Chapter Seven

Azra stepped up behind Pyra and watched as his lead adjusted the weapons that he wore a final time. It still struck the Denynso as strange to see the warriors all armed so heavily. They were accustomed to going into battle with nothing more than their massive bodies and their in-born skill and lust for war to fuel them through their clashes. When they did have weapons, it was generally small blades or hand-hewn weapons that fit with their own personal skill. It wasn’t until they were trapped on Earth in the basement of the laboratory building that they had begun to use larger weapons generally relied upon by the other species. They had taken everything that they could from the emergency chambers as well as from the floor of the corridor after the battle with the hybrids, resigned to the fact that they didn’t know what they were facing when they encountered the army in the corridor, and that that would be even truer when they finally made it to Penthos to reconnect with the rest of the group.

Eden stood close beside Pyra and he saw her glance back over her shoulder, her eyes scanning over the entire group behind her as if to make sure that everyone who was coming with them had made it to the main lounge of the ship and were ready to finally step through the hatch and onto the surface of Penthos. Azra could feel the energy of everyone around him. Though no one was speaking, the whole area seemed electrified as if they were thinking the same thoughts together and sending the emotions of those thoughts out into the space around them. This is what they had been waiting for. They had been preparing for this moment since they swarmed the laboratory, even before for those who had already been on Earth when the members of the group that had been redirected to Penthos escaped and came to help them. That moment seemed a lifetime behind them after everything that had happened since. He barely remembered the horror of learning what Creia had been going through on Uoria and the plans that Ryan had for them. Now, though, they were finally on Penthos and ready to join back with the rest so that they could bring this situation to an end.

As he stood there, Elise’s voice reverberated through his mind. He had been purposely blocking her out of his thoughts, preventing them from being able to communicate, for most of the time that he was on Earth. He didn’t want her to worry about him or to be distracted by thoughts of her, which would have kept him from being able to do what he knew he needed to do. It had been painful for him to stay so disconnected from her. Even though they had had to be apart since soon after they completed their bond because of the obligations of her career, it felt different to be apart by force and to not even be able to communicate with her. When she first told him that she was going to have to keep going with her travels rather than staying with him, at least until the end of her contract, Azra was devastated. He wanted it to be like the other Denynso warriors and their mates. As soon as they had completed their bond, they started their lives together. Now, though, he was grateful that she had been on the ship when it was redirected from its path to Uoria so that she could pick up the group that was coming to Earth to help them. Having her there meant that there was greater understanding of the new passengers and what was happening.

Then, though, at least he was able to communicate with her occasionally. He could check in on her and the rest of the group and find out what was going on. When he recognized that he needed to cut off the communication it felt like he was impossibly far away from her. Now he was finally headed to her and he was going to be able to see her again. His heart felt like it was going to pound out of her chest just thinking about being able to see her and touch her again. As excited as he was, though, he was also nervous. He didn’t know how she was going to react to everything that was happening around her and the terrible situation that she was now involved in, whether she was going to be coping well or if this was showing her just how serious her decision to be his mate was and what life with him would mean. If that was the case, she might be struggling with it and may even want to leave him as soon as she had the opportunity, returning to the life that she had before she met him and putting him and their relationship behind her.

It would be easy for her to put him aside if that was what she wanted, but the same couldn’t be said for him. Now that his heart belonged to her, there was nothing that would get it back. He was fully and totally entwined with her and always would be. Even if she walked away from him and he never saw her again, he would never stop missing her or longing for her. He would always love her and crave her, and the desperation to be near her would never dissipate. There would never be another woman in his life and he would live out the rest of his days alone. Azra couldn’t bear the thought of not having her in his life and could only hope that she would still want to be with him when this was all over. All he could do was reassure himself that she was still there. She could have chosen to go back to Uoria with those who left Penthos. She could have made emergency contact with Earth and had them send a shuttle to retrieve her. She didn’t do either. Instead, she had chosen to remain on Penthos with Maxim, Lynx, Zyyr, and Lila and was in the compound waiting for him. It had been her choice to remain with him for this long, so maybe that would continue to be her choice.

