Alien Romance: The Alien's Bliss: A Sci-fi Alien Warrior Invasion Abduction Romance (42 page)

Chris touched his arm. “If he wants to come, let him come.”

“The warriors won’t like it,” he told her.

“You can explain it to them.” Chris wiped her hands on a cloth. “If you’re ready to go, we can go now.”

“We’re ready.” With one step, Emily crossed the border into Lycaon territory. A shiver ran up her legs, but her feet stood on the same solid ground as in Ursidrean territory.

Faruk hesitated to cross. Chris murmured under her breath. “Maybe this isn’t such a good idea. We don’t want to create an incident.”

Emily stepped forward. “It’s all right. He’s been guarding the border for years, and now he has to cross it.” She held out her hand to Faruk.

He fixed his eyes on her face and took her hand. In an instant, the unbreakable bond holding them together forged a link across the stream, and he stepped across the gap. His foot anchored on solid ground, and the party moved up the hill.

At the top, Emily looked back. Ursidrean territory stretched out of sight to the mountains beyond. Marlo stood on the hilltop across the stream. He raised his hand, and Emily waved back. Then the trees swallowed her up.

Emily settled in for another long day of hiking through the thick forest, and they didn’t stop until sundown. Chris and Turk made camp on a ridge overlooking a river valley running down to wide open plains. “That’s it.”

Emily looked around. “What is?”

Chris pointed to a mist hanging over the forest canopy. “That’s the village.”

Emily frowned. “It’s a cloud.”

Chris laughed at her. “It’s smoke, silly. It’s the smoke from their fires. When there’s no wind, it collects between these ridges and doesn’t blow away so it looks like mist.”

Faruk came to her side. “It’s still a long way down. We won’t get there until late tomorrow.”

“It seems so close,” Emily remarked. “You could put out your hand and touch it.”

“I should warn you,” he told her. “The Lycaon live pretty rough. They don’t have power, and they heat all their water for washing and cooking on open fires.”

Emily gazed down at the mist. “I guessed that from the smoke.”

“They don’t have the comforts you’re used to in Harbeiz,” he told her.

“I’ve spent time in the mountains before,” she told him. “Besides, from what you say, it doesn’t sound much different from your camp on the border.”

He shrugged. “I guess not.”

“Have you seen the Lycaon village before?” she asked.

“No, I’ve never seen it,” he replied.

“Then how do you know it’s rough?” she asked.

He shifted from one foot to the other. “I guess I don’t, really. I only know what I’ve heard.”

“Who have you heard from?” she asked. “Have other Ursidreans visited Lycaon territory?”

“Not that I know of. We only heard things.....” He trailed off.

“It sounds like a typical case of prejudice,” she told him. “You don’t really know anything about them, so you make up stories about how they live rough, without power, and cook on open fires when you do the same thing. That’s how wars get started.”

He changed the subject. “How did you wind up spending so much time in the mountains? How did you come to work on the mountain search and rescue?”

“I took a first aid course in high school,” she replied. “That led to a more advanced first responder course. At the end of the course, the instructor told me I should go out for search and rescue, so I did.”

“You must have been good, to stay with it as long as you did,” he remarked.

“I suppose I was good,” she replied. “I loved it, and I went to all the trainings. I never got tired of learning new things and challenging myself.”

“Was the rest of your family involved?” he asked.

She made a face. “No, none of them was ever interested in that sort of thing. My family was always very sedentary. They never did anything physical, and they never understood why I loved search and rescue so much. They used to make nasty jokes about it.” She turned away.

Faruk followed her gaze down the hill. “I’m sorry to bring it up.”

“Don’t be,” she replied. “I’m glad to put that part of my life behind me.”

“You can spend all the time you want in the mountains here,” he told her. “The Ursidreans belong to the mountains. That’s what makes us different from the other factions.”

Emily cocked her head. “Do you want to know something interesting? My dad used to say the same sort of things about search and rescue that you just said about the Lycaon. He couldn’t understand why anybody would want to sweat and puff to hike all the way up some mountain, just so they could camp in a flimsy tent with no power and no hot water and no cable TV. He thought anybody who did that must have some kind of mental disease.”

