Await
An agent of time with antlers and hooves, a dead Terran in need of a job and a timeline awry make walking for the dead seem easy.
Orphia has spent her life waiting for life to start. She ends up being a Walker for the Dead, and during a funeral reception, a dagger finds her. Waking in a bubble between time and space isn’t nearly as unsettling as the man who is holding her hands and helping her through the agony of reanimation.
Xeric is a Hirn and one of the Nameless. He is doomed to see his people living and thriving at all points in time, knowing that their death and extinction is inevitable. He bonds to Orphia the moment that he sees her, and at the moment of her death, he is there to catch her and carry her off to a new world with new challenges.
Who could resist a man who carries off their body to a world outside of time?
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Await
Copyright © 2012 Viola Grace
ISBN: 978-1-77111-232-1
Cover art by Martine Jardin
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.
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Await
A Terran Times Tale
By
Viola Grace
Chapter One
Orphia Kardin sat next to her charge and waited. Her life had turned into endless rounds of
hurry up and wait
for the last five years. She had been to fourteen new planets with her clients, and on each, she had walked, swam and shot them into the final rites to allow them into their afterlife.
Today’s assignment would be a battle, her armour told her that. Her Alliance training had given her skills that life as a waitress on Earth had not prepared her for.
A Walker for the Dead was the formal title that she had been granted. Death Escort, Corpse Runner and Body Tripper were the less formal tags that she had heard over the last five years.
Her job was simple. When a high-ranking official died off world, a Walker was sent to escort their body back home if their culture decreed it. Orphia would stand in for the death rites and carry out any business that the deceased needed to have carried out.
It was a right and a duty to take part in the end of a life, but some days Orphia wished that she had something a little more active to engage in rather than simply waiting for someone to die.
“Walker Kardin, we are making landfall. Are you ready?”
She checked her weapons and placed her hand on the casket of the dead Teio Representative, Arcathan.
She had four hours of meditation ahead of her while she walked Arcathan to the death pool of Teio. It was a lava swirl that would consume him and her duty was to defend him while she walked and guard him when he burned. Normally, family would have taken on this duty but Arcathan had no surviving children or spouses.
The Alliance was paying her to risk her life, and she did it to give these folks the dignity in death that their cultures demanded. What one culture decreed to be appropriate, others deemed desecration. Learning the methods and reasons behind the rituals was her favourite part of the job. Physical training was her least favourite part of being a Walker, but bruises healed, skin sealed and muscle made most of her funeral uniforms look good.
The shuttle she was on shuddered and her muscles tensed. It was time to guard her charge and earn her pay.
Monks greeted her, and she loosed her weapons, holding the two long knives at her sides as she floated the casket out of the shuttle. They began a long, droning chant, the metal embedded in their tusks created a soothing vibration.
Orphia walked at the head of the procession, her body standing in for Arcathan’s. The monks carried him behind her and as she made herself the target, they took on the burden of carrying him.
With the chant setting the pace for the walk from the tarmac to the lava pit, they passed the first mourners to one side of the road.
Orphia was braced for the first attack when it came. The chant of the monks was calming her nerves, and her body was ready for action.
When the battle howl reached her, she continued to walk but met the male’s blades with her own. She was being attacked by an angry boar-man with four arms who topped her by two feet. A Teio outweighed her by a hundred pounds, but the Teio gravity was one third Earth normal. It was a fair fight, and she met him blade for blade.
Orphia kept in step as she defended Arcathan. The attacker engaged in three ritual strikes, and then it was her turn. She brought her knives down hard and strong on the left blade and grinned as she heard it snap.
He broke ritual and sliced at her, cutting a red stripe along her shoulder that sent the other onlookers into murmurs of disapproval, but by the time he had realized what he had done, she drove one of her knives into his wrist and disarmed his right hand.
Two strikes and he was on his knees.
She wiped the blades off on her long tunic and resumed her place at the head of the procession.
It was her first blood of the day. Arcathan would be pleased.
Her arms felt like lead and blood dripped from her clothing and weapons. Neatness had gone out the window after the fifth attempt on Arcathan’s body.
The monks slid the body into the lava and she turned to face the crowd of mourners and enemies that Arcathan had earned in his lifetime.
She smiled grimly as the body slowly burned away and the enemies faced her in a final attempt to destroy a little of Arcathan’s honour.
The dark blue blood that covered her was not her own, and the scent was overpowering. She flicked the blades and the would-be attackers stayed back.
A gong ran out, and everyone breathed a relaxed sigh. The monks ceased their chant, leaving with a slow and steady pace. Arcathan was gone.
A male with the tusks that bore the marks of an ambassador came toward her. “Welcome to Teio. I am Ambassador Catheth. Please, join the feast in honour of Arcathan. He was a great male and it was a tragedy that he did not carry on his line.”
She inclined her head. “I would be honoured to participate in the celebration of Arcathan. May I bathe the blood off and change clothing?”
