Marriage Contract with my Cursed Alien Mate

Chapter 198: Chapter 198

Dron was content to stay exactly where he was for the rest of the night.

There were still things he wanted to tell Tempest. Things he had seen and learned since leaving Thraqe that he was still trying to understand himself, but they had more time for that now. At least he hoped they did. He had told her most of the important parts. She knew about Tine, Mikael and the settlement. She knew he had no intention of simply returning to Thraqe and pretending none of it existed.

Tempest had agreed to help him without hesitation.

Of course she had.

Dron should have expected nothing less from his mate.

He rubbed his fingers along her arm as she rested against him. There was a peacefulness to having her this close that he hadn’t experienced since being ordered away from her. Even if none of this was real, his body didn’t seem to know the difference. He could feel her warmth, smell her, feel the weight of her body resting against his.

Everything about the dream felt real.

Which meant there was something else he needed to know.

"Tell me, what happened with you?"

Tempest stiffened.

It was slight enough that he might not have noticed if he weren’t touching her.

"Nothing."

The answer came much too quickly.

Dron frowned.

Tempest smiled up at him as if that would somehow make him believe her. "What? Nothing happened. I came looking for you, had a little adventure, found a secret human settlement, nearly got trampled by an army of crazy alphas, then you showed up and saved the day. Everything worked out perfectly."

Dron stared at her.

"You are a terrible liar."

"I am not."

"You are."

Tempest rolled her eyes and turned her attention toward the desert.

That only made Dron more suspicious.

He knew his mate. Tempest could talk for hours when there was something she wanted him to know. She would explain every thought that crossed her mind, including the ones that contradicted whatever she had said moments before. Now she had managed to summarize her entire journey across Skoq in a handful of sentences.

"It really wasn’t that bad," Tempest said.

"Tempest."

She sighed.

Dron shifted so he could see her face properly. Tempest immediately looked away.

"We may not be in our bedroom, but this is still ours."

That brought her attention back to him.

Dron glanced around the desert surrounding them. "No one else can hear us here. No one is going to interrupt us. Whatever you tell me stays between us."

Her eyes became glassy.

Dron’s chest tightened.

"Tempest?"

She looked away.

A drop of water landed against his arm.

Dron frowned as another struck his shoulder. Tempest wiped at her cheek before looking upward, and Dron followed her gaze.

There were clouds above them.

"What the hell?"

The drops began falling more steadily.

"Does it rain in this dream?"

"I don’t know."

"You’ve been here before."

"Not while it was raining."

Dron stared at the sky.

Tempest gave a weak laugh beside him. "Of course my emotional breakdown comes with special effects."

Dron reached for her face. There was water on her cheek, but he couldn’t tell whether it had come from the sky or her eyes.

His thumb wiped it away.

"I lost part of my soul."

Dron froze.

"What do you mean?"

Tempest stared at her hands.

"I killed someone."

Rage struck so quickly that Dron’s body reacted before his thoughts caught up.

"What?"

"He was trying to kill me."

The rain grew heavier.

"Who?"

"I don’t know who they were."

"They?"

Tempest looked at him.

There had been more than one.

Dron pushed himself upright. "Where did this happen? Were they from Skoq? Were they following you? Did they know who you were?"

"I don’t know."

His hands curled into fists.

The rain suddenly poured from the sky.

Water soaked them instantly. Dron stood and grabbed Tempest’s hand. There was an outcropping of rock a short distance away, and he pulled her toward it. Tempest’s foot slipped against the suddenly wet ground, and Dron caught her around the waist before she fell. He lifted her the rest of the way and carried her beneath the stone.

It wasn’t much of a shelter, but it kept the worst of the rain from hitting them.

Tempest pushed wet hair away from her face.

"Well, this is new."

"Tell me what happened."

She hugged her arms around herself.

"We were traveling. Gerax had the scanner and everything was supposed to be clear. Then suddenly it wasn’t. There were people everywhere. They were camouflaged so well we didn’t even know they were there until they were already on us. Rynax fought. Everyone did. I had the staff Rynax had been teaching me to use."

"He taught you to fight with a weapon?"

"A little."

"We’re not getting distracted by that."

"I am not distracted."

"You’re going to yell at Rynax later."

"Yes."

Tempest sighed. "At least you’re honest."

Thunder exploded overhead.

Tempest jumped.

Dron glanced toward the sky.

The storm hadn’t existed until Tempest became upset. Now rain hammered against the rocks hard enough that it was difficult to see the desert beyond their shelter.

