“And when you leave?”
She chewed her lip. “Let’s not worry about that right now. The most important thing is getting the information I have to the Intergalactic Council. There’s nothing that says that I have to be in a rush to leave or anything.” She nudged him with her hip. “Besides, you still have to show me Evath.”
“That is correct. It may take a bit of time for me to show you all the places of Vora that you really shouldn’t miss.”
His voice rasped, his mouth close to her ear as he dropped his head down. Desire shot through her at all the things that he promised with those simple words. Her lips parted and closed as she swallowed. She met his eyes and licked her lips, watching the way his eyes tracked the sweep of her tongue.
“That sounds like it may be a rather lengthy vacation.”
“It will never be long enough,” he murmured.
Before she could come up with a clever reply, his tail snaked around her hips and drew her against him. Gripped by what had to be some sudden madness, Jenn flattened her body against his as she pulled his head down to hers. Her lips fastened on his and she felt the soft exhalation of his surprise. Eyuul stilled, giving her complete control over the contact, and she didn’t hold back. She slicked her tongue against the seam of his lips and plundered the depths of his mouth when they parted. The taste of him fed the sparks of her lust, fanning the fire burning through her.
Eyuul didn’t give her control long. His arms tightened, and his mouth attacked hers ardently. Every stroke of his forked tongue against hers wound something within her tighter. It was nearly unbearable. She didn’t know how long she remained in his embrace, allowing herself to fall into the taste and feel of him.
She could feel every point of contact from her pelvis to her chest, her body tingling wherever his skin touched her own. Even through the ragged material of her thin dress, she could feel the burning desire rise between them at their contact. His eyes brightened and seemed like living flames. Desire overwhelmed her and she felt like she was being consumed in it, burning in the heat of his regard.
A loud hissing and the crackle of flames jerked her attention away from his gaze and she shifted out of his embrace. The pot was boiling over and the smell of cooked shoyla was heavy in the air. Jenn grabbed a stick and pulled the hook away from the fire, her cheeks warming with embarrassment. She’d practically thrown herself at him. She pasted what she hoped was a cheerful smile on her face as she turned to Eyuul.
“Well, soup’s on. We might as well eat our fill. We have a long trip tomorrow.”
A thoughtful look clouded Eyuul’s expression only for a moment before he smiled pleasantly at her and went to retrieve a couple of rough “plates” made from slabs of tree bark that had been smoothed and cleaned. Despite her opinion on eating shoyla, Jenn was surprised that she ate with gusto that night.
THE ASHIER SNEERED at the Vori hissing and rattling their tails at him. The Arobi pack had tracked the female without error until it reached the point where her scent had mixed with that of several of the indigenous population. The Arobi had tracked her to the precinct of the village before losing her scent entirely. So, the Ashier, ever being a reasonable male, had approached them.
It was unfortunate that they didn’t take too kindly to his method of persuasion.
A large female lay before him in a pool of her own blood, surrounded by the remains of six males. Almost twice the size of any of the males who attempted to protect her, she’d reacted viciously to the Ashier’s attempt to extract information in his usual custom. He wouldn’t have suspected such a savage, resilient species to be so sensitive about light torture, but she’d attacked with her company of males with a vengeance. It had only been the quick draw of his blaster and the reflexes of the Arobi that protected him.
His lips quirked as he ran a finger over the barrel of his blaster.
“I will not hesitate to kill every one of you if someone does not give me the answers I seek. Someone will speak to me of the human female.”
A male slid forward, spitting a mouthful of blood on the ground. The alpha had done a fine job on him before they’d been interrupted. The male bestowed a warning glare on his kin before addressing the Ashier.
“We do not wish any trouble. You have killed our matriarch. You have done enough harm to us already, weakening our clan. No female is worth this price.”
“Xenel, do not!”
A smaller dark green male attempted to push forward, but the other, the obnoxious color of rusted metal, restrained him without effort. The one addressed as Xenel flicked a disdainful look toward the smaller Vori.
