Chapter 9

Min-Ji

Corin was kissing me! It felt like a dream come true, like I was living in a fantasy. One moment, we'd been facing nasty robots, creepy spider bots, and one of those chainsaw-mawed beasts. The next, I was in heaven, held by the man I wanted, and his mating marks were so bright they were blinding.

Kissing a Naga male wasn't the same as kissing a human man—not that I had any recent experience. My last boyfriend predated the mission to the Zeta Quadrant, where Serant was located. A year and a half of traveling at faster-than-light speeds to get here. It was one hell of a dry spell, and I was very ready to break it. Though, I wasn't quite sure if I wanted that to happen in a room with half of a zombie robot corpse. If we could just step out into the tunnel, that would work for me…

Then he did a thing with his tongue, twirling it with mine, and at the same time he pressed his hips forward and I felt the heat and pressure of his cock against me. Ah, fuck it. Who cared where we were? As long as he didn't stop, that felt so good.

He was the one who suddenly lifted his head, turning it to hiss in warning at something over his shoulder. His pretty mercury eyes glowed as fiercely as his mating marks did, and all I wanted to do was admire how pretty it looked, how sexy he was. Thankfully, he had more sense than I had at that moment. He set me down on my feet so suddenly that I wobbled and nearly fell over, his tail looped around my waist to help me, but he turned and moved away.

I stood there, clutching his tail and reeling from what had happened. I might've felt a smidgen of hurt that he could turn away and move on like nothing had happened. Only, something had happened, and I wasn't the only one who was affected. As my brain managed to catch up to the new situation, I took in the signs that Corin was shaken up, and one significant change.

He was touching me. His tail was still looped around my waist, holding me tightly but gently, and his sigils were glowing. He wasn't hiding what we were; he didn't deny it, and he hadn't withdrawn completely. A surge of hope pounded through my veins—this was it, this was the first step. I hadn't imagined anything that one night while injured; he really was my mate.

Corin bent down and threw the remains of the naga robot away from the viewscreens. Some cables came unhooked as he did, but the metal bones were just that, a pile of bones and robot parts. With a disgusted hiss, Corin pulled another small flask free from his belt and threw it on the robot's headless remains. They went up in a violent whoosh of flames and fire, this time much more safely in the corner. I tried not to feel disturbed that he was carrying something so volatile around so casually.

My mate didn't even watch the inferno but got to work on the computer system instead. I would have offered to help, but I couldn't read the Naga letters. That wasn't something the translator upgrade Artek the Shaman had devised could help with. Corin was hunched over the controls, his scales shivering along his back, and it looked like he was in pain.

I glanced around the room and found Triff nearby, sitting idly with two slow-blinking purple lights directed my way. The robot probably didn't understand what was going on between Corin and me, but I still gave it a helpless look. I didn't want Corin to hurt from touching me, and I felt guilty for being elated over this change when he was acting like that. At least now I knew for a fact that we really were mates.

When I took a tentative step toward him, his tail slithered away like water. I almost tried to grab the tip before his touch disappeared, but I managed to restrain the urge. I wanted to keep seeing the evidence of our bond, but this wasn't the time or the place to make a point of it. Corin's scales stopped rattling along his spine as soon as he stopped touching me, his discomfort or pain easing.

"What's going on?" I made myself ask. It was better if I focused on the problems at hand, we still had a rescue mission to fulfill. I had my proof. He wasn't going to get away without a very good reason, I'd make sure of it. That meant I needed to find some of that patience I struggled with, but I could do it.

"I heard an alarm. It looks like some repair bots set it off in one of the air vents to the west. It might be the direction they took Vrash's control core and head, but it could also be a distraction." He didn't move aside when I came to stand next to him, and I felt some tension shiver out of my body as I noticed that. We were almost touching, just a tiny step to the side and our arms would brush. This was normally when he created space, but this time, he didn't.

"So, what's the plan? How do we find out where he really went?" I asked, looking away from the leather strap that wound around his biceps and at the screen. Corin had pulled up schematics of the pipes, and there was one obvious spot with blinking red lights, but several more had orange blinking dots.

A feathery brush against the edge of my jaw nearly made me jump, but it was Corin, urging my chin up to his with a gentle finger. His sigils flared to life all over his chest, and they were starting to glow down the front of his tail too. I couldn't read the expression in his silver eyes, but whatever he was thinking, it was intense. It felt like he was promising to explain, to talk, later. "We let him go," he said, "because we have to find the warriors first. What I can do is try to take control of the repair bots. That should ensure he can't do any more damage."

His finger dropped away when he returned his hands to the controls and got to work. That gesture had said the world to me. It was a bit of acknowledgment that the bond was real and that our relationship had changed. I was content to watch him work and guard his back after that. I didn't even get bored when ten minutes turned into half an hour, and then an hour. My desire for an explanation—a heart-to-heart—was growing by the minute, and it was hard to stand still as I contemplated what I wanted to say.

Triff started cleaning when the bot realized we were staying a while, and I watched in fascination as he opened the top dome part and beamed light toward the ceiling. Drifts of dirt and dust came tumbling down when it did that. That solved that mystery. A little of that treatment, and the crystals in the ceiling glowed as bright as ever.

"I got it, and I managed to retrieve data about the hydro plants. I think I know which one our warriors are stuck in." Corin's voice was just a low rumble when he made his announcement, but it sounded loud in the silence. Then I heard the pitter-patter of tiny feet, and my skin broke out in goosebumps. Crap, that sounded like the repair bots were coming back.

Corin's lips tilted into a smirk, his silver eyes dancing with a hint of sudden amusement. "Don't worry, Min-Ji. I'll send the bots to the failing hydro plant so they can do their job. You won't have to see them." Damn it, I thought I had managed to hide how much I disliked anything with more than four legs, but Corin hadn't missed a thing.

