Zac (Storm Foxes)

(I've posted a few excerpts from this one, which is circling in various forms in my head. This repeats some of the plot points of previous iterations, but in a different form. It's... getting there. Slowly.) 

I remember the anger most of all, driving me through the freezing, early snow. I couldn’t feel my toes in my boots and my ears hurt like they’d fall off, but right at that moment, I hated my father so much it didn’t matter. I hated him enough that I brushed aside the early nips of the storm foxes’ teeth. I hated him enough that, striding through the bush, I wasn't even scared. I hated him. He was going to pay. 

I reached the old, rust-red railroad, abandoned in the bush decades ago, the faltering line demarcating native eucalypts and wattles from plantation pines. Unlike the eucalypts, the pines looked natural in their coverings of snow. ‘Look at us,’ they seemed to say. ‘We were made for adversity.’ 

So, it seemed, was I. 

It was anger that propelled me through the darkening forest as wind spat snow in my face. It was anger that drove me deeper and deeper into the trees that loomed overhead, blocking the light that glinted in storm foxes’ eyes. But it was grief, when at last I reached the Winter King’s clearing, that brought me stumbling to my knees. 

I was eight, and Mum had gone.

“Fix it,” I told him, the Winter King, with his great stag antlers and all-seeing eyes. “Bring her back.”

He smiled sadly. “You know I can’t.”

I challenged his gaze. “Send your foxes. Find her.” The storm foxes, riding invisible on the wind, nipped at my ears, my nose. I ignored them. 

His smile vanished. “They are not my foxes any more. They no longer do my bidding. I could not send them if I tried.”

“Then make me one.” My heart hammered in my chest; this was it, this was my father’s punishment, the thing I’d set out to do. He’d driven my mother away, and now I would leave him too. “Make me a storm fox, and I’ll find her.” If I could ride the winds as they did, I’d find my mother wherever she was. Nowhere in the whole wide world would be too far. I’d find her, and I’d bring her back. 

The Winter King’s eyes glazed up with tears. “Is this really what you want?”

My jaw ached. “I do.” Cold burned my fingertips. Alive. I felt alive, so damn alive; nothing could touch me now. 

The Winter King bowed his head. “So be it.” 

I stood, too agitated to kneel, robbed of the fight I’d expected. “I hate him,” I said, though it was none of the Winter King’s business. The storm foxes circled me, red fur and cream throat, black eye and white tooth, glimpses magically visible in the gloom. “I never want to see him again.”

The Winter King laughed without mirth. It sent shivers down my spine. “Be careful, child. You’ve lost one parent already.”

I scowled and swatted away a fox that nipped at my ear. “I’ll find her.” 

The Winter King bowed and faded away.

The foxes’ nips grew restless, daring—a toothy, masochistic leer. For the first time, fear trilled along pathways that anger had made. 

I didn’t scream when they tore into me—I’d asked for this—but I couldn’t stop the tears from rolling down my face. It didn’t take long before blood joined them, trickling from my eyebrows, dripping off my earlobes, oozing from wounds on my neck and scalp. 

I closed my eyes, alive. It hurt, but in a way that was normal, natural: the physical response of a body being torn apart. For the first time since Mum had walked out, the pain in my heart dulled. 

The sharp, sweet iron of blood overtook the crisp smell of the pines. My pulse rushed in my ears until I couldn’t hear the quiet yips of the foxes any more. Slowly, I sank to the ground, fighting against the impulse to shelter my head. 

Maybe something had gone wrong. Maybe the Winter King had left me to die. Walked out on me, just like everyone else eventually did. 

I tried so hard to be good. 

Under all the pain, something began to itch. I opened my eyes. At first all I could see was a haze of red—blood, maybe, or fox fur? It was hard to say. But then the musk of fox grew stronger, the iron of blood faded into the background just a little, and I realised the trees were taller than they had been. 

No. I was shorter. 

I swiped blood from my eyes—

Ow. I had claws. I stared at my hand—paw—hand? I had paws?

Oh. I realised the storm foxes had withdrawn a little, and that the pain had changed. Instead of the sting of open wounds, I ached like I’d run to Melbourne and back. And I had paws. 

I tilted my nose to the sky and yipped with delight. I was a storm fox, and now I’d find my mother quick as breathing. 

I leapt off the ground, ready to soar with the winds and the snow. For a heart-buoying moment I flew—

The ground smacked into me like disappointment, and I discovered the truth: I was a fox. Not a storm fox. Just a fox. 

Foxes couldn’t cry. I was glad.

