by T. S. Ryder
"What did she do to you?"
"She's experimenting. She wants to see how long it takes before we stop healing." He grunted as he slid off the table, right onto the floor. His eyes rolled into the back of his head.
"Get up," Libba said, tugging his arm. "You're no quitter, Brask."
A noise behind her made Libba turn. A dragoness stood in the doorway, her eyes gleaming. Brask moaned, struggling to get to his feet. A dark liquid began to run from his wounds.
"Stay away," he mumbled.
The dragoness ignored him, her eyes on Libba. "So you are the little human who cost my son his life. And you have proven yourself incredibly stupid. I was going to let you have a quick death, but now that I see you—"
There was a roar. Libba didn't see Brask lurch to his feet, but suddenly he was on the dragoness, fists flying. She twirled away from him, actually laughing–the bitch! A small knife flashed in her hand and she tore a strip of flesh from Brask's back as he stumbled into the wall. Libba snatched up her gun, but there was no way to fire without hitting Brask. If he was stunned, there was no way she was strong enough to lug him back to the ship. She trembled, helpless.
"It looks like threatening a Justice Warrior's mate fills him with fire," Nylæq observed, slicing at Brask again. "How are you still standing? Your injuries should be killing you. I wonder if you'll live long enough to see the human die?"
He roared, pushing himself from the wall, and turned. Once again the dragoness danced just out of reach.
"How should I kill her? Should I take her apart? Should I slowly disintegrate her to her atomic base? Should I—"
Brask's fist collided with Nylæq's chest. As she backed up, gasping, his fingers wrapped around Nylæq's throat. His lips curled back. The knife sunk deep into his ribs but even as he howled he squeezed tighter, twisting his body to force the dragoness down. Libba heard screaming as the knife sunk in again and again and realized it was her. Nylæq's eyes widened. She slashed at Brask's face. Blood spurted. Brask jerked her head one way and the other.
The dragoness kicked wildly and was still.
Libba dashed forward, grabbing Brask's arms. "We have to get out of here. Brask!"
He didn't seem to hear her. He was still squeezing the dragoness' neck. Libba cupped his face with her hands, having to use some force to turn his head towards her. His wild eyes met hers.
"It's done, it's over," she said. "You have to come with me, now. We have to get back to the ship. Brask. Come with me."
His gaze slid out of focus as he nodded. Libba pulled him to his feet, wrapping an arm around him. She knew that she couldn't support him if he fell, but tugged him along, putting one foot in front of the other. She wasn't going to give up. She wasn't going to let him give up.
God help her, she was getting them out of this place.
Chapter Ten
His wounds had longs since scarred over, but the internal damage from Nylæq's 'experiments' was taking longer to stitch itself back together. Brask lay on a couch, a book propped in his hands, wishing that Stlozyn healed just a little faster. At least they weren't as slow at healing as humans, though. Libba had given birth two weeks previously, and even with medical attention, she was still complaining about her tender parts. A dragoness would have been sore for a day or two, but by the end of the first week would have been fully healed.
The human, sitting across the room with her feet up, glanced up at him. "You're staring at me."
"Because you're so beautiful."
Somewhere in the kitchen, they heard Biryl groaning. "Don't. I can't stomach another one of your 'cutesy' moments."
"Cutesy?"
"It's a human word meaning so sweet it makes you sick."
Brask closed his book and sat up with difficulty. His skin pulled, making him gasp, and he put a hand on his chest.
"Are you okay?" Libba asked, her eyes widening.
"I'm fine. Just healing." He groaned. "I keep hoping that I'll remember how we got off of Nylæq's ship. I don't even remember killing her."
"I know." Libba gave him a sympathetic look. "I don't remember much after that myself."
She shivered, and Brask held out his arms to her. She moved from her chair and snuggled against him. She was so soft and fit into his arms perfectly. He closed his eyes and thanked the Creator for bringing her into his life.
