Chapter Three
Sometime later that afternoon—timekeeping devices seemed to be in short supply, but it was probably an hour or two after they had brought Blake his midday meal—he had decided to see if they really would allow him to leave this tiny room they’d consigned him to. They had brought him a plain, brown robe, of some scratchy lightweight material along with the food, so he got up and put it on. His boots were missing, so he walked barefoot to the door and tried the handle. It opened easily and he stepped outside. He was surrounded by buildings that reminded him of the cabins some people lived in centuries ago back on Earth. The compound around him was a series of these cabin-like structures, all of varying sizes and all made from the trees in the vast forest around them. It was part of a vast complex, surrounded by a high fence for as far as he could see, made of some metal chain like material and topped with what looked like pieces of broken glass.
He was in a separate area that he supposed must comprise the “hospital,” fenced off from the rest of the huge building complex. In the center of the open space outside the cabins in his area, there were some tables and benches, with several people sitting around on the long wooden furniture, doing nothing in particular. Some were pacing up and down the sides of the fence with a wild look in their eyes—these he avoided. Others were simply sitting and staring off into space and still others were reading from small electronic devices. A game board of something he didn’t recognize was set up on one table with two men staring down at it. They barely glanced up at him as he passed. He walked over to the fence to look out, but the only view was of more structures like the ones around him. In the far distance, he could see large groups of men behind fences like this one. He stuck his fingers through the links in the fence, leaning into it, and sighed.
The doctors had given him so many injections and pills that morning after Davos left that he felt groggy and muzzy headed. The injections had been painful, reminding him of the ones he had to take when he had the children. It was actually becoming increasingly easy to believe that he’d had some kind of psychotic break with reality, and the people like Davos that he’d been talking to and interacting with were only figments of his disordered imagination. Some of them, like the one he thought was Davos, could perhaps be doctors, who had taken on familiar and beloved forms in his mind to help him keep it from shattering completely. That had to be it. He’d read about split personalities back on Earth. Sometimes, if trauma became too much, too severe, the mind could do that, couldn’t it? Could split off into a whole different personality to cope with it. Could it build an entire new reality?
If his mind was supplying imaginary relatives for him, then that would explain why he kept seeing Davos, but a Davos who had no memory of him or their lives together. And it would also explain why he was seeing that handsome young Tygerian now walking out of a cabin behind him and looking around to find a table to sit at. The young man who looked exactly like his son, Derrick.
Blake turned to study him. Yes, he had the same profile as Derrick’s. The same color hair. Some people who didn’t know the Tygerians well as a people, thought that all of them looked alike, but it simply wasn’t true. There were variations in the color of eyes and hair, even body types, though they were all built on a much larger scale than humans. Faces were quite individual too. Derrick, for example, had his father’s high cheekbones and his straight little nose. His hair color was that exact shade of Davos’s reddish gold, and he had that same habit of tucking it behind his ear. While Davos had some slight differences, in his clothing, for example, this boy looked exactly the way Derrick had looked when Blake had last seen him, except that this figment of his imagination was sporting a large gold earring in one of his ear lobes.
Blake approached his hallucination, walking right up to the table to challenge it. The boy looked up at him and his eyes goggled and his mouth fell open. “Omak! What-what are you doing here? I can’t believe it!” He jumped to his feet and pulled Blake into a fierce embrace, hugging him so hard Blake thought he might do him an injury.
“You certainly hug hard for a figment,” he said softly to himself, and was amazed when the young man pulled away and looked down at him, smiling.
“I’m not a figment or whatever it is you called me. I’m really here. And so are you! Oh, thank the gods!” He pulled Blake in his arms again and might have crushed him if one of the guards by the door hadn’t yelled something at them, telling them to break it up. Derrick glared at the guard but held his father out at arm’s length and grinned from ear to ear. “I’m so happy to see you, omak.”
“Derrick? My God, is that really you?”
“Of course, it’s me. Omak, sit down, please. What have they done to you? You look like you’re going to pass out.”
“I think I might. You’re the first person I’ve seen here on this planet who actually recognized me.”
