by Nia Mars
I nod. “Another two billion people died little by little. I’m lucky that my ancestors found a way to cling to life.” I blink. “I can’t stand the thought of Lily being left all alone to survive.”
A muscle jumps in his jaw. “Did the pirates take your sister too?”
“No. At least not when they took me. The last time I looked for her, she was safe.”
“And you want to go back to her. Leave here.” The sympathy is gone from his voice.
“Yes. She’s younger than me. She needs me. You understand that, don’t you?”
“No. I understand one’s duty to one’s office.” And he strides out, leaving me gaping. So much for softening him on the issue of my return.
I spend the next hour doing sit ups, pushups, and jumping jacks, swearing at him. Then I just lie on the floor, on my back, and stare mutinously at the metal ceiling.
I need to relax before I strangle somebody, because if I do, then they definitely won’t ever take me back to Earth. I try to picture what an alien prison looks like. Okay. This is not helping me relax.
Breathe.
Slowly, slowly the tension melts from my shoulders.
“Oath Forger.”
I bolt up to see Tiam on the room’s display. He’s watching me with avid interest. His gray eyes are eating me up, his gaze roaming over me. Over and over. Borderline creepy.
“I respectfully request the honor of transporting you to my ship,” he says in a formal tone that couldn’t be more different from the tone he’d used with Koah earlier.
I have no idea how to respond. On the one hand, he’d spent the better part of a day trying to kill us all. On the other hand, he stopped the attack as soon as he learned of my presence on the ship. So, clearly, his beef is not with me.
On the third hand, I know next to nothing about him. I know next to nothing about Koah, but still I know a hundred times more about Koah than I know about Tiam. Also, Koah has consistently protected me from the moment we met.
On the fourth hand—hey, we’re in alien world here—Koah is not going to take me back to Earth until the war ends. Maybe Tiam would take me sooner. I don’t kid myself that the current lull in fighting is anything more than a temporary truce that could last only hours.
Yet I’m afraid that agreeing to a transport to Tiam’s ship when I don’t know exactly what that would mean is like pushing buttons with symbols I don’t understand. I almost got my hand cut off for that recently. I’d like to think I’m smart enough to be more cautious going forward.
“We will meet tomorrow in Merim,” I tell the silver king.
If he’s disappointed, he disguises it well. He doesn’t scold me or pressure me as Koah would. Instead, he says, still staring with a disturbing intensity, “You are the answer to prayers.”
Uh-huh. I’m a scavenger from Earth.
I press my lips closed so the words can’t spill out. Nobody can know that I’m not the Oath Forger. That little misunderstanding is my only protection, my only power, my only leverage. Unfortunately, how long I’ll be able to fake it is anyone’s guess.
“I mean no offense, but why are you with Koah?” Tiam asks.
I can’t see a reason to not tell him. “I was kidnapped by pirates.”
The transformation in him is instant and breathtaking. In a blink he turns into this...avenging angel...eyes flashing, muscles jumping in his neck.
His voice is a ragged blade of pain as he asks, “Were you harmed?”
I don’t understand the extreme over-reaction. We are strangers.
“I was rescued.” Obviously.
His gaze is penetrating, and his distress is so strong it comes through the display and makes my heart lurch into a mad rhythm, so I add, “I’m fine. I didn’t get hurt.”
“I have a full medical team on my ship.”
“I don’t need medical help.”
Still, several seconds go by before he calms down.
“Have you accepted Koah?”
What is it with these people and acceptance? “No.”
A flash of triumph on his face. “You will accept me.”
I wish I knew how to hang up on him.
The next moment, I’m glad I didn’t. He is my best chance for a ride back to Earth, now that I know Koah never meant to fulfill his promise in a timely manner.
I open my mouth to ask Tiam. Then I change my mind. Bringing up my return to Earth always pisses off Koah. I am just going to ease Tiam into it.
