His thumping heartbeat filled his ears.
The ground vibrated with a burst of thunder that dragged itself out over several seconds as though it were raking immense, booming claws across the mountainside one meter at a time. In his mind’s eye, it shattered rocks and tore up great clumps of dirt in the process.
Lightning. The red tinge had been lightning, seen through his eyelids.
When had he closed his eyes? When had his exhaustion become so complete, when had his body grown so heavy, his mind so…so clouded?
He felt like he was sinking into the ground, sinking into himself, but he didn’t fight it. Yuri was here, and the storm’s sounds were soothing and familiar. So familiar…
The droning sound of rain pattering on trees, ground, and stone was safe, natural, serene. It was water—just water.
A soft moan rose unbidden from Thargen’s throat. He felt heavy, so heavy, but there was something heavier still in his gut. Something cold. That relentless drumming wasn’t falling water. It was the crackling of ravenous flames, the popping of distant gunfire, shrapnel raining into puddles and onto muddy, blood-steeped ground.
The darkness took on that crimson tint again, but it did not fade now. The boom that followed wasn’t thunder—it was an explosion, the ground-shaking impact of an artillery shell. He knew it in his bones.
The gunfire sharpened and increased in volume. Distant shouts and howls echoed through the air. Thargen’s skin tingled and itched, bathed in the heat of raging fires.
They were here. He knew they were here, and it was too late.
He opened his eyes to a world of fire, smoke, and blood—he was standing on a battle-scarred field made anonymous by widespread destruction. Dark figures charged from the haze and flames, featureless but for their jagged-toothed mouths. Their howls intensified, suddenly deafening and immediate.
The armored vanguards on either side of Thargen opened fire. None of them were wearing helmets. He knew the sweat-beaded faces of those vorgals; he’d served with most of them for years. But what were their names? Why couldn’t he remember their names?
Yuri.
Eyes wide, he looked down. He was naked and unarmed in the rubble-strewn field, skin covered in muck and blood that glistened in the firelight. The pounding of his own heart drowned out the din of battle.
She wasn’t there.
She’d been lying beside him, hadn’t she? She’d been nestled against him, held securely in his arms, and her alluring fragrance had been filling his nose. Now he had only the smells of dirt, blood, and scorched flesh, the sting of smoke and singed metal.
Rage stirred in him, but it felt oddly distant—it felt impotent. His limbs were leaden, and his feet were sinking into the muck, and those howling fucking shadow-skeks were attacking. Thargen growled and pushed himself forward. Every muscle in his body strained to pull his foot up from the mud. It was like the whole planet sought to drag him down.
The blaster fire from the vorgal vanguards was tearing through the skeks, but two more of the grinning monsters emerged from the smoke for every one that fell.
A glimpse of pale flesh ahead momentarily stilled Thargen’s heart. That was Yuri—it had to be her. But she was amongst the enemy. He had to get to her, had to get her out of here. He had to save her.
Growling, he tore his foot free of the muck and moved forward. The next step was no easier, but he simply clenched his jaw and willed himself onward, battling the hungry mud for each centimeter. The ground ahead was black with skeks, so many of them that he couldn’t distinguish the living from the dead.
The vorgal soldiers around Thargen were dying. He saw them, even though he wasn’t looking at them, saw their faces with stunning clarity. He saw skeks bullets punch through already battered vanguard armor. Saw skeks blades and axes split skulls. Saw comrades he’d known for years use their dying moments to kill more of their enemies and build their own burial mounds out of corpses.
And he felt a thousand knives plunge into his heart because he knew their faces, knew they’d died bravely, but he still did not know their names.
Yuri.
He would not forget her name. Wouldn’t let her become another anonymous ghost in his memory.
Thargen roared and continued moving. She was just ahead; he’d get to her. He had to.
Skeks projectiles struck his body with dully, heavy thumps. The pain was distant, little more than points of warmth blossoming across his body, but each one slowed him a little more. The skeks swarmed, hacking at him with blades and gnashing teeth. Thargen lashed out at them wildly with fists, raked at them with his nails, bit into their filthy flesh with his tusks.