"There was one man."

Dron forgot about the weather.

"He came at me. I tried to get away from him, but I couldn’t." Tempest stared at the ground. "I had a spear."

Dron remained silent.

"I didn’t think about it. There wasn’t time. He was coming at me and I knew what was going to happen if I didn’t do something."

Her voice broke.

"I threw the spear into him."

The image formed in Dron’s mind before he could stop it. Tempest alone and terrified, gripping a weapon she had never been trained to use while a male came toward her.

The rock beneath his feet trembled.

Dron barely noticed.

"He died."

Dron closed his eyes.

He had killed more males than he cared to count. Some deaths he remembered clearly while others had blended together after cycles of fighting. He had been trained for it from the time he was young enough to hold a weapon. There had always been an enemy in front of him and an order telling him what needed to be done.

Tempest had none of that.

She had simply wanted to find him.

Dron opened his eyes.

Tears streamed down her cheeks.

"I felt it, Dron."

He pulled her into his arms.

Tempest buried her face against his chest.

"I felt everything."

"You survived."

"I know."

"He would have killed you."

"I know that too."

Her fingers tightened against him.

Dron stopped himself before saying anything else.

The words weren’t helping.

Tempest knew why she had done it. She didn’t need him to explain her own survival to her.

"I watched him die," she whispered. "There was a person there, and then suddenly there wasn’t. Because of me."

"Because he forced you to choose."

Tempest pulled back enough to look at him.

Dron cupped her face.

"I won’t tell you that taking a life shouldn’t hurt you. Maybe it should. Maybe the fact that it does is part of what makes you who you are." He wiped at the tears beneath her eyes. "But I will never wish you had made another choice if that choice meant you weren’t here with me now."

Tempest’s lips trembled.

Dron pressed his forehead against hers.

"You did not lose your soul."

"It feels like I did."

Her eyes closed.

Dron held her as the storm raged around them.

For once, he didn’t try to fix anything. He didn’t know if there was anything to fix. There was no enemy left for him to fight, no wound he could bandage, no order he could give that would erase what Tempest remembered.

All he could do was hold her.

So he did.

Eventually Tempest’s breathing slowed. Dron felt some of the tension leave her body, and at almost the same moment, the rain weakened.

Dron noticed immediately.

"Tempest."

"Hmm?"

"Look."

She lifted her head.

The rain was still falling beyond the outcropping, but it was no longer pounding against the desert. The thunder had faded too.

Tempest stared at it.

"The rain started when I got upset."

Dron looked toward the clouds.

"And the storm got worse when you got angry."

Dron frowned.

Tempest pulled away enough to look at him. "I think this place is reacting to us."

Dron considered that.

This place existed because of their connection. They had never understood exactly what the shared dreams were or why they happened. If their minds created the landscape around them, then it made sense that their emotions could change it.

The ground trembled.

Tempest grabbed his arm.

Both of them looked down.

"That was you."

"It was not."

"You’re still pissed."

"I am."

"Maybe try being a little less pissed."

Dron glared at her.

Tempest raised her hands. "I’m just saying, I’d rather not find out if dream rocks can crush us."

Dron took a slow breath.

He forced his shoulders to relax.

He focused on Tempest standing safely in front of him instead of the male who had attacked her. He thought about waking with her in his arms. Their home. The sunflowers outside. Anything other than the violence he’d been imagining.

The ground shook again.

Harder.

Dron’s brow furrowed.

"That wasn’t me."

Tempest looked uncertain. "Are you sure?"

"Yes."

Another tremor rolled beneath their feet.

The sensation was different from the storm. The rain and thunder seemed to move around them naturally, changing with the emotions passing between them.

This was rhythmic.

A jolt.

Nothing.

Then another.

Dron went still.

Something was wrong.

"Dron?"

He barely heard Tempest.

There was something else beneath the sound of the rain.

Faint.

Distant.

His name.

Dron turned toward the open desert.

"Did you hear that?"

"Hear what?"

There it was again.

"Dron!"

His entire body tensed.

He knew that voice.

The desert flickered.

For a fraction of a second the rock, rain and Tempest disappeared.

Darkness replaced them.

Then the dream snapped back into place.

Tempest grabbed his arm. "Dron, what’s happening?"

The ground lurched.

Dron stumbled.

The storm distorted around them. Rain seemed to stop in the air before suddenly rushing downward again.

Someone shouted his name.

Not Tempest.

Gerax.

The beta wasn’t calling for him.

He was screaming.

"DRON!"

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