The Ilia's Lovers - Chapter Thirty-Six

Dahnus blinked rapidly several times, seemingly frozen on the spot. Elaine reached out, thinking to shake him out of it, to make her strong, competent, always planning Dahnus come back, but before her fingers could even reach him, he snapped to attention. He looked at Elaine, his grey face paling even further and offered his arm.

“Where are Lord Efari’s guards?” Dahnus asked as Elaine slipped her arm into his and let Dahnus lead her, as he followed the Kuyon, back into the building, and away from the ball.

“We have them set up in one of our conference suites. You can set up there. They, your guards, and Lady Franklin’s guards have searched the building and surrounding area several times.

All their guards had surrounded the building when they first entered. Hadith must have called for his guards when the Surilan approached him to join him outside. What lie had he told to make Hadith follow?

“I believe Ardirion is at the ball,” Dahnus said. “Would you have someone request his company?”

“Immediately,” the Kuyon said, snapping his fingers. A member of his staff appeared and with a whispered instruction, disappeared in the direction of the ball room.

Hadith.

Oh god! Oh god! This can’t be happening!

For a moment Elaine’s feet failed her. Dahnus caught her, holding her close.

“Oh god! Dahnus!”

“He will be well, my heart. I promise.”

Tears slipped down Elaine’s cheeks, but she swiped them away and they resumed their walk, falling back in behind the Kuyon who’d waited a discreet distance, giving them their moment.

Double doors stood in front of them, A couple of Dahnus’s guards stood before them. They opened the doors, and Elaine followed the Kuyon and Dahnus into a massive suite.

A huge black conference table sat on one side of the enormous room with screens around it. Hadith’s guards were sat there, Kagen Dase, the new head of Hadith’s guards after the tragic death of all his guards when they were returning from visiting Ariana a couple of months before. In the centre were small seating areas dotted around, giving people space for more intimate conversations. At the far end stood a series of terminals with seats against the walls and on the other side was a large, more comfortable seating area sitting in front of the windows.

The Kuyon… Governor Aquel, Elaine suddenly remembered, was leading them towards the table. Kagen looked furious. Stood over him, Elithan and Hemian both waited for Dahnus and Elaine to reach them.

“Where are Zinif and Thalvuten?” Elaine asked, looking through the room and not seeing either of the enormous males.

“They are out in the gardens with Lord’s Yitia and Ikolla,” Hemian answered Elaine directly. “Lord Ikolla is looking for a scent trail he can follow, and the others are staying with him in case they find something.

Kerrok was looking for a scent trail. Kerrok and Radiin were looking for Hadith. Elaine felt like she could cry with gratitude.

“It was Dorosa,” Kagen said, his face twisted in a snarl.

“What’s Dorosa?” Elaine asked.

Hemian drew near as Dahnus let her hand slip and approached the other head guards.

“Dorosa is a non-lethal device made to disorient people. It produces a localised sound effect that effectively overwhelms the brain, shutting down the ability for an individual to do anything. Many often lose consciousness.”

“Why didn’t we hear it?” Elaine asked, stepping back to let Dahnus, who was now crouched in front of a half feral Kagen as he quickly filled the Ilan in.

“A Dorosa… when I say localised, what I mean is, it cancels out the sound past a few fen… feet from the epicentre of the blast. You would not hear anything even if you stood a foot away from the edge of the blast radius.”

Elaine nodded. Earth had that kind of technology for centuries. Destructive interference if she was remembering it correctly. Two sound waves of the same or similar frequencies align in a way where each cancelled the other out. She’d spent a dinner listening to a sound engineer explain it, among many other things related to sound engineering, which he was studying at college, where she’d met him. At the time she felt hard done to. That was a night she was never getting back. Now she felt a moment of gratitude.

“Dahnus, what is wrong?”

Elaine turned to find the Prince Eternal striding into the room on legs that appeared longer than the last time she’d seen him, several of his guards behind him. He walked over to her, recognition and a small nod of acknowledgement, before he turned to Dahnus as he joined them. Dahnus filled him in quickly on what was happening.

“A Surilan?” Ardirion looked at Kagen who nodded in confirmation. “Xyen, bring my entire entourage. Message the villa we’re staying at. I want everyone here and accounted for.”

“Immediately, my prince,” the Surilan female who appeared to be his second bowed and walked towards the doors, her bracer to her arm.

No, not a bracer, it was her arm. A cybernetic part, like the Prince Eternal, she was almost entirely cybernetic with small areas of what appeared to be her natural skin here and there. Elaine shivered.

“It will be a few minutes before they come,” the Prince Eternal said. “In the meantime, is there anything I can do? Any way I can help?”

“I don’t think so, but thank you, Ardirion.”