"That's right, you two just sit there being all cutesy while I slave over making dinner," Biryl complained from where he was. "Doesn't bother me at all."
"Nobody asked you to stick around, you know," Libba reminded him, rolling her eyes. "You're the one who decided that we couldn't do anything without you. But you know what, women take care of babies by themselves all the time on Earth. We don't need your help."
Biryl snorted. "Here I am, aiding two criminals, and what thanks do I get? None, that's what I get. How would you like it if you had to take care of two people who couldn't take care of themselves while one kept insisting that she was fine? Except, of course, when she's complaining about how much pain she's in?" He glared at the two of them, and a pained look crossed his face when one little cry started two more from the nursery. "Make that taking care of five people."
"I'll get them," Libba said, standing.
Brask leaned back into the couch again. He would volunteer to go help his mate with the triplets himself, only it wasn't a good idea to pick up and carry the infants in his state. In a few more weeks, hopefully, he would return to peak physical condition. Until then, he had to take it easy.
"I tell you, one more day of this and I'm out of here," Biryl muttered. "I don't see how anybody survives as a parent."
Despite Biryl's complaining, Brask knew that he would never leave them. They probably didn't need help, not anymore at least, but it was far more than just a matter of getting day-to-day tasks done. The only reason any of them were still free and not sitting in a Stlozyn prison somewhere–or worse–was because Biryl had faked their deaths.
There was no way Brask would have been pardoned for killing Nylæq, despite the circumstances. Dying was the only way they would have a chance at living. A large part of the crew that had stood with him against Din had followed them to the planet they now lived on. It wasn't the most welcoming place, but it was survivable.
But what surprised Brask was that there were still newcomers arriving. The first ones had been farmers sent by Trafin, and like Brask they wanted a place where they could freely practice religion. The next batch were low-ranking scientists who wanted the same thing.
There was a risk that if people continued to flee to the planet the Science Board would find them, but Brask couldn't turn away people who wanted the same thing from life as he did. They did need a board of government, though, and would be holding elections soon. It was almost certain that Brask would be voted in, and he was already planning what to do with the colony when that happened.
Libba returned from the nursery, wheeling a basinet that contained their three babies, who were now all crying and flailing their fists. Brask heard Biryl mutter something about needing some silence to keep his sanity. His friend slipped from the house as Libba handed one of the triplets to Brask.
Struggling to comfort the other two, Libba retook the spot beside her dragon and sighed. "This is a little exhausting. It's a good thing I'm not a quitter, otherwise I'd go running to the Science Board just to get some sleep."
Brask smiled at her, rocking his son. Three healthy dragons, a little on the small side but still tough as nails. All three of the babies were a strange pinkish color, and the littlest one had fewer scales and more hair than the other two. Brask suspected he would end up a little more human than his brothers.
"If you had known what was going to happen when I suggested that you get pregnant by me, would you have chosen the same?" Brask asked hesitantly.
Libba didn't look at him. "Yes. But I would have decided to have your babies because I knew how happy I would be. Not because I was afraid of the Science Board. What about yo
u?"
"I'd have done it all again in a heartbeat. I have everything I ever wanted now. A family. A mate who respects my beliefs, even if she doesn't share them. A colony away from Bronæl where I can practice my religion, and where other like-minded individuals can gather." The baby he held stared up at him and he smiled. "And what about you? Are you happy?"
"Yes." Libba leaned against him, her cool gray eyes so full of warmth that there had to be a fire burning somewhere inside her. "Until I met you, I was a drifter. I'm not drifting anymore. You're my rock, Brask. The rock I will build my future on."
*****
THE END
Slave to the Alien Dragon
Description
A curvy slave fighting as a gladiator PLUS a hot dragon warrior fighting for his planet PLUS an enemy looking to destroy them!
The mighty, proud race of dragon shapeshifters, the Kinai, have kept to themselves, guarding their secrets from outsiders and living their lives in relative peace.
