Kierra's Thread (Argadian Heart Trilogy Book 2) (8 page)

“Eluria, I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to reach
him.”

Kierra’s concern for Jarek had increased since returning to
Ednos. Four weeks had passed and he continued to distance himself farther and
farther away from her—not only physically, but mentally as well.

She’d tried on several occasions to reach him through the
thread, but it was like a set of steel doors had been set in place, barring her
entry.

Eluria was the only one Kierra felt comfortable to talk
with. She’d come to her out of desperation.

Kierra accepted the cup Eluria handed her. The aroma was
soothing, a warm honeyberry blend of tea.

“He’s been through a lot.” Eluria took a sip from her own cup.
“You remember what it was like when we first brought you here.”

Kierra nodded. “Though it wasn’t until recently I figured
out why I couldn’t be touched or touch anyone. I kept that part of myself
locked away even from me.”

“Do you think Jarek could be doing the same thing? Or maybe
when Odon broke open all the doors, Jarek was forced to face things
he’d
locked away from himself?”

Kierra looked at Eluria, as a new thought surfaced. “Do you
think that might be it? There were—things—I saw when I went to him. Things he’d
kept hidden from me.” Her heart palpitated in panic. “I may have left it too
long. He’s built such solid walls now—not only around his mind, but his
physical self.”

Eluria nodded. “We’ve all seen it, he withdraws a little
more each day. You may need to do something drastic. But I think you’re the
only one who can bring him out of it.”

Kierra set the cup down on the table and stood. “You’re
right.” Tears flooded her eyes. “Isn’t it strange that the very action that set
me free, bound him in chains. I still feel our connection, but I also sense he
now denies it.”

Eluria rose from the lounger and clasped Kierra’s hands, her
expression sympathetic. “Did you know he has no memories of Serdion? He has no
memories of childhood to offer him solace. No memories of his family before he
was taken into bondage. The only knowledge he’s retained is his time with Odon.
And you.”

“But I’ve given him nothing,” Kierra cried. “His memories of
me can offer little succor.”

Eluria’s hands tightened on hers. “Then give him new
memories. You must find a way to break through.”

“I will find a way,” she vowed.

“You know, I’m seeing so much of the old Kierra surface.
She’s been gone a long time.” Eluria leaned forward to hug her. “I wasn’t sure
you would ever return and I’m so thankful.”

Kierra returned the warm clasp. “And now I just need to
return Jarek to us. Thank you. You’ve given me some hope that I can find a way
to reach him. Now, I just need a little guidance from you.”

*         
*          *

As Jarek slid his identity card into the slot to gain
entrance to his apartments, the weight he carried in his mind seemed
particularly heavy. He’d made the decision he must leave Ednos and separate
himself from Kierra.

His abilities at concentration were poor at best. He was
unable to assist on missions. He had no memories of his youth, of the world
where he was birthed, or the family who’d nurtured him. No memories of
traditions, ceremonies, beliefs.

His first memories were of bondage, nothing of freedom. He
stayed with the Freelion rebels now because he felt some link of friendship to
the Argadians he’d fought with. But there was no memory of hate for the
Tribunal who had ravaged his planet. Because he didn’t remember it or his
culture.

Hate thrived inside him for Odon and what he had perpetrated
on Kierra, the woman he was drawn to, had loved in thoughtwalk, was linked to.
And for what Odon had forced from him. But Odon was dead. And Jarek felt
distanced somehow, cut off from emotions and relationships.

Devon had told him of Serdion and its devastation, but it
was as though those things had happened to someone else. He could visualize
none of it.

But Odon was another matter. And all he felt now was colored
by his service in bondage. He questioned his every response to that man. Had he
truly submitted to protect Kierra, or had it been something else? He remembered
Odon forcing him to his knees, demanding Jarek service his khout with his
mouth. Odon’s hand on his head, massaging as he did as he was commanded. And
his own khout hardening in the sexual assault, his nipples tightening.