"Thanks. How far do we have to travel? We should hurry." I hadn't been bored while watching my favorite person work, and my favorite cleaning bot clean, but I was feeling antsy. We'd been down here almost two full days. What if that was too long? What if they weren't just out of food, but out of air? They could already be dead.

"Not sure. I've filled in some blanks on my previous map, so our route should be more direct. Let's hurry." He tapped the roll of lavender leather on which he'd hand-drawn a map with charcoal. I hadn't realized there were blanks, and now I was relieved I hadn't known. I really didn't like the idea of getting lost in this maze of tunnels and storage rooms. "Good news, though," Corin said. "I now have a comprehensive list of everything stored down here. We could fix so much."

He was talking and moving, already heading for the doorway, and I had to break into a jog to catch up. Triff hummed at Corin's side, its polishing disks leaving a shiny trail in the dirt behind it. This time, it wasn't me keeping up an endless stream of conversation. In a complete turnabout from that morning, Corin was talking a mile a minute about what he'd discovered, the supplies, and how immensely helpful the repair bots were going to be.

At first, I enjoyed listening to his voice, but eventually I realized he was talking so much that I wouldn't ask questions. He didn't want to tell me what was going on, why he'd been hiding the mating marks from me when he'd known all along.

My worry for the warriors, my feelings for Corin, and the hurt from him rejecting me all coalesced into one big pile of anxiousness in my belly. Eventually, that emotional stew boiled over, and I couldn't help but burst out: "Why? Why don't you want me?" Damn it, that was not how I meant to breach the subject. Intellectually, I knew it was more nuanced than that.

Corin came to an abrupt stop in the middle of the tunnel, and I tripped over his tail and stumbled into the wall. He didn't reach out to catch me, and I glared at him, because that felt like another rejection. I thought we had a moment. I thought that the brush of his finger meant he'd tell me, and that he wanted me. But here he was, already back to his old antics of avoiding and changing the subject, never touching me.

Oh, no. Now my glare was turning into something else when I wanted to hold firm and make him feel my wrath. Instead, tears were starting to slip out, and, furious at that show of emotion, I wiped my eyes with my wrist. "Just explain it to me, please. I need to understand."

Corin was always a big mystery to me, but the look in his eyes was all pain and anguish. When he spoke, his voice was rough as a growl, and his hands balled into fists at his sides. "Not want you?" he said, his tail vibrating and coiling wildly next to him. "Not want you? I want you more than air, more than life itself! You are everything I've ever wanted. You've owned my heart and soul from the moment I met you, and it takes everything in me not to claim you."

His words were exactly what I wanted to hear, but they didn't make sense. If he wanted me that badly, then why was he keeping his distance? Why was he always telling me to leave him alone? "Then claim me! I'm not objecting. Why aren't you over here kissing me? Why this?" I jerked my hand between us, indicating the space that separated our bodies.

My heart rate spiked with a hint of fear when Corin bared his fangs and hissed in fury. I didn't fear him because I knew he'd never harm me, but my body had a healthy respect for how strong and dangerous a Naga male was. He could squash me like a bug if he felt like it—he was so much stronger than a human, and so much bigger.

"To keep you safe," he growled. "Everything I do is to keep you safe. You're better off moving on. Forget this exists between us. It's the only way you're going to survive on Serant." He didn't give me time to process that, but spun away and raced at breakneck speed down the tunnels. No endless talking this time. No words filled this silence except mine, and they fell on deaf ears.

No matter what I said, he wouldn't tell me what danger I was in if I mated him. What risk I'd be taking. When I told him that was my choice, not his to make, he hissed, but that was the only response I got. Furious, I wanted to pound my fists against his scales; I wanted to call him names. Why did he get to decide? He wouldn't even explain what kind of danger. What a stupid, chauvinistic male thing to do! I had enough of men deciding the course of my fate.

It was very tempting to grab the tip of his tail and tell him to shove it someplace indelicate. He could forget about calling me his mate if this was how he treated me. I deserved better. But then Triff made a sad little beep and bumped against my ankle, and I shook myself out of my pain-filled anger to look up at Corin.

I noticed his hunched shoulders and the way he'd dropped his chin to his chest as he moved. The soft whisper from his twitching scales. He was always like that. Most Naga only twitched their scales on rare occasions, but Corin's scales twitched at least half the time I saw him. This wasn't easy on him either. I wasn't the only one hurting.

My mouth snapped shut on the last angry words, and I fell silent, staring. I needed to remember the type of person Corin was, not get lost in my feelings. He was caring, with a regular bleeding heart, and felt responsible for everyone. He took on so much on his admittedly wide shoulders, and everyone assumed that he could handle it. But who did he lean on when he needed help? I didn't think he confided in Zathar or Iave, his closest friends, the same way they confided in him.

Hadn't I only recently discovered how extremely long and important his list of tasks was? They included things like fixing up an entire hydro plant, surveying these tunnels for collapse, and restoring the mess hall and kitchens inside Ahoshaga so we humans could eat indoors when it got cold… That was just the tip of the iceberg. Knowing that, I had to assume he thought he was doing the right thing by staying away from me. And knowing that, I also knew he was wrong. But how did I convince him of that?

My brows lowered as I focused on what to do. I could figure this out. What could make him think that keeping his distance was the right thing to do? I knew enough about Naga mating bonds to know how all-consuming they were for the males and how often they were one-sided when it came to a Naga female. But I felt it, I felt that bond just like he did. If it was hard for me to stay away from him, it had to be almost impossible for him. So what was the threat to my life if anyone found out?

I was pondering that question when we arrived at the next hydro plant. Our third stop, but hopefully our last. "Oh no…" I murmured when I saw what had happened to the tunnel. "That's bad."