Genevieve woke groggily to a painful agony. It throbbed to the rhythm of her heart. It even hurt to breathe. She wondered if what she’d experienced earlier had all been a wild
vishna
hallucination. There was no sign of her Epoptes replica. But she was indeed lying on top of a
vishna
tree—that part had been real—and feeling a real lance of pain with every breath she sucked in.
A large shadow scudded overhead and she gazed up at the silhouette of a giant bird, backlit by the sun. It was a scree, hovering over her like an angel. She imagined a person seated on it. Azaes! He leaped off the bird and bent over her with a face of concern. Was it still part of her dream, she wondered, staring up at him. Must be. Azaes was dead. Burned to death in Bragg’s wildfire. Then with a loud sob of despair, she let herself slide into unconsciousness.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Her eyes fluttered open as she became aware of a wonderful sensation and smell. She lay half reclining on a
kosh
pressed against a warm body. Azaes! And he showed no injuries on his splendid body. His arms enveloped her and he looked down at her with warm eyes. She had to be dead and this was another one of her wonderfully delirious dreams…But it all seemed too real. The evening light streamed upon them. She was stiff with an old pain and his body felt deliciously warm and virile against hers.
“Azaes!” She’d wanted to scream it out, but her voice broke and it came out in a lame croak. “You’re…”
“Alive and well,” he smiled. Oh, that smile! She wanted to taste it and consume it and drown herself in it. He stroked her hair. “As you are now too. You spent some time in a healing trance, then I had you transferred here to my
kosh
when you showed signs of awakening.”
“As for why we are all not dead,” he explained, “It was Anka. She saved us all from the explosion and wildfire. Luckily she wasn’t in the house. She’d just come back from a secret rendezvous,” he said with a smirk and a shake of his head. “The naughty girl arrived just in time to see it all and drag us to safety before the second explosion took the orchard and would have toasted us all. We all owe her our lives.”
Oh, God! What great news! They were all alive! “And Diaprepes?”
“He’s in a healing trance at this very moment, and doing very well. I am confident that he will heal perfectly. He is a strapping healthy man. When last I looked in on him, he was showing that all of his vital signs were back to normal.”
She sighed, then stiffened in his arms. What he must think of her! The awful things she’d done, the awful things her colleagues had done. “I must return home to keep any more of us from coming here,” she said emphatically.
He nodded gravely. “Yes, you must go, return to Earth. For your sake and for ours.”
She swallowed hard. He’d acknowledged it. Cheerfully sending her on her way. He was probably glad to see her go too. And yet, he was warmly embracing her now.
“Genevieve,” he said in a gentle voice. “I know that everything you did was for us. I confess, I was furious with you and may have said some things that hurt you. But I thought you’d betrayed me—eh, us.” He thought for a moment and sighed. “Betrayed
me
. I felt personally betrayed. But then what you did… I heard that you crashed the
Chimera
. You did it to save us, didn’t you? Even though it might have killed you and your fellow human. I don’t want to know how you dispatched Bragg, but I do know he has been consumed by the jungle.”
The backpack! Agitated, she searched around.
He patted her hand reassuringly. “The backpack is safe and all is in order again. It was on you when we found you unconscious, lying atop the largest
vishna
tree I have ever seen. Universe knows how you managed to get up there with a broken ankle and a punctured lung.”
“You’re not angry with me, then?” she said in a still feeble voice.
“No, no, Genevieve. The opposite! You sacrificed yourself for us. You…killed for us. Killed your own kind.” She watched him swallow and swallowed herself at the thought of killing Bragg. He was mean and narrow-minded. But perhaps his murderous behaviour was simply the madness he’d incurred on this planet. Yet she’d killed him without remorse. And had set out to kill Sanchez and Porter.
“Once I got Diaprepes into a healing trance and left instructions with Shiva, I followed you by scree,” Azaes went on. “I missed your crash, but I caught up with you at the Great Crystal.”
