Ancalagon - 110. Chapter 110

“Bringing in the Galactic is the last resort,” I said. I frowned at Ases. “You should be the one saying this, not me.” After all, he was the ambassador, and the one who was supposed to be well-versed in politics and creating positive relationships between new species and the Galactic in the first place.

“Maybe.” He shrugged one shoulder. “But I’ve never been forced to flee underground in tunnels carved out by giant bugs, either.” He made a face. I should have known that was at the heart of his true distress. He hadn’t been that upset when we’d been tramping through the trees, finding our way through barely there paths. Up there he’d had the sun, wind, smells and sounds. Here it was stagnant air, dirt, and gloom.

If I was bothered by it, he was probably itching to find a way out and seconds away from shifting the entire time we were down here.

“The Kardoval have to be stopped,” Garjah said. “That they would subvert my own officers in this way and attempt to retain total control and isolation at the cost of the rest of our people is wrong.”

“We’ve been telling you that for some time,” Chaintrik said.

“I know.” Garjah bowed his head to him. “But it takes seeing, and experiencing,” he grimaced, “to believe that those we’ve put our trust and faith in our whole lives are so corrupt.”

“What are we going to do?”

“I am going to take them down.” Garjah stared at me, his nostrils flaring. “You are staying safe.”

“How did that work last time?” I contested hotly. “You left me, and I was attacked. If it wasn’t for Bouncer, Ases, and Chaintrik, I’d have been in a cell next to yours. Or as far away from yours as possible and used against you.”

“Exactly. I’m afraid that would happen if you come with us. You’re safer here.”

I shuddered. “No. Humans are not meant to live underground.” There were two colonies I knew that lived underground, but the planets or stations I’d lived on with my parents that required total environmental isolation had always been pods with built in green spaces. Even those had been a struggle for me. I wasn’t capable of staying underground. “Ases and I both tolerated it to get to you, but we can’t stay here. I want out.”

Chaintrik and Garjah exchanged glances.

“What was that look?”

Chaintrik cocked his head. “There may be a place, but I don’t know if he will be welcome.” He indicated Bouncer. “A cerops is dangerous and could attack and feed on anything they can pierce with their claws, even if it’s bigger than themselves.”

“Have you seen him do that?” I asked. “Even once?”

“No.”

“Exactly. He’s not dangerous to anyone or anything that isn’t dangerous to us.”

“Fine. I’ll see if I can make arrangements.”

When we were finally shuffled up and out of the tunnels into the shelter that Chaintrik mentioned, I forgave him for his hesitancy. It was not unreasonable to worry about a strange creature with deadly venom in his claws when you were hiding him among your children.

But they loved him.

It was just after breakfast when we arrived, and I was exhausted. Garjah and I had fallen asleep in a tangle on the bed in the tiny room that we were showed to, and Bouncer had curled up right next to our bed. When I woke up to the sound of laughter—a much higher pitched rumble than the chest sound Garjah made—and looked down, Bouncer was gone.

I was up and out of the room in a flash, but Ases was there in his shifted form with Bouncer and kids barely able to stand on their own two feet to a height nearly as tall as my chest were surrounding them and climbing on them.

“They haven’t had new toys in forever,” someone said, startling me badly. I yelped and my heart started to pound in my chest. I panted, staring with wide eyes at the female next to me. “Sorry,” she grimaced. “I thought you heard me come over.”

“No, I was distracted,” I said waving my hand at the amazing sight in front of us.

“I was too, and scared to death the first time Mellatok grabbed your cerop’s ear to pull herself up. But he just sat there.”

“He is very smart and always knows when someone is out to harm him or us. He’d know if she was just needing help too.” I wasn’t sure how, but cerops raised their young and even kept the juveniles around for a short time during whelping the next generation. I knew he’d had younger siblings before his mother drove him off. He’d probably been climbed on before.

I was more surprised they hadn’t come screaming for us the second they saw her that close to his teeth. Or the youth who was laying with his head between Bouncer’s paws and staring up at his head, giggling each time Bouncer leaned down to sniff his face and blow air over his head. “You aren’t afraid?” I cocked my head and studied her.

“Your friend promised they would be safe before he shifted too.”

Biting my lip, I hesitated. “Bouncer isn’t a shifted person, you know that, right?”

“Yes,” she smiled. “I know what he is. But we were told to trust you by people we trust. And Garjah,” her voice sounded awed. “He would never put our people at risk. He protects everyone, all our people. He could never bring harm to us.”

It never failed to shock me when I talked to someone who viewed Garjah with so much awe. I forgot how most of his planet’s people saw him. How important he was. Maybe there was a way to use that.