Wednesday Briefs: Ancalagon Ch. 105

 

Ases wrinkled up his nose before he even drank the tuber milk, but I kicked him under the table. I’d warned him in the transport what he had to do, and I knew he could drink this and lie about it. I’d once seen him swill an entire bottle of bar mixings on a dare.

He’d vomited profusely within minutes, but that was alcohol and sugar. This was just fermented tuber milk. Totally fine. He was a shifter; he should like milk.

I upended my cup, suppressing my shudder at the gloopy nature of the thickened milk and the bitter tang that clung to the roof of my mouth and every single tastebud on my tongue. “Just as exquisite a flavor as I remember from the first time I tried it.” My eyes watered, and I swallowed the saliva that wouldn’t stop flowing as my body kept trying to get rid of the nasty flavor that was so noxious I swear it was burning the hairs out of my nose.

Surprisingly, Timok actually looked like he did enjoy the tuber milk as much as he said he did. I narrowed my eyes at him. Was he that accomplished a liar?

Should we trust him?

He winked at me when our host smiled. “I can take you to Chaintrik,” the male said. “Follow me.”

I scooped up the bag of nuts Timok purchased, and we were quickly down in the tunnels. Our guide had a light, but it barely showed the path in front and kept our group out of the darkness. I was not a fan of being underground, and I kept my head on the swivel.

“What are you looking for?” Ases whispered. “And why did you bring those nuts? Do we actually need them?”

“Giant bugs.”

“What?” He flicked his claws out in the dim light and started looking all around. “How giant?”

“How do you think they made these tunnels?”

Ases looked horrified.

“They’re definitely big enough that you and Bouncer would have a challenge fighting back if one attacked from our back or sides in this limited space. Though he’d like to eat an althea, I’m sure. I had to hold him back last time we saw one. I think all he thought was dinner.” I was keeping Bouncer close to me just in case.

Now Ases looked disgusted. “Bugs?”

I shrugged. “It’s what I fed him the first time we met. Grubs, out of these really hard trees that he couldn’t get to himself since his claws weren’t sharp enough to dig into the wood and he’d been kicked out by his mother.” I patted his back. “At least, I assumed that’s what happened. He was hungry, and I didn’t want to get eaten, so bugs were better.”

The distraction was good enough that I barely noticed when we hit a central point where the tunnels met and the rebels had a meeting room set up. I passed off the nuts to our guide, glad Chaintrik didn’t have one of his bugs with him.

He sat at a console, studying several screens while all four hands were flying over the controls, but he stood and turned when we entered. A tech took his place.

“Essell, it is good to see you again, but I am sorry that it is happening because Garjah was taken.”

“You know what happened?”

“We do.” He waved a hand toward the screens. “We monitor nearly everything, and he contacted us after the attack at the welcome dinner. He was concerned that someone was feeding him false information, but he couldn’t be sure who.”

“He trusted that it wasn’t you?” Timok asked. He crossed his arms over his chest.

“Yes.” Chaintrik didn’t justify his answer and turned back to me, ignoring Timok. Despite my fear for Garjah and my desperation to save him, amusement tugged at me, and I had to suppress a smile.

“I need to find him, and we need help to save him. Then we’re going to take out everyone who had a hand in trying to hurt us, starting with whoever took Garjah and ending with the Kardoval. I’m going to take every single scrap of power away from them because that will hurt them the most.”

“You’re sure that’s what they wanted to do?” Chaintrik asked.

“Ases, show him.” I wasn’t going to justify my actions every step of the way, and we had more than enough evidence to damn those four who thought they were able to get away with kidnapping and murder. That would teach them to hire idiots. Ases’ mech had recorded very interesting conversations.

“They don’t say it was the Kardoval who sent them.”

“Garjah will be with them.”

Chaintrik goggled at me, his thin nostrils flaring. “How do you know that? We just found him.”

My heart sped up, and I stepped in close to him, breathing faster. “You know where he is, and we’re still standing here talking? Where is he? Take me to him!” I clenched all my hands into fists.