A small hand rose from amidst a pile of dead skeks ahead, its fingernails painted green.
Snarling, Thargen pressed harder. Rage refused to provide the strength he needed, roiling in an ineffectual little ball in his chest. He dug deeper, clawing at the core of his being for something, for anything, because he had to save her. He had to get his Yuri home.
He heaved howling skeks off him, shattered bone with his blows, and felt fresh, hot blood running over his skin. The mud sucked at his feet and pulled them ever deeper, hungry for more blood, for his blood.
Yuri dragged her torso out from beneath a corpse. Her eyes were wide with fear, her skin as covered in dirt and blood as Thargen’s.
Powerful arms banded around Thargen’s torso, legs, and shoulder, and another curled around his neck. He thrust a hand forward, leaning toward Yuri and pushing with every bit of strength in his legs.
“We need to go,” someone said in a calm, deep voice behind him. Urgand’s voice.
“No,” Thargen snarled. His joints strained, and his arm felt like it would dislocate in three separate places at once. He couldn’t look away from Yuri’s face, from her terror and desperation, from the pleading light in her eyes.
“You’re seriously wounded,” Urgand said firmly. “We need to evac.”
Thargen couldn’t leave without her. He wouldn’t. She was all he had, she was everything he needed—and right now, she needed him.
Yuri reached for him. One of his fingertips brushed one of hers. Hope flared in Thargen’s chest, pushing aside his useless Rage. He just needed a few more centimeters…
He caught her hand in his. For an instant, relief brightened her eyes.
The arms clamped around Thargen yanked him backward with sudden, immense force. He clutched Yuri’s hand with all his might—but his might made no difference. The blood coating their skin ensured that her hand slipped from his.
No!
The terror in her gaze pierced his chest like a spear. He reached for her again, but he was lifted off the ground and swept away at an impossible speed, watching her grow smaller and smaller with distance. Though he couldn’t hear it, he felt a roar tearing out of his throat.
What he could hear was Yuri.
“Thargen!”
The arms holding him were like bands of tristeel, unrelenting and unmoved by his desperate struggles. Yuri was a tiny, pale figure amidst blazing orange fires and black, shadowed corpses, left behind just like his comrades. His roar intensified, rattling his chest.
“Thargen!” she called again, her voice somehow louder even though she was so far away.
The shadowy assailants restraining Thargen forced him to turn around, ripping his eyes away from Yuri. He snarled and fought to break their grasps, vision flaring as his Rage finally produced a spark, finally built some heat. Baring his teeth, he drew back his fist.
When Yuri called his name again, her voice was startlingly close.
“Thargen!”
Thargen jolted awake, opening his eyes to total darkness. His body was tense, limbs trembling with an unsettling mix of fury and fear, and cold sweat coated his skin. He was on his knees with one fist poised to lash out at the foe pinned beneath him. He needed to get to Yuri. He couldn’t leave her there, couldn’t—
Gentle hands grasped his face, forcing him to look down. “Thargen, w
ake up.”
He knew that voice, knew that touch. He drew in a sharp breath through his nose; the air smelled of rain, dirt, and Yuri. The fire, the blood, the skeks—all of it was gone.
Thargen opened his raised fist as ice blasted through his body, extinguishing the heat that had built within him. He wasn’t on a nameless battlefield being overrun by skeks. Yuri hadn’t been taken. She was here with him, she was under him, and he’d been about to…
“Fuck,” he rasped. “Did I…”
Yuri stroked his cheeks with her thumbs. “No.”
His lungs emptied with a heavy exhalation, and his body sagged. He dropped his hands to the ground to brace himself, but his limbs still trembled—not merely because of the chill inside him, but the thought of what he might have done to her had she not woken him.
Yuri slid her hands down the sides of his neck until they reached his shoulders. She coaxed him down atop her, guiding his head to rest on her chest, and cradled his torso with her thighs. She took his weight without any sign of discomfort. She shifted one palm to his back, smoothing the tension from his muscles with firm but tender motions, and settled the other on his cheek.
