by Mary Auclair
Whatever had been going on in the Breeding Facility had turned these people into the half dead group they were now.
“Stay behind,” Aliena told Kamal in a low, soft voice, so as not to scare the humans. “They can’t have non-humans close to them. Not yet.”
Kamal’s silence was her only answer.
Aliena moved slowly, approaching the group cautiously, showing her empty hands. Her eyes locked on the old woman as she did. As she got nearer, she smelled them. They reeked of unwashed bodies, soiled diapers and sickness. They reeked of hunger and desperation. Her eyes watered from the stench as she crouched down, close enough to the woman to touch her.
“My name is Aliena. We came here to free you.”
The woman blinked suddenly shiny eyes. Her wrinkled lips pulled together, and she gave a slow nod.
“What happened here?” Aliena turned her head, meeting the dull stares of children and old men and women.
“They left.” The old woman’s simple answer pulled Aliena’s eyes back to her. “They took all those who were deemed important—the young women and men, all the girls. The rest of us, they locked up in here. They didn’t need us anymore.”
“They just left you to die?” Aliena’s voice died down until she was whispering. “How long ago?”
“A few weeks. Maybe a few months. It’s hard to know. They left a bit of food and water but it didn’t last long. Not with the little ones who were so cold.”
Silence fell between Aliena and the old woman. The immensity of the crime committed by Minister Knut and his men was too great. No words could paint the horrors these innocent people had endured as the owners of the Facility left them behind.
“It’s good that you came, even if you came too late.”
The old woman’s eyes slid down to the small boy, the pain so obvious in her faded eyes that it shred Aliena’s heart into pieces. She watched the sunken eyes flutter open, then close. The child was still alive, but barely.
“We will help you.” Aliena reached for the woman’s hand, closing her own around the stone-cold skin. “We have food, medicine. Enough for all of you, all of us. You will never be locked up again.”
The old woman wrapped her other hand over Aliena’s, then her eyes widened. She drew in a sharp breath, staring at Aliena’s face like she was seeing a ghost.
“You’re one of those who escaped, one of those who followed Markus.” The woman reached for Aliena’s face, her wrinkled, soft fingers tracing the line of her cheekbone. “You’re Leenia’s daughter, aren’t you?”
The shock made Aliena fall on her ass. Her mother’s name, spoken by this stranger, was the last thing she expected to hear.
“You knew my mother?”
“She wanted you to be free so much.” The woman smiled softly. “She would be glad to see you survived.”
Grief and other emotions coiled in Aliena’s throat, preventing her from saying the words she wanted to say.
The old woman’s eyes suddenly grew larger and she hugged the child in her arms closer, trying to shield him from something over Aliena’s shoulders.
“Is that all that’s left of them?” The male voice coming from behind her was unusually soft, but she would recognize it in a million.
She turned her head and met Kamal’s gaze. His face was carefully neutral, but his eyes gleamed with emotions that matched her own in ways she could not even think about. He kept a respectful distance, but had taken a number of steps ahead of his troops.
Markus. I have to find out what happened to him.
Aliena nodded to him, silently telling him she wasn’t about to lose her mind, even if she desperately wanted to.
“Are there others here with you?” She looked at the old woman again.
Quietly, the old woman shook her head. “They rounded us up. Divided us into two groups. I don’t think there’s anyone left.”
Just like that, Aliena knew. Markus wasn’t there. Still, she needed to ask.
“Markus came back for you. He brought men from the village, wanted to free more of you. All of you.”
“Markus and the others came.” The woman nodded, but sadness filled her eyes. “They weren’t able to do much. They were caught.”
Aliena’s face became numb. This was the worst case scenario, the one Markus would have wanted to avoid at all costs. Because being caught alive meant they were going to be interrogated. And with the right methods, anyone would talk. Not willingly, not at first, but anyone could be made to talk.
They could rip a person’s brain apart trying to extract information, and the information they wanted was worth a fortune. Each one of them was worth a fortune.
It doesn’t matter anymore. We’re never going to hide again.
Forcing herself to push away the enclosing darkness that threatened to swallow her whole, Aliena looked at the old woman. Such strength she sensed there. Such resilience.
She couldn’t fail her. She couldn’t fail any of them.
“Come with us. You have nothing to fear anymore.”
As the words left her mouth, she knew they were a lie.
Kamal
His crew stood quietly behind him. That was all right with him. There was nothing to say, anyway. Most of them had never seen such a terrible sight, apart from Marmack. It would haunt them, he knew. Nightmarish visions from the past still haunted his sleep, even after all these years.
Only he and Marmack alone had entered the holding cells on that day when Tailan had changed the course of his life. Only they had seen the terrible state of the Cattelan younglings and females in the bowels of the stronghold. Barely clothed bodies, just skin and bones, with eyes so devoid of hope, they weren’t even afraid. The bodies, piled in the corner of the room, were frozen stiff.
The humans left for dead in Minister Knut’s Breeding Facility were no less pitiful.
It had taken a few hours to escort all of them back to the human village using the small hover transport from the Mellark’s hold. Most of the elderly could not walk such a long distance, and the children were too exhausted and too cold.
