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She had changed into one of the sundresses she favored as soon as they were done with their lessons. The soft yellow dress reflected the moonlight. With her dark hair curling loosely down her back, she looked almost ethereal in this light. Since her back was to him, his gaze went to her right shoulder, where part of the symbol tattooed there peeked out from beneath her hair. He knew that symbol like his own face now. It was a curving green branch with thin leaves. An olive branch. He remembered very clearly pressing his lips to that shoulder to reveal the mark identifying her as a daughter of Saraqael at the Becoming ceremony. Actually, he found himself remembering that moment a lot.

“Are you going to be cold?” he asked when he felt the slight chill in the air.

“Oh, no. I’ll be fine, thanks. I love this weather.” She glanced at him over her shoulder. “Would you mind walking with me in the woods? I’ve got my sandals on.”

“Of course,” he agreed. He followed her off the porch and matched her pace, staying just a few inches from her. “Are you all right with having to move from this location?”

She didn’t respond immediately. Her gaze roved over their surroundings as if memorizing them. “I understand it,” she said at last. “I do love it here, but for largely selfish reasons. The woods comfort me, as you know.”

“Perhaps there will be woods wherever we move to.”

Shifting her gaze to him, she smiled and replied, “Maybe.”

They entered the woods and walked a while in silence. Due to her glowing eyes, he figured she was communing with the night creatures. As she did, he scanned their surroundings, alert for any danger. He was also looking for Aurora, though the cat had informed Olivia earlier that she would be off hunting. He had grown almost as attached to the animal as he had to Olivia.

And there was the crux of it, he thought to himself. He had grown quite attached to Olivia. Her brush with the kragen had really impressed this realization upon him, though the knowledge had been resting in the back of his mind for a couple of weeks now. His reaction to seeing her yanked so violently from his sight had been anything but typical for a Gloresti.

He had frozen.

Even though it had only been for a second, it had still happened. His reaction had been in direct opposition to a Gloresti’s natural instincts. He should have been in motion the moment she started speaking to him, but shock and—this was the big one—fear for her had kept him rooted to the spot rather than simply letting his instincts guide him. And he had understood in that single slice of time just why it was that only older Gloresti with stronger emotional control were typically chosen for pairings.

No…he knew himself enough to understand that it wasn’t just the Gloresti protectiveness binding him to her now. There was definitely more to it than that. But he was so ignorant when it came to human emotions that he couldn’t figure out what it all meant.

“It’s just beautiful out here,” she whispered finally as they entered a small clearing flooded with moonlight.

What was beautiful was her. And he had never, ever had thoughts like that before. What was wrong with him?

“Why is it that you stare at
archigos
Gabriel when he isn’t looking?”

He hadn’t meant to blurt the question like that, but there it was.

She looked at him in bewilderment. “What?” She sounded utterly baffled.

He relaxed at her evident confusion. He hadn’t even realized he had tensed. “I see you looking at him frequently. I was curious why.”

“Like when?” she asked. She still sounded more puzzled than upset by the question.

“Such as this evening. You watched him touching Amber.”

“Oh.” It was a long, drawn out response, indicating realization. Now he saw her flush as she reached up to twist a lock of her hair around her finger. “I didn’t realize…”

He felt himself tensing again. But he forced himself to remain quiet and listen.

She caught his gaze and said, “I wasn’t staring at Gabriel, exactly. I was just watching him interact with Amber.”

“I see.” He didn’t. Not really. But he wanted to, and that had to count for something. In an effort to try and understand more clearly, he said, “He does touch her a lot.”

She said softly, “Yes.”

“She does not like to be touched by anyone else. I have wondered why it is he shows his feelings for her that way when she is generally opposed to it.”

She sighed and moved over to sit down on a fallen log. He followed her and sat beside her. The skirt of her dress touched the side of his right leg. She gently folded her hands in her lap as she collected her thoughts.

