Possessed

by Tana Stone

  A momentary lapse, I told myself. As gorgeous as he was, I could not let myself fall for him. Even though a part of me wanted to know what it would be like to surrender to someone as big and powerful as him.

  “No way can the first guy you sleep with be a warlord of the Vandar, Astrid,” I whispered, as I sank onto the foot of the bed. It was absurd, although everything about the situation was ridiculous.

  I still didn’t understand why he’d taken a prisoner when the Vandar didn’t do that. Why had he brought a woman on board when it was obviously not done? And why me, of all people? There was nothing special about me.

  If he’d taken my sister, I would have understood. Tara was beautiful and strong, and a fitting match for a Vandar. But me? I shook my head. None of this made any sense.

  Before I could slip down the familiar rabbit hole of self-doubt, I heard the sound of blaster fire outside the door. I stood quickly. That wasn’t right. The ship had landed, along with the rest of the horde of Vandar spaceships, and as far as I knew, the crews were busy whoring and drinking. Raas had said there would be some warriors left on board in case I needed anything, but I couldn’t imagine why they’d be firing weapons.

  Loud shouts and the pounding of heavy footsteps made my eyes dart around the room. Was the ship being attacked? I knew there were plenty of aliens who would love the chance to turn the Vandar over to the Zagrath, and taking a Vandar horde would be a particularly impressive haul. But Raas Kratos had seemed confidant they were landing on a safe planet. Not only that, but the Vandar flew using their invisibility shielding, so it would have been impossible to follow them. So, who was firing outside in the corridors?

  The dim lighting flickered and then went out, plunging me into total darkness. The panel by the door also went dark, which meant I couldn’t call for help.

  “Just great,” I said under my breath.

  More sounds of blasters and screaming came from the other side of the door, then there was silence. I held my breath, waiting for more noise, but there was nothing. Had the attackers gone? Had the Vandar fought them off?

  After a few minutes, I smelled the distinct scent of smoke drifting underneath my door. Was the ship on fire? Panic clawed at my throat. Who knew I was in here? Was anyone still alive to get me out, or had all the Vandar been killed and the attackers gone? If they’d decided to burn the ship instead of capture it, I was as good as dead.

  I gathered my voluminous dress in one hand and made my way forward, extending my other arm so I wouldn’t walk into a wall. When I’d reached the other side of the room, I groped until I found the door.

  “Here goes nothing,” I said to myself as I pressed both hands against the seam of the door and pulled back as hard as I could. To my surprise, it began to open. The loss of power must have disengaged the locking mechanism.

  I pulled until I’d made a space wide enough to fit through, and I eased myself out of the room. When I was in the corridor, I saw faint emergency lights glowing on the floor, so I started to follow them away from the smell of smoke.

  Taking careful steps, I made my way down one staircase, pausing when I heard the echoing of footsteps approaching. I didn’t know if they were Vandar or attackers, so I ducked down a darkened hallway, holding my breath as the sound got closer.

  “The Raas’ quarters must be here somewhere,” a gravelly voice said, as the group stopped not far from me.

  “If we hadn’t disengaged the power, maybe we could have found them faster,” another voice said.

  “We had to do that to stop the fire,” someone else snapped.

  “Who thought it would be a great idea to shoot the electrical systems to start the fire?”

  A loud grunt. “Enough! We don’t have time to stand around arguing. We have to find the female before the Vandar realize we’re here and return to the ship. If we haven’t gotten her by then, we’re as good as dead.”

  My pulse quickened. These attackers were here to find me? Had my sister sent a crew of rescuers after me? Or had she alerted the Zagrath Empire that one of her crew was illegally taken and they’d sent a crew? Either way, I was rescued. I let out a long breath, preparing to step out and reveal myself.

  “So, do we take her or kill her?” the first voice asked.

  I froze. Kill me?

  “We take her, and then dispose of her. We can’t leave the body here. Those were the orders.”

  “Then let’s go,” one of the aliens sighed. “I want to get this job done and get the hell off this ship.”

