by Kiersten Fay
He said his good-byes to Oxnel and his men and then joined his new crew.
Cale approached him. “Hey, pirate. Is it true what these Denaloids do to prisoners? I've heard some nasty stuff.”
Denaloids observed a strict code of conduct, but what they were notorious for was rendering harsh punishments. “Just be glad you were under my protection.”
“Good,” Cale said. “We have a male on board who needs some…discipline. He tried to force himself on Anya. Can we dump him here?”
Ethan looked to Oxnel who was close enough to hear the conversation. Oxnel gave an approving nod. Ethan turned back to Cale. “My men would love a pet project.”
Cale disappeared into the ship and then returned with the male in question.
Oxnel appraised the prisoner with disgust. He gripped him by the nape of the neck and thrust him toward three waiting guards. As the guards restrained him, the male’s pathetic cries for mercy echoed.
Ethan spared him no pity. This miscreant would beg for death long before he received it.
The female demon, Sonya, drew Ethan’s attention when she sauntered forward and cracked the prisoner in the face with an artful right hook, rendering him unconscious. Ethan’s brows shot up. Then she turned to him with an arrogant wink and a flick of her tail. He got the impression that she wanted to hit him just as hard. He smiled at the thought of her trying, and how much fun it would be to thwart her every attempt.
As she ascended into the ship, her outrageously short skirt and smooth thighs demanded his attention. His legs had him closing in before he realized it.
“Nice form,” he whispered in her ear, letting the double entendre slip into his tone.
A whisper of her intent hit him just before she whirled on him, but he remained still, not wanting to reveal his talents just yet. He didn’t need to look down to know she had a dagger held to his neck.
She took in his amused expression and anger flashed in her eyes. The cool metal of her blade creased his skin. She spoke to her brothers without taking her eyes off him. “What should we do with the pirate?”
Anya spoke up. “I think you should lock him up.”
Ethan's jaw dropped, and his eyes darted to the princess. Of all the things he expected, he hadn’t seen that coming—from her, at least.
“Sounds good to me.” Sonya smirked. “How about you guys?”
Both Sebastian and Cale nodded.
Sonya shoved Ethan down the hall. Still a little taken aback, he stumbled, but quickly caught his footing.
Fine, he thought darkly. It wouldn’t hurt to play along for now. He would do his time until the princess came to him for her answers. Curiosity burned behind her eyes. If she wanted answers, he’d make it clear she would get none until he received the respect he deserved.
Anya’s voice traveled down the hall toward them. “In sickbay, please.”
Sonya rolled her eyes and then looked to Sebastian. He nodded.
“Lucky for you, pirate, Anya’s heart is too soft for her own good. The cell in sickbay is too nice for the likes of you,” Sonya grumbled and pushed Ethan along once more.
Ethan gathered a calming breath, reminding himself it would not be a good idea to show the she-demon how easily he could disarm her.
Instead, he took in his surroundings as they marched through the wide corridor. Soft golden light feathered over the walls that gave off a pleasant hue of golden-brown. Plush carpet cushioned his step. It was unusual for most ships to offer such luxurious detail.
“Nice ship,” he blurted.
“So glad you approve.” Sonya shoved him again. He gritted his teeth.
Sickbay was as impressive as the rest of the ship, but not as inviting with sterile walls and too bright lights. A prestigious-looking doctor with dark hair and a rigidly straight posture perched at a desk near the back of the room.
“Sonya, thank the gods!” The doctor shot to his feet. “I feared the pirates had…” He trailed off, his eyes scanning over Ethan.
“Well, the pirates had…” Sonya left the rest of the statement open for interpretation. “This one will have an extended stay in your observation cell.”
“Is he injured?”
“Not yet.”
The doctor raised a brow before expressing a hint of irritation. “You cannot continue to use my sickbay as prisoner quarters.”
Sonya ignored the complaint as she heaved Ethan into an alcove containing nothing more than a small cot. Then she pressed a button on the wall, engaging a force field that closed him in.
Their eyes locked through the transparent wall. Ethan countered her ferocious gaze with an arrogant smirk. “My thanks for the escort. I expect you’ll be tending my future needs as well.” He slid his gaze to her shapely legs.
Her jaw dropped, then she clamped it shut. His lips twitched with amusement.
She scrutinized him for a long moment before commenting, “I always imagined a pirate with your reputation would have more scars, but you look positively dainty.”
Ethan merely smiled. “You look pretty dainty yourself.”
Her lips pulled back in a sneer. “That shows how little you know about me.”
“Likewise.”
With one last disdainful glance, she stowed her blade at her waist and headed for the door, giving him leave to appraise her plump backside before she disappeared. She might have a barbaric temperament, but she boasted an outstanding figure.
Chapter 5
“I don’t understand why we didn’t just leave the pirate behind.” Sonya finished drying a glass and then set it with the others behind the bar.
“I haven’t even sat down yet,” Sebastian complained, sliding onto one of the stools.
With a huff, she set to mixing him a drink. He looked exhausted. Dark stains hugged his eyes, his lips fixed in a scowl. He had probably spent the last two days in the control room, fearing the moment he stepped away, Darius would find them.
