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  When she wandered into the Forge, Sarsen immediately thought the Creators had returned. While their forms were similar, he could spy the difference. A relation, perhaps, sent to Sonhadra to finish what Sheenika started.

  He should despise her for what her people did to his people. Not a single unaltered person remained on Sonhadra. They were all captured, conquered or transformed. His people were gone, and he and his two brothers had been alone for a thousand years in the monument built to the Creator’s ego, and all he could think about was how she smelled like river water. Sweat, smoke, blood, fear and under that, the clean scent of the river. His mate had been from the river tribe. Memories stirred, but the accompanying emotions remained as elusive as ever.

  A second Creator entered. This one was larger, male, and not as healthy as her. The heat did not agree with him.

  They traded angry words.

  Sarsen couldn’t help himself. He breathed in her scent, letting it fill his lungs.

  She shouted in surprise, falling away from him, and before Sarsen could apologize, she struck the male Creator dead. Violence always followed the Creators and their elegant, cruel kin. This little female Creator wasted no time.

  She had done what no valos had been able to do in a thousand years: she spilled the blood of the Creators and opened the heartstone vault.

  In the past, Sheenika had sliced her own palm to open the vault. This female was either crueler or more cunning in that she sacrificed another creator and let him bleed out on the floor.

  Sarsen would have to dispose of the body soon, but for now he followed the female Creator down the spiral stairs.

  Lucie

  She descended the stairs, one hand against the stone wall to keep her balance. The heat lessened, but every step down highlighted her bone-tired exhaustion, the smarting ankle, and the thousand scrapes and bruises that covered her battered body. With Halliday gone—she tried not to think about what she had done—she could rest anywhere, if the stone golem left her alone. She’d worry about that later. She probably imagined it. Stress and exhaustion could play tricks with your mind.

  The stairs emptied into a room and a huge pile of crystals filled the room, like a cartoon drawing of treasure. A hole occupied the center of the ceiling. Lucie assumed it was the chute from the anvil. The crystals were tossed down into this heap and discarded. Lucie had a hard time believing the giant pile simply to be discarded rubbish or imperfect pieces. Lumpy shapes, not facets like gems, of the crystal caught the light and glowed.

  No.

  She peered closer. Some of them glowed, the others just reflected the light. The jagged edges of the ones closest to her feet caught at her slippers. She waded into the pile and held up a crystal for examination.

  It was cracked, the light gone completely. Another crystal held a small ember of fading light. Perhaps it would be extinguished soon.

  A light from the center of the pile caught her eye. Wading in, the crystal pile came up to mid-thigh. Moving was slow going as every step proved a battle to push the dark crystals out of the way, but she made her way to her beacon. The sharp edges from where they cracked scraped against her arms. Finally, she plucked up the crystal with the strong glow.

  It shone like a rare jewel, oval with golden flakes embedded deep within. It was beautiful.

  Two more crystals nearby burned with the same intensity. Lucie pocketed two of the crystals, but she clutched the first perfect crystal in her bloody hand. She turned to leave.

  The golem stood behind her.

  Too exhausted to jump, scream or run away, Lucie held out the crystal in a trembling hand. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to take it. You can have it back.”

  The golem looked at her hand, as if confused. He said something, words sharp and crackling like an evening campfire, but he didn’t sound upset or angry that she’d found the treasure pile.

  “Please. Take it back.” She gave her hand a shake for emphasis.

  He came to a decision and snatched the crystal away. He cradled it to his chest before pushing it into the notch she noticed earlier.

  The golem fell to his knees, gasping for air.

  “Are you okay?” On instinct, Lucie rushed to his side. She knew nothing about his physiology, didn’t speak the language, and had no supplies, but she could hold his hand while he went through… whatever this was.

  “We need help!” she called out. She stroked his arm while his entire body shook. “You’re going to be okay. Someone will come. I’m sorry I took your crystal. I didn’t know.”

