Dominance Fury Read online

He pivoted and then stomped away putting distance between himself and Arjim, halting when he reached one of the columns inside of the circular chamber. He pressed both palms against it, his gaze following the line of it upward to where it joined the ceiling high above. He concentrated on the massiveness of the stone composition attempting to harden his sorrow. Despite his efforts to ignore Arjim's presence, he could feel the rhythm of the sentry's breathing, hear every thump of his heart, read nearly every thought. "It's maddening to be bonded like this to you with no woman, no child to give purpose to our linking."

  Arjim spoke the truth. Despite their grievous loss, the linking remained intact, each having privilege to the other's thoughts, emotions, pains, pleasures--though there were very few pleasures to conceive of. Still, the mere thought of detachment caused angst in both of them. It made no sense that they continued to be linked.

  "The more time that passed, the more difficult it became to even speak of her aloud." Lowering his head, Calem allowed the pain to seep through him before shutting it away, rejecting its existence like he--they had always done before.

  "You've had little trouble transmitting your fury into my brain." The tone of Arjim's voice changed matching the coolness of the pillar that Calem was stroking, his provoking intention clear.

  As always, it worked. Calem tensed. For a brief moment he stood motionless--frozen, continuing to face away from Arjim. He then turned and leaned back against the column. He folded his arms and crossed one ankle over the other. His demeanor appeared collected, but Arjim knew better. The warrior's cockiness was on level with his own.

  "Considering the density of your skull…" A smirk formed on Calem's lips matching the amusement that was gleaming across his face. "It's quite the feat."

  Arjim allowed the comment pause before speaking, He mirrored Calem's stance, but the affect in his voice remained flat. "I have very little difficulty relaying to you, though my thoughts nearly die of loneliness roaming aimlessly through your brain. Tell me…" He cocked his head to one side and then continued to speak to him mentally. How do you tolerate the emptiness?

  Akau! No one to greet you? Calem lifted an arrogant brow. The switch from verbal conversation to mental wordplay was decisively instigating and behaviorally typical of both of them. It never failed to rile. "Pardon my rudeness…"

  …but your arrival in my head is always insignificant…

  I'm surprised you caught my meaning. Arjim pressed his own thoughts into Calem's head with the same intrusive intent. Considering there's nothing but an echo between your ears to even capture my words, not alone comprehend them.

  "Ka! Such sharp wit. You need to take caution with such pointed things, Arjim less you fatally cut yourself." Calem paused, allowing a moment of feigned pensive thought. "That reminds me. I'll need to hone my blade for the next time we're sparring."

  "Mine will be blunted to match your cock," Arjim returned. "Unable to penetrate anything."

  "Better blunt than none to speak of."

  Both their gazes dropped to the other's groins. Each glared at the perpetual erections that ever since reaching adolescence had tortured them incessantly. Coupled with the mental and emotional meshing, they felt more chained than linked--trapped. As it was many, many times before, frustration and sexual angst clutched at them.

  "Must you do that?" Calem snarled.

  "Do what?" Arjim spoke between clenched teeth. There was no need for explanation. He already knew what the comment was about.

  "Push your spirits bedamned, lusty compulsions into my brain every time you get a rise!" Calem reached for his talon arc, immediately realizing that because they were ordered to relinquish their weapons before entering the temple, it wasn't there.

  Arjim in like reached for his own missing blade. "If I had a choice, I'd slap the mental gates shut, you illogical idiot. You're a hindrance to my efforts with the females!"

  "Be sure to stick your head in that slapping gate and spare me your annoying and dim-witted thinking," Calem snarled, his voice conveying annoyance. "And by the way, when was the last time you were able to think logically about any of this?"

  "I promised myself I would think about it logically if ever you got laid without my assistance."

  Taking a threatening step closer to Arjim, Calem glared at him accusingly. "Getting laid without your presence would've been much less demanding had you not been sniffing up my asshole every time I showed interest in a woman."

  "My assistance was necessary," Arjim sneered undauntedly. "You're as exciting as a corpse in a swing."