****

The sound of the hatch opening was deep and slow. Pyra felt as though he had been standing watching it gradually slide open for hours, the opening revealing the planet in front of them little by little. Though he had seen much of it through the windows of the ship, it was different looking at it without the thick glass between himself and the desert beyond. The entire planet looked dry and desolate. He couldn’t imagine anyone or anything able to survive on the hot surface even though he knew that this was the planet where the illegal prison colony had been run by the Valdicians and the prisoners, many of them Denynso, had been kept for a period Pyra didn’t know how long. He knew that they had lived there and thrived enough that they were able to leave the planet and go to Earth to be a part of the breeding program, but that didn’t provide him with any reassurance. Spending any length of time on this planet seemed like torture in of itself. He couldn’t imagine the Valdicians voluntarily committing themselves to living there for as long as they did.

When the hatch was finally open, Pyra drew in a breath and reached down beside him for Eden’s hand. She took it and offered it a squeeze. Even though it was tiny in his, fully enveloped by his grip, the presence of it made him feel stronger and more prepared for whatever they were going to face when they walked out of the ship. Out of the corner of his eye he saw his mate look up at him and he glanced down at her. She smiled at him and for the first time he noticed just how much she had really changed since the first moment that he saw her when she walked down off of the shuttle onto Uoria. There had been no affection in her eyes then. In fact, the bright green, that was now a beautiful orange, was sharp, shallow, and filled with suspicion and distaste. There were moments when he saw something that he would have described as hatred if she had known anything about him or had reason to hate him as the warriors did the enemies that they encountered in battle.

Pyra hadn’t felt any of those negative feelings when he first saw Eden or when Creia declared that he was to be her guard and protector for the entire time that she was to be on Uoria. Though she seemed to get angrier and more aggressive with each passing moment that they spent together, Pyra only became surer that she was the woman that he had been waiting for his entire life. Just as this fiery redhead showed sharp aggression with each moment that he was with her, Pyra himself was feeling more intense and more violent than usual, wanting to kill any man who got close to him, even his brothers. The feeling, though, accompanied by sexual arousal unlike anything that he had ever experienced, though, wasn’t about anger or dislike for this woman. Instead, it was his body’s way of telling him that he was rapidly approaching the moment when he would meet the mate that was intended for him from his birth. The aggression and violence was meant to keep other men away from him so that they wouldn’t approach his intended mate, while the powerful arousal acted as a further reinforcement of the knowledge that he was going to meet the woman with whom he would share his life so that he could differentiate this level of violence and anger from the viciousness that was naturally inborn in the warriors and that had given them the reputation of being the most fearsome warriors in the Universe.

Looking back, Pyra knew that it wasn’t fully instant dislike for him that had caused Eden to act that way when they first met. Instead, she was being controlled by her emotions toward the same horrible man who had created the hybrid army they were preparing to wage war against. Ryan had been her boss at the University laboratory and when she refused his advances, he had planned what he thought was the perfect vengeance. He demanded that she go to Uoria and collect the blood of the most powerful Denynso warrior so that it could be used for his weaponry development. His thought was that if she succeeded, he would have access to the material that had eluded him and that would help him to move forward with his grisly efforts, and if she failed, which was far more likely, she would be killed in punishment and retaliation, and he wouldn’t have to deal with her any longer. What he didn’t know was that she would arrive into the guardianship of the very warrior whose blood she was meant to illegally collect, and that that warrior, Pyra himself, would love her ferociously from the first second that they were near each other.