  Two figures entered the vault. One was enormous, like a mountain, and took up the entire door. The other was slender, dark like smoldering charcoal, and squeezed past the mountain. They spoke rapidly, voices pitched as if asking questions.

  Panicked, Lucie reached for the other two crystals and held them out.

  The slender one approached, plucking it out of her hand before she could change her mind.

  The mountain in the door just regarded her with those calm eyes. She recognized him as the stone golem by the river, minus the plate armor. “Hi again. I got one left with your name on it.”

  The slender one grabbed it and handed it to the mountain. He spoke, asking her a question.

  “She... not speak the Creator’s tongue,” a rasping voice said. Her fallen golem lurched to his feet, clearly pained.

  The slender one spoke. “Bonded me... blood.”

  Her brain caught up with events. She was in a room with three aliens and no exit. And they just spoke English. Sorta.

  Nope.

  It was too much. She literally fell from the stars, survived a crash landing, made first contact with an alien, probably murdered Halliday, and that pushed the absolute limit of weird her brain could take.

  She felt herself shutting down as her vision went dark. She barely noticed the crystal digging into her back when she hit the ground.

  Asche

  His brothers were bumbling idiots. Ertale tackled the female Creator—after opening the vault there remained little doubt in his mind that was what she was—and then encased her in a protective fire shield. His dangerous and irresponsible actions confounded Asche. Infuriated him, actually; so much so that he didn’t know how to express his rage at his brother.

  Ertale could have crushed her, broken a bone, suffocated her or burned her. Yes, he had protected the small Creator from an ak’rena but then he abandoned her.

  Sarsen was no better. He’d frightened her, which drew the attention of the other Creator, who had hurt her.

  Fools, the both of them. Had it been so many years that they had forgotten how to care for the Creators? Apparently so.

  Wait, he was infuriated and angry. He felt; for the first time in a thousand years he felt an emotion.

  Asche rubbed at the newly reinstalled heartstone. What was he expecting? A sudden onslaught of returning emotions? Well, yes. This gradual warming seemed so anticlimactic. The way her fingers trembled when Sarsen took his heartstone from her outstretched hand—

  Asche couldn’t name the feeling lodged in his throat. He’d have to examine it carefully. Until then, his female was injured and filthy and dehydrated, and would be hungry when she woke.

  Sarsen and Ertale followed him as he took her to the most lavish apartment suite in the city. This was not the one Sheenika used during the city’s construction, but it was meant for her. Sheenika never actually stayed a single night in the City in the Caldera. She slept in her ship, trusting only her computers and cameras to keep her safe at night.

  Her paranoia had not been not misplaced. If any valos could injure her, they would. If she displayed a weakness, even sleeping, they would use that to rid themselves of her and her curse.

  This one was different from the other Creators. Asche could tell. She reacted to the valos with surprise, not with haughty disdain. She made no commands. She gave them their heartstones; cradled them in her bleeding hands and then returned the stones as if they were trinkets and not everything.
r />   She was kind.

  To a valo. Amazing.

  Creator or not, Asche would serve her. She clearly needed someone to provide care for her. She was injured and thirsty and hungry and exhausted. That no one would help a kind hearted person bothered Asche. That her own kind had injured her…

  He cleaned the grime from her face with a cloth and cleaned the visible wounds, covering the lacerations on her hands with a thick healing paste. Sarsen complained the entire time. He ignored his brother and removed the tattered remains of her garment to check for additional wounds and clean her. When she stirred to waking, he coaxed her to sip from a water flask. She never stayed awake for long. When she slept, he dabbed her parched lips with a damp cloth. All the while he spoke, telling her of the long wait he and his brothers endured, waiting for her.

  While brushing out her tangled hair, he discovered a small device affixed to the shell of her ear. He had seen similar devices before. Sheenika had used one for translation before his people learned her language. Asche assumed this device served a similar function.

  “You don’t have to do this,” Sarsen said, standing in the doorway.

