Page 214 of Mates for the Raskarrans #1-6

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Dazzik

A lthough my Sam settles quickly, it is a long time before I am certain enough of her sleeping to leave her side.

The djenti berry water has helped, but this cough of hers continues to ail her, and it stirs something uneasy in my gut.

There are things in the forest which could heal such ills, I am sure, but I am no healer.

I would not know which plants or where to find them.

Still, she does eventually slip into a deeper sleep, and though it wrenches something deep inside me, I peel myself away from her as carefully as I can, then head back outside once more into the rains.

Jestaw is waiting, his colour high in his cheeks after labouring in the rain while I have tended to my female.

“It is done,” he says. “They are not buried well, and I fear the rains will wash them out before the season passes, but it is something. It is what I can manage to do for them.”

“It is more than some deserved.”

He does not argue with this.

“I have checked the stores also while you have been busy,” he says instead. “Empty. Sansla, I would guess. He disappeared at some point during your fight with Basran. Took his hunters and supplies enough to feed themselves until the hunting season restarts.”

“Do I need to fear them returning?”

Jestaw hesitates, but shakes his head. “I would not like to say I know that male’s headspace, but I think no.

I think he will go to Walset’s empty village, make his home there.

For all that none complained when Basran moved the tribe to this place, few were comfortable here.

It is an unnatural place. A bad place. You should take your female far from here. ”

I nod, but I do not think my Sam will find it unnatural or bad. Perhaps she will not like the reminder of her home world, but I do not think it will unsettle her spirit as it does mine. Besides, I will not risk moving her while the rains still fall. Not while she is sick.

“Do you have something to feed her?” Jestaw asks.

I think of my stores, a good two days of travel from here, I think, even if I run the entire way. That is four whole days my Sam must wait for food. It is a problem, and I am not sure how I am going to solve it with Basran’s stores raided.

Jestaw must read my answer in my face.

“I have very little I can give. A couple of meal bars, some dried meats.” He picks up a pack from where he has hung it on a low branch, holds it out to me. “Take it. It might buy you a day or so to find another solution.”

I do not like to take it from him when he has nothing of his own, but for my Sam, I do so without hesitation. I can hunger. She will not.

“What will you do now?”

I do not offer for him to stay, and he does not ask. We are past that, for all he has done me some good in protecting my Sam. He must seek his path back to Lina’s graces away from me.

“I will go after the others. Find and rally who I can. I do not know how we will survive the rains with no home, no stores, but if Lina wills it, we will find a way.”

I do not want him here, but I do not wish him dead, so I give him what I have.

“Two tribes have emptied from their villages of late,” I say. “Sansla may have Walset’s bed for his own, but Darran’s village is empty, awaiting a fresh claim.”

“Darran. I know the name. Perhaps the location of his village will come back to me if I think on it long enough. You have my thanks for this, Dazzik. Truly.”

“As you have mine for protecting her.”

Jestaw’s expression falters and he averts his eyes from mine.

“It is something, perhaps,” he says, his voice rough. “A small repayment of the debt that I owe to Nelsah’s spirit. That I tried to protect another, the way I should have tried to protect her.”

I cannot offer him absolution. It is a thing he must make his own peace with, as I have.

“Go well, then, brother,” I say to him, and offer up my arm.

He takes it, gripping me firmly for a moment.

“I hope your female is okay. I hope she recovers her strength and is not too saddened by what she has suffered these past days.”

I think of my Sam’s cheery nature. I think she is not the kind to be saddened about anything for too long.

I am putting things into the room that is not a bedroom when my Sam rises from her sleep again. She looks pale, too thin, and I dislike the redness in her cheeks. It is not a healthy glow, but a sign that her fever has not yet run its course.

At the same time, we make sounds of protest at each other - me wanting her back wrapped up in some pelts and resting, she shooing me away from the strange table and the shiny squares on the wall.

