Chapter Eleven
As preoccupied as Zhor was with his discovery of alien machines on the plateau, the aroma that hit him right between the eyes when he entered the rooke stopped him in his tracks as abruptly as if he had slammed into an invisible wall. A mixture of emotions too varied and numerous to sort went through him—among them nostalgia so potent that it was almost debilitating—scattering his reasoning abilities as surely as if he had been physically assaulted.
“What dat?” he demanded.
Annika gaped at him guiltily, still too focused on trying to sort her impressions to grasp what he’d asked. “What?” she asked, quickly shoving the blanket she’d been examining in the light from the air shaft behind her.
He sent her a strange look.
Reddening, she pulled the blanket from behind her. “This?”
He stared at the blanket blankly, clearly more confused, not less. After a pregnant moment while she waited to see what it was he was accusing her of so that she could formulate a defense, he sniffed the air. “Dat.”
Annika blinked at him a couple of times, but she had only to take in a long drag of air herself to abruptly conclude he was asking about the stew, not what she was doing plundering through his belongings. “Oh. Stew.”
He knew that word. What he was smelling sure as hell did not smell like the stuff she had called stew before.
After studying her a long moment, trying to grasp the vibes he was getting from her, he shook off the effort and followed the smell.
The heavenly scent was coming from the pot, he decided as he stared down at the bubbling mixture, but he was damned if he could see a notable difference. He glanced at Ah-na when she followed him in. “Dis … uh … Podunk stew?”
Relieved that he didn’t seem pissed off, Annika smiled at him. “Smells good, huh?”
He grinned back at her and Annika thought for a moment that her heart was going to beat her to death—or choke her. “Eat now?”
It took her a few moments to recover her equilibrium.
Well, somewhat gather her wits. “Uh.” She had no clue how long it had been cooking. “I should test it. I’m not sure.”
He looked suspicious when she fished a small piece of meat out and cut off a piece that was barely a mouthful. Then she popped it in her mouth, chewed experimentally, and then shook her head. “Still too tough—tough enough to make shoes,” she said disgustedly.
Zhor studied her with a mixture of suspicion and disappointment.
Annika shook her head. “Fine! Try it if you don’t believe me.”
Zhor instantly snatched the rest of the meat and popped it in his mouth.
And chewed.
And chewed.
And chewed.
Annika snickered in spite of her embarrassment. “I told you it was still too tough to eat. It needs to cook a while.”
Swallowing brought tears to his eyes but clearly he would rather choke than admit defeat or waste it. “Good.”
Annika laughed. “Sure.”
“Dah! Good.” He paused. “Make shoes.”
Annika popped his arm playfully before she even considered the impulse. She was so relieved when he chuckled instead of whacking her back. “You don’t even know what shoes are! Not the word anyway.”
“Ny-et,” he agreed cheerfully. “What dis shuz?”
She pointed to her feet and then patted the sides of the boots she was wearing.
“Ah.”
She could see when he reasoned through the exchange and actually did get it. He shook his head at her. “Ah-na good cook.”
It never took him more than a matter of seconds, no matter whether the concept and words were new or not. She suspected, in point of fact, that he understood her far better than she understood him.
Discomfort flickered through her. She’d just dismissed every single clue that suggested his intelligence … because she’d already made up her mind.
She must have left her scientific mind at the ship!
Well, she supposed she had done just that. She’d arrived at the planet with certain preconceptions about it and she hadn’t made any attempt to adjust those notions to fit actuality.
The question was, she wondered, was she seeing clearly now? Or was she allowing her feelings for Zhor to cloud her judgement now?
And what were those feelings if it came to that?
She was attracted to him. She had been almost immediately because she had found his appearance appealed to her even when he was such an unknown entity she didn’t know whether he was a threat to her or not.
She thought he’d pretty well proven, several times over, that he was no threat, though—in any way.
He hadn’t even tried to push the intimacy thing.
She was a little outdone about that if the truth were known!
He should have tried to make it up to her, damn it!
It had been …. She had no clue, but a very long time—at least a couple of weeks, she was sure.