“It was just a dream,” she said softly.
He knew she was right, but it hadn’t felt like a dream—they never did. Even now, he could still see the faces of his fallen comrades in his mind’s eye, could still see the bone-chillingly real terror that had been on Yuri’s face. He released another breath, this time shaky and thin, and tried to focus on her warmth, her softness. Her closeness.
Thargen curled his hands up around her shoulders to hold her close.
“Stay with me,” she whispered.
The combination of her hands, her voice, and her presence acted as a balm to Thargen, filling him with warmth and easing away the fury and fear that had seized his heart.
Stay with me.
She’d said those words before.
Thargen tightened his hold on her and turned his face into her breast, inhaling deeply her sweet, soothing scent. “Never leaving you, zoani.”
Fourteen
“Stay here,” Thargen said as he hooked several knives on the waistband of his pants, using the little clips attached to the sheathes. The gray morning light, though still weak, lit his muscles in harsh contrast to the shadows inside the shelter.
Yuri flicked away the pine needles she’d just picked out of her hair and looked up at him, brows furrowed. “Where are you going?”
“I need to kill something,” he said as he dipped to pick up one of the hardlight axes; the other was already in place along his thigh. His gaze shifted to the untouched meal bar sitting atop the pallet beside Yuri—the one he’d thrust at her when her stomach had growled a little earlier. “I’d prefer someone, but we’re overdue for some real food.”
She could totally go for some real food right now, but—
A pang of worry spiked through her chest.
“Wait,” she said, pushing herself to her feet. “You’re going out alone?”
Thargen stepped over to her. He still had to look down at her despite having to stay hunched over to fit in the shelter. “You ever hunted?”
Yuri blushed, and smiled sheepishly up at him. “Well, no, not in real life…” Way to be useful, Yuri! Those virtual games really paid off, didn’t they? “But what if something happens to you?”
He raised the axe and spun its haft on his palm, closing his fingers to stop it abruptly with the grip facing her. “Things don’t happen to me, terran. I happen to them.”
She frowned and took the weapon. Having it in her hand, feeling its weight and solidness, only increased her uncertainty; it was just a physical confirmation that he was about to leave. She knew he was strong and capable, knew he could fight, but however much he acted like he was invincible, he wasn’t.
And I don’t want to lose him.
Thargen hooked a finger beneath her chin and lifted her face toward his. “There’s nothing on this planet that can take me away from you, zoani. I’ll be back soon.”
Yuri eased closer to him, slipped her free hand around the back of his neck, and pulled him down into a kiss. She closed her eyes and parted her lips, flicking her tongue along the seam of his mouth. He growled and cupped the back of her head in his hand, slanting his mouth to kiss her harder. His tongue invaded her mouth and stroked hers, beckoning it—no, demanding it—to do the same.
The kiss was heated and wet, charged with the sexual energy that had been crackling between them since the moment they’d met. Yuri swayed toward him, arching her back. Her body tingled with desire. Her breasts were heavy with the need to have his hands on them, and her nipples had tightened into achy little buds.
It wasn’t until Yuri bit his bottom lip that Thargen grunted and pulled away from her. She moved to follow, to continue what they’d started, but he released the back of her head to catch her jaw, halting her movement. She opened her eyes to look up at him. His lips were dark, swollen, and glistening with a hint of moisture.
Thargen’s tongue slipped out to lick his lips, and Yuri suddenly imagined that tongue licking a different set of lips. Heat flooded her core in a rush, and her sex clenched.
Can this man make me any hornier?
“So fucking sweet.” His nostrils flared with a deep inhalation. “And I haven’t even had a real taste yet.”
Oh, eff me.
Yuri squeezed her thighs together. “You can. Like, right now.”
He grunted, and the corners of his mouth curled into a wicked, sexy grin. “I’ll save that as a treat for later. We need something a little more…savory right now.”
She lifted her leg, brushing her thigh against the prominent bulge at his groin. “I could go for some meat right now.”
