Chapter 1 #2
alone for the rest of his life. If Mekos fell in love and that woman married another . . . Kaley didn’t want to think of what
the consequences would be to Mekos. An entire life without his chosen partner?
Tanek turned her in his arms. “We must not think of that now.” He ran his hands up and down her back. “Unless you want to change rooms. Mekos and I could be together and you can stay with the princess.”
“Nope!” she said firmly.
Tanek smiled. “Speaking of babies, my ears are fine but my next son may have ridges.”
“Oh? And what if it’s a girl? Maybe she’ll have wings like a Never.”
“I guess we’ll have to wait and see what we can produce,” he said as he began kissing her.
“This place is great!” Mekos said from Aradella’s bedroom doorway. “The house, the outside. I’ve never seen anything like
it.”
In Aradella’s life, she was rarely allowed privacy, but even so, she wasn’t used to males being in her room. Or in her house.
Or for that matter, on her island.
He was eating an orange and had another one in his hand. “Here!” He tossed it to her.
Aradella had to stretch, but she caught it.
“Good catch.” He sauntered into her room and looked out the big window. “Where do you want to go first? Wonder if the markets
are held every day? It’s nice to think everything is free. I could get Grandpapá something. Or we could go see where the steam
from the volcano comes out. I heard they have festivals there.” He turned back to look at her. “Which one do you like? Or
do you know of something else?”
On the bed was a big cloth bag and she’d pulled out a few dresses.
“Is that all you have to wear? You need pants like Kaley wears.”
She had no idea what to reply. The idea of being free to walk wherever she wanted was beyond her comprehension.
“What are you doing here?!” came a shout and the two young people looked at the doorway.
Standing there was a large woman with crinkly gray hair pulled tightly back.
Her dark eyes were full of anger. “You!” She sneered at Mekos.
“Get out! How dare you put yourself near the Honored Girl? You cannot—”
Aradella was so used to attacks from people that she reacted quickly. “Queen Olina has ordered that he is to stay with me.
For my protection.”
“You need no protection here. Valona is all the security anyone needs.” She was obviously insulted.
“I’m sure that’s true,” Aradella said calmly. “However, I must send word to Queen Olina that you will not comply with what
she has arranged for me.” She raised her left arm where the chip was. “I will tell her now. What is your name?”
It took the big woman a moment to recover, then she lowered her voice. “Valona said that you are to stay with me.”
Aradella had her fingertips on the chip that was buried under her skin. “I understand. I’ll tell my aunt, the queen, that
Valona’s orders supersede hers. And your name is?”
The woman seemed to recover enough that she stood up straighter, then gave another sneering look at Mekos. “He is to stay
away from me.” She stomped out of the room.
Mekos went to Aradella. “That was wonderful! You were so very clever!”
Aradella felt her face turn red at the compliment. She wasn’t sure what to say. “But I wasn’t good enough for your father”
came out of her mouth.
Mekos took a step back, looking as though he’d been slapped. “He and Kaley . . .” He didn’t finish.
Aradella was embarrassed at what she’d said, but she didn’t tell him that. Instead, she followed the big woman into the open
living area. Mekos was behind her.
“I am the guide. You need to know nothing more,” the woman said. “Come! I will lead you to see this place.”
What followed was thirty minutes of the guide raving about what a spectacular place the Lair was—and all of it was due to the magnificent, glorious leadership of Valona.
They were told of her beauty, her wisdom, her kindness.
“She is generous to a fault. She gifts us with holidays and ceremonies that others can only dream about. Whatever we have, it is due to Valona.”
Aradella’s eyes seemed to grow wider with every word. Olina ruled by fear, but Valona seemed to rule by love and kindness.
How was that done? When she looked at Mekos, he gave a gesture of vomiting. Aradella clamped her lips together to keep from
laughing.
When they entered the village, they saw that it was perfectly kept. There wasn’t a weed in a flower box, a pebble in the trimmed
grass, an unwashed window. As for the women, they were all clean and tidy—and they abruptly halted and stared at Aradella.
“Good Day of the Moon to you,” one woman said softly. “Is that her?” asked a very pretty girl. When the woman nodded, the
girl mouthed thank you to Aradella.
Mekos stepped closer to Aradella. “There’s something not right here.”
Aradella nodded in agreement, but she didn’t know what was making her feel that way.
