- Caroline -

A shadow comes spinning and hits Troga in the head with a metallic bang. so when she releases the fire, her gape is pointing the wrong way. The blue-white flame passes harmlessly many yards off target, and I only feel the heat from it on my face as it vaporizes a huge tree.

My head snaps around. That shadow...

Then I can’t help gasping.

Someone is walking calmly towards me. A caveman with green stripes, wearing some kind of brown hat...

“Xark’on!”

He grins with those white teeth and his fangs. “Caroline.”

I open my mouth to say more, but I don’t know what. He has me right where he wants me now. Bait for his trap. I suppose he just wants to watch.

He comes up to the net, grabs it with both hands and rips it apart as if it consisted of wet paper. Then, he lifts me out of it and just holds me for a moment, pressing me into him.

I don’t return his embrace, but a tiny little bud of hope is starting to light up in me.

“Are you well?” he growls into my hair.

“No,” I state, because I’m really not, and this is not the time. “That dragon...”

He holds me and carries me a few yards past the trap, away from Troga. She’s been knocked out, but she’s starting to stir, and she looks more dangerous than before.

“Let’s leave,” I suggest quickly.

“I would,” Xark’on says. “But then there’s them.”

I look past his great bulk. And there they are, his tribesmen. A hundred of them, with their bared swords glinting in the sunlight. They’re keeping their distance, but they’re clearly blocking us from escaping.

Troga is shaking her great, sleek head and thrashing with her long tail. She’s going to get vicious.

“I should have told you about the bait,” Xark’on says into my hair, still holding me tight. “But I didn’t want you to know that I had considered using you. The Ancestors had so clearly given you to me for that purpose. The next day it became clear to me that I could never do it. The mere thought became insane to me. Unfortunately, I failed to consider that using you to bait Troga would seem quite natural to others.”

I look around fast. The trap is now between Troga and us. That’s no coincidence. It’s actually not that different from my own plan. Except I would have been alone here. And probably not this close to the dragon.

“I’ve been thinking today,” Xark’on says. “I was hit on the head. Perhaps it helped me remember something I was told many years ago. About how men and women would live together. Caroline, I have nothing to offer you except my death and disgrace. Even so, I’ll ask: will you marry me?”

Huh. Interesting timing. We’ll probably be eaten by a dragon, and if we’re not, I have a feeling those tribesmen won’t like us much. But yeah, I get it. This was his last chance to ask.

And my last chance to answer.

“Yes,” I say quickly. “I will. Now get us out of this... Oh my god, you’re bleeding!”

His hair and face is a mass of sticky, dried blood. Some of it has dripped down onto his shoulders.

“Someone hit my head when I went up into the tree. You remember? Last night?”

“Yes! Of course I remember last night!”

“They wanted to use you as bait. I told them it was not possible. So they hit me.”

All kinds of emotions are fighting inside me—relief that he’s here with me, horror at what they did to him, fear of the dragon. Strangely, right now the strongest of them is joy. He didn’t betray me!

But fuck me if this isn’t the worst time ever for a tearful reunion.

I squeeze him back. “Let’s trap that dragon.”

Troga seems to have shaken off her grogginess, and is now inching towards us, somehow managing to slither on her four powerful legs with claws the size of chef’s knives.

Xark’on puts me down and turns towards the dragon. “Yes, let’s do that. You stay here.”

Then, he walks down the gentle slope towards the tree with the rope and the now badly mangled net.

He jumps up and grabs it and then hangs from it like a kid in a climbing net at a playground. “Troga! Your dinner is here!”

He swings back and forth from the rope. “Come and eat me!”

But the dragon has stopped. This blatant show has to make her suspicious.

He’s crazy. She’s within range to shoot her fire at him. But he has a point. If we ever want to trap her and get the stranded girls to safety, someone has to hang there and be bait.

But I think we should be smarter than this. I want Troga out of balance.

I walk down to Xark’on. “I’ll get her closer. Be ready to run. If she spews fire, we’re dead.”

