Awake (4 page)

He leaned forward and pressed a kiss to her shoulder. “But I want to.”

As his lips trailed over her skin, she bit her lower lip to keep from making any distracting sounds.

Did you put him up to this?
Her inner tone was accusing as he trailed over her collarbone and down her breasts.

I did not. I got the information that I was seeking. This is his impulse, not mine.
The Orb was amused and distracted.

Kali joined in on the distraction as the sharp edge of teeth grazed her nipple a moment before a sharp tug pulled the nerve connection between her breast and her clit. She shoved awareness of the Orb aside and just let herself feel.

When he rolled her to her back and air caressed her body, she opened her eyes wide. Odin flipped the covers away and was kneeling next to her, staring at her curves as his fingers slowly learned each of her textures.

He leaned over her, and she reached up, cupping his jaw and stroking her thumb down the cords of his neck. Odin slipped his fingers between her thighs and parted the lips of her sex. She clenched her jaw on the moan that came out of her when his fingers slid in.

Her hips twisted, and she pushed against him, the rhythm took hold, and she ceased to see his focussed face above her.

He brought his thumb up and caressed her clit in short circles. Jolts of power ran through her, and she couldn’t stifle her cries any more.

Odin brought his mouth down on hers, and he took her cries into him with a low growl.

She was curled against him, and he was calmly licking his fingers when Kali spun her mind back into its proper place.

At a loss for words, she blinked to settle herself as he drew the covers over them and held her tightly against him.

“Good night, Kaliana.”

She whispered, “Good night, Odin.”

He breathed slowly, and her body caught onto the beat. Before she knew it, the world was lost to warm, comfortable darkness.

Chapter Six

Kali woke alone. There was a vague feeling of the Orb doing something at the back of her mind involving the streams of consciousness that were still coursing along through Kali’s mind, but the active thoughts were gone.

Odin was also gone, but when Kali swung her legs off the bed, she found him. A thick layer of mist covered the floor. She walked carefully to the lav, and a tumble of fog came with her, making closing the door impossible or at least rude.

Despite her consumption of the day before, she was shocked that her body did not have any of its standard needs. She stepped under the shower and gave her body a quick scrub to reset the sensitive points from the night before.

She was groping for a towel when a naked and amused Odin handed it to her.

“Good morning, Kaliana.”

She spluttered and dabbed at her face while trying to cover her body. “Uh. Good morning, Odin. Did you sleep?”

His face had altered slightly. His features had taken on more of a solid cast. His jaw was wider but his lips still had a sensual curve to them.

“I don’t need to sleep, but I do need to take on my natural form from time to time.” He took the towel from her and dried her back before kneeling to work on her legs.

Her limbs trembled at his proximity. He gave a chuckle and kept drying.

“What do you find so amusing, Odin?”

“You. You have no idea what you do to me.”

“I am not doing anything.”

He stood and wrapped her in the towel before he did the same to her hair. “I didn’t understand why the Orb put us together, but after last night, it suddenly made sense.” Odin shepherded her out to the dining area and pulled the chair out for her.

She sat and drummed her fingers on the table. “What do you mean
it made sense
?”

He moved to the selector and picked some foods for her. “My species is gaseous by nature.”

“Right.”

“Your pheromones call me like no other being I have ever met. Even my own species never appealed to me the way you do.” He poured a cup of tea and walked over to her with it.

She blinked and blushed at his frank stare. “I don’t quite understand.”

“There is a narrow chemical cloud that surrounds you, and it calls to me.” He sat across from her and took her hand. Without another word, he raised the inside of her wrist to his lips. “Your body began its reaction the moment that you broke out of your tank, and I was hooked. When the Orb asked me to be your companion and guard, I jumped at the chance.”

She shivered and held the towel tightly to her breasts with her free hand. “Um, that is a little unexpected. I have never had a man attracted to the way I smell before.”

