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Cycles ago, I showed the arkoda mercy.
That is the last time I ever will if my Kennedy is threatened.
* * *
Cycles pass.In Sombra, we measure time by the rise and the fall of the gold moon. There have been three since the night Kennedy welcomed me with open arms and the spark of life that will one day be our spawn came to be.
Demonesses grow their offspring for twelve cycles. Her belly will go round somewhere around the eighth. It is customary to ignore the presence of the spawn until then.
Demonesses—and now my Kennedy—are more than just a vessel to a new soul. They are revered as the creators they are once the spawn shows signs of nearly arriving. Before then, it’s about taking care of the mother, making sure she wants for nothing.
Today, Kennedy wants to go for a walk. ‘Stretch her legs’ as my mate puts it. A simple enough request, and wanting to please her, I ask if she wants to let Freya trot alongside us. Many of the villagers think it odd that my mate keeps a prey beast as a companion, but thanks to her essence, I know that Kennedy thinks of the ungez as her ‘pet’. It reminds her of a domesticated animal from her world, and so long as she’s happy in Sombra, I’ll let her keep as many ungez as she likes.
Fortunately, she only desires the one. And since she dotes on the creature—pride wells up inside of me when I think of what a fine mother she’ll be to our spawn—she asks it if it wants to join us.
Ungez don’t speak. They chitter and chatter and scratch our floor, but I’ve yet to hear one speak. Of course, my Kennedy insists she understands Freya.
More human magic, I once thought, before getting to truly know my mate. She is teasing, and it makes me adore her more for it.
According to her, Freya would rather curl up on the couch and sleep rather than stroll around the village square. Since that means I don’t have to chase the ungez when it inevitably gets curious and runs of, I’m glad.
My good mood lasts throughout our stroll. In the cycles since we arrived in Nuit, the villagers have accepted Kennedy as one of their own, even though she is the only human many of the demons have ever seen.
At least, that’s what I thought… until I hear someone call out Kennedy’s name while we’re walking together through the village square.
It’s the way they say it. With her essence inside of me, I know precisely how my mate’s odd human name is pronounced. The other demons? When they use her name, it sounds more like how I once said it:Ken-dee.
The pale-haired, white-skinned female shouting for my mate? She said “Kennedy” with a distinctly human accent.
I go still, predatory instincts at the fore even as my hands crackle with magic.
A human is here. It matters not that she has a Sombra demon of her own shadowing her, or that Kennedy has not mentioned returning to the human world since the night of our first gold moon together.
I see the female and the dark shadows I’ve worked so hard to banish rise up suddenly. I shift from demon to my less substantial form, torn between running back to the edge of Sombra with Kennedy and challenging the human female and her mate for daring to come takemymate from me.
How else would they know her name unless, somehow, they came searching for her to take her from me?
I took her first. She’s mine.
Kennedy’s gaze slides my way. Bristling in place, torn between fighting and fleeing, she must sense my confusion—and my growing rage—through our bond.
“Loki? You okay?”
I will be.
I don’t want to jostle Kennedy or our spawn so I decide not to grab her and run. Instead, digging my heels in the dirt, I lower my head so that my two-horns are ready to defend us against anyone who would take her from me.
“Loki? What are you doing? Are you feeling alright?”
“Kennedy!”
It hits me then that my mate’s human hearing did not pick up on the other female calling her name the first time.
Now that she has, she spins around, hair fanning behind her as a brilliant smile flashes across her face. “Shannon? Oh my God.Shannon.”
“I knew it,” the pale-haired human female calls out in Kennedy’s language. “I freaking knew it. This is where you’ve been all this time?”
“What are you doing here?” Her attention falls on the male demon. “Holy shit. You got one, too?”