“It’s not that simple. He is deep within the security headquarters; we aren’t actually sure he isn’t there voluntarily—”

“He’s not,” Timok said. “I was with him when they captured him. Trust me when I say, he did not go of his own free will.”

“We cannot get directly under the building he is in because we have not tunneled that far, but we can get close. However, we cannot rush into this. There’s a risk of revealing our secret if we aren’t careful, and too many people depend on the safety of these caverns to allow the Kardoval to find them.”

Chaintrik was right, but it was killing me. Tears burned in my eyes, and my throat ached, but I nodded. “How soon?”

“We’re looking for the closest exit, but we must wait for dark.”

“A whole day?” I said in dismay. 

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Julie Lynn Hayes

Wednesday Briefs: Ancalagon Ch. 104

 

“No one else has the resources they have or stand to lose what the Kardoval do. So, yes, he does need help. He’s been betrayed, attacked, and someone has to be holding him or he’d have tracked us down instead of you. Now let’s go. We have plans to make.”

Timok looked about as put out as he ever had, and I took a small amount of pleasure in that. But now that I was going to let him help us, he needed to get to it. Ases snorted. “Meet Mr. Bossy.”

“Now is not the time for jokes.”

“I’m not joking,” he retorted. He looked at Timok. “I don’t know you, really, but he becomes a terror when he’s on a mission. And I know that face. I don’t know what Garjah told you to do, but Essell will do whatever it takes to go save him if that’s what he decided has to happen. Look how he ended up here with four arms and mated to an alien, after creating first contact and helping negotiate an alliance with extremely favorable terms for your people.”

Timok folded his thin lips together, then inclined his head. “You do make a point. Not every idiot can crash a ship on a planet already being claimed by another species.”

“Hey! You guys stayed hidden on purpose. How was I supposed to know?” I would have continued to get angry, but Timok turned around and started walking away. “Where are you going?”

“To save Garjah. Isn’t that what you told me we had to do?”

I deflated. “Oh. Yeah.” I hustled after him, Bouncer keeping right beside me this time instead of ranging around in the trees. “Do you have a transport close by?”

Timok nodded. “A small one. We should be able to fit, but it’ll be tight.”

 

He was right. The transport was a tiny two-seater, so it was a good thing that Ases and I weren’t as big as they were. We both fit, barely, on the back seat but there was no room to secure any webbing around us in case of a crash. We’d just have to hope being wedged in would keep us in place.

Besides, Bouncer was literally draped across Ases and my laps. It was a good thing neither one of us were afraid of him. Timok said he wasn’t, but the way Bouncer flicked his ears and kept inching his muzzle closer to him and then away when Timok’s shoulders hunched made me think he was doing it on purpose to make the doctor flinch. That made the tiny transport dip, which made my stomach dip, so I flicked one of his ears. “Stop it.”

Bouncer rumbled, his chest vibrating against my legs.

“Intolerable beast.”

At that Bouncer went so far as to open his mouth and huff warm air right on the back of Timok’s neck. “Argh.” Timok made a sound deep in his throat and leaned forward. “Would you make him stop that?”

“Don’t say things that make him upset.” I managed to free one arm from where it was trapped against the wall of the transport and rubbed Bouncer’s head. “He’s sensitive.”

“Sensitive,” Timok muttered. He said a few other things, but they were under his breath, and I couldn’t make out what he was saying even as close as we were.

“Where are you taking us?” Ases had been quiet up till now, and I knew that meant he’d actually been thinking.

“If Essell is right about the Kardoval being behind the attack, then the only people who can help you are the rebels. The thing is, Garjah is also the one who knows how to contact them. I was thinking we should try to find Seedrah to see if he ever told him—”

“I know!” I said in a rush. “I know how to contact them.”

Timok craned his head around. “How?”

“We have to go the Dytokshun market, and there’s a signal. A phrase you have to say while you buy acoji nuts and a skin of tuber milk.”

