by Zoey Draven
She was being bargained over like a commodity, like a roll of silk in the marketplace. Tavar’s fists squeezed into Erin’s arm and she bit her lip to keep from crying out. The Mevirax leader didn’t even seem to realize he was hurting her.
But when he said, “Very well, Po’grak,” his voice was steady and even sounded…apologetic.
Po’grak’s back straightened, his tail slapping loudly on the floor. “Good.”
“I will send my guard for the crystals. A vonne.”
Po’grak’s eyes narrowed, “Two vonnes of crystals.”
Dread shot through Erin. How many times could they travel to Earth with that amount of Luxirian crystals? Could they? How many more women could they take? Erin had always been under the impression that only a significantly sized crystal was enough to power a spaceship to Earth.
“That will clean out most of our stores,” Tavar argued.
Po’grak replied, “It would not have been necessary if you brought the other human as promised.”
Tavar made a show of sighing. He paused, as if thinking over the offer. Po’grak’s eyes glinted in the light, his greed evident. Erin wondered how such a male had ascended to leadership when his emotions were so plainly obvious.
“You will start administering the vaccine to Laccara while they are retrieved then,” Tavar said, somehow making it seem like both a demand and a question.
Po’grak’s slim, almost nonexistent lips thinned. Then he gestured to one of the other Jetutians in the room, who went over to the far wall. The same shimmering veil from the entrance covered a hidden compartment there. When he reached his hand through it, Erin heard a clink and then the Jetutian stepped away, a clear vial between his clawed talons, filled with a black liquid that looked thick like molasses.
Laccara stepped forward as the Mevirax guard went from the room, back down the long hallway, off the ship to presumably retrieve the crystals. Tavar stayed, watching as Laccara sat down on the slab of the metal table in the room. She seemed confused when the Jetutian made her lie down, even more so when he strapped her limbs down tight, but she didn’t seem to be afraid.
“How long will it take?” Tavar asked, his voice rumbling, sounding impatient and annoyed. Erin saw the way his eyes strayed to the shimmering compartment on the far wall when Po’grak was not looking.
Po’grak didn’t answer him. Erin watched the other Jetutian fill a slim black device with the liquid from the vial, the end of which pointed into a thick, shining needle.
Laccara’s anticipation filled the room. Erin could almost feel her longing as the Jetutian slipped the needle into the softened flesh of her hip.
Then her body jerked, something changed in her face, and Erin went pale as a bloodcurdling scream escaped her throat.
Tavar dropped her arm in shock as Laccara’s body began to tremble and convulse, even as the Jetutian continued to inject more of the thick molasses into her.
“What is this, Po’grak?” Tavar demanded, his brows furrowed in anger, stepping forward.
“It is part of the changing,” Po’grak replied, looking not at all concerned with her screams. He bared grey and sharp teeth when he studied Tavar. “Your own female did the same. It will pass. Eventually.”
It was obvious the Jetutian male delighted in her pain, in her screams. Erin saw Tavar’s fist clench, perhaps the only emotion he showed that made Erin believe he cared for Kossira at least slightly.
Laccara’s screams were getting louder and louder the more the Jetutians flooded her with the vaccine, her body thrashing on the slab of metal, her limbs twisting against the restraints the other Jetutian had put on her. Now Erin understood why they’d been necessary. Horror filled her, freezing her in place.
“Stop this!” Tavar shouted, approaching Po’grak. “This is not—”
“This is exactly what you wanted!”
“Nix!” Laccara screamed when Tavar approached her. She didn’t want Tavar to intervene. “Nix, leave it!”
Suddenly, a loud boom reverberated around the spaceship and Erin lost her balance, stumbling to the floor when it swayed too much.
Po’grak went dangerously still, then his eyes cut to Tavar, fury rising in them. “What did you do?”
For a moment, Tavar looked just as surprised and furious as Po’grak. “I did nothin—”
Another thunderous boom came, this one so loud and so powerful that Po’grak lost his footing, and vials and equipment rattled and shook from their hidden places.
