The Fly House (The UtopYA Collection) (40 page)

"Yes," she moaned, but then the sweet heat of his mouth disappeared.

Before she could turn, his hands gripped her hips and the head of his erection rutted against her.  He pushed hard at her small opening, her slick juices anointing the crown.

"Spread," he whispered, his palm shoving her thigh to the side.  She slowly complied, moving her knee wide as she pressed her bottom to him.  He groaned and brought his hand down between her shoulder blades.  He pressed her flat to the bed as he entered her, thrusting to his hilt.  She bit her lip as he fisted her hair and dragged her up to his chest, impaling her upon his length. 

"You are mine," he said through gritted teeth.  She rose up as much as she could and brought herself down hard on him, thrusting his delicious rod deeply inside her.  She twitched her hips, feeling him throb against her walls.

"Wrong," she said.  "You are mine."

His throaty laugh was the last thing she heard before he thrust into her so deep that the resulting orgasm shut down every function of her body.  The primal sound that spiraled out of her unhinged her control.

He followed her release, holding her steady to him.  His hips bucked against her with the last drops of his passion, before he folded her down on the bed beside him, his manhood still thick inside her.  It took moments before either of their breathing returned to normal, before either could scale back from the heights of their passion.

Maeve finally laid her head on his chest, feeling the lazy drag of his fingers through her hair.  His heart beat strong and steady below her ear. 

She was suddenly lost in this man. 

The fear lashed into her. 

The grip on her own independence had slipped the moment she'd allowed him to take her from behind.  No, it first stumbled when he'd taught her to train the dragon.  No, it had been long before that.  He'd been coaxing her trust from her since the moment they'd first met.

What was important now, what was terrifying to her, was that he'd won.  Lying there upon him was her surrender.  She knew she would give him whatever he wanted of her. 

Anything. 

Everything. 

All of her.  

It was overwhelming.  She hadn't trusted a man in...never.  Opening herself meant that he could destroy her, if he desired.  She was terrified at how she wanted to give him that ability too.  She'd never given more than the smallest fraction of herself to a lover and now, on the precipice of giving Diem everything she had, the vulnerability was too intense for her to handle.  She was glad she wasn't facing him as the tears slid from her cheek and slipped down the side of his belly, but then a rogue shiver gave her away.

"Are you crying?" he asked.  His fingers paused in her hair.  She wiped her face miserably. 

"This is what weakness feels like," she whispered. 

"No," he said.  His tone was soft, but disapproving.  "This is what trust feels like, Maeve."

CHAPTER
THIRTY

Start of Cold Season One, Year 2095

Steven Burtman made his way back through the Archive corridors, past the barricades that the Archivers had put in place, hoping to block the nose or claws of a dinosaur that might break into their halls.  The barricades would go up like marshmallows with one breath from the animals that were really on the surface. 

He pushed aside a flimsy sheet of transparent plastic that was intended to block the radiation or the toxic particles that might be tangled in the air from the surface.  All the barriers seemed embarrassingly foolish now that he knew what was truly up there. 

Steven tread down the central hall, worried with how he was going to tell the Archivers, and worse, how he was going to make them believe.

***

The Rhas returned that evening.  The chill was hard in the air, a sharp taste of the new season.  Diem took Maeve out to the middle of the dragon grounds with him as he made a fire.

"Do not speak, unless I speak to you first," he instructed her, but he could tell by the set of her jaw that she already had no intention of heeding his instructions.  It was not House custom for a man to have to explain himself to a woman he was only mating, but Diem was moved to do it.  The strings of this burgeoning connection to Maeve drew both patience and explanations from him.  "The reason you would not want to speak is because these Rhas will demand answers that you may not have.  Your answers could put me in a bad position."

"God forbid, you get stuck in a bad position," Maeve blew some hair from her eyes.  Diem paused to give his further explanation weight with her.

"If I have to kill a Rha for overstepping his boundaries with you, it would be a very bad position."

She looked away then, but he was satisfied that she understood the point he made. 

When the Rhas landed, one by one, she was surprisingly silent, only nodded as they greeted her.  Diem wasn't sure if he was more relieved or awed, since her own acknowledgments of the other Rhas seemed both proud and dismissive.  Women never showed that kind of confidence in Diem's presence.  Maeve acted as though she belonged around the fire as much or more than the rest of them did.

And as far as Diem was concerned, she had it right.     

The Rhas gathered, seated on spindling stumps around the fire.  Started from a Buntle trunk, the flame before them didn't crackle or smoke.  It burned a deep blue that was nearly lost in the darkness.  It cast heat but had no scent, and its light was only a slightly dimmer shade of the shadowed faces around it.  The dragons were assembled in a circle around the men and Maeve, lying tail to tail to do it, to block the meeting completely.

