Saving Hibreon Ch. 08

This chapter wraps up the characters stay on Hibreon, with Chapter 9 taking them to Xian. I recommend getting caught up on the previous chapters, or this one won't make any sense. If you're enjoying Saving Hibreon, my other related Literotica stories are Getting Lost and They're All Crazy. Also Angel in Bronze 1 and 2 take place in the future in the same AU.

Thank you for reading, and I hope you're enjoying the story.

-Guinevere A. Hart

***

Sabrael's journal answered a few of Lost's questions. His mission with the Blight world where he'd found her was to observe, record, and report. He'd chosen her because of the unusual circumstances of her birth, and she was little more than an interesting subject for his research. Over six years of long-distance study, Sabrael had begun to care for her.

It wasn't his intention to take her away, but her home and family had been attacked. When her mother set Lost on a raft by herself, Sabrael had panicked. He easily recruited his colleagues to help him rescue the orphaned child. But afterward, he had the herculean task of convincing them to allow him to take her home to Arcadia. The Eloua didn't interfere in raising the children of other sentient species. The Oracles who worked with them came to Arcadia as young adults. What Sabrael wanted was unprecedented.

In the end, he'd won his argument. She had the potential for great power that required a balance with the enlightenment of the Divines. Her strengths could be more effectively cultivated in a peaceful Elouan environment. From there, Lost knew the rest of the story.

Sabrael's journal occasionally referred to a curiosity about the being that had spawned her, but he didn't understand who or what she was. It was Sabrael's belief that the person he'd taken in was a direct descendant of the gods the Eloua worshipped. In nearly ninety years, she had been his subject, his ward, his partner, and his lover, but she had always been his "Divine Responsibility."

She snapped the book shut and spoke to it as if she spoke to Sabrael, himself. "Pfft. You told Dakath I have to know what I am before I can help the ghosts, but you don't even know." In a momentary huff, she folded her arms and stared at the journal and photos as if to chastise them.

Then an idea came to her. To Lost, it was only a year ago that Sabrael had died. To the rest of the multiverse, two centuries had passed. As traveled as the Eloua were, they would have had to encounter a person like her birth mother. She'd ask Araquies about it later.

Feeling a little better about things, Lost packed the book and pictures back into their container, then she went through her own old things from the past. Her extra stash of embroidery thread had rotted and could no longer be used. Her craft box was full of brittle, yellowed paper, dried up pots of paint and glue, rotted fishing line, and sticky tape that had long lost its stick. She did find a few jars of finely powdered glitter in a rainbow of colors.

She held the jars up to the light to admire the sparkling shimmer of her newfound treasure. A devious plan began to form in those glimmering colors, and Lost giggled in anticipation. She snuck back to the room where her lovers lay sleeping. Then she silently slid their bags into the hall where they wouldn't be disturbed by her preparations.

***

Kytia couldn't remember the last time she'd been up to her elbows in a bucket of soapy water. When she really thought about it, this was probably her first time. She grinned as she listened to Lost babble orders at Wyfrost, glad that she wasn't the only one who could be bossy. Taking a break, she pushed a stray hair off her sweaty forehead with her upper arm and sat back on her heels.

Lost fluttered from one surface to another, cleaning furiously. She wanted the ship spit polished to a high gloss before the Sil engineer showed up to make his assessment. Kytia could tell Lost was nervous, probably afraid the engineer would find some reason to take Luma from her. "Hey," she tried, "It's okay, Lost. We've got this."

Lost groused back at her. "This me Luma, nai dirt clot."

"Dirt clod", Kytia corrected.

Exasperated, Lost blew hair out of her face, then stared pointedly at the floor bucket. Once Kytia finished laughing, she said, "Yes, ma'am."

Wyfrost entered then and shook his head. "Role reversal has my head spinning."

"Poor baby," Kytia remarked with an eyeroll, while keeping her brush in contact with the floor.

He had a crate in his arms and spoke to Lost about it. "This is everything from Pol's room. Do you want to go through it before I take it to storage?"

Kytia paused and turned to look in case Lost needed her. She admired her witch's resolve when Lost latched the lid on the crate. With quiet reverence she said, "Pol es nai in these things, Wy. We need a space for the people that live, people we gonna save."

Wy nodded, and with a sly wink at Kytia, he said, "Yes, ma'am."

Then quietly, Lost said, "I not 'ma'am'."

