oath forger 01 - oath forger

by Nia Mars

  His large hands cover my hips and he’s holding me in place, pressed against his iron rod between my legs. He only stops the ravaging of my lips to say, “Moah,” in a ragged voice, then he is back to kissing me once again.

  An elemental connection pounds to life between us, and I forget everything else. I forget where I am. I forget Earth.

  His hands slide down to cup my butt cheeks and he drags me along his thick shaft.

  Oh. Ah.

  I want this. I want him. I want to give in.

  “Do you promise to take me back to Earth?” I whisper against his lips.

  Everything stops.

  He’s staring at me. Then suddenly anger boils in his eyes. He struggles with his emotions, his fingers biting into my skin, then relaxing again.

  He’s breathing as if he’d just outrun a sandstorm. When he speaks, his tone is cold. “I will take you back to Earth. When this war is over—”

  I fly off him, betrayal choking me. “When this war is over?”

  I’m so mad, I could scream. And then I do. “This stupid war has been going on for a hundred years! It could go on for another hundred. What do you plan on taking home, my ashes?”

  He’s only five or six years older than me, I think. So, if I’m dead of old age, he’ll be likely dead of old age, but I’m too angry to worry about the break in logic. Also, maybe he’ll live to five-hundred. What the hell do I know about him? He’s an alien.

  “My Ava—”

  “Don’t say that.” I’m at the wall, as far from him as I can get. If I could, I’d go farther.

  He stands.

  I pick up one of my shoes from the floor and throw it at him. The shoe bounces off the wall next to him. “Don’t you dare touch me again.”

  He no longer looks angry. Now he looks stricken.

  He’ll take me home when the war is over. Never. Never. Never.

  How could I have been so stupid as to believe him?

  When it hits me that I’m never going to see Lily again, I sink down against the wall. Because I don’t want him to see the tears that are burning my eyes, I pull up my knees, fold my arms around them, and lay my forehead on top.

  “Ava?”

  He sounds pained.

  He knows nothing about pain. He hadn’t been stolen from his people. He’s not stuck in some hellhole corner of the universe without a way back home. In the middle of war.

  My throat is tight enough to hurt.

  He never meant to take me home.

  I don’t look up. Not even when I hear him walk to the door. Not even when the door clicks closed behind him. I sit there, thinking of my sister.

  The magazine would have kept the two of us fed for a month. With Lily by herself, it should be enough for two months. Two months that she doesn’t have to go back out into danger to scavenge.

  I planned on finding a way to get back to Lily before the two months were up. And if I can’t? She can’t go scavenging alone. You need someone out there to watch your back. She will need to find a partner.

  What if she isn’t able to find a good one?

  I finally get up, but only to pace the room as I had earlier. I need to plot my escape.

  Escape. How?

  I need to steal a spaceship and learn how to fly it.

  The tortured laugh that bubbles up my throat echoes off the metal ceiling.

  Delusional: check.

  My escape is never going to happen, is it? Seems just as impossible as waiting for some galactic war to be over.

  Before I could scream in frustration or throw the other shoe, the ship’s alarms go off. Red lights blink all along the ceiling. The sharp warning beeps hurt my ears, so I slap my hands over them.

  I stick my head out the door just as one of the crew members, Haras, sails by.

  “What’s going on?” I call after him.

  He shouts back over his shoulder without stopping. “We’re under attack! Please strap in, Madam!”

  Chapter Seven

  MY FIRST SPACE BATTLE is surreal. It’s chaos. It’s a sandstorm times a million.

  I want to hide under the furniture, but instead, I pay attention. Maybe I’ll learn something that’ll help me escape later.

  My ears are ringing from the weapon blasts; their deep, irregular bass beat reverberating through everything around me. The ship shakes as our shields absorb endless hits.

  It occurs to me that I’m in a tin can, hurtling through darkness, and at any second I could be vaporized into space. I’ve had more comfortable thoughts.

  I have to hold onto the walls to make it to the command deck. I stop outside the door, kind of peeking around the doorframe. I don’t want Koah to see me. I’m still mad at him. I don’t want to deal with him right now. I just want to know what’s going on here.

  The whole crew is in the room, and so are the royal guards, everyone strapped into bucket seats.

  The display screen is fragmented. The largest section shows a battle outside. After a moment, I can tell two distinct forces apart—ships that are attacking us versus ships that are defending us. I suppose Koah’s fighters have come to our aid.

  On a different section of the screen, symbols are scrolling endlessly. They must be reports, giving the status of the ship’s shield and distance to enemy ships—battle data.

  It’s the third display that I can’t look away from.

  “I will withdraw, when you withdraw from Evig!” the man on that third display is shouting.

  He’s about Koah’s age, but his hair is silver. He wears a silver uniform. His gray eyes are as hard as the ship’s titanium cladding. While Koah’s anger is red hot, the stranger carries a cold rage.

  Koah looks like an ancient gladiator. The enemy guy looks like...the only thing I can think of is the vampires in the old movies I watched with Lily. He looks hard, powerful, his features almost too perfect. If anyone could mesmerize a person into doing their will, this guy is it.

