by Merel Pierce
The guard narrowed his eyes. He stared pointedly at Elland’s open trousers. “And they are the only Omegas on board?”
His nostrils flared. Fuck, Elland thought. The guard was an Alpha. He would be able to smell her.
“The only other is my mate.” He had no choice but to admit it and hope they would leave her alone, but if they didn’t, he would kill them all.
“I have orders to take her back at any cost.” The guard levelled his weapon at Elland who stared back at him, unblinking.
“You do not want to do that, son.”
“I am not your son.” Yet the hand holding the plasma gun to his head began to shake.
“Put down your weapon before you get hurt.” Elland’s eyes flicked to Arran, who nodded. He was ready. They all were.
If they wanted to take Rayne, they would have to go through Elland and his men, and they would leave none of them alive. As his mate, Rayne now had the benefit of protection from any Aurian soldier anywhere. They would lay down their lives for her.
Omegas were sacred.
“Call her out, Elland. Let's not waste any more lives for the sake of a slave.” The guard firmly pressed the gun’s barrel to Elland’s temple.
He was fast, but he doubted he could move in time if the weapon was discharged. Still, he blocked the way.
No one would get down that corridor. Not one of the guards would get anywhere near his quarters. They wouldn’t get anywhere near his mate.
“Rayne? Rayne? Unless you want me to shoot your mate…” The older guard’s voice carried in the silence. “…you need to come out right now. I'll give you to the count of three.”
He only got two when Elland heard the lightest of footfalls behind him and his heart sank.
“I'm…”
She didn’t even get to finish the sentence. The guard turned his gun from Elland to her.
The blast was deafening.
Elland couldn’t move. He stood rooted to the spot for what felt like a lifetime.
Rayne didn’t make a sound as she dropped to the floor.
Chapter Eight
Elland roared and everyone started shouting at once. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Arran move quick as a snake as he attacked.
The man in front of him, the man who had shot his beloved, must have known what was coming. He must have seen it in Elland’s face. He raised his hands.
“I only followed my orders! I was told to kill her on sight!” He was shouting now too, but Elland barely heard him.
Kill on sight.
His beautiful golden-haired Omega.
His Rayne.
He snapped the man's neck with one hand, letting his still-twitching body fall to his feet, and still he couldn’t turn around.
He couldn’t stand the silence behind him. It echoed. How was it that silence could be so deafening?
His whole body shook. How could he turn around and look at her lifeless body?
“Kill them all,” he whispered.
“Elland.” Arran's voice cut through the red haze surrounding him as bodies fell at his feet, and still he couldn’t move. “Elland, she needs you.”
He blinked rapidly, his senses slowly returning to him. Had Arran just said she?
Was she still alive?
He whirled. She was so close. How had not realized how close she had been behind him when she was shot? If he had known, he could have protected her. He could have done something, anything.
Falling to his knees, he gathered her up. She was limp in his arms, her eyes glazed, but he could see her breasts moving with each shallow breath she took.
“Rayne?” He smoothed back her hair. She had come because they had threatened him. She had sacrificed herself. “Pet, open your eyes for me.”
“Elland…” Arran's voice held only pity, his fingers on her wrist as he checked her pulse. He shook his head. “Elland, I am sorry.”
“No.”
“Comfort her, stay with her.” He shook his head again, sadness making his features slack. “I am sorry, Elland. She was very brave.”
“No!” Elland was shouting now. “No, I won't let her die. I won’t.”
“Brother…” Arran's hand on his shoulder made him flinch. “I am sorry, but she’s not…”
Elland’s heart broke. How could the gods be so cruel? How could they take her away from him so soon? They had only just found each other.
“Maybe if we were closer to home…”
Elland’s head shot up. “Stasis?” He gathered her body into his arms, and she hung limp, her eyes closed. Elland had looked death in the eye many a time. He had seen how a person’s body reacted moments before they took their last breath.
Rayne had moments, if that.
Arran was hot on his heels. “Elland, it won't work. It will keep her alive, but it can’t heal her. She’ll just… be there.”
Elland didn’t care. He settled her cold body into the only spare pod on board. As he leaned forward to brush his lips over hers, she blinked up at him, green eyes dim, but a smile creeping across her face.
“I am so sorry, pet.” He stroked her face. “I am so sorry”
All he had wanted to do was protect her. Instead, he had caused this.
“I am glad I met you, Elland,” she whispered. And then her eyes fluttered closed.
