by Olivia March
Chapter 2
Annabelle had known she shouldn’t come outside. No matter how much she needed to see the stars, everything in her had urged caution tonight. But she hadn’t listened. At first things were fine. The night breeze had felt so lovely on her face, and the stars had awed her and comforted her as they had always done. For a time, she had felt a little…disturbed. She’d heard nothing and seen nothing suspicious, but she hadn’t been able to shake the feeling that she was being watched. Right then, with that feeling, she should have fled back to safety. But she hadn’t. Just the thought of going back into that dark little box had been unbearable.
Now, she could only bemoan what a foolish girl she was. Her back was to the wall, and in front of her were five dirty, leering men. They stood around her like a pack of wild dogs temporarily at bay, watching her every movement, undressing her with their cruel eyes. They were covered in filth, their straggly hair and beards looking they had hadn’t seen water in a very long time. A couple were already obscenely cupping themselves, making sure they were prepared for what was to come. Annabelle knew what that was. She might be a virgin, but she knew how sex worked. She knew what rape was. And she knew both were staring her in the face now.
“Mmm mmm mmm boys, look at this prime piece that dropped in our laps tonight. I get the first taste. You all can sort out the order while I’m fucking her.” The biggest one said this. The biggest and the dirtiest, of course. Because in post-invasion Earth, many people had been reduced to their most basic natures. They lived only to survive, no matter what damage they caused to others. And the biggest and meanest ones lead packs of savages like the one facing her now.
Annabelle was tempted to let loose some screams and tears, but that wouldn’t help her. It could even make things worse. While it was doubtful she was going to survive the night, screaming until Scourge or even more nasty men found them wouldn’t increase her chances of living. She couldn’t stop the adrenaline from rushing through her veins, terror was freezing the air inside her lungs. They didn’t keep her waiting too long though, barely a minute passed before the leader pushed forward and grabbed her by the throat.
Annabelle instinctively fought the hold cutting off her air supply, but that only provoked the beast to land a right cross on her cheek that nearly sent her tumbling into unconsciousness. She was barely aware of the fiend throwing her to the ground and ripping at her clothes. If only she’d tipped all the way over and wasn’t aware of what was happening. In her haze, she felt her shirt and bra being cut away and cruel hands painfully squeezing and pinching her breasts. She could dimly hear the other men panting and calling encouragement to their leader as he abused her body.
Annabelle looked up at the stars, trying to let the pain move to the back of her mind while she took in the beauty above her. It was harder when she felt her pants being torn away, her last defense against the violation that was coming. Part of her mind screamed to fight. It was the same part that had screamed at her to help people when the invasion began. But now, as then, she cowered inside herself instead. It was small comfort to know that this time, others weren’t being hurt by her cowardice. Just herself.
Tears did fall when she felt the brute push himself between her thighs. She could feel his foul breath on her skin, hear the disgusting, eager noises he was making in the back of his throat. His erect penis brushed her thigh, and Annabelle braced herself for his invasion. She had no idea what this would feel like, she only knew it would hurt, and hurt a lot. Before he could penetrate though, Annabelle’s ringing ears caught a different sound. It almost sounded like…screams. And not her own screams.
It was hard, but Annabelle managed to tear her gaze from the stars to find the source of the horrible sound. At first all she could make out were shadows. So many shadows, but unlike any shadows she’d ever seen. These shadows moved…and when they moved, blood flowed. One by one Annabelle’s would-be rapists were absorbed by these shadows, and all that came out were battered chunks of dead flesh. The leader had jumped up to help his friends and was treated to the same. Those screams would haunt her, as would the sight of all those mutilated bodies that had once been men, now littering the forest floor like so much rubbish.
Annabelle waited for those shadows to come for her as well. She should be afraid, but strangely she wasn’t. The shadows had saved her from being raped and tortured before she died. If whatever that was dispatched her with the same efficiency her attackers had received, she was ending up with a better deal than she’d had before. She waited, her eyes absorbing the beauty of the elegant shadows as they moved closer and closer. But then, when they reached her, she didn’t feel the bite of pain as they slashed and cut. The shadows compacted instead, collapsing in on themselves until suddenly before her was…a Keeper?