“You are out of normal time and space, expect only that things will not go as you expect.” He pressed a kiss to her pulse and returned her hand to her.

She smiled and sipped at her tea.

He retrieved their meal and set hers in front of her. It was a scaled-down version of the meal he had seen her pile on her plate the day before.

Kali kept looking up at him as she worked her way through breakfast, and she tried to find the Orb to ask what the hell was going on. Chasing something so nebulous within her mind was not easy, but as she finished her last bit of toast and jam, the Orb answered her internal pleas.

Yes, Kali?

Why is he doing this?

Doing what?

Pretending to want me.

The dry laughter within her was gently mocking.
He wants you. My interaction with him was a test. It is you that he wants, not your body. When I am in control, he has little to no interest in intimacy, and he is happy that the line has been drawn.

Kali still couldn’t believe it. For a man who looked like Odin to be panting after her was a bit of a shock.

He can look like whatever you wish, Kali. He drew your preferences from your mind and body while you slept.

What?

He asked me, so I allowed him full access to your sensual urges and preferences. He was very pleased that you liked the way he looked to begin with but made the few changes your subconscious requested.

Oh god.

Don’t worry, he does not mind. He was pleased that he was so close to your ideal right out of the gate.

The euphemisms that the Orb was now using indicated that it had indeed been paying attention to her thought patterns. Kali let her endless questions rest quietly as she sipped at her third cup of tea.

“What would you like to learn today?”

Kali was shocked by his sudden words when quiet had been ranging between them. “Um. I don’t know. Perhaps you could tell me more about the other Terrans who have recently become Nameless. Why are they here and restricted to the tower?”

Odin ran a hand through his hair, and she watched the silken strands swing hypnotically.

“As far as the rest of the Nameless are concerned, they are being held here as a type of punishment, but that always seemed peculiar to me. I am personally guessing that they are here to keep others from watching their comings and goings and replicating them.”

Kali smiled, “You are a good guesser. They are part of an action plan that has been eons in the making.”

“Why Terrans?”

Kali shrugged. “My guess is that it has something to do with the way our minds are structured, combined with our social behaviours. We tend to pair off, and it isn’t too difficult to imagine that a bonded pair gets less notice on many of the worlds that are visited.”

Odin grinned, “You haven’t seen the men that they are bonded to. Come with me.”

She looked down. “Can I get dressed? As much as I enjoy this towel, I would rather have something more substantial on.”

He waved her to the requisition station. “Choose what you like. It all comes off eventually.”

She gave him a withering glance, but he was remarkably un-withered. How he could calmly wander around not wearing anything was beyond her, but she supposed that with his natural form being something in the gaseous range, he really wasn’t that concerned with his bits. Kali, however, was exceptionally concerned about his bits. She had been in the back seat when the Orb had sex with him, so the urge to find out what that smooth column felt like, the heat, the steely silk and the endless motion was beckoning her with the taunting knowledge that it was going to be inside her soon but she didn’t have the nerve to start it.

Sighing heavily, she selected a skirt and bodice that belonged on one of a hundred worlds. If she was going to start learning about the neighbours above her, she was going to be comfy when she did.

When the clothing arrived, she simply dropped the towel and stepped into the skirt before using the closure on the bodice to wrap her from breast to hip. Once tucked in, she closed the skirt and turned to see Odin watching her, fully clothed, with a bemused smile on his face.

“What is that smile for?”

“Clothed or unclothed, you are still lovely.”

She blushed and ran her hands through the hair that curled in wild ringlets all over her head. Stretched out, they would near her butt, but curled up as they were now, they coiled just below her shoulders. The humidity of her transformation had straightened it, but that was all over now. “Thank you. You look very charming yourself. Now, show me the mirror so that I can check up on my people.”

He offered her his arm.

To her surprise, she took it and let him lead her into the wide living area that seemed to have grown since the previous night. It was now large enough to hold over a dozen people with seating for all.

