Ohber_Warriors of Milisaria

by Celeste Raye

  Libby was silent as well, ready to freeze me out without a second thought.

  I cracked my neck as I stood up and my eyes skimmed around the camp.

  “Oh yeah?” I said quietly, turning to them. “Jealous?”

  Christina looked stricken by the comment, and I waved her off. “I’m kidding, Chris.”

  “I don’t like that,” she snapped back. “You’ve been freakish since all this has gone down and at first I thought it was comforting. Now… I just don’t know, Fi. It doesn’t sit right with me.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I griped, rubbing my temples.

  She gave a one-shouldered shrug in the way only a sassy girl could pull off and locked eyes with me. “Maybe this was a setup,” she offered.

  “Oh, come on,” I spat and then looked at Libby so she could share my outrage. The blonde averted her eyes, and I frowned deeply. “Guys,” I reasoned. “What, I’m a traitor now?”

  Christina crossed her arms and pursed her lips out. “What would you call it?”

  “I would call it pragmatic,” I said.

  “I would call it disgusting,” she argued. “He killed Benjamin.”

  “No,” I said. “One of the others did. In fact, he removed Benjamin so we wouldn’t have to look at him. He also moved Libby when we asked him to.”

  “Oh, sorry,” Christina scoffed. “I didn’t realize he was prince charming. Bravo for him then, right?”

  Libby cleared her throat and both Christina and I looked at her with frustration. She shrugged her shoulders meekly and then offered, “Also… he does it all in the rudest way possible. Everything he does is so classless. They hate us,” she said sadly. “They just hate us.”

  “Not now, Libby,” Christina said, pinching the bridge of her nose.

  I reached into my pocket then and tossed the blonde a large metal key with rust that caked around its teeth. The key to our cell sat in Gadadirth’s pocket. I made a play for it, swiping it as we left the tent and then kissing him goodnight as he locked me back up.

  “Key to the cage,” I whispered, darting my eyes to the lock around our cell. “You’re welcome.”

  “Oh, Fiona!” Libby beamed and raced up to Christina, slipping the key from her delicate fingers and inspecting it.

  “Oh, Fiona nothing,” I griped. “I worked my ass off to get that for us, and you guys are already calling traitor on me.”

  “Hey,” Christina said, grabbing my hands with a genuine apology in her eyes. “I’m sorry, okay?”

  I shrugged her off and looked toward Gandadirth’s tent. Camp had been bustling since early this morning: packing up and gathering a ton of food. We were going to be traveling again; I just knew it.

  “Fi,” Christina insisted, putting herself in my path. “I’m really sorry, okay?”

  I wanted to argue with her; I wanted to ask her exactly what she’d done to try and get us out of here to give her any right to play the blame game. I took a breath and shook off my thoughts, realizing we were all under immense pressure. Stress was bound to take over.

  “We have to stay united if we want to get out of here, okay?” I whispered, and both girls nodded. “Jadirel,” I said lowly, “he’s the leader. He’s been looking for reasons to kill us, and this is going to be his lucky break, okay? So, once we open the cage, we have to get the hell out. Run like hell; got it?”

  “Got it,” Libby repeated and Christina nodded her acknowledgment.

  I walked to the opening of the cage and held my hand out to Libby, who set the key in my hand.

  “What, now?” Christina almost protested.

  “They’ve been packing up all morning, right?” I said and didn’t wait for a response. “We’re going to be moving soon. I can feel it. We have to get out of here before they realize the key is missing. So, when I open the door, we all slip out and head west. The forest is really thick, which can work against us.”

  “On the other hand, that gives us plenty of opportunities to hide if we feel we’re being tailed,” Christina added.

  I snapped my fingers to her as if to say ‘Bingo’ and I took a listless breath.

  We’d made it out of the cage unnoticed, but it was mere minutes before the camp’s leader spotted us.

  Christina and Libby were with me at some point, but I’d lost them in the panic. I saw three shifters fly after them. Overkill. Jadirel had led them, but somewhere along the chase, he decided I was the one worth following and broke off from his group.