"The shipment went out today," Diem said, "but another will be coming fast and we already know we don't have the dragons we need.  We must decide when we will attack."

"I am confident that we can seal the wormhole located on our peninsula," Shown said.  "However, it might take all of our dragons to do it, depending on the resistance we get."

"We only have our dragons to work with and some won't be of much use," Diem said.  "To seal a wormhole, a dragon's flame must be precisely targeted.  Bark isn't fit for flying and since the wormhole is so obscured, we don't know how high up it is, so that counts him out.  Cirque is fast, but is too..."

"Impulsive," Span grunted with a shift of his eyes to Impulse.

Diem nodded in agreement. "No offenses meant, but if Cirque shoots too quickly and misses, he could seal only part of the hole or none at all and timing will be crucial.  The longer we take to seal the hole, the more likely the Plutians will be to send larger numbers to counter us.  Depending on the size of the hole, it may take several shots of flame to completely seal it."

"It must be done quickly," Span said with another hot glimpse to Impulse, "but not impulsively." 

"So fast to discredit," Impulse tsked.  "My dragon has lightening fast reflexes and with some training, he could improve.  If we are looking at all the possibilities of failure, then Cirque is still a better choice than even Soar.  My dragon isn't quite so voluminous."

"Soar could outrun your little Echo dragon in any race, regardless of his size," Span growled.

"Possibly," Impulse crossed his arms, tapping a finger on his elbow. "But you'd have to skin him to his skeleton to get him through a vestibule."

Impulse had a point.  Soar was fast and formidable, not built for hiding or squeezing into spaces, but for smashing them open.  Span looked away, grumbling to Shown, "Do we know if there is a vestibule to the wormhole?"

"We are not sure," Shown said.  "We've located the opening, but it is obscured—"

"Obscured," Impulse said.  "How do we know what size the opening is if it is obscured?  The Plutians could bring their whole planet through!"

"As we said, we will need all of our forces," Diem said.  "We don't know what it will take to seal the hole.  It might take the flame of one dragon or all five."

"Or six hundred," Flesh mumbled.  Bundled in his furry coat, the Rha looked like a three hundred pound hampig on his stump.  "There is still the question of the other wormhole."

"We can only work with what we know," Shown said. 

"But we will prepare for what we don't," Diem added.  "And we have one extra dragon.  A heathen."

Span shifted on his seat.  "Oh?"

"A Samoan heathen from the unexpected hoarde, which I used to cover what would have been our shortage this season..."

"We must decide a skilled rider!"  Impulse said, but Diem raised a hand.

"The dragon has bonded to its master already," he said.

"Who?" Span asked.

"M
e." Maeve said.  Diem frowned a bit.

Span guffawed.  "You gave a heathen to a woman?  What kind of magic swol is this?"

Diem jumped to his feet the moment the insult left Span's lips, but Maeve was already standing beside him.  Diem expected her to be as outraged as he was, but she was calm as she crossed to Span's stump.  She loomed over him.

"Swol?" she smirked, peering down at the Rha.  Even in the dim light, their gazes struck one another like two streams of dragon flame.  "You know nothing about me.  Only a man with a weak flex would talk about a woman he knows nothing about."

The air in the circle closed in tight.   Maeve had no idea what she was doing, insulting the Rha.  In retaliation, Span could throw her down and attempt to have her in front of them all, to prove his prowess to both her and the other Rhas.  Diem stood ready for whatever move Span would make.

But Shown got to his feet and stood behind Maeve.  It was a definite show of force
—it would be two Rhas against one, since neither Impulse nor Flesh were pulling their backsides from their fireside stumps to declare a side themselves. 

Still, Span had never been cowed by a lack of support or unlikely odds.  Diem held for the Rhas reaction.

Span merely scratched his chin and looked away.  It could have been that he realized that he needed the instruction and the alliance of this ring as much as they needed him, but Diem knew that Span was not afraid to strike out on his own, a maverick.  Diem was more than a little stunned.  He had seen Span stand his ground against the most powerful of men and even some Plutians.  But against this woman, with her boots and her defiant gaze, Span closed his mouth tight.  He wouldn't apologize, but more importantly, he didn't attack.

"Let's make our plans with what we have available," Shown said as he returned to his seat.  Diem and Maeve did the same, but Diem was pleased with how Maeve held herself.  She didn't dart angry glares around the fire.  Instead, she sat straight, and it was obvious by her carriage
, as well as the posture of the Rhas, that she was now part of the conversation.

