The figure’s bloody features grew clearer as Thargen closed the distance; when the alien turned his head, Thargen caught the faint sheen of red qal marks.
Firios’s eyes rounded as they met Thargen’s. He dropped a hand from the panel to fumble at something on his belt.
“My turn, skeksfucker,” Thargen growled. A wave of Rage swept him into a charge. His feet pounded on the metal floor panels, making them shake and vibrate, and the remaining distance between him and the volturian shrank to nothing within the space of a couple heartbeats.
Firios finally freed his weapon from his belt, but Thargen’s knee struck Firios’s chest before the volturian could raise the weapon in defense. Thargen threw all his weight and momentum behind the blow, driving Firios back into the wall. There was a satisfying crunch, emphasized by a choked grunt and the sound of the volturian’s weapon clattering to the floor.
When Thargen withdrew his knee, Firios pitched forward, sucking in a labored, wheezing breath. Thargen clamped his hands on either side of Firios’s head, stopping him before he could fall. If Firios struggled against Thargen’s hold, his efforts were too weak to make a difference—too weak to be noticed.
Twisting from his hips, Thargen slammed the volturian’s head against the wall. The wet, muted sound of the impact was like fuel to the fires of his Rage, making it flare anew. He drew back and swung again and again, faster and faster, pouring more strength into each blow. His furious roar swallowed the sounds of flesh being mangled and bones shattering, of blood and soft tissue spattering the walls and floor.
He didn’t know how many times he’d slammed Firios’s blood-slickened head against the wall when it finally slipped out of his hands. The volturian slumped lifelessly to the floor. Thargen whipped his arms to the sides, flicking away blood, clumps of hair, and flecks of flesh and bone. For a moment, the scent of the Firios’s blood was the strongest and sweetest of them all. Thargen breathed it in deeply.
Too fast. Should’ve made him suffer. Should’ve made him scream.
And he should’ve put up a fight.
Thargen crouched and plucked the fallen weapon off the floor; it was a stun baton, still collapsed and deactivated. He clenched his jaw and stilled his fingers before he could crush the weapon in his grip. The stun baton was a coward’s weapon, a crutch…but he couldn’t discard it yet. Not while the unknown challenges lurked ahead.
Without rising, he leaned to the side to look through the partially open door.
The dust was even thicker in the next room, making everything shadowy and indistinct—but the shapes ahead suggested storage containers or crates of some sort. And there was a light somewhere within that cloud of dust—not the red of emergency lights or the washed out glow of the lights over the cage room walkway, but a pure light that possessed that indefinable, undeniable quality marking it as coming from a natural source.
Daylight.
One corner of his mouth tilted up; there was a way out. There had to be.
Nothing seemed to be moving in that room—nothing but the dust cloud and the air it rode, which was just a touch colder than what he’d been acclimated to on the ship. When he breathed that air in, it made his nostrils sting.
Not done yet. Not out.
He stood up and turned toward the cages. The black-scaled female ilthurii and the gray-skinned female sedhi had emerged from their shared cell, and the male azhera at the back of the room was shoving against the door of his cage, fighting to get it open. A couple other captives were stirring, but Thargen’s attention shifted to Yuri, who was standing up in her cell, her eyes looking black in the weak red light.
Conflicting urges held him in place for a few moments. He needed to find more of the smugglers—especially Mortannis and Taeraal. They had to pay for all this. But he also needed to keep Yuri safe…which meant keeping her close. He didn’t care what shared trauma he and the other captives had endured here, he didn’t trust any of them. Not with Yuri.
Even his Rage was torn between those two motivations, which were at once interconnected and opposed. Fulfilling the first by killing the smugglers meant upholding the second, but doing so would also place her in danger whether he left her behind or brought her along.
The whole thing was confusing enough to dull the edge of his Rage and make his head hurt.
Can’t let her out of my sight. Won’t.
“Yuri!” He strode toward her.