Kytia thought she and Wy had teased too much. Apologies weren't something she was good at, but she'd learned they were necessary in a relationship. It turned out she didn't need to say anything because Lost wasn't hurt.

With a smile, Lost pointed at herself and said, "Ilyana. Me name es Ilyana."

Kytia nodded her approval. "Well, you're definitely not lost anymore. Your name is lovely, Ilyana."

Wy asked, "Did you make it up on your own?"

"Nai, me mum and dad called me that."

"Okay, then. It's a pleasure to meet you, Ilyana."

Ilyana laughed, pleased with herself and her real name. She took her dust rag and flitted off to the next room. Just to make sure they understood she was still playing the part of boss, Ilyana briefly stuck her head back through the door and said, "Please, you keep clean up."

When she was gone, Kytia looked at Wy. "I stink at people skills. I'm going to screw up and call her Lost."

"Yeah, just say it in your head before it comes out of your mouth. And if you screw up, well, we both love you. Even if you do stink."

"Fuck off, Wy. Didn't Ilyana give you something to do?"

Wy headed for the door with a mock grumble, "Surrounded by bossy..."

"Bossy what, Wy?"

"Bossy, brilliant, beautiful ladies." He answered with a big dumb grin.

By the time they'd finished scrubbing down the ship, the three of them were hot and getting cross with each other. Kytia had screwed up at least three times and was sick of apologizing. Joking and banter degenerated to terse words accompanied by exasperated sighs and frequent eye rolling.

It all stopped when Wy began to strip. Miffed or not, Ilyana wasn't one to turn down an opportunity for sex, so she started to undress as well. Kytia maintained herself control and demanded, "What the fuck are you doing?"

Wy dropped his undershorts and shrugged. "It's hot as the Infernal Tempest in here. I'm going for a swim."

Ilyana immediately pulled her shirt back on and shook her head. "Oh, fook, nai."

"She's right, Wyfrost. It's the gods damned artic ocean!"

"Yeah," he stated, "So it should be nice and cold." He bent over his bag and retrieved his rolled-up towel.

Stark naked, Wy headed for the door. "Come with me if you want. Or you can stay here and be hot, bitchy, and crazy by yourselves."

He went out at a jog, and Kytia nearly went after him. "You know what? I'm not taking the bait. Not this time. He always does this. He tries to piss me off, so we'll fight. But I'm not going to play this time. If he wants to go out there and freeze his balls off, let him go."

In their ylf'nim tongue, Ilyana said, "People shouldn't swim by themselves. It's not safe. We should probably go out to the shore at least. Besides," she joked, "If he freezes anything off, he's going to want a healing spell."

Ilyana went to grab a towel for herself and Kytia, then she asked, "You coming?"

Kytia sighed. "Yes. But I absolutely refuse to have any fun whatsoever."

Ilyana had a funny grin on her face as she handed Kytia her towel. "What?" asked Kytia.

Ilyana shrugged, "Nai."

Wyfrost finally managed to get both Ilyana and Kytia into the water with him. The two ylf'nim women only spent a few minutes, mostly clinging to the frost giant for warmth. His body heat offered a delightful sensation against the icy water. Once back on the rocky shoreline, all their previous irritation with each other was gone.

Ilyana wrapped up in her towel and climbed on a sunbaked rock to warm up. Kytia grabbed her towel to dry off and Wy did the same. She happened to glance over at him and paused, because Wyfrost was suddenly covered from horns to toenails in sparkling multicolored glitter dust. "Uh, Wy, you've got a little something going on there." By "there" she pointed her finger up and down the length of his body.

Wy stared at her for a long moment. Then after glancing down at himself, he tossed his chin towards her and remarked, "I'm in good company, then."

Kytia slowly, reluctantly looked down at her own body. Sure enough, she was also coated in a fine shimmering layer of dust. Both she and Wyfrost looked up at Ilyana who was still perched on her rock. Through a giggle fit, Ilyana announced, "Pretty Wy! Pretty Kytia!"

Kytia felt a bubble of laughter erupt from her own belly. Then she put on a mock glare and declared, "Oh, you're going to end up wearing some of this shit too, girlfriend." Kytia tossed her towel aside and ran for Ilyana's rock.

With a small squeal, Ilyana jumped down the other side of the stone. She tried to scramble away, but Wyfrost was on his way in. With the sea at Ilyana's back, Wy on side, and Kytia on the other, she had nowhere to run.

Ilyana surprised them both when she suddenly dove between Wy's parted legs and popped up behind him. She paused long enough to blow a raspberry at them and sang, "You can no catch me!" Then she made a mad dash for the ship.

