Page 28 of Taken (After the End #6)

Chapter Eighteen

Lacchus

The sail takes flight, and Rhen gasps in wonder.

The sails, made from treated frex-frex hide, are massive in scale and glitter pink and blue and gold.

They move lazily through the increasingly violent wind as Skall, another Mpo, shouts the orders to guide those of us at the ropes attached to the largest platform.

The platform is made of wood, the world’s scarcest resource.

This platform in particular has been treated and cared for since my mother’s mother’s mother’s generation.

It is logical that I, the strongest Mpo, would be at one of its ropes, but it has never felt like an honor before now, with Rhen looking up at me with her small mouth hanging open.

“So that’s how you move camp?” She watches from a few feet back and jumps in her new boots, stolen from the underground cavern she left for me.

It has been three days since our return.

There were injuries among the Vironai that prevented us from taking advantage of the afternoon winds yesterday.

We were lucky that they picked back up this morning.

We roused early, Rhen confused as she pulled on her boots instead of the sandals most Vironai females wear, but opting for the clothing I provided her instead of her thicker gray garment.

It pleases me to see her with her belly exposed, covered in small brown dots, like stars, as well as her legs peeking out from between the strips of her skirt. She has strong legs. She is stronger than even she knows.

“Come. Help me pull.”

“Me?” she says comically, her head dropping forward, her eyes bugging large.

I lift my chin, lips twitching when she stares at me like I’ve gone insane, but she comes toward me anyway and takes the length of rope that I offer her. Trusting me, as she’s done so many times before.

“When he gives the order,” I say, pointing to my right at the Mpo at the rope on the other forward corner, “run as fast as you can.”

“Run?” she says, voice so high-pitched that the female at the rope behind mine smirks.

“You think she can run with us?” the female asks loudly.

I look over my shoulder at her and make a cawing sound, three times from the back of my throat.

She and the other twenty-three Vironai positioned at ropes around the edge of this platform, laden with the camp’s most precious supplies, chuckle.

I tip my chin at her, and she gives me a surprised look, but grins.

I know it must come as a surprise to my fellow warriors to see me like this. Having fun.

“What does that mean?” my female asks me. “The translator told me what she said, but not your screeching.” She pouts up at me, the brat. But like all brats, she’ll get what’s coming to her…in just a few moments…

I shake my head and try to curb my grin. “It was a dismissal,” I lie. I glance at Skall and see his fanged smile.

He shouts again and we move as a unit. Standing on the left corner, I move first, scooping Rhen up as I go because, yes, she may be strong, but she is not Vironai, and she is certainly not Mpo.

Her legs are not long enough to keep up.

I keep the rope over my right shoulder, Rhen wrapped around my left side.

“Grab the rope,” I tell her, grunting as the resistance of the platform abrades my scaled shoulder.

She does as she’s told, holding on for dear life and, as we pull, the sail catches wind to help us in our work.

The platform lifts from the ground and, as we continue to pull, sprinting twenty paces and then fifty, the resistance of the rope releases more and more and the platform takes flight.

“Are you holding on?” I ask her.

“Yyyyeeeesssss,” she says, voice rattling as she rides my shoulder.

“Hook your leg around the rope. Step on it so that you can keep your whole body on the rope.” She obeys my commands, and the moment she’s securely fixed to the rope, I give the clicking command and the entire tribe releases the ropes they’re holding and together we watch the platform lift rapidly ten feet into the air, taking Rhen with it toward the sky.

She screams and I laugh as she looks over her shoulder down at the ground which now hovers about my body’s height below the rope-wrapped soles of her feet.

Her gaze quickly flicks to the other members of the tribe.

Seeing that she’s been played, she screams, “I hate all of you so much! Assholes! Vai se foder!” She releases the rope with one arm to point at me, but the wind changes direction, pulling her dramatically to the left.

She screams and wraps herself up tight in the rope while Skall and Nifiri, the female who’d been at the rope behind me, usher the others forward to save my mate.

I watch them pull the platform down low enough for her to be able to reach the ground.

A common prank among the Vironai, no one has been more fun to play it on that I can remember.

My fellow warriors clap her on the shoulder, smiling and laughing with her as she utters more curses that, without translators, they can’t understand—but also a few attempts at curses in the Vironai language she’s picked up in the past several days.

All I can think to myself as sunlight shimmers around her ire is yes. She’ll do alright here.

Later that night, we camp and several of the unmated females entice her into dancing with them around the fire.

I grant them my permission and do not explain to Rhen that mated females engaging in this dance is not done.

Because I want it done. I want to watch her swing her hips in the light of the moon like a goddess chasing stars.

She leaps and spins and rolls and gyrates and the females dance with her and are laughing where they are usually fighting.

It is sensational, the way one small thing can transform everything.

Seated on the sands, I lean back on one elbow and watch her with a sigh. And when she returns to me, sated on good company and wine, and she kisses me ravenously, I lean back fully, dragging her body over mine.

I split her skirts with my hand, free the material covering the slick entrance to her body.

She blinks at me, eyes bright with surprise, but I feel lazy tonight and want to watch her.

I tap her hips twice with my much larger hand and she smiles.

Her surprise morphs quickly into excitement as she reaches for my pants, frees my cock and lowers herself onto it without hesitation.

Like she was born Vironai in another life.

Her head thrown back, she moans loudly and wantonly, and I can sense the energy she releases as it permeates the tribe.

They watch her do what no female of our tribe is known to: rut me in the way she likes.