I saunter towards Troga, taking the second throwing star out of my chest pocket. The strangest thing has happened: I’m not panicked anymore. Xark’on didn’t betray me after all. It makes me feel like I could face anything. Like an army. Or a crazy monster from out of the old myths on Earth.

The dragon shifts its attention to me. I stop with my hands on my hips. We stand like that for three heartbeats. Then, the dragon pounces at me.

I squeal and feel the draft from one clawed foot as it whips through the air right behind me. I’m running for my life, and a split second before it’s too late, I remember that there’s a trap here. I veer to the side, hearing the dragon sneer behind me, like a thousand drops of water falling on a red hot plate.

Then, I’m behind Xark’on, and I take the throwing star between my fingers like he taught me. I wind up and aim for the snout.

And this time, I hit it. But Troga doesn’t scream. She just comes galloping straight for us with insane fury, hissing and thrashing her tail, the sharp, black spikes on her spine pointing angrily forwards.

Xark’on still hangs from the rope, and the dragon pounces at him. He jumps to the side, and then the dragon crashes through the cover we made and down into the hole.

I can’t see what happens down there, but there’s a few seconds of ferocious activity and movement and screaming. Then it’s quiet, and then there’s another scream of the purest rage.

Then, there’s less and less noise from down there, and finally the jungle is silent.

Troga is dead.

Xark’on retrieves his sledgehammer from where it landed after it hit the dragon and then comes walking up to me.

I put my hand on his chest. “Roti’ax tried to use me as bait. He wanted to put me in a net. But I escaped, and I jumped over the trench. I found your Treasure. I don’t want your tribe to get it. The women need safety and protection. I will take them home to my tribe.”

“Yes,” he says darkly. “This tribe deserves no Treasure.”

The tribesmen are walking this way, and now their swords are back in their scabbards. They have big smiles on their faces. They’ve brought children too. Three babies are being carried in strong arms.

Xark’on’s sledgehammer is still in his hand.

I have something in my hand myself. Something star-shaped and hard.

“Well done, Xark’on!” Roti’ax says. “The dragon is dead. And since the bait is still alive, surely you’ll need no part of the Treasure.”

“I see you’ve brought your own bait,” Xark’on says and points at the three babies. “In case the first one didn’t work.”

Roti’ax shrugs. “The tribe is willing to make some sacrifices for the Treasure. We did put a snare beside the main trap in case someone came snooping. But the chances of anyone walking into that was quite small, we thought. So we brought a different option.”

“Ah. Even I didn’t think of using the tribe’s own offspring for this purpose.”

“You’re not the chief, Xark’on,” Roti’ax says generously. “I am. It’s my duty to think of the tribe’s best.”

“Did you remember to feed the Treasure? To toss some food over the trench to them?”

“We thought it better not to. The trap would soon be finished, and we wanted the Treasure to gratefully accept our proposals. A few days of hunger might help them with that.”

Xark’on studies the polished head of his hammer. “Do you remember me telling you that the women of the Treasure had to choose? That they could not be forced? That they had to agree from their own free will if they were to come to our tribe?”

Roti’ax waves his hand impatiently. “Yes, yes. You went on about it at great length. But did not the Ancestors give us the Treasure? Surely they will agree. And if not, then it will simply be a test. The Ancestors might test our determination. And we will be determined, Xark’on. Our tribe will have women today. Soon we will be mating!”

He says that last part loudly, and the tribesmen cheer. He’s a good politician.

“I hear you tried to place Caroline in a net?” Xark’on’s voice is calm, and probably only I know him well enough to hear the strain in it.

Roti’iax laughs. “You know she was the bait. It was the only natural thing to do.”

“Was it?”

“Yes, of course. I told you she was bait. And you knew it, too. Now. Where is the Treasure?”

“There will be no Treasure.”

The jungle has never been this silent.

Roti’ax stiffens imperiously. “What?”

“There will be no treasure for this cowardly tribe. You tried to use Caroline as bait. You tried to murder her. At that moment, this tribe lost its Treasure. Caroline will take the women to her tribe instead.”

“Xark’on, this is...”

Xark’on grabs the chief by the throat. “I swore to kill you if you harmed Caroline.”

