Page 66 of Saved By the Alien Hybrid (Hybrids of Yulaira #1)

With his sleeve pinned up over his missing arm, Rentir trailed behind Haerune to the common area. Cordelia’s hand was in his, squeezing so tight his bones ached.

The room was abuzz with the murmuring of voices.

The group nearest to the door noticed him first, and Nyx’s eyes widened in recognition. “Holy shit, Rentir’s awake!” she announced, pointing at him.

Awareness spread through the crowd like a ripple, a hush falling over them as they turned to stare.

Faces jumped out of the crowd at him, but there were many he didn’t recognize—including a few that only came about three feet high.

The younglings watched him curiously, their eyes darting up to the grown males in askance.

Someone began to clap. He looked to the source of the sound—Eunha, standing alongside Lidan and a few of the other women. Pandora followed suit, and Seren, and then Lidan experimentally copied the gesture.

Rentir’s gaze drifted over all of them in astonishment as the gesture spread like wildfire, until the room was a roar of applause that he felt wholly undeserving of.

His eyes met Ven’s in the crowd, compounding the shame when the male ducked his head and turned away, pushing his way out of the crowd.

When Cordelia dropped his hand, he thought she had seen Ven’s reaction, that she agreed with his disappointment, but he realized she was clapping as well, beaming up at him with tears in her eyes.

Yelir stepped out of the throng, then, and Rentir braced for the aspersions the miner would doubtless cast on him.

Instead, he brought all four hands together and joined the others in applauding, his face somber.

He stepped forward as someone behind him whooped, sparking a chorus of similar cries.

One of his big, red hands clapped behind Rentir’s neck, dragging him forward.

“This is a momentous day,” Yelir called in his booming voice, and the crowd fell quiet to listen. “For today marks the liberation of Yulaira!”

Cheers roared, echoing off the walls.

“Today, we are hybrids no longer,” he continued, releasing Rentir. “Today, as we start our lives as a new people, we take a new name!”

More cheering, a dull roar.

“Today, we are the Lidaron!”

The cheering grew deafening. Despite everything, a smile tugged at Rentir’s lips even as tears pricked in his eyes. Cordelia pressed into his side, frowning up at him as Yelir was reabsorbed by the crowd.

“What does that mean—Lidaron?”

“The people of hope,” he said, and then he cupped the back of her head and kissed her hard, drowning himself in the proof of just how right that name was.

Nyx sidled up to him along the fringes of the crowd, darting sidelong glances over the rim of her glass. “So…”

He blinked down at her in confusion.

“I’m thinking we start a club, right?” She tapped her prosthetic against his boot pointedly.

“A… club?”

Cordelia returned with drinks, shouldering her way between them as she handed a glass off to Rentir. “Ease up on the man, alright? He’s just had a near death experience.”

“I was extending an olive branch!” Nyx declared with indignation. “Renny and I are starting a club for people injured in the line of duty.” She suddenly scrunched up her nose. “Eugh, we’ll have to let Yelir in, won’t we? No, that’s no good. I’ll workshop it.”

Eunha strolled over, stirring a stick in her drink. “These alien margs are the shit.” She licked at the rim of her glass. She’d encrusted it in a thick film of salt, much to the hybrids’ horror. “We should crash more ships. Maybe the next one will have some little umbrellas.”

Nyx guffawed. Rentir shared a look of confusion with Cordelia, but she only rolled her eyes and shook her head.

“She means she likes the booze they pilfered from the Gidalan.”

“Hell yeah,” Eunha said, raising her drink in what the humans called a toast.

Nyx clinked their glasses together, then drained hers with alarming speed. “’Nother one,” she muttered, trailing off toward the table where Seren was filling glasses with the Aurillon’s stores.

Sophia trailed over, worrying the rim of her glass with her finger. She hugged Cordelia with one arm and then smiled wanly up at him.

“Hi, Ren,” she said, patting him on his arm. “How are you holding up?”

He shrugged with the shoulder that still moved at his will. “I am here with the great love of my life, celebrating the freedom of my brothers. I cannot think of a complaint.”

Her smile broadened, and she nodded. “That’s what I like to hear.

” Her eyes dropped to her glass for a moment.

“I, um. I wanted to say that I was sorry about Thalen.” She looked up at him, and her eyes were swimming with unshed tears.

“He seemed like a really good man. I only got to talk to him a couple times before he… but I could tell that he was remarkable.”