Dahnus took Elaine’s hand as he spoke. It was shaking. His thumb rubbed anxious circles into her skin.

“Ilan Ascendi,” the governor appeared at their side. At some point he’d gone to the consoles across the room but now he was back, and he looked, disturbed.

“It seems our systems at several of our space ports went down about twenty minutes ago. Several ships were allowed to leave before they got the message to shut down the ports. They haven’t been able to update the system with which ships have left. I’m sorry. I don’t know how this happened.”

Dahnus looked at Elaine. There was fear there. Elaine’s throat closed and she gripped his hand tighter.

“May I use your system a moment?” The Prince Eternal asked, though he was already crossing the room as he asked. Sitting in front of a console, he began tapping away.

“Of course, your eminence,” governor Aquel said, looking like he knew very well he didn’t have a choice in the matter.

Elaine watched the Prince as he worked. His people crossed the room and surrounded him, seemingly to keep him safe, but there was something about it. Though the prince was tapping, he didn’t seem to really be there. There was an absence about him and the guards seemed to be there more to obstruct what he was doing, then actually guarding him.

Watching the Prince Eternal was addictive, but after a few minutes Elaine turned to Dahnus. He was watching her closely. She stepped into him and he wrapped his arms around her.

“We’ll find him,” Dahnus said, though there was a quaver to his voice that worried her.

“We’ll get him back and bury the ones that took him,” Elaine whispered back.

Dahnus gripped her tighter, and they stood there for a couple of minutes, getting comfort from one another.

“Ilan Ascendi?”

Dahnus released his grip, but kept Elaine tight to his side.

While they’d been stood embracing, the whole room had filled with Surilan males and females in different stages of cybernetic conversion. Kagen and his males were walking up and down the line, but already Elaine could see him shaking his head.

“Is this everyone, Ardirion?”

“Everyone, I’m afraid. If the perpetrator is not there, then he was not one of my people.”

Ardirion’s voice was oddly hollow as he spoke, though he quickly stood up and crossed the room.

“I’ve restored the systems in those ports and compared the video feeds from now with those from earlier. There was a Surilan ship that left the port while the system was down in Arpassa. I’ve compared it to the records from Surila, and I believe it’s a mercenary ship.”

“Mercenaries, then it could be anyone?” Dahnus said.

“Not anyone.”

Pyri was walking towards them, her pack following. She looked worried, and her pack angry. She crossed the room and pulled Elaine into her arms.

“It’s going to be okay. We’re going to deal with this.”

“We got the message a few moments ago,” Talis said, his apple green eyes taking in the whole room.

Pyri drew away but held onto Elaine’s spare hand.

“Who?” Dahnus said. The worry was gone, the fear. Now it was anger. Dahnus had a direction for his rage.

“Zharr Araq. He says they have Lord Efari and unless you hand over Lady Franklin, they’ll sell him.” Talis handed something to Dahnus. “These are the coordinates for the exchange.

Elaine felt a chill across her body.

“Zharr Araq?” she asked.

“You met his brothers, the twins, Velon and Menon, when Danari brought you to Amara.

Twin Devori faces looked at her through the screen on Danari’s ship. They’d all but forgotten the Devori over the last few months. Elaine felt impervious on Amara. But she wasn’t on Amara anymore and neither was Hadith.

But why go for Hadith. Elaine was there too? Why take Hadith? Why hadn’t they just come for her directly? Why Hadith?

“Breath, Elaine,” Pyri said, her hand squeezing tighter.

“This is all my fault,” she managed to get out through a throat too tight to breath.

Castus was so smug. He looked at her, with everything he’d done, and he smirked. He was going to get away with it all and she couldn’t bear it. The knife was there. It hadn’t even been a thought and now they had Hadith.

“It’s not your fault. It will always be Castus’s fault. It will always be the fault of the IGC allowing slavery. This isn’t your fault, Elaine.”

It didn’t matter what Pyri said. Elaine knew the truth.

Dahnus was completely silent.

Elaine looked at him. He was already scheming. Already planning what came next. Elaine didn’t think for a moment Dahnus would risk Elaine to save Hadith and it worried her.

“It’s still in Kuyon space,” Talis was saying. “Any support you need.”

“I need you to take Elaine back to Amara.”

“You can’t be serious?” elaine said, turning on Dahnus.

“I’m not taking you anywhere near those Devori,” Dahnus said.

“I’m the first person you should be taking. We can distract them with me and they’ll be so busy chomping at the bit to get me, they won’t notice the…” Elaine gestured at all of the guards in the room, “… horde of people we bring to take them down.”

Dahnus put his hand to face and shook his head.