Thargen shuddered and squeezed his eyes shut, releasing a long, low groan. “You’re fucking killing me, terran.”
Yuri chuckled and scraped her nails over the back of his neck. “I can cure you. I was trained as a nurse, remember?”
Well, kind of, but there’s no need to get technical.
He lowered his mouth and pressed a soft kiss to her lips—tender rather than fiery, soothing rather than arousing. Before she could coax more from him, before she could escalate it, he pulled back.
Had that kiss been a gentle rejection?
You’re a glutton for punishment, Yuri, that’s what you are.
“Be back soon, terran,” he said in that rumbly voice that only teased her more. “Stay here. I won’t go far.”
Yuri stuck her bottom lip out—she wasn’t too proud to pout—as he withdrew, breaking all physical contact with her.
What was it going to take to get that giant club between his legs between hers?
Thargen caught his bottom lip with his teeth. “Fuck, zoani. I can’t think straight when you look at me like that. Not enough blood for my brain.”
Yuri laughed, and immediately after, her stomach decided to rumble. Her hand flew to her belly.
Damn you!
Now Thargen laughed.
“Doesn’t mean anything,” Yuri declared.
“It’s my job to see to my female’s needs.” He moved to the opening and paused there, looking back at her over his shoulder. “Gonna take care of your hunger, first. Then we’ll see if I can’t do something about your appetite.”
Yuri’s toes curled into the moss, her sex clenched in anticipation, and she grinned. Thargen’s eyes swept over her body, fire blazing in their golden depths, before he stepped out.
She stood there for a time, some small part of her hoping he’d change his mind, that his big body would reappear in the opening and block out the light, but she knew he was serious—and that he was right. They needed food.
The sky was still overcast, and the gloom outside was enhanced by the fact that this side of the mountain didn’t get direct sun in the morning. The wind was still blowing, rustling foliage and making trees creak, but at least it wasn’t raining.
Yuri blew out a long,
slow breath, pushing the loose strands of her hair out of her face. She sat down in the pallet, laid the axe on the ground beside her, and glanced at the meal bar. Her stomach cramped again. If she was this hungry, she could only imagine how Thargen must be feeling. She doubted a single meal bar was enough to sustain a vorgal of his stature for a day—especially lately, with how hard he’d been pushing himself.
And he gave this one to me, not knowing whether or not he’ll actually catch something out there.
Yuri picked the meal bar up and held it on her open palms. She had no idea what these bars were made of. Her best guess was hard-packed sawdust given their appearance, texture, and taste. Sawdust or insects ground to powder and glued together.
She shuddered.
What the hell, Yuri? Don’t think about that!
Scrunching her nose, she broke the meal bar into two, tucked the larger chunk inside one of the open backpacks, and nibbled on the corner of the smaller piece. As she chewed, the meal bar broke down into something increasingly dirt-like and seemed to suck all the moisture out of her mouth.
And of course, they were out of water cubes.
Once she’d finished eating—and her arousal had finally cooled—another pressing issue made itself known.
She had to pee.
Yuri stretched her legs out her and crossed them, willing herself to hold it, to wait for Thargen to get back, but the need swiftly became unbearable.
She looked at the entrance. “Damn it. Guess I’m playing mountain woman again—by myself.”
Wrapping her hand around the axe, she pushed herself up to her feet. Keeping her thighs squeezed together, she waddled to the opening and stuck her head out, peering left and right. She saw no movement save for the vegetation swaying in the wind.
She ducked out of the shelter. The wind swept over her, fluttering her hair and clothing and sending a slight chill up her spine. Raising the axe with both hands, she stepped forward, glancing around her.
It’s fucking clear, her bladder yelled at her. Go!
Yuri ran to a nearby tree, shoved her pants down—nearly falling over when they caught on her foot in her rush to get them off—and set them aside, dropping the axe on top of them. Relief came swiftly once she’d pulled up her shirt and squatted.
Savage Desire (The Infinite City Book 4) Page 22