  Calem snorted. "That was you I saw in the play park? I wondered where that rotting smell was coming from."

  "Ka!" Arjim sneered at him. "You are mistaken. It was drifting from your mother's open legs."

  The smacking sound of flesh being struck was hard enough to make a zombie cringe. Even across the galaxies the yo momma insult was a tasteless dig and one Calem did not take lightly.

  Arjim took the punch to his jaw like the sturdy warrior he was. His retaliation was equally as sturdy, the bloody nose Calem was swiping at testimony to the strength of the impact. It mattered little that one felt the pain of the other. They welcomed it, for pain deadened the heartache of a love now lost and a passion for her that neither of them seemed able to smother.

  Your blame is misplaced. Arjim gritted his teeth as the pair closed the gap between them one gripping the other's neck--squeezing.

  Calem gagged through his partially constricted airway, his grip tightening on Arjim's throat ignoring the reciprocating affect of his own infliction. She's dead because of you…your insistence at pushing into her brain.

  Perhaps, Arjim croaked. But it was you who insisted on speaking to her. His knee came up and he delivered a full blow to Calem's groin with the full thrust of his knee. Both yelped.

  "Fucking starblasters!" Arjim fell back, his doubled over posture matching Calem's, his balls throbbing as if he himself had been crushed there. Technically by his own actions he had been.

  A ferocious growl rumbled from Calem's throat, and he charged at Arjim, vicious intent burning in his eyes. They collided, wrestled, fell apart, Arjim swinging a fist at Calem's jaw but finding air as he missed the ducking warrior. It was then Calem's turn. He drew back his arm to strike, now uncaring of their sacred surroundings. His fury was blind.

  "Cease!" Someone echoed from the dark recesses of the temple.

  They halted, recognizing the voice that gave the command, though their feral eyes remained fixated on each other, their chests heaving with their angry intakes of air.

  "Would you shame your families by shedding blood within these sacred walls?" The Pontiff Jer appeared, his omnipotent presence stifling to the anger passing between Arjim and Calem. Immediately they both sobered, but their expressions were more blank than humbled.

  "This … this thing between the two of you …." Jer waved a casual hand as if brushing something diminutive. Turning, he laced his fingers behind his back and paced a few steps. "Why do you fight what most see as a divine blessing?"

  "It is no blessing to be bound as such with no purpose Pontiff," Arjim answered.

  "No purpose?" The Pontiff spun around. The silver color that rimmed his irises flickering wildly as he glared at them. "Perhaps you miss what the divinities deem fitting."

  "No disrespect," Calem spoke this time. "But there is nothing, no one for us."

  A slight but astute grin appeared on Jer's lips as he stepped closer to them both. He pressed a palm to Calem's shoulder. "Do not seal the tomb before the heart ceases to beat."

  "But the silence…," Calem began saying. He hushed when the Pontiff's grip on him tightened.

  "The truth often speaks in whispers." Jer's gaze slid from Calem to Arjim and then back to Calem again. "All you need to do is listen."

  With that, the Pontiff backed away. He reached for the hood on his robe and covered his head with it, his face becoming a barely recognizable shadow beneath the large folds. He turned, and soundless
ly departed, leaving both warriors staring after him. Arjim and Calem stood quietly for several moments. It was the most undisturbed their minds had been for as long as either could remember. The calm was a welcomed relief.

  "When was the last time we linked by transdelta?" Arjim stared ahead, avoiding eye contact with Calem. His chest began to heave, the familiar arousal stirring in his groin. "The last time we were able to truly connect to her, to attempt Edification?"

  "Eight phases past, when we were both twenty phases." Calem's face contorted at the heartbreak stabbing his chest.

  "This dawning," Arjim clenched his teeth, tamping the fear of searching once more and finding nothing. "We link once again."

  A shudder rippled up Calem's spine in reaction. Clenching his teeth, he tamped the fear of another failure threatening to surface. Neither moved, silence ticking through their hesitation. Their gazes finally shifted toward each other and locked, pushing at the dread as they grappled with hope.