Faruk sighed. “I can see why you’re happy to get away. Was your husband the same way?”

“No, no,” she replied. “I met him on search and rescue. We did it together for three years before we got married.”

“And after that?” he asked.

“After that, I was too busy helping him raise the kids to have time for search and rescue. Then, after he died, the whole thing lost its appeal for me. I hadn’t been into the mountains since he died - until now.”

He hugged her around the shoulders.

“What about you?” she asked. “How did you get onto the border patrol?”

“I got called up when I was five, just like every other Ursidrean cub,” he replied.

Emily’s eyes popped open. “Does that mean the Ursidreans have some kind of military draft? I didn’t know that.”

He nodded. “It’s not really a military draft. It’s a civil labor pool. When a cub reaches maturity, you report to the labor pool for assignment. If you’ve had any special training before that, you get assigned to your specialty. If you don’t, they can assign you wherever they need people. That could be the military, it could be the border patrol, or it could be any civil station in the city. You never know where you’re going to end up.”

“And then do you stay there for life?” she asked. “Does that become your permanent vocation?”

“Only if you want it to be,” he replied. “If you don’t like it and want to do something else, the labor pool assigns you somewhere else to go.”

“So that’s what happened to you?” she asked. “They assigned you to the border patrol?”

“No,” he replied. “I had special medical training and disaster management training from my academy days. They assigned me to the infirmary.”

Emily gasped. “The infirmary!”

“You didn’t know, did you?” he asked. “I was going to be a doctor.”

“What happened?” she asked. “I thought you didn’t like the infirmary.”

He laughed. “And now you know how I ended up here. I told the labor pool I didn’t want to stay underground in the city for the rest of my life. They asked me if I still wanted to do medical work and disaster management, and I said yes. So they sent me to the border patrol to be a medic. End of story.”

“And you’ve been here ever since,” she concluded.

He nodded. “I’ve been happy here.”

She eyed him. “And you never had any desire to go back to the city?”

“None at all.” He cocked his head. “Why do you ask?”

“What if you find a mate?” she asked. “What if you had cubs of your own? You couldn’t raise them out here.”

“Why not?” he asked.

She looked around. “Where would they stay? Where would they be born? How would they learn what it means to be Ursidrean?”

“I would teach them what it means to be Ursidrean.” He smiled. “I am Ursidrean.”

“But they wouldn’t know what the city is like,” she pointed out.

“There’s more to being Ursidrean than living in the city,” he replied.

“You know what I mean,” she told him. “They wouldn’t have access to the Academy and all the other resources the city has to offer.”

“I thought you loved the mountains,” he countered.

She turned bright red. “Who said anything about me? We’re talking about you.”

He gazed back down the valley. “Right.”

“Don’t tell me you’ve never thought about those things,” she told him. “Don’t tell me you’ve never once considered your future.”

“I have thought about them,” he replied. “But since I don’t have a mate, and I’m not likely to have cubs anytime soon, what’s the point of planning the whole thing out? If I had a mate who wanted to live in the city, I suppose I would have to deal with that when the time came.”

Emily kept silent. He stroked her arm and pressed her hand, but she didn’t respond.

“Why do you take this subject so seriously?” he asked.

“You know why,” she murmured.

“Tell me anyway,” he told her. “I want to hear you say it.”

“Here we are, holding hands and hugging each other,” she replied. “You said you didn’t want me to leave, that you were looking forward to spending time with me and getting to know me better, and now we’re deep in Lycaon territory together. Are we on the way to being mates? Or is this just a joy ride through the countryside, having a good time while it lasts?”

“We’re not on a joy ride through the countryside,” he told her. “We wouldn’t be deep in Lycaon territory together if we were. I would have chosen a much more hospitable place to take you for a joy ride.”

Emily shook her head. “Then we have to think about where this is going. Are we on the way to being mates?”

He cocked his head to one side. “I don’t know. Are we?”

“Is that what you want?” she asked.

“Is that what
you
want?” he asked.

She smacked her lips. “Stop repeating the last thing I said and answer me.”

“Okay,” he replied. “I wouldn’t mind if we were on the way to being mates. As a matter of fact, I would be delighted. There. I said it. Are you satisfied?”