No…maybe she’d already died, and somehow landed in hell despite never having stepped a foot out of line her whole life. She’d seen Keepers on TV. They fought in golden armor, and their beauty shone so bright it hurt the eyes. The creature standing before her now…well, he was beautiful, no doubt. But it was a dark, hard beauty that was far removed from the angelic beauty of his peers. His hair was so dark she couldn’t distinguish it from the pitch-black color of his armor. His skin was pale like the moon, and he had sharp cheekbones and slanted eyes. He looked faintly Asian to Annabelle’s mind, but the color of those eyes was not brown. Nor was it blue, or gray, or green. They were black. Not dark brown, but black. Annabelle blinked a few times, hoping the night was tricking her eyes, but it didn’t help. The creature remained in front of her, staring with his head tilted, examining her as she was examining him.
Oh, God.
* * * *
Nefarion was having a hard time tempering his rage. He’d lightstepped back to the girl in haste but hadn’t managed to save her entirely. Her face was bruised and bloody, and her clothing had been torn from her body. The wrap that had covered her hair from his gaze was gone, leaving silky locks the color of sunlight spilled all over the ground. Her skin was pale, and those magnificent breasts he’d noted early were now on display, except he could also see the bruises, and the bite marks. Her thighs were still open, but he didn’t try to violate her by looking there. He knew he’d arrived in time to stop that ultimate violation, so an examination wasn’t necessary. He refocused his eyes on her own, willing her to gather herself and get up.
She showed no signs of it however. She just stared at him, a small frown on her face. Nefarion sighed, but as a Keeper ignoring a female in distress was an impossibility. The girl had been assaulted, bruised up, thrown around. She seemed incapable of picking herself up and getting out of the way of danger. Nefarion felt a soft emotion enter his chest for how helpless the girl was, but he quashed it. He was from Balruin, where the weak weren’t pitied, they were crushed.
“Are you going to lie there all night with your body exposed, female? I have killed these men for you, but should you continue to lie there like that, more might come and see your bared body as an invitation.”
Nefarion watched as awareness seeped back into her still dazed eyes. Her legs slowly closed, and sparks of anger entered those eyes he could now see were green. A very delicate shade of green, pale like seafoam, as dainty as the rest of her.
“Is that how you’d see it? Are you thinking to pick up where those swine left off?”
Nefarion barely resisted a moan then. Helion’s mate had a pleasing voice, but this girl had one even better. It was as soft and delicate as the rest of her, but the anger in it, the hint of defiance, intrigued him and caught his interest. That was dangerous though, for her anyway. He doubted a small human female could handle the force of a Balruin Keeper’s interest.
“Do you want that, girl? I doubt you’d enjoy a ride from me any more than from the filth I cut to pieces. Though I am cleaner, and I wouldn’t strike you.”
The way the girl’s eyes widened then was amusing. She looked at Nefarion like he was crazy, and maybe he was. He was also busy, and she showed n
o signs of getting up to fend for herself. Perhaps he shouldn’t be so hard on her. The girl had just narrowly avoided being raped and murdered after all.
“Don’t be alarmed human, I will take you back into your dwelling.”
Nefarion scooped her up before she could protest, amazed at how light she was. He wondered if she could fend for herself in her new reality. Perhaps she hadn’t been eating and didn’t have the skills to hunt up food. He speculated on these things while he ignored her feeble attempts to get away from him, between her attempts to conceal those luscious breasts. As much as he enjoyed that view he needed to get this girl in clothes. Her skin was like ice, and she had several bruises and cuts that needed cleaning as well.
He tracked back to where he had originally seen her exit the ground and found a door at the end of a staircase. After concealing the opening once again he strode down to the door and pushed inside, immediately grimacing with distaste. The darkness didn’t bother him, not at all. But the musty smell, the dirt-covered floor and walls, and the general feeling of decay was depressing. He’d rather die under the stars than live in such a hole.