“Well, I hope you’re comfortable. That’s going to take a while.” Timok poured on the speed, and I closed my eyes, my hand still resting on Bouncer. I tried not to think about what could be happening to Garjah right then, but I was scared for him. He needed my help, and I would stop at nothing to save him.

Even drink that nasty tuber milk again.

 

“We’re here.”

I’d fallen asleep. Exhaustion had made that inevitable, despite how uncomfortable it was in the tiny transport. My legs were dead asleep, and I could barely hobble out of the transport even leaning on Bouncer. “How are you not a cripple?” I asked Ases. He was moving fine.

Ases shrugged. “More flexible joints?”

Timok tapped a button on his comm and the transport beeped. “We should move away from this, just in case it’s been tagged. I don’t think I’ve been tracked, but we need to keep moving.”

Right. “Okay, so we need to find a nut-seller.”

Thank goodness Timok was with us because not only did I not have a cred-stick on me, I had no idea what the different signs meant. He was able to lead us to one, the same one I’d been in before. The name on the sign said Cheisumn, and she smiled. “Oh, if it isn’t the foreigner and his beastie, and bringing another new friend from off world as well. What can I do for you?”

“We’d like some nuts and milk, please.”

Her eyebrows rose, and she glanced at Timok but then nodded. “Come with me.” This time her shop was empty, but she still asked us to take a seat. Instead of a skin, she passed out cups then disappeared into the back. A man appeared in the doorway she’d gone into.

Time to drink and lie, then make the rebels help me. They had to, or their cause would die too. 

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Julie Lynn Hayes

Wednesday Briefs: Ancalagon Ch. 103

 

“How did you find me?” I stared at him, wide-eyed in shock. I jerked away from the tree, crouching with my lower arms braced against the ground. I could dart left or right, though he was blocking the direct path toward the spring where Bouncer and Ases were hunting. I wasn’t sure I wanted to lead him toward them anyway.

“I didn’t find you. I found him.” He pointed over his shoulder at Bouncer. He slipped around Timok, as silent as I’d expected him to be, and came to stand at my shoulder. I put one hand on his back, but I didn’t move otherwise.

“How?”

“Do you really think I’d allow a creature that can kill so easily to roam free? What if he wasn’t as tame as you and Garjah thought?” Timok held up a comm pad and pointed to a dot on it.

“You tagged him?”

“Good thing I did. Do you have any idea how long it would have taken to find you otherwise?”

Ases cleared his throat. “That was the plan.” He stayed behind a tree that was to one side and behind Timok. “Can I get my robe or pants, Essell?”

“Yeah, sure.” I pulled his robe off my shoulders, then balled it up. “Here, pass this to him.” I tossed it at Timok. He grunted in surprise, and I sprang to my left, moving away from him and putting a tree between us. Bouncer moved with me like he knew what I was going to do before I did it.

“What are you doing?” The robe dangled from Timok’s hand. He frowned at the tree I hid behind. I peeked around it then scanned the rest of the area.

“Anyone else around?” I whispered to Bouncer. His ears were swiveling, but he didn’t seem to stop or pinpoint any particular area, so maybe Timok was alone.

“Staying alive,” I answered.

“Which is a good thing, but did you get hit in the head while doing it? Garjah’s house was destroyed; were you harmed before you escaped? Do you need medical attention?” He reached into his pocket. I tensed.

“Hey! I need my robe.” Ases’s distraction was perfectly timed. Timok stopped reaching into his pocket and looked over his shoulder away from me and toward where Ases was hiding. As soon as he looked away, I took off for a different hiding spot. Bouncer scrambled beside me.

This time I scrambled low and went for a set of bushes out in the open instead of trying to tuck my body behind a tree. They were massive, but it was too obvious. I sank down, sitting as still as I could to avoid shaking the thin limbs on the bush and giving away my location.

Ases, bless him, tried to get Timok’s attention again. “Naked here. Robe, please.” He caught the end of the sleeve and yanked, which pulled Timok’s gaze away from the area of my bush.

Timok let the fabric slide out of his hands. “Yes, do cover up.”