He flung the memories aside as the door to his apartments
slid open. Rather than protecting Kierra had he sought to be forced into
submitting? These were the thoughts that drove him farther and farther away
from Kierra. The idea that he has used her as an excuse to submit to a
masochist.

Or were the memories he thought he had of those moments
manufactured by the programming of Odon? The memories, or lack of them,
tortured him, and finally made him realize he could no longer stay here.

Kierra deserved a male, not a coward who had let himself be
used in such a manner. A male without memories, and what memories remained he
couldn’t be sure were true or false. He didn’t trust himself.

He knew he’d loved her in thoughtwalk, but what if his
physical body didn’t respond in the same way? What if the altered memories
changed him so he was unable to react to her in the ways of a male for his
female mate?

In his conscious mind he wanted to be with her, but what if
something reared its ugly head and he failed to respond? She’d already suffered
so much, and he couldn’t bear the thought of causing her pain by not being able
to provide what she needed.

But how did he tell her he was leaving? For good. And where
would he go? Argadia was not home to him. Serdion, at least in his mind, didn’t
exist. Where could he find peace from his thoughts, ones that he wasn’t even
sure were his own?

There should be colors in his mind, but he felt none of
them. His mind was gray, unable to focus, hiding the speculation he couldn’t
deal with, rationalizing the rest so he could function on some level. Every now
and then a fracture of memory would be revealed to taunt him—bits and
pieces—rootless images. He remembered the colors because they were part of his
life with Kierra. He’d studied the information available on the Serdion
culture, but that could only tell him so much. And some of his responses were
instinctive in some way—done without memory. His mind was a ruin of what it had
been.

Although Odon was dead, Jarek was his legacy—a male without
direction, half programmed, half free—and useless to all. A male should have
purpose and he had none. He should not be wallowing in self-pity, but could
find no way out.

He pulled away to the present, realizing the illumination in
the apartment wasn’t as bright as it should be. He turned and walked toward the
controls.

“Don’t,” a feminine voice behind him halted his hand. He
whirled around and stopped. Blinking rapidly, he was positive his eyes played
tricks on him. Contrary to what his dark thoughts had anticipated, his khout
quickly hardened at the vision kneeling in his greeting room.

“How did you get in?” he rasped, then swallowed, attempting
to clear his throat.

Kierra smiled. “I have connections.”

“Why?”

Her solemn gaze slid up to meet his. “Because you wouldn’t
come to me. In fact, you’re moving away from me. And I didn’t want to wait any
longer.”

He couldn’t let her do this. Haydon, but he found he
couldn’t just tell her to leave. The vision of her kneeling on the woven red
rug, naked pearlescent skin, the jade-colored glow of her radiance emanating
all around her—an indication of her sexual desire.

She was any male’s vision of beauty and passion.
Encompassing a fantasy realized. Her hair fell around her shoulders in a silken
cloud. Full, rounded breasts teased his senses. He wanted to savor with his
mouth and tongue their firm, decadent flavor.

His gaze wandered downward, across her defined, luscious
curves to the shadow of her shax, a hinted glimmer in the dusky light. He
wanted to tell her to spread her thighs wider so he could see the sensitive,
pink lips. His fingers trembled at the thought of touching her, piercing the
entrance to her shax-ra, sliding through her sweet nectar, to a paradise that
awaited.

He felt the colors in his mind begin to surface and he
turned away from the visions and his traitorous thoughts.

Fuck her
. Those were the first words to enter his
mind.
Take what she offers
. Possess what you crave.

He tried to stop them, but the colors of his own sexual
desire swirled inside his head. Hues of scarlet and gold clung to him, calling
him.

“Go away, Kierra.”

“No. Not this time. I have healed, Jarek. And now it’s time
for you to heal. I’m not just here to be touched by you, but to touch you. I
know you’ve lost memories, and I’m here to give you news ones. I hope,
beautiful ones.”

“You have no idea what you’re asking of me.”