There were faint traces of the girl all over this room. A dismal pallet was in one corner, and half-burned candles, unlit, were all over. He saw shelves lined with human food in those bizarre canisters, and a small stack books neatly lined up against one wall. More importantly though he spotted clothes. As soon as he tended to the girl’s injuries she’d be able to put on some clothes and hopefully alleviate the obscenely inappropriate lust he was feeling. The girl had almost been raped, and all he could think about was tasting her breasts himself and slipping between her thighs. Balruin Keepers were frequently savage, but even he wouldn’t stoop that low.
Instead, he laid her gently on the blankets and pulled out his first-aid satchel. The sooner he tended to her the sooner he could leave. It wasn’t a good idea to linger here with her. She unsettled him, a feeling he wasn’t used to and didn’t enjoy. Mithrain’s body was waiting to be found, and the girl was a distraction from that mission.
* * * *
Annabelle held her breath the entire time she was in the Keepers arms. It was shocking enough to be in that position, but he’d hardly asked permission. He’d carried her with no apparent strain either, his arms had been like iron bars under her shoulders and legs. On the one hand her naked body being held against all that cold black armor was a chilling experience. However, some of that silky black hair brushed against her bruised thighs and that feeling was quite soothing. His scent was intoxicating as well. Unlike her, it seemed he had access to baths, because he smelled fresh, and a little spicy. His scent reminded her of a thunderstorm, clean and exciting and full of electricity.
When he carried her back down to her little hole, it occurred to her that she should feel more fear about being alone with him. Perhaps getting her bell rung so hard earlier had shaken her up more than she thought. She still felt the pain of her injuries, and her brain felt fuzzy. Maybe the self-preservation brain cells had been completely obliterated by that one hard punch, because all she felt when he laid her down on her makeshift bed was relief. Relief! She was naked, and vulnerable, and had a Keeper inside her hiding place. It was too dark to see his face, and he wasn’t attempting to molest her, but at the very least she should be feeling fear.
Maybe not being able to see him helped. She was a modest person by nature, but with the darkness in the room he probably couldn’t see much of her. And she didn’t have the strength to fend him off even if he was enticed by her naked body. She just wanted to lay on this pallet and recover from the scare she’d just had. Being three seconds from a brutal rape changed a person, and Annabelle wasn’t sure yet exactly how changed she was now. It was hard to wrap her mind around the brutality of her fellow man, and the unexpected kindness of an alien.
The Keepers were a relative unknown to people like her. She knew they’d arrived on the heels of the Scourge and were the enemies of those foul beasts. It seemed like their only interest was in fighting the Scourge, but only time would tell. The only thing Annabelle knew for certain was that this Keeper had saved her life and saved her from being raped. He was tending to her injuries as she lay prone on the blankets, but he wasn’t taking advantage of the situation to touch her inappropriately.
All in all, Annabelle felt strangely safe with him, but…there was the scary factor to consider. Unless that rapist brute had knocked her brain out, she’d seen him brutally murder five people with shadows. How that happened she couldn’t even wrap her mind around. It seemed like the Keeper was those shadows. Those shadows had retreated inside him when he’d come forward to speak to her. But how could that be?
“What I saw…was that real? The shadows…the blood…” her question was soft, the intimacy of the complete darkness they were in compelling her to speak in a whisper.
At first the Keeper didn’t answer. He was rubbing some type of ointment into her skin. She could smell the herby scent, and it soothed the hurts on contact. Annabelle couldn’t see his face, so had no visual cues that could tell her what the Keeper was feeling, or if he intended to answer her. But eventually he did.
“Yes, it was real. The shadows are a part of me. I bend them to my will and use them to aid in my kills. Does that bother you?”
Annabelle took a moment to answer. Strangely, her body focused on his voice more than his words. It was smoky and deep, yet somehow still made lyrical with that other-worldly accent. Just the sound of it made her shiver, though she’d prefer to blame that on the cold. But he had asked her a question and had stopped ministering to her while he waited for her reply.
