Broken Skies (3 page)

“I’m not a dog,” says Jace.

The alien ignores his comment. “Do you have any weapons?”

Jace turns his head, looking at the other two aliens and takes another step backwards. “Yeah,” he says. “I’ve got this!” Jace swings the rabbit forward by its ears, sending it straight into the alien’s face and takes off into the woods before the other two have time to grab him. I let out the breath I didn’t even know I had been holding. Jace knows these woods almost better than I do. The aliens don’t stand a chance of catching him.

After a moment of hesitation, the three aliens take off into the woods— a lot quicker than I expected them to. Jace led them off so I could get away, so why am I still sitting here staring into the clearing? I shake my head and climb out of the tree. My knees bend at the impact of jumping the last few feet and, when I straighten up again, the younger alien is standing in front of me. Why did he sneak off and why isn’t he with his buddies?

This close I can see his eyes more clearly. Black pupils ringed with a sliver of gold and blending into an emerald green on the outer edges, much like his hair. I’ve never seen anything like it. Now those eyes I could never mistake for human.

It takes a moment before I realize I’m gaping at him and move to back away. My foot hits a rock and I stumble, barely catching myself before I fall. I wince, but he hasn’t made a move to pursue me so I dash farther into the woods. In only three steps, I crash against a hard chest and bounce backward, this time landing on my butt on a cushion of pine needles.

Looking up, I’m face to face with the alien.
Damn. He moves fast.
I don’t have time to think anything else before he springs forward and grabs my wrist, pulling me to my feet. He takes a step away once I am standing and glares at me.

“Where are you going?” he asks.

I say the first thing that comes to my mind. “Away from you.” He almost laughs. I don’t know why he would find that so funny. It’s the truth. I narrow my eyes and return his glare, putting my hands on my hips. “What do you think you’re doing in my meadow?”

“Your meadow?” He raises an eyebrow.

“Yes. Now take your friends and leave.” The less he says, the more my hands sweat. I hope he can’t tell how nervous I actually am.

This time he chuckles. He mutters the word ‘friends’ under his breath and shakes his head to himself. “They are no friends of mine, little girl.”

Any fear I felt is replaced by a fast striking anger. “I’m not a little girl.” I move to turn around and walk away, but he grabs my arm again and I freeze in place. His fingers dig into my bicep and ice cold fear seems to spring from his grip, slowly working its way through my body. I have to remember to breathe. In. Out. In. Out.

The blood leaves my face and my head spins. My eyes involuntarily widen and as I work on controlling my breath and swallowing the lump climbing up my throat. The alien cocks his head to the side with a curious look on his face. Then his eyes widen and in another second, I hear it too. There’s someone coming this way, a group of someones by the sound of it. The alien puts one finger to his lips, moves his hand to my shoulder, and shoves me down to the ground.

We have just enough time to slide down behind a bush when the three older aliens crash through the brush only feet from our location. The last one is dragging a struggling Jace by one arm, the other arm hanging limp at his side. Jace stumbles into a tree with his shoulder and cries out in pain. I try to catch his eye to let him know I’m there, but he just trips along behind the alien, not even pausing to look around.

When they reach the clearing, the lead alien faces Jace and shoves him hard. Jace stumbles back a step and then falls to his knees.

“Now let’s try this again, human,” he says, leering down at my brother. “Do you think you can cooperate this time?”

“I don’t have much of a choice now do I?”

The alien backhands Jace across the side of his face. “I don’t tolerate disrespect from vermin.”

Jace’s head rocks to the side and it’s as if someone has taken all the air from my lungs. I inch toward the clearing.

The alien tilts his head and narrows his eyes down at Jace. “What…?”

Jace doesn’t get up, but the alien pulls him to his feet by his shirt and tosses him to the other two aliens. “It seems we may have already found what we are looking for. Take him.”

“No!” I can’t stop it. The shout comes echoing out of my mouth and into the clearing. The aliens tense, instantly on alert.

