Chapter 19
I have never felt like a princess. But I have never rode on a wolf Shifter’s back at the front of a pack like some warrior babe leading a charge into enemy territory.
Zorin, in his four-legged form, is larger than Rorsar, Davarok, and Kren.
He is fast, dark, and warm between my legs.
His black fur with its silver-frosted tips drifts and swirls with the wind.
Onidus runs alongside us, his pale white gold form blurring with each step like he’s enhanced or moves by way of magic.
Zorin eases his pace to a lumbering walk that sways my body with each step.
Onidus remains beside us, the others behind as we enter the Abr race grounds.
The few couples and singles who are not on the creatures tour whisper among themselves in the garden beyond the open race field and the benches along the exterior of the main complex building.
“What’s it like up there?” Onidus asks with a slight chuckle to his voice.
Zorin glances back at me as he continues toward the entrance.
I run my hands through Zorin’s thick, soft coat, and hate the idea that I’ll have to get down. “So much fun. Humans don’t run nearly that fast. And he’s hot so I don’t get cold.”
“Hot huh?” Onidus jeers at Zorin. Then he quiets like he doesn’t want to say what’s on his mind. “Looks like fun. Wouldn’t know. We can’t bond with Mindorans. We tend to burn their fur.”
“Can’t you shut it off?” I ask, lying down on Zorin’s back and soaking in the comfort of my big protector beneath me. Noticing a scar breaking up his fur, I spread his coat and run my fingers over it.
Zorin shudders. His posture rises with more pride.
“No. Unless we are in immense agony and near death. That is why some of us master masking.” Onidus shrugs. “It’s not like Mindor would ever like us riding them like beasts of burden. So consider it an honor.”
“I do.” I find another scar. They are everywhere. The ache that forms in my chest makes me press my lips to the closest. How can someone so good get so abused?
But I know it’s because he sacrifices, he doesn’t ask for help, and he no doubt has trusted others when he shouldn’t have.
Zorin and his pack circle the complex building toward the males’ hangars. I catch our reflection in the glass windows. Racers inside turn to look. Aliens of all kinds gape at us.
Doors open and four more Mindorans, including one female, step outside.
They shift and join our pack. Rorsar gave me a quick introduction to their M-pack as we rode out to find Zorin, and seeing them all together behind us fills me with invigorating energy.
Zorin might try to take on the world alone, like Rorsar said, but it’s clear he has an entire family right here with him.
Abr is definitely going to have something to say about this. A pack of huge wolf shifters stalking through the race grounds like they’re on a hunt…
But when I notice Ohni inside the main hallway outside the creatures’ facility, she gives me a covert thumbs up. The way her wide eyes and open smile track us, I don’t think she’s seen anything like it either.
I sit up and smooth Zorin’s fur back into place. As I do, I notice more racers walking to the windows, including several Mindorans with eyes a deeper blue than the Shifters behind me.
Must be Lunas.
Carielle flicks a glossy curl of hair over her shoulder then crosses her arms, looking thoroughly disgusted.
I can’t help but smile. Eat your heart out, bitch.
“Ooh, she’s pissed,” Onidus sings out. “But she looks like a karat, so who gives a fuck?”
“A carrot?” I ask. “Like the vegetable?”
He laughs. “No, a karat is what we call the entitled civilians born into power that think gold flake on their breakfast and diamond encrusted halos around their irises are necessities they can’t live without.”
“Both sound painful.”
“What is it your people say?” he asks. “Beauty is pain?”
Zorin shifts upright and catches my legs, holding me up. “If that’s what someone thinks is beautiful.”
Onidus holds the door to the hangar wing open for us as the rest of Zorin’s pack stands and follows us inside. “I don’t care what she wears. Rot on the inside will still make her ugly in my eyes. And I can always see through the fakeness to the soul underneath.”
He darts his gaze at me as Zorin takes my hand and guides me toward a glowing ramp.
My chest tightens. “What do you see in me?”
Zorin draws me protectively close and stares him down.
Onidus lifts his hands in innocence. “Just a good heart trying to survive and avoid more pain. Please don’t eat me, Zorin.”
