Chapter 28 - Polly

Aloryk hadn't been joking when he'd said he was going to keep me hidden. He'd gone out to get us food, to fetch me water to bathe with, and even some thin hide that he'd urged me to amuse myself by decorating with the same stain I used on our tattoos. Not that I'd been bored, not with the way Aloryk had practically pleaded with me to ride his face again.

But it's hours later, in the dark of night when I wake to find that I'm alone.

I'd fallen asleep curled into Aloryk's side, his arm and tail wrapped around me. I remember watching his skin-stars react with each of my breaths as my exhales ghosted across his chest. I'd watched those twinkling little colorful lights while Aloryk's big, warm hand had stroked my hair, my eyelids seeming to feel heavier with each comforting slow glide of his palm.

Funny how quickly I'd gotten used to him just being by my side at all times that I feel so irrationally cold now that he's missing.

Hauling myself off the huge feathered nest, I absentmindedly finger-comb my unruly hair and step toward the open doorway. The moons seem almost as bright as a stage-lights illuminating this little corner of this alien planet as if Aloryk's Goddesses were watching everything unfold. Blinking, I walk out into the village at night, intent on finding my mate.

"You are meant to be sleeping," a low voice drawls from behind me. My heart leaps to my throat. Gasping, I spin on my heel to see a Trixikka male leaning back against the wall of mine and Aloryk's hut. "Aloryk will pluck my flightless wings bald if I let you wander around in the darkness, female."

The hand that had flown up to cover my heart falls back down to my side when I recognize the male in question. ‘ Jaxyn ' I think his name is. He's Tryk's brother, the one who ‘hatched' with a deformity to his wings. "Where is he?" I ask.

Jaxyn tips his head back against the stone wall, his face turned up to the night sky, the moonlight kissing the line of his exposed throat. He sighs and works his jaw, his tail flicking at his feet. "Your mate is with the beautiful one." I purse my lips, about to ask what the hell that's meant to mean when Jaxyn straightens. "All of you females are… captivating … in some way or another," he pauses to tilt his head this way and that, stretching the muscles in his neck. When he starts to talk again, there is a faint smile of adoration on his lips and a touch of awe in his voice. "But that Delphi …" My heart thumps painfully once, twice. Jaxyn pushes off from where he's leaning against the wall and stalks toward me. "She is truly made in the image of a Goddess. In my lowly opinion."

He stands before me, all seven-foot-something. And I can barely speak. All I do is gape up at him, my whole brain glitching. "Wha-… what is Aloryk doing with Delphi?" I manage to stutter out.

Jaxyn sighs and shakes his head. "Chasing a dream. A dream he should forget if you ask me. He already has his mate, why push the Goddesses for more?"

I… what?

"A… dream ?" my voice is small and hoarse when I ask, "he dreamed about-" I can't say the words.

He dreamed about me.

He dreamed about me .

Jaxyn snorts to himself. "Stupid fool. I have told him to just be grateful for what he has been given."

"I…" my arms come up to hug my body without much thought. "He's with Delphi?" I ask again, just to be sure, just to make sure I'm not having some kind of nightmare. "Aloryk snuck out in the middle of the night… to meet with Delphi?"

Jaxyn nods his head. "He asked me to watch over you while he was gone. Perhaps when he comes back, you can talk sense into that head of his."

I make a shaky sort of huffing noise - like I meant to laugh at that suggestion, but couldn't quite get the laughter out. "Yeah… maybe… I'm gonna…" without even looking at Jaxyn, I hitch a thumb over my shoulder and head on back into the hut.

The very empty hut.

* * *

It must be another hour or so when Aloryk comes back. An hour of my mind racing to all the worst places.

I feel him slip right in beside me on his nest-bed. He smells different. It's an almost floral scent, but there's something coconutty about it too. Like a massage oil or something. He's never smelt like that before.

"Where have you been?" the words fly out of me into the dark of the hut just as he's arranging his limbs around me.

Aloryk tenses. The silence in his held breath is deafening and has me counting the heartbeats between my words and his. One… two… three… four…

"I was needed to cover another male's patrol," he says.

My pulse booms loud in my ears as soon as I hear his lie.

