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“Daphne, the cavern has let us out.”

The low voice in her ear sent shivers down her spine. “Hmm?”

“Come along, my bonded mate, before it changes its mind.”

Hands pulled at her, helping her to sit up. She opened her eyes to see Apolan’s concerned face near her own. With a sense of wonder, she lifted her hand and saw the thin pink line crossing three fingers. “It wasn’t a dream.”

He sighed and lifted her in his arms. “No, it wasn’t. Come along. I don’t know how long we have been here, but we need to get back to the surface.”

She leaned against him, her head spinning and senses overloaded. “Sounds like a good idea.”

With her eyes closed, she could still feel the exact moment that he entered the glade once again. Her smile was genuine, and her breathing came easier. “That’s better.”

“You feel it too?”

She chuckled. “Oh yes. There is a reason that I never moved to the settlement. Nothing feels as good as this.”

Daphne opened her eyes and looked up at the starlight streaming into their one small part of the forest.

He set her on the floor of the flying platform and checked the chronometer. “Oh, thank goodness. It is the same night. We were only underground for a few hours.”

She smiled and slowly got to her feet. “Is that all? It felt like the beginning of forever.”

He turned to her in surprise. “Daphne, are you all right?”

She took a step off the platform and walked a few feet away before she turned to him. “You hear them all the time, don’t you?”

Understanding lit his eyes. “I do. You can hear them now?”

Daphne looked into the dark of the forest all around her. Thousands of trees whispered to her in greeting. Congratulations were offered in low murmurs. Not congratulations for the bonding, but for the small bit of evolution she had just undergone. They considered it the height of sophistication for one of her race to understand them.

She giggled, euphoric at the thought that she could understand the forest in which she lived.

“You can commune with them tomorrow. I regret to disturb your first moment with the forest, but we need to report both of our discoveries to the Nine.”

He gently wrapped an arm around her waist and steered her back to the platform.

The forest’s consciousness thrummed through her, and she swayed gently, humming to herself as the song became part of her.

Apolan watched her with a smile on his lips. “You were almost there on your own, you know. There was only a slight nudge needed to push you over the edge.”

She grinned at him, “Thank you for nudging me.”

He sighed, “You have no idea how I want to answer that.”

She snickered, a happy giggle that continued until they landed at the new embassy building.

Daphne sighed. “Why are we here?”

“We have to register our union with the Nine. It is important that we lock it in with the registry office as quickly as we can.”

He held his hand out and escorted her through the guards watching the front doors.

The Wilders lifted their heads and sniffed at the couple. “Ambassador. Congratulations on finding of your bride.”

Apolan smiled, “Thank you. Daphne Harrow Leoraki is about to be registered.”

She clung to his hand as the Wilders very obviously scented her.

“You may want to complete the union. It could become awkward if her people object and bad for her if you wait too long.”

Apolan nodded his head and continued to pull her further into the new building.

Daphne asked quietly, “What did he mean?”

“Each race of the Nine has its courtship rituals. The Wilders and the People of the Air trigger a heat in their mates. The Shadows put a piece of their darkness into their prospective mate that grows to fill her. The Forest people are more subtle. We match our minds to that of our chosen companion using a mechanical means. It is a little bit sneaky, but we get by.”

She paused as they entered his private quarters. “What do you mean mechanical?”

“A small bit of resonance technology that routes conscious thought through our minds until our mind shifts to match that of our mate. It’s complicated, and I am not sure about why it works, but my family has one of the best acquisition records for perfect matches. I suppose part of it is luck, but most of it is instinct. The moment I met you, I knew that you were the one for me, and I brought out a family heirloom.”

She blinked, wide-eyed as she touched the earpiece. “This is a machine?”

“It translates for you by running what you hear through my mind.”

She wanted to take it off, but her hand didn’t move. “It’s an heirloom? Your family always hijacks brains?”

He took her hands and stared into her eyes. “I did not hijack, I simply learned the patterns of your mind and helped you to learn the common language of the Nine as well as anything you thought about learning. We also only use the mechanical means with women not born of the Nine. My great grandmother was from outside the Nine, and while she challenged my great grandfather, they lived happily for a very long time. The earpiece that you are using was designed for her.”

She blinked in surprise. “Your great grandmother?”

He smiled, “I will tell you all about her, but first, we have to register our union. Come with me.”

At a loss for words, she walked with him into his private study. He sat in the chair and to her shock, the moment he had made the call to the ship, he yanked her into his lap.

A com officer was on the other end of the visual, and he looked at them in surprise. “Ambassador Leoraki, how may I direct your call?”

“I need a conference call between the historical archive and the registry office.”

The com officer looked a little confused, and his wings fluttered. “That is an interesting combination.”

Apolan’s voice was wry. “I am aware of it.”

The officer’s cheeks darkened, and his fingers moved across the keyboard. “Connections are being processed.”

A moment later, the screen was split, and they were looking at two people. One of the Stone Folk was staring at them from the left and Forest person was on the right.

The Stone representative cocked his head. “Ambassador, what can I do for you?”

“Registrar Yessik, I would like to register the bonding between myself and the Gaian, Daphne Harrow.”

The grey man frowned, “I thought you were going to wait until our garden was operational.”

“That brings me to the reason that I am also speaking to Archivist Utasi. My mate found the original bonding cavern, and the crystal has bound us together already.”

The woman with the nut brown skin, hair and eyes looked excited. “You know where it is?”

“I have been there, and I will give you the coordinates when you come down for the celebration next week. I will expect that you bring what you need and that you take care not to disturb the area. It is a sacred space, and we must treat it as such.”

Archivist Utasi nodded and smiled. “It will be an honour just to scan the place where so many of our people began.”

“It has missed your people.”

The words came out of Daphne’s mouth before she could stop them.

Everyone involved in the conversation paused and stared at her.

Apolan caressed her arm. “Has it, Daphne?”

“It has. All those lives bound together in its presence, and then, you went away and my folk have not seen it, nor are we ready to use it. Well, most of us cannot use it. There are a growing number who can and will, but they are not here yet.”

Daphne felt a pressure on her mind, and Apolan caressed her arm in a slow pattern.

“Are you speaking for the forest, Daphne?”

She frowned, “No, for the cavern. It is the heart of Gaia after all.”

The archivist was rapt, as was the registrar. The attention that she was getting made her uncomfortable, so she did what she did best—she hid.

Snuggled against Apolan’s chest, she held tight to him and pulled herself in. She heard comments and felt Apolan’s body vibrate as he spoke.

The room went silent, and he pressed a kiss to her forehead. “We are alone again. You can come back.”

She looked up at him and smiled. “Sorry. I wasn’t expecting that.”

“The conversation or being used to speak for a five-thousand-year-old consciousness?”

With nothing in her field of vision but him, she cupped her hand around the back of his neck and drew his mouth down to hers. “Yes.”