“Of course, of course. You are now our honoured guest.” He gestured for her to precede him, but she took a place at his side instead.
They walked to the great house and those gathered followed in their wake. Orphia noticed the trail of blood she was leaving, but there was nothing to be done about it. Drops of crimson mixed with the dark blue and the colouration caused ripples of comment behind her.
She smiled grimly. She wasn’t one of them, but she managed to carry out their ritual all the same. Now, it was time for a shower and a bit of a party.
Her bag from the shuttle was brought to her, and she took a quick gel cleanse that managed to remove the blood from her and leave her squeaky clean. The white gown that she slipped on was a mourning colour for the Teio, as it was for so many species around the Alliance, white for the purity of the soul when the body was dead, the colour of the stars.
Arm wraps covered the slices and gouges left by her battles. She wove her black locks into a braid and tucked it into a coronet.
With a glance in the mirror, she lifted her head and stepped out to join the party to celebrate a man she never met but risked her life for.
A ballroom was filled with Teio, the room grew quiet as she entered.
Ambassador Catheth looked at her in shock. “I never expected you to be so…pink.”
She laughed. “This is the way I was born and the way I will live my life.”
She circulated with the guests, and a few thanked her for carrying out Arcathan’s wishes with such dignity and enthusiasm. Orphia took the thanks with polite grace and continued her path around the room.
Some of the Teio were not as charmed by her battle skills. They moved aside as she passed, refusing introduction, when she had completed her circuit of the room she once again stood next to the ambassador.
“How many folk have you represented, Walker Kardin?” The ambassador was tipsy. He swayed slightly as he spoke.
“Over a dozen different clients. A dozen different races. I walk for any I am called to.”
“Duty or destiny?” He swayed again.
“Can’t it be both?” She grinned and stepped out of his way.
Orphia heard a battle growl behind her and shocked cries from the crowd. She didn’t feel the blade that entered her back, but she supposed that that is what happened when your spinal cord was severed.
A howl of rage that was not natural to any Teio echoed through the ballroom. Screams of panic filled the room, Orphia heard them absently as her knees buckled, and she collapsed on the ground. Green, black and brown flashed in front of her eyes as darkness swam up to get her, or perhaps she fell into it, she didn’t know.
Chapter Two
Waking was unexpected. Her vision showed her flickers of blinding light with beings inside. They spoke quietly, but she could hear tension in their tones.
Hands gripped hers and held them tight. She was lying on her belly and there was a horrible noise in the air. Fire ran through her, the hands held her immobile.
After careful analysis, she had to admit that she was the origin of the horrible sound. With effort, she gritted her teeth and tried to shift.
“Hold still, Orphia. You are undergoing surgery. We can’t give you anaesthetic, so simply breathe slowly, and I will do what I can to mitigate your pain.”
She blinked rapidly, but with the position her head was in, she could not see the speaker. Heat ran up her arms, and the searing agony that pierced her torso receded.
Once the pain was no longer her primary concern, she was able to take in her surroundings.
It felt peculiar to be held on what amounted to a chiropractic table. Her face was braced in a padded ring, her arms were free of her sides held down and out, her hands gripped by the man with a dark, honey voice. She could feel light touches on her back, but aside from the occasional whisper behind her, she was completely suspended in the heat generated by the large hands holding her own.
She heard his low voice murmuring quietly to her, and his thumbs slowly stroked along her pulse points. Heat was replaced by tiny waves of pleasure. The ache in her back combined with the tendrils of pleasure confused the hell out of her.
The hands on her back grew slightly rougher for a moment, and then, they disappeared.
Orphia blinked, “What?” She tried to sit up, but he held her down.
“Give yourself a moment. Move slowly. Your spine was severed and the healing needed was extensive. You are lucky that our healer was available. I would have had to take you to an Alliance facility if he hadn’t been.”
She raised her head and blinked rapidly to verify her vision. The male sitting with her hands in his was a member of a species known to Terrans far back in history and known go be extinct in the rest of the Alliance. She was staring into the black stellar eyes of a Hirn.
His skin was a mix of forest greens and browns, his hair carried waves of the same deep green. The horns of a stag graced his head, and there was no doubt about it, he was a giant. Even his eyes carried the slanted grace of a deer, but there were galaxies in his gaze that she had never heard of.
“You’re a…”
He raised one eyebrow. “Yes?”
“A Hirn?”
He grinned, showing surprisingly sharp canine teeth. “Very good. Now, you have to rest for a moment, so I will give you the standard introduction.”
She blinked as his thumbs began that slow circle on her pulse points once again. Shivers of pleasure ran up her arms through her shoulders, cascaded along her breasts and pebbled her nipples before it snaked between her thighs to generate slick moisture in her channel. Embarrassment heated her face, and she looked down. There was no way for her to hide her face. His grip caused a slight issue.