A Glimmering Green Hope

Galen Andez crossed the threshold to his living quarters and set the door code to private. There were times when he would welcome the intrusion of his flight. Some days he left the door open hoping he'd catch someone from the training fleet to come and join him for an evening meal. Today his head ached, his muscles screamed in protest after extensive use, and he was the kind of fatigued that would end either with eighteen hours of sleep or with killing someone.

There wasn't an in-between on days like this. Too many hours linked to a Daylion Pride fighter could kill a man. This week he'd been hitting his limit every day ending in Y.

Stripping off his sweat-soaked shirt he tossed it in the general direction of his room before prowling over to the kitchen. Food. Lots of food, heavy on carbs and vat-grown proteins, and then he was going to sleep like the dead. Showers could wait.

He eyed the remains of a kitchen that had gone through this carnage six days trying to find something. Going out shopping was out of the question. Having his food delivered would require more human interaction than he could mentally entertain at the moment. There had to be something. A ration bar if nothing else.

A wink of emerald green caught his eye.

He tilted his head, watching the shimmering green to see if it would wink away, a hallucination caused by too many hours uplinked to a machine. Nope.

Stalking into the receiving area he stared down at the emerald green bra draped casually over the arm of one of the low, comfy chairs. None of the women in fleet wore bras under their body armor. It was, he'd been told, both uncomfortable and redundant. The body armor did an excellent job of keeping bouncing to a bare minimum. This... he ran a finger over the curve of the plush bra before picking it up. This was a fancy cage for full breasts.

The scent of warm wood and fresh grass lingered on the fabric like the memory of a ghost. Lyrian treesilk... expansive and luxurious. He caressed the fabric. Oh, hell yes!

There was only one woman he knew who would wear Lyrian made clothing. Last time he'd seen her he'd been a junior cadet still fighting for a chance to become a fighter pilot. She'd been... something else. Nothing like fleet. Nothing like the station-raised normcore people he'd been raised with. No ground pounder or starchaser could compare.

Just remembering her set his blood burning. The taste of her kiss was addictive, her voice hypnotic... Women like her were trouble. Sometimes the cause of it, but sometimes just there, like a rogue catalyst in the chemical equation of life.

A background sound he hadn't registered in his fatigued stupor became silent. He looked toward to the refresher room where the sound of water had stopped. Oh, hell no.

"Shyla?"

The door cracked open and a vixen with brindled hair curling from the refresher's humidity grinned at him. "Hiya, handsome. Dinner's in the chiller. I'll be out in a moment."

"Oh. No." Galen shook his head as his body tried to divide into two equal halves. One half wanted to run like a star was about to collapse in front of him. The other half wanted to rush to her embrace.

She tilted her head to the side, the little coquette. "No?" One bare foot crossed the threshold between the door and the living area. A tanned, toned leg followed, hinting at the naked body hidden from view. "Should I come out now?"

"What are you doing here?" His mouth was dry. Aching muscles found new life. She could have asked him to dance across the vacuum of space and he wouldn't have stopped to grab an EVA suit.

"My room wasn't ready, and I needed to shower. I didn't think you'd mind. Do you?" Her voice was pitched perfectly, a cross of sweet innocence combined with the fluster of a girl who knew he was cross but couldn't quite understand why.

Which was a bloody lie. Shyla was a 'pathic, one of the rare humans who could touch other human minds.

Every computer could read a person's fingerprint. Every 'pathic could read a mindprint, the unique pattern than belonged to an individual. She wouldn't have had to consult anyone to find him. She'd probably walked past, felt the impression of him in the room, and waltzed in without further thought.

"What if this were my girlfriend's room?" Galen asked, crossing his arms across his chest.

"I checked for women's clothes and signs of a lover. I wouldn't have stayed if I thought you were with someone." She stepped out of the refresher room wearing the shortest dress he'd ever seen on a woman. It might have been a long shirt. The navy blue fabric dropped from a string around her neck and unapologetically covered only the most spectacular views. Her back, arms, and legs were free to view, and he did, reveling in the sight of her.

Shyla reached out and stroked the side of his face with a gentle hand. "You're hurting."

He closed his eyes and took her touch too. The pain in his head eased, his muscles relaxed, the tension that wrapped around him like a boa loosened its grip. "Shyla..." He'd meant to rebuke her, to push her away, but it came out as a prayer.

One moment she was standing at arm's length, the next she was pressed against him, the heat of her body washing through him. Her lips found his, and he was lost.

When he opened his eyes he was laying on his bed with Shyla propped up on one elbow beside him. His pants were still on. The magical blue dress was still clinging to her and hiding everything he wanted to see. Shyla had added a knowing smile to her wardrobe. And he felt better than he had since the war started.

He flopped back on the pillow with his eyes closed. "Shyla."

"You needed it."