With arms around one another in support, the ilthurii and the sedhi hurried past him, heading for the open chamber door. He ignored them; they weren’t a threat.
Yuri stepped into the walkway a moment later, moving with a staggered gait to compensate for the tilt of the floor, and looked at him.
Despite everything, he couldn’t help noticing her delicate body, her feminine curves, her smooth, pale skin. His cock roused immediately, twitching upward as it hardened. Even through all the overwhelming smells layered in the air, he picked up her scent. Thargen halted a few meters away from her.
He curled his hands into fists. The blood on his fingers was sticky and cooling, but his Rage was already rebounding from his confusion, burning hot.
It would be so easy to take her. So easy to sheath himself in her warmth, to fill her with his seed over and over and over again. He wouldn’t even have to think; Rage would handle it all, would drive him on with relentless, animalistic eagerness to take what he fucking wanted.
Yuri hurried toward him, grasping the bars of the cages she passed to keep herself balanced. As soon as she was close enough, she reached for him and asked, “Are you okay?”
Thargen jerked back from her hand and drew in a hissing breath. There were other smugglers aboard this ship, he knew there were, and they needed to be his targets—but Rage was only concerned with the immediate. It was focused entirely upon her now. He couldn’t accept her touch, couldn’t trust himself.
He would not hurt his zoani.
She halted and narrowed her eyes, sweeping her gaze over him. “Thargen, is that…is that blood? Is it yours?”
Farther down the walkway, one of the cell doors opened slightly. The occupant—the female volturian—grunted. Holding a bar beside the door with one hand, she pulled herself out, shoving the door wider open with her shoulder to fight the angle of the floor. As soon as she was out, the door slammed shut with a resounding bang. She limped toward Yuri and Thargen slowly, favoring her right leg.
Most minor details were usually lost on Thargen during his Rage, but one stood out now—the collar around the volturian’s neck.
“Need to go,” he said. “Stay right behind me.”
Yuri frowned and eased closer. “Thargen, the…the other people—”
“Now, Yuri.”
She recoiled slightly, eyes widening, and nodded.
He clenched his jaw. Even Rage could not shield him from the stab of guilt that struck him in that moment.
Rather have her scared than dead.
But when he spoke again, his voice was notably softer. “Come.”
Thargen turned and strode toward the partially open chamber door, flicking his wrist to extend the stun baton in his hand. Beyond that doorway lay the unknown, and he couldn’t deny that part of him was excited to plunge into it—largely because of the chances for battle and mayhem. It was Yuri’s footfalls, quiet but unmistakable behind him, that kept his excitement contained.
Mayhem was bad for her. He needed to keep her away from it.
He crouched when he reached the door, and even then, he had to bend forward to fit through. The dust had thinned significantly, but the far ends of the room were still obscured by it—because this was a damned cargo hold. There were crates, chests, and containers scattered all over, much of it buried in plain sight amidst the mangled remains of fallen shelving. There were two figures ahead, features indistinct in the dust, rummaging through items on the floor; likely the ilthurii and sedhi who’d rushed out of their cages.
But it was the source of the light he’d noted
before that stood out the most; it was definitely natural light, streaming in through a huge tear in the hull to Thargen’s left. The contrast between that light and the relative gloom inside the cargo hold made it impossible for him to see anything beyond the breach, but he knew in his bones that it was outside, and almost any outside was better than being on this ship.
He paused just inside the hold and glanced back.
Yuri ducked under the door effortlessly. In this light, her bruises—both new and old—were painted in stark contrast to her pale skin. She was bleeding in a few places, too—one of her knees was oozing blood, there were a few little cuts on her arms, and the knuckles of her right hand looked like she’d been in a fistfight. The liquid smeared on her cheek was crimson, having flowed from a cut on her temple.
Thargen normally enjoyed the sight of blood. It had woken a primal thrill in him for as long as he could remember, had somehow made everything more immediate, more…real. But seeing Yuri’s blood made his stomach fold into knots and his chest tighten. His Rage growled in fury, hungry to make someone suffer for the damage done to her, but even it seemed to know that such a pursuit wasn’t a priority.
