Ruthless

by Kate Rudolph

  He hoped that Yormas’s room was just as empty as the Oscavian’s, and that he wasn’t missing out on even more information.

  A spike of fear lanced his chest, and rooted Toran in place, bile rising in his throat and sweat covering his arms. His breathing grew labored and for a moment he thought he’d been poisoned or otherwise injured. But whatever he was feeling, it wasn’t coming from him. It was something he felt deep inside of him, through a connection that hadn’t been sealed but was still strong enough to tie him to the human woman who completed him.

  Iris was afraid. Iris was in trouble. Something had gone wrong. As those thoughts swirled around in his mind, he took off running towards the observatory restaurant. He had to find Iris, had to keep her safe. Because if she wasn’t safe, he had no reason to live.

  EVERYTHING WAS GOING fine. Iris arrived at the observatory after the Oscavian and Yormas had been seated, which worked out great for her. The android host tried to seat her on the other side of the restaurant, but when she asked to be seated near one of the windows nearer to her targets, it redirected without pause. She was out of sight of the men, but could make out the murmurs of their voices. That was where one of Toran’s toys came in. The amplifier did exactly what its name implied, and when she enabled it she could clearly hear everything that Yormas and the Oscavian were saying.

  He’d given her another piece of tech which was meant to allow her to view both Yormas and the Oscavian and whatever they were looking at despite the fact that she did not have a clear line of sight on the men. It looked like a little scroll and Iris anchored it to the table in front of her and unrolled it before following the instructions that Toran had given her to calibrate the device to her targets.

  Yormas and the Oscavian sat across from each other, neither of them eating a meal despite the fact that they were sitting in a restaurant. They each had drinks which they casually sipped, and a small tablet sat open on the table in front of them. Whatever magic the device used to view them allowed Iris to see the screen of the tablet, but it was useless. The viewing device didn’t act as a translator and she couldn’t read what she thought was Oscavian. At least the device would capture a recording and if there was anything important they would find out about it later when they could run the images through a translation program.

  “It would have been more private to meet in your room,” said the Oscavian. Hearing them speak as clearly as if they were sitting next to her sent a tingle of fear and excitement down Iris’s spine. This was nothing like her normal job. Though she occasionally ran into dangerous people, and often people with secrets, she never felt like she was putting herself at risk. She had the might of the Sol Defense Agency behind her and any harm done to her would be met with retribution. But not here, not today. The SDA had no idea what she was doing, and she doubted that either the Oscavian or Yormas would care if that wasn’t the case.

  “I did not leave the planet to stay cooped up in my room all day,” Yormas responded. What was it about that man’s voice that froze Iris’s veins to ice? If she didn’t know who he was, she would have said his voice was pleasant, melodic. Instead Iris was on the edge of shivers.

  On the viewer, the Oscavian shrugged, satisfied with Yormas’s explanation. Iris wondered if there was more to it, but she didn’t want to get distracted by chasing the thought. She could worry about that more later.

  The Oscavian pointed to something on the tablet and pushed it towards Yormas. “All the research indicates that we’re falling within acceptable parameters. Even better, our new... friends seem more amenable to negotiation. We won’t run into another incident.”

  Yormas placed two fingers on the tablet and scooted it close. “Good,” he said, making small humming noises as he read through the data. “Is this all from the single source? Or have you managed to find new specimens?”

  “The single source, mostly. As we’ve been instructed to scale back our collection efforts, most other sources do not fit the desired profile. However, we never expected to be able to compare the new subject to a living specimen. This is the closest match we found out of more than a thousand options.” The Oscavian tried to keep the glee out of his voice, but Iris could hear it. He might have dressed the part of an intergalactic tourist, but at heart he was a scientist, she would bet her life savings on it. And with every word they spoke, she became more convinced that they were speaking of Laurel, and perhaps they had managed to get their hands on one of the Detyens from Toran’s home world. That was a good, and if she could find the women who had abandoned Laurel to her fate, she would give them a piece of her mind.

  “With data like this, I find myself eager to enter back into negotiations,” said Yormas.

  “Yes, well, showing your new friends what could happen to them has help negotiations before, has it not?” Asked the Oscavian. Did he mean the destruction of Detya? Had Yormas or whoever he was working for wanted something from them that they refused to give up? And had they got it from someone else in the intervening century? These were all questions that Iris would need to answer later.

  Yormas peered at the Oscavian for a long moment. “You’re too smart for your own good,” he said with a note of warning.

  The Oscavian snatched his tablet back and placed it in his pocket. “I’ll be off then. When you give the word, we’ll be ready.”

  “Good.” And with that abrupt end, they were done. Iris knew she could try to make her escape before the two aliens left the restaurant, but she decided to stay in her seat so that she didn’t bring any more attention to herself. As discreetly as she could, she shut down her devices and hid them away so that if anyone glanced her way, they would see nothing of importance. The Oscavian left without glancing her way and half of the knot of anxiety that had lodged in her chest began to dissolve. Once Yormas was gone, she’d be able to breathe again.