"No. I was fine."

"You were close to breaking."

"I was fine. I needed some nutrients and some sleep, not a full healing."

Two points of warmth touched his bare chest. Fingers, walking from his navel to his sternum, then dragging back down with the faintest hint of pain as her nails abraded his skin. He arched his spine involuntarily as she pulled her hand away. Every nerve in him thrummed with needing.

"You need so much more than healing, Commander." Her breath was hot against his ear.

"Shyla." This time her name came out as an impatient growl. Seven years without her. Seven years of thinking of what he would say next and all he'd managed to grind out was her name. Galen pressed his palms to his eyes in a desperate attempt to center himself. "Why is it that I can't think around you?"

"Because you haven't had a decent sex partner in three years and you've spent every waking hour since we parted beating your body into a pulp for the glory of the fleet and the safety of humanity."

"It's not about glory." Not anymore.

"Dying to save the rest of the species isn't a very efficient plan," Shyla said. She shifted on the bed and he felt the weight of her pulling the mattress down, the heat of her body near but not touching. "You should at least donate to the gene pool before you kill yourself."

A horrible thought occurred to him. "You're not-"

"No." She didn't need to hear the question. She probably didn't need to hear him talk at all. "Breath, Galen. I'm on the station for work. Lawfully hired. You aren't aiding or abetting a fugitive."

"This time."

"This time," she agreed. "Nor did I come to seduce you, well, not with the intent to procreate. Children aren't really in my five-year-plan at this point." The bed bounced as she got up. "Come on, flyboy. You need to rehydrate before you fall back asleep."

He let her take his hand and pull him out of bed. "Shyla?"

She stopped in the doorway, silhouetted by the light of the kitchen. "Hmm?"

"I'm glad you're back."

Answer The Question

I tilted my head back against the pastel green wall of the day spa, relaxing just enough that I could feel every ache and pain in my body. Man, I was looking forward to this massage. 

The doorhandle on one of the client rooms twisted, and a fraction of a second before the door opened, I stiffened. Heat sang through my body and, furious, I stuffed it away, stifling a groan. Not Ty. For a brief moment I panicked, wondering if Bianca had mixed things up and booked my massage with Ty—something I’d asked never to happen again after that first time—but I forced myself to breathe and relax, keeping my eyes closed. Bianca ran her day spa with a golden heart and an iron fist; she wouldn’t do that to me. 

Still, as Ty exited the client room and crossed the waiting area, footsteps soft on the rugged floor. I felt more than heard him pause in front of me, every sense in my body standing to rigid attention. 

Steady breath in, steady breath out. Steady breath in, steady breath out. I’d managed to successfully ignore him through all of our infrequent encounters since that first massage, and today would be no different. 

In front of me, he sniffed. “I clearly need to have a word with Bianca,” he muttered, and I couldn’t tell if he was including me in his audience or not. “That lounge needs replacing, and some things around here are getting downright old and worn.”

I managed to avoid choking on my disbelief until he left the room, though I could still see the back of his head disappearing down the stairs, so doubtless he heard me. Whatever. I didn’t even care. Stupid, arrogant, jerk-faced twat. Just because he was so pretty that girls fell over themselves to be near him, he’d decided he was God’s gift to humanity. Well, I wasn’t falling for it, even if it had been the best bloody massage of my life. I was not some stupid, vapid piece of arm-candy for him to play with. Urgh. 

I slammed my head back against the wall just a little too hard, and winced. Moron! Imbecile! Arrogant peacocky slimeball!

“Ellie?” Bianca’s soothing voice halted my litany and I sighed, forcing away the negative energy encounters with Ty always left. “Your turn, honey.”

Damn him. I was going to enjoy my massage. He was not going to ruin this perfect moment of relaxation. Firmly shoving thoughts of stunningly gorgeous manwhores from mind, I followed Bianca into a treatment room. 

* * *

I slid into my regular seat at Felici’s just as Nana and Lydia, my older sister, were handing their menus to the waitress. “I’ll have the usual,” I said as the waitress raised an eyebrow at me. 

She nodded and swept away, leaving behind a cobalt blue bottle that sparkled and dripped with condensation. 

“So,” I said, pouring water for everyone, “What’s new?”

Lydia shrugged. “Nothing much. I was just moaning about how much working retail during the holiday season sucks. Though at least Ty is on this afternoon, so things won’t get deadly boring until he finishes up at six.”

The glass I was reaching for slipped, tipped, and sailed towards the floor. Nana, with characteristic lightning reflexes, caught it before it had barely left the table, deftly setting it upright and relieving me of my water-pouring duties.

“Ty works at the boutique as well?” I said, aiming for nonchalant. 

