Текст книги "Alien god"

Автор книги: Ursa Dox

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Текущая страница: 7 (всего у книги 29 страниц)

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CHAPTER SEVENTEEN Torrance

My eyes opened, and I lay still for a long time, trying to make sense of the glowing spire of rose gold overhead. A plush mattress cushioned me, and thick, fluffy blankets warmed me. This was way more comfortable than my bed on the ship...

The ship!

I wasn’t on the fucking ship. I was at the top of an alien tower guarded by the male who’d likely killed my friends. I felt as if I were trapped in some dark fairy tale, only there was no window, no ladder of hair I could let down. It was just me.

Except, it wasn’t just me. I realized quickly I was not alone. My eyes landed on the chair near the hearth. My breath shrivelled in my lungs, and every muscle tensed as I fought not to move and draw his notice.

He was here. Asha Wylfrael. In my room while I slept. From here, I could see him seated in profile. He slouched back against the chair, his long, muscled legs stretched in from of him and his wings draping down and to the sides. His fingers were steepled together against his chest – a chest that was now mostly covered with what looked like a black leather vest. His broad jaw was tight, his eyes ahead, staring intently into nothing. He looked like a sullen dark prince, as if he’d moodily tossed himself into his throne.

He didn’t stay that way for long. His wings folded brusquely behind him and his back went ramrod straight. He knows I’m awake. Panic made my throat go tight and dry.

He rose, the movement one of perfectly contained power. He turned towards the bed, no longer a sprawled-out prince but a king, a monarch in his realm.

“How long have you been here?” I whispered, sitting up and drawing the furs against my chest, as if they could somehow protect me.

His only answer was a penetrating stare.

I broke eye contact when I heard a sound at the door. One of the fox aliens, not the woman who’d been in my room last night, entered with a tray.

More room service, I thought dryly. How long could they keep me in here? And where would I even go if I was released?

The other alien was very similar in appearance to the female one, but had broader shoulders, larger hands and ears, and held himself in such a way that made me think he might be male. Like the other one, he had green, cat-like eyes, but no white flecking through his fur. Instead, he was completely orange, from the shaggy fur of his head to the downy stuff that covered his whole body. He wore a vest, like Asha Wylfrael, and matching trousers and slippers made of what looked like pale blue silk.

Asha Wylfrael and the fox man had a short conversation, probably about me, speaking as if I weren’t there. The fact I couldn’t understand anything they said was maddening. Like I was trapped behind a thick pane of glass, banging from the inside to be heard, to be a part of the world again.

The fox alien left. I watched him go warily, not wanting to be alone with Asha Wylfrael again. What the fuck was he doing in here while I was asleep? That was more ominous than I wanted to even consider. Having someone else around, especially someone who seemed as gentle and calm as the fox creatures, lent me a little comfort. Even though the fox aliens were obviously my captors, too, they seemed almost sweet. The female one yesterday had been so gentle, her voice trilling and soft, when she’d led me up here.

Not like him. Him, with the broad black wings and the stars on his skin and the eyes that tried to tear me open.

I won’t let him, I thought, steeling myself. If he tries anything, I’ll fight. I’m weaker than him, but I refuse to let him terrify me with just a look.

He didn’t try anything in that moment besides sweeping imperiously back to the table he’d been lounging at before. This time, he sat in the opposite chair, the one turned more towards the bed. His wings rustled, and he held out a large, glowing hand towards the other chair in a gesture that couldn’t mean anything else but sit here. Now.

I thought about refusing, turning up my nose at the offered seat and the food and him, and I hesitated. A ripple of tension went through his wings. His eyes narrowed, gleaming blue slits, and then he was up. I tensed, assuming he’d come for me in the bed. Instead, he stalked to the other chair, yanked its massive crystal body back as if it weighed no more than a plastic lawn chair, then stopped. Both he and the chair were fully facing me, now. His hands rested on the chair’s high back, the top of which only came partway up his chest.

Every bodily instinct told me not to go. Asha Wylfrael loomed, wings spiking darkly into the air, looking like some sort of savagely beautiful demon guarding a gateway into Hell. This felt somehow pivotal, like the moment in a story when the naïve young woman eats food in the fae realm and is trapped there. Forever.