“Elaine. I can’t. I can’t risk you. I can’t risk you even being this close to the Devori. Had I known there were agents of theirs on this planet, I’d have taken you away a moment later. No. You go back to the palace. I will be there with Hadith a day or two after you arrive.”

“A day or two?” Elaine shook her head. “You can’t be serious. Dahnus—”

“NO!”

Dahnus closed his eyes for a moment and let out a deep breath.

Elaine looked around them. The space had cleared, like an invisible bubble, allowing them the illusion of privacy to have a “conversation”.

Across the room, Pyri arched a brow and shook her head.

Elaine looked back at Dahnus who appeared almost bowed under the weight of pressure.

“Zinif, please get everyone back to the ball. I need you to accompany Lady Franklin home.” Dahnus stared into her eyes as he said the last four words.

“Silla,” Dahnus croaked. “I need you to be safe.”

The words echoed in her head and with it the conversation from earlier. The fight. The talk in the garden before word of Hadith’s abduction. Elaine could see all of that in Dahnus’s eyes too.

“I need you to be safe,” he whispered.

Accepting the inevitable, Elaine nodded.

“Then I will be safe,” she whispered back.

*****

“Morrara, I do not like this,” Talis said, shaking his head. He’d voiced his opinion every few minutes for the last hour, but Pyri had a way with him. Yet again, she set to explaining how it wasn’t fair that Dahnus was sidelining Elaine and they had to help.

“I know whose face will fill the spot of your adalan,” Elaine had whispered to Dahnus before she left. He looked at her with surprise, but also with acknowledgement. Hadith would be his Ilidan. Hadith’s face would, someday, fill that spot next to Dahnus’s bust on the sunset balcony. Elaine didn’t even want to think about the third spot, their Ilia. What would she do when they found their mate? Would she stay and watch them love her? Leave with all of these mates Dahnus had basically forced on her? Would that make her a hypocrite?

“And they definitely don’t feel a mate bond for me?” Elaine asked, looking out of the window of the akora at the three males, a pack, Pyri and Talis were borrowing to Elaine for her little mission. It was the most Elaine would allow Pyri to do. There was no way she was putting Pyri, her pack and their daughter at risk. Adosian pack bonds meant that if one male of the pack died, so did the others. If the female died, so did her mates. Females alone could survive the bond death.

“They’ve assured me they don’t feel the bond at all. No draw whatsoever,” Pyri assured Elaine again.

“And they would have me to answer to, if they lied.”

“I’m not worried about being lied to. I’m worried Dahnus will add them to, as the Prince Eternal put it, my entourage. According to Hadith, he was looking for a Hinari quartet.” Elaine felt the air leave her lungs. She and Hadith had only had that conversation earlier. A few hours ago. Now he was…

“Oh,” Elaine said, holding her hand to her heart to try and slow it down. To stop the ache, the fear, the horror. “Oh god!”

Pyri crossed the Akora away from Talis and the rest of her pack and sat next to Elaine. She rubbed circles into Elaine’s back until she got her fear, her horror, her breathing back under control.

What was she doing? Going off like this without Dahnus. Should she just go back to the palace?

But the idea of sitting in the palace waiting to hear if Hadith and Dahnus were dead or alive was too much to bear even in thought.

Besides, agree or not, this was Elaine’s fault. If she hadn’t given in to her desire for revenge, for justice, Castus would be alive and Hadith would be accompanying her and Dahnus home tomorrow.

“I think this is them,” Pyri said.

Elaine followed her line of vision and saw an akora landing a short distance away.

Almost as soon as Elaine agreed to go, they left. Dahnus contacting Zinif to redirect them to the port. Pyri told Dahnus they were leaving tonight, changing their plans, to get Elaine away in case there was still a risk of her being taken. Dahnus was so relieved, he readily agreed. The sooner Elaine was on their ship, the better. That way Hemian and his men could stay with Dahnus, giving him a much better chance of getting Hadith back alive.

But the ship waiting in the port wasn’t there to take the Adosians, their human mate, and Elaine and her entourage to Talis’s ship. Instead, it was taken Elaine, her mates, her guards, and these three Adosian males to the planet where the Devori were demanding Elaine in exchange for Hadith.

Now, all she had to do was convince her mates and guards to go along with all of this.

Zinif, Thalvuten, Kerrok and Radiin got out of the akora and made their way across the tarmac of the space port. Or whatever they made the floor of a spaceport from.

“Okay, once I get out, you leave, so they don’t have a chance to force the issue,” Elaine said.

“Elaine, are you sure you can’t use us?” Pyri asked.

“Of course I could use you, Pyri. But I won’t risk you. You have to go home to your daughter.”

All five of Pyri’s pack were nodding along as Elaine finished.

“Take your pack and go home, Pyri,” Elaine said.