Nana smirked, and I pointedly ignored her. 

Lydia nodded. “Oh yeah. He does mornings in the spa and afternoons downstairs in the storefront.”

I made a careful mental note to avoid the boutique in the afternoons. Not that I needed much help with that; Dusk Alley was a designer boutique selling women’s clothing, jewellery and cosmetics that was at least four times out of my price range. I’d known they were affiliated with the day spa, but I hadn’t realised they shared staff. I guess it made sense, especially for the cosmetics and beauty product sales. Whatever. Irrelevant. 

I shoved the whole issue aside and turned to Nana. “So, I was thinking of hitting up the department store this afternoon. I need some clothes for work. Do you want to come?” Not only did Nana have impeccable taste, she also had an almost bottomless bank account that she had no qualms sharing with her only two surviving family members. 

She nodded decisively. “Yes,” she said. “It will be illuminating.”

My eyebrows knitted in puzzlement, but I let it pass. Nana was well known for her bizarre comments and apparently unconnected observations. “Sure,” I said. “Thank you.”

“Swing by Alley when you’re done,” Lydia said. I’m stuck there till eleven tonight. I’ll take my break when you come.”

Nana was already agreeing enthusiastically, and I groaned. So much for avoiding the place. 

Never mind. We’d go in, find Lydia, and drag her out for a break. The chances of running into Ty were entirely minimal. Everything would be fine. 

* * *

“I’ll just be a second,” I assured Nana as I ducked into the bathrooms. We’d spend a good couple of hour clothes hunting, and all of the resulting outfits were nicer than what I had on now. If we were going to stop past the boutique to collect Lydia, my chances of running into Ty were absolutely minimal, thank heavens—but I wasn’t about to give him more fodder for insults if I could avoid it. Old and tired. Prat. 

Locked safely in a stall, I surveyed my options. The navy was too formal; the silver too attention seeking. I settled on a neutral-toned skirt that showed off my butt and a red silk blouse with fluttery cap sleeves that managed to actually make me look like I had cleavage for a change. The whole outfit was sophisticated and chic yet effortless, the neutral skirt enriching the light brown of my hair and the red blouse the best possible colour for my skin tone. 

I pulled it all on, slipped on one of the many pairs of gorgeous new shoes—it was so shallow, but I did love Nana’s bank account—fluffed my hair, and headed back out. 

Nana whistled. “Don’t you look special,” she said.

I smiled distractedly, running my fingers along the blouse’s neckline. “It’s missing something,” I said. “I need something around my neck.”

Nana shrugged. “If you say so.”

I loaded my bags back into the trolley and marched off with it determinedly. Three times Nana tried to draw my attention to jewellery stores that we passed, but I knew exactly the one I was after. 

We rounded the corner: Dusk Alley. Chewing the inside of my lip and narrowing my eyes, I made a beeline for the back of the store, where their jewellery display was located. 

Nana caught up after a few moments, and eyed the dazzling array of entirely over-the-top necklaces, the lightest of which looking like it had to weigh at least a pound. “These aren’t really what you’re looking for, dear,” she observed candidly.

I shrugged, stifling my irritation at the truth of her words. “I thought they’d have a bigger range. This one’s okay,” I added, pointing out a silver-filigreed piece with a floral motif. 

Voices erupted around the end of the aisle and I froze. I will not turn around. I will not turn around. I realised I was checking myself out in the mirror to make sure the outfit was sitting right, and jerked my gaze away. “Or this one.” I reached for another necklace to my left, conveniently allowing me to turn my back on the approaching Prince of Twathood. 

Nana, of course, turned towards him. “Oh, I see. Of course.”

Was it permissible to hit grandmothers for being smug? If it had been Lydia I’d have whacked her for sure. 

“I’ll just go wait out the front, I think,” Nana continued, oblivious to my glares. “My feet, you know. And my hips. And my back.” She hobbled away to the tables out the front, looking every day of her age—which I’d never seen her do when she wasn’t up to mischief. Urgh. 

I was too busy fuming at her retreating back to realise that Ty had gotten within range. 

“Can I help you?” he said, eyes dancing. 

No. I was not looking at his stupid eyeballs. I whirled back to the jewellery display. “That one,” I said primly. “I’d like to try it on please.”

He reached for the necklace that hung just out of my reach, brushing past my shoulder in the process. I jolted at the energy his touch sent through me and ended up three feet away down the aisle. My stupid reflexes were always a little unpredictable, but they always seemed worse when he was around. This had been an utterly stupid idea. So what if he thought I looked old and tired? Why did I care what he thought? 

“Here.” 

