and the male fell silent. “I have considered that,” he said kindly to his a’sankh advisor. “I believe that it will serve the interests of everyone if we encourage deeper bonds between Cha’lii and our community. This may be best accomplished by creating a mating bond to a male in our san’mordan. He will secure her alliance and loyalty, and his family will see to her care and safety when he cannot.”
A rumble of complaint issued from Vash, but he nodded. “That could work. She is small and so should not be too difficult for her family to control should it become necessary. I can draw up a list of suitable males with strong dispositions and the required patience for adapting to peculiar offworlder ways.”
Rhyst stared at the males, his sister’s sound of dismay echoing in his ears despite the volume of their voices. He met her eyes, and she trembled, her expression ill. Accepting a mating had been a female’s choice since from their earliest ancestral memory. It would be the worst kind of imprisonment! What was being proposed…
A menacing growl rolled up his throat. Servants trembled, their heads whipping around to face him as the king and his advisor ignored his objection.
Instead, they were going to take his Cha’lii and mate her to an unfamiliar male, a stranger, who would have complete control over her—to whose touches she would have to submit. The mating venom would see to that, regardless of what she wanted. Hot rage unfurled from within him.
“No!” he roared, drawing a stunned silence through the chamber.
Very slowly, the king turned toward him. “What was that, a’sankh Rhyst?”
“No, you cannot do that to Cha’lii,” he said. “I will not allow you to give her to a male. If she requires to be mated, then I will mate with her. I am already familiar with the female. I would be far more suitable, and she knows my sister Ag’hana. She will not have everything she has started to come to know torn away from her to be thrown to a male without any choice in the matter.”
Fa’suh frowned at him. “That is a very unusual request, Rhyst. A’sankhii don’t mate. Why would you even want to be burdened with the care of a female?”
“I am perfectly capable of mating,” Rhyst ground out in embarrassment, a feeling heightened by the scornful gaze of the elder upon him. “Moreover, I want to. She is mine. There is no law forbidding it.”
“Law or not, this is blasphemy!” Vash snarled with such vengeance that it almost startled Rhyst. This was the elder who soothed him when he was new among the a’sankhii. Yet now he looked at Rhyst with an expression of intense disgust. “Never in all of our history have a’sankhii taken mates. It is not the purpose for which we were made. We are made to be apart. To give our lives and devotion. To be mateless and unattached so that we have no other obligations but to the state.”
“And just how many recruits have you acquired in the recent solars?” Ag’hana broke in with a bitter laugh. “How are all these fine traditions working for you when males choose family over service? Where are all the young males patrolling the palace grounds learning their drills?” she questioned as she threw her arms out.
Vash’s ears flattened to his skull. “If we demanded that a male from each family come into service, we would have enough…”
“No,” the king interrupted, his tone hard. “I will never agree to conscripting our males and taking away all choices.” He sighed and swiped a hand over his face. “The genetic modifications, do they affect reproduction? Specifically, if mated, will they reproduce a’sankhii or Tak’sinii offspring?”
“We have never looked into it,” another advisor, this one from the science divisions, said. “It was presumed that they would not reproduce.”
“The humans tested my seed and stated it was viable. You have witnessed this for yourselves,” Rhyst said tightly.
“Yes,” the king agreed. “But we have to control our a’sankhii population. It needs to continue to be a matter of choice, not of birth. If your offspring will be born a’sankhii, it could set a dangerous precedent.”
“Then we will not have young,” Rhyst growled, ignoring the twinge that struck deep within him.
Fa’suh tapped his fingers more aggressively against the arm of his throne. “Very well,” he said as he slapped his palm flat against the armrest. “I shall agree to this mating. However, before we go any further, I