Zorin sucks on an elongated tooth and scrutinizes him, then continues to the ship, keeping me under his arm.
“Stars, he’s moody,” Onidus remarks.
“It’s just his rut,” Kren mutters. “It always makes us a bit grouchy. It’s worse that he can’t do anything about it.”
A shiny gold man stands at the top of the ramp in a vibrant ship of polished white metal.
“Tessi?”
Zorin encourages me up to him.
“I am General Viriden. We spoke on the com.”
I don’t know why, but I wish I could hug him, maybe because he’s a friend of my mother’s, and he feels like the last thread I’ve got let of my old life, of the home I was supposed to have. But he’s an officer, and I can’t break protocol.
“We have to leave soon to help with patrols around Mindor. Please follow me.”
Zorin stays close, his pack not far behind us.
Viriden leads me into a small room where a woman stands by an orb of glass with a chair in the middle. “Have a seat.”
“Looks like it could suffocate me.” I stop by the open door. “Can it?”
“No. It will just protect the ship from anything that might…manifest,” the woman says.
I reluctantly climb inside and take a seat. Viriden closes the door and latches it. “We’ve got a series of tests to run. It might tingle. But sit tight, and we’ll have you out of there in a few minutes.”
I fidget in the chair, feeling Zorin’s eyes and those of his pack on me. Onidus stands off to the side. He smiles when I meet his eyes. He tilts toward Viriden, like they’re speaking, even though I can’t hear what they say.
The bubble gets hot for a moment, then very cold.
The air vibrates then shimmers. The cell returns to normal temperature as audible sounds of different pitches and frequencies cycle.
A probe rises from the floor and presses a panel into my chest as another pushes into my back. They run more frequencies through me.
I hope they’re getting something out of this, because I feel nothing. I would hate to disappoint them after the parade and the stress on extra security.
I’m probably nothing special, and it was just a dream.
Then a set of panels rise from the floor to my right and left sides, boasting white half-domes with pearlescent light.
“Place your hands on the disks please,” the woman says.
I crack open my fists, fight to straighten my fingers, and realize just how stressed I am about this whole situation. A strange hum fills my chest as I move to set my hands on the domes. Settling my palms down, I feel a tingle run through my body.
The woman’s screen flashes, and the frequency of the prickling vibrations changes. It’s like I’ve accidentally bumped a charging unit on a ship’s engine starter.
Zorin steps close to the glass, body tense, eyes on me. He speaks, though I can’t hear him.
The panels change colors to one blue and one red.
The same vibration pattern thrums through my palms and into my forearms. Light starts to feed into the veins of my hands, matching the colors of the panels, turning into a purple blend the further it crawls.
Then the colors shift to yellow and red with orange near my elbows.
Tests continue with different colors, light, and vibration variations. Finally, the panels shut off and submerge into the floor.
I slump back and linger in the stillness for a breath.
A set of binoculars descend from the ceiling.
“Tell me what you see.”
I blink in the darkness. A second passes before the first image appears.
“A boy on a white hill.” Then another. “It’s bright, but maybe a thruster’s coil pack rail.
If that’s what that is for you.” More images flash through my eyes, and most of them I can see pretty clearly. “Why are we checking my vision?”
The binoculars retract.
Viriden opens the door. He motions me out. Zorin, Onidus, and the M-pack gather around us as he shows me the screen beside the woman.
“What is this?” I scan the data bars that show my sensitivity and responses to the different stimuli.
Viriden opens a chart. “Tessi… I don’t know how to tell you this. I’ve been trying to figure it out since you called me from Earth.”
Zorin hangs his head and steps back among the rest of his pack, like he thinks he’s no different from them, and he knows his place is no longer with me.
“To be transparent, I didn’t know,” Onidus remarks. “Sensed something, but that was it.”
Everyone is looking at me with hesitation like they don’t know what to do. Like the time I stumbled into Aphria’s office after the bear tried to take Radar. I was covered in blood, mostly the bear’s, some of it mine. But it’s why I stitched extra boning into my armor after that.
“You are half…”
Zorin’s rasp of pain distracts me.
My breath locks in my lungs.