  He stood up, and she forced herself to look away. Tracking him with her gaze would be too obvious. So when he slid into the seat across from her, she practically jumped out of her chair and had to fight back a yelp of fear. That ice she’d been feeling before froze her in place, and she knew her eyes were wide with fear, but she couldn’t school her expression. She wished that Toran were there with her, or that she had let him do this part of the mission. He would know what to do now, while all she wanted to do was spring up from the table and run.

  But they were in a public place, she tried to calm herself. Yormas wouldn’t try anything here. That assurance ring hollow.

  “Hello, my dear,” he crooned. “You’ve been following me. Why?”

  THE SPIKE OF IRIS’S fear turned into a steady beat of terror as Toran got closer to the restaurant. Perhaps he should have alerted station security to a potential problem, but without knowing what Iris had run into, he couldn’t take that risk. He could be putting her in more danger if he did that then if he went in alone. He would do anything to save her, if saving was what she needed. He could not say the same for station security. He couldn’t guarantee that they hadn’t been bought off by Yormas or Varrow.

  The observatory restaurant looked innocuous as he skidded to a stop in front of it. The android attendant approached as if it were about to offer him a table, but Toran ignored it and burst into the restaurant, looking for the trouble. The pulse of the denya bond pulled him deeper inside, and he found Iris in a matter of seconds. His heart nearly stopped as he realized that Yormas of Wreet sat across from her at her table.

  His mind raced, trying to determine the best course of action. Instinctively, he shrank as best as he could into the shadows, trying to stay out of sight and not alert Yormas to his presence. He had to trust Iris. Right now the ambassador just seemed to be talking to her, and she could learn a lot if he’d turned to gloating. From his position, Toran could offer her cover. If Yormas made a move against her, Toran would take him down. No one threatened his mate and lived.

  His plan was interrupted by a heavy purple hand clamping down on his shoulder. Toran moved by instinct, twis
ting into the hold and taking control of his attacker, slamming him towards the nearest wall. But before the fight could even start, the cold barrel of a blaster jammed into his back against his spine and Toran froze. “Lift your hands up,” said Varrow. “This is a modified blaster, and a single shot will lay you flat. You won’t get up from it.” Blasters were normally nonlethal, but it didn’t take much work to modify that safety feature.

  Even so, Toran momentarily considered fighting back. If he could give Iris those few seconds to get away, whatever happened to him would be worth it.

  “We have your woman,” Varrow said, seeming to sense the direction of his thoughts. “If you sacrifice yourself now, you’ll do her no good.”

  He hated to agree with his enemy, but he would do anything to keep Iris safe. He raised his hands up and put as much space as he could between himself and the Oscavian guard. When Varrow instructed him to turn around, he did so slowly and with no argument. Anger poured off of him in waves as he saw that Yormas and Iris had joined the two of them. The ambassador was clutching Iris’s arm tight, strong enough to leave a bruise. He would pay for that. They would all pay for that.

  Toran risked a glance around the room and was surprised to find out that they were all alone. The door to the entrance of the restaurant had been closed, the heavy metal door as strong a barrier as a wall. Either they’d tipped someone off, or had somehow managed to reprogram the android. If it had just been him, Toran could beat three to one odds. He was a soldier, and had escaped much worse situations than this. But Iris didn’t have those skills, and he couldn’t risk her getting caught in the crossfire.

  “We’ve met before,” said Yormas, narrowing his eyes at Toran. “I never forget a Detyen. After all, there aren’t that many of you to remember.” The smile that curled his lips was evil, and any lingering doubts of Yormas’s involvement in the destruction of Detya dissolved in an instant.

  Toran remained silent, unwilling to play the ambassador’s game.

  But Yormas didn’t like that. He curled his free hand in Iris’s hair and yanked it back, exposing her throat to the room. “She’s a pretty one, you chose well. Though I would suggest hiring your spies for skills rather than looks next time. Well,” he huffed out a malicious little laugh, “if you had a next time.”

  “Why did you do it?” The question jumped out of his mouth and Toran wanted to call it back. They needed to escape this situation, not prolong it.

  “You would have to be more specific than that. And I find I’m not interested in answering your questions.” He turned to the security guard and nodded to Toran and then Iris. “Scan their IDs. I want to know who they are, and why they’re here.”

  The guard did as instructed, placing a small scanner first against Toran’s palm and then Iris’s. The device beeped when it found a match for each of them, and the guard flashed the screen of the scanner to Yormas, who nodded in satisfaction. “Whatever you’re doing, you shouldn’t have gotten messed up in this,” he said, almost apologetically. He leveled his gaze at Toran, but his hold on Iris relaxed slightly. “Especially you. You’re lucky to be alive, and you’re throwing it all away on some petty quest for what, revenge? There’s no such thing. The galaxy is far too big for something so small.”

  Toran had to clench his jaw to keep from responding to that, but it was obvious that Yormas hadn’t yet figured out why he and Iris were observing him and Varrow. Yormas was close, assuming it had something to do with the destruction of Detya. But Toran wouldn’t be the one to confirm it, and he turned his eyes to Iris, trying to signal by look alone that she should keep her mouth shut if she could. If he was reading her right, she understood what he meant.