“Take a chance, Jarek. You were so patient with me. But I’m
afraid I don’t have the same patience as you. I’ve given you as much time as I
can. I’m only sorry it’s taken me so long to come to you.”

“You don’t understand the memories I have. And what I don’t
have.” How could he make her understand? Especially when his body, and what was
left of his mind, were demanding he take what she offered.

“Tell me, Jarek. You’ve locked me from your mind and I feel
so lost without you.”

He turned away from her, unable to continue looking at what
he coveted more than anything else. “I don’t want you touched by what’s left to
me. I don’t know what’s real and what’s not. What are my memories and what are
manufactured? I have no memories before bondage. Or rather what I do have are
so splintered as to be worthless. And those—I don’t know what they are made
of.”

He heard a soft breath of movement and then felt her body
pressed to his back. Tightening his body—denying her impact on his senses—he
closed his eyes.

“Let me in, Jarek,” she whispered, wrapping her arms around
his waist. “Let me give you more memories. Let me show you that your memories
of Odon hold no substance. I’m here for you.”

“How can you know? I don’t know. I feel as though I’m alone
in a worm hole of darkness without direction.”

“Let me help you find your direction.” She began to undo the
fastenings on his uniform. Her hands touched the flesh of his chest. It was
like being branded, except it was silk brushing against his skin.

Her hands moved upward, forcing the suit down his arms,
falling to his waist. He could think of nothing but her hands shifting over his
shoulders, down his arms, swirling over his back.

“Kierra—”

Her hands skirted to his waist and pushed the uniform off
his hips. “Let me show you how much I love you.” She moved in front of him and
knelt at his feet. “Allow me this. Please.”

Unzipping first one boot, then the other, as he balanced a
hand against the wall, she pulled them from his feet and tossed them aside.
Then she removed his suit and tossed it aside.

She rose, stepped away from him, and smiled. “You’re as
magnificent in your physical body as in our thoughtwalk. What I’ve been missing
all this time. I know that your people revere the melding through the mind
higher than the physical. But, Jarek, we shall know both. And the colors we
create—there will be none like them anywhere.”

He reached for her, but again Kierra stepped away. “We will
go slowly. I want you to know every moment of pleasure. And to know it is
through us—you and I—that you know it. I’m going to give you such memories, they
will usurp all previous ones. I promise you a new sanctuary.”

“Sanctuary?” He had a vague sense of it, but most of that
memory had been destroyed. Fragments. All fragments littered his mind.

She touched his jaw. “You once shared your sanctuary with me.
It was a beautiful place filled with colors, your colors, that seduced and
pleasured me more than I thought possible. It was a place of no Befores or
Beyonds. Right now you fear me in your mind, but I’ll bring you to a place
where you will know I could never judge you for anything you’ve ever done.”

“How could you not?” His body tingled with awareness of her
in ways he’d never known. He wanted to open his mind to her—wanted her words to
be true.

“Do you judge me for what happened in our years of bondage? When
my body was taken time and time again?”

“How can you ask that?”

“Then do you think me weak? That my love is such a poor
thing it can’t be trusted not to judge? None of the Before matters. Not to me
and not to you.”

“I don’t know how to let go of it. I have no certainty that
anything I remember is real.”

“What about the thread that connects us? Do you think that
is fashioned by Odon?”

“No—I—” The thread linking him to Kierra was different. He
was sure of it. There was some inner sense that denied it was part of anything
that Odon had created or altered. “It is real.”

She linked her hand with his. “Then come with me. Trust me.
Let us share some of the bliss that is waiting for us.”

“Where are we going? Hopefully not too far since we’re both
naked.”

He heard her throaty laugh, and his khout hardened even
more.

“We’re about to begin a journey. A cleansing that is long
overdue.”

She’d been fearful he would reject her out of hand. That she
had left it too long. Eluria attempted to impart the knowledge she’d learned as
a Twilight Companion, skills and arts an ordinary female would not know. But in
the end, Eluria had told Kierra to go with her instincts and they would guide
her.

