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Calling the guy dangerous was like calling the man-eating flowers weird, or Kaelum cute.
Yes, he was super fucking hot.
Don’t judge me. The guy’s over seven feet of pure muscle, with long dark hair, warm, glowing eyes, and the way he handled me in the river was downright gentle.
Plus unlike so many of his brethren, Kaelum seemed to have at least some tiny portion of common sense. He had called me soft, as a human, but he already knew that didn’t mean weak. He was the only non-human who hadn’t treated me like I was barely capable of walking without help.
Tyber treated Kaelum’s wounds, leaving little more than a shiny pink patch over where each hole had been. He didn’t say a word about where they might have come from, only gave Kaelum a hard look at the size and shape.
Kaelum clenched his jaw and clamped his lips shut.
So when we left, and he was limping less, I turned to look at him. “There’s some history here, and I want to know what it is. Did Vorian call your dad out or something?”
Kaelum winced but pulled me onto the middle of one of the great stone terrapads that served as elevators in the... well hell, I didn’t know. Was it just the castle? Or was a whole city built into the cliff Kaelum lived at the top of?
Underground seemed like it might be the safest spot on a planet where all the plants and animals wanted to murder you.
Anyway, that was a question for another time.
I turned and pinned Kaelum with a look.
He flushed—the very first time I’d seen it—and it gave his cheeks even more of a blue tint than the hint of blue they always had. Somehow, it both made it obvious that he was an alien, and... it was adorable.
“Vorian is my half-brother.”
I blinked, staring at him, trying to figure out how—how would—oh. I stood there, blinking mutely for a moment. “So, um, your dad and Crux were both into the same woman. Your mom.”
He cocked his head. “Into? That’s a crude way of putting it, but I suppose—”
“Slang!” I shouted over him. Good lord. “It’s slang. It means they were both romantically interested in her. Or something like that.”
“Oh.” Kaelum stopped and considered for a moment, then shook his head. “Crux is interested in very little other than his work. He wished to have my mother because she is beautiful. So he took without asking, and from that, Vorian was born. Mother was one of the only humans to have ever carried a Thorzi child, let alone two. And her situation is why we have laws about the treatment of humans now. You are not chattel, to be ignored, and injured, andforced.”
He looked so disgusted by the idea that I almost smiled despite the horror of the subject.
But Vorian was Kaelum’s mother’s son.
She’d been forced to watch her own sons fight, possibly to the death. I had thought she disliked Vorian, though.
And why not?My brain pointed out. Maybe some women could overlook the circumstances of Vorian’s conception, if Crux had raped her like Kaelum was implying, but some women would never want to look at a child born from that. I’d never lived her circumstances, so I had less than no right to judge.
The whole story certainly proved that I had been right about Crux.
“We should make sure he took Genevieve home,” I told Kaelum. “Crux, that is. If he’s a rapist, I don’t trust him to do the right thing.”
Kaelum’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t jump to take offense. Rather, he seemed thoughtful, and eventually, he inclined his head. “Crux knows well that this matter is governed by my father’s laws. I do not think he would dare break laws that were made because of his own bad behavior, but I will look into it. I would not wish you to feel threatened by him.”
I thought back to the way Kaelum had snapped at Crux on his own ship, the way everyone had treated him, and in relation, Vorian. “You feel threatened by him. Why shouldn’t I?”
Kaelum turned and faced me, wrapping an arm around my waist and pulling me close. “Because I will kill him before I see him harm you.”
And against Crux, I didn’t doubt that.
But against Vorian? I wasn’t sure anyone could stop him.
The terrapad came to a stop, and Kaelum turned us in a direction that felt random to me and started walking. Would I ever know this place that well?
Did I want to?