“Do not compound your crimes against the clan, Jiriel. You helped her escape, and you did not alert any of us that a male of the es’Etale clan was among us and followed her out from our nesting grounds.”
“It was wrong to keep her caged here!”
“Silence!” The Ashier was growing impatient with the entire matter. He shoved the giant body of the matriarch over so that her eyes glared sightlessly at her clan—a promise of what would happen if any of them thought to mislead him. “If this male retrieved her, where would he have taken her?”
“To the es’Etale territory, in the Norveth Valley,” the distastefully colored one remarked, his lip curling. “I have no doubt he would attempt to hide her there.”
Finally, they were getting somewhere.
The Ashier swung over toward the male, his weapon at the ready. The Arobi growled as they paced around them. The strange coils on the male’s head alternately snapped around him and flattened with uncertainty.
“How do I get there?”
“There are likely taking the long way through the jungle, but I can show you a quicker route that may bring you out ahead of them. Unlike some of my brethren, I do not care what your plans are for the female. As long as you make the female pay for the humiliation and harm she has caused to my clan, I am satisfied.”
“Show me.”
Chapter 16
Jenn clung to Eyuul’s back, her body plastered against the hard muscles that seemed to glide against her belly and chest with every movement. It was disconcerting at first to be carried around like a baby in the sling he’d fashioned for her before they left the nest. Especially when every movement caused an erotic friction between their bodies. She had no doubt that he was aware of her arousal. Every so often, he paused made a raspy snarl low in his throat, shuddering before he regained control of himself.
Neither of them could really ignore it, though they didn’t speak of it.
Getting into the sling had been awkward enough, though Eyuul had been patient. After three false starts in which she’d promptly toppled into his coils, she finally managed to scramble up into the contraption. He hadn’t a single noise of complaint, despite how uncomfortable his low crouch must have been to maintain and the dig of her feet as she climbed his broad torso.
Pointing out their mutual attraction after all that would just make things more uncomfortable between them. There was no reason to make it worse.
Although she wasn’t thrilled at being hauled around like a baby, Jenn couldn’t deny that they moved much so much quicker over the ground. She counted her blessings that at least Eyuul was sticking to the ground and not taking to the trees. She wasn’t sure if her heart could take speeding above the jungle with just a bit of material tying her to his back. Even on the ground he was lightning fast, his coils whipping as they propelled them over the surface like they were sliding over grease.
Jenn leaned forward to speak in his ear. “Do you think we will be in your clan’s territory before nightfall?”
He turned his head slightly so she could better hear his response. “At our current speed, if we don’t encounter any obstacles, we should arrive by evening meal.”
“Oh, that’s good.”
“Do not be worried, Jenn. My clan doesn’t hunt for the shoyla in the mountains except on special occasions. There will be a variety of fare that you may find more
pleasing.”
Jenn flushed, realizing her dismay had been too easy to read. All the same, she was relieved. She would be happy if she didn’t have to choke down another mouthful of shoyla for the foreseeable future.
Now that they were descending the mountain, the variety of wildlife was notable and captured her attention while Eyuul slipped among the trees. Tilting her head back, she watched the exotic insects and tiny scaled reptiles, and others that looked like a cross between a lizard and a bird, its bright plumage shimmering in the sunlight as it fluttered about on four wings.
A comfortable silence fell between them, interrupted only by the buzz and alien chirps of the wildlife, and the rasp of foliage beneath Eyuul’s tail. For the first time, she was truly able to appreciate the beauty of Vora—now that she wasn’t looking at it through the lens of panic and terror, or through a haze of pain.
It was unmistakably deadly, but it was beautiful too just as a cobra could be both beautiful and dangerous at once. Beautiful plants in varying shades of green to fuchsia surrounded them, intersected with bright blooms. Some of the flowers were as big as her head with rich scents. Other long vines had fragrant ropes of blossoms dripping from them that varied in size from a silver dollar to the size of her palm.