He needed to get her out of here. Now.
“On my ass, terran,” he commanded, activating the stun baton. It hummed to life.
“Do I get to touch it?” Her brows dropped, and she turned her face away with a cringe. “Wait. Sorry. I’m not…not thinking very clearly. Bad time to joke around.”
I think I fucking love her.
Thargen smirked. “You don’t start moving, I’m gonna slap yours.”
Her eyes widened, but the way she caught her lower lip between her teeth suggested she wasn’t afraid of his threat.
A deep ache pulsed in his groin, flowing through his balls and along his shaft. Even if Thargen was surprisingly lucid, his body was primed with Rage, ready to fight or fuck. It didn’t care which.
But he did.
He turned away from Yuri and moved forward, picking a path through the debris on his way toward the breach. The light from outside fell across a wide section of the floor, illuminating a jumble of items that had spilled from numerous crates and containers, a problem that would’ve been avoided had the smugglers secured their cargo.
Thargen’s eyes rounded as he raked his gaze over the mess; he was looking at a pile of weapons, clothing, and equipment. One glance was enough to tell most of it was military grade.
Apparently, the Zulka did run guns in addition to flesh.
Guess someone has to keep the markets on Caldorius supplied.
Thargen stepped forward, deactivated the stun baton, and tucked it under his arm. He bent to pick up one of several auto-blasters from the floor. “This is some quality shit.”
The sedhi and ilthurii—who were a few meters away, digging through the scattered objects—started and turned their wide eyes toward him. The sedhi raised one of her hands, brandishing a tristeel combat knife. Both females had pulled on ill-fitting clothes—the sort of bland gray undershirts that many paramilitary forces favored.
Yuri moved beside Thargen and raised a hand, palm out, toward the females. “We’re not going to hurt you.”
The sedhi glanced at Yuri before returning her gaze to Thargen. She narrowed her eyes; her orange irises shone with reflected light. It was only when her companion, the ilthurii, placed a hand on her shoulder that she finally lowered the knife.
The two females returned to their scavenging, the sedhi’s tail flicking as though in agitation. Thargen couldn’t blame the sedhi for her distrust; though all the captives had suffered in those cages, individuals like Iljibi had proven they weren’t all friends just because they happened to be enslaved together.
Thargen dropped his attention to the auto-blaster and opened the power cell chamber. He wasn’t surprised to find it empty; you had to be dumb not to secure your cargo, but you’d have to be on a whole new level of stupid to transport loaded weaponry.
He tossed the auto-blaster aside. It landed amongst a heap of identical weapons, all useless without power cells.
“The air in here…it kinda burns when I breathe,” Yuri said softly.
Thargen flicked his gaze toward the breach but didn’t keep it there long enough to adjust to the light. He didn’t need a glimpse of the world beyond just yet. “Just the dust. We’ll be okay.”
Yuri walked forward.
Uncharacteristic alarm flared in Thargen’s chest; he had the sudden urge to grab her and pull her back to his side, where he could keep her safe. He resisted.
Barely.
After a few steps, she stopped and bent forward to rummage through the items around her feet, pulling a piece of clothing from the tangle. It was a pair of black leggings, the kind usually worn beneath armor. Compared to her, they were huge.
Yuri stuck one foot in, then the other, and tugged them up her legs, but they sagged. She rolled the waistband a few times until they hugged her hips snugly enough not to remain in place.
In his mind’s eye, he pictured himself sliding those pants back off, letting his hands run down the outsides of her thighs. He imagined her lower half being revealed a little at a time, and his excitement at that thought was even stronger now that he knew what was beneath.
Well, not all of what was beneath. He’d only had the briefest glimpses of her slit, and it remained something of a mystery, a treasure not yet claimed.