“I didn’t,” Roti’ax gargles, his face red and his eyes bulging. “She’s fine! She escaped! Look! There she stands!”

“You would have killed her if she hadn’t. Now look at her feet and her hands. I see blood.”

“She’s still alive,” Roti’ax splutters. “I didn’t—”

“You didn’t. But you tried. And for that, you get this. To begin with.”

Xark’on taps his sledgehammer to Roti’ax’s forehead, and the chief faints immediately.

“There will be no Treasure!” Xark’on yells so all the tribesmen can hear him. “Go home! You will all be alone with no woman for the rest of your miserable lives!”

Yru’zan comes over, unsteady on his feet, his eyes wild. “We must have the Treasure. We must!”

Xark’on lays the sledgehammer over his shoulder. “I know you must. And you never will.”

“He tried to rape me,” I say aloud and point at Yru’zan. “To mate with me against my will.”

If Xark’on was angry before, now he goes pale with fury. “Against her will, Yru’zan? My woman?”

But Yru’zan draws his sword. “The Treasure. I know where it is. I don’t need you to give it to me as if I were a beggar! I will take it!”

“I will keep the Treasure from this tribe,” Xark’on says. “It no longer is where it was.”

Another tribesman has snuck up behind us and suddenly throws a rope over Xark’on’s head and tightens it around his neck.

“Where?” Yru’zan asks, breathing hard, putting his sword at Xark'on's throat. “Where?!”

Xark’on manages to laugh. Then, he swings the sledgehammer behind him, knocking the man there on the jaw and propelling him a good foot up in the air before he collapses on the ground.

But he’s underestimated Yru’zan’s madness. His tribesman has has murder in his eyes when he now suddenly draws his sword back.

I have not underestimated anyone, and my aim is good. The spinning star hits Yru’zan in the throat, and a spray of blood shoots out before his sword falls to the ground and he also collapses.

It’s not necessarily a better situation we’re in now. We’re surrounded by a hundred horny caveman aliens who have just been told that they’ll remain virgins forever. And they all have swords.

I bend down and take Yru’zans heavy sword in my trembling hands. “Can we fight them off?”

Xark’on keeps his eyes on his stunned tribesmen, who are now probably his very much former tribesmen. “You run. I’ll keep them. Take the women and go to your tribe. Think of me once in a while. I love you, Caroline.”

Tears spring to my eyes. If it were just me, I’d stay, and we’d fight to the death, back to back. But I have to think of the girls. They don’t know the way. And I really don’t want them to fall into the hands of this tribe.

“I love you too,” I say, because nothing else comes to my paralyzed mind. “I always will.”

He bends down and kisses me while the tribesmen come closer, and there are many zhing noises as they all draw their swords.

“Be safe and happy, my love,” Xark’on says. “Now run.”

I know he’s right. So I do.

- - -

I’ve run maybe ten paces when I hear a terrible screech immediately followed by another. And I know those noises.

Dactyls.

I look up while I run. There are two of them. And while there’s a perfect target of a hundred now wildly fleeing cavemen just thirty feet away, they seem to be diving for me.

I still have the sword, but it’s heavy as fuck, and I know I can’t fight with it.

But instead of swooping on me, the two dactyls land, quite calmly, flapping their huge, bat-like wings.

“Hey! Need a ride?” Heidi is sitting astride the neck of one dactyl, her husband Dar'ax on the other.

I almost faint from sheer relief. “Yeah! And I need someone to rescue that guy with the hammer. Actually, never mind.”

With the tribe scared off by the dactyls and running away, Xark’on is by my side in two long strides, his hammer ready to smack the living daylights out of the dactyls that are each the size of a private jet.

“It’s okay,” I hurry to say, grabbing his hammer hand to make sure he doesn’t use it for anything less than ideal. “These are from my tribe. Remember I told you they fly on dactyls? That’s Dar'ax, that’s Heidi. Guys, this is Xark’on. My fiance.”

Heidi nods and smiles. “Uh-huh. Every time one of the girls vanishes in the jungle, they always reappear with a fiance. I’m glad you’re not breaking the tradition. Okay, where you want to go?”