“Humans convey many things through touch,” she explained, looking into his eyes. “It is very often a sign of comfort, affection or love. But the ease of accepting these gestures is instilled in humans in our young and formative years. Amber’s childhood on the human plane was full of turmoil, leaving her leery of gestures of affection. Once she was placed in the same foster home as Gabriel, he taught her how to accept love.”

“By touching her?”

Now, she smiled. “No. In fact, I believe he initially showed his love by
not
touching her. Not until she was ready.”

He frowned. “I do not understand.”

As usual, she didn’t grow impatient or irritated with him. She appeared to be trying to think of how to explain better. “Humans have what is called ‘personal space,’” she said after a moment. “Some people require more of it than others. The ability to interpret another person’s willingness to accept physical contact by another person is something we learn as we mature. Well, some of us do.”

“Ah, yes.
Archigos
Gabriel explained this concept to us after the Becoming ceremony. Along with the information about the human need for privacy and human female menstrual cycles, something our females do not have.”

Olivia blinked. She started to say something, then stopped. Her mouth opened a second time, then closed. He watched this with rapt fascination, wondering what he had said to cause the reaction. She ultimately cleared her throat and said, “I imagine that wasn’t one of Gabriel’s favorite conversations of all time.” She sounded distinctly humored.

One corner of his mouth rose. “Now that you mention it, he did seem rather uncomfortable.”

She nodded. “Yet he discussed it with you, anyway. Because he knew it would make the three of us uncomfortable when it came up and he wanted to help ease our discomfort. Thoughtfulness such as that sets him apart from many others.”

She looked back into the center of the clearing and then got to her feet and moved again into the moonlight. He stood and followed her. When she spoke, he had to stand close to her to hear her. “In answer to your initial question, I watch Gabriel interact with Amber because it represents to me the best things about humanity. He touches her to offer her comfort and to show affection and love. He has taught her to do the same with him. They share a very special connection. It makes me unbelievably happy for them both, and a little wistful. Their relationship is something most people on the human plane seek and hope to have.”

James considered all of this in silence. She had just put into words some of the very things that he hadn’t even realized rested in the back of his own mind. This was why he so enjoyed conversing with her. She opened doors for him.

“Estilorians do not put so much meaning into touch,” he admitted. “Physical interaction for us is done really out of necessity. We cannot conceive children with each other like humans do, as you know. Centuries of this knowledge has evolved into males and females seeing each other as, at best, friends. We appreciate each other’s forms, but do not generally attach emotion to those observations.” And here, he turned to face her. “But you touch me, and I find emotion attached to it. You reach out and touch me when you are happy or nervous or humored.”

When he paused and just looked at her, she lowered her gaze to the ground. “I’m sorry. I didn’t even think—”

“Do not apologize. I am not censuring you. I am thanking you.”

Surprise flashed over her features as she again looked up.

“You are teaching me, and very patiently so. I would like to touch you.”

Her breath caught in her throat. “James…I think you should understand that humans don’t touch each other just to touch. We touch each other to express ourselves.”

“I realize that.”

“Oh.” She blinked, appearing flustered. “Well…okay.”

As soon as she gave her permission, he lifted his right hand and placed it on top of her head, the pad of his thumb touching the middle of her forehead, then the side of her face as he stroked his hand downwards. Her skin was remarkably soft. She tilted her head into his touch when he rubbed the backs of his fingers along her cheek. Then he moved closer and lifted his other hand, allowing all of his fingers to weave into her hair. The silky strands felt incredible against his calloused palms. The moonlight seemed to sparkle on every curl.

She shivered. He sensed that it wasn’t from the cool evening air. Moving his hands from her hair along her shoulders and then around to her back, he gently pulled her up against him. He had wanted to do this for a week, ever since she had hugged him so fiercely the day she learned to fly. When she seemed to melt against him and pressed her right cheek to his chest as her arms went around his waist, he leaned down and inhaled deeply. She smelled vibrant and ridiculously alluring to him. Her scent seemed to pervade him. He suddenly thought he would be content to stand there with her for the rest of his days. Closing his eyes, he rested his chin on the top of her head.