"We will need ground forces," Shown said.  "We will need protection for our Houses."

"We have something else to offer," Diem added.  "Guns.  And extra fighters."

The other Rhas leaned forward, elbows on their knees, expressions hard and suspicious. 

"You've been hiding things of worth from us?" Span asked.  His eyes flicked to Maeve.

"As if that would be a new practice to you," Impulse rolled his eyes at Span.

"Please," Shown spoke over them all.  "Tell us what you have that might help us all, Rha Diem."

"We have an Archive," Maeve said instead.  All the men's attention flashed to her.  Diem's muscles tensed along his spine, ready, as he watched the other Rhas, but he didn't bother to stop her from speaking.  "There is a place beneath the ground that was recently unearthed.  People paid, a long time ago, to be kept alive, suspended in sleeping chambers.  Before the Plutians came..."

"You're one of them," Span said, stroking his chin.

"An alien?" Impulse asked.

"No, she is human," Span said.  "As human as any of us.  She is from the archaic Earth."

"And you've been living in the ground all this time?" Flesh said.

"Suspended and asleep, in Profanyl chambers, to preserve people during the oxygen depletion..."

"The Archive," Span said.  He rubbed his chin, studying Maeve's face as if he was trying to place it.  "I remember it."

"That's where I've come from," Maeve said.  "My name is Maeve Aypotu.  Those chambers were supposed to be opened in seventeen years, but the Archive closed and the entrances were bulldozed in.  The chambers were left, forgotten.  Its been 82 years, not 17, so, here I am.  There are 53 people down there now.  And we have guns.  We have other things to offer to the fight too, in return for our safety."

"Safety," Span snorted.  "None of us have it to offer.  We don't have it ourselves."

Impulse looked to the other Rhas, his tongue flicking out on his lips with excitement. 

"Fifty-three humans?" Impulse asked.  "Why not offer them?  We could barter these spare humans and save our Houses from this blood shed!"

"Do you think the Plutians would barter?" Flesh's chins wobbled with the question.  Diem jumped to his feet.

"There will be no barter!"  His voice rolled like a crack of thunder.  "These are people too!  They are human, just as we are!  Even one more word of a barter around this fire and I will kill the speaker myself!"

"It would do no good to barter the spare humans anyway," Span said.  "Do any of you think for a minute that the Plutians would take fifty humans and simply not want more?  It would be worse for us all to whet their appetites."

Impulse settled back on his stump and Diem relaxed.  But then, Maeve spoke again.

"You said you will need ground forces," she said, her eyes on Rha Shown.  "I think you are right.  If the Plutians attack, your Houses and your people are out in the open.  The Plutians could scorch the surface again and wipe out all of you.  But what if we gathered as many people as we could from your Houses into my Archive?  The Archive already survived one Scorching.  If we moved the people underground quietly, there is a good chance the Plutians would never even know.  If something happened to the rest of us on the surface, at least we might be able to give our race a small chance of survival."

The men stared at her in silence. 

"It's brilliant," Shown finally said.

Flesh cleared his throat.  "My dragon is not fit for flying, I know this.  But he would be perfectly suited to guarding the entrance to this Archive."

"That leaves only four dragons in the sky," Impulse said.

"Five,"  Maeve corrected.  "My dragon will be there."

The men exchanged glances and Diem felt their tension.  A woman in combat was something none of them wanted.  Especially Diem.  And especially if it was Maeve.

But Impulse clapped his hands as he rose from his stump. 

"Enough of the talking then.  You must teach us to fully control our dragons, dragon trainer," he said.  The tension around the fire broke with and knit together in a warmer unity. 

"Yes," Span said, leaning in toward Diem. "Teach us."

Diem rubbed his palms together slowly.  He had to tell them everything he knew and he understood that with this information, any one of them could ultimately use what they learned to kill him and take control of his House.

***

Diem sat forward, leaning his own elbows on his knees.  Training a dragon was so simple, he'd been living for years wondering why none of the other Houses had ever figured it out for themselves.  Maybe it was laziness.  Maybe it truly was a gift.  Or maybe it was that different people could all see different obvious things that were hidden to everyone else.  He'd tried to explain it a few times before, but many just didn't listen hard enough to hear the answers they wanted from him. 

But Diem understood dragons from the way they moved.  He knew, from their subtle nuances of breath and limb and twitch of tail, what they were thinking.  It was as obvious to him as knowing when his skin was hot or cold, knowing when his belly needed to be filled, knowing that his body ached to have Maeve beneath him once again.