For all she is sickly in her colouring, her eyes are fierce enough when she looks at me that I relent, and she drags over a chair from the far wall to the table.

I rush to do the moving for her, but the chair slides easily across the floor with no more effort required than can be exerted by a single finger.

It is more of the strange magic from her world. Technology. I do not like it.

My Sam, though, gives a satisfied look as she sits down before the table, running her hands over the bumps and ridges all over it. I do not understand what this table is used for. It would be no good for eating - bowls would tip and spill if rested on such an uneven surface.

Then my Sam starts pushing down on some of the bumps, and they sink into the surface.

The first does not seem to do anything, but the second makes one of the shiny squares light up, a hissing noise issuing from the walls somewhere.

I duck, bracing for attack, before I remember the squawking box in her dream. More technology.

Then my Sam pushes on another bump and overhead, light flickers.

Not a tiny sun as before, but a long tube that glows.

I step out into the tunnel and find more such tubes in the ceiling there, illuminating it completely.

In the new brightness, I can see the rusty marks of blood spilled, along with the rest of the dirt and filth I am yet to clean out of this place.

Back in the room with Sam, the remaining squares on the wall before her are now lit up.

As my eyes adjust to their brightness, I see on them pictures of the other rooms in the building.

Several different views of the large room where I fought with Basran, and the bedrooms, also, including the one where my Sam has been sleeping.

My Sam makes a noise of satisfaction, then she pushes at the same lump several times, the views on the shiny squares shifting.

Showing rooms we have yet to discover? The cave is large.

Looking at it from the outside, I think it must have two layers, and I think of the downwards tunnel my Sam showed me in her dreams. Humans have built ways to travel up and down within their very tall huts.

There must be something like that within this place.

“ Donthink Basran figuredouttheresanupstares,” My Sam says.

I snarl at Basran’s name, but then she grabs my hand, tugging me to her side.

“ Look .” She points up at one of the squares. On it, another bedroom. This one much larger, the bed at the centre of it designed to sleep two. It looks untouched, also. None of Basran’s brothers have dirtied it.

My Sam smiles at me, and I can see the strain in her expression. But there’s still determination there, and she turns back to the squares, changing the picture that shows on each of them until at last she must find what she seeks, for she lets out a breathy whoop of triumph.

And promptly starts coughing again. I scowl at her, wishing I could tell her to temper her enthusiasm until she is quite well again, but she just grins at me, before darting forwards to press her lips to mine.

I had forgotten quite how pleasurable that simple touch is, and my cock stirs in my leathers, desire pulsing in my veins, so that it is me who must temper myself, calm my reactions.

I look to the screen that has my Sam so triumphant.

It is another bedroom, I think at first, for there is something like a bed in it.

But it is not quite like the others. It is higher, for a start, and there are other things in the room.

Another picture square is set on one of the tables, cabinets crafted from the grey shiny material my Sam’s world so favours line the walls, and there is a curtain that draws only round the bed.

I would think it something to divide the room for two to sleep, but there is no other bed in place.

“ Mediccenter,” my Sam says. “ Medisin. ”

I do not know what this ‘medisin’ is, but if my Sam desires it, I will get it for her.

“Where are these rooms hiding?” I say to her, forgetting, despite her nonsense words to me, that she cannot understand me.

“ Cumon ,” she says, rising to her feet.

She wobbles, and I catch her by the elbows, righting her.

I wish to bundle her up in bed again, but there is a bedroom somewhere in this place that is clean and fresh for my Sam, which will be of greater comfort to her.

And it will mean her skin will no longer carry the stink of some other male, which will be of great comfort to me.

I follow my Sam down the tunnel as she runs her palms over the walls.

There are doors here that are not open, I can see that now with the strange lights on overhead.

I do not know how they open, though, for they have no hinges, no handles.

My Sam stops before one of them, pressing her hand to something next to it, and to my surprise, the door shoots upwards, disappearing into the ceiling.

Inside, there are the steps going up and going down.

First, my Sam leads me to the down steps.