I turned back to him, expecting to see the silver filigree. Instead, he held a ropey, glimmering creation I could have sworn wasn’t on the shelves a moment ago. It was a single necklace, but made up of tens or maybe even hundreds of strands; I couldn’t quite get a fix on it to figure it out, and the threads it was woven from seemed unnaturally fine and soft, like spider’s silk, the beads tiny and delicate as dewdrops. It glimmered gently in the fluorescent lights of the store, and I stood motionless, transfixed. 

“Do you like it?” There was a depth of emotion to Ty’s voice that I’d never heard before, and my heart skipped a beat in response. 

“Yes,” I breathed, awkwardness and irritation forgotten.

Ty beamed and my pulse skipped again. Saints, he was beautiful. Too beautiful, like a dangerous snake, but as he moved towards me with the necklace in hand, I was powerless to break the spell. 

He reached for me and I turned to face the mirror, back to him so he could fasten the jewellery around my neck. Instead, he laid one end of it across my forehead and directed me to hold it in place while he arranged the rest of the multitude of strands through the back of my hair, half catching it up in a style that seemed at once impossibly complex and incredibly simple. 

He fastened the catch on the jewellery just above my left ear and dropped a strand of hair to cover it. I stared at myself in the mirror, lost for words. The necklace—headpiece—whatever it was—had glimmered before, but in my hair it fairly shone. I felt like I was wearing a headdress made of moonlight that seemed to pulse gently in time with my breaths. 

“Stunning.” 

I glanced up at Ty in the mirror, surprised to see his eyes shining wetly. That instant was enough to break the spell, though, and I turned. “Let me show Nana,” I said. “I mean, let me see what she thinks.”

He stepped back, deferential. “Of course.”

Out the front of the store I found Lydia engaged in vibrant conversation with Nana, who sat with her back to me. Lydia’s eyes widened as she spotted me and paused midsentence. Nana twisted in her chair to see what Lydia had seen—and her hand flew to her mouth. 

“Oh,” she said as I drew close. “Oh, Elyena. You have it in your hair.”

I shrugged, suddenly embarrassed. “Oh, well,” I said, tugging on the strands across my forehead. “Ty thought he’d try something different.”

“Ty did this?” Nana asked. She turned back to her table and busied herself in her copious handbag before I could reply. 

Irritated, I snagged the necklace and tugged it down over my face. I shook my hair free from it and twisted it around to hang around my neck. There. Much better. Stupid Ty and his stupid ideas. What was he playing at, anyway? 

“There,” I snapped at the table, Lydia already engrossed in a new conversation with Ty and Nana still rummaging in her bag. Seriously, would it kill them to focus on me for more than a second? “Is that better?” I twitched the luminous white strands that trailed down my chest, still beautiful, but lacking the glorious beauty they’d had in the mirror just before. 

He narrowed his eyes critically at me. “The shirt does alluring things to your cleavage, I’ll give you that, even if it does emphasise your wide shoulders. I still wish you’d let me trim your hair, your forehead’s getting completely lost…” He trailed off under my glare. “No?”

“I meant about the necklace.” I thought my voice was remarkably calm for someone struggling against the impulse to commit homicide. 

Beside him, Lydia laughed. “I’m sorry. I’ve been training him for months, and he’s still barely housebroken.” She turned to him. “Ty, what’s our mantra? Answer the question…”

“Nothing else.” He nodded. “Answer the question, nothing else.”

They repeated it again together before dissolving into giggles. Ty reached across the table and tugged at Lydia’s hair, and she shrieked with mock outrage. Before I knew it, a chase was in flight—though I wasn’t actually sure who was chasing whom as they ducked back into the store and circled around racks and clothes stands. 

Ty caught Lydia for an instant, and I frowned in sudden realisation. This whole pantomime was starkly familiar: ten or fifteen years ago, it had been me and Lydia. My frown deepened and I watched closely for tell-tale glances or stray caresses, but as far as I could see, it was true: this wasn’t flirting, it was sibling horseplay. 

“Everything okay?” Nana’s voice cut through my thoughts and I turned, startled. 

“Hmm? Oh. Yes.” I glanced back at the two idiots still causing chaos in the store. “Everything’s… fine.” 

Nana’s eyes twinkled with something unreadable that tugged at my stomach, and I shook my head. “I’ll just, uh, go put the necklace back.”

“Yes, dear,” she said. “You can try to do that if you like.”

I rolled my eyes at her theatrics and headed for the back of the store. I tuned out Lydia and Ty’s ridiculous noise and hunted the display shelf for a place to hang the necklace. Oddly, there didn’t seem to be any empty hooks. I ran the necklace through my fingers, glancing down at where it hung limply around my neck. It was pretty—magically so—but it lacked the sparkle, the mysterious something else I’d thought it had when Ty had first put it on me. 

