Page 17 of Entangled by the Alien Mercenary (Monster Mercenary Mates #4)
Elyssa
Tass was tense, and that would usually make me fear that danger was lurking around the corner, but this time, I didn’t think that was the case. He was nervous for very different reasons, and it made me want to step protectively in front of him and face off against the tall, green-clad Viridara male who was approaching us. He did not seem threatening—his shoulders had stooped with age, and his beard was long, gray, and mossy. He looked like the mages from my favorite stories, the ones who tried to defy Vamor and cheat death.
“Greetings,” the male called out to us, his voice booming across the green, idyllic little glade we had stepped into. This magical clearing was surrounded by many massive trees that reminded me of the jungle beyond them. And yet, the hilly field and the many flowers, along with the warm, sunny atmosphere, made it feel like we had stepped into another world. Just as the grove felt like a completely different, magical place, its caretaker looked otherworldly and magical as well.
Then my breath was truly taken away when another being stepped from beneath the trees and caught up to the caretaker with several huge steps. A being that defied my understanding—tall and lumbering, but oddly graceful at the same time. It was strangely feminine while also huge and sturdy, with curved limbs of what appeared to be wood, yet long pink waves of flowers that fell around her shoulders like hair. If you’d told me this was what Nelly would look like when she grew up, I’d have readily believed it. It was a shocking thought to consider that this might be her mother—that the Entlings Tass talked about were really the children of the Sires. For this had to be a Sire; there was no other option.
Tass raised his hand and waved back, but there was no smile on his face; his jaw was clenched tight. His temples were fluttering as if on the verge of opening his Iredese in warning. He hadn’t looked this tense when he was fighting De’tor last night, and that worried me. Before I could think twice about it, I stepped in front of Tass and, by extension, Nelly, who was clinging to his shoulder but was half hidden behind his neck and hair. “Hello,” I said, and I waved back. “My plantist friend brought us here. I hope that’s okay. We are in desperate need of making a call and finding a safe haven.”
The male had black eyes, the iris so large no eye white was visible—just like Tass. But his eyes held a vague hint of brown, like tree bark, making them look soft and welcoming. His face was craggy and worn beneath his long, moss-laden beard, and when he smiled, it was obvious he did it often—and a lot. “So I see. The vines…” He flapped a hand at Tass’s shoulders, and the green robe he wore rippled as a pair of very similar vines danced into the air behind his head.
The huge tree-being, the Sire, had caught up to the caretaker by then. She was three times as tall, and she had to stoop down to reach him with her long, creaking arms, but reach down she did. As if they’d walked like that a million times, her long-fingered hand wrapped around his back, supporting him, and he sighed, relaxing against her.
I did not realize that Tass had halted completely and that I was defensively standing in front of him—not until I saw that the caretaker had sped up now that the Sire was supporting him, and they reached us in short order. “I am Plantist Cyperus, and any plantist and his mate are welcome to rest here.” That was easy, and immediately my brain tingled with alarm bells: too easy. Nobody was that gullible or nice, at least not in my world.
When he squinted expectantly at us from his wrinkled green face, I realized I’d fallen silent for too long. Introductions were the polite thing to do, but Tass was still frozen. He’d only briefly touched on what a plantist was, and it was clearly a heavily laden term for him. I’d sensed his feelings of inadequacy about it, though I could not fathom why, considering the impossible, amazing things he’d done. My strong protector—he was all vulnerable and hurt inside this grove, unable to hide his wounds like he had before. Well, I’d protect him when he couldn’t, like he had for me.
Just as our host, Cyperus, opened his mouth to speak again, his expression growing a little tight with displeasure, I spoke. “Forgive us, Plantist Cyperus. We’ve been through a lot the past few days, and we are very tired. I am Elyssa, and this is my mate, Tasseloris.” As I said it, my heart leaped in my chest. I’d confirmed what the older male had inferred before: Tass and I were mates. It felt like I’d just laid myself bare in front of a stranger, but it also felt very right for those words to roll from my lips. When I said it a second time, they felt even better. “Tass is my mate, and he’s been injured protecting us.” I moved my hand to indicate the damage done to Tass’s black armor.
The plantist shifted on his feet, his slightly brown gaze growing sharper as he took in Tass’s appearance with clever eyes. He might be old, and he might speak kindly, but this male was no pushover. I was certain that he would have begun with the probing questions, but with a creaking and groaning, the Sire moved. Her huge but elegantly feminine shape shifted on the moss, drawing all eyes instantly to her. Then she startled me by speaking in a voice that sounded exactly the way I expected a tree to sound—deep, sonorous, ancient, and with a slow, steady cadence that made me feel like I was swaying in the wind along with her. “I am pleased to see you again, young Tasseloris. And I am even more pleased to see that you brought home my wayward Entling.”