Derrick shook his head and leaned toward him, lowering his voice. “Of course, I recognize my own omak. But no one here will know who you are. We’re in the Never Never.”
“We’re in the what?”
“Well, that’s what Rhaegar calls this place. And all the other pirates. You came through the wormhole, didn’t you?”
Blake nodded, feeling a little dazed. “Yes. It was an uncharted one that we hadn’t seen before. None of the engineers on board had it mapped on their star charts. It was just suddenly…there.”
“No, that wormhole wouldn’t be charted,” Derrick said, shaking his head. “It comes and goes, but nobody knows how or why it does. Or even how it’s maintained. It belongs to the pirates. Well, they’re the ones who discovered it anyway.”
“Honey, what are you talking about?”
“It’s not always there, you see. The wormhole that takes you to the Never Never. The pirates use it but they don’t really understand much about it. Even Rhaegar didn’t know all of it, and he was afraid to go in, in case we wound up in the Never Never, and then who knows when it would open again for us to travel back. But we were desperate when Father came after us. Rhaegar took a chance on it being there when we were running, and he said if we could maybe make it just to the edge of the Never Never we might be able to hide out there and then come back in before it closed again. Pirates have been doing it for years. But only when they’re really desperate, like we were. Too much chance the wormhole will destabilize and trap them in the Never Never, he said.” He hugged Blake again. “Gods, it’s so good to see you. But how—why are you here?”
“You sent me a distress message.”
“Oh, gods yes, I remember now. It was while we were still looking for the wormhole. It wasn’t there when we came through there the first time, but then we circled around, with Father still right behind us, gaining on us, and there it was. Rhaegar said if we were lucky we could go through it to reach the Never Never, but we had to be careful to go only to the edge, and we couldn’t risk going in too far.”
“Why do you keep saying the Never Never? What is that? Is that where we are?”
“I-I’m not a hundred percent sure what it is exactly, or even if we’re there. Rhaegar could tell you more. That’s just where I think we are, because nothing else makes any sense. I think we may have gone in too far, like Rhaegar was worried about. Father was right behind us when we went in. He-he shot at us—” He put his hand over his omak’s as Blake gasped in surprise. “Not directly at us. I don’t think he really meant to hit us, because he fired way over our bow. He was only trying to scare us, Rhaegar said. But the shots made something happen inside the wormhole. We started losing control and our ship was spiraling. The whole wormhole began to destabilize and disappear again. Rhaegar’s ship began to break up, and Father managed to dock his ship with ours and took us on board. Just in time too, because right after that, our ship blew up.”
“Oh my God!”
“That caused an even bigger disruption inside the wormhole as you might imagine and we started hurtling through space at an incredible speed. We were thrown violently out the other end and that’s when…well, everything changed.”
“What do you mean ‘everything changed?’”
“It’s hard to explain. It was like Father was himself, and yet different. He has those blue eyes for one thing, and he didn’t know me. He saw this earring and called me a pirate. Even Rhaegar…” He put his hands over his face and gave a little shiver. “He acted as if he didn’t know who I was anymore. His eyes were so cold. He thought that because I’m Tygerian, I was one of Father’s crewmembers and he-he attacked me.”
“Oh, baby.”
“Rhaegar didn’t hurt me. He started to, but then he stopped as soon as he touched me and he got that look on his face like he got when he first saw me on that moon, Belline. But then Father’s crew members arrested him. They arrested me too and threw us all into cells on Father’s ship, but they put me in one separate from Rhaegar—who still didn’t know who I was. He kept calling to me, asking me my name, but the guards told him to shut up. It was awful, omak.” He shook his head. “That’s when I knew we’d gone too far into the Never Never. Rhaegar told me we had to be careful about that or we’d all change or disappear.”
“What?” Blake shook his head, feeling more confused than he had before. “I don’t understand any of this.”
“He never got to explain much more because we didn’t have time, but it has to do with parallel universes. Do you know what they are?”
“Blake Cameron!” came a shout from the guard at the door. “Come with me. Now!”
Blake shot the guard an irritated look. “Leave me alone, damn you, I’m busy! Come back later.”