The Jetutian leader stalked to the door leading to the hallway, throwing it open. Beyond it, Erin saw hordes of Jetutian males racing down the hallways, armed, pouring from the spaceship in all directions, down towards the shimmering entrance they’d come through.
Where had they all come from? she wondered, dizzy with dread, wondering how she would escape now with so many roaming about.
Po’grak yelled something at them and they sped their pace at whatever order he’d given them. When he turned to face Tavar, even Erin could sense his fury.
“You think to betray me?” he rasped, stalking towards the Luxirian male. “You would be nothing without me!”
Another explosion came. Erin cried out, lurching forward, her eyes catching on the pattern pressed into the flooring. Follow the hallway until the white door, Kossira said. But was it right or left to the grey door?
The Jetutian hovering over Laccara lost his balance with that last explosion and the device he’d poured the vaccine into tore from her flesh, dark blue blood spraying in its wake, and it skidded across the floor. Erin’s breath went shallow, seeing the black liquid leak from the tip of the needle. She needed to get to it.
Before she knew it, Po’grak lunged for Tavar, who was hurriedly unstrapping an unmoving Laccara from the table as the third Jetutian in the room reached for a blade at his hip.
This is my chance, Erin thought. As a fourth explosion rocked the spaceship, so much so that she thought it lifted from the ground only to thud violently back down, she used the distraction to push herself from the ground, the muscles in her weak arms almost giving out on her with the effort.
She lunged for the vaccine as Po’grak reached for Tavar. She heard a gasp of air and when she looked, Po’grak had a curved blade jutting from his side—right between the plates of his armor—just as the Jetutian lingering in the corner knocked Tavar off his feet.
Erin didn’t wait a moment more. She scrambled across the floor—keeping her grip on the vaccine—towards the door to the left. She threw it open, her heart thundering in her throat, and saw there was a darkened hallway stretching before her, the same circular pattern Kossira had drawn out printed into the floor. At the end of it, she saw Jetutian males racing past, but they didn’t see her. She kept to the shadows.
Without a backwards glance, as piercing, guttural yells and cries and the ringing of blades began to echo throughout the spaceship, Erin bolted down the hallway, the black device pressed tightly in her grip.
Chapter Forty-One
“Erin!” Jaxor called, his voice carrying across the hallways, over bloodied and dead Jetutians and Luxirians alike. Their blank, lax faces stared up at him as his belly coiled with dread.
Most of the battle had taken place outside, but had slowly spilled into the ship as they drove the Jetutians back, which was what they hadn’t wanted. Vaxa’an wanted the fighting outside, on Luxirian soil, so his warriors could storm the vessel afterwards with little resistance.
“Erin!” he called again, tearing through the vessel, checking every hallway, every room he passed.
Vrax, vrax, vrax, he chanted over and over in his mind, the panic rising. He refused to think the worst. She had to be on the vessel! He’d watched her step on board from the shadows of the forest, though Vaxa’an had to physically hold him back from storming after her.
He circled back, going down the second hallway that led to the main entrance of the vessel. One of the first rooms was the medical bay and he stilled when he came across it, cur
sing himself for not following this hallway first. Because once inside, he knew this was where Erin had been.
There were two dead Jetutians inside. Laccara was on a metal table, her limbs loose, her face slack. For a moment, he thought she was dead, but then he saw her chest rise and fall. Blood coated the walls, thankfully none of it red, so it wasn’t human blood.
Another pair of legs was sticking out from the other side of the table. Jaxor jumped over one of the dead Jetutians and he stilled when he saw it was Tavar.
There was a blade in his back. He was lying face down on the floor, blood pooled around him. When Jaxor rolled him over, he saw his eyes were open and unseeing.
Gone then, Jaxor thought, blowing out a short breath. Gone to the blackworld.
Jaxor rose, casting a glance at Laccara. She was alive. Tearing the Com band off his wrist, a communicator, but most importantly a tracker, he placed it next to Laccara. It was the best he could do for her—Vaxa’an would find her. But Jaxor wouldn’t risk Erin’s safety for her.