On a whim, I faced the mirror and tugged the necklace back up into my hair, trying to mimic the style Ty had created. Soft strands fell over my forehead and caught my hair partially up; it wasn’t quite how he’d done it, but… I tilted my head at the mirror and my heart skipped a beat. 

Slowly, tentatively, I reached up to touch the gossamer strands where they glimmered and glowed like a slipped halo.

Something solid hit me between and across the backs of my thighs. I flailed wildly for balance and found myself clinging to—his head, as he pranced wildly around the store with me on his shoulders, shouting, “Answer the question, nothing more! Answer the question, nothing more!”

Oh saints, my stomach’s showing. I tugged awkwardly at my shirt, caught between momentary embarrassment and his wildly infectious enthusiasm. “But what’s the question?” I shouted over the din. 

He laughed. “The necklace! It works!”

I laughed back, even though I had no clue what he was talking about. “Yay?”

Ty performed some complicated sort of movement that removed me from his shoulders and ended up with me in his arms. “Yay?” he said, eyes oddly serious in contrast to the frivolity of the situation.

“Well,” I said, waving my hands as vaguely as I felt, “It works, right? So yay?” I still had no idea what ‘working’ entailed, but whatever it was, apparently this was Christmas for Ty. He hugged me tightly to him and where our skin touched fire rippled through me. Saints. I’d forgotten what it felt like to have actual proper skin contact with him, not just accidental brushes I did my best to avoid. 

It was like drowning, and it was addictive, and it was probably just my imagination that my necklace halo was glowing like it might go nova and Ty was holding me, touching me, and my hands wrapped around the back of his neck and up through his hair and the air around us burst into flame with perfect, glorious pleasure. Skin. I needed his skin. 

My stomach flipped as something happened to gravity and I had a brief impression of broken plasterboard and a flash of darkness before Ty lay me down somewhere soft, and all I cared about was the touch of his skin, because it was beautiful, and perfect, and I nearly sobbed as heat soaked through me, lighting up every fibre of my being and chasing out fear and doubt and darkness—except just there, the very seat of my logic and rationality; it remained unmoved, a cold stone trying to catch my attention in the wave of heat.

“Wait,” I gasped. I needed a moment to process this. 

He ignored me, hands rubbing at my shoulders just like they had that first time in—I took in the plush-rugged floor, the pastel green walls, the ivory couches around the perimeter of the room. We were in the day spa. I struggled semi-upright. “Wait! How on earth did we…” 

He paused, and I found the gaping hole in the floor. Vague memories of a surge of power, of Ty springing upwards ten metres or more to the roof – through the roof – through the floor… I stared at him, wide-eyed, the magma flow of heat suddenly halted. “What are you?”

“Happy,” he mumbled against my shoulder.

I whacked him gently on the back of the neck. “Answer the question,” I said.

“Nothing more,” he murmured, nuzzling my neck. My skin fizzed where his lips touched, and I had to concentrate to rap him on the back of the head. 

“Yes,” I said. “Nothing more.”

He sat back, eyes clouded with lust slowly clearing. “I am what you are, love: a child of the gods. Well, I am closer than you: my mother was a true goddess. Your grandmother is the actual godling in your family.”

My heart stalled. Child of the gods? Me? Nana?

Actually, I had to admit that made a hell of a lot of sense. Nana’s bizarre observations, her uncanny sense of timing, her ridiculous physical abilities for someone her age… I blinked, unsure what was more unsettling: that my grandmother was a godling, or that it was dead easy to believe it. 

“Hold on, wait,” I said, wriggling further out from underneath Ty. “If you’re a godling, then…” I hesitated, not sure how to phrase my question, and not sure I wanted to know the answer. A godling. No wonder girls of all ages threw themselves at him. How many women had he loved in his lifetime? Ten? Twenty? A hundred? 

Cold logic was almost as good as a cold shower. “No,” I said. “No.”

“No what?”

“No I am not going to be the latest in a long line of floozies no. Not interested. I don’t care what you are, I’m not available.”

His eyes widened, body and face alike drooping in disappointment. “But Love, you feel it, I know you do.”

“Feel what?” I snapped, arms wrapped tightly around my torso. I felt nothing that he didn’t manipulate me to feel with his stupid godly powers.

“This,” he whispered, and reached out. His fingertip connected softly with the corner of my jaw, and I swallowed at the melting heat that consumed me. His finger trailed down my neck, tracing a blissful line across the hollow of my clavicle, lighting fire oh-so-carefully down my sternum. 

He pulled away and I remembered how to breathe. 