 Ases turned so his back faced Timok, not letting his imperious, slightly superior air deter him for a second. “Essell doesn’t need medical attention; he needs Garjah.” Ases crossed his arms over his now robed chest. He shook his hips to wiggle the draped fabric into place.  

“You do both know I could hear exactly where he went, right? There’s not exactly a lot of places to hide.” Timok waved a hand around the light foliage and lack of hiding places.

Ases flicked out his claws, crouching slightly. “If you’re here to hurt him, I will hurt you.”

“I would never.” Timok spread his arms apart. “I have only ever helped him.” He glanced right at where I was hiding. “Have I not, Essell?”

Stars. He did know exactly where I was. I tensed, then stood and walked out from behind the bush. “Someone helped the Kardoval attack Garjah and us at the same time. You were with him and now you’re here without him. Where’s Garjah?” Saying his name was hard, and my voice cracked on the last question. I swallowed hard against the pain in my throat, my eyes burning.

“He fought the attackers and told me to escape and find you.”

Jumping back into the conversation, Ases said, “We’re just supposed to believe you?” He huffed. “Why would we do that?”

“Besides all the times I’ve saved his life?”

“Maybe that was all part of it. Get his trust, get Garjah’s trust, then zap, blast to the back when you betray them.” Ases mimed the shot, which looked strange with his partially-shifted hands.

Timok sighed. “Did you know that I was raised in a residence right next to Garjah? That we grew up together? Aside from a bond mate, we could not be closer. I would never hurt him. Since he loves you, I would not hurt you.”

Did we dare trust him? I looked at Ases, and he didn’t seem inclined to, but he didn’t know Timok. I’d spent enough time around the abrasive doctor that it didn’t feel like he was lying to me. Surely, if he’d been told to get close to betray us, he would have been nicer to me. Bouncer sat next to me and leaned against my thigh.

That, more than anything else, convinced me to take the leap. Surely if he sensed deceit in Timok, he’d still be on edge.

“What can you do to help us?” I asked.

“You believe me?” Timok raised his eyebrows.

“Isn’t that what you’ve been telling us we should do?” I snapped. “What other choice do we have? We’re alone on this planet, and I need help to save Garjah.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Garjah wanted me to save you. He can get himself out of trouble.”

“Really? Because he told me there was no way the Kardoval were behind the attacks, and I think it’s obvious they are.” I crossed my arms, daring him to deny me.

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J Ray Lamb

Julie Lynn Hayes

Wednesday Briefs: Ancalagon Ch. 102

 

“We can’t risk a fire. I’m going to shift. I’ll stay warm, and you can layer up with my clothes.” It was getting darker, and Ases was right. There was no way we should build a fire this close to the port, if I even had the ability to start one. At least the lightning arcing from the storm kept the complete darkness at bay.

“All right.” Bouncer had grumbled, probably about the lack of easy access dinner. I’d encouraged him to go find something to eat, but he wasn’t the best hunter. “You should take Bouncer to go find something to eat.” He didn’t usually eat in shifted form, but I knew he’d done it before.

“What about you?”

I was hungry, but I sure wasn’t eating raw whatever-they-could-catch meat. Nope, no thank you. Maybe in a day or two, if we were still out here, I’d be hungry enough to gnaw on raw flesh.

“I don’t want to leave you unprotected.”

Being alone wasn’t ideal, but Bouncer would never settle if he wasn’t fed. Ases had never seen it, but a hungry cerops was a restless, cranky cerops. “I’ll be fine. There’s no one anywhere close to here, and the electricity from the storm keeps everything but the trincophants away. They eat charged particles, so my tender flesh should be safe.” My joke fell flat when Ases looked uncertain.

“Hey, who’s the biologist here? I think I’d know if I was in danger. What are you afraid of?”

“Garjah finding you all alone, then killing me when I come back because I let a little thing like hunger leave you unprotected.”

