Born

Allora swallowed. “What if I have no wish to wed?”

A muscle ticked in his jaw. “By colony law, that is your right. But, you will be disowned from my family.

I doubt any would take in a rootless wench with no kin.” His gaze roved over her in an assessing manner, his sneer telling he found her lacking in every possible way. “Wear something appropriate to your station because you are about to be promoted from Task Mistress to fiancé.”

4

Cormack couldn’t help but follow the task mistress. From the shadows of perpetual midnight he watched her stride to the tunnels. As a field laborer, he had no right to be there, but snaring a cloak from one of the many stowed on the table by the entrance hid the designation tattoos on his arms and neck.

The fire snapped and danced in the grates, though this region of the earth remained warm from the sunny season. Soon enough the constant darkness would lead to permafrost and the fires would be kept blazing, the smoke rising from the ground in huge billowing tendrils warming the Born while the Bred were forced to huddle together in clusters. The weak and the sick would die off and be recycled, while the Born grew plusher with every turn of the planet.

The sounds of drunken revelry broke him from his morose thoughts and Cormack had to intentionally unclench his fists. Rage would not further his aim and he wanted to see her again, could feel her pull like the poles drawing at the oceans after the great stillness came leaving landmasses bare.

Though he knew it was foolishly arrogant of him, he felt as though she needed him in some way.

Ridiculous to think a beautiful Born woman would turn to a lowly field laborer, but then who would believe he’d licked her luscious cunny only an hour before? And she hadn’t ordered his death yet.

Perhaps he would pursue her until she either fell into his arms or removed his head from his shoulders.

’Tis the madness. Even as the thoughts coalesced in his fevered brain, Cormack considered that he might be on the verge of deconstruction. Breds had a shelf life, no more than forty years, tops before their brain and body chemistry started breaking down.

Bodily functions would quit, systems shutting down one at a time. The lucky ones suffered heart failure without ever feeling a twinge. Others decayed, bit by bit, becoming phantoms of their former selves before begging the Born to end them. Some simply went mad, sometimes taking other Breds out with them.

He knew which demise he preferred.

Yet even as he weighed the risks of seeking her out, his feet carried him forward. Believing it to be safer to settle in and wait for news of her, he stowed away in an empty room. This section of the tunnels had been dug by Breds, probably the first Breds ever to roam the planet. He touched the perfectly squared off wall, that had been dug with handheld tools, since machines were never to be trusted. The cool rock had no give, just like Cormack—a man without a purpose, merely existing for the use of the Borns.

A gasp sounded behind him and he turned to see a scantily clad Bred woman wielding an empty pitcher as though it were a sword. “What are you doing in here?”

Cormack heaved a sigh, more relieved than he’d like to admit in seeing a familiar face. “Lara.”

He let the cowl drop away from his face and she gasped. “My stars, Cormack. What are you doing in here?”

Cormack thought furiously, not wanting to link his task mistress to his name, in case he was found out. “Some of the litt’uns cry from hunger. I thought I could make off with a few extra packets.”

A smile stole over her face, her dark brown hair swinging loosely as she nodded. “You picked a good time for it too, what with all the strangers around.”

“Strangers? I hadn’t heard any were expected.”

Lara shrugged her slim shoulders. “They weren’t, just showed up. Come on to the kitchen and I’ll set you up right.” She winked at him and Cormack kept the smile plastered on his face until she turned her back. Damn, he hoped Lara wouldn’t renew her special interest in him after this. Sure, they’d fucked a few times, but he’d never intended to make her his Only One. Truth be known, he enjoyed her body heat and her womanly bits, but her incessant chatter about every minutiae happening in the Born hold made him want to recycle himself.

She was certainly no task mistress.

As if the thought conjured her, he heard her voice from one of the turnoffs. It took everything he had not to follow her husky cadence, but continue on behind Lara. He cast about for something to say, while mapping the location in his mind. “What did the strangers bring to trade?” And more importantly, what did they want in return?

“I was attending the House Mistress and did not hear anything directly.” Lara stopped shy of the opening to the kitchen and lowered her voice. “But her ladyship said her youngest daughter, the troubled one, is to be wed.”