His cock throbbed painfully in time with his thudding heartbeat, stiff as a tristeel pillar, and his eyes fell on her breasts as she bent forward again. He clenched his fists against the wave of Rage and desire that roared through his veins.
Thargen jerked his gaze away from Yuri. She was doing something productive; he needed to focus and do the same. The blasters were useless, but there was other equipment here—and there was no telling when the smugglers would arrive to find the would-be slaves rummaging through their illicit cargo. For Yuri’s sake, he needed to get her out of here before then.
The female volturian limped into the cargo hold at the edge of his peripheral vision, calling Thargen’s attention toward her. Her qal was dim, and she was covered in cuts and bruises beyond her injured leg. Her expression was one he’d seen before—far-off and dull, as though her mind had disconnected from her body at some point during the trauma she’d suffered. She wasn’t going to last long.
None of them would, if they didn’t move quickly.
So get moving, you green-skinned bastard!
Thargen transferred the stun baton to his mouth, clamping his teeth over the grip, and strode into the mess. He bent forward and dug into the debris with both hands, seeking anything that could aid them outside the ship. With each passing second, the sting of the air grew a little sharper. He could only imagine what it would feel like to draw in those first few breaths of pure alien air once he were outside.
He tugged a rumpled piece of cloth from the pile and unfurled it for a quick inspection. It was one of those gray shirts. His eyes were immediately drawn to the smudges of blood on the fabric—blood from his hands.
Ah, shit. Guess we’re lucky she’s been distracted since she first noticed it.
Thargen used the already soiled cloth to quickly scrub away as much of the blood as he could, wadded it up, and threw it deeper into the hold before resuming his search.
He already had a wad of clothing—all free of bloodstains—tucked under one arm by the time he heaved aside an overturned storage chest to discover a pile of black backpacks. He snatched one up. Its black material was thick but pliable, save for its outside face—that was rigid, as though armored or reinforced.
He turned his attention to Yuri. She was several meters away with her back toward him, in the process of pulling on one of those gray shirts; its hem fell nearly to her knees when she released it.
Thargen bent forward to pluck the stun baton from his mouth and called her name.
She looked at him, and he tossed her the backpack as soon as their eyes met. She flinched, but
her hands darted up reflexively to catch the bag.
“Fill it up,” he said before returning the stun baton to his mouth. He grabbed another backpack, opened it, and stuffed in the clothing he’d gathered.
There was more movement at the edge of his vision—Iljibi, looking battered and bruised but alert. The cren stumbled toward the breach, his gaze running across the debris-strewn floor. The sedhi and ilthurii seemed to have slipped out while Thargen was searching.
Fleeing into an alien world naked and unarmed was a mistake, but the absence of those two females emphasized a different mistake Thargen was in the process of making—he was taking too long. He’d wasted too much time.
Thargen pushed forward, relying upon training that had become second nature years ago to rapidly assess the objects on the floor, kicking aside everything that didn’t immediately register as useful. He was barely conscious of most of the items he picked up and shoved into the backpack; he had no choice but to trust his own unthinking judgment.
When he found the tipped over container that held tristeel knives just like the one the sedhi had brandished earlier, Thargen scooped the sheathed weapons into his backpack by the handful. He didn’t bother counting them—you could never have too many blades.
He stood up and turned toward the hull breach, meaning to call Yuri and finally get the fuck out of there, but his eyes caught on a storage container. It was similar in dimension to many of the others—about one hundred and thirty centimeters wide, half as tall and deep—but it was completely different in appearance; its black exterior was trimmed with gold edging that gleamed despite the dust.
It was also one of the few that was unopened.
Curiosity overrode his urgency. He walked to the container, grasped its handles, and turned it upright. His lips stretched into a grin. Thargen knew the symbol emblazoned on the lid—it belonged to Herestion, a famous weapon designer who built many of the elegant but brutal weapons popular in professional fighting circuits.
And undoubtedly in the fighting pits on Caldorius.
Wasting time. Need to go.
Savage Desire (The Infinite City Book 4) Page 13