The two of them hugged. Elaine flashed a smile of thanks at Talis, Adaran, Nadan, Kemar and Thelan and got out of the akora.

Zinif nodded, then his jaw dropped when the akora lifted off behind Elaine and flew away.

“Where are they going? I thought they were taking us to Amara.”

“There’s been a change of plans,” Elaine said. “Meet Amin, Damis and Cogin, they’re warriors and weapons specialists. They’re coming with us.”

The three males stepped forward and nodded. The matching tattoo on their necks, which denoted their status as a matched pack, moving along with them. Though the tattoos were hollow, meaning they hadn’t found their bond female yet.

“Coming with us, where?” Kerrok asked, eyeing the two warily.

“We’re going to get Hadith,” Elaine said with far more confidence than she felt.

Zinif and Thalvuten looked at one another, then back at her, Zinif shaking his head.

“Lady Franklin. The Ilan hired us to protect you—”

“But you haven’t worked for him since parliament demanded an end to my guards. You’ve been paid from my official stipend since then. You work for me,” Elaine said, reinforcing her point.

Zinif looked like he was about to say something when Kerrok stepped forward.

“Tell me, Satya, what is it you think you are going to do?”

Elaine swallowed down her fear, swallowed down her doubts and, jutting her chin out in defiance, she stared Kerrok straight in the eye.

“We go there, observe the Devori and their Surilan mercenaries. You, Radiin, Amin, Damis and Cogin set up in the trees and Zinif and Thalvuten bring me to Zharr Araq—”

“No way,” Zinif said. “I wouldn’t take you in a thousand light years of that carfri.”

“Yes you will. Because it will look like Dahnus really doesn’t even care what happens to me. That’s how the Devori will take Dahnus’s lack of presence. Like Hadith and I aren’t even worthy of his presence. That will make them overconfident. You demand Hadith before you hand me over.” Elaine swallowed again. “I don’t know if that bit will work, but if Dahnus isn’t there and they’re overconfident, they’ll be more likely to make mistakes, right? Then when Hadith is away from them, you guys take them out.”

It was such a weak plan. Elaine could hear that as she was saying it out loud. But it didn’t matter. Even a weak plan with Elaine in the mix was better than a brilliant plan of Dahnus’s without her there. The Devori would become recalcitrant. They’d argue and demand and then they’d hurt Hadith and whenever Elaine thought of Hadith like that, hurt, she felt a part of herself die.

The world was flickering in and out of her vision. She was blinking fast, she realised. Then it blurred.

“Lady Franklin,” Zinif said, compassion in his voice. “Call back your friend. Let them take you home.”

For a moment Elaine was tempted. Let Dahnus handle this. He was much better at this kind of thing than she was. But then the thought of Hadith injured and Elaine not being there with him.

“I can’t,” Elaine whispered.

“I like your plan, Satya. But it needs some work.”

Elaine looked up at Kerrok and his golden eyes. He had blond hair in locks with decorations threaded through strands. His horns, so close to Tessan, which is where the genetically altered Tessans had gotten their horns from, swept majestically back from his brow bone in a colour like sun burnt hay, and his skin, like the skin she’d seen on some Hispanic people on the beach during her and Pyri’s vacation to Brazil during the academy holidays. Dark, and beautiful and showing off every muscle visible to her even in the artificially lit darkness of the port. How had she never really looked at him before?

“What would you change?” she asked.

“Not change, add. We can’t risk Lord Efari. So we stack the odds in our favour. I know of a weapons dealer on this planet. Let me make a call?”

“How do you know of this dealer?” Radiin asked.

“Within a few hours of meeting my mate, I knew every supplier of defensive and offensive weapon in a fifty light year radius. I must protect my mate,” Kerrok finished, looking at Elaine, his eyes softening.

“Are you saying you are going to do this?” Zinif asked.

Radiin nodded, even as Kerrok made his call, his voice carrying across the port.

“As Lady Franklin said, we work for her.” Thalvuten’s voice was impossibly deep. He smiled at Elaine.

“We’ll go get the ship ready, then,” Amin said, nodding at Elaine before him and his two pack mates walked off, crossing the port to their ship which stood a couple of hundred feet away.

“Besides, Devori are weak. I could crush one with my thumb. Come, Zinif, let us crush some Devori.”

Zinif shook his head, but clearly seeing he was outnumbered, he and Thalvuten walked over to Elaine to flank her for the short walk to the ship.

“Fine, but when we get fired, I’m not going back to Tessa.”

“You can’t be fired. I’m the one employing you. Dahnus will just have to lump it.” Elaine grinned at him.

Kerrok was still talking on the comm, but he turned to watch her. Radiin standing nearby, watching silently.

They’d come through for her. It was a stupid, foolish endeavour and still they’d come through for her.