My scalp prickled, the ghost of Asha Wylfrael’s fist in my hair. A reminder that I had no choice, no choice but to go to him, to go through the demon’s door, to eat the fae’s food.

I slid out of the bed.

I should have been prepared for the way my muscles gave out when my feet hit the floor. But I wasn’t.

He was, though.

Before I could hit the hard crystal and probably crack my poor human tailbone, hands were on me. Two huge, powerful hands, nearly circling my entire waist. I froze at the contact, breath catching painfully in my throat.

Asha Wylfrael’s hands emanated heat. For some reason, this surprised me. So much of him seemed cold and icy, echoing the landscape outside. The frost-white hair, the blue eyes that seemed to freeze as much as they burned. But there was no denying the heat of his contact, seeping through my grey cotton T-shirt. The heat was at my back, too, as he’d apparently hauled me up against his chest when catching me. I stared down, panic rising at the sight of his sharp black claws so close to the vulnerable skin of my abdomen, only flimsy fabric in between.

“I can stand up,” I choked out. “Let me go.”

So much adrenaline was coursing through my veins now I probably could have run a damn marathon if I’d wanted to. My muscles ached from yesterday’s exertions, and the stress made me even shakier, but there was strength there, too. Thank God I ate something last night.

Grimly, I realized it wasn’t God I should be thanking for making me eat. My scalp prickled again, more urgently this time, the tingles throbbing downwards into my spine.

Carefully, slowly, I put more and more weight onto my feet, straightening my legs and showing him I could stand on my own. He didn’t let go right away, as if not quite trusting I could do it.

“That’s one thing you obviously have to learn about humans,” I said. “We’re stubborn.”

He murmured something in response – a dark, hot whisper near my ear, his breath a shock of sensation that made me shiver.

I worried he’d said something like, “I don’t care if you can stand, I won’t let you go.” But he retreated, his hands drawing away from my waist. I panted, my body burning even while goosebumps puckered over my skin, as he strode back to the table. He leaned back against it, his arms crossed over his broad chest, his face a cool, unreadable mask.

It was a test, with him as the only judge. My hands curling into sweaty fists, I vowed I wouldn’t fail.

I began to walk. My muscles quivered but otherwise held strong. When I reached the chair, I hauled myself into it with relief, feeling like I’d crossed into safety.

The illusion of safety was shattered when the chair scraped into movement. I gasped, clutching at the pink crystal arms of the chair as Asha Wylfrael pushed me towards the table from behind. He didn’t stop until the arms of the chair collided with the table, creating a cage of crystal I wouldn’t be able to escape without shimmying down on the chair’s seat, sliding to the floor, and crawling out.

From behind the chair, Asha Wylfrael reached down for one of the plates on the tray ahead. I didn’t move my head, but my eyes slid to the side, staring at the ferocious curve of his star-bitten bicep as he placed a plate in front of me.

I followed the glowing line of his arm down to the plate. The food there was mostly recognizable, I thought. There was what looked like bread, but dark red in colour, like it had been soaked in wine. There was also a small jar of a taupe mixture that looked like some sort of paté, and beside that, a collection of shiny, black spheres that reminded me of tapioca pearls.

Asha Wylfrael and I noticed the stone knife at the same time. There was a hiss of sound above me, a sharp intake of breath. We lunged for it simultaneously, but he was faster, his hand closing powerfully over the green crystal handle. Swearing under my breath, I let my hands fall to my lap. Asha Wylfrael stood staring down at me, his silence a rebuke that needed no words, no shared language.

“It wasn’t like I was about to stab you or something,” I muttered, daring to look up at him from beneath my lashes. “I just...” My words disappeared, an unexpected tightness entering my throat. I just wanted something, something I could use, something I could keep, something to make me feel safe...

I blinked rapidly, not willing to let a single tear fall in front of him. He watched me impassively. Then, he did something surprising.

He held the knife up, close to my face. I flinched back, afraid he was going to cut me, but he didn’t. Instead, he ran the edge of his thumb down the knife’s edge, pressing so hard I saw a divot form in the flesh.

No blood.

Heat flooded my cheeks, a combination of humiliation and powerless despair. It’s a fucking alien butter knife.

