Stolen by the Warlord: A Sci-Fi Alien Warrior Romance (Ash Planet Warriors Book 1)

by V. K. Ludwig

  Twenty-Three

  Toagi

  A cacophony of rattles and shrieks raged beneath my sternum. Its tendrils weaved around my ribs, like concentrated panic, demanding my attention.

  I kicked my yuleshi instead, and let the beast sprint toward the bulwark of warriors. Katedo’s main warband were lined to each side of the salt-stained rock retaining this valley, which narrowed with each fall of a paw, funneling me toward death.

  Birds of prey screeched overhead, circling as if they’d caught on to the scent of fear tainting each pearl of sweat running down my spine. Before Ceangal, the thought of dying had never concerned me much. I wouldn’t have left anything behind but a polished stone, gossip, and that warrior doll Telkem had once braided for me.

  Now I would leave behind my kunazay.

  The only family I’d ever had.

  Grit pricked my skin where I pressed my calves against the yuleshi’s rump, my limbs shaky from exhaustion and likely those first symptoms of ice fever. I’d dodged it the last time. Chances had been slim I wouldn’t catch it during this second outbreak.

  Not that it mattered.

  Katedo already waited for me.

  Distance blurred his frame, but the straightness of it remained, backed by an impeccable bloodline many generations old. He walked toward me, and each roll of his shoulders let the knives on his chest holster reflect the sun’s last rays from their blades.

  He lifted his arm.

  His hand flicked.

  Somewhere, something whistled.

  A thud followed, and the yuleshi fell away from underneath me. The beast cried out. Its head disappeared. Gravity suspended itself for a fraction of a second. When it returned, it catapulted me forward.

  My spine hit the ground, limbs tossing as I rolled and tumbled. A loud pop. Pain radiated from my shoulder, but it had nothing on how grit chafed along my chest as I skidded to a halt. Ash whirled up, caking my nostrils before it smudged my vision.

  Groaning, I worked my arms and legs underneath me and pushed myself up to kneel. Every muscle in my body burned. As did my eyes when I blinked the blur from my vision, letting them wander to the arrow protruding from the yuleshi’s windpipe. Rapid but shallow, its breaths barely rose the beast’s ribcage anymore, and yellow eyes nervously flicked about.

  Katedo, always the nauseatingly perfect example of our kind, stepped up to it with a knife in his hand, and thrust the blade into the yuleshi’s throat. “I return your soul to Mekara.”

  He severed the artery of what he thought was Canja, as expected, which was why I’d given her to Ceangal. There was no greater shame than losing your mount to the blade of another warrior — except having your female stolen away, of course.

  The animal barely twitched as it bled out within seconds. Warm and thick, its blood flowed in dark red rivulets across the ash and, whatever the greedy planet didn’t soak up, pooled against my knee.

  When the tips of black boots stopped inches from my hand, I looked up and lifted my arm toward Katedo, fingers splayed. “I came to surrender to your judgment, but not before I pleaded for your help.”

  “My help.” His scoff came perfectly timed with that kick against my chest, hard enough sour bile swept onto the back of my tongue, amplified by my groan, but I kept myself steady. “You made me look like a fool in front of my entire tribe, the Empire, Torin da taigh L’naghal himself!”

  He grabbed my horns and yanked me onto shaky legs before he opened his chest holster. Nostrils flaring, he slipped out of it and clasped the leather in his fist. Arm outstretched, he held it there for a moment as he stared me down, then he dropped it.

  The clanks of metal blades quickened my pulse, the way I widened my stance a reflex. “I didn’t come to fight you but to surrender.”

  “Oh, you will surrender, Toagi.”

  His tailclaw came at me. I dodged it with a sidestep. The second swing, I avoided with a backflip and a kick against his chest. Bad choice.

  His claw punctured my thigh. Pain seared across my muscle. It got worse when he tugged, ripping his claw from my flesh and my leg out from underneath me. I paddled the air, but my left arm only twitched, and its unmoving weight threw me off-balance.

  The ground seemed harder when I hit it a second time. A million needle pricks skittered across my back. Numbness followed, along with a swell of blood that seasoned my gums from how I must have bit myself.