I jump up behind Heidi with a cheery confidence I’m not feeling to show Xark’on that it’s okay.

He reluctantly climbs on behind Dar'ax, and then we’re airborne and circling the trap site.

“See the dragon?” I point down. “We made that trap and killed it.”

Troga is down there, on her side, with at least ten of the iron spikes going right through her. You’d think it might be a sad sight, but all I feel is elation. She wanted me dead.

Heidi stares. “That’s the scariest thing I’ve seen. You have to tell us about it.”

“I will.

Of course the stranded girls are nowhere to be seen. Their experiences with dactyls have been much worse than mine. So I get off the flying horror and track them down on foot while Heidi waits. I then have a challenging time convincing them that:

1) the dragon is dead and

2) this dactyl is a nice one.

But when Eleanor is finally done with her skeptical questions, they all come trouncing behind me to where Heidi is waiting.

I enjoy the look on Heidi’s face when I march out of the jungle ahead of twelve girls she last saw as they were being carried away by dactyls that were much less nice than the one she’s riding. I let the girls themselves explain everything to her.

Except they’re only half done with that when I cut off their explanations. “Can you take them to the cave? And can I borrow Dar'ax for a little while?”

Heidi just nods, still shell-shocked, and waves to the circling Dar'ax to land.

I climb on behind Xark’on, holding him tighter than probably necessary. But fuck it, I have him now, and I’ll cheerfully hang on to him like this until someone pries me off.

“You want to come to our tribe?” I ask into his striped back.

“If I may.”

“You may. You fucking may so fucking much.”

“Um... now?”

Ah. He only knows one meaning of that word. “Later, my love. You’re extremely welcome at our tribe, is what I’m saying. Let’s get your stuff from the treehouse.”

I direct Dar'ax to where it is, but the dactyl just won’t fly there. So he lets us off a mile away, we walk to the tree, check that nobody’s up there and then we use the ropes.

I take a rag and carefully clean Xark’on’s head, caked in blood from the blow he took to the back of it. At the same time, I tell him about the adventures I had on my own.

Then, he uses even more care when he cleans the cuts on my toes and fingers, tenderly kissing each one when he’s done.  “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about the bait and the Treasure. But the Treasure seemed unimportant to me then, and the bait was... difficult.”

I kiss the top of his head. “When we’re married, we have to talk about the difficult things too. No matter how difficult they are.”

“We do,” he agrees. “Those are the most important things. How soon can we get married? Today?”

I smile at his sincere eagerness. It’s just as urgent for me. “How about tomorrow? One of the girls has to officiate. I’m usually the one who weds them, but there’s no chance in heck I’m going to officiate at my own damn wedding. I’ll be too busy doing bridely things. You know, bawling and throwing bouquets and looking stunning. And clinging to you like a crazy woman.”

We collect his art supplies, and I take down the picture of Bune. It’s pretty much done.

“Is this all you’ve been working on for the past weeks? I mean, you were always working far into the night.”

“There’s one more thing.” He takes a skin out of the stack of paintings and hands it over.

I hold it up. It’s Troga the dragon, black and lethal and slick. And dead. Her eyes are closed and she’s lying on her back, all four clawed legs pointing up and her tail slack on the ground.

Someone is standing on top of her, as in triumph.

It’s me.

With my spear and my old worn dress that I had before I got this new white one. The likeness is pretty good, except my face isn’t quite photography clear. My hair is, though. Perfectly shiny and smooth, as opposed to the way it looks in real life with all its tangled, straggly mess. There’s an aura around me in that picture, an otherworldly light.

This is how he sees me. Strong and mysterious and victorious.

“I was going to use myself as bait,” Xark’on said. “And I would never see your triumph over Troga. So I painted it to enjoy. It warmed my heart to look at it and work on it.”

“You crazy man.” I sniff and bury my face in his striped chest. Then I give his pectoral muscles a good punch. “You would kill yourself just to trap Troga? Did you think that would be a triumph for me? It would be terrible! What would I be without you?”

