Lacey enjoyed verbally sparring as much as actual fighting. It must be a common trait among humans, because Roxy was equally verbal when the two women fought together. Chel had actually picked up quite a few human curse phrases watching the women battle through one simulation after another. ‘Trash talking,’ as they called it, actually seemed to be a sort of bonding between the women, one that he could understand. Warriors were often boastful and enjoyed cleverly insulting their opponents.
“Come at me, motherfucker!” Lacey shouted at Gwarnon, her wide cheekbones casting deep shadows beneath the harsh simulated lighting of a Frenghetti swamp. “You told me we aren’t done until one of us ends up in that poison ivy from hell shit. Come on! Stop standing there like a statue and do something.”
Gwarnon remained frozen on the other side of the slowly rotating platform, his balance perfect, his face as expressionless as the statue she called him.
The more Lacey ‘trash talked,’ the more she unknowingly truly hurt Gwarnon’s feelings. Even though Chel had told him a million times that Lacey didn’t hate them, Gwarnon’s life was screwed up by his bitch of a mother and a part of him honestly believed Lacey didn’t want him as a bondmate. Part of the problem was that, unlike Chel, Gwarnon couldn’t really feel Lacey through their growing bond yet. Just bits and pieces—mostly her anger—not the occasional bouts of happiness and attraction that Chel felt through his fragile psychic connection with their future Matriarch.
Chel kept telling his friend to be patient, but he knew Lacey’s constant rejection wore on them both.
“Jesus Christ!” Lacey screamed, cutting through Chel’s thoughts. “Arrgh! I hate it when you go all robot on me. Fucking blink or something, so I know you’re alive!”
Gwarnon’s face didn’t betray a single reaction, his mental shield as high up as Chel had ever seen it—as high as Gwarnon always had it in his mother’s court. A knowing hit Chel in the gut, full force, that if he didn’t do something to stop this now, Gwarnon might seal himself off from Lacey forever.
It was time he had a talk with their Earth bride about some of her misconceptions.
With or without the crystal implant, there were some things she needed to understand.
“Enough!” he shouted, startling Lacey out of her rant. “End simulation. Lacey, come with me. Now.”
She blinked at him, unused to Chel being anything but patient and kind with her. “What?”
Lacey stumbled a bit as the room abruptly turned back into its normal pale olive walls and shiny black floor. Gwarnon reached out automatically to steady her, and she accepted his hand without hesitation. Something inside of Chel eased a little bit at that willing touch, and he hoped that the Lord of Life would give him the words to help him get Lacey to understand they were meant to be together.
Gwarnon asked him via their implants what was going on, but Chel said he’d tell him later and turned off his link.
He’d need his wits about him for the task ahead.
Convincing a woman who thought she hated them that she really didn’t.
That she might someday grow to love them.
Lacey scowled at Gwarnon as she snatched her hand away and stomped over to Chel. “What is it?”
Instead of answering her, he handed her an absorbent towel then a drink before motioning to her. “I would like a word with you, Lady Taylor.”
She frowned at his choice of words, but obediently followed him back to her quarters while rubbing the towel over her shoulder length curls. Once inside, she tossed the towel onto a nearby chair, then rounded on him with her hands on her hips. He tried to ignore the way her hard nipples poked against the fabric of her suit and focused instead on the anger mixed with guilt and the ever present soul deep sorrow buried deep in her heart.
With her head tilted back and her eyes closed, he took a moment to admire her even as he wanted to spank some sense into her.
“I’m sorry, okay! I know fighting with Gwarnon is stupid, I know it. I know it’s screwing with my training, and that I can’t afford the distraction, but I just can’t help it!” She threw her hands up with a growl before dropping them again. “It’s just…it’s just that I can’t stand it when he gets all cold and closed off. I hate it when he does it, and I just want him to snap out of it.”
Understanding gave him another small clue to her soul as he took a seat in one of the chairs, avoiding the couch.
It would be too tempting to pull her into his lap, and that wasn’t what she needed from him.
And her needs would always come first.
“In order for you to understand Gwarnon, you must first understand his mother.” He gestured to the other chair. “You might want to have a seat for this.”
Frowning, she did as he asked, grabbing a deep purple pillow from the couch and holding it to her chest. “This is bad, isn’t it? I can feel…I mean your face is very expressive, I can see this story makes you sad.”
“It makes me incredibly sad, Lacey, and you can say what you really mean. You feel my sorrow, and that is normal and natural for bondmates.” She looked down and muttered something about not being his bondmate, but he ignored it. “Gwarnon’s mother is a sadist and what I believe you humans call a sociopath.”
Chel told Lacey about some of the mental torture Gwarnon had been subjected to at the hands of his mother, how Lady Melissi could bend people’s emotions to her will, that she was the ultimate manipulator. He briefly described all the years he’d hidden the fact that Gwarnon was his bondmate and told her about Lady Melissi convincing Gwarnon that his blood brother Jerit and Matriarch were dead. If Gwarnon believed he had no future, no Matriarch, Lady Melissi had hoped to finally crush Gwarnon’s will and make him her puppet—something she had been unable to do, even at her worst.
He told her about Gwarnon’s break from his mother’s hold, how their mate had joined the Kadothian Military, despite being one of the few Kadothian males who wasn’t expected to serve. As Lady Melissi’s only child, he could have lived a much easier life, one of leisure where he would have been treated like a prized possession and would never have to face true battle. Instead, he’d worked his way up through the ranks, going on endless combat missions, until he was recruited for a secret branch of the Kadothian military. Then, Chel told a noticeably quiet Lacey about all the good Gwarnon had done, all the personal risks he’d taken to protect people from his mother’s insanity. How they’d secured a small, isolated Territory and made it a secret safe haven for the innocents running from Lady Melissi’s wrath.
“Jesus Christmas.” Lacey looked faintly ill as she said, “Lady Melissi sounds like a monster.”
“Absolutely. To protect his mind and soul from that monster while growing up, Gwarnon learned the less reaction he gave his mother, the less she would torment him. He learned to wall himself off from everything, to feel nothing in order to survive Lady Melissi’s court. Nothing can penetrate the wall he built around himself if he doesn’t allow it. And there are very, very few that get to see the true Gwarnon. With most people, he is as cold and unfeeling as the robot you call him. There are very, very few that have seen him smile—like you have. That have heard him laugh—like you have. Those are the most precious gifts Gwarnon could give you, and those are your gifts to properly cherish…or lose.” He gave her a moment to think about what he’d said before he lowered his voice to a softer tone. “I know you don’t mean to truly hurt Gwarnon when you trash talk him, but you wound him nonetheless. It brings back memories of his mother’s court that he would rather not ever remember.”