by Ella Maven
Stupid, stupid pardux. He underestimated me. Most did. Of course, it still wouldn’t be easy. If I couldn’t see him, I couldn’t take advantage of his weaknesses. My mind chewed on that problem, wondering how I would handle him when I could only fight blind.
The hair on the back of my neck rose, and I whirled around. The air shimmered for just a moment, a slight blur in the shape of a male. I narrowed my eyes. Someone was there. Before I could say a word, a series of clicks reached my ears.
Sherif appeared behind me, crouched on the balls of his feet. He wore a pair of pants in that same shiny material as his father. His gaze was on Varnex training, and I returned to my own study, ignoring the Kaluma behind me. I wasn’t about to tell him to leave, and I wasn’t going to miss an opportunity to watch my opponent fight.
“When he lowers his shoulder on a charge, he does so at an angle. He leaves his left side open,” Sherif spoke in a deep, low rumble. “Exposes his stomach.”
My shoulder tensed. Why was he telling me this? “I noticed.”
“And his left hip—”
“Is weak,” I finished for him. “He favors it.”
I glanced back at Sherif, who inclined his head in agreement. “Old injury.”
“Blanking takes energy.”
“Blanking?” I asked.
“When our scales flip to match our surroundings.”
“When you go invisible.”
“It has to be learned. It’s not instinctive. If we’re hurt badly enough or too tired, we can’t blank.”
Was he going to tell Varnex I knew his weaknesses? “Why are you telling me this?”
“It won’t be easy to defeat Varnex. He’s pardux for a reason.”
I eyed him, searching his glowing eyes, but they were expressionless. His face was hard. I’d never met another being who hid his thoughts and emotions so well. Not even Gar. “Do you want me to defeat your father?”
He was quiet for a long time. We listened to Varnex grunt and taunt his training partners. The warrior was strong, massive, and quick. This wouldn’t be an easy fight, not even if I knew his every move before he made it.
Finally, Sherif answered my question in a soft voice. “I’m not sure.”
I turned around, but he was gone. Not even a blur remained. When I caught sight of him again, he had reappeared on the opposite side of the settlement.
I was eager for Tabitha to get back. Maybe she had better luck with the females, because I sensed Sherif was going to be my biggest battle, and it would be all mental.
Tabitha
The kitchens were housed in a large wooden structure with several slatted vents in the roof. A row of fire pits lined the wall, and bowls and kitchen utensils were stacked on a table along another wall. A large table took up much of the center of the room and on top sat hunks of raw meat. Out back, I’d seen a few warriors carrying a fresh kill, and they had cut it open and hung it up to let the blood drain.
Normally, that would have made me gag, but I’d been on this planet for a few months now. I was used to game being prepared.
Wensla rattled off orders although she wasn’t a drill sergeant, and she didn’t seem to get off on ordering the other women around. She was efficient, and the women scurried to follow her orders. She motioned to me to follow her, and I found myself standing at a narrow table piled with a light orange root-like vegetable. The smell reminded me of a sweet potato.
“These tubers must be peeled and chopped for the evening stew,” Wensla explained. She handed me a crude knife; the handle wrapped in a scrap of leather. “Like this.” She ran the blade over the skin, scraping off a thin layer, before slicing it up in one-inch cubes. When she was finished, she dropped the pieces in a large bowl between us.
I immediately reached for one and copied her movements. I wasn’t as adept with scraping—I would have killed for a vegetable peeler—but I got the job done. She watched me carefully before resuming her work.
Conversation was limited. Several women worked behind us preparing the meat by hammering it into thinner strips and then slicing it. They seasoned it with what looked like a salt mix before handing it off to another set of women who threw it into a large iron pot to sear.
