Freeing Luka: The Clecanian Series Book 2 Victoria Aveline (story read aloud TXT) 📖

he wakes up and is angry with me for making his marks appear? What if he never wants to see me again? Worse yet, what if he doesn’t turn out to be the person I think he is?

Alice had been in a lot of bad relationships in the past. Not just romantic ones, either. People seemed to think that because she was a nice person, they could walk all over her. And the sad truth was, she let them. Last year, after her piece-of-shit boyfriend, Jeff, cheated on her for the third time, she’d yelled and cried, but his response had reduced her to ash. The words replayed in her mind now: “Why don’t you leave me, then?”

Why hadn’t she left him after the first time she’d caught him cheating? Because she had a bleeding heart, that’s why. His tearful apologies, excuses, and promises had pulled at her heartstrings.

It was ridiculous, but she already felt closer to Luka than she ever had to Jeff. What if Luka turned out to be just as bad or worse? She couldn’t imagine he was, but what did she really know? They’d never even had a real conversation.

Stop it! You’re spiraling. She blinked away her unshed tears and tried to focus on something positive. These were all what-ifs, and there was no point being upset about them now.

A thought popped into her mind. “Izzo. Do you know what time it is?”

He glanced away from Vanessa, who’d been grilling him endlessly for the past five minutes. “Uh, yeah.” Reaching over, he touched an innocuous part of the cruiser wall. A display full of alien symbols popped up. “It’s six before prime.”

Alice sighed a pent-up breath and slumped in her seat. She crossed one arm over her stomach and began biting her nails again. Of course it is.

Chapter 8

From the name “The Pearl Temple,” Alice had been expecting to be taken to a white marble-columned building on a hill, where they’d sequester her with other unwed women. Looking at the scene before her made it clear she hadn’t been listening to Izzo at all.

The word temple must just be an odd translation of this place because, to her eyes, she could see nothing resembling a temple.

After walking through a towering arched gateway and seeing their new home for the first time, the women had all stopped in their tracks. A shallow body of water, thousands of feet wide in every direction, sprawled out before them. Although expansive, the lake somehow looked quaint, like a koi pond in a giant’s garden.

The two moons, now closer to each other in the night sky, illuminated hundreds of floating blossoms on the water. Some of the pale pink and yellow floating flowers were small enough to fit in the palm of Alice’s hand. Others were as large as a car. But they all seemed to angle themselves toward the soft moonlight.

They must be where that wonderful smell comes from. The delicate scent of sweet flowers hung in the heavy air even without a breeze. Though not as humid as the mountain had been, the air here was still thick and warm.

Glowing creatures in various shades of blue and green were visible just under the surface of the water, swimming lazily and illuminating the thick stems of the watery plants. Their long, eel-like bodies twisted and curved as they swam, delicate ribbons of light trailing behind them.

Hypnotized, Alice followed the progress of one creature as it moved, but it disappeared near the center of the lake where a large, domed building stood. The water must be deeper there.

The round building rose from the middle of the lake like the center of a giant lotus with smaller buildings jutting from its sides like petals. Scattered over the rest of the large lake, hundreds of small, pale homes sat floating on the water. The white sides of the structures shone with a faintly iridescent shimmer, similar to that of a pearl.

Is that where the name comes from?

“Why is this place called The Pearl Temple, Izzo? On Earth, ‘temple’ means a place for worship, not housing.” When he didn’t answer, Alice glanced over and found Izzo watching Daisy take in her surroundings with a contented smile. She stifled a grin. “Izzo?”

With raised brows, he focused on Alice, seeming surprised to find her there. “Oh, uh…” He cleared his throat. “Centuries ago, this lake was used for spiritual purposes. People would come here to pray or meditate or think. The bilom,” he said, pointing at a glowing creature swimming nearby, “are the guardians of Pearl Lake, so when they built here, they named it The Pearl Temple. The bilom are electric and sting anyone who gets in the water.”

Rita leaned over, watching a bilom flit back and forth. “But why Pearl? They don’t look like pearls.”

Izzo shrugged. “I don’t know what pearls are on your planet. Our translators do what they can, but they aren’t always perfect. The bilom produce little stones instead of eggs on occasion. We call them pearls.”

“That’s pretty close to what Earth pearls are, I guess. Not the same kind of animal, but hey—” Vanessa smiled, propping her hand on her hip “—who’s to say one animal’s trash isn’t as good as another animal’s trash when it comes to making jewelry? Do you guys gather the pearls?”

“There’s another lake deep in mountains where the majority of bilom live that some people harvest pearls from, but it’s difficult to do without disturbing their environment too much.” A grin spread over Izzo’s face. “It used to be if a person wanted to court someone, they’d try and prove their love by diving into the water and retrieving a pearl. If they weren’t stung, it was meant to be.”

An image of Luka slowly emerging from the lake in a sopping-wet white shirt, with a satchel of pearls in hand, popped