“That also occurred to me that last day,” he says and kisses my hair. “It made me cranky. I suddenly didn’t know which bait to use.”

I embrace him hard. “Next time something is making you cranky, just tell me what it is. I always want to help you. And I know you want to help me.”

“Let’s go to your tribe and get married.”

Before we have Dar'ax fly us to the cave, Xark’on asks to be set down in Troga’s trench.

He takes his sledgehammer and strikes it down at the glass with gigantic force.

The glass doesn’t shatter.

It explodes in a tremendous shock wave that propagates along the trench and blows all the glass to a spray of shards and dust as far as I can see. The noise is horrific, like loud, angry static from some immense radio, as the shockwave disappears into the distance.

Xark’on gets on the dactyl, and we fly home to the cave.

The new girls are already there, eating from leaves full of steaming food, some of them in dinosaur skin clothes that they have been given by the old girls.

They all stare at us when we get off the dactyl and come walking hand in hand.

Sophia comes out with her newborn in her arms. She comes right up to me and hugs me with one arm, sniffling. “My freaking god, Caroline. I was so fucking worried. I may be a mother now, but there’s no way I’m going to ask you where the hell you’ve been. But now I understand why my mother did that. You’ve been doing good things, I know that. Who’s your friend?”

I sniffle too and hug her right back. “This is Xark’on. A new man for our tribe. And my fiance.”

It feels good to say.

We get some food too, and then we all spend a good few hours just getting everyone caught up on my side of the story, not touching too much on the bait situation. Xark’on is talking calmly with Jax’zan, Dar'ax, Trak’zor, and Ar’ox. As usual, the cavemen hit it off with talk of iron and forging and hunting.

I’m getting close to the end of my tale. “...sooo we need someone to officiate. You up for it, Delyah?”

“Sure thing,” our elected leader says without hesitation. “I won’t be as good as you, but I’ll give it a shot.”

I reach out to squeeze her hand. Now that I won’t be the only other single woman here, I’m glad she has the company of twelve other girls. Unless they’re married back home. But they can’t all be. “You’ll be perfect at that, like you are at everything else.”

She looks down with a shy smile. “I guess we’ll see.”

“Tomorrow, okay?”

“Okay.”

I give her hand an extra squeeze. “Thank you.”

Eleanor comes over. “Hey.”

“Hey,” I say, a little reservedly. She never seemed to like me much.

“That was really cool what you did for us. We saw you climbing that glass wall. And the dragon came up right behind you and spewed fire. Shit, we were so sure you were dead. And then we saw you running. We could not fucking believe it. You’re a rockstar. I just want you to know.”

And just like that, she’s one of my favorite people. I stand up to hug her. “Thanks. It was a team thing, you know? Never could have done it without you girls and your expert rock throwing. You totally distracted that monster.”

“Yeah. And now we have food, and we’re not trapped. Except on this planet. That the spaceship over there?”

“That’s Bune,” I confirm. “That’s where the dragon came from. Just right after we were dumped on this planet.”

“So we know it still works. Any plans to go there and maybe check it out?”

“We’ve been there several times. But it’s huge. We’d have to make our way into the depths of it. And when we do, we have to be armed. We don’t think whatever it is that controls it is all that friendly.”

The rest of the day passes fast, and when the time comes to reveal Xark’on’s paintings, everyone is stunned.

“That’s insane,” Aurora says. “It’s like a freaking photography. And he did it with a stick?”

“He made it look just the way the world really looks because he knows of no other way,” I explain. “It’s an insane amount of work, but he’s not lazy.”

“Is this the dragon?” a very pregnant Emilia says, holding up Xark’on’s last picture. “It looks deadly.”

“It was. I think it came from Bune. We really have to deal with that spaceship.”

“We’ve been talking about that,” Sophia says. “And the guys have made steel for crossbows like Aurora’s. Now we have to make twelve more. But the more we are, the better. But we can talk about that later. Now I think we have a wedding to prepare?”

“A wedding, huh?” Tamara says, now on her fifth big leaf full of turkeypig stew and still chewing happily. “How does that work in this freaking jungle?”