10. Chapter 10

Patiently I waited the next morning for Niara to appear from her room, going mentally over last night. For a moment, I had her. She had been aroused by my presence, her pupils had dilated and I saw my own reflection in them. Something had happened though, even before Sarissa's arrival. For the life of me I couldn't figure out how Niara and I had gone from almost kissing to her retreating to her suite.

I went over that moment for hours last night and the next morning, analyzed and dissected it, but there was nothing, nothing, that gave me even a hint of why she had rejected me.

Servants arrived with the breakfast trays and my patience wore thin. If Niara wasn't about to come out, I would have to go get her. The day was slipping by and we had a lot of things to accomplish.

To my surprise the door to the seffies chambers was locked. Amused I suppressed a grin at her obstinacy and raised my hand to knock, just when it pulled open.

"Why did you lock your door?" I asked when she stared surprised at my raised fist .

She caught herself quickly though, "For the same reason you tried to enter," she countered, reminiscent of our earlier conversation yesterday. A chuckle escaped me.

"Are you afraid you would succumb to my charms?" I teased.

"Afraid?" She pretended to seriously consider my words, before she shook her head, "No. Worried I might not be able to fight you off."

That killed the chuckle in my chest, replacing slight amusement with outrage, "I have never and will never force myself upon an unwilling seffy."

She pushed by me, "I don't know you other than that you took me away from my home against my will, so you'll have to excuse me, if I'm not fully trusting you."

The little synn—cat—had claws and knew how to use them. I rubbed my chest to keep the churning anger at bay, it wouldn't help my position any if it erupted.

"Breakfast," I swiped my arm toward the loaded table, glad to be able to change the subject.

She had already been on her way and didn't pause at my words. Instead she claimed one of the pastries my chefs reserved for the first meal of the day.

"This is good," she praised between bites.

"We could sit down," I suggested.

She reached for another pastry, "We can eat while we walk, I imagine you have a lot of things on my to do list for today."

I did, but I would have given her the time to sit down and eat like civilized people. My eyes caught the single illis flower in the middle of the table. I pulled it from the vase and handed it to her. “For you.”

With both of her hands full and her mouth in the middle of chewing, her eyes widened at the sight of the rare flower. Satisfied to have finally left her speechless—even if it was with the help of pastries—I watched her take a visible swallow while she put the pastries back down on the table.

She held her hand out and took the flower from me, “For me?”

I nodded, taken aback by the beautiful smile playing around her lips, mesmerized by the way she held the flower up to her nose and closing her eyes, took in the sweet scent. Good gods, she was the picture of a seductress and knowing she didn’t do this on purpose spread a never before experienced emotion through my chest. Care , my mind supplied, you care for her .

“It smells wonderful, thank you!” she opened her eyes and our gazes met, freezing me in place, while my cock stiffened. Astonishingly that wasn’t what I desired most though—I wouldn’t have said ney to her—but what I truly wanted was to fold her into my arms and gently kiss her.

I broke out eye contact first. “You’re welcome. I couldn’t let it stand that you had never seen or held one before.”

With a yearning expression she put the flower back into the vase, “Either way, that was… surprisingly thoughtful. Thank you.”

I noticed she wore a different outfit today, tight leather breeches with an open shirt that was tied off at her waist by a belt. Underneath it she wore the same black bathing suit I had seen her in before. Discomfort rose in me at the idea that she would wear this in front of my dragoons, that they would all see her in her nearly naked glory.

The discomfort grew into something else: possessiveness.

Nobody should see her like that, but me .

I didn't know where that thought came from, but it was there. The myriad of emotions she or the thought of her had been going through me all morning was beginning to make me dizzy.

"Are you ready?" While I had been mulling this over, she had already made her way over to the main entrance.

With a loud sigh, I grabbed the leg of some unfortunate sky critter and began chewing on it, grumbling all the way about having to eat like a barbarian, especially during my favorite mealtime of the day.

We didn’t speak another word, but I was sure I had gained a smidgen of her goodwill with my gesture. All the while I was planning on how to endear myself to her next, I purposefully kept a few steps behind her, expecting at any moment for her to turn questioningly at me to find out which hallway to take, but with an uncanny precision and memory, she kept marching right for the elevator.

Here she did flounder, since she didn't know which floor we were going to and with a smug expression, I pushed the one for the harbor level. On the other end of the elevator shaft, unknown hands set the activator in motion, large fish, that swam in a circle and wound the line to bring the elevator up. It was one of my own genius inventions and I was rather proud of it. I would have probably boasted about it right then, had her closed expressions held even a hint of invitation for talk. Which it didn't. She actually looked walled off. Well so much for having gained a smidgen of goodwill , I thought, wondering if anybody understood seffies’ moods and if they would be willing to explain them to me.

An explanation of a different kind hit me, if she thought she needed those walls as a defense, it was only because it was needed to prevent a breech. Had the seffy truly been that set against my advances, she wouldn't need them. Interesting .