My skin broke out with chills, and a shiver shot down my spine. She knew the Entling, and she knew Tass. How was that possible? It was what finally seemed to break my mercenary from his shell. His shoulders jerked back, his vines twitching and curling behind his back. Then his hand went up to gently touch Nelly, where she had huddled beneath his leafy green hair. It flared—a mane rising and plumping—making him seem taller, but also providing more cover for the little creature.
“You are a Sire once rooted in the Petal Grove?” Tass asked, his hand still protectively cupping Nelly’s shivering form. My heart grew warm inside my chest, my feelings for Tass as my mate growing and tangling with all the other things I felt at that moment. He was such a good male, so protective of those who needed him. I was lucky to have stumbled upon the one person honest and true in this desperate attempt to escape Elpherian’s grasp from beyond the grave.
This was when Cyperus took note of Nelly huddling behind Tass, and his eyes went wide with surprise. “This is the missing Entling?” He reached up his hands as if he wanted to grab Nelly, but Tass shifted out of his way, and somehow, I found myself moving between them. That’s when I discovered that while old and stooped forward, Cyperus was still much bigger than me. His shoulders were wide, and it was obvious that beneath the loose robes, his body was still corded with muscle. This was a male who labored long and often in the sun, who worked in his garden for hours each day. Age might have slowed him a little, but he was still very strong—and a little scary—when he leveled a glare at me.
“You dare to interfere in grove business, Elrohirian? You might find your welcome wearing thin.” The threat was not even masked. Ah, that’s the other side of him, I thought immediately. I was relieved to see it, to know that it was there just like I knew it would be. Then Tass coiled one of his vines around my middle—a hug as well as a way to yank me to safety if need be. I appreciated that show of support, feeling like we were united, a team. That wasn’t something I’d ever had before, and it felt good. It also felt like Nelly should be part of this, and she did not seem to want to leave Tass’s shoulder, so maybe she felt the same way.
“Careful, Plantist Cyperus. I do not tolerate any disrespect to my female,” Tass said darkly. He let his Iredese flare along his temples, a luminous gold that pulsed with energy. “And I do not hand over an Entling unless I know she will be safe. I found her far from her grove, nearly crushed in the carnage created by criminals. How do I know she was not sold or stolen from your grove?” Ouch. Those were some harsh words, and I expected this to greatly offend Cyperus, but he stepped back and lowered his shoulders with a pleased nod.
The Sire, with her pink curtain of flowery hair, began to lower to her knees with a deep, humming noise. “Ah, young Tasseloris. I remember your fire so well,” she said. “So much talent, so mishandled.” Tass went stiff as a board again, and I turned to curl my arms around his middle, hugging him the way his vine was hugging me. Mishandled? If he was, that wasn’t Tass’s fault—I was sure of it. He aimed to please in everything, and he was desperate for approval. I knew that feeling all too well.
“Your teachers had no idea what to do with you, and I was very saddened by what happened.” The Sire reached out her arm, which was easily as long as Tass himself. It closed the distance between us and could have swatted one of us like a fly with the power inherent in that kind of limb. She held her fingers open in front of Tass’s face and gently undulated them without ever touching my mate’s skin or harming any of us. It was an invitation for Nelly to climb into her hand, and the Entling did so, finally uncurling from around Tass’s neck.
She floated across that long limb of twisted vines and wood to clamber to the Sire’s tall, flower-covered shoulder. There, she nestled herself beneath her Sire’s chin with soft chirping sounds. “You did well, little one,” the Sire said in what was probably her softest, most modulated tone. It still boomed across the clearing, but it was filled with warmth and kindness. I could see how it settled the tiny Entling, who looked truly minuscule beside her Sire.
“Ah, so you are that plantist,” Cyperus said, his face clearing of any suspicion that had clung to it earlier. He eyed Tass’s damaged black armor anew, but this time, there was none of the judgment in it that I’d seen earlier. “This Sire left her grove because of you. Come, come! You wanted haven and to make a call, if I remember correctly? Follow me to my home, and we’ll take care of both those things.”
He turned and began to hobble away, quickly helped by the massive Sire as she rose back to her feet to follow him. When she turned, I saw that dozens of pairs of large green eyes peeked out at us through the long waves of pink flowers that draped her. More Entlings, just like Nelly. If all of these grew into huge Sires, how many were there? And how long did it take?
I cast my eyes about the clearing again to figure it out. Wouldn’t there be Entlings larger than this? What was the in-between stage? They couldn’t possibly shoot up from tiny Entling to giant Sire overnight. But nothing inside the clearing hinted at answers to that mystery.