“The Great Crystal?” She blinked in confusion. She'd never made it there. She never even made it to the alien ship. What was he talking about?
“Yes,” he said eagerly. “I got there just in time to see you dispatch those two murderous ruffians. But you disappeared into the darkness as I entered the light of the fire.”
She stared at him. God! It was true, then. The Epoptes, in her shape, had carried out her dream! That meant that Sanchez and Porter were dead too. Her whole crew were dead. Except for her.
“So it’s true,” she said in a shaky voice. “The Epoptes told me.”
“What?” Now it was his turn to look puzzled.
“An Epoptes, in my shape, killed those two,” she stammered convulsively. “Not me. I wasn’t even there. Then she told me and we made love…”
“You’re upset,” he insisted. “You don’t know what you’re saying. I saw you there, Genevieve. You did it. But, don’t be ashamed. I don’t condemn your violent actions. They were actions of valour and courage.”
Wasn’t he listening to what she said? It was her double. The Epoptes in her shape! And if he only thought it all through, he’d have realized that she couldn’t be in two places at the same time, crashing the
Chimera
and killing the last of her colleagues. But perhaps he was right, after all. She had deliberately killed Bragg and she had dreamed that she killed Sanchez and Porter. Perhaps on this world that was the same thing. And in a sudden moment of shame and despair, she fell into convulsive sobs.
Azaes enveloped her in his arms and rocked them slowly, as she shuddered with silent weeping. He held her against his strong, naked body for a long time until her tears dwindled into sniffles.
“We searched all over the jungle for you,” Azaes said in a quiet voice, gently stroking her hair. “After I witnessed what you did to Porter and Sanchez, I went back and fetched my sister to help me. We combed the forest. When Anka found the
Chimera
, I went mad with thoughts of you crawling out of the destroyed ship and finding you dead in the swamp. We found Bragg. Died of
fika
poisoning by the looks of it. He’d gotten swept up in the
igapo
and we found his already half-rotten body wedged in a swamp palm. But we couldn’t find you.”
He sighed out a long breath. “I finally spotted you lying on the
vishna
. You looked…dead. Then, you stirred as I approached and broke into tears.” He smiled wistfully. “Seems like I have that effect on you. That was your reaction when you first ever saw me.” His face darkened with gravity. “I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t survived,” Azaes said in a trembling voice. He breathed in the smell of her hair, and tenderly stroked her soft locks. “You are my
kusha
…” he murmured.
Suddenly reminded of his betrothed and the Eosian laws, she reached up and gently touched his face. “What about all your laws? Like the one regarding sexual intercourse. Didn’t you break it with me? How are you going to fix that with Shiva? She’s betrothed to be your wife.
She’s
your
kusha
,” she ended in a sharper voice than she’d intended.
He regarded her with sad eyes. “Yes.” He sighed heavily and took her hands in his. “She is the best choice for me. She has the most pure set of genes I know. But I don’t love her, Genevieve. I could never join with her. The
vishna
would refuse us. Because I love
another
.”
Her throat swelled with emotion. It went suddenly dry and she couldn’t speak.
“Shiva may have pure genes, but
this other
has a pure heart.” He paused, smiling into the sun. Then he fixed an intense gaze directly into her eyes. “You were the only one of the crew who was pure of heart.
That
is why I saved you, Genevieve. Despite what the Epoptic dream told me…and that is why I fell in love with you, despite what my dream warned and my own resolve not to…”
Her heart slammed but she managed to find her voice. “What did your dream warn?” she stuttered, still feeling her heart flutter with a mix of exhilarated trepidation.
“That once I fell in love with you, you’d kill me.”
She recoiled suddenly and objected passionately, “I’d never kill you, Azaes! I love you with my heart and soul!”
He seized her back in his arms. “Don’t alarm yourself. You’ve already killed me.”
“What?” she gasped.
