Page 25 of Xel: Broken Bond

Noleen nodded, then lifted her head to look squarely at my master, her eyes still misty. “I’m sorry,” she said, without any hint of anger or resentment. “I was rude, and I apologise. It won’t happen again.”

My master hesitated for a moment, then said, “Thank you.” He didn’t embellish the sentiment any further than that. Then, perhaps as a gesture of good will, he said, “We’re assuming he hasn’t been vaccinated in several years. It seems to have been that long that his previous owner hasn’t been able to look after him.”

Noleen nodded, then fetched the requisite vials out of her kit. “Would you mind holding his head for me?” she asked me politely, meeting my eyes. “I’m going to put these in his rump and he might want to kick a bit.”

“I’ll do my best to distract him,” I said, with a hint of a smile. She might have been slow to pick up on her mistakes, but it seemed she was willing to learn from them, once prodded a bit. “Ooh, look at this!” I said to Huckleberry, pulling a stray carrot stick out of my pocket. I still had a couple of spares from earlier. “Nice carrot, hm? Ooh, is that tasty? What a good boy.” By the time I’d finished making a fuss of him, Noleen had successfully injected him and was putting the rest of her gear away. She offered me a wan smile, then headed for the gate. I followed her through, then made sure it was securely latched behind me.

“He’s much as you would expect,” she said to my master, this time looking him in the eye. “Underweight, malnourished and likely feeling sorry for himself. I’ll give you a mineral supplement for him, but aside from that, give him plenty of TLC and a good quality feed. If he develops any unusual symptoms,please give us a call. Did you have any other questions, while I’m here?”

That last part made me think she really had learned something. If the rest of her good behaviour was a front, she’d be trying to get out of here as quickly as possible.

“No, that’s it for today,” my master said. “Thank you for coming.”

“It was good to meet you,” Noleen said, deliberately offering her hand. “And once again, I apologise for my rudeness.”

Though it lasted only a split second, I noticed my master’s hesitation in taking her hand. But he did so, and she shook it firmly, not shying away from his grip at all. “Xel, good to meet you too,” she said, offering her hand to me. “And thank you for your help.”

She picked up her equipment and headed for the car. Once she was inside and heading down the driveway, my master turned to me.

“Thank you,” he said, his voice wavering just a little. “I never really know how to deal with…” He gestured vaguely towards the car, encapsulating everything that had just happened.

I nodded and gave a small sigh. “Dimari are taught from a very young age to resist anyone else’s attempts to shame us. In some parts of the galaxy, there are people who look down on the dimari simply for existing. Being in servitude to another person is shameful, according to them, and furthermore, they believe we are somehow to blame for our own situation.” I looked at him steadily. “No one should be allowed to make you feel shame for simply existing.”

To my surprise, my master frowned at that. “But I’ve been told that dimari can get very upset if they get reprimanded for doing something wrong, or for failing their masters.”

“Indeed, yes,” I agreed. “I would feel great shame if I did not serve my master diligently. But that would be as a consequenceof my own actions and decisions, not as a result of merely being owned by someone.”

“Good to know,” my master said. “And yeah, I try to…” He huffed out a sigh. “I try to not let other people’s attitudes get to me. But it’s exhausting, always having to be on guard as to what people are going to do.” He swayed towards me, looking tired and despondent, despite the fact that we were now alone, and that the visit had ended on a more positive note. Without thinking, I reached out and wrapped my arms around him. He leaned into me, almost collapsed into me, in fact. He rested his forehead on my shoulder, his arms wrapping loosely around my waist. I made an effort to breathe slowly and deeply, hoping that he would feel the rhythm and match it, or at the very least, feel soothed by it. But my heart was pounding a frantic rhythm in my chest, and my best efforts did nothing to slow it.

My old master had never, ever touched me like this. He’d had sex with me, but he’d never hugged me, never comforted me, or given me reason to attempt to comfort him. And the sensations, both physical and emotional, shot through my nervous system like a peculiar sort of drug. I felt simultaneously invigorated and languid, courageous and horribly timid. I could feel the warmth of his breath through the thin fabric of my shirt, and unbidden, my cock started to fill, responding to his closeness.

I subtly angled my hips away from him. He was not inviting me into any kind of intimacy, and brazenly displaying my arousal would be entirely inappropriate.

That was something of a shock, actually. For a large part of my training, I’d been taught how to bring attention to my arousal, rather than how to disguise it. Being in a situation where I was specifically required tonotseduce someone was something I hadn’t had to deal with in years. Not since I’d been selected as an erotic companion and my trainers had begun tointroduce me to all the ways in which a body could be made to feel delectably wonderful.

“Sorry,” my master said, pulling away from me. “I don’t mean to be… It’s just tiring.” He shook his head and took a breath. “We should go and see what Leesha’s up to. Actually, how about I go and do that, and you go and give Bo an update on Huckleberry? I’m sure she’ll be curious about it.”

“Yes, sir,” I said, but I noticed that this time, my voice contained a little more warmth, compared to my usual air of diligence. I headed off down the dirt road towards the reception building.

But as I went, I was uncomfortably aware of a niggling disquiet in my own mind. My behaviour this afternoon had been… odd. And it took me a few moments to figure out what exactly had been so out of place.

I’d been… brazen. I’d been decisive, in a way that a dimari was not supposed to be decisive. I’d shoved my way between my master and the vet, and made her feel the weight of her own misbehaviour. But I’d done so without any form of prompting or permission from my master.

And then – and perhaps even more brazenly – I’d touched my master without permission. I’d pulled him into my arms and held him. And yes, he’d seemed to thoroughly appreciate the support, unprompted though it had been, but a dimaridid nottouch their master without permission.

But Cole Jenkins was not my true master. I felt, in the same moment, a profound sense of shame at my own breach of protocol, and a deep satisfaction that I had defended and comforted my master so well. My actions with the vet had come from a desire to protect him – an entirely appropriate sentiment to feel for one’s master. And yet the method of that protection had been outside of any protocol I’d ever been taught.

What the heck was going on with me? I was following thespiritof all the rules I’d been taught, at the same time as making up themethodto suit my own desires. What would my old master think of my actions? I wondered abruptly. A moment later, the thought crossed my mind that I absolutely didn’t give a shit what he would have thought. He was dead, and Cole was very much alive.

That was… not right. That was not the appropriate attitude for a dimari to have. But my master had died. And my bond with him, my anchor to everything in this world, had been broken. And perhaps I was only just beginning to realise what that meant for my future.

CHAPTER TWELVE

COLE

“What are you…? Seriously? Leesha!”

“He was lonely,” Leesha said, her face all innocence, as she held the door open so Bribie could come lolloping into the house.