“Did this place get bigger?”

Odin smiled, “You are host to the Orb, you tell me.”

“The Orb is busy knitting a plot of some kind. I won’t bother it.” She tapped her temple and looked toward the mirror. “Is that it?”

“That is it.”

She pulled up a chair and sent her thoughts toward the image. A human woman came into focus and Kali grinned. There were perks to being the host of the Orb. “Get the popcorn, Odin. I am going to be here for a while.”

Kali didn’t know if he heard her, but she didn’t care. She had some of her own kind nearby, and she wanted to get to know them as quickly as she could.

Chapter Seven

Halfway through the exploits of the first Terran, Kali asked for a data pad, and she was handed a pencil and paper. With intense focus, she wrote names, times and information that she needed to make sense of.

Aura was the avenger. She was sent in to kill those who committed crimes and disappeared afterward. She was the means by which they ceased to be. Her mate was Randr, a male of a species that the Orb recognized as a randomly occurring race.

Aura had a lot of blood on her hands but not one of those that she dealt death to was an innocent.

When Kali had a pretty good grip on Aura, she shifted to the next Terran that the Orb brought to her mind.

Odin brought her a cup of tea, and she sat for a moment, absorbing the pattern that she had noticed in Aura’s actions. There was a similarity in the killers that she hunted, a darkness that was terribly familiar.

“Do you know what is going on here, Odin?”

“No, Kali. This is between you and the Orb. I confess to curiosity, but I am sure you will fill me in when it is time.”

Kali flushed at the mental image that she was treated to while the words
fill me in
ran around her mind.

She filled her cup again and triggered the information on Sky and her partner, Tavik, the descendant of Ravikka. They were definitely in position to stop things from happening. They saved dying plant species, animal species, and the last of genetic lines. Theirs was a life between life and death, and they did the best they could.

Sky had the peculiar sigil of a set of scissors rather than the regular dagger carried by most other Nameless.

“Hey, Odin, why didn’t I get a knife?” Kali looked at him over her shoulder.

“You are not to leave Home. You are the centre, the pivot point of the Nameless. You cannot leave this bubble universe.”

She sighed and looked around. “I suppose I have just traded in for a bigger tank then.”

He chuckled. “It is a well-appointed tank, and you are not alone. So, it is very different.”

Kali nodded. “Fair enough. Now, onto the next one.”

Idara was her own woman. She had spent her life being quiet and mousy only to die in a very unpleasant manner. She was paired with the dark Admaryn, Harken. He cared for her, watched over her and caught her when she fell.

Harken was always one step behind Idara’s techniques for stopping the minor bits of disaster that folk ran into every day. Together, they worked to save one life at a time from folks who never needed to die in the first place.

When she watched them, Kali saw the dark energy coiling in the vicinity of the disasters, but she still didn’t know what it meant.

The last Terran, aside from Kali herself, was Orphia. Her partner was a bit of a surprise. Kali had never seen a Hirn before. Xeric was one of that ancient race, and he had been delighted to take Orphia on as partner. Her own background held genes of his race, and it made them an excellent match.

They were ideal matches in every way for couples who were put on assignments that were extended over time. They had to wait for almost every mission that the Orb sent them on, but they had each other.

Sighing happily, Kali pulled her gaze from the mirror and smiled vaguely at Odin.

He cleared his throat and inclined his head. “Kaliana, Host of the Orb, you have visitors.”

She sat up and watched the four couples that she had just been researching file into the room. “Oh, hello.”

The women grinned at her.

Orphia asked, “Terran?”

Kali got to her feet. “Yup. Please have a seat. The Orb wishes to speak to you.”

They looked at each other in surprise, but all took a seat on the furniture.

The Orb of Time pushed forward, Kali saw the change in her skin tone from creamy to stellar.

“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to my home. With the addition of my new host, Kaliana, we finally have enough personnel to form a cohesive unit.”