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Gitgo’s fear and refusal of gaining a larger reward to let me go came back to me. The only one whom he could fear more than the emperor was Lady Madeema and her power. It was said she had her spies everywhere.
Suddenly, I couldn’t think straight any longer, only one thought ran through me. Out, I need to get out of here.
With a sob, I ran for the wide doors that would lead me into the hallway. They opened automatically at my approach and without slowing down I raced past the startled guards.
“Heather!” Daryus yelled behind me. I didn’t turn. The sound of his voice only lent me wings and I practically flew down the corridor. I had no idea where I was going to go, I had no place to go to. But my confused mind was set on flight, and so I did.
I found an elevator, got in, blindly pushed buttons, got out when the doors opened, and ran again, passed people who stopped and stared at me as if I had lost my mind and I probably had.
Why would Daryus do that? Why?
I had no answer.
Stomping footsteps, too close behind me, spurred me on and suddenly I was inside the park.
Night was approaching, long shadows from an artificial sun looked like perfect hiding spots and I left the cobblestoned path to run straight for the thick of the trees. I didn’t turn to find out if guards or Daryus were behind me, it didn’t matter, I didn’t want either to catch me.
Heather running past us startled me.
“Heather?” I called, but she didn’t slow.
“Guards!” Noctus yelled and ran into the bathroom, blaster out, looking for whoever or whatever might have caused my mekarry to run out in a panic.
From deep inside my gut I sensed that nobody would be there though. Feverishly, my mind recreated Noctus, Lady Madeema, and my conversation. What had Heather overheard? What was said right before she rushed out?
We had been discussing Lady Madeema’s ploy of having ordered Sir Priough taken from his room while he was visiting here with the king of the Cryons. She claimed Sir Priough had surrendered himself to her, asking for asylum in exchange for information against his king. I had never believed that this was how it happened. I had no doubt that she had forcefully taken Sir Priough from his rooms, and tortured him until she had the confession she needed to find proof against the Cryons for the atrocities they were committing.
This is a fine mess you got me into. Are you sure nobody will suspect my involvement in the abduction? Those were the exact words I said to Lady Madeema.
Nobody will find out that you knew about this, Emperor. If worse comes to worse, we can make Lady Natoi the villain. Staphor knows she deserves it, Commander Noctus had suggested, not unreasonably, because it would be easier to accuse Lady Natoi of conspiring against the empire than abducting her own charge. Which would paint a bad picture of the whole project.
I hated spinning lies like this. Too many people were already involved in Lady Madeema’s fuckup to keep it quiet, but what choice was there? I could not let my top intelligence officer take the fall for this. She saw an opportunity and took it, no matter how ill-advised.
That didn’t matter right now though, as I puzzled out what could have caused Heather’s flight. Then it came to me. Put into a different context, what she had overheard could have made her suspicious of me. Did she really think I could have been involved in her abduction? Could have sat by as she got hurt?
The answer was simple and it hurt. Vra.
She had no idea what she meant to me, no idea what we had truly been talking about, and I couldn’t fault her for it.
So I did the only thing I could: I raced after her. Ordering my guards to, “Stay back!”
I didn’t need forty guards to follow me, watch me bring my mekarry back. This was something I needed to do on my own—as a man, not as an emperor.
Heather managed to get into an elevator before I could catch up with her and I had to stand back and figure out which level she got out on. When I realized that it was at the park, something flared inside me.
Something ancient and primal.
I jumped into the elevator I had been holding until I was certain of where she was going and pressed the same button she had. My entire body came alive during the ascent, my nostrils flared as if I was already taking in her scent.
Many, many centuries ago, our ancestors used to chase their mekarries through the wilderness of Pandrax to claim them as theirs. It was the final test in the ritual of assuring a male was deserving of his mekarry. The tradition died out long before we even forgot about our sacred mekarry bonds. That it surfaced now, only made it that much more clearer to me that it was once again Staphor telling us we needed to return to the old ways.
Thanks to Staphor's guidance, my two best friends, who also happened to be two of the most powerful males in Pandrax, had already sealed their mekarry bonds with their human merrilies. I believed it was his way of pushing me into action and telling me that it was his will to take a human as my empress. And by Staphor, nothing would stand in my way..
With a roar, I raced into the park and lifted my head. With my nostrils flaring, I tried to get a read on her scent, then I broke out into a sprint that led me straight into the forest’s deep foliage.
With every step I took, I felt my cultured self falling away, felt a primal me rise. Her scent nearly drove me insane, fresh and alluring and… filled with fear. I roared again as the predator inside me took over, guided me over a fallen log, through shrubs, deeper and deeper into the forest, parts I had never been to.
My ears picked up noises I shouldn’t have been able to hear: gasping, as if somebody was running out of air, which I suspected she was. I didn’t think she would be able to keep this fast pace up for long.
