Chapter 29 Sparks of Eternity #2
That’s when a wild truth dropped in Sheba’s soul, and she took a harsh inhale of breath.
She waited until he lowered his hands, the golden lattice fading away as did the illumination that danced across his skin.
She navigated the uneven stone and rocky ground, approaching him as the glow in the sky settled.
‘It was you all along, wasn’t it?’
Idan turned to her, his irises still radiating a persistent, amber luminescence, arching a brow. ‘You figured it out.’
‘The way this planet healed itself puzzled me for months,’ Sheba said. ‘How the people recovered from impossible traumas was inexplicable until I just put two and two together; the phenomenon coincided with your arrival on Tansinia.’
His eyes remained locked on hers, mouth quirking.
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ she chided with a soft smile.
He shrugged and turned back to the view of the churning ocean.
She stepped close to him, circling her arms around his waist.
She pressed her cheek against the broad expanse of his back, the residual heat of the power he had just unleashed still throbbing through him.
While his calloused hands settled on hers, his gaze fixed on the savage horizon.
‘I didn’t mention it because the act of being a benevolent god possesses an inherent selfishness, even if the intent remains protective.
In essence, I stripped the people and the wildlife of a measure of their agency by forcing this grace upon them.
But I refuse to regret it. This soil deserves every ounce of divinity I can offer because it saved my soul.
By releasing my Sughrikhat healing into the meridians, I ensure Tansinia stays insulated once we depart. ’
Sheba tightened her hold, then moved around to face him.
She pulled his head down, claiming his mouth in a long kiss overflowing with raw devotion.
When she finally broke away, she kept her hands on his chest.
‘I approve,’ she whispered. ‘Do you plan on performing the same feat on Dunia?’
He shrugged, a brief flash of a smile ghosting across his lips. ‘Perhaps. It depends on how that planet treats me.’
‘I should warn you,’ Sheba teased, her hazel eyes dancing. ‘Dunia has its own sentient caretaker. You might find yourself locked in a struggle for the title of prime guardian.’
Idan let out a resonant chuckle. ‘A battle I’d want to avoid, though I suspect I ought to establish a friendship with that entity before asserting my will, if ever.’
‘Wise words, warrior god,’ she replied, her tone turning sober. ‘Dunia defends its borders with absolute ruthlessness. I have witnessed it dismantle capital ships and hurl the wreckage into the sun.’
‘Intimidating.’
‘Look who’s talking,’ she retorted, nudging him with her shoulder. ‘You ready to leave now?’
With one last wistful glance around him, Idan nodded. ‘Naam, my queen, let’s pack up and seek our next adventure.’
They turned away from the abyss, strolling back toward the farm hand in hand.
Inside the hut, he stored away his leather-making tools, a few iron kitchen utensils, and his meager wardrobe of dark tunics.
Lago arrived to help haul the remaining crates to the ship.
With the hut emptied, Sheba made her way toward the livestock pens, kneeling in the straw.
She stroked the thick fleece of the lamb she delivered weeks ago.
The creature was no longer a spindly runt but a robust youngling, its wool matted with the debris of the pasture.
‘How will I live with myself if I leave you here?’ Sheba murmured, her fingers tangling in the wriggling animal’s coat.
‘Then don’t,’ her man rasped, appearing behind her. ‘Take her and her little sheep family with us.’
Before Sheba could object, Idan signaled for Lago to herd the yearling, its mother, and the lead ram toward the ship’s cargo lift.
‘Where exactly do you plan to house a flock of livestock on Eden II?’ Sheba asked with a wry smile, rising to her feet as the animals trotted past her.
‘My apartment won’t cut it, and Eden II is not quite carved out for animal husbandry.
The entire moon is a city built on a barren rock.
Apart from the parks and indoor gardens, there isn’t a blade of natural grass within a thousand kilometers of the dome. ’
‘I’ll get an aerated storage unit secured at the space port,’ Idan growled, his jaw set in a stubborn line. ‘It is a temporary measure til we procure a permanent farm on Dunia, nada?’
Sheba shook her head, a soft laugh escaping her. ‘Your fantasies are valid, my love.’
Idan closed the distance between them, pressing a hard, brief press of his lips against her temple.
‘Indeed, they are. We’ll be the owners of a fokkin’ amazing property in no time, you wait and see.’
Their lips met in a kiss until a thunderous, ground-shaking bellow cut through their intimacy.
From the shadow of the northern ridge, a six-eyed Basilisk bull appeared.
It was a monstrous mountain of obsidian muscle and horns, his multiple pupils tracking their movement with predacious intelligence.
He trotted into the yard, the impact of his hooves vibrating through the soles of Idan’s boots.
‘Shuaqagec!’ Idan rasped, shifting Sheba behind him and stepping forward with an outstretched hand.
Idan caught his woman’s gasp of surprise, but he ignored it, his focus aimed at the beast.
The steer slowed as he reached Idan, delivering a massive, solid bump against the warrior’s shoulder that almost sent him staggering.
Idan went still, his hand resting on the bull’s broad, scarred snout.
They remained locked in a silent, psychic communion for a long minute, the brute harrumphing with a sound like grinding stones.