The last time they’d faced off against Darius’ ship, Extarga, Marada had not fared well, and Anya had nearly died using her gift to feed energy to the ship’s warp drive.
After taking a swig of her new mixture, dubbed bloody screwed, Sebastian finally replied, “Ethanule claims to know how to translate that damn book.” Sebastian let out a sigh. “Anya hasn’t even opened it yet. She seems wary of it.”
“That’s understandable,” Sonya replied absently. When her brother shot her a confused stare, she added, “Whatever’s in that book could change her life…again.”
“Aye.” He shook his head as if unsure whether he should be encouraging her to open the book or toss it into space, along with Ethanule.
Sonya was rooting for the latter. “What else is bothering you?”
Sebastian hesitated for a moment. “Ethanule is a male of her own race, and I have not yet…” He trailed off.
“Ah. I get it,” Sonya said. “You’re afraid Anya will choose the pirate over you.” At Sebastian’s halfhearted shrug, Sonya added, “That will never happen. Have you not seen the way she looks at you? You’d be daft to believe she’d throw you off for another.”
“He wants her. I know it.”
Some inner part of Sonya, buried deep in a corner of her mind, growled at Sebastian’s statement. It would be typical of a pirate to try to steal another’s mate. And even though she knew Ethanule would never succeed—Anya was lost for her demon—the idea made her seethe.
For some reason, she felt the need to avert her gaze from Sebastian. “Has he admitted to this?”
“No. I just feel it.” He clenched his fists.
Sonya rolled her eyes. “You think everyone wants Anya.”
“They do, don’t they?”
She laughed, but he wasn’t far off. Anya had a way of carving a place for herself in the hearts of everyone she met. “Why haven’t you claimed her, anyway?” She couldn’t understand the delay. When a demon finds their mate, the matter was usually settled within days, not weeks, as in Sebastian and Anya’s c
ase. “What’s the wait?”
“Anya has reservations. She fears if Darius reclaims her—which will never happen—that I would be left mated and alone forever.”
“But that would be the case even if you never claimed her,” Sonya rationalized. Most demons held a deep belief that the fates create only one mate for each of them. A single perfect companion, and when found, must be cherished as such.
“Aye, she does not understand. Imagines I could possibly find another.” He scoffed at what Sonya agreed was an absurd assessment, though it was true not every race held the same ideals as demon-kind. Tierlocks, for one, believed in many mates, often at once.
And even some demons disbelieved the one mate theory. Sonya supposed that the destruction of one’s planet and being scattered throughout space could rock anyone’s cultural belief system to its core.
For a long time, even she had doubted, what with her perpetual bachelor brothers and Marik unmated for so long. Not to mention her own single status. She’d begun to wonder if they all relied on fate too much and overlooked potential matches due to the lack of life-shattering signs they’d been raised to expect. Then Sebastian had found Anya, and Sonya was again reassured. Then again, perhaps she was merely over-romanticizing the whole situation.
“Would you speak with her?” Sebastian interrupted her thoughts. “Get her to see reason?”
“Sebastian, just let her get accustomed to the idea. It must be her choice, as well as yours.”
“Exactly why I want you to speak with her. She will listen to you. And you can tell her how great it would be.”
Sonya wanted to yell, “How the hell would I know how great it would be?” She’d never even bedded a male, let alone contemplated taking one as a mate! Instead, she begrudgingly relented while resenting Sebastian anew for his role in her perpetual state of loneliness.
Demons naturally crave pleasure. Without it, they become irritable, or could even slip to the Edge without meaning to, placing anyone nearby in danger.
And they wonder why I snap at them all the time.
Sebastian finished his drink and left. Sonya took his empty glass from the bar and proceeded to wash it in the water basin and then tended to the other patrons seated around the room.
Just as she stepped back behind the bar, Anya entered the pub looking shell-shocked. She had the book nestled in her arms. Sonya motioned her to an empty bar stool and started mixing one of her special Anya concoctions—light and sweet. Anya placed the book on the stool next to her. Then she took the offered drink and gulped it down to the last drop.
“Bad day?” Sonya mused.
“I'm a princess,” Anya blurted in a half-crazed tone.
Sonya stared at her for a moment, waiting for the punch line. “Is that so? It's not a bad thing to be, I guess. Unless…do they sacrifice princesses where you're from?” When Anya considered the question with alarming seriousness, Sonya gasped. “No…Do they?”
Anya shrugged. “I don't know. All I've learned so far is that my people are called Faieara, and they may be involved in a war that has spanned four hundred years or more. My father sent me, my mother, and apparently two of my sisters away, to avoid capture. And oh, yeah, did I mention I might be over four hundred years old, if what Ethanule says is even remotely true, which I don't know for sure. And somehow he thinks, at least, I believe he thinks, that I am somehow capable of helping our people.” She rapped a finger over her temple. “Did I leave anything out?”
Sonya had begun to worry Anya would pass out from lack of air. She’d never seen her friend so shaken. “Oookay…. Take a breath, everything will be fine. What about the book, what does it say in there?”
“I haven't opened it,” Anya admitted, looking slightly shamed.