The guard looked outraged and charged angrily over to the table. Derrick jumped up to stand in front of Blake protectively. “Stay away from him!” he growled, but the guard pulled a short, wooden baton from his belt and kept advancing on them with a murderous look in his eye.
“Stop it!” Blake cried and stepped around in front of Derrick, catching hold of his arm. “It’s all right. I’ll go with you.” He turned back to Derrick and gripped his hand. “Don’t antagonize them, baby. These people are all crazy.” The guard grabbed for his arm, but Blake dodged him. “Wait! I have to be able to find you again!”
“I’m in that little building over there,” Derrick said in rapid Earthan, pointing at the door he’d come out of. “The one on the end. If you can, come to me tonight. Otherwise, I’ll come back here tomorrow as soon as I can and I’ll keep looking until I find you. Don’t worry—I’ll see you again soon. We won’t lose each other.”
The guard took Blake’s arm and began to pull him away. Despite Derrick’s words, he had an awful feeling he’d never find him again, but Derrick smiled at him encouragingly. “Try not to worry, omak. You’re not losing your mind, though I would have thought so myself if I hadn’t known a little about this place. Or what Rhaegar told me anyway. It’s just the Never Never, that’s all. Stay strong and I’ll see you again soon. I love you.”
“I love you too,” Blake said, tears filling his eyes. God, it seemed like he’d done nothing but cry since he got here. No wonder they thought he was insane. Despite Derrick’s words, though, he was frightened he wouldn’t be able to find him again. And if that happened, he thought he would definitely lose what little sanity he had left.
But he didn’t feel quite so alone anymore. He had his son now, and he had to believe he could find him again. He straightened up, not wanting Derrick to see him like this. He would be strong for him, if for no other reason. He jerked his arm away from the guard and glared at him.
“Take it easy, damn it. I’m coming.” The guard muttered something at Blake but allowed him to walk on his own to the door. Just before he opened it and went out, he superstitiously looked back, afraid Derrick would be gone, another figment of his fevered imagination. But Derrick was still there and gave him a little okay sign, a circle with his thumb and forefinger that made Blake smile. He’d taught his children that when they were really small—they were all Tygerians in looks and personality, yet they knew a few old Earthan customs and some American slang from Blake. It had always been their secret language with each other. Blake turned then, squaring his shoulders and followed the guard out the door.
****
Davos paced back and forth in his office, feeling restless and out of sorts. He hated any kind of paperwork and always had. It was almost always boring and was perhaps one of the worst things about being king. That and the endless meetings with ministers. He had been trained to be a warrior and not an arbitrator or a pusher of papers. He’d practically gone to sleep reading the endless messages from his Minister of Finance earlier that morning. That was the one thing his enemies could use against him, and like any king, he had his share.
His cousins, three of them, all old men, all distant, but all still related in some way to his uncle, had all brought forth their claims to the throne upon his uncle’s death. And they had their supporters, though most of the ministers wanted a warrior like Davos, who had an undeniable and direct line of kinship to the throne. Still, his detractors would seize on any excuse they could to discredit him, so that even though he hated the endless meetings and the tiresome paperwork, he had to force himself to do it anyway.
He had felt odd for the last few days. In fact, he was feeling strangely restless. It had all seemed to begin when he’d first seen that human. Or no, even before that. When he’d been on the ship and the pirates had attacked.
Just a week earlier, Davos had been on a routine mission, and one that was more or less done to promote the recent additions to their fleet and boost morale among his people. He had been flying with a few of his ministers and a highly decorated ship’s captain on the maiden voyage of one of the fleet’s newest ships. The ship was a new assault carrier, basically a smaller version of a battlestar, only carrying a single squad or two of smaller craft. It was capable of operating in the atmosphere, so the captain had asked King Davos to join him on the ship’s maiden voyage in a few orbits around Tveir. He and this captain had actually been enjoying a drink in the ship’s lounge when the captain was informed the ship’s crew had spotted alien, hostile craft in Tveir airspace and was engaging the enemy. Only a few moments later, the ship had suddenly begun to shake violently, hurling both Davos and the captain down onto the deck.
