Nova: A Scifi Alien Romance (Rebel Lords) (8 page)

I
didn’t sleep
that night, not even for a moment. My mind was completely plagued by conflicting thoughts and worries. I stared at Julia as she slept, trying to process all that had happened the past couple of days. I lost a large portion of my men and wounded most of them, I fucked a human, I lost that human and ran directly into the human to retrieve her, faced the reality that I hadn’t sold her yet or even thought about it, and then made love to her. Things couldn’t have been more twisted. It felt as though my soul was being mangled beyond recognition. I really didn’t even know who I was anymore. If myself from two weeks ago would have seen me then, I would have kicked my own ass. After so long of being repulsed by Dracon and his human, I was doing the same thing. I was falling for this human even when I couldn’t help it. She was passionate and smart, and Julia was in fact her own person. She didn’t think like the other humans and seemed to have a bigger heart. And I couldn’t shake the fact I was just completely drawn to her.

But I was supposed to sell her. The thought of doing so had escaped my mind for days at that point. My entire brain had been seized by my attraction to her. And now that it was brought to my attention… I had to. After losing so many men, the last thing I needed was for my people to start questioning me and wondering why I still had the human—I wouldn’t be able to give them an answer that they would like. And after she ran away like that, I couldn’t let that happen again or else my people would demand her blood. No, I had to sell her and quickly. My heart just ached at the thought, but I tried to push it away. It was going to be done and there was nothing I could do about it, no matter the connection I felt with her. My only hope was that with her out of sight, she would be out of mind. I couldn’t let her be a distraction anymore—I had to regain my name and status. Keeping her around would do nothing but hurt that.

I left the hut that morning before she woke up, going to find wisdom from our shaman, Bru. His small, minimalistic hut was not very far, resting at the top of the hill overlooking the village. None of the tribe seemed to be up yet, no one walking about to do chores. Good. I needed complete privacy. I knocked on the door of the hut and stood back, waiting for Bru to answer. Only a few seconds passed before the door opened and the short elderly man stood before me. Bru was the shortest man in the tribe, standing only at five feet and eleven inches; he was also the only one to keep his head completely shaved, tribal tattoos covering the cap of his head. “Nova, what troubles you at such an hour?” he asked.

I looked behind me at the sky, realizing the sun wasn’t even out yet. Looking back to the shaman, I spoke quietly, “I seek your wisdom, Shaman. I must speak to you in private.” Bru waved me in and shut the door behind me.

“I take it this is about the human staying in your hut,” Bru spoke as he moved to the small cooking surface in the corner of the hut, pouring us each a cup of herbal tea.

My eyes widened at his words, feeling as though he had struck me in the chest. “How did you know?” I breathed, lowering myself to sit on the floor. The hut was so small, about the size of my bathroom. All that it had in it was a bed, a small cooking surface and a fridge, a small table in the corner, and a door leading to his private toilet and shower. He had no belongings but his clothes and blankets.

“Well, it was just a matter of time before you came to me about it,” he chuckled. “I figured it would take you a while, with the hatred you felt towards Dracon and Amelia’s relationship.”

I blinked at him, completely thrown that he was speaking so casually. “So… you know about us then?”

“I’ve known since I heard that the target you were capturing was a female. It just fit too well with the prophecy for me to ignore,” Bru told me simply, walking over and sitting in the floor with me and handed me a cup of tea.

“Prophecy? What are you talking about?” I asked with curiosity burning in my eyes.

“The prophecy about our leader mating with an enemy and, I quote, ‘everything will be doomed, only to rise again’,” Bru spoke, his hand motioning in the air as he spoke each word of the quote.

My face screwed into a look of disbelief and confusion.
What?
“I thought that prophecy was about Dracon and his human?” I questioned him, my eyes narrowed a bit. Had the old man lost his wits?

“Well, the prophecy doesn’t say
who
it is about, nor does it limit to just one leader of the Navani. Prophecies are clear, yet vague. It can tell you what happens, but not everything. There has been more than one time that a prophecy has come true for many people,” the elder explained, taking a sip of his tea. “Don’t look so ill-tempered, Nova. This isn’t anything you can help. Sure, there will be some things to explain to the village, but just like Dracon’s, they will come around,” he tried to comfort me. But I was inconsolable.

I put my head in my hands, closing my eyes as tight as possible. “It’s more than that, Bru. She can’t be my fated mate…” I breathed to him, my voice not even a whisper.

Luckily, the old man wasn’t hard of hearing. “Oh? And why not?” he questioned, skepticism in his voice.

“Because…” I tried to start but voice trailed off, emotions causing my head to swim. “Because I have to sell her back to the humans.”

“Who said you
had
to?” Bru asked.

“
I
did. I told our people if I brought her into this village, then I would sell her back. And yesterday she tried to run back to the humans, even though I don’t know why for certain. After the massacre the other day… I just can’t afford for anything else to go wrong. And her being here will strike anger in our people,” I tried to explain, letting out a groan when my words finished. Why did it have to be this way? Why couldn’t I feel nothing for her? I wanted to be disgusted by her human body, not crave it. Julia plagued my every thought.

“But you love her, don’t you?” Bru asked after a long silence; his tone soft and understanding.

I let out a sigh, finally lifting my head from my hands. “I don’t know how I feel to be honest, Bru. I don’t know if it is love, but it’s an attraction. I feel almost magnetized to her. Yet we seem to hate each other. And of the midst of the hate, are these tender moments where I can feel my heart swell just at the sight of her. And her voice and her image haunt my thoughts, when I’m around her and when I’m not. I’m driving myself insane.”

