seemed that the castle was made of mithrim to withstand the temper of the Ak-hal. The numbers of human women and Ak-hal were fewer in the hall that day. Their faces looked grim. Among them, I spotted Libba. She had a burn mark on her cheek. Otherwise, she appeared unhurt. I was led by Moranen to the dais. I dared to look directly at him. I seemed to have more control over myself—the spell of the Ak-hal had been broken the moment that Khofti’s voice had first sounded within my head. Moranen’s face was angry—annoyed. There had been a delay in plans. He wanted to wage his war against the Kamani. He wanted to crush them beneath his taloned claws. We stepped up to the dais, where Sarita and the king sat, and the shaman stood, golden cup in hand, waiting.

  I took the prince’s hand, as before. He looked at me coldly.

  “I saw how you looked at him,” he whispered to me, so no one else could hear. “After this, you will only look at me that way.” It sounded like a threat. I wished that Khofti would magically appear, and make all this go away. But the bears were too far away. They would never make it in time. It was up to me. I thought of the weight in my pocket, wondering what it could be.

  The ritual was completed. We stood, hand in hand, in front of the Ak-hal. They clapped, their mirth lukewarm.

  “Whose blood was used in the elixir?” I whispered. Moranen looked at me sharply. His smile spread slowly across his face.