  Yormas shoved Iris towards the Oscavian guard and then clapped his hands together once. “Get rid of them. Whatever they heard, we don’t want it spreading. Then find their quarters and see if they’re keeping anything interesting from us.” He turned to Varrow. “This is why I like meeting in public. You learn all sorts of things.”

  Varrow’s face was impassive, but he nodded once. It was impossible to tell what he thought of this entire situation, but he wasn’t objecting to anything that Yormas commanded. “I have two more of my detail that will join you,” he said. “I think these two need more than one guard.”

  “Excellent,” said Yormas. “Let’s leave them to it.” As Yormas and Varrow walked towards the restaurant door, it slid open to reveal a handful of Oscavians waiting to meet them. Varrow pointed to two of them and they walked back to join the guard that was already looming over them.

  Toran took the chance to study Iris. She had gone pale, and her eyes were wide with fear, but otherwise she seemed uninjured. Whatever had happened, it hadn’t been violent. Good. His mate was unharmed, and that would make escape easier. Because he was getting her out of this, no matter who he had to go through to make that happen.

  The Oscavians were efficient. Two flanked Toran, one keeping a discreet blaster pointed at him, and the other pointing an equally discreet blaster at Iris’s back where she stood in front of them with her guard. They took a moment to pat both Toran and Iris down. Toran was unarmed, but the guard found a device in Iris’s pocket and took it from her. Toran recognized it was one of the tools he’d given Iris to listen in on the conversation today. The guard let the device fall to the ground, where he crushed it underfoot, destroying whatever information it had collected. Iris flinched and Toran tried to reach out for her, until his guard made a warning sound and twitched his blaster, looking for an opportunity to shoot.

  Tourists on the station gave them a wide berth once they left the restaurant, and security turned a blind eye. In a matter of minutes, they had left the densely populated areas of the station and boarded a small platform that seemed designed more for employees than visitors. The head guard seemed to know where they were going, programming a destination into the panel in a matter of a few strokes. Toran tried to sidle up closer to Iris. Even if he could only touch her hand, it would be worth it. But his guards were too on point and kept him back.

  They were nothing like the thugs who’d detained him and Kayde back on Fenryr 1. These Oscavians knew what they were doing, they must have been highly trained, and they understood exactly how much of a threat he could pose. He hated when his opponents were like that.

  The platform came to a stop in a dark hallway in the bowels of the station. The guards led them even deeper down the pipe-lined walls. The air here was humid, and unexpectedly hot. He heard a dull roar come from the end of the hall, and Toran’s heartbeat kicked up. He recognized that sound. Fire, an incinerator. No, the Oscavians weren’t messing around. There would be no evidence of what had happened to them. And as they hadn’t trusted the comm lines—probably a good move given the attitude of security here—Raze, Kayde, and Dryce would have no idea that anything was wrong until far too late.

  The end of the hall terminated at a dark wall with heavy doors on either side. A small window on the door to the right danced with yellow flames as the incinerator fired. The door to the left was identical, but the window was dark, as the secondary incinerator was not active.

  The guards shoved him and Iris in front of the darkened door. They couldn’t open the firing incinerator, which he supposed meant they would live for a few minutes longer. Iris’s hand found his and she gave him a squeeze. She looked at him and everything that they’d never been able to say, all the emotion they’d been dancing around, was laid out plainly in her eyes. But she said nothing, and Toran could understand that. This moment, their love, was meant for the two of them. To let the guards hear it would cheapen it, and he would not give them the satisfaction. He nodded once, as if to tell her that her message was received.

  Determination firmed in Iris’s expression and she flicked her eyes back towards the guards. Toran could read that too. There was no use going to their death willingly, and even if they harmed her, she was telling him it was worth it. That they had to try to survive.

  This time Toran did
n’t acknowledge the flick of her eyes, didn’t give the guards a second to read his intentions. He sprung towards the closest one, his claws flashing out between one breath and the next and raking across the exposed face of the nearest Oscavian. He went down with a cry as blood spurted.

  A blaster shot took Toran in the shoulder, but as it seemed only set to stun, he was able to push through it and launched himself at the second Oscavian. But the second and third shots were stronger and Toran toppled over, unable to stand back up. The uninjured guard stood over him and aimed the blaster square at the middle of his chest. He fired a single shot and everything went black.

  Chapter Twelve

  IRIS HAD NEVER BEEN so glad to wake up, and she’d never been more certain that waking would never come. It had been a desperate move to encourage Toran to attack the guards set on killing them, but better desperate than dead. For a moment she thought they’d blinded her, as the room they were stuck in was almost pitch black, but her eyes found the small sliver of light coming through a window on one of the walls. She’d seen that window before from the outside.

  They were in one of the incinerators.

  Iris sucked in a breath, and tried to keep her calm. It was warm in the incinerator, but the fire hadn’t started, and she couldn’t give up, not yet. Not while she was still alive. Not while Toran was breathing shallowly next to her. He was still unconscious. She ran her fingers lightly over his chest. It was a soft touch that wouldn’t have woken him from a normal sleep, and it certainly wasn’t enough to rouse him from unconsciousness. Iris took a step further and swiped her lips against Toran’s forehead.