Trayrock, Present TimeThe vehicle slowed, the engine changing tune, and then stopped completely. The late afternoon had taken on the golden glow of just before sunset. Through the windows of the vehicle, the landscape was breathtaking, the elegant smooth-barked white trees with their heavy canopy of green leaves filtering gold sparkles and dappling the road they framed in patches of sunlight and shadow.If she had been home, Lyric would have brought a cup of tea out to Arthur’s bench and sat in the last of the day in peaceful contemplation, just being present in herself, watching the birds and insects, and perhaps a brave rabbit.But that was then, and this was now.“What is it?” She asked Niarthen as she lifted her head from his shoulder. The door slid open, and the driver leaned in and spoke, and Niarthen answered. The guards immediately began to rise from the seats, picking up the prisoner’s by their elbows and guiding them to the door.Isaiah protested the movement, casting a loo
Downstream from Havermouth, Present TimeTheir little party set up camp just down the river from Havermouth, not far, in Lyric’s judgement, from the Edison’s farm. She stood just outside the little dome that she and Niarthen would sleep in that night and searched the trees for distant lights in the direction that she guessed the farm would be.“Mia Persuma Inillium?” Niarthen came up behind her and put his arms around her. She wondered if he’d been visiting Sapphire again. She had not seen him go, distracted by the business of setting up the camp for the night. It happened occasionally that they would be separated, and normally it did not bother her – she knew that he would find her, or she him. But now, his disappearance held more significance.She hated Sapphire with a passion that was entirely unfounded, based on nothing more than instinct and a sketch.“You look deep in thought. Are you troubled over earlier?” Niarthen asked, oblivious to her thoughts.The decimation of Trayrock,
Outside of Trayrock, Present Time“It’s old, but it’s holding in there,” Jules decided as he and Cameron inspected the shed. “If they’d kept up with the pointing, the roof, and maintained the south-west wall better against the wind, it would keep going indefinitely. It’s a shame really that they let it go.”Cameron raised his eyebrows at his father. “As if we Edisons haven’t done the same dozens of times.”Jules tsked with a wry smile. “Farming is a business, unfortunately. No room for sentimentality. If you don’t have a use for it, you have to put the money where it’s going to do the most work for you. Still,” he touched the weathered wooden support beam. “It’s always a shame to see an old girl like this on the way out for lack of care.”“We can stay here,” Cameron called out to the rest of the group. “We’ll get a fire going and see what we can use to make things a bit more comfortable.”“On it,” Jules began to search the shed.The rest of their party didn’t enter so Cameron went out
Trayrock, Present TimeThe sounds of war never changed Samuel thought as he took to the sky. There was always that break between the peaceful before and the roar of noise that announced the arrival of battle. Screams from below chased him as he sought that balance of height and vision. He kept one eye on Ember whose flaming wings and hair made her a target whereas, against the rising smoke that bit at the back of his throat and stung his eyes, he disappeared.Below, he watched as the Emissary and her mates divided between two vehicles, the drivers heading towards the bridge, the path slowed by the panicked flight onto the streets by the civilians of Trayrock.“We should have carried the Emissary,” Ember was unhappy with the situation. She had to yell over the screams below and the sounds of the battle. The approaching army’s heavy artillery had already struck several buildings – targeting points in order to drive the people of the town towards the approaching army, herding them like s
Outside of Trayrock, Present TimeAislen hadn’t realized just how mentally noisy Trayrock had been. Since the Mer had attacked, it had been like the volume had been turned down, again, and again, and again. Every time it got quieter, she would feel a shiver of cold cross over her skin because she knew what that meant. A large group of minds rendered silent. So large a group that even the incoming minds of the Mer did not fill the space left in their passing.She reached out over, and over, in the hope of finding Tiffany, but there were just too many heads still – the Mer thoughts were incomprehensible due to the language divide, and the people of Trayrock’s thoughts were scared, panicked, and mentally screaming. She couldn’t find anyone in the soup of thought… She knew, though. She had known straight away, perhaps even realized it at the very moment that Tiffany had died, feeling that severing of connection. Tiffany was dead.Talen held her as she recovered from the hysteria induced v
Outside of Trayrock, Present TimeHunting rabbits was just plain fun, the way they scattered and bounced and changed direction in a flicker of an eye. Rhett had always enjoyed it as a wolf, the feeling of power seeing the whites of the rabbit’s eyes as they freaked out and fled, and the enjoyment of his own strength, speed, and skill as he chased them down and closed his jaws over them.Chasing down the rabbits in human form with his mates was a moment of much-needed levity. Even Aislen and Cameron were laughing as they made their kills, giddy with the endorphin release.It was a relief to see them both shrug off their moods for a brief respite. Cameron’s anger had burned brightly - but it had burned itself out, Rhett hoped. Aislen’s sadness over her mother was complicated and heavy, and Rhett knew that it wasn’t going to go away quickly. Aislen held onto her feelings far longer and far harder than Cameron did, but after his dad’s concerns over her pregnancy due to her hysteria, he wa