***
Tasseloris
Entering the grove and seeing such a familiar place had been much harder than I had expected. The sight of a Plantist coming to greet us was like a sucker punch to the gut. He was what I had once been expected to grow up to be, but my path had diverged—grown tangled and stunted. Then Elyssa had stood protectively in front of me and said the things she’d said. She had claimed me as her mate without a hint of shame, and I’d learned that I did not care half as much about the opinions of others as I did about hers. And Elyssa saw me as worthy.
To discover that the Sire who lived in this grove knew me was also a shock. For a Sire to leave their grove and not only travel to another but to do so by leaving their planet… it was almost unheard of. But this Sire had left the Petal Grove and traveled from Viridara Eight to reach Viridara Three and settle anew at the Bloom Grove. She must have done so while taking her Entlings with her, as they remained Entlings for impossibly long lengths of time—generations. I distinctly recalled a pink-blooming Sire at Petal, now that I was not actively avoiding thinking about it. That Sire could definitely be this one, and she’d had Entlings then, too.
Elyssa held on to me as we walked behind Cyperus, who was amicably talking about the status of his Ekra harvest for this season. It still felt a little like I was missing a small piece of me; Nelly wasn’t clinging to my shoulder, and I’d gotten very used to having her there. I could see her green eyes peeking at me from the highest vantage point atop her Sire’s shoulder, her position indicating that she was the oldest Entling spawned by this Sire.
“Watch your head,” Cypures said as we reached his home. It was a low building, partially dug into the ground, and, as he had warned, I had to duck low to fit through the small, oval-shaped door. There were several wooden steps to climb down, and I felt a hint of unease because this meant we were leaving the Sire—and thus Nelly—outside. Though I’d told Elyssa that we’d have to leave the Entling here, it felt incredibly painful to consider that in a few hours—or maybe a day—we’d have to say goodbye forever.
The plantist keeper of Bloom Grove had a very cozy and modest home. It was not kitted out with much technology, but I caught sight of several drawings and paintings along his walls. He indicated that we should sit at a large trestle table in the center of the tiled floor, and I sank down slowly onto the seat, Elyssa tucked under my arm at my side. When the roof across from me began to lift, my breathing eased, and I began to feel the first hints of relaxation. The Sire was peering in beneath the moving panel, and Nelly was sitting right next to its cheek, where I could see her.
Soon, we had steaming mugs of herbal tea in our hands, and the plantist was fussing over my shoulders, where I’d had to rapidly shed and regrow vines and sails over the past few days. He was tsking loudly about the strain on my body and stirring more herbs into my cup after his first assessment, which should help to replenish me. He had also placed a fairly old model of a comm device on the table in front of me, and I was tapping messages into it as he worked.
“You must be the cause of that crashed shuttle not far from here,” Cyperus stated as he poked a finger at the nearly closed wound on my thigh. I hid a wince and nodded. Dravion had a better bedside manner than this, but nobody knew how to care for a plantist better than another plantist.
“I was aboard that shuttle when criminals in Jalima’s employ shot it down. We’ve been working to stop them and root them from the jungle ever since, but with no backup, it has been an exhausting endeavor.” I found it prudent not to mention that it was Elyssa who had drawn them into the woods in the first place and that they were after something she carried. Let him think Elyssa and I had arrived together and had been working together from the start. If he discovered how new our mating was, he might not trust her, which would be highly unfair and also unwarranted.
My first message had reached the Varakartoom, and when I got a reply, I drew in a relieved breath. “Not safe to call. We have been banned from leaving the port or the ship until the investigation closes. Undercover support has been sent on foot. Expect them soon; they will arrive in the next twelve hours. Lay low. We will contact you when we know more.”
It was more or less what I expected had happened. The Viridara police would have tracked the shuttle to the Varakartoom, but they could not act without angering the entire nation or until they were cleared of wrongdoing. So who could be the undercover support? I knew that it was nearly impossible to leave a ship under that kind of lockdown. They would have put a plantist on a ship like the Varakartoom—she had too much of a reputation as a troublemaker not to. Nobody escaped the scope of a plantist’s domain without them knowing it. That’s why I was such a good tracker.
“Good news?” Cyperus asked as he returned with a bowl of smelly green paste, which he began smearing on the healing wound on my leg. “You look relieved, son.” I nodded slowly, still pondering what to say. We were getting the aid I had been hoping for, but I wasn’t sure how much to reveal. If Elyssa weren’t so tired, I would have walked out of here already—ripped off the bandage of saying farewell to Nelly and left. But she needed rest, and a safe, comfortable bed to get it in. Out in the jungle, we’d be back in the rains that came with the monsoon season.