  Koah’s chest rattles as he growls. “Mark my words, Tiam. I will never withdraw from Evig. Nezid will never have the allanite mines.”

  The screen goes black. I can’t tell which one of them hung up on the other.

  A moment passes in silence, then Captain Embrin speaks up, carefully, hesitantly. “Should we not inform him that the Oath Forger is on board?”

  Koah’s entire body stiffens. His hands curl into fists, then uncurl. “Someone else might pick up on the communication,” he says at last. “We can’t guarantee that our transmissions are secure.”

  Okay. Wait. What? There are other people out there who want to kill us, beyond this Tiam guy? I swallow hard.

  And why does his name sound familiar?

  Then it comes back to me. Tiam is Krek of Nezid. Head of the Ternel Alliance.

  Because I can’t read well, I usually try to remember everything. Over the years, I’ve developed a pretty good memory.

  I step forward without meaning to. “This guy is one of The Five?”

  Koah whips around just as the ship takes a heavy hit. “Why aren’t you in our room, strapped in?”

  Because I don’t know alien battleship protocol? Also, I don’t remember seeing straps.

  Another hit.

  The strength of this one throws me back. Koah is flying toward me. He catches me before I can split my head open, and he rolls us so I’m on top of him as we fall.

  I stay there for a couple of seconds, trying to gain my bearings and draw air into my lungs.

  His voice is urgent. “Are you hurt?”

  I sit up to check. “I’m fine.”

  He isn’t. His shoulder is at the wrong angle, either broken or dislocated. His face is bleeding. As he dove for me, he scraped his skin along the metal paneling, and the paneling is full of protrusions, dammit, probably more control buttons.

  Why in hell did they have to put those stupid controls right there?

  “Shield damage at the storage section,” the captain calls out. “Display dysfunctional. I can’t get a read on how b
ad it is.”

  “Go check,” Koah orders his guards. “I can get to the med unit on my own.”

  They hurry off and disappear down the hallway. The entire ship is still shaking, from one attack after another.

  When Koah heads to the med unit, I follow after him. He shows no indication that he’s in pain, but that shoulder makes me wince. If he hadn’t caught me, it would be my bones right now, sticking out like that.

  “I can help,” I offer as we step into the room. Everyone in the colony knows some minimal first aid.

  He stops, turns, and raises an eyebrow.

  I gesture toward one of the beds. “Sit.”

  He does and looks at me with expectation.

  God, his indigo eyes are beautiful. Under different circumstances, in a different universe, I could look at those eyes for hours on end. The heat that slowly comes into his gaze is now familiar, and yet it hits me with a new force every time.

  A drop of blood rolls down his cheek.

  That streak of crimson snaps me out of my daze.

  Right. I can do this. Can’t I? I can at home, where I know where everything is. Right here, right now, I’m out of my element. “Disinfectant?”

  As the ship takes another hit, he points to a mint-green button on the wall, the size of my fingertip. Hoping that this vending machine won’t try to kill me like the last one, I press the button. A small hole opens up, and a sealed foil package is dispensed. Looks like pictures of those old condom things I’d seen.

  I tear the package open, take out the wet paper square inside, and rub it all over my hands. A little tray pops out. I guess that’s for medical waste. I put the used towelette in there, then push the little button for another and turn to Koah.

  He’s sitting sideways on the bed. When I move over, he opens his legs so I can step between his massive thighs and reach him better. He turns his head, offering up his bloodied cheek.

  “I don’t know if this will sting or not,” I tell him.

  He says nothing, as if talking about pain is beneath him.

  I start with his temple and gently wipe off the blood. He stays completely motionless. Since I can’t tell if I’m hurting him or not, I keep going.

  The color of his hair really is stunning—the deepest, most beautiful indigo I have ever seen. His eyebrows and eyelashes are indigo too, but a shade darker. His cheekbones are pronounced, as are his nose and wide jaw. He is rugged, masculine beauty personified.

  I’m still angry at him for misleading me into thinking that he would take me back to Earth in the near future, but my anger has lost a lot of its heat. “Thank you for catching me.”

  “I want to protect you,” he tells me. “It hurts me when you’re hurt.”

  His words should sound strange, but they don’t, because as mad as I still am at him for not taking me back to Earth, I feel the odd connection that snapped into place between us when I first saw him at that hearing, and then again when he kissed me. I feel an overwhelming urge to help him.

  Does he feel something similar toward me? If he does, I might yet have a chance of talking him into returning me home sooner rather than later. I’m just going to have to keep trying.

  I dispose of the bloody towelette, then move to look at his shoulder.

  “Popped out when I landed on it,” he says, as if dislocating a limb is no big deal. He’s facing me again, his gaze holding mine.

  “Okay. I know what to do with that.”

  The way life is on Earth these days, injuries are common.

  With my left hand I take his right hand, and I put my right hand on his upper arm. “Don’t stiffen up. Relax.”

  Then I yank, kind of rotating and pushing at the same time, as hard as I can because I want to get this right on the first try.

  His shoulder pops back into place with a dull sound. He never winces. He never takes his gaze from my face. He looks barely affected.

  My heart, on the other hand, is definitely beating way too fast. “Better?”