“You’ve set in motion events that force me to relinquish my immortality, essentially bringing about my death.” He let out an amused laugh at her horrified expression. “As soon as I leave Eos, I lose my immortality. The effects of the
vishna
will wither and I will be like you. Is that so bad?”
“Then don’t leave! Why should you leave?” she choked out the words.
“To accompany you, of course,” he said, leaning back to study her face with a puzzled look. “If you’ll have me.”
She stammered, “I-I can’t be responsible for you giving up your immortality. I’ll go alone!” She pulled away vehemently, panting in determination.
“No, you don’t understand,” he pulled her close to him again, his face growing tight with his own determination. “I fought against the emotions I felt for you because I feared death. But I see now that this is my destiny, to remain with you and live out my mortal life beside you. Genevieve, we can watch each other age…together. Grow old and wither like an old vine, together in love, and die in each other’s arms…only to join the embrace of all that is in the universe. Don’t you see, that is our immortality, for both of us.”
She buried her face in his shoulder and wept, pressing her body to his and inhaling his wonderful masculine scent. He pulled her wet face up and wiped the tears from her cheeks then kissed her. “Does this mean that you’ll have me?” he asked.
“Oh, God, yes!” she cried.
“Then here is what you and I can look forward to for the rest of our remaining days…”
He gently set her on the downy
kosh
and bent over her, grinning like a boy. His eyes grew deep with raptness as he gazed over her body. It made her giddy with anticipation as her mind reeled with memories of his tender passion in her dreams. Would he be that way now, or would he repeat his previous rough lusting inside Zac?
His face traveled the length of her body, smelling her, fondling her with his lips, biting her. He cupped both her heels with his hands, raised her legs and drew them apart, opening her and revealing her moist vulva, already swollen and pulsing. She opened her legs further in invitation. He seized in a long breath and kneeled on the floor to bury his face in her furry sex. She felt his warm breath on her, titillating, then gasped as his tongue traced the hot crease of her labia, then her clit, teasing out a cry from her. His wet tongue penetrated and she moaned, surging up into a sitting position and coiling her long legs over his shoulders. His tongue curled and flicked inside her vagina sending ripples of heat through her body and bursting out her face in a flush. Her knees began to shake and she stooped over him, hair tumbling over his head. She felt him shudder and he cried out, aroused by the touch of her hair on his skin.
Azaes rose, gently coaxing her down again, then turned back to her crotch and lay on the bed with his long penis near her face.
She took it into her mouth, running up and down its slippery length with her lips and teeth and tongue. His cock thickened and moved and he groaned with obvious pleasure. She pulled out and stroked it vigorously with her hand. It grew even larger, and she could feel it engorging in waves to his moaning breaths. He ran his tongue frantically over her clit, drawing out panting breaths, and she knew she would climax soon.
He pulled out, sitting up to look at her, and she seized his face in her hands. They kissed feverishly as she made him lie face up on the bed and squirmed over him, climbing on top. Sitting astride his muscular thighs, she coaxed his penis to rise and dance in her hands. He watched her, almost whimpering. Sweat burst out of him and ran down his heaving chest. She moaned with him, so close to coming herself, as she slid on him and pumped slowly. They were both wet and panting together. She pumped more vigorously, gasping throatily, and rode him, bucking hard. He grit his teeth and hoarsely shouted out foreign words then groaned out his come. His surge triggered her own rush of come. She screamed it out then collapsed on top of him in a warm embrace, joyfully exhausted. He took her in his arms and she lay comfortably on him in blissful silence then fell into a light doze.
She awoke as the last rays of sunlight left the room to the stirring of his penis inside her. Renewed excitement surged through her as he swelled in great waves, filling her. He rolled them over to lie on top and thrust slowly, deeply. He slid in and out in steady and rhythmic slow motion until her moans turned into sharp cries and she felt her come rise up alongside his. They climaxed together.