by Presley Hall
But you can’t, the small, insidious voice in my mind hisses at me. You’re banished. You’re alone. You’ll never fight for Kalix again. You’re not a true Kalixian anymore. You’re as good as dead to them.
I sink down onto my knees in the grass behind the boulder.
It’s better this way. I bow my head, trying to fight back the pain that comes with remembering. The last time the Orkun invaded, what did you do?
The cruel voice hisses through my head again, the harshness of it twisting in my gut like a knife.
You helped them. You deserve this. You deserve worse.
I reach up, touching the thin ridge of scar tissue at the back of my head.
I didn’t mean to do it. I never intended to help our worst, most vicious enemies. But that doesn’t change the fact that I did it. I am a traitor, and I am responsible for the loss of everything I once loved.
My parents are dead because of me.
I open my eyes, forcing myself to look up at the formation of ships high above me. And then I see something that makes me leap to my feet.
One of the Orkun ships has broken away from the others, but it’s clearly not a tactical move. The ship appears damaged, smoke pouring from its left side, and whoever is piloting it definitely isn’t in control. It nearly rolls over, veering wildly from side to side as it plummets downward away from the battle…
…and toward me.
Well, not toward me, exactly. My mechanical eye begins to whir, making calculations as I track the ship’s path through the air. It’ll crash close enough to my location that I’ll be able to reach it by foot. There’s no chance of it pulling up now. It’s too close to the tree line. But if anyone survives that crash…
I grit my teeth hard. I can’t ever go back to Jocia or fight alongside my people again, but there’s no way I’ll let an Orkun warlord crash in my woods and leave here alive. If anyone on that ship survives the landing, I’ll be there to finish them off before they can ever meet up with the rest of their deshing army.
A moment later, I hear the sound of the vessel crashing. The shrieking sound of tearing metal rises up as the trees rip it apart. Determined to make sure the Orkun on board are truly dead, I start to forge through the trees in the direction of the sound, all thoughts of hunting forgotten.
The trek to the crash site is mostly uphill, and I’m sweating lightly by the time I reach it, but the exertion feels almost like nothing these days, even in the heat of the afternoon.
It would be impossible to miss the ship. It lies like a beached gornu in the midst of the broken trees, the metal sheared down to the frame in one section, the blunt wings bent and twisted. The hatch is deeply dented, but I’m able to pry it open with some effort. As I swing it wide, I keep one hand firmly on the long knife at my belt, ready to attack if I see a sign of movement.
If there are any Orkun still alive, they won’t be so for long. I can feel my blood humming in my veins at the thought of battle, at the thought of taking any of those deshing monsters down.
I might not be able to fight for Kalix any longer, but I can still kill for her.
There’s only one Orkun on board that I can see. He’s clearly dead, his short, lumpish body twisted in a way that no creature could survive. His head hangs at an unnatural angle, and one leg has been nearly sliced off by flying metal.
I take a few steps farther into the ship, my thoughts switching from violence to what I might be able to salvage from the spacecraft for my home. In the years that I’ve lived in the wilderness, I’ve managed to build a remarkably high-tech house for myself by bartering and scavenging what I can. There’s likely some tech in this ship that would come in handy.
I don’t even see the ship’s second occupant until I almost trip over her. And then I freeze in place, looking down at the most beautiful female I’ve ever seen.
She’s injured and unconscious, but I can tell she’s alive. Her chest is faintly rising and falling under the tight, thin shirt she’s wearing, and I’m momentarily distracted. She’s dressed strangely for a female, in a shirt that blatantly shows off her curves, paired with tight trousers and heavy boots on her feet. Her hair is thick and dark, tangled around her ashen face and matted in places with blood.
I can see bruises on her pale skin, and rage bubbles up inside of me as I glance back at the Orkun’s body. Good, I think with satisfaction. It’s good that he’s dead. Not only because he’s Orkun, and they all deserve to die, but because I’m certain he’s the cause of those bruises.
Shifting my attention back to the female, I narrow my eyes.
Who is she? What is she?
She looks like a Terran woman to me, although I can’t be certain. I’ve rarely been off-planet, even in the time before my banishment, and I’ve never encountered a Terran in the flesh. I’ve only seen holos.
Whoever—or whatever—she is, I can’t leave her here. I’ll come back later to scavenge the ship. Her injuries can’t wait.
With that thought, I reach down to pick her up, careful not to jostle her too much. She’s not heavy, but I can tell that she’s strong. Her body is lean and muscular, similar to how Kalixian females are built—or were built, before the Orkun killed nearly all of them. She’s smaller, of course, but she has the build of a warrior.
The feeling of her in my arms sends an almost unfamiliar ache through me, a feeling of desire that I taught myself to bury long ago.
And underneath that, there’s a deep pull inside my chest. I feel an urge not just to take her back to my home and see that she’s healed, but to protect her. To keep her safe… and at my side.
Mine.
The word pierces through my mind, as clear as if I’d said it out loud. The thought seems foolish—why would this woman belong to me? She may not even survive, and even if she does…
Why would she want me? I have nothing to offer anyone anymore.