  Adrenaline coursed through my veins and forced my legs forward, but it wasn’t enough.

  “No, no, no,” I whispered with a throat full of tears as I felt the yellow leader’s claw dig into my arm. I let out a loud cry and struggled against his piercing grasp before I tumbled to the ground.

  My fall brought us both to the soil below. I scraped at the grass and tried to pull myself out from his weight, but he grabbed the back of my shirt and pulled me back toward him.

  “I’m not sure exactly what you’re still doing here,” he seethed, shots of spit roping out of his mouth in a fury as he spoke. “But I’m getting a little tired of it.”

  “You haven’t even tried to understand what our alliance was all about,” I spat. “You just nixed it before we ever had a ch–”

  I felt a sharp sting hit my face as the yellow shifter slapped me across my face, dragging my legs back toward him as he flushed his wings into the air, forcing himself back onto his feet.

  He pulled my hair back, and I screamed in panic, letting out a pathetic yelp into the ether.

  “You're right,” he said brashly. “And I don't want to. I had enough of listening to humans. You come in with your weapons and your tits and think that you can get whatever you want. Steal our power. Stop our lines.”

  “Yeah,” I spat. “Because every female wants to have a Weredragon child, right? Because that sounds like a treat.”

  His oversized, red eyes beamed down at me with confusion as I knelt before him, his fist still gripping my hair relentlessly.

  “That’s called sarcasm,” I snipped, and he pulled my head back to look down at my face. His wings flicked from firm to flowing in the wind over and over again; his tail steadily whipping from side to side with irritation and thought.

  The skin around the corners of his eyes tightened, and he tossed me back to the ground so I was flat on my back.

  Before I had the chance to scramble away, he was on top of me, pinning both my arms down with a single hand. I could feel he was hard; the pulsing mound was feeling giant on top of me.

  He pushed it against me, and I could see something take over him; his body was twitching.

  “What’s DET?” he said smoothly.

  “That’s my little secret,” I whispered.

  His free hand gripped my neck. With both hands occupied I could feel the full weight of him on top of my body then, his dick still pressing into me. My leg pulsed as I could feel the length of him burning against me: a sensation I wanted to flick off and forget about.

  “What is it?” he seethed.

  “Clearly, you don’t know how making deals works,” I spat, struggling to breathe beneath him. “See, you’re supposed to promise me something in return.”

  In truth, I didn’t care how long our little chat went on for, so long as it gave Christina and Libby enough time to get out of there: to find safety. If he was chasing me, it meant he wasn’t after them, and that was good enough for me.

  “We’ve kept you alive,” he enunciated so I could feel his hot breath on me.

  “And if I tell you, you’ll kill me.”

  He cocked his head. “Not necessarily true. After all, there’s something to be said for these…”

  His hands made their way to my breasts then, caressing them in a way that would have felt sweet and gentle if he weren’t doing it as a controlling act of dominance. His touch made my skin crawl.

  I shuddered underneath him, and with a disgusted whine, I said, “I can’t say the same for you,
” and tried to pull away from him.

  He held me tighter then, dragging my body down so that I was in line with his hips once more, mud streaming through my hair as he pulled me.

  “Just Gandadirth then,” he said and reached his hand smoothly down my pants, feeling around until he found my center. “You’re a silly girl.”

  I grit my teeth and spit in his face, screaming and calling out to anyone.

  His fingers bucked against my skin, trying to figure me out: trying to figure out what would make me moan and getting harder as his fingers explored my body. If he thought I would make any sound other than wild cries for help, he was severely mistaken. He let out a pleased grunt as he buried his face in my breasts, licking at them clumsily, like a teenage boy might at the first sight of them.

  I looked up and could see my pack had fallen: the same one I was able to steal from Gandadirth’s stash last night and hide under the cloak he’d given me to shield myself from the cold. If I could move up far enough, I could reach it and maybe grab a laser pistol.