  "Sit," Calem lowered to the floor, his eyes remaining solidly fixed on Arjim. Crossing his legs he tailor sat and waited, knowing what they needed to do but fearing the truth would remain as they had always believed it .…

  That our Tina is dead.

  Arjim shared the thought. His heart pounded. Yet he, too, grappled with trepidation and the need to know what the Pontiff hinted at. He sat in the same position, opposite Calem and facing him, knees touching. Their irises narrowed in pinpoint connection, irises sparking. Briefly each felt the twinges of anger but it dissolved quickly.

  Arjim lifted his right hand, his thumb and fingers forming half of a triangle--half of a delta, calling Calem to the transdelta linking.

  His hand quivered.

  Calem raised his left hand, his thumb and fingers mirroring Arjim's. The beat of their hearts synchronized. Arjim gulped back the fear, swallowing Calem's along with it. As he inhaled, Calem exhaled his somatic presence, seeking the spiritual rhythm that would bind them as one.

  "Our last experience with her in linked, sexual arousal .…" Angst at another failure curled through Arjim's insides halting his words.

  Calem opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out. Instead he closed his eyes, remembering the piercing sound of silence that had followed that last encounter and the emptiness it stirred within. They'd linked with their Tina, attempted to touch her body, and her heart, to bring her into harmony with their souls and their minds. She was there, but her presence was so brief that they believed they'd imagined it.

  Taking a deep breath he redirected his mental awareness toward Arjim. He opened his eyes and they locked gazes. Their hands connected forming a full triangular pattern. Their minds were immediately melded as the transdelta linking shared by males called to the Trigon was initiated. A discomfort jolted through each of them. Unfamiliar by avoidance, invasive yet compelling, the gap of singularity faded. The power of mind and spirit surged. Two souls began to intertwine as their life forces linked, bringing both to a blended state of mind.

  At first they sensed nothing, apprehension pushing the urge to uncouple, but they held it together, driven by yearning and need. Twinges of resentment and anger rose and then waned, solidarity becoming their guide to their search. But the search found silence.

  She's dead.

  Arjim felt Calem's effort to withdraw their link but forced the twining, tightening the mental seam. Wait … listen.

  Calem relented and they waited, snatching patience, allowing the continuum of space and time to carry their essence to the far reaches of the universe. Still there was silence and more silence, but instead of becoming discouraged, their meditation intensified, determination an innate drive of the joining.

  They heard a faint voice.

  Tina. Calem beckoned first.

  Her terror shot through them, but it wasn't aimed toward them. Something was terribly wrong. No matter how diligently they tried, Calem and Arjim were unable capture her mind. It was as if a barrier was hindering their connection to her. All they could grasp at were hints of a female voice, and fleeting emotions, but no image, no sense of familiarity, no assurance that she was really there. If they hadn't been seeking it with all the fervor they could gather, they might not have heard her at all.

  She groaned again, louder this time. The spiritual summoning consumed them, the pull of it compelling, inescapable. Her form manifested, a beautiful image of an exquisite woman they had known only as innocent youths and eager young men. She was captivating though they detected no details. It was merely the perception of her that drove Calem's and Arjim's desire. They wanted to, needed to, craved to touch her, the distance between them and their Tina making them wild to close the gap, to claim and make her their own. They had to find her.

  Simultaneously Arjim and Calem dropped their hands, both visibly shaken by the discovery. The feeling was so overwhelming it was almost painful, nearly unbearable. Retreating, they each shifted into an esoteric trance, withdrawing from their web of thoughts and suppressing the link between them. They sat quietly for several mins.

  "Brethren …," Arjim finally whispered. His heart was pounding so fiercely it felt as if his ribcage would splinter. Phases and phases had passed since hope had spoken. "There is still a woman between us."

  Calem heaved several breaths, his body going rampant as his salacious needs took flight. She was alive. He nodded to Arjim and then flashed a cocky grin. "It seems we've always had something to Flaunt for my cousin."

