Each of our guard has two hundred troops assigned to them. The Warriors Nokita chooses tend to be mechanically inclined and fit his area of expertise. He also has humans in his unit. Cuba stayed frozen in the fifties for generations. Keeping their vehicles running required knowledge, and the island has truckloads of men and a few women who enjoy tinkering on old engines. They’re gold in the new world, and we’ll take all the help we can get.
Nokita relaxes a bit and goes into parade rest, a small quirk to his lips. “I’d also like to report the dissemination of weapons has gone smoothly.”
“Of course it has. I put Attila the Hun and her sidekick general in charge.”
“Yes, my Alpha,” Nokita says with a slight bow of his head and a small grin as he leaves the room.
I sat in rapt attention during the entire exchange. This is Marinah in her element. “Why did you put the archers on the docks?” I ask after the door closes.
She smiles and shrugs. “The humans are like Ruth and Che. They don’t want their safety dependent on us. It’s why they started the archery group. They need to be part of this fight.”
“Someone told you this?”
She rolls her eyes in irritation. “The women had no problem telling me how they felt, and please notice the past tense in that sentence. They’ve had nothing to do with me since my Nova fit.”
“Nova fit?” It’s my turn to smile.
“Nova tantrum?” she grumbles.
“How about Nova Queen to save their lives and those of our Warriors?” My voice is stern so maybe it gets her attention.
“Tantrum and fit sound less threatening.”
Her expression has me moving. I rise from the chair and enter her space. She rests her fork on the table next to her plate, turns slightly, and dips her head into my stomach; her slow steady inhale tells me she’s fighting the side of her that says she isn’t qualified to lead. I slide my fingers over her soft braids and wisely don’t mention the twig in her hair. “Your Nova is pure beauty. She’s made for war and you need to embrace her. She will save the island if it’s asked of her.”
“You’re so sure,” she mumbles against my skin and then looks up. “What if she’s made for peace?”
I’m unsure how to answer that and have no idea where the question came from. Our Beasts are made for war, and a Nova is the scariest Beast of all. “Why do you ask?”
“It’s something I read in the women’s journals. You need to hear it.”
I walk to her bedside, pick up the stack of journals, and take them to the table. Marinah lifts the top book, shuffles pages, and begins reading.
War is the world of Shadow Warriors. For Shadow Women this is unacceptable. We are mothers, nurturers, providers. That which is war will never touch our door again. I, as Nova Warrior, have suppressed that which weakened me. My Nova will stand guard as we walk a path of harmony. She is at peace with my decision.
“Who wrote it?” I ask when she gently closes the book and looks up at me.
“My grandmother.”
It makes sense the woman was Nova. They didn’t all stay on the home planet as our texts suggest. We also have no information on female Novas. Maybe the women kept secrets.
Marinah continues. “She was Nova and she suppressed it.” Her eyes travel the room in thought. “Endura told me my grandmother was revered by the women. Could Endura have known I was Nova?”
Interesting and something I’ll think about in the future. Axel’s comment on our men having the ability to turn Nova gave me food for thought. “Have you read the entire journal?”
“No, only the first three sections. I’m translating as I go.”
She laughs at the look on my face. My uncle had me study our texts until I thought my brain would explode, but thankfully, I never had to translate them. “Have you learned anything else?”
A sad smile crosses her face when she shakes her head. “I’m trying to understand why the women won’t fight with us.”
I doubt we’ll ever understand. The idea of running or standing idly by a fight isn’t in our nature. I gather Marinah into my arms, lifting her from the chair. “It’s their choice,” I say as I inhale her scent.
“I was so terrified to live before my Warrior came out. They are willing to simply die. It angers me but more, it saddens me. There must be a way to fix what happened so long ago. No one is alive from that time, and we must find a way to meet in the middle.”