What instincts? The only thing she’d ever known of physical
joining was what the Enforcers had taught Kierra through pain and drugs. Jarek
had offered her the sensual mind bonding, but she’d shied away from physical
contact. Now, when she was finally ready, he’d been so damaged, he’d pulled
away from her. Did she have what it would take to heal him?

She led him into the shower enclosure. The automatic motion
indicator engaged and a warm rain of water fell over them. Kierra reached for a
bottle of fragrant liquid body cleanser and poured some into her hand.

Turning back to him, she spread the liquid into the thick
bed of dark hair on his chest. She worked the foamy liquid along his shoulders
and down across his ribs.

Moving closer, she brought her body flush with his and
rubbed her sensitive breasts against his chest, enjoying the feel of rough hair
as she moved her hands to his back and down over the curve of his muscled
buttocks to skim the back of his upper thighs.

The heat of his body penetrated the cool water that streamed
down their bodies. Without touching his khout she progressed along the curve of
his hip, to the inside sensitive flesh of his upper thigh. “Spread your legs,”
she whispered.

“Kierra, do you know what you’re doing to me?” He
repositioned his feet, making room for her to continue roving over his body
with her now frothy, slick hands.

“So many years,” she whispered the words. “I’ve wanted to
touch you like this. To know the pleasure that awaited. But this,” her hands
slid down to his knees and back up to the crease at his thighs. “You are so
much more. Your strength has supported me, protected me.”

She gripped his thigh and she felt the muscle flex. “Oh
Jarek,” she sighed. “All this strength, do you know what you do to me?”

Pressing her body closer, Kierra rubbing sensuously against
him. Gripping a cheek in each hand, she felt the muscles tighten as she kneaded
and caressed.

“I’m going to climax right here, if you don’t stop what
you’re doing, Kierra. Symion, look at your radiance. You have all you can do to
contain it here.”

“Where are your colors? When I feel their touch it is like
so many fingers stroking my body, yet I know they all belong to you. It is you
who give me so much pleasure.”

The suds rinsed away, she raised her hands to cup his face,
and pressed his lips to hers. His hands gripped her hips and the heat in her
abdomen flared hot. She wanted to feel him inside her. But not yet.

As they were about to kiss, she flicked out her tongue and
licked at the drops of water that clung to his lips. “I would cleanse Before from
both of us. See the drain beneath our feet? Watch the nightmares seep away.
Before is beneath us, Beyond awaits. And Now, I give you memories to fill the
void between.”

She drank from his lips, sucking his tongue deeply. His
strong arms molded her to him. He lifted his head to look into her eyes.

“How have I deserved you—merited your forgiveness?”

“Forgiveness? There is nothing to forgive. We have both
suffered at the hands of a madman. This is a re-affirmation that we live and
have each other. Life has dealt us hard. Before is gone. You are the male I
want at my side—inside me. And I want to be inside you.”

She drew away from him and urged him from the shower.
Pulling out a drying cloth, she proceeded to thoroughly dry him, then led him
back to the living room, where the candles flickered and the scent of jasmine
and rose mingled, offering an erotic atmosphere made for sealing.

She encouraged him to lie on his stomach on the scarlet rug.

“Now what are you planning?” he asked as he stretched out.

She reached for the bottle of oil on the table and poured a
little into her hands. She straddled him and spread the oil over his back. A
twinge of pain struck her at the ragged scars that littered at angles all
across his back and down his legs. She forced the thoughts away.

“When was the last time you had a massage?” She spread the
oil in long, flowing strokes.

“I-I don’t remember ever having one.”

She shouldn’t have asked. His memory and what was real and
not real was painful to think about. She did not want to remind him of his
loss.

“I’m about to give you a memory—the first of many pleasant
ones, I hope.”

She hunched up until her sensitive shax rested against the
ridge of his cheeks and as she began the long circular strokes along the length
of his back, she undulated her hips, causing a pleasurable friction as her shax
lips rubbed against his rounded, smooth rear.

