Gnashing my fangs, clenching my claws, it takes all my will to resist grabbing the trident and turning it on the creature. I have been taught never to act from anger alone. But I have also been taught never to give in to intimidation.
Forcing a breath, relaxing my tense muscles, I lean into the trident’s prongs, ignore the pain as they break through my scales into the soft tissue below. I stop just before one pierces my main artery. The scent of my blood fills the air around us and I smile at Mowdar. He may have chosen this game, but I have chosen to raise its stakes. The slightest wrong move by me or him can bring my death. He has no choice now except to kill me or pull back.
“Pelk, do whatever you want,”
I mindspeak.
“I know I’m your prisoner, but does that mean I have to suffer the stink of this cavern every moment of the day? Unlike your kind, I am no cave dweller. Is it your rule that I can no longer go above to smell clean air?”
“And you want me to believe you went above to sit in the rain and just breathe?”
“I don’t care what you think.”
Mowdar growls and mindspeaks,
“Take care, Undrae,”
but he moves no more than a statue, his frozen muscles keeping the trident perfectly still.
Just as frozen in place, I mindspeak,
“As far as your daughter, I am mated for life already.”
“That can be changed in a moment. Do you think we cannot reach your wife whenever we want? You have already seen that we have no problem visiting your island. Thanks to Derek, we now know just as much about Morgan’s Hole,”
Mowdar mindspeaks.
A chill runs through me. Suppressing a shudder, I shrug to show the Pelk leader my indifference to his words. The motion drives the trident’s prongs another centimeter deeper into me, allowing more blood to run from my wounds.
Mowdar watches the blood flow down my body and shakes his head.
“You are a stubborn creature,”
he mindspeaks, pulling the trident back, all three of its prongs’ tips red with my blood.
“I still don’t know if you’re lying or not. I just know you’re willing to die if necessary.”
“Or to kill, if I must, to protect my wife,”
I mindspeak.
Dipping his trident in a glowpool, to rinse the blood off, Mowdar studies my face.
“Undrae, you need not worry about your wife’s safety—for now. But I can’t let you shame either my daughter or me any further. I talked to Malka. If you don’t go to my daughter’s bed willingly tonight, she will call a li-srrynn by your nest tomorrow night and every other night my daughter cares to have you.”
“I did not go to him to make you come to me,”
Lorrel mindspeaks as soon as I approach the nest.
I say nothing, pull the seaweed drapes closed so only our glowpool keeps us from darkness.
“Funny thing. He told me you did,”
I mindspeak, walking past where she sits on the edge of the nest, lying down behind her on the soft seaweed inside.
Lorrel keeps her back to me.
“When I woke up and you were gone, I was furious. I went to tell Mowdar that I caught you mindspeaking with your wife.”
Sitting up, I mindspeak,
“You don’t know if you caught me speaking with anyone.”
She turns and flashes her angry green eyes at me.
“I am not a fool!”
“Did you tell Mowdar?”
Lorrel shakes her head.
“When my father asked why I was so upset, I could not tell him. It would mean your wife’s death. Possibly yours too. Either way, there would be no chance of you ever coming to me of your own will. I deserve that, Peter.”
“But you did tell him I refused to bed you.”
“You are not the only one whose mind Malka and her li-srrynn can dominate. When my father said, ‘Is Peter not paying proper attention to you?’ I was glad to tell him that lesser truth rather than have him ask Malka to search my mind and find out about your wife’s mindspeaking.”
I sigh and lie back down. Once, I thought my first wife, Elizabeth, the most spoiled and willful female alive. Next to Lorrel she now looks positively sweet. Still, in her own selfish way, the Pelk girl has managed to protect both me and my wife from Mowdar’s anger.
Somehow, knowing that helps me accept what I must do. I reach for Lorrel’s tail with mine and stroke it lightly. She shakes her head.
“My father has made you do this,”
she mindspeaks.
“I do not want to be serviced. I want you to want me.”
Stifling a groan, thinking how little I want to have my mind taken over by the li-srrynn again, I go to her and nuzzle my jowl against hers.
“Now I can tell Chloe I had no choice,”
I mindspeak.
“And I can finally confess that I want you.”
“Do you mean that, Peter?”
she mindspeaks, her body relaxing, leaning into me.
I nod. I know it’s a lie. She knows it’s a lie. But as we proceed, our bodies don’t seem to care one damned bit.
31
I wake and lie still, staring at the dark drapes, listening to the sounds of the Pelk waking and going about their morning business. Lorrel sleeps on, her body nestled against me, her tail overlapping mine, her head tucked just below my jaw, her sleepy breaths blowing hot against my throat.
At home I love waking intertwined with Chloe like this. Some mornings I let her sleep another fifteen minutes or half hour just so I can savor the quiet pleasure of her sleep-warm body heating mine. I feel no such joy waking with this female.
Shifting my body a few inches away from Lorrel’s, I smile as the air cools those parts of my body that had just been warmed by hers. If, for my survival and Chloe’s, I must have sex with this creature, I will. But I will not allow her the intimacy I would give my wife.
Lorrel’s breathing changes rhythm. She moves a little and then turns, stretching and yawning, her eyes still closed.
“You moved,”
she mindspeaks.
“Is it morning already?”
“Yes, it is.”
She stretches again, extending her tail, her arms and legs, flexing her claws.
“Maybe it is still storming outside. Maybe we will not have to get up.”
“Sounds to me like everyone else is already going about their business,”
I mindspeak, sitting up and stretching too, wishing Lorrel gone. I want time to myself so I can search Malka’s alcove again, and so I can mindspeak with Chloe without worry of discovery.
