He smelled divine, but I couldn’t figure out why. It was like a mixture of freshly-cut swamp trees and sharp reeds and sheer manliness, all scents I considered rather mundane on their own but intoxicating in a blend. His scent permeated my nostrils and engorged my senses with heady desire, and I breathed it in deeply.

Khrel was attractive; I had never denied myself that truth. His height and muscular build were obviously turn-ons, and his chiseled facial features only added to the package. His white eyes were mysterious, his silver hair ethereal, and his gruff voice masculine. He was like a walking wet dream, though the shimmering blue-green skin was something I never would have imagined during my Earth years. To have him so close to me now, though, with his broad forearms flexed to support his weight and his mouth just a breath from mine, forced me to realize not just his appeal but what his appeal did to me.

I wanted him. Badly.

“You’re imagining…” I whispered, my voice round and shallow. “…me.”

“There is no need to imagine you,” he murmured back. His eyes were boring into me, undressing me from within and leaving me naked before him. “You are right here.”

“Yes,” I agreed. “I’m right here.”

His chest pressed against mine, and I could feel the ridges of his hardened muscles. He was warm, much warmer than I was. To have him so near me, parts of him touching me was much like having a hot water bottle pushed up against my skin. It was soothing and pleasant and sensual and suggestive all at once, and, for a split second, I realized I had never noticed that A’li-uud ran at a higher temperature than humans. Then again, I had never been in this close of proximity to one.

Without warning, he straightened up. His weight left my body, and I felt air rush back into my lungs, though I wasn’t sure if it was because he’d been crushing me a little or I’d been holding my breath. I sat up too, confused and surprised by the sudden change in him, but he got to his feet and turned his back to me.

“It is nearly time for dinner,” he announced. His voice had returned to normal, gruff and hoarse rather than saturated with lust. “I am nearly out of fresh produce. We will have to pick from the garden tomorrow.”

I was rendered speechless. A streak of flinty anger breezed through me, but following closely on its tail was raw humiliation. I felt like the girl who had asked the boy she liked to prom, and he said no with an indignant laugh even though neither Khrel nor I had verbally expressed any interest in one another. Body language was universal, though. It had been clear I wanted him, and he didn’t have to admit it for me to know that, in that moment, he’d wanted me. I realized almost instantly, however, that I had correctly identified him as the Tough Guy, and he was trying to shield himself from being vulnerable by ending the flirtation. I was comforted by that and able to separate myself from his behavior, and I decided to pretend it had never happened. I had a goal to focus on, anyway.

Luckily, the incident wasn’t enough to set us back into uncomfortable silence again. Over another couple of days, we continued to chat and develop an unlikely friendship. He admitted that he was indeed quite close to his mother and regaled me with stories of his boyhood—which, to my surprise, was not just eighteen years like it was for humans but a hefty thirty.

“No wonder you’re so close to your mother!” I exclaimed in surprise when he told me the numbers. “Thirty years is a long time to be under your mom’s care.”

He tilted his head at me. We were in the living room again, but this time he was sitting on one of the skinny chairs rather than the couch with me, and he looked rather like a hulking peacock atop a perch. “Why do you say that?”

“Let me put it this way,” I said. “A good percentage of my clients who actually need life coaching are thirty years old and still living with their mother.”

Khrel frowned. “But it is cruel to push children out into the world to fend for themselves,” he protested. His head was no longer cocked, but his eyes were narrowed with defensive disbelief. “Unless they are going to the warrior academy, of course.”

“Thirty years old is hardly a child,” I pointed out. He continued to look at me with obvious disagreement, and something dawned on me. I propped myself up on the couch with sudden understanding. “Wait a minute, A’li-uud are considered children until they’re thirty?”

“Yes,” he said.

“But…” I scanned his face, taking in his features and analyzing them quickly. “You can’t be older than thirty yourself!”

He furrowed his silvery brow, which contrasted with his white eyes and made them appear even brighter than they actually were. “I am one-hundred twenty-one years old,” he told me.

It was a number I wouldn’t have expected to hear in my wildest dreams, and I was knocked into a silly silence. My brain tried to compute the human equivalent, but I was either too shocked or too stupid to figure it out and ended up shaking my head in frustration. “How old is Sevani?”

“Elder Sevani is one hundred ninety-seven,” Khrel answered factually. “In fact, we have already started planning his two-hundredth birthday. The Capital will be a sight to behold.”

“Wow,” I murmured. “Is it because your years are shorter than ours? How many Earth days does it take Albaterra to orbit your sun?”

Khrel snickered. “I cannot say. I am not educated on Earth’s solar cycles.”

It was a casual conversation, one meant only to pass the time as we waited yet again for some news or a visit, but it had depth to me. I enjoyed learning about him, as well as learning about the A’li-uud, and I was starting to feel a connection with him beyond the brief moment of desire we’d shared. It felt much like my first year of college, when everyone had been out of their element and tried desperately to find common ground with someone else. We shared the burden of isolation, and we had now moved on to discover what made the other who they were. It was the definition of a budding friendship, and I was enjoying it. I quite liked Khrel.

Despite our blossoming bond, however, I had not forgotten about Isabelle, nor had I abandoned my plans. I still fully intended to find a way to escape to the Polder Quarter and retrieve her, but I now had my plot ironed out. I wanted to bring her back to the Capital, to Khrel’s, to stay with me. She needed to be protected too, whether Sevani believed so or not. Just because she hadn’t been the one attacked by the Novai didn’t mean she wouldn’t be targeted; her testimony was just as valuable as mine. It didn’t feel right to be kept under the watchful eye of the War Chief while she was left to defend herself if anything were to happen, and no amount of bonding with Khrel was going to change my mind.

It wasn’t until I’d been with Khrel for two full weeks, though, that I received my opportunity to put my plan into motion. Every night, he stood beside a cot he’d erected in my room and just watched me as I drifted off to sleep. I’d started trying to stay awake, to wait until he believed I was slumbering and retired to bed himself, but it seemed he simply didn’t go to bed. For several nights in a row, I forced myself to lie awake with my eyes closed, making my breaths seem deep and unconscious, until the sun began filtering its first rays into my room, and Khrel never slept. I was starting to think I needed to revamp my plan when my chance came.

The peak of night arrived. Through the window overlooking the ocean outside the Capital, I saw millions of white, blinking stars promising tonight was the night. I faced away from Khrel to prevent him seeing my open eyes, but I still pretended I had moved on to the land of dreams by slowing my inhales and steadying my exhales. When I heard a gentle creak of weight on the cot, my heart leaped. It was the first time I had heard him sit. A short time later, a soft snore flitted to my ears, and I knew it was time.

I pulled the covers off and silently clambered from the bed. Khrel was dozing, his body lying on the cot in an unnatural, uncomfortable position as though he had fallen asleep by accident—which he probably had. I considered getting redressed, as I’d taken off my clothes from the day and replaced them with pajamas Khrel had provided me my first night, but I didn’t want to waste time and risk getting caught. With one last glance at him to ensure he wasn’t faking, I slipped from the bedroom and into the night.