But it’s all I can think of as I trek through the woods with her in my arms, intent on getting her to safety and doing all I can to see that she does survive. The idea of her dying now seems more painful than it should, as if her passing would be a deep loss.
You’re just afraid of failing yet again. Of letting someone else die when you could save them.
The thought is all the more cruel because it’s true, and I grit my teeth, bowing my head and moving as quickly as I can through the forest. Once the woman is in my healing pod, I’ll be able to take my mind off all of this. Off my past failures.
The healing pod is something I built myself, made from parts that I bartered for in the small towns that dot the Kalixian landscape. With my home so deep in the wilderness, I’m far away from even the most rudimentary of medical care. The knowledge that I was on my own for any injuries or illnesses I might sustain drove me to build the pod as quickly as I could. It’s small and not as ornate as those in the med bay back at the palace, but it gets the job done.
I know nothing of Terran biology, if that’s what she truly is, but I gently set her in the pod anyway, hoping for the best. I doubt it can harm her, and it’s the best chance she has.
Carefully, I strip off her boots, the strange pants, and the thin shirt, then attach the pads to her skin that will allow the tubes and wires of the pod to do their work. I try to do it as clinically as possible, not allowing myself to linger over any part of her body for too long, but that’s almost impossible.
It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a female of any species, but it’s not just that. I can’t remember ever seeing any female, Kalixian or otherwise, as beautiful as this woman. Despite her cuts, bruises, and injuries, her pale body looks like perfection to me. My gaze traces the lines of the muscles in her arms and abdomen, her lean and strong thighs, and the curves of the breasts, which are covered by some kind of strange fabric contraption.
My cock stirs as I look at her, and I swallow hard.
I was no saint like my younger brother, Khrelan. He held tightly to the Kalixian tradition of waiting for one’s mate bond, refu
sing to do more than kiss a female when we were young.
I was not so careful.
There were a few women who didn’t care to wait for the bonds either, and I was one of the men eager to avail myself of their charms. After all, I didn’t want to disappoint my future mate, did I? Better I have some experience, I reasoned, so that I could please her. I got a bit of a reputation in Jocia as a young man, one that amused my father and worried my mother, but back then, I didn’t care.
Sometimes in the past fifteen years though, I’ve almost envied my younger brother his innocence. He’ll never have a mate now, that’s certain, but he also will never truly know what he’s missing. There have been nights where I’ve lain awake, aching for the touch of a female, the need so strong that it’s almost painful. It doesn’t matter how many times I take care of the urge myself. It’s not the same, and it never will be.
It’s the only part of my isolation that I’ve truly struggled with.
I look down at the woman in the pod again, fighting back my desire. I’ve never forced a woman, and I never will. It doesn’t matter how much I’m drawn to her, I won’t touch her without her consent, and I have no reason to think that she’d give it. Maybe once upon a time, when I was a different man, she would have.
But not now.
I turn away with a soft growl. The pod is activated and doing its work now, so I’m not needed. There’s nothing stopping me from getting a jug of the sweet, fermented grain beverage that I’ve learned to make myself and taking it back to my room. I could drink it down, relieve my aching, rigid cock, and then pass out into sweet oblivion for a number of hours. The woman will be fine, or she won’t, but it will be days before I’ll know for certain.
I’m halfway to my room, jug in hand, when I turn back toward the room at the back of the house where I can hear the faint whir of the pod’s machinery.
Why do I feel like this?
The pull to go back to her is strong, enough to override the throbbing in my groin and the deep need to forget everything about today. Enough to make me curse under my breath and set down my drink, walking back to check on her and make sure that she’s still breathing.
I wind up sitting on the chair next to her, watching the rise and fall of her chest as she breathes, hoping that the pod will do its job. That she’ll survive.
She must.
For the next three days, when I’m not out hunting for food, I’m watching the woman in the pod.
The fight in the skies above Kalix has ended, and the Orkun appear to have been driven off. I don’t know how long it will last, but I’m relieved to know that my people are safe for the time being. And with that knowledge secure in my heart, all of my worry shifts to the woman I found.
Her healing is slow, and I curse the rudimentary tech I was forced to use to create the pod. If she were in a med bay in Jocia, I’m certain the process would be faster.
But the pod is working, and ultimately, that’s all that matters. She is healing.
As her injuries repair themselves bit by bit, I find myself talking to her. I know she can’t hear me—and probably wouldn’t understand me even if she did—so I speak freely. I tell her things that I haven’t spoken of in years, for the sheer pleasure of speaking to another living being. Sometimes the things I talk about hurt, but in a way that feels good too. It feels like a different kind of release, as if some of the weight that has settled firmly on my shoulders eases just a bit.
Late in the afternoon on the third day, I open the pod to check her vitals and be sure that the device is still functioning properly. She’s almost completely healed. Her wounds have knitted back together, and the bruises on her skin are fading. She might have some scarring, but nothing disfiguring, and I’m certain now that she’ll live.
The scent of her overwhelms me as I lean over her—the sweet, warm smell of her skin, faintly salty with sweat.
I can’t help myself.
As if drawn by a force greater than my own mind, I lean over her still form, dropping my head close to her neck and breathing in the scent of her skin and hair.
