Chapter 12
The Test: Part One
We expect to find the orange idiots, the feathered piss stain, and Chancellor Uzellarin on our doorstep, but we don’t expect the three unwanteds to look as smug as they do. “This is the test, yes?” I ask, gauging whether there’s something we’re missing.
“Yes, Zivren,” the chancellor says with her signature crowd pleasing smile. “We’re here to administer the first part of your mate test. How are you and June on this lovely morning?”
“Fine.” I don’t offer anything more because this is an interruption from the morning I had planned, which was to jerk my cock and spray my seed all over June’s body until she came so many times I had to resuscitate her.
Now that I know how brilliantly her body reacts to my come, I can think of nothing else.
“Right, well, may we come in?” the chancellor asks, giving me a look which clearly tells me to change my attitude.
I step aside, giving them only enough room to enter one at a time, and I make sure my arms are crossed and flexed as the orange idiots enter last, forcing them to step sideways in order to fit around me. It’s a small victory, but a victory nonetheless.
“Hi,” June greets with a timid wave. “How do we begin?”
They separate us. The person taking the test is to be led outside, some distance away from the house, so the other cannot hear what’s being said.
The other will wait inside with Akkal, wearing a pair of industrial ear cups to ensure the inability to hear the testee’s answers.
As they put the ear cups on June, Akkal, thinking this is a family activity, grabs his music ear cups from his room and puts them on.
June goes along with it, turning up the volume enough that he remains blissfully ignorant to what’s happening.
One of the orange idiots remains in the family room with June and Akkal, and the rest take me outside for my part of the test.
My palms dampen once we reach our place on the shore.
June and I have spent an entire moon cycle together pretending to be mates, and I’d like to think I’ve learned enough about her to pass this test in my sleep.
But did we ask each other the right questions?
Do we trust each other enough by now to have revealed the difficult truths they might inquire about?
The only guidance we were given was to get to know each other. Did we do enough?
She’s too far away for me to hear her thoughts even if I wanted to, and even if she was closer, she’d have to be thinking about her answers at precisely the right moment for me to hear them. If this were a test on which I could cheat, I would do so in a heartbeat.
“What is your mate’s complete name?” Lord Forchan asks, already sounding bored.
I know for him this is simply a hurdle in his plan to execute June the moment he has her in custody, but I intend to snuff that fantasy out at every available opportunity. “Juniper Meredith Townsend.”
He gives me no indication if my answer was correct. “Her length of existence?”
“Forty-three Earth turns and ninety-seven days.”
So far, so good. I know those two answers were the right ones.
“What are the names of her vatra and tetra?”
Ficq. She doesn’t talk about them often because they died in a vehicle accident when she was twelve, leaving her orphaned, after which she spent the rest of her minor turns in various foster homes.
“Alice and…” She doesn’t have many fond memories of her vatra, but what was that asshole’s name?
I can see Lord Forchan’s eyes growing brighter the longer I remain silent.
Then it comes to me. “Steven. Alice and Steven Townsend.”
“At how many turns did your mate learn to tell time?”
What kind of question is this? How would I have known to ask it? “Six turns?”
“Has she ever broken a bone?”
This, I know. “Yes, three. Her pinky toe, wrist, and one rib.”
“How is her blood classified?”
Because of my job, I can make an educated guess, but I’m not confident it’s correct. “HX927B3.”
“Her most embarrassing moment?”
My mind drifts back to the table of females calling her a murderer behind her back. I could see it hurt her, but it didn’t appear to be a new kind of pain. I go with something universal, yet likely for June. “She tripped in school and her classmates mocked her.”
“Does your mate wish to make additional offspring?”
I know this one! “No, because her body has entered perimenopause and it’s unlikely she can.”
“Perry-what?” Lord Forchan asks with a sneer.
I don’t bother explaining. “It’s a phase of life for human females and it’s very uncomfortable. Look it up.”
“What’s a choice your mate wishes she could take back?”
Could the answer to this be related to the murder accusations? I’m not sure what the actual answer is, and I don’t want to guess if it could incriminate her, so I tell them, “I don’t know.”
There are at least a dozen more questions about June, and then the same ones for me before my part of the test is complete.
June and I switch places, and I wait on the edge of my seat for her to return.
Lord Forchan and Chancellor Uzellarin say nothing about our score once we’re done.
Just that they’ll return two moon cycles from now for the second part of the test, and the orange idiots will remain on the island for further observation of our mate bond.
As soon as the door closes behind them, we compare notes.
“What was your most embarrassing moment?” I ask her. “I don’t think I guessed correctly.”
She takes a deep breath. “There’s no judgment here, right? You won’t look at me differently based on my answers?”
“Of course I won’t.”
“My boyfriend was sleeping over at my apartment. We’d had a movie night.
This was right after college. We watched some war movie I barely remember, and he’d cooked us this stir fry that tasted…
off. Anyway, we go to sleep, and I have this dream about the movie.
There are all these gunshots, and it felt incredibly real.
I woke up thinking someone was breaking into my apartment and shooting at us.
” The corners of her mouth turn downward as she pauses.
“But it was just me farting in my sleep.”
A surprised laugh bursts out of me as I envision the visceral fear on her face as she popped up in bed expecting a massacre only to discover a stream of toots coming out of her adorable backside.
She smacks my arm as I continue to laugh, unable to compose myself.
“Why did you even tell them that story if you were so embarrassed? Why not choose something else?”
She shrugs. “I don’t know. They asked. I panicked. The truth came out.”
When she asks for mine, I tell her about the time I intentionally soiled my pants in the middle of our family’s annual ball to avoid dancing with the princess of a neighboring planet.
“Why didn’t you just dance with her?”
“I was too nervous I’d flatten her toes.” I shudder at the memory. “All those people watching…”
She drops her face in her hands, grumbling, “Mine was so much worse than yours.”
My laughter fades as I get ready to ask the next question. “What about the choice you wish you could take back?”
Her answer comes easily. “Oh, that. I put my coworker’s credit card number on Reddit after she told me my skin wouldn’t look so haggard if I drank more water.”
I shouldn’t push this, but I can’t help but wonder why her answer had nothing to do with her fleeing Etirinu.
“Really? That was the choice? You don’t have any bigger regrets?
” Although, even if her answer did have something to do with the events that brought her to the island, she wouldn’t reveal that to Lord Forchan and his ilk.
She shakes her head, unbothered. “Nope. That’s it. It was shitty of me. It took her years to untangle that mess and get the fraudulent charges removed from her account.”
“What about the real answer? I mean, if Lord Forchan wasn’t the one asking, would your answer be the same?”
Her gaze narrows, and I sense a shift in her mood. “What are you getting at, Ziv?”
“Nothing,” I tell her. “I was merely curious.” When that response doesn’t seem adequate to her, I add, “We don’t know what the other part of the test will be like. I want to make sure I know all there is to know about you. That’s all.”
“Well, I highly doubt they’ll ask the same questions a second time.” Her tone is clipped as she rises to her feet, striding into the kitchen for a glass of water. “What would be the point of that?”
I don’t like the way she’s looking at me, or the stiffness in her posture. This morning, before the test––that’s what I want to return to. The good feelings.
“You’re right,” I tell her, coming to stand in front of her. “Let’s forget about it.” I press a kiss to her hair and hope the day can go on without the same tension in the air, and that whatever answers we gave were good enough for us to pass.