Smoke filled the room, and since the only openings were the vents above us, it wasn’t long before I was sweating through my new clothes. I pushed back my hair with the back of my knife-hand, wishing I had some sort of hair tie. “I never worked this hard peeling potatoes for mashed taters at Thanksgiving,” I grinned at Wensla. She glanced at me with a raised brow. “It’s a holiday in America. On Earth. We peel and chop a potato, which looks a lot like this, boil it, and then mash it with butter and milk.” My mouth watered. “I could so go for my grandmother’s mashed potatoes right now. And her twice baked. Really any potato. That women knows her spuds.” The familiar hole in my gut from missing my family gnawed at me, but I pushed it aside. Now was not the time for melancholy.
“We mash the tubers sometimes,” Wensla said. “But Varnex prefers stew. It stretches the crop.”
I nodded. “Right, that makes sense. So, does he decide everything around here?”
Her hands stuttered, and her knife slipped on the skin of tuber. The tip sank into her palm, and immediately dark blue-black blood welled at the tip. “Oh my God,” I lifted the skirt of my dress to press on her wound. “Are you okay?”
She still hadn’t made a sound, and when she met my eyes, hers were round and wet. Her throat worked as she swallowed thickly. “Yes, I’m fine.”
“We should wrap this or something. I don’t think anyone wants bloody stew.” I said the last two words with an exaggerated British accent, but of course she didn’t get the joke. I cleared my throat. “Do you have a healer area? Medicine? First aid supplies?”
“Gurla,” Wensla called, and the girl rushed over, her hands coming up to cover her mouth when she saw Wensla’s injury. The cut was deep and she’d already soaked the hem of my dress. “Please finish the tubers with Yupli.”
“What happened?” she asked, her fingers on Wensla’s arm.
“My hand just slipped.” She gave Gurla a reassuring smile. “Don’t worry.”
Gurla didn’t look convinced, but she called over Yupli and attacked the tubers. Wensla gestured to the door. “We’ll head to the healer’s hut. It’s nearby.”
My dress was still covering her wound, my hands pressing on top, so we moved in tandem, a bit like our legs were tied in a three-legged race. When we walked out the door, I glanced across the settlement to Xavy. I couldn’t see him well, but he sat with his knees bent, eyes staring off to the side. I looked in that direction to see Varnex training with a few warriors, grunts and thuds echoing down the path.
Wensla and I walked farther down a narrow path before ducking inside a small hut which only contained a bench, a dirty leave-covered bed, and a table of supplies. Wensla’s arms shook as she tugged her hand from my grip and began to wipe it clean.
“Is there a healer here to help?” I asked.
“She passed,” was all Wensla said.
“I’m sorry if I distracted you,” I said, unsure what to do. I stared at the blood stains on my dress as I sank down on the edge of the bench.
“You didn’t,” she said. “Well, you did, but it’s not your fault.” I waited her out as she slathered some goop on her cut and then hauled a long strip of fabric from a bin before methodically wrapping her palm, crossing over her wrist and between her index finger and thumb.
When she finished, she flexed her hand and then leaned on the table with both hands, dropping her head between her shoulders. She took a few deep breaths before she spoke again. “You bring change. I don’t know what change yet, and if the change is good, but you have brought it down on our heads.”
I opened my mouth, but then shut it again. “I don’t understand.”
She turned and leaned back against the table. “Some Kaluma females have forecasting abilities. Mine is still developing, and I didn’t have my vision
about you until after we met.”
“What was your vision?”
Her knuckles turned white where she gripped the table at her hips. “A blue and purple storm, sharp as knives, sweeps through our home. I don’t know what you leave in the wake. All I know is that everything changes.”
“Good or bad changes?”
Her breath hitched. “I don’t know. It’s why I didn’t want to speak to you. I didn’t want to trust you. But now I wonder…” she shook her head.
“I don’t want to bring any bad changes to you Wensla. Neither does Xavy.”
Her eyes drifted off. “I believe you.”
I had to stop myself from jerking with shock. “You do?”
She nodded. “I do. How you and Xavy are together… It’s not an act. You’re mates, I believe that with my every breath. You remind me of the way my parents were.”