Outside of Trayrock, Present Time“I’m not sure that I like rabbit,” Aislen admitted as she sucked down the second one that she’d caught. “The blood is watery. It’s like the dieter’s version of blood. And,” she paused to pick fur from between her teeth. “The fur gets stuck between your teeth.”“There are worse animals,” Talen said with the certainty of experience as he tidied their kill pile.“Like what?” Heath asked - as much to keep the conversation going as out of curiosity.“Bear,” Talen said without hesitation. “The taste is not so bad, but the smell…” He pulled a face. “If you catch them after hibernation, they’re slow, skinny, and rank, but even on a good day, there is something about the odor and getting your face right into it…”Aislen made a gagging noise.“Precisely,” Talen agreed. He too was trying to keep Aislen engaged, Heath thought as their eyes caught. Although she had pulled herself together admirably, she was far from her usual self. Hopefully though, even the diete
Outside of Trayrock, Present TimeAislen knew it was a dream and not an ordinary one. This was one of THOSE dreams, which meant she needed to pay attention.She was not in the aether, and unlike many of the dreams before it, this dream wasn’t full of chaos, smoke, and bodies, that much was clear. She hoped it was another nice dream of the future, like the time she’d caught a glimpse of how the future might be with her mates. She needed another dream like that, she thought, and maybe that was why this one was so peaceful.She was lying in fragrant grass with the sun warm on her face, so bright against her eyelids that even with them closed she saw halos of light. She could hear people’s voices, the activities of every day, but there was a difference… A missing white noise. It wasn’t the only difference. There was also a difference in the air. It was more fragrant in the way of a garden in spring, with all the flowers in bloom and the earth rich and ripe.She opened her eyes and squinte
“Mine,” Rhett caught Aislen by the shoulders and turned her, pulling her body flush with his so that he could seal his mouth over hers and steal away Heath’s cum from her tongue. “Hmm,” he said as he eased back and used the tip of his little finger to wipe the corner of her mouth. “Delicious.”“This is going to take some finessing,” Talen said as Rhett stepped away so that Talen could take his place. The big, blonde man very gently stroked Aislen’s hair back out of her face before his hand strayed to the Concordian collar around her neck. He straightened it. “It has been a while since we have done this.”“Done what, Daddy?” She asked him and then gasped as Rhett picked her up and deposited her on the bed, straddling Heath’s hips and facing him. Suddenly the way that he was tied made a lot of sense, the space between his legs made room for someone to kneel between them, and the sex pillow beneath his hips would position Aislen at the right height for a man behind and one in front. “Oh
Aislen’s eyes adjusted to the darkness inside the Playroom with supernatural quickness and she smothered her laughter as she saw what Talen had been up to. The bed had been looped with Christmas fairy lights, tinsel, and red bows that held candy canes in place. As they neared, Talen activated the fairly lights so that the room, and its many sordid toys, flashed and flickered in shades of red and green - as did the two men already on the bed.Cameron wore a body harness similar to her own. It was on full display as he knelt on the end of the bed, his arms tied to the bedframe above his head, and a candy cane tied with ribbon as a gag. Talen, as a nod to the season, had used a red ribbon to tie a bow around Cameron’s cock. Tinsel had been draped around his neck like a feather boa.Heath was stretched out on the bed behind him, his arms spread and bound to the headboard, and his knees bent, heels to arse, and restrained there with ribbon that circled his ankles and looped around his wais
As Heath steered the car back out of Havermouth, Aislen watched the town pass by her window. It was both familiar and foreign, with the influence of the Mer seen in the repairs to the old buildings and the ever-increasing amount of greenery spilling over the walls from roof-top gardens.The way people dressed and interacted on the streets had changed too, with more and more people adopting the toga-like styles of the Mer clothing. Aislen caught a glimpse of Anne Mason talking with a group of tall intrigued looking Mers, and she wore multiple strings of the Mer’s bead and shell necklaces and bracelets as she smiled and gestured animatedly at the street around them.“I wonder what Anne is up to,” she remarked to Heath. “She looks like she’s leading a tour of the town. That’s probably what it is,” she answered herself. “She’d be good at that role.”“Do you miss it?” Heath asked her.“The telepathy?” She knew what he meant. “Yes and no. This is sort of cool,” she used her telekinesis to l