“Sleep now, pet. Just sleep.” He made short work of pressing the right buttons on the console, and the lid shut with a hiss, cocooning her inside.
Anything was better than her leaving him, even if it meant she was entombed forever, kept alive by machines.
Elland threw back his head and roared. He would never hold his mate again. Never kiss her lips.
He didn’t even feel the needle as it jabbed into his skin, didn’t realize that Arran was sedating him until the blackness started creeping at the edge of his vision.
Then there was nothing.
Proper Behavior
An Orki War-bride Tale
By
Isoellen
Chapter One
Druku
Druku had exceptional hearing. Locked down to a metal baking sheet, as the slavers called it, and shoved into the back of a beat-up, unmarked transport vehicle with three others, he had nothing else to do but listen to his new “owners.” A divider separated them, but the two huumon men spoke as if the males behind them were deaf and stupid, completely uncaring that the death row slaves overheard all they said.
Talking loud after a bout of heavy drinking, the pair of braggarts driving the long hauler wore matching work uniforms as they were employed by the same House.
The D-class engine clacked and shuddered, in need of tuning, and still Druku could hear them. They were full to the brim with the bravado reminiscent of every official, scientist, and guardsmen that had ever attempted to make Druku obey a command. They thought they were in a position to make him do their will. They thought wrong.
There was a reason he was slated for death; this pair of fools had ignored it.
“Want to stay another hour, and go to the Pink Flower? Everything is discounted for the festival. Have you ever been there?” the guard with a beaked nose said to the driver.
“Already been gone long enough. Too bad. Wouldn’t mind another stop. Quality pussy, that place. You can get synthetic, too. Shit. The vibrations! But we got to get our haul back. Trenneth will notice if we don’t come back with some hard-working slaves.” The driver drew the words out in a sarcastic drawl.
Druku knew that this place—this opulent city of Algar-Din, shining into the sky like a diamond—was a slavers’ city. Anyone and anything could be bought there. Their flesh markets were famous throughout the galaxy for being well-ordered and safe. No disease-riddled flesh on their stages. Definitely no creatures marked for death by three galactic agencies, including the Ikavu trade partners.
But of course, in the grand capital of Rathsima, hidden between the giant marbled pillars and in the dark recesses between the flashy shops and signage, a slave m
arket for the slave market existed. Flesh was sold in this underground market just like on the grand stages, labeled “use-at-your-own-risk” and “on-the-cheap.” Here there would be no licensing, no legal exchange, no records kept of each illegal transaction. These slaves were the rejects, deemed unredeemable and unusable. These slaves were noreyt-khom—death walking.
Druku shared the back of the transport with three other chained men, their legs pressing into the metal of his bed. The smell of them would have made him sick if he’d had any moisture at all in his body. Luckily, his last master had tried to starve him into compliance.
Arranged around him were an insane cannibal, a child rapist, and a third who carried a lethal blood disease with an expensive cure. Druku thought it must be desperation that drove free citizens to buy other men such as these, or at least a plan to use the muscle of their male bodies in a hazardous job likely to end in death.
Thinking was for intelligent beings, which these two freemen employees were not. Greed and laziness motivated them. Having made a deal for their new workers, they’d taken the leftover money and enjoyed it at the brothels a few steps down the street.
Gagged and chained, he and his fellow convicts looked at each other. Sized each other up, the way convicts did.
Grand stupidity like this rarely came along for men like them. In a world that catered to the slave trade, their guards and hawkers knew the danger of those unaffected by fear or pain. Relief to have escaped the incineration chambers filled their eyes, new plans unfurling. Instead of certain death, a chance to be free of their bonds for a few days and steal some pleasures from this world had presented itself.
Druku had hoped for death. He was tired. An end would be welcome, even if he had his doubts about its success. This was not Druku’s first execution order, or the first he had survived. This time he’d been rerouted. Someone had recognized his unique alien makeup and suggested his sale as a science experiment. The enterprising professional expected that this way, he’d still be dead, but now for the glory of science and some extra credits to jingle in their pockets.
He could have told them it wouldn’t work, but he hadn’t needed to. Black marketeers weren’t the best at keeping paperwork around. They’d sold him with the others by mistake, for half credits to the first buyer to see him.
“You don’t think anyone will say anything about the execution tattoos?” Beak Nose asked.