Her past tense made me question, “Are they still alive?”
She shook her head. “No. And I don’t think anyone in this settlement has seen a coupling like that for a long time.”
I rose to stand next to her and gathered her injured hand in mine. “Tell me what’s going on here, Wen. Please.”
She was silent for a while, her breathing rapid as if she sought to summon courage out of the air.
“Varnex wasn’t always bad,” she whispered. “He was a good pardux, strong and smart, for many generations. His devoted mate extended his life, and we prospered. Couples found mates, had offspring. Our crops flourished and the hunting was plentiful. Sherif’s older brother was born, and we rejoiced in the birth of the future pardux. Sherif was born, and the two brothers grew up together.
“Then Kazel disappeared during a hunting party. Just like that.” She snapped her fingers. “No trace. That was twenty sun-cycles ago. Varnex’s mate, our pardua…” Wensla shook her head. “She couldn’t handle the loss of her oldest, her favorite, which she never denied. She took her own life.”
“Oh no,” I gasped.
“Sherif was not yet a mature Kaluma, and Varnex went mad. He couldn’t handle the loss of his oldest son and his mate.”
“Went mad how?”
Wensla eyes went unfocused, and she stared at a spot over my shoulder.
“Wen?”
Finally, her gaze met mine and her fingers brushed over her necklace before yanking on it with a vicious tug. “He took all the fertile females in the settlement for himself.”
I blinked at her. Suddenly the pieces began to fall into place in my mind. The necklaces of all the females that matched his own. The lack of children here. The tenseness of every male. “But… how? Why would the warriors let him do that?”
“For a while, we’d been birthing less females, which was a growing concern. Varnex insisted his genes must be used to repopulate. He would provide daughters for the next generation.” A shudder went through her body as her eyes squeezed shut. “He told them once he impregnated us, he’d set us free to mate.” When she met my gaze again, her expression was desolate. “It’s been over ten cycles. He hasn’t impregnated any of us yet.”
I shook with rage and had to grind my teeth together, so I didn’t scream. “He sleeps with all of you?”
She nodded. “On a rotation. Gurla avoided his attentions because she was too young, but she recently matured, and I can’t…,” she let out a short sob and bit down on the back of her hand. “I can’t let her go through it. I’d let him grunt over me every night if it would save her from it, but it won’t.” She inhaled sharply. “I’m willing to risk the storm. We can’t go on like this. We will die out.”
“And no one sees this? No one will challenge him?”
“He still has the loyalty of the majority of warriors. Sherif is—” she clamped her mouth shut and shook her head.
“Sherif is what?”
“I can’t…”
“Tell me, Wen. Tell me.”
She panted short breaths. “Sherif is quietly gathering his own faction, but he cannot challenge Varnex. That’s not done. If he kills Varnex without support, he will not be honored as the next pardux. It will be chaos and infighting.”
“But if Xavy beats Varnex?”
For the first time, a light of hope shone through a small crack in the lines of her face. “If Xavy beats Varnex, Sherif will be our next pardux.”
“Will he do what Varnex has done?”
She shook her head. “He’s a good male. Fair. He hates his father, but he’s also smart. He can’t be too impulsive, or we will all lose everything.”
“Help us, Wen,” I said. “Help us defeat Varnex. I promise you that we don’t mean you harm.”
Wen’s jaw tensed and the she nodded her head with a glint of determination in her eye. “I have some ideas…”
Thirteen
Xavy
I barely tasted the evening meal of stew. Tabitha and I sat as far away from the guards as we dared. She repeated her conversation with Wensla in whispers, although sometimes her voice rose as she grew angry, and I had to shush her.
Shoveling the food in my mouth, I listened intently. The Kaluma were unraveling at the hands of their mad pardux. Sherif was still a variable. I couldn’t determine how he’d react if I killed his father. Would he thank me, or would he kill me in turn?