4
Jade
I feel like I’m floating in warm water.
It’s nice.
Everything is fuzzy, and nothing seems real. I’m in a sleep so deep and peaceful, so comforting, that I don’t really want to wake up. But I am, little by little, coming out of the dream that I’ve been in for what feels like a very long time now.
In the dream, there was someone else here, someone I couldn’t see, someone I didn’t know. But I could smell him—the scent of trees and woods, dirt and leather and warm male flesh. I could hear him too. His voice was deep and soothing, speaking words I couldn’t understand in a strange accent. But somehow, I wanted to keep listening to it. It didn’t seem to matter that I couldn’t understand, only that he was here.
And now, as I slowly wake, I can feel something else—warm breath on my neck, and that same scent of leather and forest and male flesh. I can feel the warmth of arousal flooding me, making my body feel tight and eager, the pain that came before forgotten. There’s a deep ache between my legs, and I can feel a knot of desire in the pit of my stomach, an aching need throbbing in my veins. It has something to do with the breath on my neck and the scent in my nostrils, but I don’t quite know why. I only know that with the wanting comes another feeling.
One that I never let myself feel anymore.
I feel safe.
My eyelids are heavy and sticky as I open them slowly, the world around me blurry at first, but as it all comes into focus, I see a face in front of mine, just a few inches away.
It’s a man. An incredibly handsome man.
The realization comes to me like a shock, but the truth is, he’s like no man I’ve ever seen before.
I take in his features in a daze. He has long, wavy black hair with black horns rising out of it, and a long scar running down his chiseled, bronzed face. One of his eyes is a beautiful, shining silver, and the other is a strange blue color. The scar is running over the blue eye, from his eyebrow over the socket and down across his high, sharp cheekbone. Tattoos decorate his arms and chest, the dark shapes swirling over his skin.
I have no idea who this strange man is, or why I’m here. And then, as I fully wake up, the memories come rushing back in a dizzying wave.
The payday loan building. The strange light. The guards. Alkul. His fighter ship. The cage, the starvation, the threat of him forcing me. The battle… and the crash.
This man doesn’t look like Alkul or the other aliens who held me captive, but I’m not taking a single fucking chance. My body doesn’t hurt, and I can feel all of my limbs. I don’t know how the hell I survived the crash, but now that I seem to have healed, I’m getting the fuck out of here.
With every bit of strength I possess, I rear up and headbutt him as hard as I can.
The impact is so hard that I see stars for a second, but I shake the dizziness away as I yank the wires and tubing free of my body and leap out of the strange, clear, pod-like thing that I was lying in.
The man reels backward, staggering away long enough for me to realize three things.
I’m wearing only my underwear.
I don’t know what he’s done with my clothes.
And the house I’m standing in is one of the strangest places I’ve ever seen. A rustic cabin with some of the most alien-looking tech imaginable.
The man moves toward me, recovering from the blow, and reaches out to grab my arm. I react instantaneously, lashing out at him with a punch aimed directly for his jaw. He dodges with a quickness that would be admirable if he wasn’t my adversary and tries to grab me again. He manages to evade my second punch too, and then his arms go around my waist, picking me up as I punch, kick and scratch at him. He’s stronger than anyone I’ve ever encountered, but I’m not going down without a fight.
I lurch backward in his arms, throwing him off balance, and we both go down, landing on the hard wooden floor. His body is pinning
me down, and I do what I’ve been trained to—thrust my hips upward to dislodge him, wrapping one leg around his back. I kick at his hip with my other foot, pushing myself back, and wrap both legs around his neck.
Gritting my teeth, I hook one ankle over the other in a grappling headlock in a desperate effort to choke him out. My blood is racing, my heart pounding, more so than it ever has in a fight. Because this isn’t just to win a prize, or for accolades in the ring.
This is real. This is for my life.
Adrenaline rushes through me. The only thought in my head is to knock him out so that I can escape. I tighten my thighs around his neck, arching my hips up to get a better angle.
He makes a low, deep sound in his throat, something that at first sounds like anger. And then, to my shock, he turns his head and sniffs deeply at me—his face almost touching my crotch.
Surprise at what he just did makes me freeze in place. But even more than his action, I’m taken aback by the rush of arousal that sweeps through me in response.
I never in my entire life imagined anyone doing that to me, but it’s so deeply primal that it sends a wave of desire through my blood, making my skin flush hot. I’m suddenly aware of how very intimate this is, of how close we are right now. I’ve never gotten turned on while fighting before, no matter how close I was to a trainer or a competitor.
But now all I can think of is every spot on my body that’s touching his, and how much closer we could be if I let him.
I’m wet, I realize suddenly, embarrassment mixing with the lust. Oh my god. That’s why he sniffed me. I’m so turned on that he can smell it.
My panties are slightly damp, the thin cotton clinging to my overheated flesh, and the man between my legs lets out another of those low, deep sounds, this time unmistakably a growl. He presses his face against me, nuzzling between my legs as he breathes me in, and I’m so shocked that my grip loosens as another powerful wave of arousal washes over me.
Why is this turning me on?