Bru was silent, just swishing around his tea in his small cup as he thought. “Well, my boy, I don’t know what to tell you. What you just described to me was a fated mate. Of course fated mates, just like all other couples, don’t always see eye to eye, but that just merely cause for even a more intense attraction to one another. And it’s not a bond that can be broken once it is established.” Bru paused, looking down at his tea before up to me. “I just hope you understand the hurt you will be putting on your own soul if you decide to sell her back to the humans.”

I winced at the words. So she wouldn’t be out of sight and out of mind, I would feel her absence. The thought of the foreseen heartache about killed my soul. I didn’t want to be without her, not with knowing this information. I yearned to get to know her, to build something with her rather than the intense love-hate relationship we seemed to have at the time. But that wasn’t going to happen. No matter how I felt about her, I had to do right by my people—and her presence there in the village would only cause an upset if they all still realized that she was there. Closing my eyes and collecting myself, I took a deep breath. “Thank you for your counsel, Bru,” I spoke softly, knocking back my tea before standing. I moved to the door.

“I will pray for your heart, Nova. You are a selfless man to do this,” Bru called from behind me. While it made me feel as though I was doing the right thing, but didn’t make me feel any better emotionally when it came to selling Julia. I walked out of the hut and looked to the sky. The sun was beginning to rise and a quick glance to the village, I could see some already beginning to walk around. I walked to town with only one goal in mind, to assemble a team to go with me to Harp.

* * *

D
ran
, three other commanding warriors, and I made our way stealthily towards the entrance of Harp. I supposed with it being so early, they didn’t have the best patrol lurking in the jungle. Shaviro’s jungles were very dangerous at night with the beasts wandering the grounds at that time. But as we neared the entrance, a small party of humans gathered at the door. All of them were men, the one in the front had a metallic arm and an eye made of a red light. Were they leaders? Perhaps scouts had seen us and recognized me as a chief so they sent for their leaders as well. “To what do we owe the pleasure of meeting the men who have been terrorizing my drill sites?” the one with the metallic arm called to us, crossing his arms.

“
Your
drill sites?” one to the left of him retorted, that one was much younger than the first human. Were humans truly so vile that they would squabble over to the credit of such evils?

“You know what I mean,” the first one sounded with an annoyed tone.

“I have your Administrator, Julia. I’ve come to speak about arrangements for a trade,” I spoke with a firm tone, making sure to pronounce all of my English words with the best articulation I had.

“
You have Julia?
” the second man gaped.

But the first one was laughing, “And what makes you think you can come to my city and blackmail me? I don’t give a shit about that woman.”

The second human put a hand on the half-robot man’s shoulder, “The hell you talkin’ about? We need her to continue to drill at all—”

“
You don’t tell them that, dumbass!
” the first yelled at the other. He huffed and smoothed his hair. “Either way, drilling or no drilling, no savage comes into Harp and threatens me. And with just three men? Are you trying to get killed, or insult me? You better just give up now before my men shoot you dead.” The man gestured to the tall wall behind them, towers on the top of them every few hundred feet.

I couldn’t help but let out a maniacal, cynical laugh. Once my laughter died out a little, I looked to him with a vicious grin, “And what makes you think I came with just three men? How do you know whether or not I have an
entire
army waiting in the trees? While we might not win against your city, you sure as hell will be dead.” The man tensed then, his one human eye narrowing at me. I could tell the human before me was the lead scum. He valued his own life above everything else. He was silent, so I continued. “I’ll do a trade. Julia for the Navani warriors you have in captivity,” I proposed.

The man continued to be silent, I could feel his anger from where I stood. The puny human didn’t like being threatened, and it was eating him alive that I actually had the upper hand in the situation. His eyes glanced back to the men with him before looking back to me. “There’s no way in hell I’m just going to give you all the
savages
I have for one broad. Try again.” Clearly, he was trying to look tough, even when he was backed into a corner.

I glared at him, wanting to snap at him and tell him he must not have wanted the woman back. But I realized then I had no idea the number of men he had. There were several tribes, and he could have several from each. While Julia was a valuable bargaining tool, she wasn’t so valuable as to win the release of numerous Navani soldiers. “Fine. Just the ones from my tribe.”

“How the hell am I supposed to know the difference?” he questioned with a serious attitude to his voice.

I pointed to my chest; at the center of my tribal tattoo was a unique symbol that looked a bit like a flame. That mark identified our tribe, and each of our citizens had it. “They will have a mark like this.”

The man squinted to get a better look, his robotic eye seeming to zoom in before zooming back out. “I think I’ve seen a few with that. You can have two of them for the girl.”

As far as I knew, we only had two that had been grabbed by the humans. I didn’t trust these humans, especially the main one speaking. He seemed vile and just horrible, I pondered if he even had a heart. But that meeting was the best I was going to get in terms of getting Julia out of the village and retrieving two of my best warriors. The village would rejoice in my name again. I gave the man a brisk nod. “Deal. I will send a scout to give you information as to when we will exchange hostages. We will meet at the clearing just east of the river. Do not bring more than five men with you, and neither will I.”

East of the river was Dracon’s tribe, the clearing not far from his village. I didn’t trust him to bring just five men. If he was going to ambush us, we were going to be close enough to our own kind that we could get help if needed—I would send a scout that way to notify Dracon. The man gave a grin and a nod, “Sounds like a plan.”

“I expect the scout to return unharmed, it will be my way of knowing you agree to my terms. If he does not return or comes back injured, then the deal is off—and the only way you will get your human back will be with her head on a spear,” I warned.