Chapter 29 - Aloryk

I had laid awake, aching this last night. Not just from how Daffy had pulled and stretched my wings, making me hold them in various positions and repeat motions over and over that they have not done since before they were broken. But the aching in my heart was almost more painful. I had told a lie to my mate and this felt wrong. It felt like something else had burrowed into my chest and lodged itself there - something that was not welcome or wanted. But still this feeling stayed this whole last night before I had eventually drifted off into a restless slumber.

Polly was quiet, and I believe she had fallen back into her sleep straight away. I tell myself that if she had not done so, I would have taken back my lie and told the truth. But I am not so sure of that. The image of her pale expression when she had first seen my wings unbound that day still burns in my mind. If I try to fix my wings and it does not work, she will have to accept a broken male as her mate. I do not want to get her hopes up, and I do not want her to see me as weak.

I do not want her to know me for a liar, either, but that is what I have become, it seems.

Jaxyn had called my wishes nothing more than a dream, but what is so wrong with dreams? Polly was once nothing more than a dream, and then the Goddesses plucked her from my mind, and put her here on Trixikka lands for me to find. I think perhaps he is too jaded to have dreams of his own. I do not blame him. The Goddesses made him with broken wings after all. But I saw the way he looked at the female, Daffy… or ‘ Delphi '… whatever Polly had said was her correct name. Perhaps the Goddesses will finally gift him one of his dreams with this new female?

I can feel the warmth of this day's first sun start to creep into our hut and I stretch, blindly reaching out for my mate in our nest. My hands find nothing, and it is enough to force my sleep-heavy eyes open and suck in a breath to find the nest empty.

"I don't know what you did, Ricky, but you better hope you can undo it."

Chaz-Titi steps into my hut without invitation, standing before me with her hands on her hips.

"What-?" I have barely gotten my waking wits about me, and now this female is here, giving me an accusatory look first thing this morning. "Where is Polly?" I ask, squinting at my friend. I assume she left to find nourishment to break her fast, leaving me to rest alone. I do not like the thought, but if she was hungry and I was asleep, I will not begrudge my female for leaving to find food.

Chaz-Titi crosses her arms over her chest. "She's gone with Zarriko's guys. Did y'all have a fight or something? She said you agreed for her to go, but looking at you now, that was obviously a lie."

The suddenness of the way my heart plummets painfully almost leaves me gasping for air.

I am up and out of my hut instantly, running forward before turning back around and stalking back to Chaz-Titi again. "What do you mean she has gone with Zarriko's males?" My mind cannot comprehend such a thing. Surely I misheard the female?

My friend shakes her head and shrugs, and it is not getting the answer out of her mouth fast enough. I grab the tops of both her arms and jostle the female a little, as if this will make her words fall loose. " Chaz-Titi ," I growl, holding her tighter - perhaps even too tight, but I have no time to care for that. " Where… Is… My… Mate ?"

"Protector Aloryk!" my High Spear's voice booms, cutting through my rising anger like a life-stone blade. "Leave the female alone."

I drop my tight grip from Chaz-Titi's arms and turn to High Spear Rynn as he approaches, flanked by his mate and Second Spear Mavyx. "But-…" I start, feeling my chest tighten painfully. I can barely breathe. "Polly-"

"She has gone to Zarriko's tribe, yes," Rynn says, coming to a stop before me, his expression stern, but concerned.

I shake my head. "I do not understand. Why did no one stop them from taking her from me? She is my mate!"

It is then that my High Spear's eyes drop to my chest, a terrible look of pity crossing his face.

They didn't stop her, because to anyone else, she is not mine.

But she knew. Polly knew she is everything to me, my female, my mate, and everything I am is hers in turn. Heart-stars or not, I wear her name over my heart because it is hers alone, she knew this… did she not?

I catch myself from sinking into that feeling of despair. There has been some kind of horrible mistake. I need to see my female. "I need someone to take me to Zarriko's tribe," I say, my voice hard as I stare at my High Spear.

Rynn sighs, a muscle in his jaw ticking as he works it. And it is then that I know he cannot help in this matter. As far as everyone else is concerned, I have no heart-stars, I have no claim, and Polly has chosen to leave this tribe.

Turning back inside, I retrieve my spear and an extra dagger.

I may be a broken male unable to take to the skies for my female, but I have working legs to take me. By the Goddesses! Even if I were broken in that regard too, I will crawl the length of all lands to reach my Polly.