Ythana clapped her hands and rose smoothly to her feet. Soon a uniformed Yadeshi appeared. Household staff, Gayle assumed, from the uniform of loose blue linen, wide-legged pants, and a thigh-length tunic. Ythana gave some quiet instructions and the servant clasped her hands and bowed her head before retreating.

“Come,” Ythana said. “The rest of today will be for arranging your calendar for the upcoming week, and we’ll have a stylist and designer come attend us.”

And thus, started another whirlwind of fittings, treatments, discussions on various social and educational activities for the next week.

“And we will need to choose a physician,” Ythana said. “My personal physician can attend you for now, but it should be your choice.”

“You mean for… fertility treatments?”

“Even so. But also for any health care you may need. Our doctors here handle the overall care. Mental, nutritional, physical therapy should you become injured.”

“That’s… a lot of schooling.”

Ythana laughed. “Forty years, I believe. But the best of them have their choice of clients and are highly revered in our society.”

Of her hair, Ythana agreed with the stylist from the shuttle, and the new attendant who came to manage Gayle’s hair came prepared with swatches of colors and a virtual demonstration of how different styles would look on Gayle. It was odd to see herself prance around the room as a hologram, but fun.

“The braids are fashionable but the color really does nothing for your skin tone,” the stylist said. “I agree a shade of bronze would suit. Something to bring out the undertones of your skin.”

They decided on a dark honey gold with a metallic sheen, and different fabrics were matched to her new coloring.

“You’ll be stunning,” Ythana murmured. “What a coup for our family. There was some concern our youngest son would wind up mating a tavern wench.”

Gayle choked on the wine she’d been sipping. “Wow. I guess anything is better than a wench.”

Even though she was still mad at him, she had to lift her no-talking restriction temporarily to tell Ithann what his mother had said.

He snorted. “Mothers never have faith. A wench could never endure me in the bedroom. Only a warrior female would ever have done.”

* * *

Gayle escaped Ythana’s relentless lessons—and the guards, though she suspected she’d only lost the ones ordered to be ‘visible.’ The Yadeshi were like ninjas sometimes. Barely made a sound.

Not that she didn’t enjoy the lessons—she’d thrown herself wholeheartedly into tutorials, both in person and digital. Excursions to various galleries and facilities and nature conservatories. Observations of different schools and training complexes devoted to a myriad of disciplines. Anything and everything she could think of, Ythana was having Gayle dabble in.

She enjoyed staying busy, and she enjoyed Ithann’s continued training, as ruthless as his teaching style was. But she needed to escape for a few hours and just wander downtown, sit and enjoy the breeze and not think about anything.

Taking a transport to an artsy little neighborhood she’d wanted to explore further, Gayle strolled along the streets, pausing in various shops to peruse merchandise or art. She wore her newly bronzed hair loose, and had donned one of her simpler sun dresses, a cheery yellow with a flirty knee-length skirt and a wide sheer wrap. No hiding the bangles, but she could make them less conspicuous.

A tall, human woman walking around with fancy gold around her wrists and an escort in tow? It wasn’t hard to guess who she was, especially since Ythana delighted in showing Gayle all the latest society gossip vids. In that, it was much like home.

It wasn’t too long before boredom set in. The problem with all the lessons was really that even though they kept her busy—they weren’t a purpose. What she really needed was a job. Some place she had to be every day, a responsibility she had to fulfill. She’d tried explaining this to Ythana, who’d merely raised an eyebrow.

“What is stopping you? You’re a Bdakhun—not a prisoner.”

“Ithann—”

“Oh, leave Ithann to me. Males always have unfortunate ideas in their heads.”

Which was why, when she passed the youth center on her way to a nearby cafe, she paused and entered. On Earth, a place like this would always be hiring. Part-time attendants, volunteers to help man activities. She figured she had a knack for herding mischief makers—hadn’t she helped that instructor on the ship? She paused long enough to look up the establishment’s website, swipe a few pages to see what they were all about so she didn’t look like a fool making assumptions. And it was, indeed, a youth recreation center specializing in travel ‘experiences’ for advanced teenagers. Vacations for rich kids, she translated.

Gayle approached the receptionist desk. The male attendant looked up, curious. He wore the sleeveless natural fiber vest shirt most of the males—who bothered to wear shirts—wore, and his hair was in two long braids down his back. The Yadeshi version of formal workday styling.

“Are you lost?” He spoke his language hesitantly, as if uncertain she would understand him.

She wanted to laugh. Her translator was tuned down to only forty percent now. “No, unless I misplaced an entire planet. I was actually wondering if the facility is hiring.”

His expression brightened. “You speak Earth languages?”

She switched to English. “Two, actually. English and Swahili.”

“Have you had any experience with teenagers?”

“No, but I’m combat trained and accustomed to the… personalities… of high-class children.”

He reached under his desk, and spoke. “Ravetha? We have fresh meat. I’ll send her to you. She’s combat trained.”

Gayle wondered why he sounded so delighted.

* * *

“You aren’t paying attention!” Ithann roared.