  They ran off, passing me huddled in the dark with one hand pressed tightly over my mouth so I wouldn’t scream. Why were these attackers here to kill me? It made no sense. If they knew about me at all, why wouldn’t they be here to rescue me? Unless they wanted to take me and kill me to strike a blow against the Raas directly. But who of his enemies knew he’d taken me?

  I realized that my entire body was shaking as I stood in the dark. I tried to suck in deep lungfuls of air to calm myself, but knowing that a bunch of people were on the ship for the express purpose of finding me and killing me made it hard to breathe.

  For a brief moment, I wished Kratos was with me. He wouldn’t let anyone hurt me, and I had a pretty good feeling that whoever these alien attackers were, they wouldn’t stand a chance against him or his Vandar warriors. The only reason the attackers had been able to take the ship was because the Raas and his crew had left it.

  Where are you, Kratos?

  I would have given anything to see the huge warlord, even though I’d been angry enough to kill him not so long ago.

  More footsteps echoed, and I pressed myself against the wall, glad I was as petite as I was. At least it was dark, and I was small. They would have a hard time finding me in a ship so cavernous. All I had to do was stay hidden until the Vandar returned to the ship.

  Suddenly, the lights within the ship turned back on. Even though it was still pretty dim, as was standard for the Vandar, I was no longer hidden.

  “You have got to be freaking kidding me,” I muttered to myself, glancing around the empty hallway.

  I needed to find a place to hide, and a hallway wasn’t it. Peeking around the corner and seeing that no one was coming, I made a dash for it. I ran on my tiptoes, holding my ridiculously full skirts up to keep from tripping.

  I rounded a corner and saw a wide hallway lined with steel barrels and stacked tall with boxes. From the other end, I saw the red glow of blaster fire and heard a cacophony of yells. Someone was coming. I didn’t know if it was the Vandar, or the aliens trying to kill me.

  I was out of time, and out of great options. Eyeing the row of barrels, I noticed a narrow space behind them and the wall. Sucking in my belly so much that it hurt, I wedged myself behind the steel barrels, crouching down so my head wouldn’t poke over the top.

  The battle was getting closer to me. My heart hammered in my chest as aliens ran by me. Even though it was almost deafening as the steel floors rattled and blasters fired, I held my breath for fear that one of them would somehow hear me. When I was sure they’d all gone, I released a breath.

  They’d gone. They hadn’t seen me.

  Then a hand closed over my wrist.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Kratos

  I ran through the narrow alleyways of the city toward the shipyard. My crew ran behind me, our pounding boots making the ground tremble and causing windows in the towering buildings to slam shut as we passed.

  We’d left the pleasure house in a matter of moments, the rooms emptying out as the battle cry was raised and warriors tugging on kilts as they’d thundered down the stairs. I hadn’t waited for anyone, drawing my battle axe and leading the way through the Jaldon city.

  “How did this happen?” I called over my shoulder to Corvak, who was close at my heels.

  “The boy said a small war party killed the guards and boarded the lead ship.”

  “Not the others?”

  “I do not think so, but I did not take much time to que
stion him, Raas.”

  I nodded and focused my eyes forward as the stone pillars fronting the shipyard came into view—along with a plume of black smoke rising from my ship.

  “Tvek!” I growled, when I saw the dark column curling into the air.

  Angry murmurs rose up behind me like a swarm of fury. We barreled through the gates and made short work of the hardpacked ground between us and my ship.

  I didn’t pause when we reached the wide ramp, but I raised my battle axe as we rushed up it. “Find the attackers. Kill them all!”

  My crew raced through the ship, ducking down corridors and up staircases in search of the invaders. I had one destination. I had to reach my quarters and make sure Astrid was unhurt.

  My heart skittered in my chest as I reached the door and saw that it had been forced open. Bile rose up in my throat, but I forced it down. The Zagrath had no reason to harm Astrid. If anything, they had probably been sent to take her back. For a moment, I regretted leaving her sister and the crew of the pathetic freighter alive. If I hadn’t been merciful, this would not have happened.