“Thank you, Olivia.” he said. “I truly understand now.”

Chapter Six

“That makes two new additions this month, my lord. One Scultresti and one Waresti.”

Grolkinei, eldest of the Mercesti class, looked at his head of intelligence and nodded. “That is acceptable, Cesaro. You know adding too many to our numbers at once would draw too much attention. We have had patience for more than eighteen years now. We can wait a bit longer.”

They sat together on the porch of Grolkinei’s gorgeous lakeside home. Glasses of amber-colored liquid sat on the table between their two chairs. The remainder of Grolkinei’s commanders was in the process of training their newest recruits. Their numbers were beginning to swell, something that made his dark heart swell right along with it. Soon—very soon—they would have the army necessary to take control of the Estilorian plane.

The Mercesti had not always been at odds with the other classes. Before the creation of the Estilorian plane when Estilorians and humans lived in supposed accord, the Mercesti had been relied upon by all Estilorians for their skills in strategy and innovation. It was only after the creation of the new plane, when Grolkinei and like-minded Mercesti realized that their elder and class leader, Volarius, had permanently removed them from the human realm, that their class morphed into something much darker and incongruous with the rest of Estilorian society.

Killing Volarius had been Grolkinei’s greatest triumph. The weak old fool.

Grolkinei believed Estilorians belonged on the human plane. Humans should have been made subservient to the Estilorians millennia ago. The weak, whining, short-lived creatures whose wars between each other had prompted the nine Estilorian elders to create the new plane didn’t deserve the display of power it had taken to do it. Had he had any inkling of what was going to happen, he would have killed Volarius before the event. But that was then.

Nothing to do now but find a way to reenter the human plane.

When news of the Corgloresti Saraqael’s pregnant human lover had reached the Mercesti, Grolkinei could simply not believe it. Never in all of history had an Estilorian ever successfully impregnated a human, though attempts had been made over the centuries. Then he found out there had been a scroll used by Saraqael, one involving incredibly powerful energy. It had been so powerful that Saraqael, a relatively young Estilorian, hadn’t been able to control it, killing himself in the process. Ironically, the scroll had not been intended to result in pregnancy. It had been meant to save the life of the human, who had been dying of a rare disease, and who died anyway following giving birth.

As soon as he heard about it, Grolkinei had determined that he would take Saraqael’s child after it was born. He knew that, given enough time, he would be able to work with the child and figure out how, at long last, he could transfer to the human plane. Once he transferred, he could figure out how to bring over the rest of his army. Surely a child of half-human and half-Estilorian blood—Corgloresti blood, at that—would be able to transition between the planes. And when the news came that it would be three children rather than just one, he figured that simply increased his chances of success.

He used subterfuge to disguise his true plans, generating rumors and discord that led the others to believe he wanted the children dead. He figured once he took them, the Estilorians would believe he had killed them, when in truth he would be using them for his own purposes. The elders had managed to keep the location of the births a secret until just before it took place. Then Grolkinei’s commander, Layla, intercepted the single thought that he needed to hunt them down. He set up a trap, leading everyone from the birth site except for a small contingent of Waresti fighters. They were no match for his best fighters, led by the fearsome Angius.

Unfortunately, the elders were not so foolish as he had believed. The mother of the children was transitioned almost immediately back to the human plane after the children were born. Then three Corgloresti, one per child, had escaped before Angius and his team arrived at the birth site.

Still, Grolkinei had been so certain he could catch them when Layla intercepted another thought leading him to the site where one of the Corgloresti would transition to the human plane. He couldn’t stop the first two Corgloresti from transitioning. But he saw the last of them and simply knew he would defeat him. The child would be his.