Page 59 of An Alien for the Farm

Rationality fades, replaced by the sheer, unadulterated need to claim. To hunt. To dominate. I am lost in visions of my kahl, my grasp on the present slipping away with each passing moment. Only one thing remains clear in the chaos of my mind.

I must stay away from her, even though everything within me demands that I have her now.

19

ELEANOR

Itold Varek everything I could. At first, when he answered the ping, he was smiling, fangs slightly visible, and I realized that smiling must be a thing he and Zynar learned to do to put species like myself at ease.

On Varek’s face, it’s even less natural than Zynar’s. So much so I noticed. His smile and every other change on his face as I told him what was going on.

That Zynar and I were ‘resting’ when I suddenly heard the vibration. That he was burning up but refused my help. That he locked himself in the barn. I even mentioned that his color was more vibrant. More pink.

From the moment I began explaining the symptoms, Varek’s carefully cultivated smile slipped. He became expressionless. So much so that looking at him through the vid feed felt like I was looking at some kind of predator I had no idea how to read. It sent a shiver down my spine, a realization that they are so different from myself. It’s no wonder Xarion had advised I hire a Raki. Just staring at Varek without his mask and I can tell that, in another time, me in my humanness would have been his prey.

So why am I hurrying back outside in the rain? Why am I heading back toward the barn? I saw Zynar, how he was. How his eyes had changed. How he looked even bigger, stronger than usual. I saw how he reacted to my proximity. He locked himself away, probably with good reason. Why am I going back there?

I bang on the barn doors, calling his name. There’s no response, but I’m sure I hear chains rattling. Picking up the wet skirt of the robe I’m wearing, I head around to the back of the barn. I find the place where there’s a missing strip of wood again and I stand on tiptoes, peering in.

What I see makes my breath hitch.

Zynar’s secured himself with chains against a central pillar in the barn. He’s wrapped his arms, his torso, and even then, he’s struggling to release himself, as if two versions of himself are warring—the one that tied him there and the one that wants to get out.

“Zynar,” I whisper and he suddenly goes still. A trickle of fear goes down my spine as his head snaps in my direction. Sheets of his damp hair obscure his face and still I can see the glow of his eyes underneath. Focused on me. The air seems to still, seconds passing with the singular stare before he suddenly jerks against the chains. I jump, losing my vantage point on the tips of my toes and causing him to disappear briefly from view.

The chains begins to jangle with almost deafening intensity and when I manage to go up on my toes again, it suddenly stops. Zynar’s staring at me through that sheet of his damp mane, his chest heaving, his fangs bared….and his cock…

My eyes widen as my gaze lowers to his groin.

He’s hard. So very hard, it looks painful. It jumps as I look at it, pre-cum seeping from the tip as his hips jerk in a forward motion at my attention. My wide eyes fly back to his. Memory of what we just shared comes back immediately, and that fear that had trickled down my spine disappears. Because this is the same male that worried about hurting me. The same male that held me close in the aftermath and cuddled me like he never wanted to let me go.

The same male who answered my job ad and helped me with my roof. The same one that volunteered to help me get this place up to par. The same one that gave me space when I needed it. He’s the male that’s made me feel alive again after so many years of feeling like I was simply existing. The first male who has lit a fire in me after so long. The first one I actually think I could…love?

The thought makes me hardly breathe as I stare at him through that crack in the wall. I watch as he struggles to release himself. As he struggles to get to me, and it all becomes clear that this isn’t about him. It’s not about him at all. It’s about me.

Zynar’s locked himself up because of me. Chained himself because of me.

He wants to protect me from something. From himself?

“I’ll find a way to help you,” I whisper, and he jerks at the chains, his gaze heightening on me through the shadows. “I will.”

Something hard rises in my throat as I move away from the barn, something I’m unable to swallow down as I walk away from the building. Because losing sight of him feels like I’m abandoning him there even though I’m not. I can hear the chains jangling as he tries to release himself to come after me. He doesn’t even speak. Doesn’t call out my name. Whatever’s happening has him relying on his base self, one that looks like it wants to tear me apart. But I refuse to believe that’s all there is to it.

My heart is heavy. A heavy beating thing that slams into my ribs with each thump. As I head back to the cottage, I still hear the chains jangling and my heart breaks. I cast my gaze to the front gate, the rain obscuring my vision, but not enough to see that Varek’s not arrived yet. He won’t be here for a while. My chest shudders with a heavy breath as I turn to head out of the rain. The best thing I can do is some research on my communicator. Figure out what’s happening and how best to help Zynar. But as I step onto the porch out of the rain, a distressing bay reaches my ears.

I tilt my head trying to figure out where it came from when I hear it again. Oh shit, that frickin’ ooga in the field. It bays, crying so loudly and so hard that I’m left conflicted.

Zynar needs my help but so does the stubborn beast.

Wrapping my robe tighter, even though it’s wet and provides little cover, I step back into the rain, jogging toward the field. I see the ooga through the sheets of gray as the rain comes down even harder. It’s standing in the center of the field. Why doesn’t it move? If it’s stuck in the rain, surely it has enough sense to try to get out of it.

I glance back at the barn and then at the gate. No Varek yet. I don’t even want to go inside my house with Zynar in the barn suffering. Might as well help the ooga.

I’m on the field, the rain so hard it’s blinding. With nothing to hold it back across these flat plains, the wind hits me with a full gust that has me planting my feet into the wet earth and bracing against it as raindrops try to batter every inch of my exposed skin.

I grunt, pushing forward toward the ooga. The closer I get, the more I realize it’s not simply just standing there. It’s stomping its feet. Beneath it is a wide ring of overturned dirt that it has trampled as if it was turning in circles but unable to go anywhere else.

“Hey! Come on out of the rain, you troublesome thing!” I shout at it over the wind, my heart still doing somersaults, my mind still on Zynar. Perhaps that’s why I don’t immediately hear the little snarl underneath the sound of the rain and wind. Perhaps my distraction and preoccupation with Zynar’s state dulls my other senses. Because as I near the ooga it spins, making that distressing baying sound as it stomps.

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