“Why not?”
“Because only three people in the universe can open that book, according to Ethanule. And if it does open for me, then…well, that makes everything real. And if it doesn't open…” She didn't finish her sentence.
Sonya could guess the turmoil that was beating a destructive path through Anya’s head. She finally had answers as to who she was, where she came from, and why she was isolated away from her people…and it all sounded like one big mess, with the pirate directly at the center.
Yep. Should have left him behind.
Sonya offered an encouraging smile as she refilled Anya’s glass. “Either you are who he says you are, or you're not. Whatever you find out, we're still here for you.”
Anya's lips thinned into a half smile. “Thanks. It's just, I'm so close to finding out who I am, finally. But what if he's wrong?”
Or worse, Sonya thought to herself, what if he was lying.
* * *
Ethanule lay on the uncomfortable hard mat of his cot with his arms tucked behind his head, staring up at the high ceiling.
As he’d predicted, the princess has come to him seeking answers. He’d been shocked by how ignorant she was of her previous life on Evlon. She remembered nothing of her family or her people, just as he feared. She was even unaware of her true age!
Her father had warned that her memory would be fuzzy, but Ethan hadn't anticipated this complete lack of knowledge.
He had only offered her the basics, then had refused to say more until granted his freedom. He’d been in this cell for two days now. Measure for measure, they had their reprisal.
The enticing scent of cooked meat filled Ethanule's nostrils, and his stomach growled. When he searched for the source, he saw the female demon entering with a plate of food.
He'd have liked to say it was the promise of food that brought him to his feet, but he'd only partly be telling the truth. The she-demon was clad in another of those tight skirts and a form-fitting top decorated by woven laces at the front.
Not only was she a feast for the eyes—even though she was a demon—the strength and bravery she had demonstrated on his asteroid commanded his respect. Not that he would ever tell her that.
She stalked toward him. “Hungry?” Her tone was dangerously low.
He offered a noncommittal shrugged.
“Not hungry?” She hovered the plate over a nearby trash bin. “I'll just get rid of this then.”
“Well, if you're just going to throw it away. I don't approve of wasting food.” He extended his palm, though the force field was still in place.
“Oh, you want it then?” She held out a piece of meat to him like a master to a pet.
He crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow at her. “Look, demon, either give me the food or throw it out. I don't give a damn either way.” His stomach chose that moment to betray him with a growl, and the sexy little demon quirked a triumphant smile. “Did you only come here to torment me?”
She crossed the room and set the tray on a nearby counter. He tried not to notice her curves under the thin clingy material of her skirt. Her tail flicked when she caught him staring. Her smile vanished, replaced with a hardness that didn't fit her.
“I came to judge for myself,” she announced cryptically.
“Judge? I'm a prisoner. I think everyone's made up their minds. What's more to judge?”
“You said a lot to Anya. Maybe it's true.” She narrowed her violet gaze. “And maybe it's not. If it's not true, I warn you now to come clean. Because if you fill her head with false hope, you won't live to see what Sebastian will do to you because, pirate, I'll make sure I get to you first. And I'll rip your entrails through your gut and make you watch while your insides are being torn from your body.”
“Graphic.”
She bared her tiny fangs.
He put his hands up in surrender. “Everything I told her is the truth.”
Sonya tilted her head, looking as if she were deciding whether or not to believe him. Then her brows furrowed. “So, she's really a princess?”
“Yes, the youngest of three.”
“And what happened? Why was she sent to that place?”
“Like I told the princess, I'll offer no more until I'm freed
.”
Sonya shifted her weight. “You're a pirate.”
“We've established this.”
“Pirates in general are untrustworthy. You'll do and say anything to get what you're after. So, pirate, what are you after?”
“I wasn't always a pirate. I'm just trying to save my people.”
“How long have you been a pirate?”
“Three hundred and fifty years,” he answered without thinking.
“That's a long time of taking what you want with no consequences. You must have grown fond of the lifestyle.”
That was true enough. He'd acted the part for so long he was no longer sure if he was a soldier or a pirate. He'd had to do a lot of underhanded things to get into the right position. Was it all for the sake of his home? Or was a little bit of it for him? He had enjoyed it more than he probably should’ve.
“That's what I thought.”
“I didn't say anything.”
“It's all over your face. Once a pirate, always a pirate.”
He'd prove her wrong about that. It had been his duty. He was a soldier, doing a king's bidding. And now he would focus on being a loyal and honorable husband to the princess. The demon turned on her heels without another word, her hips swaying as she went.
“You know, you're not bad looking for a demon,” he found himself saying. Maybe he was a little more pirate than he wanted to admit.
She glanced back at him and sneered. “You are not even slightly good looking for a pirate.”
Sonya wondered at the fierce beat of her heart as she stomped her way back to the pub. Such a flimsy compliment should not affect her so. Especially one from a conniving pirate, designed to appeal to her vanity.
Yet the pirate’s eyes had traveled the length of her body and back again with blatant interest. A traitorous smile crept over her lips. She gnashed her teeth and pressed her lips together until the urge passed.
The ridiculousness of it!