Page 41 of The Alien Minotaur's Bride

I wanted to go home. To the dwelling with the nest in the corner and the furniture modified for my height. To the male who had waited three rotations to find me and would tear apart anyone who tried to take me away.

The guard knocked on the door.

"Your scent has changed," she said through the panel. "Significantly. I'm required to report it."

"Report it."

I lay back on the pallet and let my body do what it wanted – letting down milk, flushing with warmth, broadcasting the bond-scent the chamber had masked, as strong now as it had ever been.

Something had shifted. I could feel it. My body knew something my mind was only just catching up to.

The decision was made. The choice was real.

Now I just had to survive the next two days until someone worked out what that meant.

The milk soaked through my shift and pooled beneath me on the pallet, warm and steady. For the first time since they'd brought me here, the ache in my chest was relief instead of pain.

I pressed my hand over my heart and felt my pulse – steady now, where it had been erratic before. The heat-tremors had smoothed into something manageable, warm instead of burning, present instead of overwhelming.

My body had been waiting for me to decide.

I closed my eyes and let myself drift. Not sleeping, exactly, but not fully awake either. Just floating in the warmth of my own certainty.

Somewhere out there, Keth was fighting for me. I knew that. He was doing whatever the Khorreth legal system allowed, probably breaking a few rules along the way, trying to prove what Vorreth had done.

But he didn't know yet. Didn't know I'd made a choice. Didn't know that my body had responded to it, that my scent had changed, that something fundamental had shifted in the bond between us.

I hoped he would feel it somehow. Through whatever connection we had. Through the biology that linked us whether I'd chosen it or not.

I'm yours, I thought. I chose it. I chose you.

The warmth spread through my chest, my belly, my limbs.

For the first time in days, I felt like myself.

Not the person I'd been on the relay station – cold, hungry, running on fumes. Not the person I'd been in the first days here – frightened, confused, fighting my own biology.

Someone new. Someone who knew what she wanted and had decided to reach for it.

I fell asleep like that, hand over my heart, body finally quiet.

The decision was made.

Everything else would follow.

CHAPTER 13

DOORS ARE OPTIONAL

I heard him before I saw him.

A distant rumble, felt more than heard – the vibration of something massive moving through reinforced corridors. Then hooves. Fast. Not the careful, quiet footsteps he used at home when he didn't want to startle me. These were thundering, urgent, the sound of someone who wasn't trying to be subtle.

I sat up on the pallet, my heart suddenly pounding.

Voices outside. The guard, raised and alarmed. Another voice answering – low enough to feel in my chest even through the walls. A crash. Something heavy hitting the floor.

The door didn't open.