Jared had wanted to have sex 24/7, especially when they’d first gotten together. Granted, they hadn’t been in survival mode like Zhor apparently was, but did that really account for his seeming lack of interest?
Was it just the way his people were? Maybe they didn’t have recreational sex at all? Humans, after all, were almost the only animal on Earth that had sex purely for pleasure. Most of the other animals only had sex for the purpose of reproduction—not all, but most as far as they’d been able to determine.
Or was he just not that interested because she wasn’t one of them?
Or was he still nursing a wounded ego and didn’t want it badly enough to risk trying with her again?
He didn’t act like anyone that was sulking or moping, though.
In some ways he behaved as if she was part of the furnishings, or maybe another guy.
That thought made her wonder if he was a samsie—just didn’t have any real interest in females.
She didn’t believe that! And she didn’t think it was just because she didn’t want to. She’d seen him look at her with interest more than once—and that was since the debacle of their first intimacy.
Zhor, who’d been pacing the cavern like a caged animal, finally stopped and peered at the bubbling pot again. “Is ready?”
Annika was surprised, and pleased. She shrugged. “It’s only been cooking maybe thirty since the last time I checked, but I’ll check it again.”
He nodded. “Eat now.”
She glanced at him in surprise. “You are hungry.”
“Ny-et … Dah.”
Puzzled, she looked a question at him. “Yes or no?”
“Smell good.”
She might have taken that at face value, enjoyed it as a compliment, and ignored the ‘vibes’, but she could tell he was anxious for some reason.
“What’s up?”
He flicked a look of surprise at her that annoyed her. Like she was too stupid to grasp subtleties?
Frowning, he ignored the question while he focused on fishing out chunks of meat and roots to eat. “No safe,” he said finally, succinctly.
No attempt to explain what he meant by ‘no safe’.
Annika dipped out a serving for herself, although she’d pretty much lost her appetite after the announcement.
“What do you mean it isn’t safe? What happened?”
It dawned on her abruptly that he might have seen a rescue ship. He would consider that a threat, wouldn’t he, even if she didn’t?
Either he was bent on pretending he didn’t understand her, or he really didn’t, because he played deaf and didn’t respond. Instead, he focused on his food.
When she’d settled to eat her own, she was obliged to admit it required concentration. The meat was still the next thing to inedible—almost as tough as it had been the first time she’d tried it and the roots where so mushy it was nearly impossible to scoop them into her mouth with the crude utensil she had to use.
It dawned on her as she struggled with her food that she’d forgotten one of the basic fundamentals of cooking! Everything didn’t cook at the same rate and foods that took longer had to be started first. Foods like meat. She shouldn’t have thrown the roots in until she’d cooked the meat tender.
Damn it!
She at least had the satisfaction that it tasted pretty damn good, but that was cold comfort when it was a flop after all, the meat so tough it was nearly impossible to chew up. She had to cut it into tiny, manageable pieces since she couldn’t chew it well enough to keep it from choking her.
While she worked at eating her disappointing cooking efforts, she tried to think of possible dangers that they might be facing that would be serious enough to alarm Zhor but not so serious that he thought they needed to run—immediately.
Nothing actually came to mind except the possibility that he’d spotted a ship. Every other scenario that came to mind was something of urgent threat that would require an immediate response—natural disaster, animal attack, enemy attack—drought, pestilence.
She supposed it was possible that he’d discovered enemies moving into the neighborhood. That would suggest it wouldn’t be safe where they were anymore and would inspire him to be uneasy and preoccupied.
Maybe he was weighing options?
It was hard to imagine the possibility of finding another shelter that filled all of the needs this one did.
No doubt there were others on this world with the capability of flight that Zhor had, but, strategically, this cavern would still be hard to beat since it had a clear view for miles. It was not only hard to access, it was cut into the stone and it had running water.
As crude as it was, it still beat the hell out of being fully exposed to the elements and predators of all kinds—with no running water!
So was he just trying to decide how much of a threat there was? Or was he trying to think of somewhere else to go?
He answered those questions, at least, once they’d eaten what they could of the difficult stew.