Turning from her, he scanned the rest of the room. His stomach dropped when he saw another trail of blood, this one leading from the medical bay to a different door on his left. Po’grak? he wondered.
It was entirely possible. Jaxor hadn’t seen him—or his body—all night. Had he carried Erin away from here? Or had she managed to escape and he’d followed?
His blood went cold and without another thought, he stormed through the door and followed the trail of blood down a long hallway. There wasn’t a Jetutian in sight. In this part of the vessel, it almost seemed deserted.
The blood led him to a white door, but the blood trailed left, down another corridor, which took him to a grey door.
Behind the grey door was a storage room.
“Erin,” he called out, but the room was empty. He turned, frowning, peering at the walls, the ceilings, the floor, wondering if there was a hidden entrance somewhere. It was only after searching the room a second time that he saw a latch in the floor and he scrambled for it, lifting it open.
Cool air whistled up to meet him and without hesitation, he jumped down, landing on his feet, on Luxirian soil.
All that way just to end up in the forest again, he thought.
It didn’t take him long to get his bearings. He was at the back of the vessel, far away from the fighting, which had seemed to lessen considerably, judging from the sounds ringing through the air.
That was when he heard it. A soft cry, barely discernable, from within the thickness of the forest looming in the distance. But he recognized it immediately.
Jaxor sprinted for it, his heartbeat pounding in his throat.
Nix, nix, nix, let her be safe, he prayed. I will give anything as long as she is safe.
Erin cried out when Po’grak managed to take hold of her ankle and yanked her back down to the ground.
He found me, he found me, was all she could manage to think. He must’ve seen her leave the medical bay, had followed after her.
The force of hitting the ground knocked the air out of her lungs and, panicking, she gasped, desperately trying to breathe. She was already so weak from her captivity in the Mevirax dungeons. She was winded and her limbs felt like they weighed a hundred pounds each.
“Give that to me,” Po’grak hissed, reaching for the needle gun in her grip half-filled with the vaccine.
The only reason why she wasn’t dead already was because he was injured himself. Tavar had stabbed him in his side. That same blade was in his grip now as he crawled towards her on the ground, lime green blood gleaming on its tip. There was a trail of the blood inside the dark forest. It seemed to glow in the low light.
Still gasping for air, Erin drew back her leg with whatever remained of her strength and kicked him as hard as she could across the jaw. Erin heard a snap, heard his hiss, but she was already scrambling up from the ground, her fingernails clawing at dirt and moss, all while keeping the needle gun in her grip.
She only made it a couple strides away—her heartbeat felt like it would beat its way from her chest or simply burst from the exertion—before Po’grak slammed into her, using the overwhelming bulk of his body to take her down to the ground again.
“No!” she rasped. “No!”
Po’grak clawed for the vaccine but she struggled against him, kicking her legs beneath him, trying to get free. His claws raked down her arm as he grappled for it, icy hot blood spilling. Her blood this time.
Po’grak’s bellow of anger and rage almost made her eardrums burst.
“You are not worth this!” he yelled.
Then she gasped, feeling pain explode in her chest. Time seemed to still. Even Po’grak stilled over her. When she looked down, disbelief and shock raced through her, seeing the blade jutting from her chest.
Po’grak grabbed for the vaccine and he easily pried it from her loose fingers this time. In her shock, she released it.
“Now I must find another,” he cursed, looking down at her, but not really addressing her.
In the whirring, frantic state of her mind, she knew he meant another human. Another human woman. Because that was all she was to him. Cattle for slaughter. A prize to be won. There was no difference in his eyes. He’d wanted her for the Pit, nothing more.
Another bellow rang out through the clearing, one achingly familiar. Erin felt the trickle of her own hot blood leak out from the wound and she lay perfectly still, strangely calm, knowing she shouldn’t move too much, in case her movements pushed the blade deeper.