It only lasted only a few frightening, disorienting moments, but when the motion stopped as suddenly as it had started, Davos found himself not in the lounge, as he had been moments before, but on the bridge of the ship, seated in the captain’s chair, with a wild fight raging around him.
Somehow the crew on the bridge was in the midst of a battle with pirates! He had no idea what was happening, or how he’d lost time and been suddenly transported to the thick of this conflict with the intruders. Or even, for that matter, how the pirates had come on board in the first place, but there was no time for anything but grabbing a weapon and wading into the middle of the fray.
The crew had managed to subdue them fairly easily—most of them had acted as disoriented as Davos himself had felt, and he wondered if this apparent new ability of the pirates to transport onto other ships had scrambled their brains. Their ship had broken apart and even the pirate’s leader, the notorious so-called “Captain” Rhaegar, seemed to be more interested in fighting with one of his own pirates rather than engaging the ship’s crew.
The young pirate in question was a Tygerian, which was unusual in the extreme, but he had acted oddly too, not really defending himself and calling out once to Davos for help in fighting his own pirate crew. Captain Rhaegar, who at first seemed intent on killing the boy, began fighting to get back to him. The young man even called Davos, Father for some insane reason. They had rounded all of the pirates up, put them in the brig and brought them down to land at the prison for interrogation.
The young Tygerian had continued to act so unhinged that Davos had him taken to the mental facilities of the prison hospital. As for the others, they all refused to answer any questions, though the pirate Rhaegar had demanded to know where the young Tygerian had been taken. As if any attention would be paid to his “demands.” Rhaegar, along with his crew, been sent to the prison facility to await transport and trial.
The entire episode had been strangely unsettling and perplexing, but before he could delve further into the mystery, this odd little human had showed up out of nowhere, making his bizarre claims as well.
Davos ran a hand over his face. A few minutes ago, he’d asked one of the guards to bring the human to his office. That should be more than sufficient to chase away this…whatever the feeling was. At least he hoped so, because, not even factoring the human in, Davos was having perhaps the strangest days of his life since he’d become king.
Davos didn’t care much for humans, as a general rule. In general, he despised the human race on general principles—after all, the humans were responsible for destroying the atmosphere on Davos’s home planet of Tygeria, causing many deaths and necessitating the move to this planet they had renamed Tygeria 2. Most people simply called their new home “Tveir,” which was also the word for “Two” in his language.
Davos had also found most humans to be unbelievably arrogant. This little human showed signs of that trait as well. Davos stood at the window now in the gathering gloom of early evening, thinking about him. What was there about the man that attracted him so much, besides, of course, his obvious beauty. He was a bit older than most humans Davos had encountered, but he was still one of the best-looking ones he’d ever seen. Not to mention his fearlessness and defiance. And those blue toenails.
When he’d first seen him lying on his back at the soldier’s training camp, he had been struck immediately by how pretty he was. The thin, tattered robe he wore had hardly hidden any of his assets. He was slight and slender, but he had an impressive bulge at his groin. Davos had felt his own cock pulse in response and yelled at him in an effort to hide how attracted he was to the man. A shiver of desire ran through him even now as he remembered the way he’d looked, spread out on the ground, his well-muscled legs wantonly apart and all that blond hair falling over his face.
Restlessly, Davos went over to the window to gaze out at the prison grounds while he waited for the guards to bring the man. This area that now housed this prison was where they’d first landed on Tveir and built their initial settlement. It had taken them many cycles since they resettled here, and they still hadn’t rebuilt the way they wanted to. The barracks were all made of wood, since that had been the most prevalent building material on this planet when they arrived. As time had passed, they had come to realize this area was not the best place to build their capital city and had relocated it some distance away, on the far side of this continent, the largest of the planet’s two main land masses. The weather there was much more temperate.
Eventually, this area and these buildings had been turned into a prisoner of war camp, mainly because it was a safe enough distance from the larger cities, and poor weather didn’t have to be a consideration. If the Alliance soldiers had stayed on their own planets, they wouldn’t be prisoners now and wouldn’t have to worry about the bad weather. That went for the other violent prisoners incarcerated in the prison as well.