If only Garjah would come find me that quickly. He wouldn’t be able to find me, though; we’d never talked about this. He’d always assumed if the house was attacked, I’d make it to the security suite, which was impenetrable. At least I’d taken the time on our space flights to research the planet and its flora and fauna, always looking to learn about new wildlife. I’d extracted a promise from Garjah to take me out to explore when we’d settled… well, everything.

Guess the Kardoval moved up the timetable. They’d also taken my guide away from me. I clenched my hands into fists. “Just go. He won’t be coming here; no one knows where we are. That’s why we’re safe. There’s nothing here to hurt me, excerpt the constant sound of Bouncer’s whining giving me a headache.”

“Fine. But if he finds out, I’m telling Garjah you made me leave you. We won’t go far, and we’ll be back as soon as we can. I think I smelled some burrowing mammals back by that small spring we passed.”

I nodded. “Bouncer’s got the claws for digging.”

My feral little ball of energy flexed his paws, digging furrows into the ground. “No, don’t dig here. I don’t need a tripping hazard. We talked about this.” I yanked his big paws out of the dirt, grimacing when clods rained down on my lap. “Thanks.” I tried to brush it away, but it was damp and smeared. “Great." I glared at Bouncer. He butted his rough cheek against mine, and I held firm until he chirped and tilted his head. “You’re lucky you’re cute.”

Ases, already done shifting behind my back, chuffed. His tail flicked.

“What? He is cute.”

Ases flicked his ears, then nosed his clothes. I leaned back and grabbed his robe, wrapping the long fabric around my shoulders like a cape and draping his pants down my legs. Good thing he liked flowing clothes.  

Left alone in the near-dark while they hunted, I had nothing to do but think. I ignored my hunger as best as I could, the water we’d drank at the spring at least taking care of my thirst and putting something in my stomach. We’d been too busy just getting away from Garjah’s house and worrying about pursuers to forage, but tomorrow we’d have to try to find other food. There were some ground plants I could eat raw that Ases should also be able to digest.

What was harder to digest was the conversations we’d listened to. Someone had known that Garjah had left the house with Timok, leaving us vulnerable. Could Timok be the traitor? Leaning back against a tree trunk, I tried to figure it out. Who could possibly be working against the alliance?

Timok was extremely knowledgeable about other species; he didn’t hide his amusement or pleasure at flicking at me, especially when I got irritated. An alliance with the Galactic would give him more aliens to meet, to learn about, to experiment on. Of course, his callous disregard about the genetic changes he’d forced on me—regardless of how he claimed it was saving my life, not seeing how I was different and what he could manipulate medically—could hide a traitor’s motives. Maybe he’d intended to kill me?

Maybe Timok wasn’t as good of a doctor as he claimed to be?

I just wasn’t sure if that fit though. There were easier ways to kill a person if you were a doctor. Hell, he could have injected me with a placebo and did nothing.

So who else knew Garjah’s plans that morning? Seedrah? Garjah claimed he was loyal. He was like a young cerops, always eager and happy to please. He did his duty, and he was eager to learn, always asking questions. But we’d been alone a lot too.

If he wanted to kill me, he could have.

I ran my hands through my hair, pulling on it. Stars! Why couldn’t I figure this out? Thumps crashed through the bushes. I turned to warn Bouncer to be quiet, a little surprised he wasn’t more tired after our long day of trekking through the jungle, but it wasn’t him.

Ases was going to kill me.

If Timok wasn’t the traitor, and he didn’t do it first. 

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J Ray Lamb

Julie Lynn Hayes

Wednesday Briefs: Ancalagon Ch. 101

 

Our beautiful home was being violated, which made me sick and furious at the same time I felt relief that every moment they spent searching in vain for us there, they weren’t out scanning the jungle.

We’d been walking for what felt most of the day, and the trees were starting to thin. Sweat had slicked every inch of my body and matted my hair until it started to stand up on its own. A hum, almost on the edge of my ability to hear, and the scent of ozone, made my nose itch.

Where were we? If I was lost, did that mean no one else could find us either?