I lurched forward, my elbows hitting the table. My head sank down into my hands, my palms pressing against my burning eyes until all I could see was darkness. I wanted to stay there. The darkness. I’d lost so much – my dad, my home, the friends I’d had on this planet. Now, here I was, a prisoner not even trusted enough to hold a goddamn butter knife.

“Why are you even here?” I asked dully. He hadn’t killed me yet, and he didn’t seem to have come to hurt me. He couldn’t interrogate me, either. So what, then?

I didn’t expect an answer. And I didn’t get a verbal one. But there was something. Something that startled me enough to pull my hands away from my face.

It was the sound of stone and crystal hitting my plate.

I blinked at the knife as it rattled back into place, as if it had been carelessly tossed down from above. I looked up questioningly, seeking Asha Wylfrael’s face but only finding his back as he walked away from me to the other side of the table. When he sat down in the chair facing me, he did not look at me, but wordlessly began to eat from the other plate.

He came to eat fucking breakfast with me?

I watched him incredulously, wondering if I was dreaming. This scene was just way too bizarre. The two of us seated across from each other, with matching plates, like we were sharing a meal at some bistro together.

“Why are you even here?” I asked again, the question a whisper this time. His eyes flashed to mine, and I found myself looking back down at my plate. My gaze lingered on the knife, now still.

Tentatively, I picked it up, my fingers curving around the dark emerald handle. Across the table, Asha Wylfrael stopped eating, as if waiting to see if I’d hurl it at his head even knowing now that it couldn’t cut. When I didn’t, he took a swig of something from a mug.

Why did you give this to me?

Had he tossed it back down on my plate simply because he’d been satisfied the knife couldn’t actually do any damage?

Or had he noticed my reaction – my defeat when he’d taken it from me – and changed his mind about keeping it from me?

Or maybe it was all a trap. Something meant to look like carelessness, or kindness, that was supposed to lure me into a false sense of security.

“Did you kill them?”

I hadn’t even realized I’d asked the question until the words were out of my mouth. Asha Wylfrael lowered his mug, staring at me intently, as if by reading my lips from across the table he’d be able to make more sense of my foreign words.

“Did you” – I pointed at him – “kill” – I took the knife and mimed aiming it at my own throat – “them?” At the last word, I swung the knife wildly to the side, pointing towards a wall, beyond the wall. To the place my friends had once been. “Did you kill them? Did you kill the other women? Humans?”

Asha Wylfrael’s fox-like ears twitched. He leaned forward, bracing his starlit forearms on the table.

“Humans,” he growled. I shuddered at the disarming sound – the ripple of his deep alien voice wrapped around a word I actually understood. His eyes flicked to the knife I held. “Kill humans.”

He didn’t nod or anything like that, but there was a sense of acknowledgement in his repetition of the words. I knew in the deepest parts of myself that he’d understood my question. And had now answered it.

So, he did kill them.

Obviously not everyone, as the ship had left with some sort of crew. My heart twisted when I thought of Min-Ji and Suvi. They were so late getting back to the ship. Is there even a chance they made it?

I remembered how easily Asha Wylfrael had erected and then toppled that massive wall of snow, and I doubted it. He was too powerful. He could have stopped them in their tracks before they ever reached the safety of the ship.

“And will you kill me, too?”

Asha Wylfrael cocked his head, trying to make sense of the word “kill” among all the others.

“Asha Wylfrael... Kill me?” I once again aimed the knife at my own throat, this time to emphasize who it was I meant.

His silvery brows rose in an apparent mixture of understanding and surprise. He leaned back in his chair and studied me, one hand’s fingers drumming a slow beat against his leather-clad thigh, the other hand rubbing thoughtfully at his chin.

Fuck. I shouldn’t have asked him that. He looks like he’s actually considering it now!

Cursing myself for being such an idiot, I tightened my hold on the knife. It was so dull it was basically worthless.

But right now, it was just about all I had.

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CHAPTER EIGHTEEN Wylfrael

The blunt, if clumsy, courage of her question gave me pause. Made me stop and study her, rubbing my hand across my jaw. I wasn’t considering the answer to the question itself – I already knew I wouldn’t kill her now. I was considering her. This fragile creature with her skinny little neck, useless little knife, and enough spirit to go chasing down the question of her own death, even if it meant throwing that question at the feet of a god.