“I will see you in Merim tomorrow, right?” I ask. “By the way, my name is Ava. Ava...Smith.”
I swear his eyes bug out of his head at ‘Smith.’ One day, I’m going to figure out why they all do that.
“My Ava,” he says, dreamily. “Yes, you will be mine tomorrow in Merim.”
“You mean you hope I’ll accept you?”
“Yes.”
Maybe part of being an Oath Forger is that I have to pick a husband from among The Five? Easy. I’ll pick whoever is willing to return me home.
I eye Tiam for potential. No harm in feeling him out just a little. “If I asked you a favor, to help me do something, would you?”
“I would give my life for you, my Ava,” he says without blinking.
He opens his mouth to say more, but suddenly the connection is severed, and I’m looking at a blank screen. I know I didn’t hang up on him, and I’m pretty sure he didn’t hang up on me.
The next second, Koah bursts through the door. His eyes are wild; he leaps for me and grabs me by the shoulders, searching my face. “What did he do? Are you all right?”
“Um, we talked?” I roll my eyes. “Chill.”
When I pull back, he lets me go with great reluctance. He asks through gritted teeth, “What did he tell you?”
“He wanted me to transport to his ship.”
Koah is nearly cross-eyed with outrage. He looks as if the top of his head is about to blow off.
“I said no.”
He is breathing heavily. “Thank you, Ava.” Then he calms, gathers himself, and his breathing evens. “What else did you tell him?”
“Not much. We only talked for five minutes.”
He looks as if he wants to grab me and wrap his arms around me, but he holds himself back. After another few seconds, seeing that I am all right, he calms down some more.
Then a speculative gleam comes into his eyes. “Were you in my bed when Tiam appeared on the display?”
Really? Seriously?
“No.”
Is that a disappointed grunt?
I can’t stop myself from saying, “If you’d like, the next time he calls, I can chat with him while sitting in the middle of the bed, naked.”
Koah looks so poleaxed, I regret teasing him.
“Ava.” His voice is hoarse. “You would take your clothes off for Tiam, but not for me?” He sounds as if his heart is bleeding.
“I was joking. I’m not taking my clothes off for Tiam. I swear.” Why do I sound so breathy?
Before I can figure that out, Koah pivots on his heel and strides out of the room. He’s back in under a minute, holding out a dark-blue crew uniform for me.
Yay. Not that my med unit tunic and pants are dirty. I think they’re made of some self-cleaning material. Still... New clothes. I’m too much of a girl not to appreciate the chance to try something different.
“Thank you. Now turn or leave.”
He turns.
I change.
And when he looks back at me... If it was hot in the room before, now it’s an inferno. Dark flames burn in his eyes and all but lick me.
Only then do I realize—stupid me—that we now have matching outfits. I’m wearing his colors. He hasn’t suddenly realized that my wardrobe could use a boost. He has marked me as his. Probably in case Tiam pops back on the screen again.
I want to say all kinds of things about that, but I can’t find the words.
The way Koah looks at me... God, the heat in his indigo gaze could melt the protective sh
ields right off the ship. It makes me remember kissing him, straddling him, rubbing my body over his...
I’m so swallowed up by some sensual haze of need, I don’t protest when he takes two steps forward. His scent of fresh ozone surrounds me completely. Of course, breathing him in makes my resolve only weaker.
His hands run up and down my arms, caressing. “My Ava.”
A soft sigh escapes my lips, as if I’ve been waiting to hear him say that again. Okay, so yes, maybe I have been.
His expression is conflicted, emotions flicker through his gaze in quick succession—jealousy, wonder, hunger.
His right hand comes up, and he runs the pad of his thumb along my jawline. I can’t breathe. Then that large, warm thumb rubs along my bottom lip. My entire body tingles.
“Accept me.” His voice is a soft growl that vibrates between my legs. “Surrender to me, my Ava.”
He looks at me as if his life depends on my answer.