In passing one such low-hanging vine, Eyuul snapped off a star-shaped white bloom, handing it back to her. He didn’t say a word, but somehow the gesture was almost sweeter without any flattery attached to it. Jenn fingered the long, soft petals and smiled to herself.
She doubted she would see anything near the like of it anywhere on Earth. That was if she was even able to get the Council to hear her. That was a potential obstacle she hadn’t considered.
“Do you think the Intergalactic Council will listen to me?”
Eyuul continued to move in silence for several heartbeats before answering.
“I think it is quite probable. The situation on Agraadax has gone unresolved longer than anyone in the Intergalactic Union would like. I don’t pay much attention to intergalactic disputes, but I have heard there have been complaints from other planets due to how long it is taking the Council to deal with Agraadax’s illegal detainment of the human females they acquired.”
Jenn’s brow puckered. “How can they reasonably be expected to do anything? The Council has been sending investigative groups in, but it’s a big planet with numerous cities expanding over large parts of its landmass, the small percentage that’s free of the swamps that cover much of the planet.”
“From what I understand, they are putting priority on any information they receive regarding Agraadax. They will know the value of what you give them.”
Eyuul slowed as they neared a deep crevice of a tall rock formation. Jenn barely saw his tongue flicking as he turned his head left and then right before his crown coils obscured her view. Jenn frowned and leaned forward, trying to see around the mass of coils that went from sliding along her cheek and neck to stretching out like an aggressive halo, the ends whipping in a show of aggression.
“Eyuul, what?”
“We are not alone.”
A branch snapped, and Jenn froze. A guttural growl broke out around them, as several strange aliens darted out from the rocks, the mane of hair running down their backs bristling as they snarled. Inky black, the aliens had the elongated faces natural predators. She wondered how long they’d been tracking them.
As one, the lips of the creatures pulled back from fierce teeth, their expressions menacing as they circled around them with glowing eyes. Eyuul hissed, his tail drawing up and rattling. Out of the corner of her eye, as his tail hooked to the side, she saw the long barbs extend.
The rattle of falling rock made Jenn snap her head back around, and her breath caught in her throat, fear rising up to choke her. A grayish-green Agraak crouched high on the rocks, a smirk twisting his lips. The mass of his black braids was bound with a single band knotted at the top of his head, exposing more of the deadly length of his dull spines. Spines that she knew would turn orange or red should he indulge in the breeding hunt. He tapped a long claw on his gun as he looked down upon them with no small amount of glee.
“Finally, the hunt is at its end.” His voice was gravelly, as if his vocal cords had been injured at some point in time. A network of scars ran over his face and down every exposed bit of skin that was not covered by plain black armor. His eyes shifted to Eyuul and his smile widened. “Stand down, Vori. This prey is mine.”
“She is not prey,” Eyuul hissed, his coils snapping viciously toward the Agraak. “Nor is she a breeder who exists for the whim of the Agraak.”
“She is not,” the Agraak agreed as his grin spread. “Did the little female not tell you? She was slated for termination. A breeder who fails to breed, who expels her young before time, is of no use to us.”
She felt Eyuul stiffen and he dropped lower to the ground, depositing her from the sling onto the jungle floor. Her heart tightened, and she wondered for a split second if he was going to abandon her and leave her to her fate for the secret that she’d kept from him. She was useless as a mate. Why risk himself for her?
To her surprise, he turned, whipping his tail toward the rock, only narrowly missing the Agraak who managed to drop to the ground and evade the barbs. Eyuul’s snarl grew deeper and more threatening as he continued to sweep his tail around them, keeping the four unknown aliens from advancing. Jenn thought she saw the aliens share an uncertain look, but she couldn’t be certain.
The hunter plucked a leaf from his shoulder as he stood, his pale-yellow eyes narrowing to slits. His lips tipped up, mockingly.
