Chapter 32

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

The three lay together, arms, legs, and bodies entwined. They were no longer individuals. They were one, though, as their senses finally returned, they had to wonder how, exactly.

“Wow,” Olivia said, savoring the feeling of her men’s fingers gently caressing her body as she ran her hands lovingly through their hair.

“I-what…” Rykker tried to say before trailing off with a sex drunk laugh.

Arkness’s body shook as a little chuckle rumbled from within. “I know what you’re saying,” he agreed. “That was…”

“Incredible,” his friend finished for him. “Absolutely incredible.”

Olivia couldn’t have agreed more. That went far beyond merely the best sex she had ever had by a millionfold. That was something that had shaken her to the core. Something that she knew had bonded the three of them forever. What she couldn’t understand was how. Pheromones were one thing, but this was far, far more.

She looked down at their Infalas. All three were still glowing, though only slightly, as if even their pigments were worn out from the epic encounter.

“Kinda gives afterglow a new meaning, huh?” she joked, even the little laugh making her sides hurt a bit.

She’d clenched up hard, apparently. So hard she’d even strained a muscle or two, though she was sure the new runes would take care of that in no time.

The men turned their attention to the runes on their chests, both of them quite confused.

“I don’t understand,” Arkness marveled. “Our Infalas are reacting, but they don’t match.”

Rykker ran his fingers over Olivia’s marking with curious eyes. “He’s right. It’s clear to see, none of us do.”

“But there’s something , isn’t there?” Olivia wondered with a newcomer’s perspective to the situation. The designs didn’t match. Not entirely. And according to the Dotharian Conglomerate, the Infala only changed to perfectly match its partner. But something was gnawing at her. An idea scratching at the deep corners of her mind.

“Hey,” she called to the AI. “Can you display our Infalas?”

“ Of course, ” the unit replied, all three of their Infalas floating in the air above them.

“Nope. There it is. They don’t match,” Arkness confirmed, staring up at them from their comfortable bed.

“But there are similarities,” Rykker noted. “What does that mean?”

Olivia stared and stared until her eyes blurred. “Oh, shit,” she realized, willing her eyes to unfocus more until the patterns shifted together like one of those weird paintings from her childhood. Her heart raced, the men feeling her body tense under their touch.

“What’s wrong?” Rykker asked.

“I figured it out. Holy shit, I know what’s going on! Overlap the designs. Just the Infalas. Align each of their matching parts with mine.”

The images shifted in the air and the men stared in awe at what they saw. Rykker audibly gasped.

“It can’t be.”

“There’s no denying it, my brother,” Arkness replied, his eyes welling with tears of joy. “We are Infala bonded. But not one or the other of us. It is all three!”

Olivia’s hunch had proven correct. While each of the men had only partially matched her Infala, combined, their two designs matched hers perfectly, as if the two halves of an interlinked key were required to finally open a very, very complicated lock.

“What does it mean?” she asked. “I mean, I know the basics, but isn’t this supposed to be impossible?”

The men sat up and looked at each other, the same thought springing to both their racing minds. They uttered the same thing at once.

“We must see Zoldana. The overseer will know.”

“I’m sorry, your Infalas are doing what ?”

The look of utter shock on Overseer Zoldana’s face said far more than mere words could. It was so extreme that Olivia worried that if the woman had been much older her heart might have given out from what they told her.

“Yeah, I know, it’s kinda weird, from what the boys were telling me.”

“ Weird ? Finding a second fraxxin nut in a single pod is weird. Having your domicile unit prepare you a bath from soup is weird. But this? This is unheard of!” Zoldana was pacing now, her feet seemingly trying to keep up with her racing mind. “You three stay right here. I’m having Skrizzit Nijello brought to us.”

Zoldana hurried from the room, leaving the three lovers on their own for what was sure to be a very short wait. Given her agitation, they doubted very much that Nijello would not drop literally anything to come at a full sprint when she called him.

“So, I guess we kinda freaked her out,” Olivia said with a little chuckle, taking a seat and pulling her men down to sit nestled up against her on either side.

“I’ve never seen her like this,” Rykker noted. “But, then, I do suppose this is the sort of thing that would qualify for a freakout-level reaction.”