“What would you do if I tried?” I mused, more to myself than to her, wondering just how far that spirit would take her. I knew she wouldn’t understand the question, and she didn’t. But she held the knife a little higher anyway, as if in answer.

I smirked at the futile fierceness of the gesture.

“I’m not going to kill you,” I finally said. I waved my hand in a dismissive motion. I didn’t know how to construct a sentence in the negative in her language, having only just learned the words “kill” “you” and “me,” so the hand movement would have to be enough. I did not feel like putting more effort into the communication than that. Let her understand me, or let her not. If she is afraid that I will kill her, it is only because she has earned that fear. Let her deal with the consequences of invading my world. I do not owe her anything.

But if I did not owe her anything...

Why had I given her back that knife in the first place?

Because it’s dull, I told myself as she watched me and clutched it. Because she could never hope to harm me, or herself, with it even if she tried.

It was certainly not because of the way she’d slumped forward, as if in grief when I’d taken it, such a small thing, away from her.

No, that was not the reason. Because if that was why – if I were for some absurd reason beginning to care about what this criminal human felt...

I need some space from her. I needed to keep myself away until I’d seen Rúnwebbe and could properly interrogate her. Once I could put words to all her vicious motivations, learn from her own mouth just how much wrong she’d done by me, I would be able to find my equilibrium again.

“Worry less about me killing you and more about starving to death,” I grumbled, rising from my seat and walking to her side. I nudged the plate closer.

She stared down at the plate without moving for so long I thought I’d have to force her to eat again. But finally, keeping the knife in one hand, she picked up the bread with the other. She ate slowly and without looking at me.

When she’d finished the bread and started reaching for her mug of sweetened sotasha milk, I noticed a dark reddish-purple mark marring her wrist. Some sort of human colouring? It looks swollen, though...

Before her fingers closed around the mug’s handle, my hand shot out and gripped her wrist. She cried out with more than just surprise and anger when my thumb pressed into the spot. Hers was a sound unmistakable across species – a short and strangled melody of pain.

“A wound?” I asked, immediately loosening my hold. I did not let go, though. I raised her arm higher, inspecting the dark mark. No bleeding. A bruise? “When did this happen?”

She gave me no answer besides the curling of her fingers into a fist. I ran my thumb, more gently this time, along the swollen area, all the while mentally reviewing the places I’d touched her since yesterday. Her jaw, her waist, her upper arm... Had I grasped her flimsy little wrist here, too? I stroked the dark mark over and over, back and forth, wondering with something that felt far too much like shame if I’d done this.

The human shuddered, a feverish tremble running up her slender arm. I released her as if I’d been branded. She took back her arm and hid it beneath the table.

“What is your name?” I asked, my voice sounding harsh and hoarse in my ears. I cleared my throat, and the sound made her finally turn her small face back up to mine. “You already know mine. You called me Lord Wylfrael. What is your name?”

She pressed her lips against each other and looked away.

I fought the urge to grab her arm again, to make her face me even if it hurt, to force her to tell me what I wanted to know. It was bizarre – ridiculous – that I cared this much about her insignificant name at all.

But that didn’t stop the wanting.

“I will find out eventually, little human,” I muttered. It would only be a matter of time until I learned her name and everything else I wanted to know, too. In the meantime, I’d already gleaned one facet of information about her, whether she’d wanted me to or not.

As I stalked from the room, it was all I could think about, that blooming secret I’d stolen from her skin:

The hateful, ugly, beautiful colour of her body when it bruised.

I DECIDED THAT GETTING space from my prisoner, as I seemed so desperately to need, meant leaving the castle entirely. I stationed Shoshen outside her chamber and then went outside. I did not use any of my powers to whisk snow away from my path as I walked, instead ploughing directly through it, enjoying the seep of cold through my trousers and boots. I spread my wings as I walked, stretching the flesh, and breathed deeply of the winter air I knew so well. I headed for the back of the estate, pausing for a moment when I saw the remnants of last night – footsteps, and the pile of collapsed snow I’d heaved up to stop the human’s escape.