Bouncer and Ases had kept looping me, one keeping to an inner track and the other wider, often taking turns and switching, both popping up unexpectedly to make my heart race until I’d grown too tired to jump and curse. Now they both appeared through the gap in the trees I was making my way toward. It looked darker, as if night was falling or a storm was approaching.

“Oh shit, a storm.” But not a natural one. Had we come that far?

We had. Without planning it, we’d moved perpendicular to the city from Garjah’s house and made our way toward the port. There was a wide field with a yellow carpet of plants dotted with pink fronds that spiked above it. The dying sun glinted off the arches of orange and black rocks dotted here and there rocks glinted in the sun like geometric bridges going to nowhere.

The trincophants were flying over the canyon collecting the last of the energy from the sun before they returned to bulbous bulge of their nests anchored to the ground with matte green strands. Each poky tip spiked into the sky.

This could actually be good. The electricity from the manmade storm would block the scans of anyone looking for us. I wasn’t sure if we’d be able to cross the short plains or how to get over the ravine and storm to the port, though. Exhaustion and fear dragged at my steps, and I faltered under the canopy of one of the last big trees.

I sank down to a squat, the collapsed onto my butt on the ground. We needed to take a break. Bouncer came back first, nuzzling against my shoulder and then laying down with a sigh. His ears stayed upright, and he didn’t put his head down across my lap like he usually would. “I’m sorry, buddy. You probably would’ve been safer back on your home planet, huh?” I rubbed at one side of the thickened scales that ran over his spine. He arched, his only indication he was paying attention to me as he stared to my left.

My muscles tensed, I relaxed when Ases called out. “I’m coming out, naked. Close your eyes if you don’t want to be jealous.” He pulled back a bush so it wouldn’t whack him in a delicate place, then stepped into the small clearing under the large tree I’d picked to stop.

I didn’t stare, but I didn’t hide my eyes like a child either. “Dork. Like you didn’t used to enjoy stripping and changing just to freak out the newbies all the time.”

“You’d think more people who were into science, diplomacy, and politics would be exposed to aliens who didn’t look like themselves.”

I snorted. “Why? Outside of diplomats, or first contact scientists, those people are the blindest of all. Stuck in their ways, only able to focus on what their goal is, they don’t understand what they can’t envision controlling—be that the lab, or the people they hope to lead.”

“Isn’t that the truth.”

It was, and I blinked, my hand slowing on Bouncer’s back where I’d resumed scratching his scales. “Stars.” That had to be it. Garjah kept saying it wasn’t them, that it was too clumsy, too obvious.

“What?” Ases jerked his head around, pausing with his hands on the waistband on his pants.

“It’s the Kardoval. They might have all the memories of all the people, but they don’t leave the planet. They don’t have any experience with aliens they don’t control; the few they do trade with, they do so off-planet or at the port.” I waved my hand toward the crackling storm and wide ravine that cut off the rest of the world from that space.

“When Garjah explained how that security feature worked, and how they had to have special shielded vehicles to get past the storm and the trincophants, I was amazed at their technology and ability to protect their people. But it’s not as much protection as fear.”

“Fear of aliens like you, me, and Bouncer?” Ases cocked his head. “That would set them off.”

“Sort of. But we’re not that scary, you know? We’re not invading, we’re not a danger in and of ourselves. It’s what we represent.”

I could see the realization dawn on Ases, just as it had on me. “We represent change. Loss of control. Loss of power.”

“Exactly. The factions of people who oppose them before were small and no one who was respected paid them attention. But now Garjah, the head of security for the entire planet, has. Others are looking. Others will benefit from an alliance with the Galactic. They’ll see that, and push for it to continue. The near total control the Kardoval had over their people and what they were exposed to is over. New people, new ideas, new ways… it’ll change everything about them.”

Ases sank down beside me. “And there’s no way they will allow that.”

My stomach churned. “Not if they can stop it. Prove we’re dangerous. That’s why they wanted to capture us. To make up some sort of scenario to paint us as the bad guys. ” Stars, where was Garjah? What were they doing to him?