The survivors now sat in small groups around blazing fires in the village square, elderly males and females holding a few painfully thin younglings on their knees. Four of them had to be taken to Wyol and were now being treated for severe dehydration and malnutrition, but they were expected to recover fully in the next few days.
Minister Knut’s decision to evacuate only the most valuable subjects in the Breeding Facility and leave the others to die was startling in its cruelty.
Cruel, yes, but also ruthlessly shrewd.
The survivors, all thirty of them, would have been dead in a day—two at the most—if Kamal hadn’t agreed to raid the facility. A convenient loss to show the Ring Council that humans could not fend for themselves. All evidence of their mistreatment would surely have been erased.
It was the perfect crime.
Anger shot up inside his chest, cold and sharp, taking the form of his hatred for the male behind the shiny facade of the Breeding Facility. An acute pain shot through Kamal’s hands and he looked down, startled to see bright red blood on his palms. He swallowed, pushing saliva down a suddenly parched throat, then concentrated to retract his talons inside his fingertips.
Knut. I will end you for this.
Never in his life had he felt such hatred, such cold, all-encompassing loathing towards another living being.
A thin, quick shape attracted his attention and he immediately recognized Aliena as she hurried to a small group of huddled figures. Faces lifted up to her, eyes full of gleaming hope in the midst of their despair as soon as she approached, a smile and soft words on her lips.
He saw her for what she was, then. A true leader, one people turned to in their hour of need. Unlike Martin, who surrounded himself with the fittest men, the best hunters, Aliena cared for the weakest. The young, the sick, the old. Those in need of protection.
Mine.
The word came to him, but instead of
being laden with lust, it was filled with pride. Kamal watched her move and work, fragile, yet strong. So female, it made his body ache just looking at her.
He knew then that he would not try to leave. There was nothing he could do to halt his growing devotion to the female his body had recognized as mate.
He would have to deserve her. Somehow, he would have to make Aliena see there was more to him than a criminal, an amoral outlaw.
He moved, barely conscious of what he was doing, walking toward Aliena and the small group of survivors she was caring for. A plan had half-formed in the back of his mind. A way to prove to her he was not the scum pirate she thought him to be.
“You should leave her alone.”
A male voice made Kamal stop. He turned to stare at Martin, the human male who had the unofficial leadership of the free human village.
“Leave Aliena alone.” Martin crossed his arms and shot a quick glance at the group of human males standing a few paces behind him. “She doesn’t need you anymore.”
Again, Kamal saw it in the other male’s eyes. That mean streak, the possessive edge in Martin’s voice. A growl started low in his throat but he stifled it. This one wasn’t a challenger, not really. A small threat, maybe, but not a rival.
“I don’t remember Aliena telling me you speak for her.” Kamal controlled his voice but didn’t bother to soften his facial features as he grinned, exposing his fangs. The other male’s eyes grew wide with fear. “As a matter of fact, I don’t remember being told you had any authority in this community.”
“Well, I do. Since Markus isn’t here, I’m the chief. Any human who wishes to challenge me is welcome to do so.”
“Humans have historically elected their leaders,” Kamal said through clenched teeth. He disliked this human male more and more, found him to be weak-minded and aggressive, quick to lash out. “There are dangers to establishing a strength-based hierarchy for humans. You’d be vulnerable to any others who came and physically challenged you, for one. Under the Ring’s law, the mate of any human female could easily do so, human or not.”
The threat was there, barely veiled, and Martin blanched at it. The Ring’s laws were set for all, and soon he and the rest of the human community would have to face them.
“We’ll have an official election soon enough.” Martin pressed his lips together. “Then I’ll be rid of you.”
“I secured the exclusive contract to provide the human population with goods for five years if my crew and I attacked and liberated the Breeding Facility. You will be seeing me for a long time.”
“You’ve been given a contract?” Martin’s slim face contorted with incredulity. “By whom? Aliena?” He scoffed, his mouth twisting with a disgusted smirk. “She led you on. She has no authority to give out any contract. Her uncle might have, but he wasn’t there, was he?”
The ugly smirk in Martin’s face widened. Kamal felt anger rise, slow and steady, inescapable. It boiled right under the surface and he flexed his fingers out reflexively.
Martin’s eyes trailed down to Kamal’s hands and his face lost all color. The human took a few hasty steps back, his eyes still locked on Kamal’s now fully extended talons.
“Then I guess I’ll have to retrieve Markus, now won’t I?” Kamal exposed his fangs, not bothering to hide the threat under a grin. “That way, the humans will have a legitimate leader.”
“You’re nothing but a criminal. Scum.” Martin’s voice was weak with fear.
“Then I suggest you do not test this outlaw’s patience.” Kamal looked down at his talons, folding and unfolding his fingers, showing the deadly weapons, then set his gaze on Martin again. “You might not find me and my crew to be tolerant to your threats. A deal was struck, and now a debt is owed. You only have a choice in the matter of how you wish to repay it.”
The words had Martin’s friends shaking with fear. As one, they quietly slipped away, deserting him like the cowards they were. Martin looked behind him to see his so-called friends walking away without meeting his eyes. He turned back to Kamal, and what was in that male’s stare was a look of pure hatred.