  I pushed the door open wider, rushing in and hearing a click behind me. I pivoted and dodged to one side, barely missing the blaster fire that warmed the tip of my ear. With a roar, I swung my axe and the soldier stumbled back. He clearly wasn’t used to hand-to-hand combat, and he fired again, even more wildly than the first time. The blaster missed me, but hit my headboard, searing a hole through one of the iron shields welded together.

  “That shield was over a thousand rotations old,” I growled, turning back to the soldier.

  His expression was terrified. I noticed that he didn’t wear the uniform of a Zagrath empirical fighter. Instead, his clothes were worn, and his blaster outdated. He had heavy ridges over his eyes and his skin was jaundiced. A Lussite. The race was known for being thugs, but not very good ones. I had never heard of Lussites daring to attack a Vandar horde before.

  I swung my axe again and knocked the blaster out of his hand, taking the tip of one finger with it. He screamed and clutched his hand as blood spurted from it.

  “Why are you here?” I raised my axe high, waiting for his answer.

  The soldier looked up, his face twisted in agony. “For the girl. We’re here for the girl.”

  I’d been right. They had been after Astrid. But they weren’t Zagrath. Not that the empire hadn’t been known to hire out for its less important missions.

  “How did you find us?” I asked, hearing the shake in my voice.

  “We were told the Vandar horde that took the human would show up at Jaldon, so we waited.”

  “Told?” I watched him cradle his hand and eye the blaster on the floor across the room. “Who told you?”

  He shook his head hard. “I don’t know. I don’t make the plans. I just do what I’m told and get paid.”

  So, mercenaries. My eyes went to his clothing again. Not very well-paid ones. I almost felt bad for killing this foot soldier.

  He used my hesitation to dive across the floor for his blaster. Without thinking twice, I brought my axe down across his neck. I did not feel bad enough about killing him to die for it.

  I was heaving when I spun around and took in the rest of the room. He clearly hadn’t found Astrid. Where was she?

  My quarters were spartan, and my furniture stark. There were very few places to hide. I strode into the bathing chamber, plunging my arm into the green water and then into the red, the only pools opaque enough to hide in. Nothing. My gaze quickly scanned the rest of the stone room, but the long counter and open shower did not provide any secret nooks.

  As I walked out of the bathing chamber, Bron ran into my quarters. His face was flushed and his hair sweaty. He glanced down at the body and the growing pool of blood on the shiny, black floor. “Where is the girl?”

  “Gone,” I said, the word like bile on my tongue. “She escaped from my quarters.”

  “She could have been running from them,” he said, pointing his axe at the dead fighter.

  “They were here to take her back.”

  A look of understanding crossed his face. “This was not an attack on the Vandar?”

  I gave a single hard shake of my head. “This was a rescue attempt.” I readjusted my grip on my axe. “One we must ensure is not successful.”

  “Yes, Raas,” Bron said. “We will find her. I will tell the warriors.”

  “She is not to be harmed,” I said, as he backed out of my doorway. “If she needs to be punished, I will be the one to do so.”

  I gave a final look at the dead Lussite on my floor as I stormed after my majak. If they had laid a hand on my female, they would all find themselves with one less head.

  The ship was filled with the sound of battles, and I knew that the screams were coming from the Lussite invaders as they were being hunted down by my crew. Soon the invaders would be eliminated, and we would send a clear message to anyone else who attempted to take what was mine.

  I walked through the empty hallways, listening for soft footfall or a female’s voice. She would not have been able to enter any of the other chambers without the proper code, so she was either with the Lussites, or she was hiding.

  Winding my way through the ship, I followed two of my warriors as they battled a group of invaders. Even though the Lussites fought with blasters, my raiders were highly skilled with their axes, and soon there were more alien bodies littering our corridors. As my warriors ran off to find more of the enemy, I stepped over the bodies and paused.