She thought she would give a good chase, until she crashed into the Sil engineer who'd come to inspect the ship. The Sil caught Ilyana to help keep her on her feet. Then he stared at Kytia and Wyfrost, both naked and coated in glitter. Baffled, he said, "Uh, wow. Okay, should I even ask what's going on here...or...?"

"Nope," Kytia said, and she didn't offer anything further.

The Sil straightened himself up, smoothed his scales and collected himself. "Right. I'm Cole, and I'm just going to have a look at the Nephilumen, if now's a good time?"

Ilyana nodded and allowed Cole onto the ship. Kytia could tell right away that if she didn't intervene, her girlfriend was going to follow the poor engineer all over the place. "Ilyana, come on and get dressed. We'll catch a chill running around like this."

Wy helped by putting his body between Ilyana and the busy Sil. He suggested, "You've got to help us get some of this stuff off, at the very least."

"Cole knows what he's doing, Ilyana. Luma's going to be fine." Kytia didn't really know Cole from any other Sil on Araquies' payroll, nor did she understand the first thing about ancient Elouan spaceships. It sounded like a soothing to say, however, and she was pleased to see it did help Ilyana relax.

Wy was still stuck on the glitter situation. "Tell me this comes right off."

"Nai," Ilyana answered him in ylf'nim and Kytia translated. "When you're an old Norrhim, you're going to have glitter stuck in your wrinkles. Your horns are sparkly forever."

"Yeah, I figured." Wyfrost wrapped his arms around Ilyana and grabbed her buttocks. "What do you say, Kytia? I'll spank the left cheek, and you get the right one?"

Kytia grinned and shook her head. "I think we should just roll around together until it all comes off on her."

The three of them tucked themselves behind a closed door. With the engineer on board, they were quick. Hands and limbs twined together, with Ilyana in the middle. Heat in the tight space climbed rapidly. In just a few moments, they'd shared sweat, pleasure, and glitter dust in equal measure.

Kytia couldn't help but laugh with her when Ilyana cackled at her own reflection in the mirror. They got dressed, and Kytia added a few more touches of Ilyana's glitter to her face and hair. When Ilyana was satisfied with her look, she left the room to see about her ship.

Wyfrost only shook his head, trying in vain to wipe the stuff away with the same towel that put it there in the first place. He watched Kytia apply the dust like makeup and griped, "What the Infernal are you doing?"

Kytia smiled at him through her reflection and shrugged. "It's already there, Wy. If I have to wear it, I might as well wear it my way."

"Who are you, and what did you do with my ornery she-devil?"

Kytia took a slightly dirty, yet glitter-free, shirt from her bag. She stood on her toes and wiped some of the dust from Wy's face. "Make no mistake, I am forever your ornery she-devil. But you have to admit Lost— I mean Ilyana— makes life a lot more fun."

"And sparkly." he added with a grudging smile.

"Yes," Kytia agreed. "Life is definitely more sparkly."

His smile waned and Kytia asked, "What?"

"Kytia, we need to talk about what's going to happen after this mission."

Kytia's stomach tied itself in an instant knot. Now that Wy had his family and his village back, he wouldn't need her anymore. He was kind, patient, thoughtful, everything that she wasn't. She braced herself for the worst heartache she'd ever endure. Carefully, she said, "Okay..."

"I know you love Raelinholm. You've been all about getting back there since we met. Then when they wanted to set you up as queen, you refused."

"What does that have to do with anything? I'm nobody's gods damned queen, Wy."

"You're my queen, Kytia." So, he wasn't pushing her away. Despite the flood of relief that knowledge brought, she wanted him to make his point.

She threw up her hands, exasperated. With her typical lack of grace and eloquence, she demanded, "What do you want?"

"I want you and Ilyana to live with me in Fjallheim as my wives."

Kytia snorted through a sudden burst of laughter. Then she looked in his eyes. "Well, fuck me sideways. You're fucking serious?"

Wy nodded, "They want me to be Arl. They want you to be Speaker for the ylf'nim, and Ilyana to be Vala. I want this. I want Fjallheim, but only if I can have you and Ilyana share it with me."

Kytia was still stuck on the word "wives". She'd never had a proposal before, had never even given the concept of marriage much thought. At the same time, she could no longer imagine living her life without Wy and Ilyana. He waited for an answer, and she had no idea what to say. "I... I need to think about this, Wy. Okay?"