Out of the corner of her eye, she caught movement, but her vision had begun to blur, her eyelids growing heavy. She felt something wet track down her cheek. She thought it might be blood too because it felt hot, but then she realized she was crying.
“I don’t want to die,” she whispered, her heart twisting at the thought.
Po’grak’s body rolled off her suddenly, the weight of him gone so she felt like she could breathe again.
That was when she saw Jaxor.
He was on top of Po’grak, his face contorted in fear and rage. Erin watched as he plunged a long, gleaming sword straight into Po’grak’s chest, pinning him to the earth. Jaxor pushed the sword so deep that the hilt was flush with the Jetutian’s plated armor. He’d pierced it through the armor in his strength and in his fury.
Erin’s vision wavered again and she blinked, looking at Jaxor. Po’grak was still on the ground, and his breaths sounded raspy and thick.
Jaxor was off Po’grak in an instant and at her side. Erin looked up at him, her lips dry, her tongue tasting strangely metallic.
Blue eyes and a grim, handsome face. The sight of him made her cry harder, made her heart flutter and clench in sorrow and relief.
His hands shook as they smoothed back her hair. “Rixella, oh Fates, you…you need to lie very still, tev?”
“You did come,” she whispered, reaching up towards him.
He grabbed her hand, holding it, his grip strong and warm. She was starting to feel cold, but she wasn’t shivering.
“Vaxa’an!” Jaxor bellowed loudly, his voice echoing through the line of trees. To her, his voice was hoarse and raspy when he said, “I will get you help, luxiva. You will be well.”
There was something important and then she remembered. Her eyes flicked toward Po’grak and she said, “The vaccine, Jaxor. Get…get the vaccine.”
She saw it then, the glimmer of the needle in the moonlight. She tried to reach for it, but her limbs were heavy and weak. She was so, so tired.
Her eyes fluttered shut. Then she heard, “Nix, look at me, rixella. Look at me.”
“You did come,” she whispered.
Then everything faded.
Chapter Forty-Two
When Erin woke next, it was to bright light and her first thought was: is this heaven?
But if this was heaven, surely it wouldn’t hurt this much. That was her second realization as she groaned.
“Oh my God, she’s waking up,” came a familiar voice. A
flash of red hair appeared. “Erin, Erin it’s Lainey. How are you feeling?”
“Lainey,” came a second soft voice. “Don’t crowd her. Give her some space.”
Cecelia, Erin knew, that soft voice unmistakable.
Her vision sharpened, though the room still swam a bit. “Where am I?” she whispered, her throat so dry that she imagined it could tear like paper.
“In the command center,” another voice chimed in. When Erin’s gaze connected with Kate’s, the brunette smiled gently, something wrapped tightly in her arms. She was cradling it like…like a baby. “In the Golden City.”
Erin’s breath hitched, but her head gave a hard, dull throb.
“Enough. Out. All of you,” came a fourth, hardened voice. When Erin looked over at the new voice, she saw it was the old Luxirian doctor. What was his name again? “Even you, lavrix’an. I am sorry.”
“Of course, Privanax,” Kate said, inclining her head. Privanax, that was his name. From the bundle she was cradling, Erin saw a small, chubby arm emerge, the flesh tinted a soft blue from the light.
“Wait,” Erin whispered, struggling to sit up, confused and disoriented and dizzy.
Privanax forced her back down into a supine position and Erin turned her head to see that all the women were there, now filing out the silver door. Kate, Beks, Cecelia, Taylor, Lainey, Bianca, and Crystal.
“Crystal,” Erin whispered, stunned and relieved. The blonde came over before she left, pressing her lips to Erin’s forehead. Tears swam in Erin’s vision and she grasped for her hand. “You’re okay.”
“Yes, I am,” Crystal whispered, squeezing her hand, though Privanax frowned at the blonde, giving her a hard look. “I’m here and safe. Now, you rest. We can talk later.”
Then Erin watched as she, too, left. When the room was cleared, all except for Privanax, Erin felt a little more centered, a little less overwhelmed.