Chapter Eight
Stevan
“What news?” I demanded as I strode into the room where Catherina was instructing her new recruits. Everyone in the room instantly dropped to their knee. “Rise and speak freely,” I commanded.
It had been eight weeks since the Waters had moved back to their planet. During that time, Catherina had crafted a script and a call had gone out for males and females. There’d been thousands to volunteer, eager to serve their people, but dear Catherina had rejected all but ninety-one. Now she was shuttling between the Fire and Water planets, conducting classes, teaching our people and the Waters how to mate successfully.
“Slow, my Lord,” Catherina said.
My eyes narrowed. “Why? Are these men and women not following your instruction?” If they weren’t, they would regret that choice.
Catherina smiled. “Yes, my Lord. They’re trying. We’re making progress, but I’m fighting millions of years of evolution. I’m trying to teach a Kegger to not bite, and that takes time and patience.”
I grinned. She was picking up more and more of our idioms and manners. The Kegger was a nasty, ill-tempered, vicious beast, suitable only for hunting and eating.
“Show me.”
Catherina smiled and pulled the ceremonial blade she’d taken to wearing, pointing to Sereni and a male whose name I didn’t know.
“Sereni, Hulg, let’s show our Lord how Water women want to be touched.”
The two stepped to the center of the room and gazed at each other. “When are they going to start?” I asked.
“Shhh…” Catherina hissed softly. “They have.”
As I watched Hulg took Sereni’s face in his hands, his gaze never leaving hers, as he softly caressed her face.
“Good,” Catherina said softly. “Now, Sereni, how would the Water react?”
As I watched, Sereni softened, gazing into Hulg’s eyes, then burst into laughter.
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! Let me try again!”
I went stiff with rage. Perhaps Catherina sensed my wrath rising within me because she touched me on the arm and shook her head slowly as Sereni composed herself and once again gazed into Hulg’s eyes. She touched his face tenderly, as I had my mother’s as she lay dying of old age. I didn’t understand what she was doing. Hulg wasn’t infirm or injured. He wasn’t an infant. I didn’t understand why Catherina was forcing Sereni to touch him as if he were a child. I realized then that was the problem. We didn’t understand what we needed to give to the Waters to mate and bond with them.
Hulg touched her lips with a finger, smiling at her, then forcing his features back into the softness of before. Sereni giggled, then composed herself again, and opened her lips slightly.
Suddenly the mood was broken as Hulg burst into a deep laugh, causing Sereni to do the same before he pulled her roughly to him, their hands locking as they strained. Sereni, with her guard training, easily overcame his defense, threw him to the ground and fell on him, taking his lips before laughing and bounding to her feet and then offering him a hand.
“I don’t understand what they were doing at the beginning,” I said softly.
“And that’s the problem, my Lord,” Catherina replied, her voice quiet, as Sereni and Hulg returned to the group. “The aggressiveness of your mating is very off putting to the Waters. They don’t understand the Fires any more than you understand the Waters. I’m working with the Waters as well, teaching them that just because a man is aggressive, that doesn’t mean he’ll hurt them. That’s a much harder task because I’ve found its easier to have a Fire male act tenderly than it is for a Water male to act aggressively.”
The task was daunting. It angered me when Sereni laughed, but I could understand why. Catherina was forcing her to act silly, as if she were damaged and her mind was gone. Hulg too. If I were walking in Hulg’s steps, I’m not sure I could hold a straight face either.
“Walk with me,” I said to Catherina as I turned and strode to the door. “Give us space,” I ordered as we stepped into the palace hall. My guards took ten steps back to create a bubble of privacy around me.
“Yes, my Lord?” Catherina asked.
“Can this be accomplished?” I asked as we strolled down the hall. The halls were designed to allow guards to move in mass for defense of the palace, so we had plenty of space.
“I believe so, my Lord.”
I smiled at her. She was becoming a better Firaspatciti every day, but I missed the innocence of her when she first arrived. “Call me Stevan.”
She smiled, understanding the significance of what I’d said and was obviously please. She was now one of only a hand full of people that could say my name without fear of swift and brutal reprisal.
“Yes, Stevan, I believe there’s hope. Your people are trying, as are the Waters. You both want the same thing. If we could have even on successful bonding, others may follow.”
“The way Hulg and Sereni were touching…” I shook my head. “I’ve mated with Sereni. She’s Firaspatciti to her core and that’s not who I saw in there just now.”
She smiled and bobbed her head. “I know. She’d doing this to please you. To please you and to save her people. She’s trying, Stevan, they all are. The problem is, I’m asking them to go against everything they’ve learned. Strength! Aggression! Never surrender! Never show your enemy you’re vulnerable! That’s what the Fires know and understand. But I’m asking the opposite. I’m asking Hulg to open himself up. To contain his strength and not display it. To hide his aggression. To surrender himself to another person and allow himself to be vulnerable.” She shook her head. “I’m asking a lot, and I know it, but they are trying, Stevan. They’re trying very hard.”
“But you’ve been working with them for weeks, with no end in sight. The pace is too slow. If we can’t do better than this, then we’re doomed before we start.”