In a way, she didn’t blame him. She’d been worrying about work and inadvertently rushed her moves—as if that would speed up the session—and making sloppy mistakes. He’d just ‘killed’ her with a Form a toddler could block. But she’d been thinking about what tricks the teenagers were planning and just…

Gayle sighed, staring at the sky from the flat of her back. Ithann didn’t even bother to offer her a hand to her feet. After a minute, she executed a quick flip and rose, not wanting to irritate him further by pushing to her feet with her hands like a ‘clumsy human.’

He stood several feet away, arms crossed, glaring. “How long do you plan on wasting my time?”

There was something in his voice… she frowned. As used to his surly nature as she was, today there was an extra edge of meanness, as if he meant the snide comments he said.

“Why are you in a foul mood?” she asked. “I may not be in top form, but it’s because I have—”

“Things to do.” His arms dropped to his sides and he stalked forward. “I know. Such important things to do. Herding cattle.”

“Teenagers.”

“I know what I said. You’re neglecting your main duty to waste time—”

“Hey, wait a damn minute. My job isn’t a waste of time.”

His eyes were a chill blue. She missed their white, hot heat and realized, abruptly, she hadn’t seen the glow of uncontrollable lust for days now. She’d filtered his long, impassive stares to the back of her mind to deal with later. There was always another lesson, another activity. And now that she’d begun meeting some of the female mates and warriors Ythana considered of an appropriate class, Gayle was even busier. Plus, she had the job.

The job at the center for youth she’d been astounded to learn was the same one that had hosted the travel group on her shuttle. Ravetha had recognized her right away, and hired her on the spot.

“I’ve already seen you in action,” the Yadeshi woman said, her voice wry. “And I’d be crazy not to hire the prince’s wife—it lends a certain gravitas to our staff.”

“What do you want me to be doing with my time?” she asked Ithann, pulling her mind back to the present. “I’m making a life for myself here. I won’t be much use to you sitting in your house all day doing nothing.”

“You’re doing too much.” For a moment, frustration shone through the ice of his eyes. “Have you forgotten that the only way—other than accepting the bond—that you can obtain full married rights is if we have a child?”

She folded her arms. “Well, what do you want me to do about that, Ithy? I can’t just snap my fingers and push out a baby.”

“No, but you haven’t arranged to begin the fertility treatments. And—you’ve been too tired three nights in a row.”

Outrage bubble over. “Is this about sex? You’re upset because we haven’t had sex in three days?”

He took a step forward, and another, crowding her until she planted her feet and shoved him in the chest.

“Stop bullying me!” she exclaimed.

He grabbed her wrists, yanking her forward into his arms. The gesture might have been romantic but he stuck his face in hers, hissing. “I’m not bullying you. You’re neglecting me. There are consequences for neglecting a Bdahn of—”

“Oh, you are so full of it, Ithann.” She tried to jerk away and when she couldn’t, fury ignited. She executed a quick Form—that mainly involved a sharp kick to his ankle, and they both went tumbling to the ground.

On purpose, because he could have blocked her if he wanted. But this way, she landed on her back with a heavy man on top of her, a smirk on his face, his body imprisoning hers as her hands were pinned over her head.

“I think I’ll just let you make it up to me right now,” he said.

Her eyes widened. “I’m not having sex with you in broad daylight in the middle of a public garden.”

“No one will come in. I gave orders.”

“You were planning this?” She should have been pissed, but the idea intrigued her instead.

He was hard, arousal obvious. “Since it appears I can no longer expect to come home and find my wife sweetly in bed awaiting my pleasure, I’m forced to more creative means to get what I want.”

“You could always wake me up.”

He snorted. “I want a woman squirming in my arms, not a drooling, incoherent log.”

The nerve of him. “I do not drool.”

“Prove it.”

She didn’t understand the correlation between oral sex and proving she didn’t drool while sleeping, but whatever it was, by the time they’d mutually satisfied each other, Gayle couldn’t fathom how in the hell she’d been too tired.

“Aren’t you late for work?” he asked, chewing on a blade of grass.

The nerve. Gayle sighed, sitting up. “Ithann, I don’t want a baby right away.”

He stared at her.

“I’m just getting on my feet, learning who I am. Living my life, for once. A baby…”

“I see.” His voice was cold. So cold.

“It doesn’t mean I don’t want one. I do. Just… can we wait a year?”

Ithann rose and walked out.

* * *

He didn’t speak to her for three days. She tried. Tried to talk to him. Yelling didn’t work, attacking him didn’t work. Seduction didn’t work. Oh, he responded to that, but when they were done, he still refused to speak. After another day of that bullshit, Gayle took blankets and pillows and moved into the sitting room.

He said nothing, did nothing.

Anger morphed into hurt and disappointment. She told him she would go spend a few days with Ravetha, and he just shrugged.

“I didn’t kill our firstborn, Ithann,” she said.

He wouldn’t look at her. Gayle’s temper snapped; she slapped him. The blow was hard, a sharp cracking against his cheek. His head jerked back, then whipped around to stare at her, nostrils flared. And all she saw on his face was anger. Untempered anger.

“You refuse the bond, you refuse a child,” he said. “You cannot love me. In fact, I believe you used me to leave your planet. What else should I think?”

His words stunned her. “How can you even think that?”

“What else,” he repeated, “should I think?”

And this time when he walked out of their room, she said nothing.