Jace looks almost directly at me. “Jax, run!”

I scramble backwards on my hands then spring to my feet and take off into the woods with tears running down my face. I don’t hear the aliens pursuing me, not that I would. After my experience with the younger alien, I know that if they want to catch me they will. I keep running anyway. The world slows down around me and my feet drag. My brain barely registers the surge of—something— behind me before I’m knocked forward into the dirt and blackness overtakes my vision.

THREE

My eyelids stick to each other, but I pry them open anyway. Two green orbs float over my head. “Pretty,” I murmur before my eyes shoot open and I scramble backwards away from the alien boy standing over me.

I back up until the top of my head connects with a tree— ouch— and I use the tree trunk to pull myself up. On my way up, I reach into my boot and pull my knife from its sheath, waving it in front of me while the forest keeps spinning around me. “Get away from me!” He holds his hands up in a position that I guess is supposed to put me at ease. It doesn’t work. If anything, his movement causes my heart rate to increase and my breaths to come faster. “Stop it.”

“I am not doing anything,” he snaps. “Put the knife down. I just saved your life you know.” He takes a step forward. Wrong move.

I fly at him, swinging my knife in an upward arc, aiming for his chest, his stomach, anything. He moves away quickly enough to avoid what should have been a fatal strike, but when he puts his left arm up to block my blade, it cuts through his forearm and he winces in pain. I’m a flurry of movement, striking here and there, just hoping to land one hit. The alien stops trying to block my swipes and starts trying to fight me instead. Unarmed he’s really no match for me.

Then again, maybe he is. He manages to grab my wrist during one of my more reckless movements and he twists it until I drop the knife. He pulls me toward him until my chest is against his and holds me tightly against him. There are words coming out of his mouth, but they just don’t register.

Must get away. I can’t move. I must move. I beat at his chest with my fists, screaming whimpers flowing out of my mouth. “Stop it. Stop it. Stop it.”

Something must get through to him, because he releases me. The knife sits near my feet and I go for it, but I end up being held from behind with his arms wrapped around my chest. My head flies back and I hear a satisfying crunch and his arms drop. I pick up the knife again, but my hand is shaking too hard to use it.
Fingers, get a grip!
A giggle works its way past the terror in my throat. The shakes travel up my arms and down to my legs and I collapse onto the ground, laughing.

“Blazes, you must have hit your head harder than I thought,” says Alien Boy, one hand over his nose. “Calm down. I am not going to hurt you.” He reaches one hand forward, to put it on my shoulder? To put it around my neck?— I jerk backwards, moving out of his reach.

“Don’t touch me!”

He drops his hand and backs away. I move backwards too until my back hits a tree trunk. I close my eyes and concentrate on slowing my breathing. In. Out. In. Out.

When I open my eyes again, his gaze meets mine. The slim ring of gold around his pupils is such a vivid contrast to the brilliant green that I almost want to fall into them. Is that some alien thing? Some power in his eyes? I shift my gaze away.

He has removed his jacket and wrapped it around his arm, revealing a tight gray short sleeved shirt. The fabric shimmers in the light and I start to reach out to touch it, but quickly pull my hand away before he notices. I can’t draw my eyes away from the lean muscles of his chest showcased by the undershirt though. He catches me looking and I fight the blush trying to form on my cheeks.

Maybe his eyes aren’t the problem here. I raise my eyes to meet his. He stares steadily back at me, not lowering his gaze and not flinching away. A quiet anger simmers in those green gold depths, and I can tell he’s trying to hide the pain he’s in.

He speaks first. “Can we move past this now?” His voice drops. “I am not dead yet and I would like to stay that way.”

“I didn’t assume you would be,” I say. “
I
wasn’t trying to kill
you
.”

He laughs and shakes his head.

The dismissal grates on me. “What I meant was you were the one trying to kill me. I only defended myself. Nice to know you guys are able to be injured after all. Thanks for the intel.”