“
Na nivia
, you’re destroying me.”

“Does it please you?”

“More than that. It is exquisite pain.”

“Will it give you good memories? Or should I stop and try
something else?”

He groaned. “Don’t stop. Symion, don’t stop. Where did you
learn to do this?”

She smiled to herself. Eluria had been right, thank
goodness. Continuing for a few more minutes, she then stopped. If she didn’t,
Kierra knew she was about to climax with the friction and she didn’t want that
just yet. Her shax was dripping with her juices, her shax-ra pulsing for
immediate attention.

She lifted a leg and moved aside. “Turn over,” she
instructed him.

He did so and lay on his back, watching her, Jarek’s eyes
flaring green emeralds. Again, Kierra straddled him. His khout lay thick and
hard, shooting upward. An iron shaft needy of piercing her willing flesh. She
wrapped her fingers around his flesh, feeling the silken hardness, hot to her
touch. Pre-cum glistened along the slit on the engorged purple head. It looked
to be ready to burst, the pressure of so much pleasure prepared to erupt.

She splayed one hand against his groin, sweeping upward to
his stomach. She looked into his eyes, green blazing fire. “And do you now
doubt your response to me? I certainly don’t.”

“No,” he gasped. “Seal with me, Kierra.”

“Who do you think of as I open my body for you?”

“Symion, you,
na nivia
, no one but you. Always.”

Lifting up, she rose above him, her shax opened to him as
she dropped down to encase him within her desire. “As I thought—as I knew. I
want to feel every inch of you enter me. Every. Inch.”

Kierra gasped as her shax-ra stretched to accommodate his thick
length. Tingling pleasure consumed her. He grazed her pleasure nub as he
entered and spasms of desire flooded through her. She lifted and dropped down
again, crying out with her desire.

“So good, so very good. Oh, yes.” Back and forth she slid on
his length, bringing him deeper and deeper, her juices lubricating his khout,
and he hardened even more.

Once he was fully sheathed inside her, he sat up and she
wound her legs around his hips. They stayed like that, without moving. Tears
rose to flood Kierra’s eyes. “Too much,” was all she could say as she sobbed
against his shoulder, her nails digging into his back.

His arms tightened around her as he smoothed his hands along
her spine. “Too much what?”

She sniffed and smiled. “Too much happiness. Never will we
be parted in any way again, Jarek. Never, do you hear me? We have fought too
hard to reach this moment. Finish it.”

He lay her back on the rug and proceeded to thrust in a
long, slow rhythm. “Faster,” she gasped. “Deeper.” She lifted her hips and
mirrored his deep penetration by undulating her hips against him.

As her climax moved closer and she felt his throbbing
release begin, she grabbed at his ass and forced him deep. “Hold,” she gasped.
Then she felt what had never occurred before, as her threads wound about the
base of his khout and her anstillia cord released.

It lubricated and penetrated his anal canal. She felt every
inch penetrate him. Slowly. Intensely. Not only did the powerful waves of her
orgasm overtake her, but she felt his as well. He roared with his completion as
he wrapped her closer in his arms, tight to his body. Two physical bodies
sealed as one in sensual, pulsing completion in the Argadian way.

Then she felt the Serdionese rise within him. He entered her
mind and she offered him the haven he’d been denied by the loss of memory. His
sensual colors wrapped around her, through her, stroking every part of her. She
saw the lights of her radiance mingle with his colors as their souls merged
into one bright, passionate body of energy. A complete balance and mingling of
physical and spiritual—two souls meant to be one for all time. Once a single
thread bound them, now it was woven so tightly through them both, never to be
severed, stronger than the finest metal, more beautiful than the brightest
star.

The healing light of life filled with love enveloped them
and carried them through the void of darkness from Now into Beyond.

~ 0 ~

The
Argadian Heart
Trilogy

Continue the
adventure with:

Eluria’s Enforcer
(Book 1)

Ravager’s Redemption
(Book 3)