Born

17

Allora could have easily fallen asleep with Cormack acting as her blanket. All too soon, he moved off of her, shifting his weight to help her up. “You should get dressed, be prepared for when they come to get us.”

Propping herself up on her elbows she winked at him. “Had enough of me, already?”

“Never.” Gaze locked on hers, he spoke the word with smoldering intensity.

Her smile faded. “I don’t know what the Cyborgs want with me, what they’ll do to me. If you can find some way to escape—”

“I’ll go nowhere without you.” Retrieving her shift from the floor, he tugged it over her head. “This is not the end, my task mistress.”

His absolute certainty filled the dark shadowy places inside her. “The best thing we can do for ourselves is be prepared for whatever comes for us.”

Cormack’s face closed up, “I’ll kill any Cyborg that dares touch you.”

Worrying her lower lip, Allora thought about her interactions with the machine-men. “I don’t think they want to hurt me. They had plenty of opportunity to do so already. And they weren’t after the journal until I mentioned it.”

Her lover scowled. “They wanted you specifically, had a record of your thumbprint to scan. How is that possible?”

“I was born in Cyborg territory. My biological father is one of them.”

Cormack tensed and she feared he would look on her with disgust. After all, she had witnessed his hatred for the Cyborgs. But he reached out and took her hand, stroking his thumb over her knuckles in a soothing gesture. He was so different than the Born, who would crucify a child for the sins of the parents.

“How is that possible? From everything I’ve ever heard, the Cyborgs cannot reproduce, they assimilate others, raid communities and steal children to propagate.”

Shrugging helplessly, Allora murmured, “I wish I had answers for you. Was my mother captured and brainwashed? I always thought a Cyborg had raped her, that she’d been taken prisoner, but after meeting them…”

“What?” He prompted.

“I do not think they are prone to violence the way we have always been told. They seem too calculating, too detached for such acts.”

“And how many have you met? I’ve heard stories that would cause ice crystals to take shape in your blood. First generation Breds fought them during the wars, were captured and tortured for information.

Emotionally stunted does not mean stable or safe.” He caressed her cheek. “Borns are funny about parents, about connection, but please Allora, be wary, just like when you were on patrol.”

“But these questions have dogged me my entire life.”

“All we can do is wait and see.” He bent his head, dropping a kiss on to her lips. Cormack helped her finish donning her armor then wrapped himself in the blanket stained with her virgin’s blood. Holding the journal she snuggled into his embrace, smiling. “The first thing we need is to go find you some pants.”

Burying his face in her still unbound hair he murmured, “Yes, my task mistress.”

Would she ever stop shivering when he called her that? Ignoring the tingling in her breasts and between her thighs, Allora opened the journal and began to read aloud.

Most of the entries described their world, as well as the alien one young Cassandra had lived in. With every page, she grew more and more convinced that the book her Bred had unearthed was the first chronicle in the Cassandra Prophesies. The girl never saw what the machines had done to make the earth stop spinning, but she did warn of the machine sympathizers, people who related to the cold mechanical intelligence better than their own kind.

In great cities below the mantel of the planet, the Cyborgs live and thrive. Using technology and letting it use them, they are an offshoot from the natural progression of the human species, the one Borns fear because they cannot stop evolution, the ones they will give anything to stop.

“This can’t be right.” Allora murmured, just as the hatch to the vehicle cracked open. Rothguard glanced in at them, cocking his head to the side.

“We need to leave now.”

Allora rose to her feet and didn’t bother asking why. If the Cyborg wanted her to know, he’d tell her.

“Cormack needs something to wear.”

“Yes.” He tossed in a baggy flight suit. Allora frowned at the thin fabric. “It’s not thermally lined.”

“No need.” The Cyborg smirked at her. “Was he worth sleeping in the shuttle for?”

For the second time in her life, Allora felt her cheeks heat with total burning humiliation. Cormack stared at her and she held out her hands, explaining.

“I didn’t want them to move you while you were still unconscious.”

“I appreciate your consideration, Task Mistress.”

His eyes promised he would thank her privately later.

Stepping in front of Cormack so he could dress she faced the Cyborg. “We require sustenance as well.”

“Noted.”

The eerie stillness of the Cyborg might have unnerved some people. There was no shifting in either body or gaze, just a patience defying natural order. He waited for Cormack to move alongside her, wrapping a hand around her waist in a reassuring and possessive maneuver. It would have been more subtle for him to shout, she is mine, as he glared at the Cyborg. Allora didn’t mind at all, even looking over at him adoringly to underscore the point. She’d already announced that they were mated, so why hide affection she felt?

Rothguard appeared unfazed by the display.

Allora didn’t doubt that the machine man experienced sentiment, he just chose when and where to show it.

They probably didn’t even rate as a blip on his emotional radar. He inclined his head and led them out of the open vehicle.

Allora stopped dead in her tracks so quickly that Cormack slammed into her back. The tunneling vehicle had stopped on a hilltop overlooking what appeared to be a series of lakes. Boats floated on the water, a thoroughfare between several settlements teaming with life. What looked like great palaces had been carved out of the rock, the architecture making a mockery of the paltry chambers the Born lived in.

God, the heat down here. Perspiration formed immediately on her brow, under her hair and ran down between her breasts. They must be near the center of the planet, for this sultry moist air to be sustained like a tropical jungle from the old stories.

And water, so much water, more than enough to hydrate the world anew. She yearned to strip off her armor and dive in, the sapphire blue the same hue as Cormack’s irises.

Careful, Task Mistress. You can’t afford to turn into a sap.

Beside her Cormack stiffened. “Is that fresh water?”

Allora laughed at the absurdity of the notion, but her amusement cut off when Rothguard said,

“Indeed.”

“How is that possible?” Glancing down from the steep elevation of landing zone she could not take in all the blue. “The great lakes were engulfed by the northern polar ocean. There are no other source of freshwater on the planet this large.”

Rothguard surveyed her neutrally. “Is there a question coming?”

Wiseass Cyborg. Squaring off her shoulders she lifted her chin and ordered, “Lead on.”

Her eyes had to redefine color to take it all in, the vividness foreign yet so much more natural than the grays and reds and blacks she had known. Everything felt cleaner, brighter, bioluminescent plants in every color of the rainbow, including some she had no name for. No artificial light source sustained them, yet they flourished between cracks in the rocks, in the sandy soil, everywhere. She looked to Cormack, wanting nothing more than to explore this spectacular new world, buried deep within their old one, with him.

“Where’s the commander?” She asked, referring to Rothguard's cohort.

Rothguard didn’t slow his steady pace, leading them toward some sort of building that stood separate from all the others. “Home, with his family unit.”

This time Cormack anticipated her abrupt halt and stopped with her. Allora couldn’t believe what she had just heard. “You live within a family structure?”

“To some extent. Please, hurry she is waiting.”

“I thought we were going to see my father?”

As they neared the structure, Allora made out words written in the old language. Translating for Cormack she read, “For those who chose to step out of the shadows of ignorance and into the light.”

He raised an eyebrow at her. “Some sort of house of worship. I thought Cyborgs were atheists.”

Another familiar set of characters caught her eye.

“Not just any temple, one erected to Cassandra.”