“Isonian.”
“I’m sorry, what?”
“Your mother married one of us,” Onidus offers. “Your father was a mind bender. It’s adjacent to what I do. It’s why you can see me when I am masked.”
Viriden pulls up the vision report. “You are not susceptible to illusions, shielding, or facades. You are an Aural Discernist.”
“What about my hands?” I ask. “The tingling.”
He pulls up the program’s results. “Receptive, with additional markers for transferrence…”
Viriden eases past the woman who ran my tests and starts sorting through cabinets. He digs out a square of metal and walks back to me with it between his hands.
I instantly know what it is. “Neb hull plating.”
“Remember when you showed this to me?” Viriden extends it to me. “Abr security thought it was odd that this was in your armor and asked me about it.”
I take it in one hand. “So?”
He motions to it. “Both hands.”
I glance at Zorin who looks like hasn’t a clue what’s going on. After a nod from him, I reluctantly move my other hand toward the panel. Before I even make contact, the panel starts lightly smoking.
Marne swears and looks away. Viriden runs a hand over his mouth like he’s keeping his thoughts to himself. The woman gapes at me.
I try to hand it back, but Viriden shakes his head.
“Hold it, Tessi.”
I grit my teeth and grab the panel with two hands. The metal smokes like thruster exhaust that’s running far too richly. The smoke fades and oddly doesn’t accumulate in the room.
“What is this?” I ask.
“Transferrence.” Viriden takes the panel back and tucks it into the cabinet.
“You see true auras, and you transfer them. Nebs are from a smoky galaxy. So it smokes because you are detecting and cycling the necessary current through the panel. If you touch two living beings at once, you can transfer their auras to the other, energies, too.”
“But I’m human.”
“You are only half. Half Isonian. And touched by a Circidian, the one who watches you when you dream.”
“Watches me?”
“You are a chosen one. I have no doubt now.” Viriden runs a hand through his hair. “Nebs are definitely going to want you if they find out. Aural Transfer is not an Isonian trait. That is a Circidian. So just don’t go around grabbing two people at once. Otherwise, you should be fine.”
“I rarely touch anyone other than Radar or Zorin now. But that’s it.”
Viriden’s jaw muscles flex when addresses Zorin. “You understand what this means, don’t you?”
“Yes, sir.” Zorin won’t look at me anymore.
“I wish we had more time to sort through this information,” Viriden adds.
“If you experience any new symptoms, let us know. For now, stay with your guards. I am assigning Onidus to you. But we’re going to have to leave because the Mindor attacks are growing in frequency.
We have Denarsoan ships to take out and Myndrous appearing in greater frequency. ”
“But I have so many questions.”
“And we should return to help.” Marne motions to the others. “Mindor is our home. If it’s under attack, we should be there to defend it.”
Viriden nods. “But Tessi and Zorin must complete their race until the situation at Mindor is elevated to Active War as per the Abr-federation contract. Dismissed.”
Zorin and his pack turn to leave. Viriden holds me back. His pale gold eyes study my face for a long time. “You look so much like her. Please do not think that I am being hard on you because I am heartless. I promise you, I am not.”
“Why so much secrecy?”
He hangs his head. “It was to protect you from being found. Anything you need, tell Onidus. He will get it for you. Any new symptoms, you can talk to him about. He is my top soldier. I trust him with your life.”
“What about Zorin?”
“I trust Zorin as a soldier. I do not trust him as a Shifter because of their wild side. Mindorans must get approval to mate with humans. They are not permitted to be with Isonians because we too often hurt one another when we bond.”
Viriden takes me by the shoulders. “I’m sorry, truly.”
A horrid pang tears through my chest, but it’s more powerful than anything I’ve ever felt on my own. It pulses from my shoulders deep into my chest and back out again.
He suddenly breaks contact. “I apologize. I didn’t think my touch could… I’m sorry.”
Viriden backs up, grinds a fist into his chest, and hurries off.
The soft gold light of Onidus moves closer to me. “Come on, Tessi. Let’s go.”
“What did I do?”
“Nothing. He just needs a little space. It is not easy for him to see you because you remind him of what he lost.”