“See?” he said, still whispering. “How can you deny it?”

I shook my head, tears burning my eyes. I don’t want this, I don’t want this, I reminded myself frantically. “It isn’t real.” My nails dug into my palms as I stared into his sea green eyes, so full of sadness they seemed a mirror of my own. “Tell me…” I drew in a shaky breath. “Answer the question.”

He nodded, gaze darting across my face as though trying to unlock an enigma. 

“How many other girls?”

He frowned, and sadness turned to confusion. 

I rolled my eyes, flicking away tears with a quick finger. “Don’t give me that. How many other girls have you played this game with, made… feel like this?” I wasn’t holding my breath for his answer. I wasn’t. 

His confusion deepened. “But Love, I couldn’t.”

It was my turn to be confused. “What do you mean?”

He shook his head. “I couldn’t make someone feel like this. When I touch you, I feel what you feel. I felt it that first time, do you remember? The massage?”

Saints, how I had tried to forget. His touches had been perfectly innocent, utterly professional, but the fire they’d awoken in me had left me reeling in terror; I’d never felt anything that strong in my life. 

A tiny smile played at the corners of his mouth. “That’s when I knew.”

My heart pounded in my head, my chest—and everywhere else. “Knew what?”

He was leaning closer, lips a mere breath away, and I didn’t want to be a conquest, but Lydia hadn’t been flirting with him after all, and now that I thought about it—really and truly thought about it, without the filter of frustration and jealousy—could it be? Was I really the only girl actually losing her head over this man, the only one struggling not to throw herself at his feet?

“I knew,” he whispered against my ear, and I almost couldn’t hear him through the ecstasy echoing through my body, “that you were the one.”

“I don’t believe in soulmates,” I whispered back, eyes closed, every sense in my body standing to attention as his cheek tickled against mine.

“You don’t have to.” His lips traced my jaw and I shivered. “Your heart recognises me, Love, whether your believe in it or not.”

“Love,” I whispered, fingers tightening in his hair. “Is that what this is?”

“It could be,” he said. “If you wanted it to be.”

I luxuriated in the thought for just a moment, before another one hit me. I bolted upright, narrowly avoiding a collision with his nose. “Wait just one second here, buddy. Old? You think I look tired and old?” His words from that morning rang in my ear. “Not to mention, oh, I don’t know, my too-broad shoulders and my totally lost forehead.” I glared at him, wishing that godling powers included the ability to set someone literally on fire. 

Ty laughed, a soft, throaty chuckle that sounded far too appealing. “I knew you’d take it like that, and I confess, I half hoped you’d be provoked into responding. But if you recall, I said that some things around here were getting downright old and worn. I meant, Love, your constant indifference. Not you.”

He tracked a finger over my hairline, leaving tingling fireworks in its wake.

“That’s nice,” I said, pushing his hand away, “But what about my shoulders? And my forehead?”

He frowned, confusion plain again. “What about them?”

“You…” I squirmed, uncertain how to voice my fears aloud without sounding insecure and needy. “They’re not ‘too broad’, and, well, you know…?”

“Look at me, Love,” he said. “Am I perfect?”

YES, my heart screamed. YES YOU ARE BLOODY PERFECT. But I shoved the scrambling emotions away and forced myself to look. Cold logic; cold shower; I could do this. And true, now he mentioned it, his nose leaned a bit to one side, and one eye was slightly larger than the other, and if I was going to be utterly picky then his forehead was probably a fraction too large, and… “Oh.”

Ty softened into a smile. “Answer the question, Love.”

“Lydia’s wrong,” I said.

His eyebrows quirked. “What?”

I grinned, eyes dancing. “The answer. It’s not nothing more.”

Understanding lit his features. “Oh? Then what is it?” He whisked a finger against the tip of my nose, and my eyes rolled closed in pleasure. 

“Everything,” I said. “Everything more.”

He leaned down and kissed me, and this time, I kissed him back. 

Emalia's Lanterns

Lanterns lit the city like a million stars fallen from the sky. The light reflected off polished marble walls and threw the runes engraved there into sharp relief. At the gates to the under-city the lanterns ceased. Their light never fell past the dark guardians, jackal-headed beasts carved of star stone who came to life to eat those denizens of the under-city who dared to cross into the light.

Down that way, in a warren of mud buildings baked hard by the sun, lived the powerless. The people with no family name, no power, no chance to duel for the emperor’s throne. Down in the dregs of humanity was where Rion went, jumping over the gates with a push of magic and landing on the dusty street beyond without a sound.