Breathing out harshly, my breath like smoke in the clear daylight air, I lifted my hand and drew upon my powers, smoothing the snow, erasing every mark. Not quite satisfied but not sure what else to do about it, I kept walking, entering the treeline that stood between the castle and the mountains. Back here, the sotasha barn stood, a broad building made of thick crystal tile that housed the animals Sionnachans used for leather, milk, fur, and meat. I could hear the massive, shaggy white beasts huffing and grunting inside. Beside the barn was a structure much more open to the air. A single sontanna stood there, its antlers and fur snowy silver, its mane a luminous pale pink, like Sionnach’s sky. It watched me warily. Pain hit me, like a blow, when I remembered this sontanna did not know me. Like Aiko, Ashken, and Shoshen, it was a descendent of creatures I’d once loved, and it looked at me like I was a stranger.

If Ashken and Shoshen had done their jobs as Masters of the Grounds, the sontanna would be well trained. I would be able to approach it, to command it, and ride it if I wished.

But I turned from it instead, forging further into the trees, until the silent sontanna, the snuffling sotasha, the castle, and my prisoner, were out of sight.

I did not stop walking until I hit the mountains. My wounds hurt, but I could tell that even the deepest ones inflicted by Skalla were healing well. Slowly, my power was returning. By tomorrow, I might be strong enough to open a sky door to Rúnwebbe’s world...

That thought spurred me on, gave me energy. I bent my legs and launched into the air, throttling higher and higher. Once high enough, I caught the wind, sailing easily among the mountains and over the valleys. I decided in the air I’d visit the nearest villages. I wanted to see what information they had about what had happened while I’d been gone, and to re-establish myself among them. To assert that I was still alive, that I was here. That I had returned, even when they’d all feared I wouldn’t.

The nearest village, even on wings as quick as mine, was nearly half a day’s flight from my castle. It would give me time and distance to think, I reasoned, as I set myself on the path.

But by the time I reached the village, though, I did not feel I’d had nearly enough time to think at all. I’d come to no new conclusions about the various problems pricking at me. I still had to visit Rúnwebbe before I’d be able to speak to the human, and beyond that, I still needed to tackle larger problems – Skalla and the council, the star-darkness, and finding my mate. The issues were bound up together in a tangled web that even Rúnwebbe would envy.

I pushed it all aside for now to focus on my current task, hating how the human’s face was the hardest to push aside of them all.

This Sionnachan village stood on a high, broad hill, bare in the middle of dense forest. At least, it had the last time I was here. It had grown since then, the buildings spilling down the hill into cleared land, pushing the forest back. The village buildings looked so squat and short compared to the spires of the castle I’d come from and the trees scattered around. Sionnachans made their buildings using materials from the trees, but they did not carve up into the trees themselves the way my father had done when he’d built the castle for my mother. Typically, Sionnachan buildings were boxy, or cylindrical, made from crystal tile and bricks, their roofs angled to help the snow slide off and not build up too heavily on top.

I landed at the base of the hill, in the centre of a lane mostly cleared of snow. I walked along the broad lane, which led up the hill. A sled pulled by two graceful sontanna crested the hill ahead of me, beginning the descent. I stepped aside to make way, taking note of the way the two Sionnachan males in the sled twisted to gape at me in disbelief as they passed. Another Sionnachan, who’d been sweeping snow away from her front door, dropped her broom and then hastily flattened her ears at the sight of me. I grunted a greeting at her, which caused her to nearly jump out of her tawny skin. When I took a step towards her, she gasped and fled inside, leaving her broom half-buried in the snow.

Getting answers may not be as easy as I’d hoped, I thought to myself as I retrieved her broom and stood it up against the bricks of her home. Here, beyond the mountains, the trees grew in slightly different variations. There were fewer pink and green trees and many more purple ones, which meant most of the buildings in the village glinted like purple gems among the snow.

I was glad to see so many new buildings. The village had clearly prospered in my time away. And yet, there was an arresting sort of relief that overtook me when I reached the top of the hill and found the main road through the village fundamentally unchanged. When my eyes fell on one of the largest buildings – a broad tiled cylinder shining in the afternoon sun – I knew exactly where it was I needed to go.

If I wanted answers, if I wanted to talk, where better a place to go than the local pub, where tongues were loosened by ale?

I unfurled my wings and flew there, landing at the pub’s door before wrenching it open and stepping inside.

I was right – this was the place to come for chatter. The main circular room of the pub was filled to the crystal rafters with it. More than two dozen Sionnachans ate, drank, and conversed along spiralling benches that curled inward from the rounded outer wall.

