“Mmm.”
Hence the nanodogs.
On the spot they proposed calling beasters like Orm, those who could communicate with and potentially command animals, dog riders.
Though amused, Orm agreed wholeheartedly. Grinning, he banged the table with his fist. More laughing ensued. At least they’d forgotten her.
Boaz sat forward. “Back to the agenda.”
Damn.More introductions.
She forgot most of the names after that.
Except for Rutger, the final one. He was the visitor who came from the Worshipper quadrant. From memory that meant he didn’t believe in humans regaining their supremacy. Surely an evil attitude? She decided she hated him. A pity as he looked so… Cyn searched for the right descriptors…intriguing and formidable, yes…with horns that curled and swooped above his head like ram horns on psychedelic drugs. A head taller than Vargr, she approximated. Parts of him were so blue she failed to see any skin color. He was a foot-soldier.
Those blue parts were old wounds, she was told. He could heal any wound he suffered, except it came back utterly blue. One eye socket was blue and one hand. He’d fallen in battle during a top floor attack, fallen many stories, been crushed, and had risen alive after a week.
Some thought he’d died.
Well fuck. And I am strange?
“And now, tell us about your Cyn.” Boaz beamed at them.
She wriggled a little lower in her chair.
“And such a pretty sin she is too,” Vargr said.
And so it begins.With her wanting to eyeroll and smack Vargr.
11
Vargr stoodto the left of where Cyn sat and considered his audience. Tough bunch. For once, he had butterflies, which surprised him. As if this was a moment of pivotal importance. As if failing had awful consequences he could not bear to endure. After all, he’d known her for only a few days.
Except they had bond-mated, and even if she seemed skeptical, it was done.
It was that she represented hope for him. Hope with a bigH. A possible key to a good future.
He needed that. They all did.
He straightened, told his wings to shut the fuck up and not flutter, and he began to tell her story.
Leaving out the bad bits, though.
The problem was, the deeper he delved into the story, the more his butterflies danced, the more he saw a wall looming where he’d transgress too far.
He hated lying.
And so he’d said how he’d found her several stories below the top, injured but not badly. How he’d immediately seen the redmotes in her eyes—there was no way to avoid saying that part, it was too obvious.
That he proposed they keep her and help her discover who she was, her past, since she’d forgotten much of it.
Then, because he felt he should say more he added the obvious: she must have gone through some terrible times to have forgotten her past. And… he had bond-mated with her while the Lure affected her.
The room fell silent, and Boaz shifted forward, clasped his big hands atop the table.
“How do you think she came to be in that place so close to the top? How do you think she avoided the Lure all this time?”
Those questions sank into him, thumping about like unwelcome guests. He opened his mouth and found himself uncomfortably at a standstill. He did not want to lie to these men.