"Yeah, okay. Kytia," he said, taking her hands and drawing her close to him. "I love you."

"I love you, too."

***

Ilyana left Wy and Kytia to meet Cole in the engine room. She knew Araquies and Lem would be on their way to the Nephilumen, but she wanted first knowledge of any damage. Cole was just putting away his tools and wiping his hands when she entered.

Right away, she felt reassured by Cole's smile. He knew what she wanted and wasted no time. "The Nephilumen is in pretty good shape, far better than I expected in a vessel this old. Needs some work after such a long period of dormancy, and we'll need to update some of your equipment if you're going to take him on full run. New comms, new HUD, filters need to be flushed, but nothing serious. And you're going to need to resupply, of course. I recommend towing out and docking with the cruiser in orbit. It'll be easier and faster to handle the maintenance from there."

"There are people who need our help. How long will it take to fix Luma?"

Cole dipped his head in the manner of a Sil shrug. "A few hours, a day at the most. Unless you want to take one of our ships and crew. I'm sure we can get that authorized—"

"No, Luma is my ship. Just make sure he's safe."

He nodded and placed a comforting hand on her arm. "Of course."

Lem and Araquies joined them in the engine room, and Ilyana waited for Cole to impart the same information to them. The engineer then left to return to the shuttle and inform his team on the cruiser to be ready. Once he was gone, Ilyana walked back to the main deck with the others.

They stopped in what had been Sabrael's quarters, and Ilyana retrieved the journal and photos. She first handed Araquies the book. "Sabrael liked books, paper, and ink. I think you'll get more from this than the electronic data he stored. It seems he didn't understand his own condition, only that he was different. Anyway, I hope this helps."

"Thank you, Oracle. And these prints?"

"I wanted to speak with you about those. You've done everything for us, Araquies, and I hate to impose further..."

He gently waved a dismissing hand. "You are a sacred Oracle of Arcadia. There is nothing you could ask of us that we consider an imposition. Please, allow us to assist you."

She indicated the images detailing the circumstances of her birth. "Have you ever encountered a being like this?"

Araquies studied the images, and she noticed a bright ripple of concern color his luminous skin. At length , he answered, "We are uncertain. We must consult with the elder collective. Who is the child?"

She stared long into his large dark eyes and asked, "Who do you think she is?"

He nodded his understanding, and she pressed him further. "I need to know who this is. If you have some idea, then tell me."

"An assumption is not appropriate in this matter. We will not discuss this further without the counsel of our peers." He was resolute, and Ilyana would only upset him if she persisted. He said, "We will scan these things and return them to your keeping."

"Thank you, Araquies."

When Kytia and Wyfrost met them at the helm, Lem filled them in on their mission. "Shortly after you joined us, we installed an agent on Xian. We'll be able to contact them from the cruiser. We also have a station on the border of Ay'niki and Elouan space. It was originally a hospitality station, but we've been replacing our people over the last year. Now it's all military personnel. From there, you can resupply and get medical help if you need it. Understand that I'm not willing to sacrifice my station, but there is a unit on standby if you intend to go in hard."

Kytia nodded. "Hard and loud is my usual preference, but not at our people's expense. In this case, we're better off with Ilyana's magic and Wy's strategy."

Wyfrost said, "Let's hear what your agent has to say about the situation on Xian. We can get a plan together while Cole fixes up the Nephilumen."

After an extended pause, Lem said, "If this question is considered rude, please forgive my ignorance. But what exactly is going on with all the glitter?"

Deadpan and right on cue, Wyfrost answered, "Norrhim mating ritual."

***

The following day, the Sil towed Luma up to the Arcadian battlecruiser in orbit around Hibreon. The Sil crew of engineers worked tirelessly to repair and update the old craft. It took longer than Cole had anticipated, but seventy-two hours later, the Nephilumen was as like new as it was ever going to be.

While repairs were made, Ilyana, Kytia, and Wyfrost had an opportunity to speak with the Sil operative on Xian. "There's an underground movement to abolish the Ay'niki practices of oppression. So far, it's mostly escaped captives like yourselves, but some younger generation Ay'niki are joining in. Violence among the captives and their keepers has begun to spill over into the public streets."

Wyfrost said, "Sounds like a chaos we can use to our advantage."

"Exactly," the operative concurred. "The leader of their movement is called The Revenant. I've run into them a few times, and it's more than one individual operating under the same title. It's not easy, for obvious reasons, but I may be able to put you in touch with them.