Like any planet, Tveir had its criminals, not to mention the damned pirates who still plagued both their ships and the ships who came to trade with them or to bring needed commodities. The facility here now housed an average of over three hundred prisoners at any given time.
The army also maintained a big training facility nearby. It was convenient in that the landing ports for the transports were already in place. Then too, they occasionally used captured prisoners in their war games, too, just like they had done back on Tygeria. Though the soldiers camped in the large forests nearby the training camp as a rule, they also maintained some barracks on the grounds and King Davos kept one of the small cabins for his personal accommodations when he came to observe and occasionally to train with his men.
Davos was very much a soldier and believed strongly in keeping his fighting edge, but there were times he needed his communicator and an office to work from too. As he had today. He often came to spar with his men and with the captives, and enjoyed playing the Games they used to play back on Tygeria in their makeshift arenas. Someday, in the future when this interminable war ended, they might be able to rebuild some large ones for their sport and entertainment.
He could see the prison yard from his window and watched as some of the prisoners came outside for fresh air. From his vantage point by the window they looked like Lycans. Lycans were worthy adversaries, known for their size and strength, and their antipathy toward all things Tygerian was legendary. But these men hadn’t been soldiers. They were criminals—slavers and traffickers—and had been caught by Tveir authorities trying to brazenly kidnap young Tygerian males right out of the training camps. The young victims would have been sold in auctions on certain so-called Pleasure Moons, and most of them would wind up beaten to death by their new “masters,” when the young men refused to do their bidding.
Tygerians were the latest new trend among the slavers, who had customers who wanted the “challenge” of a fierce young Tygerian male and would pay top prices to get what they wanted. Then when the boys proved intractable and hard to manage, they were ultimately killed. Davos was disgusted by the slavers and had vowed to put a stop to them.
The Lycans were standing by the fence and talking among themselves. Davos made a mental note to check on the group and perhaps make sure they were separated, in case they were plotting some kind of escape. He wasn’t even sure how they had managed to get down to the planet’s surface in the first place, though they had tracked the alien Lycan ship coming into their airspace, it had then mysteriously disappeared from their scans. There had long been rumors of cloaking devices on the Lycan ships, and if they could find the one that had brought these slavers here, their scientists might be able to gather information about it or even copy the device.
They had sent out search parties in the likely areas they might have landed in and luckily, one of them had caught the Lycans coming out of the forest and had brought them here. Despite intense interrogation and even torture, however, they hadn’t given them any information yet about the location of their ship.
Davos sighed, and his thoughts strayed back to the human. He wasn’t sure if he was a soldier or not—he could be, though he didn’t carry himself like one or act like one. Though Davos hated the Alliance, he had a healthy respect for the ferocity of its soldiers. They were all bastards, but that’s what made it fun to humiliate them when they were captured.
Still, he had no wish to force sex on anyone, and he had to admit he really wanted sex with this human. Usually he took his lovers from his own officers, though Tygerians never performed anal sex on each other, like he wanted from the human. Frottage or oral sex was all that was considered necessary or appropriate for a Tygerian male. Anal penetration was performed mostly on their love slaves, usually as an act of domination, though professional “love slaves” were not really slaves at all. They were paid well and never forced to do anything they didn’t want to do. Captured prisoners were a different story. Still, actual rape was forbidden, and Davos had told his soldiers it was a dishonorable and despicable practice. Seduction or persuasion, however, was perfectly acceptable.
He’d never actually used the sleeping chamber here at the camp very often, but he thought it possible that might change over the course of the next few days. He was anxiously anticipating the arrival of the odd little human and the sexual attraction he was feeling hadn’t happened for a long time. He’d been far too busy with the relocation, not to mention the war in the past.
Love slaves were common among his unmarried officers, but he didn’t have time to keep a regular slave at his disposal. They required too much time and too many expensive gifts. The human ones were usually the most good-looking, but also the most trouble. He had to admit he liked a little of that, especially if the love slave was a former captive. Again, he didn’t believe in forcing himself on anyone and would never do it, but he liked breaking down a human captive’s resistance to the idea of a Tygerian lover and showing them their place.