  Instead of succumbing to the pain, I rolled away from Katedo. My knee threatened to buckle when I pushed myself up to stand. Then it did, and I swayed sideways into a group of warriors. They yapped and laughed, pushing me away, but at least I managed myself back into a somewhat solid stance.

  I swallowed a mouthful of blood, my words wet and gurgly. “Hear me out before you finish me off.”

  “If I wanted you dead this quickly, your blood would already clot in your veins,” he hissed, his many scars thickening, veins along his neck popping. “How dare you steal her away from me, and abuse her for your filthy schemes!”

  When he stomped toward me, I blurted, “Ice fever is running rampant among my tribe. We’ve lost many. We’ll lose even more without medicine.” When his feet stalled, the male silent for long moments, I added, “Mayala is sick.”

  A grim twist settled onto an upper lip splayed by an old scar. “You finally drove your father’s tribe into ruin. Now you come to me, expecting me to help you?”

  “I never asked you to help me. Only our people.”

  He made a sound at the back of his throat, hands fisting as he cursed underneath his breath. Katedo turned toward his warriors, then spun around again, yanking on his half broken-off horn. His lips pressed into a thin line as if reason fought bloodrage within him.

  Finally, he took a decisive step toward me. “The warriors yield?”

  “I ordered them to stand down. All carry the feathers, as is tradition.”

  “As if tradition means anything to you,” he snarled. “Sevja!”

  A female warrior donning an embroidered leather tunic hurried to his side, narrowing her green eyes at me before she turned her attention to Katedo. “Urizayo?”

  “Take twenty of my fastest riders,” Katedo ordered. “Have each of them carry ten medical emergency packages. Ride for the tribe and take care of the sick. Take my shimid with you, and have the warriors burn the corpses.”

  “Yes, urizayo.”

  “None of them will enter Noja until they’re all vaccinated and scrubbed down.” His nose wrinkled as he took me in. “The last thing we need is them dragging parasites in. Tell urizayo Razgar I need him here this instant.”

  Sevja dipped her head and immediately turned to bellow orders into the camp.

  A sense of relief settled into my aching bones, no matter how short-lived. From the very beginning, I’d wanted nothing more than to be a good warlord. Even if it came at the cost of giving up my tribe, leaving me with the title of rebel.

  I lowered my hand along with my gaze. “Thank you.”

  “I’m not doing it for you.” He grimaced, his jaw so tense his scarred cheek stretched taut enough I expected the puckered skin to rip open. He leaned into me, his voice a mere whisper, and yet its menace raised my hackles. “Is it true you stung her?”

  “We are bound before Mekara.”

  “Is that what you want me to believe? You’re a coward, Toagi. Cunning, yes, challenging me to ulish only to steal the female away I was supposed to marry, but still the same coward you were all those sun cycles ago when you killed Telkem in bad blood. Now you use Ceangal as a shield?”

  I squared my shoulders as much as the one I must have dislocated upon my fall let me. “I’ve wanted to use her for many things. Never as a shield.”

  His punch came so unexpectedly I stumbled back a step. My heel caught on the dead yuleshi. One arm flailing, I careened over the beast but managed to regain my balance.

  “That woman was supposed to ensure peace between the Empire and us,” he shouted. “Now I have Torin up my ass and a
hundred of his warriors on our soil searching for her since I couldn’t fucking deny him. Not with how I let his daughter get kidnapped.”

  At least one thing had worked out the way I’d planned. “That’s teamwork right there.”

  “Sun cycles later, and you’re still cocky.” His tailclaw whistled along my cheek before it settled against my temple. “You think this is a game? Noja scurries with interstellar broadcast reporters. You’ve been playing warlord out there in the dirt, and I’m left behind to clean up this… mess you’ve made.”

  “I only wanted what’s rightfully—”

  “You stole a woman under my protection!” Katedo hauled me toward him, holding my horns steady until my body stopped swaying, no matter how my brain continued at a spin. “Did you put your bastard in her belly?”

  My tail flicked beside me as if on instinct, and hot anger seeped into my veins. “If you meant to ask if she carries our child, then no. She does not.”