  “You shifters are pretty full of yourselves. If you could get around your ego, maybe you wouldn't need a silly little girl like me to come save your ass.”

  He speared me with a hard gaze then.

  “I’m going to ignore that,” he spat. “Consider it a kindness.”

  My eyes went wide at the comment, and the ridiculousness of it made me want to laugh, but I stayed quiet.

  He continued, “I’ll see that you make yourself useful and then we can stop playing this little game.”

  He wore a thick plated armor on his arms and legs; the metal crawling up his fingers; the cold of it biting my flesh as he wriggled his hand free from my pants before pulling them apart by my zipper, fabric frayed out with strings and threads.

  I squirmed up, which made it easier for him to rip the rest of my pants down to my ankles. I used his distraction to force myself further up, arching my back and dragging the back of my head through the muddy leaves beneath me. I dug my heel into the ground, pushing, until I was finally close enough that the tips of my fingers could grip the satchel above me.

  “That’s it,” the yellow shifter cooed with some effort, as though he thought I was really trying to help him rape me.

  I locked eyes with him then, his red irises dark and glazed as he held my arm down with one hand furiously struggled to release his penis from his armor with the other. His movements were quick and wild, the moments speeding by in a blur of forestry, armor, and his yellow scales.

  My teeth scraped over my top lip like a bulldog, and my heart started pounding wildly. The moment seemed to slow to a crawl as he grew even more furious as he couldn’t free himself from his complicated armor straps.

  I heaved my breaths, nervously shaking underneath him and trying desperately to calm down. I made eye contact again, and he looked at me, enraged that I was catching him in such a clumsy moment.

  “Let me,” I said with a shake in my voice.

  I wriggled my wrist from under his grasp and for whatever reason, he released my hands. He watched me carefully as I reached my hands down to the opening in his pants, carefully unraveling his belts and fabric latches that locked him away.

  A downpour of nerves flooded my stomach, the moment suddenly quiet with only our breaths hitting one another, invading each other’s personal space.

  He watched my hands and, with a voice thick with sexual hunger, whispered, “Good. Good girl.”

  I swallowed and gave Jadirel a look that said I relented. A demure, submissive demeanor. I grabbed his immense length and pulled it carefully from the opening in his pants, stroking it slowly and eliciting heavy, pleased breaths from him.

  “Is that good?” I whispered in my best ‘come hither’ voice.

  He stared at me then, unsure if he wanted to make conversation, even if it was a naughty one.

  My hand wrung around him back and forth, and he busied his hands over my breasts. I needed to get my other hand free without him pinning me down, otherwise, it was all for nothing, and I really had just helped him out.

  I exhaled in a long breath, and then I reached my right hand up, my left still tight around him. He twitched at the movement and went to grab me, but I set the hand on the back of his head and worked it through his hair, acting like I was doing it in an attempt to pull him closer and get him to kiss me.

  He did; leaning down and licking my lips before pulling me into a firm kiss.

  My mind was racing, and my body was a whirlwind of motion. My hand was stroking him, my lips trying to catch his erratic rhythm, my other hand free from his head and frantically searching through the pack above my head—all while he pawed at my breasts and crushed me under the weight of him.

  Finally, my fingers grabbed hold of my weapon: a small, circular ring. I pulled it from the pack and gripped it in my palm.

  Jadirel let out a small moan and removed his lips from mine, busying his hand on his dick, moving my hand away and trying, failing, to guide himself into me.

  I looked up at him; my eyes tense with a scowl as I took the ring from my palm and slammed it into the side of his neck and hitting the trigger just as quickly.

  Jadirel yelped in pain, and I watched as a laser ring burst from the little weapon and shot around his neck like a shock collar, sending him into a wild panic. He looked like a rabid dog.

  He doubled back, yelling and cursing as he tripped back and struggled to get on his feet, the laser zapping him of energy like a stun gun.

  My eyes went wide, and I quickly stood, pulling what was left of my pants back to my hips and running like hell into the woods.