They left the village and entered the lovely countryside. Tropical forest surrounded them. “We will now see the stupendous
home where Valona lives,” the guide said in a voice full of awe.
“Maybe it’s made of gingerbread,” Mekos said, but Aradella didn’t get his meaning.
It was on the path to the great and wondrous Valona’s house that they saw a little girl step out of the greenery at the edge
of the road. When she turned, they saw that she had a human face but with dark circles around her eyes, and a little nose.
She looked like a raccoon.
“Get out of here!” the guide shouted, then hissed like a snake. “Go!”
The frightened child ran back into the forest.
The guide’s face was red with anger. “You should not have seen that. They’re filthy creatures! But the women will not stop—”
She didn’t finish.
“She is a Lely,” Mekos said quietly. “Are there many here?”
“There are too many of those things and they should be destroyed! Monkeys and a wolf. There’s even a bear!” She was almost
shouting. “Those things go against all that is good. They—” She broke off at the sound of a horse close by. “Hurry! We might
see her.”
The guide ran as fast as she could, Aradella and Mekos behind her, and they came to a crossroads. Not far away, a woman on
a horse came into view. She was elegantly beautiful, with long black hair, and a dark dress that showed off her hourglass
figure. She was almost out of sight when she abruptly pulled the reins back. The horse reared but the woman didn’t lose her
balance. She turned and looked at the three of them standing there. Her eyes were on Aradella—and she frowned. But then she
seemed to decide that whatever she didn’t like was all right, and she nodded at Aradella in greeting. In the next instant,
she kicked the big horse and was out of sight.
“That was Valona,” the guide said breathlessly. “You are fortunate to have seen her. She is the most beautiful woman on the
planet.”
Aradella shrugged. “Actually, I have some cousins who are better looking than—” At the guide’s fierce look, the princess closed
her mouth.
The woman angrily walked ahead of them, while Aradella and Mekos stayed behind. “I don’t like her,” she said.
“Nor do I,” he replied, then pulled his long hair back to show his ears. They were pointed. “I am a Lely.” He seemed to expect
Aradella to be shocked.
“I know,” she said. “Your mother is half fox, and you were born to your father when he was sixteen. That he could get a fox
with child shows his extraordinary strength.”
Mekos blinked at her, then laughed. “It did take strength with my mother. She has claws.” The guide had turned and was frowning
at them to come on. “I can’t stand this. Will you be all right if I leave?”
“Perfectly fine,” Aradella said, but her heart sank at the thought of spending time alone with the awful woman.
Dutifully, they followed her down the road that Valona had been on and heard more about the glory of her. Goddesses had fewer
good attributes than Valona did.
Aradella slowed with Mekos so they were well behind the woman. “Should we pick up rocks and make a shrine to her?” she asked.
“All hail Valona,” Mekos said. “We can offer prayers to her.”
“And food and flowers.”
Mekos plucked some white flowers from a row of bushes growing by the side of the road. “I’ll offer this and say that it pales
beside her beauty.”
“You better say more than that. That’s oleander and it’s deadly poisonous.”
He tossed the flower away. “How do you know that?”
Aradella shrugged. “Just something I heard. Come on, she’s waiting for us.”
“What’s next? We get to kiss the droppings of Valona’s horse?”
She tried to suppress a laugh since the woman was glaring at them, but Aradella’s only thought was that she didn’t want to
be left alone with the guide.
The road led alongside a steep drop-off. It was as though the long-ago lava flow had created a gully. There might be a river
running at the bottom of it, but there were so many trees with hanging vines and tall bushes that they couldn’t see down.
“What’s that?” Mekos asked loudly. He was moving about to see through the trees.
“There’s a waterfall on one wall.” The guide frowned at him.
“Could we go to see that?”
The woman glared. “Absolutely not! Valona does not allow anyone to go there!”
Mekos looked at Aradella and gave a slight jerk to his head. She didn’t know what he meant. In the next second, he grabbed a vine dangling from a tree and swung out on it. He disappeared into the forest.
Again, the guide’s face turned red with anger. Through clenched teeth, she said, “Come! We must return to your house and you
will stay there until he can be found. No man is allowed to wander about freely. There are women here! They have to be protected
from male abuse. From their incessant violence. We have to—”
Aradella didn’t think about what she was doing. She reached up, grabbed a vine near the one Mekos had used, and swung out
over the abyss. Behind her, she heard a scream of terror, but it felt so good to move that she ignored it.