A soft knock on the door announced the arrival of the guard, who was bringing the man to his quarters. It was getting late—well after darkness had fallen on this planet. Davos called out for the guard to enter. The man opened the door, bowed deeply to Davos and then pushed a sullen, wary looking Blake Cameron into the room ahead of him. Davos gestured for the human to have a seat in front of his desk, as he looked him over.
This human’s hair was golden, like his skin, and his eyes were a pretty shade of blue. They sparkled with good humor and a bit of mischief. And he was brave—he had to admit. Not to mention defiant. Too much so, actually, constantly provoking Davos’s soldiers and Davos himself, and he towered over the man. Perhaps this Blake was not so much brave as he was foolhardy.
Davos was intrigued by this delusion the human said he had about Davos being his mate. A mate who had given him children! Was it an elaborate fantasy or a clever way to attract his attention? To make himself appear insane? The doctors said if he wasn’t faking his illness, he might have a human disease called schizophrenia, a disease of the mind. It could be treated if they had the proper drugs, they told him, but as the disease didn’t occur among their own people, they had no medicines, other than the other drugs they used to calm the nature of a male and make him more passive and receptive to suggestion. They were giving him hormone treatments as well to make him less aggressive.
Someone had brought him clothes to wear. A pity, really, as his body was quite nice and Davos had enjoyed looking at it unclothed. He was small, but perfectly formed and nicely defined with muscles in the right places. Nothing too much, but just enough to know they were there. He was still barefoot though, which Davos thought he might continue to insist on. His feet were perfectly shaped, small, narrow and pale. And with toes that could only be called adorable—and that was a word he had never used before when discussing a grown man’s feet—even a love slave’s. The toenails were still painted blue, and Davos found himself a little obsessed with them. Only a little—he had no odd fetishes he was aware of. Still, the human intrigued him.
He’d noticed when he’d seen Blake in the hospital that the human had a scar on his stomach, and in the same area that male humans gave birth, though it was an increasingly rare thing to do for the few human love slaves left on Tveir, as the residents mostly called it. Humans had actually lost a great deal of their popularity since Tygeria’s destruction. Still, it showed that Blake Cameron’s story about having children was true at least. He wondered where those children were now and who the father was. He found that he didn’t particularly like to think about the father, though it might answer some of the questions he had about what this human was doing here. Perhaps he’d had some help from someone on the surface.
“I decided,” he said, leaning back in his chair and gazing at Blake, “to give you another chance to confess. To tell me why you’re here on Tveir.”
“Tveir?” Blake glanced up at him. “Is that what this place is called?”
“Yes, of course. Had you forgotten so soon?”
The human blushed, a pretty pink color staining his cheeks. “I-I hadn’t forgotten. I just never know the name of this planet.”
“Ah.”
He continued to stare at Blake until he began to fidget. Finally, the man glared at Davos. “Well?” he said. “Is that it? I don’t know what happened. One minute, we were going through a wormhole and the next we were thrown out here near this planet and attacked by your ships. Completely without provocation, I might add. We were here totally by accident.”
“By accident? How interesting. Actually, that’s the first time you mentioned any wormhole.”
“Oh. It is? Well, there was one. And it was unstable.”
“Unstable?”
“Yes.”
“And where was it you said you were coming from? Remind me who this ‘we’ is that you mentioned?”
“My crew.”
“Your crew.”
“Yes. And I was coming from Tygeria.”
“From Tygeria.”
“Yes, damn it! If you’re going to repeat everything I say, it’s going to take us twice as long to have this conversation.”
Davos raised an eyebrow at the tone but decided not to make an issue of it just yet. “Watch yourself, human and don’t be rude. I’ll decide what’s necessary. But I’m wondering why you think you were on Tygeria. The planet is mostly uninhabitable now.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, I just came from there and it’s fine. We live there. Us and our children.”
“Oh, I see,” he said, deciding to humor him. “And how many children did you say ‘we’ had?”