“No, it doesn’t bother me,” she answered candidly. “I’ve just never seen anything like it. I had no idea Keepers had such a skill. My people don’t have talents like that, nothing anywhere close to it really. Will you tell me what else you can do?”
Annabelle heard the need in her voice, and inwardly cringed. She was curious about the Keeper, endlessly so. But she also knew that, after the trauma she’d suffered, she just didn’t want to be alone tonight. None of that was his problem, but she hadn’t been able to stop herself from prolonging this strange interlude. The impersonal brush of his hands cleaning her wounds, his strangely alluring voice, and his strong, capable warrior’s body seemed just elements she needed to somehow get through the night. He felt like safety to her, and she didn’t want to let that feeling go yet.
Nefarion debated with himself at her question. He didn’t want to remain down in this hovel. On the one hand, he needed to search for Mithrain. But on the other he just hated being in such a closed, confined space. Daylight was coming in a couple hours, which wouldn’t stop his search but it always complicated things a bit. In the daytime, he couldn’t conceal himself with shadows, so not being seen or tracked was always harder.
But there had been something in the girl’s voice. The curiosity in her tone had been genuine, but there had also been a plea in there, a need he didn’t want to attend to. The girl needed comforting, and he had no experience with such a thing, and no idea how to give her that which she needed. Truly the fates were cruel to send a Balruin Keeper to this girl. Just about any other branch of Keeper would have been preferable.
Stalling for time, Nefarion stood and retrieved some items of clothing for the girl. He watched as she wiggled into them with a desperate eagerness that reminded him again of what had almost happened to her. On Arthaneas, rapists were dealt with swiftly and brutally. It didn’t happen very often, but when it did the perpetrator was made to suffer in the most horrible of ways before he was finally able to die. The quick deaths he’d offered the five human males had been too humane for the likes of them. A slower, more agonizing death would have been preferable, but he hadn’t the time.
“Keepers have many skills lady, that differ by race. As a Shadow Keeper, I can bend the shadows to my will. They can conceal my presence, muffle sound, even injure an enemy.” That wasn’t all he could do, but Nefarion had no in
tention of telling her more. For some reason, she wanted him to linger, perhaps thinking that Nefarion was safe, and kind. But he was neither. Now that the girl was dressed he wanted to rip those clothes off her body and see it bared again. She’d been through a trauma, and still he managed to think with his cock.
“Do you…would you mind if I lit a few candles? I don’t like sitting down here in the dark.” The girl’s voice trembled, giving credence to her words. Nefarion hadn’t considered that, he was so comfortable being in the dark himself. He looked around for the candles she spoke of, and when he found them he lit them all for her. The half a dozen candles provided adequate light for the small space. He didn’t need them to see, but if it helped the girl feel at east it was a small enough thing.
“Thank you, um…I’m sorry, what’s your name?”
Nefarion turned from examining the room to see the girl standing on her palette, staring at him. She still looked scared, but the ointment he’d administered was healing her injuries quickly. There was no doubt in his mind that her physical injuries would heal a lot faster than the mental ones she’d gotten this night.
“My name is Nefarion.” He slowly advanced towards the girl, watching her body tense as he neared, but she didn’t back away. Foolishly brave.
“Listen girl—”
“Annabelle, my name is Annabelle, not that you asked.” Her chin jutted out at a mutinous slant that Nefarion eyed with interest. She sought to challenge him, hmm? Nefarion stopped right in front of her then, invading her space, until his face was mere inches from hers. But even though her lips trembled and sweat broke out across her brow, she still didn’t back away.
“Annabelle. I have a mission for my Commander that I need to see to. But I find myself…reluctant to leave a helpless creature such as you to fend for herself. Therefore, I’m willing to take you to a refugee camp nearby. They are protected from Scourge attacks and supplied with food and other necessities. I will drop you off there and then be on my way.”