She was so different then, and yet still the woman he loved so much. He had seen some of her softness when she stood before Creia and confessed to the mission on which Ryan had sent her. She wasn’t a part of the University program that the King was planning, but rather an independent scientist sent to the planet under the guise of collecting plant materials for biological projects on Earth. That made her more vulnerable, and Pyra could see the nervousness on her beautiful, freckle-sprinkled face as she told Creia what Ryan had asked her to do and handed over materials that he had given her. Pyra knew that she feared for her life. It was not an illogical fear. It was well-known throughout the Universe that no one was permitted to possess the incredibly powerful blood of a Denynso warrior, and anyone who was to attempt to collect it would be punished swiftly and severely. Even though she was terrified of what the Denynso King was going to do with her now that he knew that she had admitted that she had come to the planet with the intention of doing what Ryan had asked, at least initially, Eden had stood before the King courageously and gave him all of the information that she could. It was a show of tremendous bravery and her desire to make sure that Ryan would not have control over the Denynso in as much capacity as she was able to prevent.

Pyra still saw that bravery now, but the harsh, sharp edges that had defined her pretty face had softened. It was a strange development, an odd change that had come over her in a way that he didn’t think that it would come over anyone else. The other human women who had found their way into the lives of the Denynso men and their homes in the compound had become noticeably harder since their time on the planet. They were still feminine and beautiful in a way that was so different from the Denynso women, but the challenges and turmoil that they had experienced since committing to being a part of the clan had taken some of the tenderness from them and given them a tangible strength that made them seem more grounded and capable of handling the challenges ahead without being controlled by their fear or emotions. Eden, on the other hand, seemed to be the opposite. When Pyra looked at her then he had seen steeliness and thick walls that had developed over the years of mistreatment by Ryan. She had been virtually emotionless with the exception of anger and frustration, and was always quick to temper. She seemed nearly fearless. Over the time that she had been with him, though, those edges had smoothed. Her transformation into being Denynso and then into a mother had suited her, and now he could see more layers within her than he had ever been aware that she had. He had finally seen her cry and heard her laugh from the depths of her soul. He had seen her look truly happy and held her as she broke down with deep, tearing pain that pulled sadness and feeling of betrayal from within her chest. Though she was still courageous, even more so probably now that she was truly aware of what she was capable of accomplishing, his beloved mate was a calmer, more peaceful, and more comfortable creature who he couldn’t wait to share the rest of his life with when they were finally able to put all of this behind them.

As he thought back to the first day that he saw Eden, Pyra’s mind traveled to Creia. Both King of the Denynso and Pyra’s father, Creia had once been revered as he was as the most powerful and fierce warrior in all the Universe. Now he was seen as a strong, loyal, and fearless leader who protected his compound and his people with everything in him. It was he who was responsible to making sure that every child born into the clan knew their destined position in life, and though it was Creia’s wife and Pyra’s mother Theia, who was responsible for the actual training of the warriors, Creia was their unquestioned commander, even above Pyra himself when it came to leading and controlling the army.

Pyra knew that Creia held a tremendous amount of faith and respect in his oldest son. He had chosen him as the leader of the warriors when he made the decision to no longer enter battle himself, and it had been he who had agreed to allow the warriors to leave the compound where they had all spent their lives in order to explore the planet in the way that the Kings had done for generations before. He had even humbled himself by admitting that he had been wrong for not telling the warriors the complete truth about their planet and their clan, and asking for their forgiveness. Pyra knew how difficult that must have been for him. He himself had had to ask his father to forgive him when he had acted irrationally with the Mikana men and allow his father to guide him in how he was going to repair the damage that he had done and move forward to earn back the respect and trust of his own kind as well as the other species on Uoria.

The thoughts of his father and King brought painful tightness to Pyra’s chest and throat. Creia trusted him. He had sent him out into the Universe with the faith that he would take care of those who followed him and make sure that they were well protected. He was waiting on Uoria, knowing what they had faced in their time on Earth, believing that his son would do what he was supposed to do to handle the situation and restore peace. Pyra could only hope that he would be able to live up to what his father expected and hoped of him. Never before had he questioned himself or wondered if he was going to be capable of handling the challenge that was in front of him. He was the fiercest of the warriors, the most dedicated and aggressive, and the first to storm into battle, always confident of the victory that they would achieve. Now that he was looking into Eden’s face and seeing his son’s tiny head rested against her chest, however, Pyra felt a flicker of nerves and could only hope that he would be able to protect them and make Creia proud.