  Asche shifted his weight as he knelt by the bedside. Carefully he dabbed cool water on her lips; her greedy skin soaking up the moisture. “I want to.”

  “But you don’t have to.”

  Asche set down the cloth and bowl of clean water. “It feels… odd to want to do something and not be compelled.” And he wanted to care for her, this female with soft, smooth skin that was so vulnerable to harm. “She is not like the Creators.”

  “No,” Sarsen said, scrutinizing the sleeping female. Physically the female appeared smaller and more fragile than Sheenika and her kind. “I do not trust her. We do not know her intentions with us.”

  Asche shrugged, unconcerned. “We will find out soon enough.”

  Ertale arrived with a basket of fruit, vegetables and herbs. As the female differed from the Creators, they had to guess as to what she could safely consume. For now, Asche worked on a vegetable broth and would serve her fresh fruit. It seemed the safest option.

  As the sun neared the horizon, she woke.

  Asche pressed the water flask to her lips before she could shout in surprise or faint again. She drank deeply. Flask empty, he traded her a bowl of broth.

  She spoke, garbled noises that almost sounded like words.

  “Is her mind damaged?” Sarsen asked, leaning over her in the bed. She flinched back, babbling more while she clutched the bowl to her chest. “She sounds like a child.”

  Asche eyed her form under the sheet. She did not looked like a child but she was small for a Creator. “You are frightening her.”

  “I am not.”

  “You are. Can you not feel that her heart rate is elevated?” His heartstone responded to her fear. Sarsen had to be willfully ignorant to not notice.

  Her eyes darted from him to Sarsen and back as they spoke.

  “Does she understand us?” Sarsen asked.

  “Perhaps. There is a device like Sheenika had.”

  Sarsen spat at their Creator’s name. The female jumped, broth sloshing in the bowl.

  “What happening?” Her words slurred, thick like a syrup.

  “Eat. You need strength,” Asche said.

  She frowned at the bowl and spoon. In her hands, they looked massive. He did not think about that. He should have used a smaller bowl. Or made one for her size. “Forgive me,” he said.

  “Why I understand you?”

  “You’re not eating.”

  “You talk much.”

  Asche looked at his brothers. Did she want him to talk or did she want him to be quiet? Ertale shrugged one massive shoulder.

  “Eat, female!” Sarsen snapped.

  She jumped, dropping the spoon. More hot broth sloshed over the bowl’s rim. Asche cleaned up the mess quickly, tossing Sarsen a dark look. “Forgive my brother, he has been in a mood for the last decade.”

  “Why I naked?” She adjusted the blanket over her chest with one hand, holding the bowl in the other.

  “Are you always an endless stream of questions,” Sarsen said roughly. “Eat and we’ll answer. Don’t waste Asche’s soup or he’ll flog himself.”

  “I won’t,” he said, giving her a smile. In the past when he displeased Sheenika, he would have flogged his back raw. Now he felt no compulsion to injure himself as recompense. Another gift.

  She gasped and flinched away from his hand. “Your teeth.”

  His pressed his lips closed, covering the sharp teeth and fangs.

  “I am tired of this,” Sarsen announced. He stood at the foot of the bed, hands on his hips and towering over the female. “What is your name. Why are you here. What are your intentions.”

  Statements, Asche noted, and not questions. Asche understood the root cause of Sarsen’s impatience. For the first time, they had access to the heartstones. Those that still held a spark could be freed. The dormant heartstones might still be revived. Sarsen would rather be doing that than catering to the female who freed them.

  Asche believed they could do both.

  “Lucinda Morales. Of Earth. Lucie. Just Lucie.”

  Ertale’s shoulders went back, finally paying attention to the conversation. Asche understood. Lucinda sounded very similar to Lusheenn, Sheenika’s brother. He enjoyed sending his Radiant Valos to battle with the Fire Valos. Perhaps she was descended from the Creators, after all.

  “My ship crashed. I want go home,” she said. “Please, you take me back. Help the others.”

