Page 29 of Bred By Zyros (The Solar Breeding Agency #2)

twenty-six

Melody

Elaria is perfect. I never knew I could feel a love as deeply as this.

A smile fills my face as her tiny tail wraps around my arm.

The elders say she is quite a bit smaller than any Vrircik they have seen, when we reluctantly allowed them to see her from a distance.

She shares her dad’s coloring, albeit much paler and mixed with the vibrant crimson of her moon.

She shines every bit as bright; her frizzy tuff of pale hair leads me to think it’ll be closer to my shade than his.

I was both shocked and grateful to find out that baby Vrirciks are more or less ready to go after just a handful of solars.

I’d spent the first few days sobbing uncontrollably as my milk refused to come in, despite having been told I wouldn’t need it.

Unlike most babies, Elaria doesn’t need heavy feeding in her first few domtics, just warmth and rest, a sort of hibernation period as she grows heavily, relying on the nutrients she bulked up on in her shell.

Another, much larger tail tightens on my ankle—my mate, who is packing the rest of the ship while I lounge in the sun with our daughter.

His eyes are watery with emotion. I hadn’t dreamed having a child would turn rude, grumpy Zyros into a big baby, but it has.

The first few days after the night she was born were…

harsh. I’d nearly bled to death. Oddly enough, I’d managed to find a species humans aren’t acceptable breeders for.

Zyros had thought quickly to heal me with his silva, the same way he had in the jungle that very first day.

He’d rushed us both to the nearest space station once I was stable enough to move, and by all accounts, we were perfectly fine.

I watch as he loads the last few gravity carts of crystals before he comes to collect us.

Instead of letting him carry us on board, I gently unravel little Elaria from my arm, passing her to her dad.

She makes a tiny whimpering sound, much preferring my warmth to his cooler scales, which delights me greatly and bothers him to no end.

My fingers work quickly as I take the clearing in for the last time, undoing the clasp on my holo pager.

I’d already reset it, keeping only what the remaining Vrirciks would need .

While the Intergalactic Alliance had explained thoroughly what had occurred, no doubt because they were forced to, the new female in charge, a pale-yellow female I scarcely remember from the day I was taken, had refused any compensation.

Instead, they opted to have their tech removed.

Completely.

She’d allowed herself to be scanned for health abnormalities too, as well as several others, following her lead.

It seems, at least in them, the effects of the machines run off…

can’t be reversed. The chemical compound that comes with Serpentium being broken down to its raw core is highly toxic, but mostly to beings housing estrogen, or the alien equivalent.

Perhaps it’s wrong to offer them this.

But the gravity of what that likely means is…choking.

Especially since my own health scan had informed me I wouldn’t be able to carry again, I’d opted for sterilization after that to be sure neither of us would have a risk of reliving the trauma his people have known.

The scarring from his saliva, like on my leg, had been extensive .

The news had felt shattering at the moment, but I’m okay with it the more days pass. I have everything I could ever need.

The Vrircik people will likely go extinct. I won’t see it in my lifetime, due to their naturally long lifespans, but it will happen in our daughters. Elaria, by all accounts, will be the last of her kind. That fact only confirmed our choice to leave.

Zyros' slitted eyes meet mine as I hand the device to him. Ultimately, there is no one more deserving of deciding the fate of a people who harmed him so terribly. Zaelshar slips from the wood line then, all four of his enormous arms filled with baskets of my ssseerafa leaves. I give a watery half laugh. He’s been gathering them in copious amounts and bringing them to us since the birth, having apparently spent a great deal of time watching us collect them before.

Although he still refuses to meet my eyes, I’ve long since forgiven him.

I help him with the baskets, setting them inside the overloaded ship before whispering a thank you.

Rising on my tiptoes, I press a kiss into my mate’s chest, giving his arm an encouraging squeeze.

“Whatever you choose, it’s the right thing,” I whisper.

He doesn’t ask where I’m going as I head off toward our old cave, refusing to step inside with it looking so empty.

I’m surprised how much the idea of leaving hurts after such a short time.

I plop down at the mouth, my bottom lip already wobbling as a gaggle of little dudes hop toward me, all warbling and chittering as they do.

A thick lump lodges deep in my throat as one hacks up a crystal, letting it flop into the ground, making the others chitter and hiss disapprovingly.

It’s slimy, kind of gross, like them, but I take it anyway. “Thanks, little dudes.”

I don’t have anything to offer them, so I just sit and watch for a while as they carry on, my heart splitting in my chest.

“Sssaryth, it’s time.” Zyros' voice finds me all too soon as I sniffle, giving them all little goodbye pats before heading toward him. I don’t look to see where they hop off to. My eyes land on the dark colored male instead, noting the holo pager gripped in his claws.

Zyros and he share a few more words in their native language as I take our daughter from him again, passing him the slimy stone instead.

He grimaces, and if I didn’t feel so damn sad, I’d laugh as I nod goodbye to Zaelshar and head inside, settling down in my seat as I hum to Elaria.

So long passes, I fade in and out of sleep.

Right as a heavy thud jerks me awake, spinning in my chair, my eyes slam open as my hulking mate dumps an arm full of my five favorite little dudes on the bridge.

My half laugh, half sob barks out of me when I see the barbs littering his scales.

He rolls his eyes, plucking one from his neck. “Hush, female. They were trying to get on board, anyway. Too stupid to figure out the ramp. If I am lucky, they will explode once we hit hyperdrive.”

I’m still laughing, wiping tears from my eyes when he settles beside me, slamming at the controls until we launch into flight. Most of the little dudes settle around my feet, while some hop off to explore. “Don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone you’re nice.”

He smirks.

My finger runs down the length of our daughter’s tiny tail, feeling for the first time a kind of quiet, happy peace I never thought possible.

My thoughts still run a mile a minute with plans for our future and where we’ll end up, but now the buzzing is softer, kinder.

There’s not a single doubt in my mind that I’m doing exactly what I’m meant to do. That I’m precisely where I should be.

The End

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