Then, an old enemy begins to haunt their shores yet again, searching for a way to defeat and enslave them so they can use their power to conquer the entire planet of Elamaren.
Commander Kenner of the elite Darkwing Squadron is his race’s greatest shield against those who would do them harm, but he finds his mission compromised when fate brings him face to face with the only Earthling on his planet – the big, bold and beautiful Teresa Echeveria.
The victim of an alien abduction, Teresa is sold away into slavery on the strange and amazing planet, all hopes of ever returning to Earth lost forever...
Forced to fight in the gladiatorial arena, she’s holding on to the last reserves of her will to keep going when Kenner swoops in on his majestic wings to save her.
But treachery and jealousy lurk in the shadows, and the unlikely lovers must fight for both their love and their lives against impossible odds. All they have left is their faith in each other... but will that be enough?
Chapter One
In a stone-walled underground cell with a small, barred window and a strong wooden door locked from the outside, a woman stood in front of a mirror of polished bronze and donned her weapons with meticulous care. She was tall and possessed the strong musculature of an active athlete generously padded with a thick layer of fat, most of it distributed on her ample breasts, stomach, backside and thighs, forming a voluptuous figure of eight. Her dark hair was cut a handbreadth under her shoulders and woven into a tight French braid. Her caramel skin boasted several scars, mementos of wounds made by swords, trigons and spears, all of them sustained within the past year, month and seventeen days, except the one on her right thigh. That one was from a bullet that grazed her in a drug bust in her rookie year at the Houston PD.
She wore armor made of layered brown leather. Many fighters preferred metal, but she found it too clunky. Leather was lighter, more flexible. It breathed, and was just as effective as steel, provided it was properly made. And hers was. No fighter ever stepped out onto the sands of the Pit of Wallaria unless they were of sound mind and body and properly equipped both offensively and defensively. Hers was a composite consisting of a scale cuirass with faulds made of wide leather strips, pauldrons on her shoulders, greaves on her legs, and vambraces with hand and elbow guards, the underside of each hiding a retractable dagger. Whereas the majority of other fighters used knives and daggers as secondary weapons, she used nothing but them, which is why she had a pair strapped to her forearms and her thighs, and over a dozen throwing knives stashed away in the secret folds of her armor.
Outside, she could hear the masses chanting.
“Hele! Hele! Hele!”
An understanding of the Common Tongue of Elamaren was one of the first skills she acquired since her abduction, but the name she had been given was a word of her mistress’ native tongue.
Hele.
Behemoth.
Pain shot through her, and she closed her eyes tight, counting backward from ten before she opened them again, looking at herself, at this person she had become to survive. She felt her heart clench.
“I am Teresa Luz Echeverría, of Houston, Texas, USA,” she said, in English, hard determination in her clear, deep voice as she willed herself to remember the one truth no one could take from her. She touched the bullet scar, the sole anchor to her old life. “I am twenty-seven, a human woman of the planet Earth. I am a soldier. I am a policewoman. I’ve survived foster care, high school, a tour in Afghanistan and six months of hazing my first year on the Force, and I’ll be damned if I won’t survive this, too. This wretched hive will burn to the ground one day... but I’ll still be standing.” Eyes firmly on the mirror, she repeated her mantra, in Spanish this time, and then again, in Pashto and Dari each.
They could take her from her home.
They could enslave her.
They could beat her, starve her, give her a derogatory name.
They could force her to fight others for their entertainment, and then slap a pleasure-collar on her and sell her to the highest bidder.
But they could not take who and what she was. Never.
“Listen how they call for you,” a smooth, lilting voice called out from the hallway, and Teresa mentally reminded herself that killing the woman the voice belonged to would be counterproductive to her goals. After unlocking and removing the beam that both closed and fortified the door to her cell, the door opened and two... well... let’s be generous and call them men, walked in. They were twins, and by far the largest of all the different sentient beings Teresa had become acquainted with since her abduction. They were at least a foot and a half taller than her and built of nothing but solid muscle. Their skin was a sooty dark gray covered in thin, coarse hair, and their enormous heads, which had large jowls and mean teeth that seemed to always be bared in a snarl, grew directly from their shoulders.