I hear the moans of pleasure of other males and females pick up soon after, but I do not look away from my mate, my perfect gift, my shelter.

We make love that night and the next three nights beneath the stars. My tribe seems more relaxed during the days. Wilder during the nights. We manage to hunt a large frex-frex and defend against a small pack of rabid hares that Rhen insists are not rabbits.

Hares, she says, are cute, furry creatures that jump and eat carrots.

The only thing she has right is the jumping part.

They are the size of small boulders on all fours but my height when they rear up.

Covered in thick skin, they are easier to kill than a frex-frex on their own, but as a group of eight, it takes effort.

We manage to kill two without losing any warriors.

I am honored by the way members of my tribe provide Rhen shelter.

And the next morning, I am even more honored when I realize Rhen has woken before I have and is training with Nifiri and two other females to wield a spear.

She is no warrior and, like all flesh prizes, she will need protection until we reach Paradise.

It takes us six more days to reach the mountain and the mood among the tribe is euphoric. I know that Rhen does not understand it by all the questions she asks and the looks of confusion she gives me.

“What is Paradise?” she asks me as she follows behind the male Vironai before her.

She carries a pack far too heavy for her, but she refused to carry any less.

Here, our platform sails have no power. There is not enough space to maneuver our platforms or enough concentrated wind to carry them as we wind our way through the mountains, so we have to dismantle them.

Log by log, we separate the platforms, roll up our sails and distribute the weight across the group.

I carry three enormous logs secured to my body where most Vironai carry their logs as single units, and the other Mpo limit themselves to two.

It is grueling, backbreaking work, but the thought of Paradise only has me moving faster.

“You shall see.”

“Ugh,” she grunts, taking the next step up, never once complaining about the effort even though I can see its effects on her body.

We camp on the mountainside in the night, and she sleeps instantly in my arms, sprawled across my chest. We wake, and she’s slow to rouse, her movements sluggish as we make our final ascent.

The air here is cooler at this elevation, and I can see the windburn in the red of her cheeks.

I don’t like it, and, at our next rest, encourage her to put back on her gray cloak.

She does, giving me a pat on the cheek as soon as we resume our climb.

I don’t understand it, but I like the glittering look I’m rewarded with in her brown and green eyes.

“Owelay,” I tell her as the rocky ladder levels out, and we start to pass down a narrow walkway carved into the stone. “We are almost there.”

She glances over her shoulder at me nervously, and then looks up above her head at the rocky ledges lining our way forward.

It is darker down here in the crevasse, but the stone has taken in sunlight all day and is warm.

I can sense her nervousness as she trudges behind the next warrior.

We move in a single-file line until, eventually, the rocks split, and the canyon appears before us in living color.

She comes to a dead stop and I lift her despite the logs on my back, moving her out of the way of the others.

I want her to have the chance to see it as I never did—for the first time as an adult.

I was raised here as a child and always took it for granted.

Not anymore. Not now. Not seeing the tears spring to her eyes.

I kiss her cheek. “Welcome to Paradise, owelay.”

Her gaze passes from wall to wall of the deep canyon spread out before us.

The ledge to the right, crowded with eager Vironai warriors, leads down another dangerous flight of steps and will take some time to descend, but the loud whoop that goes out across the warriors around me can be heard across the entire valley floor.

And the response is sensational. Hundreds of cheers in hundreds of voices.

Across the valley, there is green sprinkled over rock, dirt that’s a dark, rich brown, so dark it’s nearly black, and most importantly, capable of being tended.

Small patches of land carry the only fruit trees the land will bear.

A town center is visible from this height where our tribe collects around a fire not unlike the ones we gathered around each night on the Barrens.

Homes are built into the stone walls of the canyon.

I point to the stone wall some distance away, a large hole in the wall that’s dark now but won’t be for long. There is a ladder carved into the stone enabling me to reach it easily. I hope she will find it easy to mount too, and if she doesn’t, I will fix it for her.

I kiss her again. “That one there is our home.”

“Our home?” she says, a soft hiccup between her words.

I capture her lips with mine, kissing her deeply. “Our home.”

She returns my kiss for a moment before just as quickly pushing me back.

“And this…all these people,” she stutters.

I chuckle, wishing I could see the splendor through her eyes.

“When you said you were warriors, I thought…you were the whole tribe—a nomadic warrior tribe. I didn’t realize you were warriors of a tribe that is so much bigger. There must be…” She falters.

The sun glints over the mountain’s edge as the villagers below herald our return. The frex-frex skins and meat we’ve returned with will be enough to feed the tribe for many months. And I am pleased at my kills in a way I’ve never been pleased before because, this time, my violence will feed her.

“There must be a thousand people down here. And kids! I can hear little kids laughing, and see that female—that Vironai there, you see her?” I don’t need to see.

I can see it all in the happy lines of her face.

“Is she pregnant? I mean, maybe she’s just fat, but still, either one is awesome!

You all have a whole happy, healthy community thriving up here! ”

“We do.”

She looks at me, gaze passing over all of my features as a look of pure contentment settles over hers. “Thank you for bringing me here, Lacchus. I love it. And I love you.”

“Not more than I love you.” I kiss her again, inhaling her words as I press my hand over her lower belly, holding her tight against my chest, our packs weighing us down, but her words and her taste making me feel weightless.

When we finally break, I set her down, and she completes one last scan of Paradise, our home—a home I have never valued more than now, for the first time entering it alongside my owelay, my queen.

We turn and start down the treacherous staircase to reach the green-carpeted valley floor, and as she walks, I hear her muffled whisper, “If only Pam could see this.”