“Yes, backup should find us soon, and my ship is unharmed,” I agreed. Tucking my chin down against the crown of Elyssa’s head, I savored the moment. Until now, I couldn’t be sure why nobody from the ship had shown up to aid me. Now I knew it was the stupid rule-abiding police who were keeping them detained, but nothing harmful. Soon enough, they’d discover that my shuttle had been shot down without warning by a surface-to-air missile, a highly illegal weapon. And they’d start finding the bodies and be able to tie them to Jalima. We should be able to rest easier for now because there was no way an outsider could find the grove.
Knowing my crewmates were safe but detained felt like a weight off my shoulders. I could focus on getting Elyssa to the ship safely and De’tor and that nasty Tahirel out of our lives for good. My fists clenched as I thought of all the murderous things I wanted to do to the Elrohirian male who had dared to lay hands on my female. It was a good thing Cyperus could not read my mind as he bobbed around his small kitchen to prepare us a meal, and that Elyssa was slipping into a light doze in my arms, giving into her exhaustion now that we were safe.
“My Entling tells me great things about you, young Tasseloris. I always knew you would amount to great things,” the Sire droned in what was probably its softest voice. It was a pleasant, low hum that vibrated through my bones. Elyssa stirred, but her eyes remained closed. I tilted my head to look into the bark-brown facial features of the Sire. They, like the Entlings, technically had no gender, but only a rare handful of Sires were able to spawn the next generation. This one looked particularly feminine, as did Nelly, but that was not the rule for the seedcarriers.
“Thank you, Nelly,” I said, slipping up with the name I’d given the tiny Entling without meaning to. That was my own exhaustion getting to me. My wounds had taken a lot out of me, as had reaching for powers I had previously been unable to control or bring to bloom. The Sire did not seem bothered by this strange way of addressing its Entling, but Cyperus dropped the pot he was holding onto the stove with a startled clang.
When he turned to look at me, it was with a look of consternation. “Nelly?” he asked, his brow lowering in a deep, impressive furrow. I worried that his Iredese might flare, but his temples remained calm and blank. I knew I’d slipped up, but I couldn’t help doubling down at this point. As a child, it had always baffled me that the Sires were just Sire—no name—and the Entlings were equally unidentified.
“Yes, Nelly. It’s short for Nelumbo nucifera. That’s after my…” I was interrupted abruptly by the elder male with a barked laugh. Startled, I only just managed to keep my own Iredese calm and my hair flat around my shoulders.
“Your grandmother, may she rest in peace. Great woman, that—ahead of her time.” So he knew her, then. That was hardly surprising; she had been a famous and very talented plantist herself when she was alive. She’d traveled to every planet, seen every grove, and taught many young talents—including, at first, me. Then she’d passed, and I’d been sent by my family to train with Master Eryngium. It was then that I began to struggle to control my powers, or even access them at all.
“Nelly suits her,” the Sire announced before the plantist or I could say another word. “She says she has become Nelly in earnest and wishes to remain Nelly.” The tight feeling that suddenly spread in my chest was confusing. Was this a good thing or a bad thing? Had I irreparably damaged the path this Entling was on by naming her, or was I giving the Entling the chance at more of an identity?
“That Entling has been itching to explore since the day it got here,” the plantist said. There was something in his tone that made me want to bristle with anger, to stand up and protect the little Entling. There was as much condemnation in that tone as I’d experienced in my lessons with Eryngium and my strict mother. Nelly did not deserve that just because she was different from her fellow Entlings, because she wanted more than to be stuck inside the same old grove all her life.
I was already moving, shifting Elyssa gently from my shoulder so she could rest her head on the table. The urge to get to Nelly and protect her from the same kind of treatment I’d experienced was all-consuming. The long arm of the Sire stopped me in my tracks; it reached through the open hatch in the roof, all the way down to catch me with long but gentle fingers by the shoulders. “Yes, I agree, Nelly. You’ve found the perfect protector. This plantist will do. Very well, you may go.”
Frozen, not for the first time inside this grove, I stared into the gnarled, wooden face of the Sire, confusion my primary emotion. When Nelly began scampering down her Sire’s arm and settled her slight weight on my shoulder, it was like everything settled inside me too. The Sire slowly withdrew her arm, and I was certain they winked, a broad smile stretching across their face. “Take good care of Nelly, young Tasseloris. I trust you to find the right grove for my Entling.” With that, she was gone, withdrawing from Cyperus’s small home, the hatch in the roof shutting with a soft, moss-cushioned thud.
Left standing in the center of the room, with green paste dripping down my leg and into my boot, I had never felt better. And then Cyperus gave me a short but approving nod, and my heart felt like it could burst.
“Come, let me show you where you and your mate can rest for the night.”