The muscles in his jaw clench. “Defending yourself from what? I was only trying to talk to you.” His glare grows colder. “Of course I should have known better than to reason with a human. Savages.”

I scoff, standing up and moving toward him. “If we’re such savages, then what the hell did your friends take my brother for?” The alien’s eyes widen, but he quickly hides his surprise, setting his face back into the stoic glare from before. “What? You don’t have an answer to that?” My voice rises, worry for Jace beginning to strangle my words. “Just came on down to harass the humans? Is that it? Couldn’t you leave well enough alone?”

“It was not my intention to harass you.” The calmly delivered words meant to placate me do the opposite and I can feel heat building in my face. These aliens—
this
alien just thinks he can come down here and do whatever he wants? This is my world, they don’t belong here and they certainly have no right to my brother.

“Intention or not, you don’t belong here. This is my forest, my meadow, my lake, my home,” I yell. “You can’t just come here and take…. Why here?” My voice breaks on the last two words and the choking burn of tears fills my throat, making me even angrier. Worry, adrenaline and anger collide, bringing me to a seat on the ground. “What the hell am I supposed to do now, Alien Boy?”

“Lir,” he says, shifting his eyes from me to his hands.

“Leer? I’m supposed to ogle you?”

His breath huffs out in something like a laugh. “No, that is my name, Lir.”

“Oh.” The single syllable pops my anger like a balloon. He might not be human, but he is human like and besides asking me questions and generally being rude, he really hasn’t taken any action to harm me. And I attacked him. “Sorry,” I mumble.

He raises an eyebrow. “What exactly are you apologizing for? Attacking me or calling me names?” The situation is so ridiculous, I can’t help but laugh. It’s more of a nervous laughter, but it seems to release the tension and even Lir chuckles.

“My name’s Jax. And I’m sorry for attacking you… and calling you names I guess.” My shoulders relax and I take a deep breath. “Why are you even here?” I ask, hoping he’s willing to help me. “I mean, why did you even get off the ship?”

“We landed for repairs.” Lir shakes his head when I open my mouth to ask what was wrong. I guess that’s more information than he’s willing to give.

“Why--”

“That is all you need to know” Lir shoots back.

My faces heats and I look down at my hands. My next words are quieter. “Why did they take my brother?”

“I do not know.” He sounds truthful, but I jerk my head up to look at him. There’s nothing but openness in his face. I don’t think he’s lying.

“Are they going to come back for you…” I look into his eyes, biting my lower lip, “and bring Jace back?”

“I do not believe so.”

I look away, clenching my hands in my lap. “I have to get him back. I’m not just going to sit here and…I’m going to get him back.” I stand up before Lir can respond.

He thinks for a moment, watching me. “Look, I understand that you want him back. But have you got this idea in your head that you can just walk up to the city and demand his return? It does not work that way. As a rule, we do not like humans and they are not allowed into our city.”

I think for a moment. “But they’ll let you in right?” I lean closer. “I’ll get you to the city if you get me inside it.”

Lir gapes at me. “You cannot be serious. Why would I need you?”

I almost laugh at his arrogance. “How long have I been out?” When he doesn’t answer, I look up and study the angle of the sun. “Around an hour?” Lir nods. “If you thought you could have handled it, you would have just left me here. Why is it that you stuck around?”

His chest rises and falls while he studies my face. What is he looking for? His eyes dart away when he finally answers. “The pulse knocked out my
kitu
.”

“Pulse?
Kitu
?”

“The energy force that knocked you over. It is a weapon. The
kitu
…” Lir holds up his arm and points to the cuff on his wrist. “It is… important.”

“So, without your fancy bracelet you’re pretty helpless,” I say. “You have no supplies. You don’t know where you are and you’re in human territory. I don’t know what they tell you in that city of yours, but humans don’t much like you guys either. Without me you’ll be lost in the wilderness with no supplies and no weapons. If you manage to escape the predators and avoid starving to death or dying of thirst and stumble into someone else that could help you… they’d more than likely kill you. I’ll keep you alive.”