Druku grunted at the stupid question. Someone eventually would notice the blazing red marks on their chests. The fresh tattoos were not subtle.
The piggy-skinned driver said, “Clothe them after we hose them. Trenneth is too sick and crazy to want to do a close inspection. He has his good house slaves to keep his dick busy. You enjoyed your time at the pleasure house, didn’t you, Foster? Even if you only had time for one girl?”
Foster honked a laugh. “Good time? Yeah, I enjoy a tight pussy. Don’t think her boobs were real, but from behind, I didn’t care much. You don’t think someone will find out? Someone is gonna notice. I got another rotation before I can leave this job. What about the pampered niece?”
“That’s the beauty of buying animals. Maybe they can help with her. Fuck, man. That big monster with the tusks looks like an orki war machine. Can you imagine her swallowing his giant dick? What do you think? I could video it. Shit, the credits we could make? Have to hide her face, though. Don’t want any of those sanctimonious dicks from the Houses complaining. It would take that stuck-up omega down a few pegs. Remind her of her place.”
Druku could hear the driver’s relish, the extra saliva in his mouth ready to drip down his round chin.
He felt eyes on him. Beak Nose had turned around in his seat to offer Druku his gape-mouthed stare.
“War machine, huh? No way. You think so?”
“We’ll tell her that’s what he is. If the highborn bitch thinks I bought a war machine for her uncle that only I control, can you imagine what she will say to me then? I can’t wait to see her face.”
His captors had strapped him down at all his joints with an immobilizer stuck to his spine for a reason. It had been weeks since he’d had the use of his arms and legs. If their new owners wanted to get any use of Druku, they’d have to remove the device. He was certain the others were wondering if that would work in their favor, or if they should just run once he was free.
Should they stop and play too while he tore the world apart, or should they take their chances elsewhere, out of his range and safe from becoming collateral damage?
“You don’t control a war machine, Zeke. Haven’t ya heard the stories? I had a buddy once who faced a phalanx in battle. Fuck, man, he lost his legs. He was only one of three survivors from an entire army against twelve of them. I thought they were all imprisoned on a planet somewhere. If what the stories say about them is true, there’s no known technology that controls them. Shit, is that an Ikavu warning sigil on its chest? Look at that thing. He could probably break those restraints any time.”
The vehicle's air system circulated the smell of the huumons rancid fear to Druku’s nose. Huumons had a stink that didn’t quit, the scent of male terror an affront to every one of his senses. He’d killed more than one of them just to get that fragrance out of his head.
The piggy driver, Zeke, laughed. “Those are tall tales. Exaggerations. I don’t think the orki exist. But that fine little city-raised princess won’t know that, will she?”
“If they did exist, they’d look like that. Did you look up any of those fucking tattoos? Where is the data pad?”
“Leave it alone. That monster is the property of the House of Trenneth now. He’s resting for his next workday in the fields. It will be fine. That mangy slaver was into overkill. His collar has a detonator, he has the ones on his feet and hands, and the spinal freeze system has him completely immobilized. What can happen?”
“When Trenneth’s niece sees it, the shit will fly.”
“Good. I’ll remind her of her place. She is just an omega pussy waiting to get fucked, and I’m gonna be the man to do it. Fuck her, own her. I’ll be alpha of it all. What will her family do then?”
The bitter scorn in his voice came out when Zeke talked of Trenneth’s niece, aggression and lust mixed in a thick musk that called to Druku like a challenge. He knew the other male’s cock must be hard, his excitement amped by talking of the female.
“I have a plan for that bitch,” Zeke continued. “Just gotta watch it all play out. Been saving something for a special woman. Nedeliah thinks she’s too good for the rest of us; too good for decent, hardworking alphas who don’t have blood as fine and rich as hers. I have a special surprise for her in the shape of a happy little syringe and my fat dick. I’ll remind her that she was born to be under an alpha. Under a man like me.
“Maybe this monster here can help me give it to her. It’s time, don’t you think? Old Trenneth is about ready for his funeral pyre. Maybe we can use these new special acquisitions to accidentally help him along. You know he has no male heir, right? Just that niece. I looked her up. She is the fucking inheritor for the whole House.” His laugh was vile.
“You’re risking your life messing with the child of a Rathsima highborn,” Foster said. “They sleep on spun gold and shit sparkles. You get caught doing anything, it will be you with a slaver’s rod up your ass.”
Zeke scoffed as if his own comeuppance were impossible.