The back of my knees hit the edge of the mattress. Apparently, I backed up all the way to the bed. His left arm slides around me, his palm between my shoulder blades, and he lowers me. He supports my weight as if I was no more substantial than the bedsheet, the whole move incredibly smooth and effortless.
Hot. Sexy. Very.
Then I am lying on the bed, and he hovers above me, supported on his hands on either side of my head. Holding my gaze, he leans down. His lips touch mine before I can decide whether to stop him.
I can’t cope with the way Koah kisses. It melts my brain. Kissing is definitely his superpower.
He lowers himself to his elbows, still keeping his weight off me, but now our lower bodies are touching. My legs open so he can lie between them. The next thing I know, that hard, hot length of his is pushing against the V of my thighs.
My knees come up on their own, until my thighs are cradling his hips. A low rumble sounds in his chest. I imagine a happy bear might sound like that, not that I’ve ever seen a bear, happy or otherwise.
He sucks my lower lip into his mouth and rakes over it with his teeth. Lightning courses through me. My body, having a mind of its own, arches against him.
Tentatively, experimentally, he rocks against my most private place. The pleasure is so sharp, I swear I levitate.
He could make me his, I realize. He could make me accept him. My body begs for him like it begs for its next breath. And I like this man, this president/king/warlord. I really like him.
He’s strong but kind, an exceptional warrior and leader, according to Captain Embrin. He is protective of me. He looks at me as if I’m the most important person in the world. As if I’m definitely the most important person in the world to him.
I could stay with him and never know hunger.
But how can he want me this much? It bothers me that I don’t know the source of his instant attraction, his overpowering need for me. Does he really care for me? Could I care for him? I feel I could.
Care? Yes. Love? No. I don’t believe in love.
I know this: I want him with every cell of my body. And I care enough about him already so that if something bad happened to him, I would grieve.
His tongue sweeps into my mouth in a silent claiming. I accept that, at least. My hands reach for his shoulders first, then cup his cheeks. He rumbles in approval.
Then I slide my fingers into those indigo locks, and he gives a dark moan of pleasure, taking my mouth even harder, fiercer, his hard length pressing between my thighs even more insistently. My body responds. Suddenly, I’m like some reasonless animal, overcome by passion, rubbing against him, feeling a delicious tension building toward a crest, some kind of release from this heat and strain. At this moment, I want that release at any price. My body demands it.
The alarm sounds. Red lights flash.
Koah’s face drops into the crook of my neck, and he breathes me in for a second while he gathers himself. Then he’s moving away.
“Strap yourself in.”
He’s gone the next second.
I still have no idea how to strap myself in or where, so I run after him.
I burst onto the command deck just in time to see the display screen change from an image of dozens and dozens of warships, floating protectively around us, to one giant ship popping up out of nowhere immediately in front of us, the cargo bay open. The next second we are jerked forward into the cargo bay, and our ship goes black, save for some emergency lighting.
“Systems off-line,” Captain Embrin calls out, her voice stiff with anger. “All instruments down.”
I can’t catch my breath. “What was that?”
Koah turns, closes the distance between us, and drags me into his arms, surrounding me like he’s some protective pod.
“You’re scaring me,” I say. “Please tell me what it is.”
His expression is a mix of fury and worry. I think the worry is for me.
He says, through gritted teeth, “We have been captured by pirates, my Ava. I’m sorry.”
Chapter Nine
MY LUCK CANNOT be this bad.
Koah’s arms are a steel cage around me. “I shouldn’t have announced your presence on our ship over the airwaves.”
Around us, the guards and the crew are arming themselves, everybody rushing around. Koah holds me still in the eye of the storm.
I pull away. “Can I have a weapon?”
“I’m going to protect you,” he promises as he takes an odd-looking gun his guard, Nilo, hands to him. It looks like a twig, except black and shiny, about six inches in length.
I guess he’ll have to protect me. I wouldn’t have the first idea how to make the twig thing work. I am, however, going to learn at the earliest opportunity.