She did look around though, as if trying to figure out how the mechanism worked, once or twice I caught her opening her mouth to voice her question, but both times she closed it. Determined to keep the silence between us.

I pulled the last of the meat off the drumstick I had grabbed and chucked it uncaringly into a corner. She sent a dirty look in my direction, but stayed silent.

So be it .

Daintily she brushed the crumbs from the pastry off her shirt and I gave her a pointed look for making a similar mess on the floor like I had. She widened her eyes at me, before they narrowed them, daring me to comment.

I snickered.

The elevator reached the harbor level and stopped. I opened the doors, allowing her to step out first.

The sun was already much higher on the horizon than I would have liked and by the looks of the males on the pier they had been waiting for some time for our arrival .

As soon as they noticed me, they stood to attention. "Vissigroth."

I nodded in recognition of their greeting and pointed at Niara, "This is Lady Niara, she will teach us today about some marvelous equipment the humans have invented, that will allow us to swim underwater for hours."

A curious grumble moved through the ranks of my males, as they all eyed Niara curiously.

Several tanks, surrounded by fins and goggles had already been set out, probably ordered by Kyle. They weren't as neatly stacked as I would have anticipated, leaving me to conclude that the males must have already rifled curiously through them.

"I would like to keep this a secret from the sirens for now, so let’s move all this," my arms encompassed the equipment, "back aboard the Nautica and we'll drive the boat further out toward Death Mountain Island." I ordered.

The sirens feared Death Mountain Island for reasons they hadn't shared with us. The island wasn't as big as some others and didn't give much room, since it was mostly a ragged mountain emerging from the sea. Every now and then smoke surfaced from the very tip of the mountain and it was said it could spit molten rock into the sky, but I had never witnessed such an event, neither had my father or his. But there were stories of it causing mayhem and disaster. One spoke of the water level rising so high, it nearly covered Aecor, another of waves taller than the mountain itself .

Whatever the reasons, whatever I might or might not believe, for miles surrounding Death Mountain Island there would be no sirens to observe us.

On the way Niara explained how to use the gear, what certain hand gestures meant and how to read the oxygen level meter.

"Oh my God, that is a volcano," Niara exclaimed when we came within viewing range of the island.

"A volcano?" I repeated, having never heard that word before.

"Yes, it's… is it active?"

I frowned, "What do you mean?"

"Does smoke come out of the top? And lava?"

"Sometimes we see smoke, and if by lava you mean the molten rock, then, zyn. Although I have never seen the melted rocks flowing."

She stared at it in amazement. Her expression torn between awe and terror.

"The stories are true then?" I broke the silence.

"I'm not sure what stories you mean, but if they include flying rocks, lava and possible tsunamis, then yes."

"Tsunamis?"

"Large waves," she explained leveling her hand as high as possible.

"Zyn, that's what the legends say."

"I read a couple of books about volcanoes," she informed me. "They've fascinated me since I was a child. I just never knew that there was one here, on Oceanus. "

"Oceanus is big," I boasted, "it takes many years to navigate from one end to the other."

"This is dangerous Myles," she implored with a seriousness that caught my attention. "I need my books. These things can kill a lot of people. If it erupts, it can create a cloud of dust that could choke anybody."

"Not underwater," I checked.

"No, but you get air down into the domes somehow, and if the air in the atmosphere is poisonous, it will get down into the domes."

"What can be done to prevent this?"

She shook her head, "Nothing unfortunately, only to be as far away from it as possible."

Her words jarred me, "Are you suggesting I move my city?"

She nodded, "The greater the distance between you and this the better."

"When will this happen?" I demanded.

"I don't know, tomorrow in a hundred years, never?"

I cursed under my breath and threw a dark glance at the volcano . If it was this dangerous, why had my ancestors built Aecor so close to it? Why hadn’t there been any warnings? Why didn’t anybody in all of Leander ever said anything?

I admitted the last question was easy to answer, Oceanus was the only planet in the fourteen planet system with a volcano . Leanders were warriors, not scientists. We did not explore or invent or researched unless it was beneficial to warring, not like the humans did, who it seemed loved to research, explore and dig into all kinds of sciences that held little interest for us.

A thought hit me, maybe that was why the gods were suddenly so keen on mating Leanders and humans. Maybe both our races lacked at something and by combining them it would strengthen us. Besides not being a scientist, I wasn’t a philosopher either, so I buried this idea, having no idea how close I came that day to understanding the gods’ will.

"I will post sentries," I vowed, "to warn us of any sign of smoke."

About her other suggestion, moving Aecor… I would need to think on that. Aecor was hundreds of years old.

To my surprise she put a hand on my arm, "Myles, there could also be underwater earthquakes, that could threaten your city."

Those words resonated with me even more, because now and then the sea ground had grumbled underneath us. Nothing bad or serious, just something that had happened and overtime we had come to expect it. It had never occurred to me that it could be stronger and actually bring the city down.

If that was the case, I owed Niara much for her warning.

"Alright, I will think this over, for now, let's start dive training."