Unknotted

Beasts Form and Land

Rokan

The dominance in me roared at the insult. With my life at stake, I released my tight control of it and allowed it to rise to the challenge. My dominance rumbled assurances that we could take him.

I jerked my rifle up into Admon’s gun hand. A shot sounded. Pieces of ceiling and insulation snowed down. I crammed my weapon into my shoulder pocket, switched it to bullet, and kicked off a shot. At this close range, the force of the blast knocked Admon backward into the checkout counter.

The ultra clutched at the blood pouring from the hole in his stomach. Admon’s face paled and twisted into a sneer. Dominance wasn’t something that could be described visually. Not really. Rather it was an innate ability to sense the strength of another hybrid in the way they stood, how they spoke, the eye contact they maintained. How the magic shuddered around them. The way Admon’s blue eyes shimmered brighter, more intensely. Something about the way his gaze met mine made it difficult to control the lethal pressure rising in my chest.

I sprang at the wounded ultra, but my feet were still trapped, so I only wobbled forward as Admon staggered out of reach. The ultra sagged to a knee. His fingers, slick with blood, pressed into the earth, summoning the power of his coavani knot. White light floated into him from the ground like ash rising from a fire. The bits of magic melted into his wound. Color began returning to Admon’s face. His breathing regulated.

I tugged desperately at my feet, trying to free them. I contemplated firing off another round, but now that eye contact had been broken, my dominance settled quickly. Clarity returned, as did the orders to bring Admon in alive. I would be lucky if my own ultras didn’t punish me for shooting him, rather than delivering him so my ultras could challenge him for Namen territory.

“Chet!” I shouted again. Screams, thudding footsteps, and the crash of breaking furniture filled the floor above. Didn’t sound like Chet was in much better shape than I was.

Then the tide turned.

The ground, unbound by magic, relaxed around me feet and I could finally start to shift them free. The retreating tide severed my connection with my beasts form and dampened my dominance. Color drained from the world, leaving it in gradients of blacks, grays, and whites. Everything felt muffled, from the way the store smelled, to the sound of the struggle upstairs, to the sight of Admon pushing to his feet.

It was hard to tell without color, but I thought his face had paled again. His eyes widened. Stumbling back, holding his partially healed stomach that he couldn’t heal further without magic, he made it outside.

I scrapped the earth away from my boots and I pounded after him. By the time I made it to the door, Admon had vanished from the alley. Flipping my visor open and inhaling deeper didn’t bring his scent to my stifled nose. Blast it…

“Rokan!” Chet shouted from upstairs.

Blowing out a breath, I returned to the store and bounded up the stairs. The small residence looked like it had been through a blender. A dozen or so women cowered in the corner, hugging each other and handfuls of children. In the center of the room, Chet knelt on a large man’s back.

“Where were you?” Chet’s visor flicked up, revealing a face with defined cheekbones, a trimmed beard, and eyes that seemed to always be laughing. “You missed all the fun.”

I shrugged, not really in the mood to explain the not-so-fun situation I had been dealing with a floor below. Chet enjoyed this work more than I ever had. Scaring families and ripping them out of their homes hadn’t exactly been what I had imagined when I signed my life away to the Keadanian army, but here I was. Doing what had to be done to fulfill the prophecy.

“Is that Phiston Grutcher?” I asked.

Chet hauled his captive to his feet. “What do you think? Does it look like him?”

If I squinted and looked past the two black eyes and the swollen nose, I could see a resemblance to the man we were sent to collect. I nodded.

“Great. You collect them.” He nodded to the civilians, likely tasking me with this because of the two of us, I had the gentler hand.

“Do we really have to take them to the holding facility? Once our ultras deal with him”—I nodded to Phiston—“their coavani knots will automatically transfer to Keadan, regardless of if they are here or there.” I hated the order to drag already frightened and beaten hybrids from their homes. It seemed so pointless to disrupt their lives more than we already had, especially when the transfer of their knots could be tested right here. Seemed also like a very poor way to welcome the new hybrids into Keadan. I had thought when I was inducted into Ultra Glark’s inner circle that I might be able to persuade my ultra to stop the standard procedure, but I hadn’t succeeded yet. Likely because of Ultra Metallia.

“I know,” Chet answered. “But orders are orders. At least they will have aid coming their way once they’re registered.” He manhandled the sub-dom from the room.

That was true. While my ultras would offer some of the prisoners to the Namenite ultras in an exchange, the rest would go to a holding facility. There, the prisoners would be added to the registry, their living conditions and home lives documented, and financial assistance given if needed. As well as protection against and liberation—both legally and magically—from abusive husbands. Going to the holding facility, in the end, was in our prisoners’ best interest.

I turned to the harem left behind and tried to decrease the intensity of my dominance, which was easier said than done. Despite my efforts, the women and children cowered under my stare. I had spent a lot of time on the northern front in my thirteen years of service. Not once had I met a Namenite woman who would meet my eyes. Mostly, I found broken and submissive, beaten and unloved women. Namen was very different than Keadan in regard to gender equality. Here, most women and children were treated as property, had only to increase a male’s magical strength.

Historically hybrids hadn’t always thirsted for more territory and power. Only thirty-five years ago, Cenzia had been made of hundreds of territories. Hybrids would marry, purchase or inherit a claim of land, and raise their families on it.

Then came the Grand Whisp’s prophecy:

Territories one, two, three.

Fracture. Fractured. Fracturing.

Hundreds. Thousands. Broken shards.

Magic and blood. Repair the breaks.

Join the many into one.

Unite or the end will come.

For so, the Core has proclaimed it thus.

The prophecy given to a group of dominants launched several campaigns to unite the territories because each dominant thought it should be united under them and in their way. After decades of warfare, Core-ordained marriages, and a boom in the birthrate, Cenzia had only four territories left to unite. Looking at the depressed state of Phiston’s harem and remembering the dozens of other harems Keadanian forces had liberated from Namenite rule, I was determined to help my territory encompass the entirety of this hemisphere.

I let my rifle hang across my chest and motioned for them to rise. “Come. I won’t hurt you,” I spoke softly.

Even without the tides in, most hybrids could estimate where another fell in the dominance pyramid. These submissives where nowhere near my tier, so at my command, they crept out of the corner and slunk forward. That only made me feel more guilt about having to detain them.

Being dominant shouldn’t be all about control and power. It certainly shouldn’t have been about suppression either. To me, being a dominant meant convincing those who offered their submission to trust me to protect them. While in my custody, these hybrids would be safe. I only hoped their stay in the holding facility would be short-lived.

“I won’t hurt you,” I repeated.

They must have sensed the truth of that. Their whimpers settled into sniffles, and tension loosened from their backs. Like a sheep before their shepherd, they allowed me to herd them down the stairs with no more prodding, and out to the town square, where Keadanian soldiers were gathering other Namenites.

Dressed in armor like mine, minus the broken face shield that was going to cost me a pretty penny to replace, General Tydeus Frost stood on the lip of a small fountain. My commander was average height with black, white-streaked hair twisted into ropes that were knotted behind his head. One of his eyes had been damaged in a battle years ago. The dark iris had turned white and shone brightly against his dark skin. His voice rumbled like disgruntled earth. “We hold the sub-dom captive. Come the next changing of the tides, Lothny Creek will be ours!”

(Chapter continues in part 2...)