Koah takes my hand and pulls me down the hallway. “Maintenance hatch. Cargo bay. Manual override.”
The rest of the crew is right behind us.
“Is it an unmanned ship?” he shouts back the question.
The captain answers. “I don’t know, Krek Koah. They uncloaked fast. Our systems went down the next second. I didn’t have time to scan.”
I look between the two. “What do you mean, unmanned?”
Koah opens a hatch in the floor and drops down. The electronic doors are probably not working. When I drop after him, he catches me. There are few emergency lights here. I can barely see. It doesn’t matter. When Koah sets me down, he keeps hold of my hand. Then he moves forward as if he knows the place blindfolded.
Finally, he answers my question. “Some of the pirate ships are remotely operated. The pirates overheard our communications. This was probably their ship closest to us.” He says something short and choppy, like swearing, in a language not included in my translator chip. “They have so much damn money, their technology is better than ours.”
“So you think they’re here for me? Because they think I’m the Oath Forger?”
We’ve reached a wall, and he’s pulling levers and setting dials. Then he crouches down, and his two guards come over to pry a panel out of the floor.
The guards drop down first, then Koah. This time, the bottom is a lot farther away. I hesitate.
He calls from the unknown. “I’ll catch you.”
I’m so scared I can barely breathe. I can barely hear him over the blood rushing in my ears. And then the lights go out in our ship completely, and I can’t see a damn thing.
I jump into darkness, into what I think is the pirate ship’s cargo bay.
Koah’s strong arms find me in the dark. He holds me close as he steps aside to let the rest of the crew escape. As soon as he sets me down and we’re moving forward, a couple of dim lights do come on. Maybe they’re motion activated.
An alarm sounds in the distance, startling me.
“Go! Go! Go!” the captain shouts over the noise.
I hear a hiss and feel a mist.
“Paralyzing agent!” The warning comes from our medic.
We are running across the bay. Then Etchin and Nilo are shooting at a grate in the wall. Ven
t unit? Even if it’s not certain safety, at least it’s not where the bitter mist is coming from. We dive in.
Narrow. Blind. Suffocating.
I’m used to dark tunnels, but this is damn tight. I scramble forward in breathless panic for several seconds before I notice that my eyelids are drooping. Soon I can’t feel my feet. But I can still move this way, so I do, on my hands and my knees.
“Are you all right?” Koah asks from in front of me, his words slow and slurred.
I don’t know how he is able to move through the vent. Maybe he’s hunching his shoulders.
“I’m okay.”
“Don’t stop moving.”
More shots ahead. I’m guessing the guard in front of us found the end of the vent and shot out that grate too. Then Koah is finally free and reaches back into the vent to pull me out. I watch with twitching, droopy eyes as the rest of the crew pile out behind me.
I count. We’re missing one.
“Haras dropped,” the captain says, her face grim.
I stumble toward the hole. “We have to go back for him.”
Koah hesitates. I can see the moment he decides that my safety is more important than Haras. He grabs my hand and drags me forward. “Can’t do anything for him now. We’re taking the ship. When we reach Merim, the medics there can help him. They’ll have an antidote. If not, they’ll create one.”
“We’re taking the ship?”
He pulls me closer to him. “Or die trying.”
“Please.”
Leaving the fallen man feels wrong. Nobody gets left behind, had been my mother’s mantra when she was a young single mother and had to drag two kids with her up to the surface for scavenging. Lily and I always knew that, no matter what happened, Mom would never ever go back down without us.
I dig in my heels. “What if the mist in the cargo bay paralyzes Haras completely? Permanently.”
Koah nods at his guards, Etchin and Nilo, and they shuffle back to the vents. The captain wants to go, too, but Koah orders her back. “I might need you when we reach the command deck.”
Our small group moves forward, all rubbery legs and stumbling feet. I have no idea how Koah knows which direction to go, but he does lead.