  Had I heard the last exhalation of death or something else? Turning slowly, I prodded at the bodies with my toe. No, they were truly dead. Then I peered over a collection of barrels waiting to be offloaded, and saw a flash of pale hair.

  My breath caught in my throat. Even though the space was tight, she’d managed to squeeze herself behind the barrels. She was hiding, and she was shaking like a leaf.

  I reached for her wrist to pull her up. She jerked away and attempted to back up, even though she was wedged tight.

  “I’m not going with you,” she cried. “Let go!”

  I lifted her up and set her down in front of me. “You thought you could escape from me?”

  She looked up at me, and her mouth gaped open.

  Before she could say anything else I scooped her up and tossed her over one shoulder. “Don’t you know by now that you are mine?”

  “I wasn’t running away from you,” she said, bouncing as I carried her back through the ship. “Well, at first I was, but then I wasn’t.”

  “You thought you’d leave with the mercenaries sent to rescue you?” My blood boiled as I walked faster. “You thought you would leave me?”

  “No.” She hit my back with the flat of her hands. “Will you stop for a second? That’s not what happened.”

  “I know they came for you.” I climbed a staircase, her body jostling roughly against mine. In a few long steps, I’d reached my quarters.

  “I wasn’t trying to escape with them, Kratos,” she said, slapping my back hard. “You’re being crazy.”

  I swung her down once I’d passed through my doors and crossed to my bed, pushing her backwards so she fell back onto the dark sheets. I loomed over her and planted my hands on either side of her face. “If I’m crazy it’s because you make me crazy.”

  Her eyes were wide. “I wasn’t hiding from you. I was hiding from the guys trying to kill me.”

  “Who do you think was trying to kill you, Raisa?” I was breathing hard as I hovered over her, every muscle in my body tensed with both rage and desire.

  “They were.” She waved a hand toward the body on my floor.

  I frowned at her. “You are not making sense, human. They were here to take you from me.”

  She pressed her lips together. “They were going to kill me. I heard them talking. They were paid to find me and take me off your ship and then kill me.”

  I stilled, the blood slowing as it coursed through my veins. “You are sure?” />
  “I heard them talking to each other. They didn’t know I was hiding nearby,” she said. “If I’d wanted to leave you, why was I hiding on the ship? I could have just run off.”

  I studied her face and saw no deception in her eyes. Plus, her words made sense. It had not been a rescue attempt. Someone wanted my female dead.

  Standing quickly, I dragged the dead Lussite from my quarters and dumped him in the corridor. When I returned, I closed the door and crossed to where she still lay on the bed, propped up on her elbows watching me.

  “Thank you,” she said, her voice trembling.

  “You are welcome, Raisa.” I leaned over her and stroked a hand down her cheek. “I will not let anyone hurt you. You are mine, and I will guard you with my life, as will every one of my warriors.”

  She drew in an uneven breath and nodded. “But someone doesn’t want me to be yours.”

  I lowered my body until it was flush with hers—my hardness pressing against her softness—bracing myself with my elbows so I didn’t crush her. “What do you want?”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Astrid

  I felt lost in his gaze as he stared down at me, his dark eyes flaring and molten. Surely, my heart was hammering hard enough for him to feel it in his own chest.

  “What do you want, Raisa?” he repeated, his words soft but urgent.

  I didn’t know what I wanted, but as crazy as it was, I knew he felt right. He also felt incredibly huge and hard as his body covered mine, and I was reminded again just how much bigger he was than me—everywhere.

  I cleared my throat. “What does Raisa mean?”

  His eyes flickered for a moment. “You want to know what Raisa means?”

  I nodded.

  “My lady,” he husked.

  “Oh.” I’d expected it to mean mate or concubine. I hadn’t expected it to be so…nice.

  “Are you?” He lowered his mouth to my throat and feathered a kiss across the skin where my pulse fluttered.

  I opened my mouth to answer but my mouth went dry as his tongue trailed up my neck to my ear. The only sound that came out of my mouth was a breathy whimper.