“It is not so easy to kill one of the Ashier. We are the most elite of the hunting caste, trained from childhood in the arts of tracking and assassination.”
“Not without reinforcements, it seems.”
The Ashier’s smile dropped and he adopted a haughty look, one that Jenn knew all too well. He located his weapon, picked it up from where it had fallen in his hasty evasion of Eyuul’s tail, and grimaced. Jenn could have laughed with relief when she saw the puncture where the blaster had been less fortunate evading the barbs.
The weapon was useless. The Agraak threw it to the ground with disgust.
His sickly eyes flickered to the small pack of aliens dismissively.
“The Arobi serve the Agraak. They are mindless beasts to do our bidding and follow our instruction. They are but an extension of my strength.”
The Arobi closest to them flattened his long, pointed ears and bared his teeth in a quiet growl, backing toward the other males behind him. By what seemed to be some unspoken communication between them, the other males also dropped back, following his lead until they edged the rocks. The Agraak was oblivious, his entire attention focused on the threat before him. Pulling a short metal spear off his belt, the Ashier snapped it into a long spear.
Eyuul whipped his tail forward and the Ashier dodged, parrying with a thrust of his own spear. Eyuul snapped his tail up, knocking the spear off course. Back and forth they exchanged blows, all the while Eyuul keeping his body between her and their foe. Sometimes the edge of Eyuul’s barbs got through to graze the Agraak, and other times the spear clipped Eyuul’s tail or torso, leaving puncture marks that bled freely. They moved around each other, snapping forward in their deadly dance.
The Ashier, leaping to the side to evade the reach of Eyuul’s spear, was finally struck with the flat of his tail, a barb penetrating a joint in the Ashier’s armor. As blood seeped down his side, the Ashier hissed in pain and retreated into the crevice. Eyuul snarled and darted forward to finish it, but the Agraak threw a small metal chip outside the entrance, immediately erecting an impenetrable barrier.
Eyuul bellowed in frustration, his tail snapping against the metal sheet that sealed seamlessly over the crevice. Jenn had seen them used before, usually for emergency repairs on the lab during her time as a test subject on Dorok. Only the right code would unseal it so that the damaged area could be mended or replaced. If it c
ould stand up to the worst winter gusts on Dorok, there was no way Eyuul was going to be able to batter it down with his tail.
Placing a restraining hand on his arm, the hair on her neck prickled as she noticed movement out of the corner of her eye. The Arobi, who’d fallen back during the fight, growled as they seemed to mill about. They weren’t advancing or making any threat, other than that low growl. She couldn’t be certain if it was aggression or a part of their communication that wasn’t something her translator interpreted as language.
The rattles on Eyuul’s tail picked up an angry tempo as he turned toward them. His eyes moved over them as if looking for any weakness as he strategized his attack. Jenn tightened her fingers on his arm. She wasn’t as confident that he’d be able to take them all on, especially when he was injured.
The larger Arobi approached, an obsidian-colored male who lacked the splatters of gray that the rest of the pack had. He held his hands out in front of him in a gesture, and his ears tilted back in a relaxed manner.
This wasn’t threatening behavior. She squeezed Eyuul’s arm again, more firmly until he glanced down at her.
“Eyuul, wait. They aren’t attacking.”
He frowned and turned again to face the Arobi. The harsh rattle of his tail died down to a light murmur, yet it was not completely silenced. The message he broadcasted was clear: he was on alert but standing down.
The Arobi crouched several feet away, holding his palms outward in front of him and tilting them toward the heavens.
“Honorable one, no harm will come to you from us. Depart. We will not follow.” Eyuul met the statement with a blatant look of distrust.
“Why should we trust you? You are in service to the Ashier.”
The male made a disgusted sound in his throat with a shudder.
“Our kind is enslaved by the Agraak. Arobi service is one of compulsion only. The Agraak think they are our masters.”
Long, pointed teeth bared with his malicious grin.
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