Without waiting, Martin walked away, following his friends in retreat. Kamal watched them, wondering how mad the human male was. And just how desperate he was to get his hands on Aliena.
The thought made him growl.
“Too bad you can’t scare some sense into him. He could use it.”
Kamal turned to see two large, velvet brown eyes. Aliena had snuck up on him, so close he could smell her on the frozen air, the sweet scent of her pheromones lacing the breeze like a magnet. Once again, he was stunned at the beauty of her, the perfection of her dark honey skin, the enticing mass of her black hair falling in disorderly tangles over her shoulders.
She was perfection made female, the ultimate temptation. Need pulsed in his veins, coursing through his body as the Mating Venom dripped from his fangs. The impulse to take Aliena and link her to him nearly blinded him and he closed his hands into fists, hoping the agonizing pain of his talons piercing his palms would distract him long enough to regain control of his senses.
I can’t fight it any longer.
“I can’t let Martin take control of the village.” Aliena’s face was strained with the pull of her fatigue. “He’s not who I thought he was. He doesn’t care about them; the old, the children. All he cares about is how much power he has.”
“You have support amongst your people.” He couldn’t look away from her neck, the pulsing base of it. “You could win them over easily.”
“No.” Aliena shook her head. The pink tip of her tongue showed briefly as she bit her lower lip. “They won’t back me. They won’t follow a woman.”
Her dark eyes hardened and she inhaled deeply, then seemed to gather her strength.
“We need to get him back. We need Markus.”
He knew what she was asking, but it was an impossible feat.
“Minister Knut could have brought those humans anywhere. Midnight God, he could have sent them to a hundred different planets. It would be like searching for a single blade in Eokim’s grassland.”
“I know where they were sent.”
Aliena took another step closer and Kamal felt the heat of her body in the air. A dangerous ripple traveled down his skin, all the way to the aching pulse in his groin.
“The survivors said they were sent to Aveyn, his own personal planet. That is where Markus is.”
It took a supreme effort for Kamal to shed the fascination of Aliena’s full, moist lips, but slowly, his brain grasped the importance of the information she’d just given him.
“Minister Knut evacuated the humans to his own personal estate?” Kamal passed a hand over his skull in an instinctive gesture. “When they just gained temporary status in the Ring? That is illegal. If he’s found out, he’ll have Prime Councilor Aav to answer to, and believe me, a Mantrilla does not take an insult on her authority lightly.”
“So does this mean you’re going to go after them?”
Hope was there in her features, under her skin, as relentless as she was.
“Yes.” The word left his mouth, sealing his future. “I will go after your uncle on Minister Knut’s estate of Aveyn.”
It was as if Aliena had received a blow. Her eyes widened and her mouth gaped open. She stood there, breathless for a few seconds, then jumped.
She landed in his arms before he could move away. The shock of her supple woman’s body suddenly meeting his own almost made him fall on his ass. The impact ran along his veins and arteries, skittering inside his bones, leaving a mark on the fabric of his very being.
He buried his nose inside the lush mass of her hair, inhaling her scent. Mating Venom dripped on his tongue in a steady flow, pushing fire down his body.
His hands closed around her waist, pressing Aliena against him, molding her to his body in all the right ways.
It would be so easy. He could take her right here, in front of her people, as his instinct told him to.
No.
Still holding her small waist between his fingers, he pushed her away from him. Aliena looked at him, surprise clear on her face.
“When do we leave?”
Kamal found himself stunned into silence. How could she think he would allow her to come along on such a dangerous mission? He shook his head, frowning at her.
“When do we leave? You’re getting that all wrong, Little Bird.” Shock gave way to anger when Aliena lifted her brows in defiance, crossing her arms over her chest and tilting her head at the same time. “You’re staying here, where you can do the most good. I’ll go hunt the humans on Minister Knut’s estate.”
His words seemed have an impact on Aliena, who unfolded her arms. Uncertainty spread across her features.
“I can’t leave my uncle’s rescue to you—to anyone. I can’t wait here like some damsel in distress.”
“Your place is here, with your family, your people. They need you to protect them. That idiot Martin cannot ensure their safety in the dangerous times to come.”
His words drew lines of understanding across Aliena’s face. He saw the exact moment where she accepted what he was saying, accepted her role in this.
“I will retrieve your uncle and bring him and the others back.”
Aliena held his stare, her pure eyes like windows to her soul. She nodded, the gesture simple, yet laden with the depth of a new trust she was putting in him. A few seconds later, he broke the contact, turning away to walk past his troops. Back to the Mellark, back to the only life he had known for over a decade.
I will come back for you. And then, I will take you.
Chapter 9
Aliena
Night had descended on the village, and Aliena sat on a wooden bench in front of the roaring fire, her aunt Elise at her side inside the mudhouse. The boys were fast asleep, as were the two survivors from the Breeding Facility whom Elise had decided to shelter.
Both women stared at the golden flames, wrapped in their own thoughts, silence thick and heavy in the air, settling between them like a thousand miles.