Here and there weak candles lit windows covered by tattered clothes. Voices floated through the darkness, fishermen mumbling to themselves as they prepared to hike down to the river Esen as the sun rose in a few hours. Everyone else was asleep. Still, Rion pulled a veil of magic over himself. The scion of the Tahtali house shouldn’t be seen here. He shouldn’t be anywhere near this part of the desert city, but he could no more stay away than he could breathe underwater.   

At last the narrow streets led him to a small plaza with a communal well that reached deep into the mountain. Here was one corner of the lower city that could belong to the city above, one corner of where hard mud was carved with flowing glyphs of power. He traced a name he loved better than his own and looked up to her window. “Emalia?”

Lantern light flared purple behind a curtain of silk. A silhouette appeared and then the curtains were drawn aside to reveal the face of his beloved. Dark hair fell around the face of goddess and every thought save one scattered. Twelve days had passed since he’d last seen her, last felt her touch, heard the whisper of her voice in his mind.

Emalia’s thoughts didn’t seem headed in the same direction. Her lips twitched into a wry smile he knew from a thousand fights in the dueling rings at the citadel. “Why are you courting death?”

“Because I haven’t persuaded you to come live in the city proper yet.” A wisp of her magic coiled around him, exciting every nerve in his body. “Let me come up.”

There was a laugh as the curtain fell again, and then the sound of stone grinding against stone as she lifted her wards. His heart raced in anticipation. The bastard daughter of a bastard. An outcast with no name. But her magic. Her mind! From the first time she’d spoken in the square in the magi’s class he couldn’t look away.

Three years had been wasted trying to tease her family name from her, trying to buy her in the time honored traditions of his ancestors. One night in utter despair he had wandered the dark city, seen her, and followed, intent only on finding her family name. She’d led him here, into the very heart of darkness, and in a breath he’d thrown away everything for her. The emperor’s law decreed that no unnamed child with magic should live. Yet Emalia lived, and he had not the heart to turn her to the emperor.

Two more years had passed while he jealously guarded her secret. Two years of yearning for her before he confessed everything to her in the desert under the light of a waning moon. Two years of fearing he would lose what he could never call his own.

And now twelve days apart felt like the cold fingers of death.

Emalia opened the door to her shop wearing little more than a gauzy tunic that dropped to her knees. Even the insignificant candlelight pierced that thin veil revealing a body that would tempt any man. “Weren’t you supposed to be in the western desert for another fortnight?”

“I was, but I was called back early for a trivial matter. I’ll leave again in the morning.” He reached for her, needing to hold her, needing to have her with him as desperately as a fish needs the sea.

“A trivial matter? I heard you dueled with Kherei and left him blind. He’s not unpowerful.”

“He’s a foolish boy rushing for the title of magi by challenging those he thinks weaker. His eyes will heal in a month or two and the time away from the citadel will be good for him.”

She crossed her arms. “He would kill you if he could. Would you make me a widow before you make me a wife?”

“My love, my steadfast star and only light!” Rion picked her up and swung her around. “Only one magi in this city could ever beat me in dueling arena, and you are her. My perfect rival, Emalia.” He kissed her, drinking her in, feeling the pulse of her blood as it coursed through her, feeling her magic seep through his skin until they were one. Every touch shared. Every thought in perfect unison.

They danced up the stairs, the memories of a thousand nights spent just like this woven into every step. Her tunic dropped beside his armor. The brush of cold air on her skin made him shiver. His hunger fueled her passion. By dawn’s light both had forgotten where the individual ended and the lover began.

Emalia rested her head on Rion’s shoulder, lazily tracing a scar on his chest. “You are worried.”

“There’s trouble brewing in the city and I have to leave to patrol the desert with you behind.”

She laughed. “I’m in the lower city. Who would come down here?”

“Someone who thinks they can gain power by denouncing you? Someone who thinks they might challenge a magi to win rank? Some fool man who thinks you are unwed and free for the taking.”

Emalia propped herself up on one arm to look at him. “Let them come. If the emperor charges me with being a false magi I will challenge him to a duel. Let the challengers come praying to their false gods for titles, I will kill them. Let the swains come with their poems and flowers, they will never have me while I live.”

“See? I could come back to the city in smoking ruins. Then I would be forced to conquer another because I cannot let you live in a fallen city. And from there, what? Once I lay one city at your feet it may well become a habit!”

“Will you lay worlds at my feet, magi? Will you give me every breathing thing to rule as I please?”

“If you so wished, it would be done.” They kissed, saying more with a touch than any words could ever convey. He knew what she wanted, felt every beat of her heart, and did not doubt she could have the world if she so wished. But his morning and evening star desired no more than his love. She never sought power, only knowledge, and so the world was spared from bowing before an immortal goddess born the bastard of a bastard in the time before time began.