She smiled. “Don’t give up hope. This is possibly the Fires greatest challenge. If you can mate, bond, and produce offspring with the Water, you can adjust more easily to the other Peoples.”
“Perhaps we should start with the others.”
“No. I want you and your people to lead. All the Peoples know that the Fires and the Waters are as far apart as two people can become. If your two Peoples begin to bond, that shows that no pairing is impossible.”
I nodded. She made valid arguments, but it if didn’t work… “And if we fail?”
She smiled. “We won’t fail, my Lord.”
I grinned down at her. “I have the word of the great Catherina Hume, savior of the Peoples of the galaxy?”
Her smile widened. “You do. I’m staking my professional reputation on it.”
We walked in silence for a time as I thought. “Perhaps you’re right. Perhaps I should lead. Perhaps you should train me in the ways of handling a Water woman so that I may better understand what I am asking of my men.”
She smiled. “Perhaps. I could pair you up with Sereni.” She gave me a mischievous smile. “She’d probably like that.”
I chuckled. “I wouldn’t though. It would be too hard to focus on my lessons. Besides, if I were in your class, I would be a disruption. I can’t have them kneeling and bowing all the time, we’d never get anything done.”
“Private lessons, then?”
I nodded. “That would probably be best.”
“Do you have a woman in mind for your partner?”
I smiled. “You.”
“Me?” she squeaked.
“Can you think of anyone better to show me how to touch a Water woman?”
“But…”
“We don’t have to mate, Catherina. Just show me how to… please a Water woman.”
I stopped and she stopped with me, staring into my eyes. “If that’s your wish, my Lord.”
“Catherina. It’s a request, not an order. If you refuse, no dishonor will follow you. But I desperately need this to work. My people depend on it working. You saw what happened in there. They may be trying, but it’s still a game.” I paused as I tried to gather my thought so I could express them in some way she could understand. “You have a bit of Fire and Water in you. You’re a bridge to connect our peoples. You’re strong yet soft. You bend but don’t break. I need to learn to be more like you, and I don’t think I can do that with Sereni, or any other Firaspatciti woman. The old traditions are still there and I think they will take over no matter how hard I fight them. I’ll be like Hulg. I won’t be able to get past the game of it all, of pretending to be someone I’m not.” I sighed. “And if I’m honest with myself, no matter how hard I try, I don’t think I can soften enough for an Aquallian unless you show me how first.” I looked at her, holding her gaze with my own. “I don’t think I can make the leap all at once, no matter how hard I try. But perhaps if I went half-way with one step first…”
“With me?”
I smiled. “With you. We don’t have to mate, but show me how to make a Water wish to mate with me.”
“You would mate with a Water?”
“As an example? Yes, if it becomes necessary. I won’t ask my people to do that I will not.”
She licked her lips slowly. “This is a dangerous game we’re playing.”
“It’s not game, Catherina. It’s a fight. A fight to the death for the Peoples of the galaxy. Great battles are only won with great risk. I’m willing to risk much.”
She nodded slowly. “Very well. I’ll teach you in private.”
I nodded. “Excellent. We won’t speak of this again. Only Kergah will know what we are doing. He alone will fetch and return you to your room during our practice sessions.”
She smiled. “Oh, won’t the tongues wag, me coming to your room so often?”
I grinned. “Then I will cut them out. When should we begin?”
“Not today, and not tomorrow. Tomorrow I travel to Water to meet with Quahaul and the other women.” She sighed. “I don’t know which is harder. Trying to teach a Fire male to slow down and be gentle or teach a Water woman to have a little backbone and to stand up for herself.”
I chuckled at the resigned look on her face. The nanites had completed their work and Catherina was lovely. She had the trim firmness of the Firaspatciti, and yet some of the curves of the Aquallia with her fuller breasts and rounder hips. She truly was a bridge, both physically and emotionally, between our two people. If anyone could solve this, she could.
“I have faith in you.”
She smiled. “Thank you, Stevan. That means a lot to me.”
I grinned. “I have to. The entire galaxy is depending on you.”
She slumped and I chuckled.
“No pressure,” she said, refusing to meet my gaze.
“No. There is no shame in defeat if you’ve given your all. I’ve seen enough today to know you have made more progress in eight weeks that we had in a year before. You are winning. But the pace is so slow. That’s my only concern. You can win a war, but if you are too exhausted at the end to claim your spoils, you’ve won nothing.”
She nodded. “I understand. But this the tip of the spear. If we have a successful bonding, then your traditions can begin to change. The Fires are capable of changing, the mating blades replacing the regular blade is but one example. The successfully bonded couples will spread the word and others will want to join them. They will have their own kind to help guide, instruct and support them. Every great river starts with a trickle.”
My eyes opened wide. That must be a human idiom, but it made perfect sense. She was right. Once we began to mate and bond with the Waters, the Firaspatciti will realize the Waters aren’t our enemies, but our allies. Every great river starts with a trickle, indeed.
I smiled down at the woman that was going to save my people, and potentially the entire galaxy. “You’ve once again restored my belief that we can avoid going into the long darkness.”
She smiled up at me. “All part of the service, my Lord.”