The Garn could be called many things, but easy on the eyes wasn’t one of them.
They positioned themselves on each side of the door, both dressed in chainmail and leather and armed to the teeth, watching her as if they couldn’t wait to be given the order to rip her apart.
But the woman who entered after them would never give that order, at least not while she could still make money out of Teresa.
She was the most beautiful creature ever created, a resplendent sample of the Skatian race. Tall, taller than Teresa, and built to willowy perfection, her features were exquisitely delicate, and her silvery hair, straight as an arrow, cascaded down her back all the way to her hips, always behaving perfectly, as if she were an anime goddess. Her skin was a powdery, pale beige hue that marked her as a member of the noble caste, flawless, and perfumed with a fresh, flowery scent Therese would’ve loved if she did not associate it with her current fate. The woman wore, as always, a long, flowing gown of gossamer silk in pale, pastel colors, strategically layered to tantalize the observer’s imagination yet reveal nothing, and no jewelry save for the long, layered necklace of painstakingly thin chains that cascaded from the graceful column of her neck to the tips of her demure bosom.
Her name was Esplyn of House Rida, and Teresa hated her with all the passion of the undying fire of a thousand suns.
“My Hele,” the woman cooed, as she observed her property. Teresa did not correct her. It was not worth the pain and humiliation of the punishment she would have to endure for it once the fight was over.
She’d learned that lesson the hard way.
“You must be very careful to put on a good show today,” her mistress instructed her, in the tone one would usually use on a mentally underdeveloped child, and petted Teresa’s cheek. “We have special guests in the audience today – a diplomatic envoy from Kinai – and we want them to have fun.” Her face scrunched in disgust. “Filthy barbarians,” she sneered but reverted quickly to her usual graceful serenity in a second. “But, alas, we must play nice with them,” she sighed, the sound of a long-suffering person resigned to their fate.
Personally, it made Teresa want to punch her (m
ore so than usually, that is). There were many people in Wallaria who deserved to feel sorry for themselves, but not this woman. As a scion of a noble family and the favorite lover of the High General, Lady Esplyn had lived a life of splendor and privilege since the day she was born, and probably would until the day she died. Even this – buying, training, and working slaves for Pit fights – was nothing but a hobby to her, a game to pass the time and indulge her sadistic urges.
But Teresa knew better than to say or do anything that would give her mistress any reason to be displeased with her, so she just stood there and waited to see if this conversation had a point.
And, when Lady Esplyn snatched Teresa’s chin in her spindly fingers and pulled her head up to face her, she knew she was about to find out.
“You must win today,” she ordered, in that cruel tone of voice Teresa knew to dread, “That bitch Sangra paid off the Pit Master to pair you with that Firuzian bitch-boy of hers, and I want to see you annihilate him. Do you understand?” Teresa nodded. She understood, perhaps better than her mistress thought. No matter how hard their masters tried to isolate and desensitize their fighters to prevent them from forming bonds amongst themselves or organizing a rebellion (as had been the case a few times in the past), they still found a way to communicate amongst themselves.
More to the point, though, her training had conditioned her to be observant, vigilant and always aware of her surroundings, and she gathered information in her head like an ant gathers food for the winter.
She knew, then, that the reason Lady Esplyn was on edge today was because her main rival in the High General’s bed, Lady Sangra of House Chenei, had issued what was tantamount to a public challenge by influencing the Pit Master to pair up the fighters to her liking. In itself, this was not strange, but when it happened without the mutual agreement of the fighters’ masters... oh, yes. Lady Sangra could not have made her motives any clearer if she had hired all the criers in Wallaria to shout it from the rooftops.