Did she know that he’d begun to bond to her? He could not tell, and it did not feel right that he should be the one to bring it up.

“Thank you,” he said instead, smiling sadly. “He was that and much more.”

“I wanted to extend my sympathies to Ven, but…” She glanced over the crowded room.

“He left. I believe it was too painful.”

She sighed. “Of course. Well. That’s enough of that for one evening. I’ll leave you two lovebirds to it.”

Her hand found Eunha’s wrist as she spoke, and she dragged the pilot away in spite of her colorful protests.

Cordelia watched it all unfold in silence with a bemused expression, nursing her drink.

He sipped his own and cringed at the bitterness of the liquid.

This is what the Aurillon drank for leisure?

All these years, he’d wondered what they were drinking, and it was…

rocket fuel. He set it down on a nearby ledge, wrinkling his nose.

Cordelia couldn’t quite hide her chuckle.

He arched a brow at her. “Are you laughing at me? Now, in my time of need?”

“What? No, I—”

She trailed off at his grin, her eyes narrowing a moment before she smacked him in his other arm.

He ignored the violence, snagging her around the shoulders and lowering his lips to her ear. “I believe I told you we had plans, Commander.” When he drew back, her eyes were molten with open lust.

“Are you sure?” she murmured, flicking her gaze toward his injury.

“Do you doubt me?” His tail slid between her thighs, slithering around to squeeze suggestively.

“Oh, I think I’m learning not to.” She bit her bottom lip. “Let’s go.” She grabbed his hand and dragged him along the periphery of the room.

When they reached the hall, he shifted his grip on her and took the lead.

“Where are we going?” she asked, jogging a bit to keep up with his longer stride.

“There’s something I want to show you.”

He led her to the same door she’d taken him through the day that they’d first had sex. Her hand squeezed around his, and he knew she was reliving the memory just as he was.

They wound down into the forest as the sun began to slip behind the boughs, but he didn’t return to the clearing where she’d mounted him. He felt her confusion as they passed the spot, venturing deeper into the woods.

“Okay, time out,” she called, wiggling her hand out of his grip. “Exactly how far are we hiking?”

He turned to see her doubled over, her hands braced against her knees as she panted. Color had risen to her sweat-dampened cheeks. The sight made him twitch down low, remembering the last time he’d made her pant in these woods.

“Tired already?” he teased. “That doesn’t bode well for the rest of my plans.”

She straightened at that, clearly taking it for an insult. “Oh, I see. You hit it once and you think you’re Casanova, is that it?”

He didn’t recognize the word, but he gathered the sentiment clearly enough.

He stalked back over to her and ducked until they were eye to eye.

“I distinctly remember doing it more than once. If you don’t, I’ll have to try harder to impress it upon your memory this time.

” With that, he pecked a kiss to her lips and then threw her over his shoulder while she shrieked.

“Are you insane?” she cried, smacking at his back. “You’re going to hurt yourself!”

“You’re too slow. I want to get there before the sun sets completely.”

“Rentir!”

He let her teeter on his shoulder, freeing his hand from the backs of her knees long enough to swat at her ass. “Enough worrying. You’re going to wound my pride.”

She subsided—at least insofar that her complaints went from angry shouting to low mutters of displeasure. When she heard the trickle of water, she braced her hands against his back to look around.

“Where are we?” she asked as they finally reached the secret spot he’d had in mind.

He lowered her gently to her feet and turned her toward the spring. She gasped, pressing her hand to her mouth.

“It is not quite a… water park?” he said, and her eyes crinkled with a smile. “And the water does not reek of the chemicals as you like it, but…”

“It’s perfect,” she said through her fingers.

He looked at it over her shoulder, trying to see it for the first time as she was. It was only a small spring, but the water was clear as blue glass, and there was a small waterfall that trickled in. He liked the sound that it made tumbling over the smoothed surface of the rocks.

“Ah, and we’re just in time,” he murmured into her ear, wrapping his arm around her waist and pulling her flush against him. “Watch.”

The sky faded to purple, then blue, and at last the dark of night was upon them. The forest came to life as creatures roused from their daytime sleep, called into the night by the bioluminescent light that abounded. The spring was no exception.

Cordelia made a delighted sound as the water tumbling over the waterfall was suddenly flecked with glowing blue light.

Below, tiny fish darted, flashing their glowing bodies.

The ferns and shrubs that framed the pool lit up as well, casting everything in that soothing blue glow he’d come to love in the time he’d shared it with her.