He sighed. “I don’t believe I did. But we have six.”
Davos raised his eyebrows. “Impressive. Six, you say.”
“Yes.” He sighed heavily and gave Davos an impatient look.
“And what about the crew that brought you here? Where are they?”
Blake Cameron huffed out a sigh. “I don’t know. I wish I did. They were all gone when I woke up.”
“How unusual. You didn’t find it strange that they would abandon you? Especially considering you’re supposed to be the mate of the king?”
“So you do admit that you’re the king?”
Davos rolled his eyes. If this was an act, it was a convincing one, but it was beginning to get on his nerves. “Yes, of course. But I’ve never married. I have no children.”
Blake Cameron put a hand to his head. “I think my headache is coming back.” He looked back up at him. “Just go on with your questions.”
“Thank you for your permission,” he said with an arch look. “Tell me more about this so-called wormhole of yours.”
“It’s not my wormhole. Surely you know about it! It’s in your own solar system. Near this planet.”
“We know about wormholes. The one you’re probably referring to is about the size of the head of a pin. Scaling it up so anything the size a human could pass through it would involve massive amounts of mass and energy. And you’re saying an entire space craft went through with its crew onboard? It’s a ridiculous story, Blake Cameron. Surely you can see that. We would need enormous resources to make that happen. And something like a huge black hole for a negative mass/energy counterpart. Don’t you think I would know about something like that?”
“You’d think so, yes. But it’s there, nonetheless.”
He made a sound of extreme impatience. If he couldn’t get this human to admit how farfetched his story was, then that must mean his psychosis was very advanced, indeed. He blew out a breath and tried again.
“I need to know the whereabouts of your crew, Blake Cameron.”
“So do I, but like I told you, I was unconscious. And when I woke up, they were just gone. Maybe they thought I was dead and decided to save themselves. And by the way, it’s been a long time since I responded to the name Cameron. Just call me Blake, damn it.”
Davos felt his lips twitch. No one ever spoke to him this way. No one. And if they did, it would have been a very bad day for them. He was surprised how little it bothered him when this man did it. He rather enjoyed it, in fact. He liked the expressions on his face, which showed every emotion he had quite plainly. It was almost like…foreplay. He shifted restlessly in his seat and gazed into those big blue eyes.
“Blake-damn-it? An odd name, but if that’s what you want…”
Blake flushed again. “Stop it. You know what I’m saying. My name is Blake.”
He nodded and smiled to show he was joking with him. “I was teasing you.” He regarded him carefully, looking him up and down and lingering a moment on those little feet. “Are you comfortable there in that chair?”
Blake shrugged. “I suppose so. Why do you ask?”
“Because I thought you might be even more comfortable sitting closer to me.”
Blake froze for a long moment and then he leaned forward intently, his face hopeful. “Davos?”
“Yes?”
“Is that—is that you?”
He gave Blake a slow, careful smile. He hoped he wasn’t having some kind of manic episode.
“It’s me,” he said carefully.
Blake jumped to his feet and ran around the desk, throwing himself onto Davos’s lap, peppering his face with kisses. Davos was startled at first, but once he realized Blake only wanted to press his lips on him, he didn’t struggle. He even allowed himself to enjoy it, though Tygerians didn’t press their lips to each other a great deal, like humans always seemed to do. Of course, most Tygerians knew what the humans liked well enough by now, and this was proving to be fairly enjoyable, though he’d rather the human pressed different parts of his body to him.
“I don’t even want to know what all that has been about before,” Blake was saying. “When you pretended not to know me. Well, I do, of course, but not just now. I’m too relieved! You were scaring me.”
“I’m glad that you’re happy, and I didn’t mean to scare you. But tell me, just who is it that you think I am?”
“My husband, of course.”
Davos rubbed his hands over Blake’s hips and shook his head. “I’m not your husband, little one. I’d like to make love to you, but I won’t take advantage of your illness.”
“B-but you said you were you.”
He smiled. “And I am me. As you see. And you are my prisoner, Blake. To whom I’m greatly attracted. But I’m not your husband, and it would be wrong of me to let you continue to think so.”