She relaxed and squeezed his hand. “Good. That’s how I feel, too. But I wouldn’t want you to give up your life in the mountains for me if you didn’t want to.”

“And I wouldn’t want you to live like Chris and Turk if you didn’t want to,” he replied. “Just because living in the mountains along the border has worked for me all these years doesn’t mean it will work for you—or for us, if it comes to that.”

Emily frowned. “I’m glad we agree on that, but it doesn’t get us any closer to solving the problem.”

“There is no problem,” he replied. “We aren’t mates.”

“When will we be?” she asked. “When will we even know if we’re going to be?”

He shrugged. “Do we have to answer all the questions of life right now?”

Emily closed her eyes and lifted her face to the glowing sunset skies. “No, we don’t.”

1. Chapter 7
   

They headed downhill the next morning, and before an hour passed, they came in sight of a bunch of stick huts not much different from those constructed by the Ursidrean border guards. People just like Turk, with hair of different hues running back from their faces and down their necks, with pointed ears and wiry, angular bodies, clustered among the houses. Women held children between their knees, and men of all ages worked around the village.

The instant the party came in sight of the village, a tall man jumped up from tossing stones on the ground in the midst of a group of youngsters. He strode across the clearing and threw his arms around Turk. They held each other close, and the tall man bellowed to the skies.

When he held Turk him at arm’s length, a glorious smile lit up Turk’s face. Emily wouldn’t have known he was the same man who confronted Faruk across the border. He turned to Emily. “This is my brother, Caleb.”

Caleb’s eyes flickered over Faruk, but he gave no sign of alarm. He held out his hand to Emily. “Welcome. Come with me to my house.”

Then he threw his arms around Chris. “Where have you been? We’ve been waiting ages for you two to get back. No, don’t tell me where you’ve been. I don’t want to know. You’re back now, and you’re together. That tells me all I need to know.”

He and Turk laughed and clapped each other on the back. Chris brushed a tear from the corner of her eye. “It’s good to see you again, Caleb. How’s Marissa?”

“She’s just fine,” Caleb replied. “But she’s not here just now. She went to another village to visit a woman who’s sick after giving birth. She’ll be sorry she wasn’t here to welcome you home.”

“We’ll see her when she gets back,” Chris replied.

Caleb led the way to an unassuming hut at the edge of the village. He squatted on the dirt floor and motioned the party to do the same. “This is Emily Allen,” Chris told him. “She fell out of the same Romarie ship that we crashed in, and she landed in Ursidrean territory.”

Caleb glanced at Faruk again. “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Thank you,” Emily replied. “Two of my sisters and my cousin were on the same ship, and I came to find out if they’re here. I couldn’t rest until I saw them again.”

Caleb nodded. “I understand. We’ll do what we can to find them.”

“Are all the women from the crash here in the village?” Chris asked. “A year has passed since they landed. They could be anywhere by now.”

“What are their names?” Caleb asked.

“My cousin is Aimee Sandoval,” Emily told him. “My sisters are Frieda and Anna Evans.”

He shook his head. “The person to ask is Marissa. She knows all the crash survivors by name and keeps track of where they are. Some didn’t survive the injuries they received in the crash, and some have left the Lycaon for other factions. I don’t know them as well as she does, so you should wait until she gets back.”

Emily stiffened. “If one of my sisters is dead, I want to know as soon as possible. Isn’t there any way you could find out before she gets back?”

Caleb sat back on his heels. “I’ll ask my mother. She’ll know.”

He started to stand up, but Turk stopped him. “I’ll go.”

Caleb’s eyes flew open. Then he laughed and squatted down again while Turk went out. “He always was a mama’s boy.” He touched Chris’s arm. “I mean that in the nicest possible way.”

Chris laughed, but her eyes sparkled with tears. “I know it. He’s had her on his mind a lot lately and he wanted to come back here to see her again—and you, Caleb.”

Caleb waved her comments away. “He didn’t want to see ugly old me, not when he had you to keep him company. He knew I would only put him to work with the warriors again, the way I did before he left. I don’t blame him for spending a year in the mountains instead of coming home.”