  He slowly tilted his head, brows furrowing. “You didn’t touch her?”

  “I never said that.”

  “You fucking bastard.” He stepped onto my tail before he wrapped his own around my neck and squeezed. “Did you rape her?”

  Unable to breathe, I shook my head, face heating as I wheezed my next words. “I love her.”

  A flinch hushed across this warlord I’d only ever known as rigid and stonewalled. Even the muscles on his tail eased, allowing me a deep inhale while he stared not at but through me.

  “We are bound before Mekara,” I said once more. “If you know of the sting, the scout told you of the com cube as well. Why would I do that if I wanted to use her as a shield? I sent her around the plateau toward Noja, far away from here, so she won’t feel my pain when you sentence me to die.”

  Katedo’s jaws clenched as he took me in, and a deep sigh followed. “Then why is the signal not going toward Noja but coming straight at us?”

  A shudder crept from somewhere deep within me, spreading its icy clasp across my body until my skin pebbled. Nafir would never go against my orders, and certainly not if said order was my final wish. Why would he bring her here, delivering her to pain, unless…

  “Perhaps she figured out why I sent her away, and zovazay is guiding her here.”

  Katedo frowned and opened his mouth to say something, but Razgar beat him to it.

  “Because of you, I had to ride this forsaken drought belt for almost a moon.” Warlord Razgar stepped up beside Katedo, letting the white bird of prey perched on his shoulder nip from a piece of raw meat. “You knew the rules, Toagi. A tribe without a warlord is to dissolve and join another.” His dark brown braid shifted as he tilted his head toward Katedo. “I’d be willing to slit his throat in retaliation for my dead scout if you don’t want the bastard’s blood on your hands.”

  Katedo shifted, a subtle motion, but I noticed his hesitation, amplified with how he rubbed his thumb over a knuckle. “If there’s truly a bond…”

  “Do we trust the words of a liar?” Razgar shrugged, and the white bird noisily flapped its wings. “Nothing but rumors until I see proof of this… alleged bond. What a crime it would be before Mekara. Did he get her with child?”

  Katedo shook his head. “He says no.”

  “Get it over with, then,” Razgar said. “If there’s no child, what reason do we have to accept his claim just to kiss the Empire’s ass over Torin’s precious daughter? This is our planet. Our rules. Toagi broke dozens of them and deserves the death of a rebel. Even the warden agreed.”

  “If there is a solid bond, she’ll suffer.”

  “This goes beyond the suffering of a few individuals.” Razgar shrugged. “She’ll survive if you kill him before she gets too close. But then again, I don’t believe there is a bond. Nothing but lies to buy time for whatever else he’s plotting.”

  With a sigh, Katedo walked toward his chest harness, leaned over, and pulled a curved dagger from it. The blade gleamed red underneath the first streaks of moonlight, its bone handle elaborately tooled, the crevices grayed with age.

  He returned with slow steps while I clasped my hands behind my back. I was my father’s son, and I would die upright with no fear, eyes set on those vast plains I loved so much. Just one final time.

  Katedo stood before me, his posture stiff, his forehead wrinkled. “Toagi son of Tilkesh, I, urizayo Katedo son of Krevon, hereby convict you of open rebellion against a warlord of Solgad, the death of another one’s scout, and the kidnapping of Ceangal da taigh L’naghal.” There was a pause and a hard swallow before he added, “The sentence for these crimes is death. You may choose between my tailclaw stabbing your brain or my blade cutting your throat.”

  “Throat.”

  A curt nod, and he lifted the dagger heated by the sun to the side of my neck. It burned. Seared into my skin and spread across nerve endings. No matter how I struggled my breathing into an even pattern, my heartbeat grew frantic.

  “You’re infected.” Katedo lifted a brow, making it clear the blade hadn’t cut me yet. My skin was peeling. He smacked his tongue before he turned his attention toward the crowd. “How far out is the signal?”

  “A good two thousand paces,” someone offered.

  Razgar grinned. “Plenty of distance.”

  Katedo offered a grunt.