Arkness nodded, his hand on Olivia’s knee. “I think you’re right. I, for one, cannot wait to see what Nijello’s reaction will be.”

He wouldn’t have to wait long. Very shortly the Skrizzit and Lithos, his young assistant, came rushing in with Overseer Zoldana following close behind, the three lovers’ Infala designs hovering in the air in front of him, overlapping and separating over and over as if on some sort of OCD-inspired loop. And given the look on the man’s face, that might not have been too far from the truth.

“Impossible,” he muttered as he studied the runes for what was likely the hundredth time. “It’s just so unlikely.”

“Or, as you said, impossible ,” Zoldana replied.

The Skrizzit’s hands were constantly in motion, rearranging the Infalas displayed in front of him in every possible way, always returning to the same undeniable fact. Together, the three of them made a whole.

“I do not understand how this could have happened,” he blurted in frustration. “I was the one who applied the pigment. I was the one who tested and re-tested the designs.” A look of realization flashed across his face. “The existing markings!” he exclaimed, turning to Olivia. “The runes made part of your existing markings! That must be it! Tell me, have there been any unusual reactions?”

An uncomfortable little smile formed on Olivia’s lips. “Uh, yeah. About that.”

“What? Tell me!”

“Well, I can kind of move things like I couldn’t before.”

“You are stronger, yes, that is part of the runes.”

“No, you don’t get it. I can move them with my mind.”

Rykker and Arkness were unfazed, having been the firsthand recipients of her delightful new talent. Zoldana, Nijello, and Lithos, on the other hand, looked shellshocked.

“You can move things with your mind?” Nijello finally said, the enormity of the possibilities this implied spreading before him like a vast, uncharted territory to which he was the first explorer ever to set foot. He was shocked, yes. Terrified even. But he was also intrigued. “Show me.”

Olivia shrugged. “Okay, but I’m not very good at it yet.”

“We would disagree,” Rykker said with a wink.

Olivia flashed him a look of faux annoyance. “Anyway,” she said, looking at a tall decorative vase resting against the far wall, squinting with effort.

“I don’t see any?—”

The vase slid to its left, leaving several mouths gaping.

“Like I said, I’m not good at it yet. And it seems to flare up when I’m, uh, experiencing heightened emotions.”

“Remarkable,” Nijello cried out, furiously making notes on the display in front of him. “Absolutely amazing!”

Zoldana was equally impressed, but also very unsettled. “What about the Infala, Skrizzit? How is this possible?”

“On that, Overseer, I am unclear.”

She did not seem to like that answer from the man who knew more about the pigments than anyone in the city.

“Excuse me?” Lithos timidly chimed in.

“What is it?” Nijello asked, annoyed at the interruption.

“Well, it’s just that I actually heard of something like this when I was on my school research trip to visit the Bolaxian colony on the far side of the Jinarius moon.”

Nijello’s annoyance was quickly replaced by sharp curiosity. “Why didn’t you say so?”

“I am just the understudy. The assistant. It’s not my place to?—”

“Nonsense! Tell us what you learned on your trip, boy,” Zoldana cut him off.

“It was a primitive tribe. They try to avoid most technology. It makes for an interesting oral tradition though, passing down knowledge by story and song. Anyway, one of the stories mentioned a legend of this sort of thing happening. It was long before any of their time, but their oral record-keeping is impressive.”

Nijello added more details to his already copious notes. “And what did the story say of this event?”

“Just that it was unlikely, but not unheard of. A thruple , they called it.”

“What does that even mean? Thruple ?”

Now it was Olivia’s turn to add to the topic. “Actually, we have that back home, though it’s got nothing to do with any magical ink bonding stuff. But a thruple is just a couple, but with three, get it? Th-ruple.”

Zoldana shook her head, processing the information as best she could, digesting this unusual but apparently not unique event. After a moment she let out a defeated sigh.

“Well, then. You three will meet with Nijello as needed for his studies. And Olivia, I ask that you help him understand your new gift.”

“Of course. But what about us?” she asked, nodding to her men.

A little grin cracked through Zoldana’s look of consternation. “It looks like you three have much to discuss.”

With that, she turned and walked out, followed by her Skrizzit and his assistant, leaving Olivia, Arkness, and Rykker to go home and figure the rest out for themselves. They rose and took their leave, happy to go do precisely that.