One by one, though, as the Sionnachans took notice of me at the door, they fell silent. Somewhere, a goblet smashed to the floor.

At the centre of the pub, where the long benches finally ended their inward swirl, was a large circular counter with a hollow in the middle where the pub master stood. For a brief moment, I thought I recognized him, with his distinctly spotted black and cream colouring and pale blue eyes. But he was taller than the last pub master I’d known. And younger. Another descendant, no doubt.

He was louder than the last pub master, Gershen, had been too. Louder, and apparently bolder. Where Gershen would have given me a brief, gruff greeting, barely audible over the sounds of the pub, this new one called out to me, his voice rich and clear, meeting my eyes with a grin when no other Sionnachan in the vicinity seemed capable of even drawing breath in my presence.

“Lord Wylfrael! Ashken sent a burrowbird with word that you’d returned. We all wondered if you’d come here.”

“I have returned,” I said, a perhaps redundant confirmation of what my appearance had already told them. But it seemed as if they needed more confirmation. Most of them looked like they couldn’t make any sense of what they were seeing.

A whisper from a bench on the other side of the pub caught my keen ears. “So old Ashken hasn’t lost his lane in the snow, then.”

“No, he has not,” I said crisply, reining in my annoyance at the way the villagers had so obviously doubted the word, and the sanity, of my old Master of the Grounds. “You would all do well to respect my staff whenever you come into contact with them, and to heed their words as if they were words direct from my lips.”

Flattened ears, and muttered phrases of “Yes, Lord Wylfrael. Of course, Lord Wylfrael,” rolled along the benches like wind bending the flowers in a field.

I frowned, not liking the way this interaction had begun. I did not enjoy the role of the angry lord, but angry was all I’d been since I’d awoken. I breathed in deeply, smelling firestone and meat and Sionnachan fur, fur just like my mother’s, and reminded myself to be calm. Civil. The Sionnachans were gentle and good, but they were clearly wary of me. I also reminded myself that, though they called me Lord Wylfrael, they were not beholden to me. My castle, and the forests around it, were my mother’s ancestral lands and now belonged to me. But I did not own the land they lived on in this village – they did. They called me lord, as they had also done for my father, not because we required it but out of their own half-fearful deference to stone sky immortality and power. Sionnachans had no kings, no landlords, and each village was completely autonomous of every other.

But because I was a stone sky god, with powers they could scarcely imagine and had never even witnessed in their lifetimes, to them I was not simply Wylfrael. I was the long-lost immortal lord, carved out of stories passed down by their parents and grandparents, a childhood legend brought to life right before their very eyes.

I did not want to be a half-forgotten legend. I wanted to exist here, to be real in this time and place. To be known as I had once known this world so well. A living god. Not a ghost.

“I’ve come to greet you all,” I said, my voice a controlled boom in the space. “To let you know that I have indeed returned, and to inquire about activities near my castle. A little over thirty days ago, a machine landed, bringing with it interlopers called humans. What do you know of them?”

The Sionnachans shifted on their benches, eyeing me and each other uneasily.

The pub master was the one who answered, the only one who seemed at all at ease with me in their midst.

“We know only what Ashken sent by burrowbird, my lord,” he called while polishing a goblet with a spare rag. “We heard tell of these people and their sled from the sky, but have not seen them ourselves. We thought it best to give them a wide berth, and they have not come to seek us out.”

So, basically what Ashken already told me, then. There had been no real contact between the invaders and my mother’s people. It was for the best. The Sionnachans were too peaceful to launch an attack against invaders the way I had done. I did not like to think what would have happened if the aggressive humans and their weapons had made their way here eventually...

“I will inform you now, then, that the humans have left. I do not believe they will be back.” I did not tell them that I’d killed nearly as many humans as had escaped on the machine. They were already unnerved by me. No need to frighten them further.

I decided not to tell them about my prisoner, either.

The crowd noticeably relaxed at my tidings, and I claimed that as a small victory.

I spent all afternoon in the pub, learning the names of the Sionnachans there and speaking with the pub master. As I’d assumed, he was a descendant of the old Gershen. His name was Garrshek, and he proved himself to be a gregarious, grinning sort of Sionnachan. He recounted the local history with a finely honed memory for detail, filling me in on their village’s growth since I’d been gone.