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“Is that bad?” I asked carefully, honestly intrigued, because I hadn’t heard the whole story, definitely not from his point of view.
“Nocc.” Daryus stared off toward the waterfall. “Discovering we are still capable of mekarry bonds was exhilarating, but it did put me in a difficult situation.”
I waited until he collected his thoughts and decided how much he wanted to share with me. When he did, it was with a self-deprecating snort. “We hadn’t even realized that we lost the mekarry bond, how frygging ironic is that?”
There were so many emotions in his voice, I was barely able to keep my hand back as it automatically wanted to move to caress his hard bicep in a gesture of sympathy. I didn’t know him well enough yet though, he was a stranger and an emperor at that, and I had no idea what protocol said about me, a refugee, a human, touching him, so I held back.
“To have found it now, with your people, is nothing short of a miracle. The honorable thing to do would be to bring down the full wrath of the imperial fleet on the Cryons and stop their atrocities against your species.”
I read the pain in his eyes for his inability to do so and said quietly, “But you can’t. Because you can’t risk an intergalactic war.”
He looked at me, really looked at me. Our eyes locked and he nodded. “Vra, you understand?”
“I do,” I admitted, even though I called myself a hypocrite, a coward, and some other choice names. Because here I was sitting well-fed, dressed, and—most of all—safe, while other members of my species endured unbelievable hardships and horrors. I had no idea if I would still understand if I was inside one of the rumored torture chambers of the Cryons, or holed up inside a basement, praying the drones wouldn’t find me. But for whatever reason, I was here and not there, and as much as I tried, I couldn’t imagine or even fathom what others were going through.
I could only voice my thoughts on this. “No matter how fair or unfair to the individual, the fact of the matter is that the Cryons would exterminate us if it weren’t for your interference. You may not be able to save every single human, but you are saving the human race.”
His beautiful teal-colored eyes were inscrutable when he replied, “That may be so, but in the meantime hundreds, if not thousands, of our mekarry bonds are suffering, even dying. Thousands of my subjects will never experience the true meaning of a mekarry bond simply because my hands are tied and I cannot come to their defense.”
I cocked my head and realized that this man was in emotional turmoil. I didn’t think I was special, but I also didn’t think he had allowed anybody a peek under his mask like the one he was allowing me. I weighed my words and asked, “This mekarry bond, this has something to do with fate, right?”
“It has everything to do with fate,” he agreed.
“This may sound flippant, but wouldn’t it have been fate that led the Cryons to Earth so that you would discover your mekarry bond?”
I didn’t believe in fate or mekarry bonds, but he obviously did. He had done so much for us that I wanted to give something back, even if it were only words to make him sleep better at night.
When he nodded, I continued, “So wouldn’t it then be prudent to say that fate knows what it is doing and would keep the people meant for a mekarry bond safe? Lead them here to your people?”
He sat perfectly still, his eyes still resting on me took on a faraway look as if his mind had wandered off hundreds of miles.
“I need to consider this,” he finally said, rising. “Thank you.” He took my hand gently and a warm humming spread through my body where we touched, followed by a tremble when his lips brushed against my flesh in an old-fashioned kiss of my hand.
He even bowed slightly before he strode down the pathway, followed by a contingent of so many guards I lost count. How hadn’t I realized that there were so many soldiers hovering in the back? Probably the same way I discounted them now, staring only at Daryus’s back covered by his cape as it moved with every strong stride he took. I had never met a man this handsome. And powerful, my mind reminded me, as if I needed to point it out.
Even now my heart was still beating erratically from being this close to him again. It was hard to discern if it was pumping this hard from anxiety or attraction. Probably a mix of both, I concluded. Kind of like if you meet a movie star you had a crush on for a long time, except this movie star was one of the most powerful men in the universe. He held the fates of trillions of people in his hands, we humans were only a tiny blip on his radar.
That thought was sobering. As soon as I was sure he was gone, I made my way back to Lady Natoi’s suite where I listened distractedly to her lamentations about how I needed to be more open to the men she introduced me to and quit being such a calleio, a word my translator couldn’t find a word in English for, but it boiled down to coldhearted bitch.
I wasn’t sure what she expected from me. Was I supposed to let these men just paw at me? That wasn’t going to happen, and I was close to telling her to go and find herself a different human, that I had had enough and wanted to go home.
But I didn’t have a home anymore, did I?
Like it or not, I depended on Lady Natoi’s goodwill. I had nothing. She had even bought the underwear I wore. Yes, she bought them for me, but she could take it all back, couldn’t she? It was within her power to just throw me out on the streets and there would be nothing I could do about it. Just like there was no place for me to go.
So I listened, nodded, apologized even though the words burned in my throat, and promised to do better. Be better.
“Good merrily,” she praised and petted me on the head. “You’ll see, we’ll find your mekarry soon.”
I made a face behind her back, yearning for some way to support myself to not be dependent on her.
A servant entered through the open doorway. Bowing deeply, he announced, “Pardon the interruption, Lady Natoi, a messenger from the emperor is here.”
She lit up instantly. “A messenger? From the emperor? Well, show him in, fool.” She clapped her hands excitedly.
One of the orange aliens—a Myx, a conquered species whose main purpose in life now was to serve any higher members of the Pandraxian empire—entered, dressed in the imperial livery of green and gold.
“I bring an invitation from the emperor,” the Myx announced just as imperiously as the emperor himself.