“Wensla said he’ll fight dirty,” Tabitha was saying.
I grunted as I scraped my bowl for the last bits of stew. I’d figured that.
“She said she will try to move herself into his, um, rotation for the night before the fight. She can try to drug him. Not much, just enough to make him woozy.”
“That’s risky, Tab.”
“She’s desperate. And so are we.”
“I’ve been watching him. I can beat him, Tabitha, I know I can.”
“With your injuries?”
“I only need to tire him out and land a hit. Make him bleed. If I can drain his energy, he won’t be able to blank. He’s a big target. I won’t miss him if I can see him.”
“It’s not that I don’t believe you, Xavy, but—”
“I know, one wrong move and I’m dead and you’re wearing his collar.”
Her eyes went round and began to fill.
“Fleck, I’m sorry.” I drew her against my chest.
“Don’t even say that.” Her little fist smacked my arm.
I told her about how Sherif spoke to me earlier in the day, and her expression grew hopeful. “He has to want you to win, right?”
“I’m sure he’s conflicted. Not matter what, Varnex is still his father. And if what Wensla said is true, he was once a respected pardux.”
She fell silent after that, and I pulled a fur over her as we watched the sun drop below the horizon, sending the settlement into darkness. At this time of day, the place was almost beautiful as the flickering torches from inside the vine homes made them glow from within.
Tabitha mumbled that they seemed like fairy lights to her. I didn’t know what those were, but she had a small smile on her face as she said it.
“I’m proud of you, Tab.” I rubbed my palm up and down her back. “You worked hard to gain Wensla’s trust, and that could be the difference between us living or dying.”
She didn’t answer, only squeezed my waist as she embraced me. The guards still stood sentry, but they didn’t linger close to us. I began to wonder if they were meant to keep us in place or if they were meant to guard us from Varnex seeking to end us prematurely.
Sherif was the only one who scheduled the shifts. In fact, he was the one who seemed to be operating the whole settlement, while Varnex only deigned to descend from his harem house to train. He didn’t eat at the tables around the kitchens either. The females delivered his food to him.
I would relish watching him bleed. I tried to imagine Daz turning mad and taking all the females for himself. I couldn’t even fathom it. The betrayal some of the warriors must have felt…
Wensla had said most fell in line because Varnex had made them promises. But I couldn’t think
of a promise Daz could make any of us in order to go along with that crazy self-centered plan.
Varnex thought only his seed should be the basis for the next generation of Kaluma. Shameful. The very idea of it made my skin itch and my blood hot. He gave his females no choice. He hadn’t honored them. He’d collared them like property and forced them to lay in his furs, to take his cock.
If I got the chance, I’d cut it from his body and shove it down his throat. A sick roiling began in my gut as I began to wonder if I was anything like him.
Tabitha must have sensed my anger because she turned in my arms and cupped my face. “Hey, your heart is racing a mile a minute. Are you okay?”
I didn’t know what a mile a minute was, but I assumed it was fast. “I’m angry at how he’s treated his females. Wensla said there were only about a dozen fertile females left, and he takes them all for himself. Not giving them a choice.” I felt my nostrils flare. “I think of the words I said to you in that cave, and my desires, and I feel shame. Am I like Varnex?”
Tabitha straddled my waist and gripped my face, hard. Her eyes shone in the dark. “You listen to me. Wensla said seeing us together is what made her want to help us. Because she sees the devotion and respect we have for each other.” She shook her head. “You are nothing like Varnex. Nothing. You don’t want to own my whole life and tell me what to do. You treat me like a partner, or a teammate. You saw how they cowered when he spoke to them. He makes them wear those necklaces because he’s a narcissist, not because he’s proud to call them his.”
She was right.
I wanted Tabitha to wear my mark because I wanted everyone to know this brave, purple-haired beauty was mine. I craved her laughter. I wanted her to desire me with her every breath, not fear me.
“Do you see the difference, Xav?” she asked softly.