  Dread webbed through my ribs, and the rapid pounds of my heart accompanied my gaze as it drifted over Katedo’s shoulder, losing itself in the expanse of Solgad’s plains. A veil of red crowned the mountain chain to the right. Black cracks veined the dry ground. A yuleshi sprinted toward us, black mane streaked with hints of purple.

  Each pawbeat sent a quiver across the ground. It vibrated into my soles, snaked up along my spine, crept into my ribcage… and tugged. Tugged so hard it felt as if it wanted to yank my heart out, once more demanding my attention.

  I’d ignored it earlier.

  Now, I blinked my eyes, finding a figure on the back of the yuleshi as black as the beast itself. Nano armor encapsulated the rider, solid and impenetrable, save for those long, windswept strands, glistening in all shades red.

  Kunazay…

  It was merely a thought, but I must have mumbled the word because Katedo’s eyes widened. His fingers tightened around the bone handle, and the warmth of the blade disappeared. Everything after that happened fast.

  I jerked back and, with a sidestep, brought distance between me and the dagger. A dagger Katedo had already lowered as he turned. Ceangal thrust herself out of the saddle, not a single flicker on her armor even as she hit the ground and tucked herself into a roll.

  “No!” She barely stood on solid legs, yet as she ran toward me and flung her arms around me, her nanites hit me so hard and rough their touch burned across my skin. “Stop trying to outsmart me.”

  “I only wanted what’s best for you.” I stroked over her face, watching nanites retreat underneath her beautiful skin that showed every discoloration, every imperfection. “What are you doing here?”

  “Satisfying fate.”

  She pressed her forehead against mine. “Toagi is my kunozay! Hurt him, and you’ll hurt me.”“Satisfying fate.”

  Razgar curled his upper lip into a cruel twist. “I want to see proof .”

  Ceangal drew away from me, her spine straight as she faced him. “Are you saying my word isn’t good enough?”

  “The Empire said and promised many things over the decades,” Razgar sneered, making his political standpoint more than apparent.

  “Zovazay brought me here,” she said, pointing to the plains behind her. “The others are far behind me with the satellite. How else would I have found him?”

  “This is a mess if I’ve ever seen one,” Katedo said. “Forgive our wariness, Ceangal, but no Jal’zar has ever bonded a female from Earth, or any other planet, for that matter. We need something more solid.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know how.”

  “Close your eyes, kunazay,” I said and, when she did, I stepped toward
Katedo, slowly lifting my tailclaw to my arm. “Watch her nanites.”

  I stabbed myself in my arm, right beneath my elbow, my eyes locked on Katedo. There was no need for me to watch Ceangal’s reaction. I witnessed it in the way Katedo’s eyes widened. That, and how my kunazay sucked in a sharp breath at the pain we shared.

  Katedo’s gaze dropped to the ground, and he trailed his tongue over the side of his upper fangs many times before he finally shouted. “Bind this rebel. I want him put in the medical bay at Noja, and under constant guard. Call one of the young shimids to tend to Ceangal’s injuries.”

  Twenty-Four

  Ceangal

  After almost a moon in the plains, the white lounger I sat on was too soft, and the air inside my chamber too humid. The privacy of four walls turned me claustrophobic, reminding me of what Toagi had once told me: I have yet to meet a Jal’zar who doesn’t itch to return to the plains.

  I felt that statement in my soul.

  Even though thick metal encapsulated the automated door, murmurs and shouts echoed behind it. No less than ten warriors guarded it, not to keep me in but to keep the masses of reporters from Earth out. They’d jumped me as soon as we’d returned to Noja, turning me dizzy with a barrage of questions, and the whirr of holo cameras. What happened out there? Is it true a freeraider tried to ransom you out? Will you return to Earth?

  A tingle formed at my fingertips and ran up my arms in a violent shudder. It kept spreading when the door momentarily swooshed open, letting in a wave of chaos as I averted my gaze, expertly ruining whatever holograms they tried to get of me.

  “Ceangal…” Dad all but stumbled over, pulling me into a hug even as he still lowered himself beside me on the lounger. “I sent a hundred warriors in all directions in search of you. Had I known this would happen… I would never have brought you here.”