I have my doubts. The women are from another time and no longer part of the Shadow Warrior world. They can keep their peaceful ways in a non-peaceful world so they can die with their moral integrity intact. The person Marinah was before we mated bothers her. She sees herself in these women. She hates that she was weak and too terrified to live. It will drag her down if she doesn’t shake off her old mantle and understand she is not the same person. She is not a Shadow Woman, she is Warrior.
“You forget, as human, you gave your life for Che’s. It was the ultimate test and even as human, you passed. Your father sheltered you, and as much as I admired the man, he did you an injustice.”
“My mother and father knew what I was.” Steel enters her voice. “They tried to make sure I never shifted or understood.”
“They could never keep your Warrior hidden. Sooner or later you would have changed.” I continue inhaling her scent, rocking a little to comfort her.
“The women might die before I can help them.”
Of course she won’t let it go; it’s not in her nature. If she could save the world, she would. “It’s their choice. We are Shadow Warrior, but we still have choices. There’s a safe place somewhere in this messed up world, and we could simply walk away.”
She lifts her head, her eyes full of fire, and I see the Alpha I hoped to bring out. “We will never walk away from this fight, and we will keep the island safe. If my grandmother’s people choose death before I get there, so be it.”
I tip her head slightly and lower mine. It’s a short kiss, just enough to remind me why I love her so much. Right now, we have an island to protect, and Marinah has the world to save.
Chapter Eighteen
Marinah
It doesn’t matter that we’re exhausted, King insists we take the motorbikes out at midnight to tour the island and double-check our defenses. He’s doing it to calm my nerves because I’m climbing the walls. He remains cool and collected, his eyes thoughtful, his expression granite, and I want to punch him in the face.
Civilians are hunkered down at the citadel or in the surrounding buildings, filling every imaginable space. It’s crowded but the evacuation itself went like clockwork which means our drills and prep work paid off. Seeing the faces of the women and children as I passed through the endless halls was hard. I remember the fear and uncertainty of life with the Federation after my father died. King was right. I need to take time to settle my nerves.
We head to the southern part of the island where the Federation’s waterlogged hellhounds begin their creepy dance. We take the highway curves at breakneck speed. Piloting a motorcycle was another learning curve for me. After my first crash, where I sailed over my handlebars and landed in a heap ten feet away, I stopped worrying about injury and learned to shift my body with the bike like it’s part of me.
We pass Shadow Warriors guarding the road at strategic locations, armed with weapons and radios to alert the towers if we read the Federation signals wrong and they attack from this direction. We are fairly sure their soldiers will come straight at the citadel, but we’ve planned for every contingency we can think of.
We reach the southernmost location and turn the bikes around, heading back the way we came. We stop where Cabel and his team are doing their gruesome job. I don’t know why the thought of systematically killing the hellhounds underwater bothers me. I’ve never hesitated killing one and have no intention of starting now. It just seems wrong somehow. Ms. Beast lets me know I’m crazy by scratching my insides. She’s right.
Cabel’s unit has at least
a hundred watercraft—everything from smaller military boats to fishing boats. We can’t see into the distance but King radios and Cabel drives his boat to shore.
“Do you need additional men?” I ask him.
“We’ll have this location cleared in an hour and move on. We send a diver down, attach a hook to their chain, and drag them with the boats. If we don’t move them, we kill them. The Federation has been planting hellhounds for months and we’re only touching the surface, but at least we’ll make a dent.”
The Federation will suffer for what they’ve done. We leave Cabel to continue his job and head back to the citadel. King pulls off the road at one of our favorite spots. He clasps my hand and leads me to the cliff’s edge that overlooks the ocean. The waves splash in the distance, and the sounds of the night roll through me, filling me with peace. It’s a lie. The Federation approaches. They want us dead. They want the human men and women of this island under their thumb. They will annihilate us for simply being different.
“Waiting is the hard part,” King says into the quiet. He circles an arm around me, pulling me closer. I rest my head against his strong shoulder, inhaling his scent. Ms. Beast rumbles softly in pleasure and King’s Beast answers. I can sometimes see his in human form, it’s almost like an aura. Our beasts no longer fight, their energy flows steadily between each other. It seems boring. I’m more alive when King challenges me.