I follow after her, my ears open to any sounds that might come from the space beneath us.

There is a buzzing in the air, but it seems to come from the light tubes overhead, and my Sam does not pay it any mind, so I am sure it is nothing to be concerned about.

There are no sounds of footsteps, no voices, no signs that any others make their homes here.

As the floor levels out, we come to another tunnel, more doors.

My Sam opens them one at a time, pausing to show me how to do it.

It is a simple matter of placing my palm over the square next to the door and they slide up or down.

It is greatly unsettling to my spirit, which my Sam takes some amusement in.

I do not mind. It is good to see her smiling.

It brightens up her skin, makes her look less unwell, and I welcome that.

Finally, we find the place she has looked for.

Inside, she does not go to the high bed, or look at the picture square.

Instead, she goes straight to the cabinets.

They are not just made from the shiny material.

They are made from something translucent, also, so that the contents are visible inside, but cannot be reached.

My Sam peers into each, then makes an exclamation sound, jabbing one of her little fingers at the things inside.

“ Redlid, ” she says, and there is triumph in her voice.

Then she goes to open the cabinet doors and finds them locked.

Her defeat is absolute, her shoulders and face dropping, all the colour that had come back into her skin fading in an instant.

I frown at this, then steer her backwards, picking her up and depositing her on the high bed.

Turning back to the cabinets, I grip the bottom of the doors and then rip them open.

My Sam makes another surprised sound, but then she laughs, and though it makes her cough again, it is still good to hear her laughter.

She hops down from the high bed, coming to the now open cabinet. The things inside of it are a little jumbled, a little muddled by my forceful opening of the door, but she reaches for one of them, plucking it out of the pile and holding it close to her heart.

“ Bettahopetheresnomorethanwunredlidwun, ” she says, then grips her prize in both hands and opens it up.

Inside are several small, brightly coloured pellets. My Sam pours some into her hand, turning them in her fingers and drawing them close to her face.

“ Lukslykeyeremember ,” she says, then, with a shrug, she puts two in her mouth and swallows them down.

“It is food?” I ask, reaching for one.

She bats my hand away, shaking her head. She points to the pellets, then points to her chest, pretending to cough. Then she taps my chest and shakes her head again.

Ah, so it is like the djenti berries. A kind of tonic to aid her healing.

I nod to show my understanding, then take the pot from her, tipping all the little pellets into her hand and nodding encouragement.

She gives me an amused smile and shakes her head, taking back the pot and putting the pellets back inside.

“ Jusstoo ,” she says, holding up two fingers, then pointing to the pellets, then to her mouth.

A little at a time. Okay. This makes little sense to me, but I am not a healer, and I do not know my Sam’s world. I will defer to her wisdom in this, even though part of me wishes to take the pellets and hide them in her food so she gets better faster.

Food. Remembering Jestaw’s offering to me, I pull out the dried meat from my pocket, offering it to her.

It is not the most appetising, having travelled far in Jestaw’s pocket, and now mine, but my Sam takes a piece, folding it into her mouth and chewing at it.

I try to make her take more, but she shakes her head, and I think of how little Nelsah wished to eat when the fever of the sickness was on her, and I wonder if my Sam’s appetite is similarly shrunken.

My Sam gestures for us to head back up the steps, and then we go up again to the next layer of this cave.

Here, I check all the doors, quickly locating a nice, clean bedroom.

The air is musty, but it is a big improvement on the stink of downstairs, and the bed has covers on it.

Not pelts, but something that is warm and soft enough that I am happy to bundle my Sam in it.

She goes straight to the bed, stretching herself out in it.

She places her pot of pellets on the surface next to the bed, then beckons for me to join her once more.

There are more things to do. I still do not have a solution to the problem of feeding us. But I find I am unable to resist her summons.

With a sense of contentment in my heartspace that I have never known before, I burrow under the covers and wrap myself around my mate, holding her close as she falls once more to sleep.