‘Are you two, what? Speaking?’
‘Naam,’ Idan rasped.
‘So you talk to animals?’
He shrugged, still focused on the beast before him. ‘Tis a side talent that comes with my abilities.’
‘That means, the second I saw you, in the bar, you were using your Ssignakht to control the cobra?’
‘Mhmmm,’ her man grunted. ‘I might have added more of a spectacle to it that night.’
‘Why?’
‘My prescience told me they’d be a woman present I’d need to impress.’
‘So that entire show was for my benefit?’
‘The whiskey drinking and flying through the air, perhaps,’ her man said with all nonchalance.
‘The hell?’
‘I wanted to gain your attention.’
‘Where’s the serpent now?’
‘It came of its own volition because I asked it. After we were done and fed it a meal, it left. As far as I know, it’s sunning itself on a rock by the sea.’
‘You utter fokkin’ rogue.’
‘It worked, didn’t it? You haven’t stopped thinking of me since.’
Sheba cursed as Idan’s shoulders shook with amusement.
The beast he was still communing with chose the moment to bellow and harrumph.
‘He doesn’t want me to leave,’ Idan translated, in a timbred rasp. ‘If I am departing, he insists on accompanying the pack.’
‘Honey, we cannot fit a six-eyed basilisk on a high-speed corvette,’ Sheba exclaimed, her hands flying to her hips in a gesture of pure, aghast frustration.
Mirage appeared at the top of the ramp, her eyes gleaming as she scanned the three-ton biological bull occupying the loading zone.
She rolled her eyes, her posture radiating reticence.
‘We can, from a weight ratio perspective, and we even have a hold for him,’ Mirage conceded. ‘But the issue is what will we do with him when we reach the docking port on Eden II?’
‘Leave that to me,’ Idan murmured. ‘I’ll call ahead to Molan and have him fix me a storage compartment.’
Sheba tut-tutted and shook her head, exchanging a weary stare with Mirage.
Idan ignored their protests. He lightly slapped the bull’s rump and guided the massive creature toward the secondary cargo enclosure.
He spent the next hour hauling bales of mountain hay and fresh straw into the bay, stacking the fodder high against the bulkheads.
Shuaqagec stomped through the metal cavern, his heavy breathing echoing off the alloy walls as he harrumphed with resonant approval, claiming the space as his new territory.
The smear of hyperspace bleeding through the viewport cast a spectral glow over the Ignis’ galley.
The scene might have bordered on romantic if not for the utilitarian water bulbs and the cardboard trays of reheated lasagna.
Idan leaned back in his chair, sipping kahawa from a tin cup, his focus on Sheba as she shared yet another hilarious story from her nursing life.
Her attention snapped to her comm-tab, which trilled with a message.
‘One moment, uso’m.’
She tapped the holographic interface, her pupils tracking the scrolling text of a high-priority dispatch from the Joint Pegasi Health Consortium.
‘Oh my!’ she whispered, with a slow smile.
‘What is it?’ Idan drawled, setting his mug down.
‘The board finalized the decision. They’ve appointed me Director of Nursing and Midwifery for the hospital network spanning both Eden II and Dunia.’
She let out a joyous scream that echoed off the alloy bulkheads.
The sound drew Mirage into the room, her nanites glimmering as she materialized before them.
‘Is anything the matter?’ she clipped, her eyes darting around on alert.
‘Nada, it’s freakin’ awesome,’ Sheba cried out, her face glowing. ‘I got the job I interviewed for, despite having a foyer collapse over me.’
Idan pulled her into a brief, fierce kiss.
‘Congratulations, Sheba. It seems we need to celebrate,’ Mirage murmured, as she reached into a galley cupboard and produced a bottle of vintage, gold-flecked champagne.
She popped the cork, sending a plume of carbonated mist into the air, filling two crystal flutes at an angle to compensate for the artificial gravity.
‘Sante,’ Sheba beamed, clinking glasses with her man.
Idan kissed her again, the heat of his mouth a promise before they both drank to her success.
‘I’ll leave you two lovebirds to your merrymaking,’ Mirage said, her form dissolving as she glimmered back into the ship’s primary console. ‘Enjoy.’
Sheba, still sipping from her flute, went through the agreement on her comm tab.
‘Better still, my love,’ she murmured, highlighting a specific paragraph. ‘The contract grants me flexible office hours. I can work from any hub on Dunia or within Eden II.’
‘So does this mean I have your blessing to buy a farm for us?’
Sheba faked a sigh of profound annoyance before she succumbed to a laugh.
‘Naam, my warrior-god-farmer. Go for it. Secure your freakin’ estate for your scary six-eyed bull and your sheep.’
‘I intend to go for more than just the land and animals,’ he growled, his hand snaking out to grip her nape. ‘I plan to tend to the most gorgeous creature of them all.’
He pulled her to him, his mouth claiming hers with a hunger that spoke of ancient, unyielding claims.
Minutes later, he moved her into the captain’s quarters, where he proceeded to ravish her.
She moaned into his neck as he thrust inside her, their sensual rhythm synchronized as the corvette tore through the fabric of the universe toward their new beginning.