Lorrel opens her eyes and mindspeaks, looking at me,
“I feel too good to rush above this morning.”
She smiles.
“Thanks to you.”
I nod. If not for the guilt I feel, I’d be luxuriating in the sweet soreness and the after-sex congestion I feel in my loins too. Still I have no desire to sit and share any morning-after reverie.
“Malka will be upset if you’re late,”
I mindspeak.
“That old bag of seaweed is always upset about something.”
Lorrel trills out a laugh.
“She will have to understand if I stay back a little while to breakfast with my man.”
“But it’s okay. . . .”
Holding an open claw up in front of my face, Lorrel mindspeaks,
“No, Peter. I want to do this. I want to share time with you. I will go tell Malka that I will not go above until later. I will go to Derek too and let him know that he should not wait for you. And then I will bring us back something to fill our stomachs.”
“I can go with you.”
The Pelk girl shakes her head.
“Stay and rest,”
she mindspeaks, getting up and stepping out of the nest. Lorrel fumbles in the dark with something nearby and phosphorescence starts to shine, illuminating her in her human form crouching over the glowpool, pouring more phosphorescent powder into it.
“You already shifted shape?”
I mindspeak.
She shrugs.
“I would have to when I went above anyway.”
Lorrel holds out her arms and twirls around.
“I like my human form. Don’t you?”
I have had enough experience with females, both human and my kind, to know better than to answer a question like that with anything sounding any less than affirmative.
“Of course I do,”
I mindspeak.
Climbing back into the nest, Lorrel grabs my head and crushes it against her small breasts, kissing me on the hard ridge just above my eyes.
“Good,”
she mindspeaks.
“Why do you not change to your human form too while I’m gone? It will be more comfortable if we are both the same.”
After she makes her way through the drapes, I shift to my human shape, sprinkle more phosphorescence in the glowpool and pick up my father’s journal. Sitting near the light, I sigh and begin to leaf through the brittle pages, studying my father’s ancient handwritten words.
Here and there I recognize words that I learned in high school Spanish, but not enough to translate any full sentence. Flipping toward the back, choosing a page at random, I stare at each word and find nothing. I do the same on the next page, with the same result. On the next, at the bottom, I stop, my eyes frozen on the last word on the page,
antidoto
.
Shaking my head, my heart racing, I put my index finger on it, trace back to the beginning of the sentence and read the words,
No tengo el antidoto.
I flip to the next page and read the rest of the sentence,
pero creo tener una idea.
{
Chloe!
} I mindspeak masked. {
I found something in the journal.
}
{
Peter! What is it?
}
{
I found where Father wrote the word ‘antidoto’. I assume that’s Spanish for antidote. He says, ‘No tengo,’ which means, ‘I don’t have,’ but I’m not sure about the rest of the sentence. Would you repeat the whole thing to Claudia for me?
}
{
She’s at the dock getting her boat ready. I’m supposed to meet her in a few minutes. We’re going to go get your boat. Tell me the whole sentence and I’ll write it down and bring it to her.
}
I mindspeak the words, {
No tengo el antidoto pero creo tener una idea,
} to Chloe, repeat it as she writes it and have her read it back to me.
{
Good,
} she mindspeaks. {
I’ll bring this to Claudia. It shouldn’t be more than a few minutes.
}
The drapes rustle and I mindspeak, {
Don’t! I’ll contact you later.
}
{
She’s there, isn’t she, Peter?
}
{
Later,
} I mindspeak, just as Lorrel works her way through the drapes, two chunks of dried fish in her hand.
Closing the journal, I look at the Pelk girl and smile,
“Good,”
I mindspeak.
“I was starting to get hungry.”
Lorrel sits next to me, her hip touching mine, as we eat.
“I am glad you changed shape,”
she mindspeaks.
“I like your human form.”
Holding a piece of fish in one hand, she strokes the top of my leg with her other, not far from my crotch.
“If you keep that up we’ll never go above,”
I mindspeak.
“You forget. I have spoken to Malka. She does not require me this morning. She said it is good we are finally behaving like lovers—maybe that will convince Mowdar of your intentions. She does not want him to risk any of our males by sending them after your wife.”
“Wait.”
Putting down my fish, I swivel toward Lorrel so I face her.
“Mowdar indicated he had no plan to go after Chloe for now. I thought she’d be safe as long as we were together.”
Lorrel frowns, takes her hand off my thigh.
“Is that your only reason for being with me?”
“No, but I want no harm to come to her.”
“No more!”
The Pelk girl turns her back toward me.
“I am tired of hearing about your wife.”
I stare at her thin, pale back, her long, thick black hair hanging almost to her buttocks. Obviously she knows things concerning my wife that I should hear. Just as clearly, asking her now would lead nowhere. I reach for her hair and stroke it.
“What if we concentrated on you instead?”
I mindspeak.
Lorrel shrugs and takes a bite from her fish. I move closer, cupping one breast from the back with my hand, putting my lips on the nape of her neck.
“Didn’t you tell me you wanted to know how it felt to have sex as a human?”
I mindspeak, kissing her soft flesh.
She continues to eat, saying nothing, showing no reaction to my touch. I uncup her breast, take her nipple between my fingers and squeeze just enough to have it crinkle up and turn hard. Lorrel sighs and leans back into me, and I take my other hand and do the same to her other breast. The Pelk girl drops the remainder of her fish, turns toward me, and I put my lips on hers, kissing her, holding her as we tumble together into the nest.