  A slight smile appeared on Arjim's lips but the joy was abruptly interrupted. An alarm pierced the air around them. It was a call to arms. Both warriors were instantly on their feet and scrambling to the temple doors. Outside, nearby sentry stood frozen, trepidation filling them. Civilian Tertani scattered, some snatching up small children and tucking them under their arms as they rushed to find shelter. Calem and Arjim had also gone still, their full attention now on their superiors who were rushing up the path. Arjim felt the color drain from his face, could feel Calem's heartbeat accelerate with the adrenaline that surged through his bloodstream matching his own.

  They knew what was happening, for there were few reasons to sound that alarm. Tertia was either under attack, or the planet's security had been breached, and they were now under quarantine. Either way, it spelled imminent danger and possible death to all.

  ?

  Chapter Five

  Jardia shifted atop the large boulder she was perched on, her hearing alert, her vision keen. She listened while her gaze darted across the clearing in front of her. Sighting a crobas was a difficult task since their fur so evenly matched the plum-colored foliage and plum-colored mossy ground. They had a keen sense of smell as well and seemed to know when a predator was about, avoiding by instinct what they perceived as a dangerous situation. The crobas were easy to track once spotted however, since their stumpy legs failed to allow them to scurry very fast. But they were extremely dangerous if cornered, becoming ferociously aggressive. And though the crobas were slow runners they could strike as quickly as a lightning bolt. Not something anyone wanted to be the target of as they had extremely long and acuminating teeth.

  A single bite could take one's hand off.

  Snaring one was worth the toil it took however, for the meat was tender and sweet, a favored delicacy amongst the Tertani clans. For two dawnings now, Jardia had been hiding in the brush near the known mating grounds of the crobas. And though she was weary with the wait, she remained determined to snag one of the creatures to take home for supper.

  Jardia sighed. So far she had yet to spy one. It seemed at least a few would've ventured from the brush hungry for the prikkies that dwelled within the field's spiky grasses. After all, how much mating could any creature endure before the gullet begged for fulfilling as well? Perhaps the keen animals sensed her presence causing them to instinctively remain hidden. Still, Jardia would persist, believing one or maybe a few would appear sooner or later.

  "Hal al beohj," she called to the Mahatma divinities as hunger roar
ed through her stomach.

  Now on a six dawning of fasting and sleep deprivation to enhance her spiritual strength and discipline, her thoughts were becoming muddled from lack of sustenance and rest. Taw was all she'd consumed for hydration. After completing her last day of her fasting it was time to eat, and crobas it would be! Jardia's ability to capture the elusive creature lent credence to the strength of both mind and body, a requisite that had earned her the respected status of a great hunter.

  Squinting, Jardia narrowed her gaze on the subtle shifting of the wispy tewha plants that blanketed the great plain in front of her. Something was shuffling in a meandering line through the brush. Abruptly, her vision blurred, and her head nodded. She was falling asleep!

  "Ka!" Jardia shook her head, attempting to rouse herself. Focusing was excruciatingly difficult. Slumber seemed so much more preferable at the moment to anything else. "Perhaps if I close my eyes only for a…"

  Tilting her face upward, her lids closed, and she inhaled the heated air while bathing in the warmth of the Tertian sun. A slight breeze brought the scents of nearby jumider flowers to her nostrils, soothing and sedating. A dreamy sensation came over Jardia and her body felt light, as if it were floating. "Ka!" She needed divine assistance. Raising an arm skyward, Jardia shook her wooden talon arc. "Oh Mahatma spirits I beseech you!"

  Silence followed. She would need to be patient. She would need to be … . Her eyes fluttered and Jardia fought against it. Yawning, Jardia felt the drifting sensation of sleep taking over. Strength, will of the spirit ….

  A remote sound suddenly cut through the air around her, disturbing Jardia's near lethargic condition. Something was growling. A crobas! She scanned the grasslands in front of her, thinking the sound came from the brush. The boulder she stood on quivered. The sound surrounded her, consuming everything, rapidly growing louder and louder, roaring inside of her ears, forcing Jardia to drop her talon arc to cover them. Frantically her gaze darted everywhere as she tried to locate the source while considering where she could run to, where she could hide should what was coming attempt to attack her.