“What if only one of us survives?” I ask quietly. It’s the one thing my heart can’t take, but we need to discuss it.
King smooths his strong hand across my back. “The survivor will continue the fight,” he says gruffly.
I glance up and hold his gaze. “I can’t lose you.”
His mouth forms a wicked smile, and the scar across his cheek stands out, making him even more imperfectly wonderful. “You couldn’t get rid of me if you tried.”
“I won’t try, then.” Going to the tips of my Doc Martens boots, I kiss him. His savage taste fills something inside me, bringing out Ms. Beast’s wild side. She actually purrs. The shadowed presence of Nova waits.
We come up for air and I ask my next question. “Do you think about what will happen when there’s no one left to fight?”
His head tilts down so he’s looking at me. “I think there will always be war; it’s the blight of mankind.”
“Is that what you want?”
He tugs one of my braids. “You’re thinking about your grandmother’s journal. What’s this about?”
His eyes hold mine, and he has no idea how much I love him. He can’t. “The white picket fence, a dog by the hearth, a baby crawling on the floor?”
His voice lowers an octave. “Is this what you want, Marinah?”
“I’m not sure.”
He kisses my nose. “I think you would be bored within a week. Maybe we can find a big furry devil dog to entertain your devil cat.” His thumb rubs across my cheek. “When it comes to children, it’s expected of us. Our children will be alpha Warriors.”
I wiggle a bit so he loosens his arms, but I don’t pull away. “What if they want to be ordinary?”
He throws his head back in laughter. “There will be nothing ordinary about our children,” he says when he can speak. “Our girls will be headstrong, beautiful bullies who tease their male counterparts and put frogs in their beds. The boys will be as handsome as their father, and they won’t know what hit them when the girls are around. Much like your men, they’ll constantly be searching for places to hide.”
“Our men,” I correct him. “Just how many children do you think you’re having?” I ask uncertainly.
“A citadel full, at least.”
My fist lands between us, striking him in the stomach. He lets out a soft huff, but I know it didn’t hurt. “You forget it’s my body that must bear those children.”
“I picture you plump and grumpy as you waddle through the citadel looking for a wall to put your boot through.”
“What about Homestead One? I thought we would raise our family there.”
“How? It won’t hold all our children, and I like the walls of Homestead One without bootprints.”
I snuggle in close again. “I love you.”
He tips my head up. “Nothing will happen to either of us. We’re a team. I love you, my queen. We have a war to fight. Are you ready?”
“As I’ll ever be.”
Our noses touch. “You’ve done a great job preparing the island. We will defeat the Federation and afterward, we’ll go after Barnes. His days are numbered.”
Mate, Ms. Beast whispers inside me.
We take the winding ocean highway back to the citadel, racing against the coming storm of battle. I know I’ve missed something. No way will this go down without a hiccup or two. I want our people safe. There’s a loud rumble inside me and Ms. Beast whispers, kill. At least we’re on the same page. I’ll kill every Federation soldier I see if it saves my people.
King and I head in separate directions once we return to the citadel. My destination is the Armory to check on the dynamic duo. I almost knock Cosway over when I round a corner and grip her shoulders to steady her. She’s holding her cat and her eyes are wild.
“Babies in danger, must help babies,” she whispers. Cosway thinks anything young, from people to animals, are babies and must be nurtured. She gives candy to the island children, and I’ve even seen her doctor a scraped knee or two. I asked her if she wanted to help Axel in the infirmary, but she doesn’t like closed in spaces and prefers to walk around the island, helping where she can. We keep track of Cosway, for the most part, as she wanders around with her cat slung over her shoulder. She’ll return to the citadel with different items given to her by the people of the island. She’s accepted here and taken care of. I don’t like seeing her upset.