Cameron had baby-napped Gera for a day on the farm with her grandparents Harry and Jules, and so Heath and Aislen were travelling light to Havermouth.“Feels weird,” Heath said what Aislen was thinking. “Not hearing her in the back seat, and not having to lug around the baby bag in case she poops or pukes. I think we should have another.”“What?” Aislen’s jaw dropped. That last comment had come out of nowhere.“Another baby,” he smirked enjoying her reaction. “Gera’s six months old now, and I think we’re ready to add to our family.”“I’m not precisely preventing it,” she pointed out. “I’m not on any contraception, and I’m constantly leaking enough second-hand cum that I could probably repopulate the entire planet with a turkey baster.”“I know,” his smirk became a grin. “I’m just saying, if you were pregnant, it would be a good thing, wouldn’t it?”“Hang on now,” she narrowed her eyes at him. There was something to his teasing. “What are you getting at precisely?”“I’m just saying, yo
Aislen woke to Gera crying. She blinked as her eyes adjusted to the dark within Cameron’s room. It was night, but she couldn’t tell how far into it from the moonlight that drifted in through the part in Cameron’s curtains. Cameron was well out, snoring into the pillow, and she eased out from under his arm carefully so as not to wake him.Cameron had been working crazy hours, pretty much seven days a week, since the war trying to bring the two farms back to where they were before the storm, and to incorporate all the changes required for farming to be done by Mer environmental standards, which dictated everything from the way the sheep and cattle were treated for parasites through to run off from fields into the river.She stole the robe that hung of the back of his door as she tiptoed out of the room, easing the door closed behind her. Gera’s outrage had softened to gentle complaint which she traced to the kitchen. Heath, in a pair of striped PJ pants, was heating a bottle of blood, w
Rhett and Gera had attracted a horde of admirers in Rhett’s tattoo parlor and Aislen and Heath stood on the sidewalk watching him show off their daughter to his customers through the window, until someone pointed them out to them, and Rhett looked up, still grinning, his eyes bright with joy, and his cheeks heated as he realized he’d been busted.“Just look at him,” Heath scoffed his tone warm with amusement. “Bet he’s lying about doing the night duty all by himself again.”“He does get up a fair bit,” Aislen smiled up at him.“Yeah, but he complains about it like it’s the end of the world, and he doesn’t tell them that,” Heath nodded with his head towards the group saying goodbye to the baby. “I do most of the nights.”“And Cameron the early mornings,” Aislen reminded him.“He’s usually getting up then anyway,” Heath pointed out. “He’s half-rooster, up at dawn to wake us all up.”Aislen smothered her giggles.“What are you laughing at?” Rhett asked as he joined them. “Good timing, by
It was a very unusual Christmas Tree, but that was hardly surprising as it was a very different Havermouth. The new Havermouth Council was made up equally of all members of the community, and the tree represented the unification of these communities. Therefore, the tree had been carefully transplanted into the park, and was draped with bioluminescent strings of seaweed, crowned with a full moon, and hung with antique hand-carved toys and delicate ornaments made of gold and silver wire and what Aislen believed to be real gems, donated from the safes and other treasure vaults of the several hundred vampires that now called Havermouth home.In the old Havermouth, these gem-crusted ornaments would have disappeared within a day, however in the new Havermouth theft was not a problem. The police force included vampires and werewolves, and it had only taken a couple of demonstrations of their tracking abilities for thieves to learn to mend their ways.Aislen clapped along with the crowd as Ty
Havermouth, Present TimeThe journey to the river house was slow. Thanks to Sigrid’s roadblocks and the damage from the Mer. They also encountered many groups of people just standing on the road, talking in confusion. No one could quite understand what had happened, and no one was entirely confident that it was the end.Gera, true to form, had woken wanting to be fed, and so Aislen held the baby in her arms and watched out through the windows as they passed along the river road towards the bridge. “We’re a long way from done,” she said softly.“Yes,” Talen agreed. “But still, I feel as if we are far closer to peace, and I find myself optimistic and excited about the future before us.”“Me too,” Cameron agreed. “But that’s also how it feels when Aislen does her thing in your brain, so it could be that too.”“We haven’t really talked about that,” Heath added. “About what happened, Aislen?”“It’s hard to explain,” she said looking down at Gera and tracing the curve of the baby’s cheek wit
Havermouth, Present TimeDown the hallway enough for the stink of the torture room and the crunch and slurp of Mercy’s meal to be less nauseating, they formed a huddle, with Sigrid, Greg, Niarthen and Lyric in the centre, discussing what they had seen, and what the Mer would do next.Aislen leaned her cheek against Heath’s shoulder, exhausted. She wanted nothing more than to shower for a really long time, put on something that wasn’t coarse and itchy, and sleep. Heath put his arm around her absently, his attention on the discussion. She wanted to tell him that the world needed to take care of itself for a while, she had done her best for it, and it was time for her to sleep.“I can’t believe that she ate him,” Dan was seriously grossed out, Aislen could tell, although he kept his voice to a whisper.“I know,” Tom replied from the corner of his mouth, his eyes on Sigrid and Greg as they spoke with Niarthen. “Did you see the look on his face? He was just as surprised as we were.”“Will