  Chapter 9:

  Gandadirth

  Light hit my eyes, just a faint strip of sunlight seeping in through my eyelids as I was being violently jostled awake.

  “The girls are gone,” came the stern tone of the purple shifter, Ik'nale. He gave me a sharp look that somehow cast blame, and I shot up in my tent, scrambling to the world outside.

  “Gets worse,” Tesyduss said, waiting outside my tent with his arms crossed, looking eerily calm as screams echoed off in the distance.

  “What happened?” I demanded, looking around the camp still half-asleep.

  He raised both brows smugly and nodded his head toward Kodyn, another blue shifter with a gaunt face. He was holding Fiona: her thin arms gesticulating wildly as she tried in vain to release herself from his hand.

  Her brown hair was a mess of mud and leaves and blood, her face looking weak and tired with drips of red flowing down in streaks.

  What happened?

  I looked her over from afar and saw bruises and her pants flayed: ripped open.

  My stomach sank at that and a wild rage coursed through me then. I set my jaw and began marching toward Kodyn before Tesyduss gripped my arm.

  “She’s the only one left,” he said to me, and I was immediately irked that he didn’t even know her name. “They made a break for it in the night. Jadirel caught her.”

  What else did he do? I wondered and ran my tongue along my teeth. I nodded slowly, watching Fiona with calculation. “The others?”

  He shrugged. “Dead?”

  I nodded and kept walking, but Tesyduss pulled me back once more. “She did something to the commander,” he said and nodded toward Jadirel, who had a crowd of shifters surrounding him.

  Forgetting Fiona, I raced to Jadirel and watched as a pink sphere darted around his neck, zooming in an infinite circle. It gripped him as he moved, causing a sizzle of heat to radiate against his neck.

  My heart sped up then, and I watched as Jadirel spread his wings and retracted them in quick succession, his body throwing out a myriad of reactions. All of it was muscle memory; just his brain trying to figure out the right combination of movements to make the pain stop.

  Veins bulged out of Jadirel’s thick skull, and he finally fell to the ground, his body heaving in a mass of breaths and twitching every time he tried to move.

  He let out a thick and
cracked dragon’s cry. The sound of it jarred us all with its weird humming through our bodies.

  The yellow shifter caught sight of me, his red eyes wet and bloodshot. He reached up for my hand, and the rest of the shifters stepped back to give us a circle of space.

  I took his hand, and he winced and gasped in a furious pain as he pulled me down near him.

  At first, I thought he might say something dire or of affection. Something someone might say on their deathbed. Instead, he shot me a furious glare and seethed, “Get. It. Off.”

  I nodded and knelt down, inspecting the ring. There was a detonator pressed into his flesh, stuck to him with a sticky substance that seemed to meld into his skin.

  “She had a bag with her,” Tesyduss said, and I motioned for him to bring it to me.

  I looked through the contents, but it was barely full. I reached around the darkness and then pulled out four more of the rings. Just a little cap that fit in the palm of my hand. I raised one to my sightline and clicked the button on the side, tossing it from my hand as the pink ring flew out like a collar and landed on the ground nearby, burning the ground beneath it.

  I blinked and blew out a long breath.

  “Has anyone tried to take it off?” I said, and they knew I meant touch it.

  Tesyduss looked around, and then they all shook their heads. I inhaled nervously and grabbed an armored glove off of Ik'nale’s purple-scaled fist and put it on my own.

  As my hand neared the beam collar, I could feel the heat on me, already sharp and cutting from inches away. I clung to a brave moment and dove my hand onto the collar, screaming in agony as the shock coursed through my hand and arm.

  I pulled at the collar and only ended up hurting Jadirel more, both of us roaring in a vivid pain before I let go, launching myself backward with the effort.

  Two moons passed before I was finally able to see Fiona. She was heavily guarded now.

  Five warriors had been scouting the forests for any sign of the remaining females while the rest of us stayed at the camp, unable to move to our new base. We were too busy trying to find a way to get our leader on his feet again.

  As second-in-command and with Jadirel knocked out, I became the defacto leader.