“Cosway,” I say so she looks at me. “Take five minutes and meditate with me.”
She nods her head and sits down where she’s at and places her back to the wall. I step beside her and sit down. “Breathe,” she says in her soft lilting voice. I follow her lead and breathe. “Bad out, good in.” We slowly inhale and exhale.
I go to my happy place while Cosway’s voice continues in a blur. I take my rifle apart and reassemble it. I look down the sight and line it up to the eyes of an imaginary Federation soldier. Sure and steady, I pull the trigger and blow his head off. He had President Barnes’ face. I line up another shot.
Cosway breaks into my meditation. “I will keep the babies safe.” She’s looking at me while stroking a hand through the cat’s hair.
“Thank you, Cosway. The babies need you.” She squeezes my hand, jumps up, and runs down the hall in the opposite direction.
I feel better after our short meditation. Now, I can face anything.
I enter the armory with that thought firmly in place. Ruth and Che sit on the floor with weapons spread around them. They both have sheets of paper and are writing furiously. Their heads pop up when they hear my boots. I walk closer and look over Ruth’s shoulder.
She glances up with a look of determination on her face. “We didn’t know the names of most of the artillery so we’re drawing scaled to size images. This will cut the confusion. After we’re finished, we’ll complete the inventory and have it to you in a few hours.”
My jaws have trouble staying together. She even has military vernacular down. Who really made this child? I try to be delicate in my response. These two have worked their butts off since I gave them this job. “Do your moms know you’re here?”
Ruth shrugs, her thin shoulders no match for the size of fight in her brain. “We couldn’t sleep so we snuck out. This needs to be done before the fighting begins. We found a few guns that could be faulty, and we placed them to the side. If someone will show me how to fix them, I’ll take over the task.”
“Me too,” Che volunteers when he looks up from his drawing of a horseman’s pick, a medieval Warhammer that somehow found its way into our stockpile.
I place my hand on m
y side where my sixteenth century German Mortuary Sword is housed in its scabbard. It’s special because it cleaves a hellhound’s head off with little effort and it’s a gift from King. “At least tell me you ate all your dinner.” Arguing with them for not sleeping will do me no good, and I must pick these battles carefully.
“Every bite,” says Che.
Ruth’s lips turn to a frown. “My mother made meatloaf. I ate it, but it wasn’t very good.”
Hmm, my stomach growls. I haven’t had meatloaf in years. “I’ll have two cots brought in here. If you get tired, rest. I’ll need you both alert when the Federation attacks.”
With their agreement secured, I head to my room and find King lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling like I did earlier. I walk to the end of the bed, turn, and fall backwards so we’re side to side. Air huffs from my chest when I land and bounce a few times.
“Quite the entrance,” he says without looking at me.
“I’m exhausted,” I sigh.
“Lie here for two minutes and you’ll be wide awake, I promise.”
“That’s the plan,” I say and roll to my side so I’m looking at him. “Is it always like this before battle?”
“Always.”
“I think it’s easier to march for days, find what you’re hunting, and kill it.” Also easier on my taxed brain.
Still looking at the ceiling, I hear the grin in his voice. “Much simpler.”
I snuggle into his chest and close my eyes. His arm pulls me in tighter, and I take a deep breath to clear my mind. “I’m going to meditate for a while. Don’t start the war without me.”
“I promise,” he breathes into my hair.
I clear my mind and think about killing. Ms. Beast likes to meditate with me, I think.
Chapter Nineteen
King
Within two minutes, she’s snoring softly. I rest my hand on her back and feel each breath. She’s worried. So am I. I never understood fear until Marinah entered my life. She asked what we would do if we lost each other, and I made light of it. I didn’t tell her that I plan on following her wherever she goes. Our souls are intertwined, and I won’t live without her. The difference is, if I go down, she’ll survive without me. She’s our destiny and will fulfill it by leading the Shadow Warriors. She only thinks she needs me. Marinah needs no one.
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