  Chapter Eight

  Lucinda

  Lucie woke to find herself naked in a massive bed, surrounded by the golems. She should have been mortified. She was naked, and someone had gotten her naked. Years on the Concord had stripped away any sense of modesty she had. The fact that she was clean and comfortable was far more interesting than if her golem alien caught a glimpse of her boobs.

  Almost bare themselves, they wore the tiniest loincloths that didn’t really hide anything. The one closest to her, the one the color of smoldering charcoal, squatted, and she could see everything.

  Everything.

  It was… interesting. Big. Purple. Thick in the middle. Bumps and possibly spikes at the base. Holy cow. It would either be amazing or atrocious. Maybe she’d been in prison too long, because alien wang didn’t look so bad from her vantage point.

  “Eat and we’ll discuss rescuing your people,” the stern one said.

  Lucie snapped her eyes up and forward. “I no looking—”

  She nearly bit her tongue at her awkward words. I no looking. Honestly. She must have lost a lot of blood or hit her head.

  “Eat. Please.” The slender one the color of smoldering charcoal pressed the bowl back into her hands.

  The tallest one said nothing, observing everything.

  And every single one of the aliens somehow spoke English.

  Right. Nothing weird about this.

  The weirdest thing of all was that she didn’t feel afraid. Lucie had spent the last four years of her life in a literal hell with bad people who did terrible things. She knew bad when she saw it, and these guys weren’t giving her the heebie-jeebies. That meant something, right? They were different, maybe dangerous, but she felt safe.

  “Am I hallucinating? Hit my head?” She held the spoon to her lips and sniffed. Salty and not unpleasant with pungent herbs that reminded her of rosemary, the broth smelled good.

  Smoldering Charcoal sighed dramatically and took the bowl and spoon away from her. He pushed the spoon to her lips. She swallowed before she could think better about it and worry about poison or alien bacteria wreaking havoc on her stomach. She tolerated the water just fine.

  “I am Asche,” he said. “You are safe. You need to rest.”

  She repeated his name, earning a nod and another harrowing smile. That dude had way too many pointy teeth. She wanted to ask about Halliday but considering the state she left the guard in, she decided to st
ick to something safe. “Who are they?”

  “Big and silent is Ertale. You saw him by the river.” Another spoonful. “The creature that attacked you was an ak’rena.”

  “The shrieking monster.”

  “Yes, that is a good description.”

  “This is a waste of my time,” the stern one proclaimed, pivoting on his heel and leaving. “We’ll retrieve her people in the morning.”

  “And that is Sarsen,” Asche said.

  “Is he always so—” She searched for the right word. She didn’t want to offend them. This was their home, and she was entirely at their mercy. He said he would help, but he didn’t seem happy about it. Did she need him to help her happily or did she just need his help?

  “Yes, but he is our brother and we love him.” Another spoonful. “It is a struggle.”

  Lucie held up a hand. “That’s delicious but salty. I need something to drink.”

  The big and silent one handed her a flask, cool to the touch. She drained the vessel and returned it with a slight smile. Their hands touched briefly. His hot fingers skated across the back of her hand.

  “Your speech ass improved rapidly,” he said. “Do you need to eliminate waste?”

  She hadn’t until he mentioned it. Suddenly her bladder refused to be ignored. He helped her out of the bed, wrapped the sheet around her and led her to the fanciest place in the universe which was meant for pee. The floors and walls were a smooth white stone, almost like marble, and it glowed in the daylight. Warm under her bare feet, Lucie found the wash basin and toilet.

  Asche watched her as she hitched up the sheets, ready to sit. Yeah, not cool. Pervert. She motioned for him to turn around before she did her business.

  Finished, she rinsed her hands in the sink. A gel oozed from a dispenser instead of water but she got the idea. Hand sanitizer was hand sanitizer.

  “I have so many questions,” she said as he lead her back to the massive bed. She fought back a yawn. Thirst sated and belly full, exhaustion crept up on her. She found it hard to keep her eyes open. “How are you speaking English?”