  He rolls the shoulder, but does not let go of my hand. “Thank you, Ava.”

  I must be all kinds of stupid, because part of me wishes he would go back to saying my Ava.

  Since he seems disinclined to let me go anytime soon on his own, I pull away. “Antibacterial cream?”

  He points at the blue button next to the mint green one.

  I push and receive a different towelette. Now that the disinfectant has dried on Koah’s face, I smooth some of the antibacterial agent over his scrapes. None of them are deep enough to require a bandage. He’ll be fine. He just needed to get clean.

  When someone comes in, I turn. It’s Nilo, one of his guards, hands bloody. “Dislocated wires,” he says. “We got them fixed.”

  He goes to a strange-looking armchair in the corner and sits. A hood comes out of the back of the chair and closes over him. He’s out of the chair in a minute, his hand completely repaired, no sign of injury.

  His gaze cuts to Koah. Some kind of silent communication passes between them. The guard leaves.

  I stare after him, disbelieving. Are you kidding me?

  For about a millionth time, I feel pretty stupid. I sigh as I turn back to Koah. “That thing could have healed you without any pain, couldn’t it? Why didn’t you say something?”

  He looks at me as if the answer should be obvious. “You were touching me.”

  I don’t know how to respond. I don’t get the chance, in any case, because a massive blast shakes the ship. This time, when I fly off my feet, I fly straight into Koah’s arms.

  We both slide off the bed and bang into the corner. The entire room rattles around us. The only reason the furniture is not tossed on top of us is that it’s bolted to the floor. This was the worst hit yet. I don’t think we can take many more like this.

  Koah holds me safe. “Are you hurt?”

  He runs his hands over me, and heat is spreading through me nearly as fast as the fear of dying in the next attack. “I think I’m good. You?”

  His face is grim as he stands with me and carries me to the command deck, puts me into his chair, and the chair automatically straps me in. Then he calls some kind of a command at the display screen, and Tiam appears.

  Koah’s hands slap onto the control board while he leans forward as if he’s ready to jump through the screen and tear the other guy apart.

  “I have the Oath Forger on board!” he roars.

  Everything goes still.

  I mean everything. All weapons instantly go silent. The ships on the screens are motionless. The universe has stopped.

  Tiam’s gaze sweeps the room then settles on me, his expression a mixture of stark disbelief and staggering hope. I can’t look away from his intent gaze that’s consuming me across the distance.

  “I am transporting over,” he says.

  “Like hell you are.” This time, I see Koah’s hand flick as he ends the connection.

  The entire large screen in front of us now shows the battlefield. I wait for the shooting to resume, but it doesn’t. The ships are moving around us as if in a coordinated effort, our guys and the enemy alike, into a protective formation around Koah’s ship.

  I wish someone would tell me what the hell is going on.

  Is the war over?

  Okay, I’m liking this.

  Koah is a lot less pleased. When I turn to him, I find nothing but dark thunder on his face.

  Chapter Eight

  THE CREW SPENDS the rest of the day on repairs. I spend it in our quarters with Koah who suddenly developed an aversion to leaving me by myself. I ask him to continue to teach me to read. I can’t handle just sitting here, staring at each other.

  This time, I’m in a chair. I’m not going back to bed for lessons. I vividly remember how that ended the first time: kissing.

  Thinking of his mouth on mine makes me miss whatever he’s saying as he paces.

  “I’m sorry. Could you please repeat that?”

  “Nee.”

  “Nee.” For
once, I manage to say the word just like he does.

  He flashes me a proud-of-you smile. I’m proud of me too. I’m making progress.

  The universal Federation language has forty-four sounds, some of them easier to make than others, each represented by a letter. Everything sounds exactly as it’s written. I suppose the alphabet was made that way since the pronunciation has to be easy so everyone can learn it.

  Koah brings up a string of letters on the screen.

  “Meh on ah ra.” As soon as I sound out the letters, I know what the word means, thanks to the translator implanted at the base of my skull. Gift. In the sense of a bestowed blessing.

  I can read!

  The first thing I want to do is tell Lily. God, she’d get a kick out of this. I can read Alien, but I can’t read English.

  I wonder how Lily is doing. It’s my new hobby. I worry about her constantly. I desperately want to see her.

  Koah stops in front of me. “What are you thinking about?”

  “My sister.”

  “You miss her.”

  “Don’t you miss your family? I mean, when you travel like this.”

  “I don’t have a family,” he says matter of factly, with no emotion, shutters closing all over the place. “They were killed in an attack.”

  I stare at him. “I’m sorry.”

  “What happened to Earth?” he asks.

  “Centuries of unchecked pollution, then nuclear war, about eighty or so years ago. Megatons of carbon in the air kept the sun’s warmth from reaching the surface. It got dark and cold. The ozone layer thinned and ultraviolet radiation went up. Plants stopped growing. Over half of Earth’s population died either from radiation from the bombs or starvation within a year.”

  I pause, while Koah watches and waits.

  “Scientists at the time said that radiation would lessen, the ozone layer would repair itself, and plants would be growing again in about fifty years, sustaining life.”

  “But without plants, the soil eroded,” he says with sympathy, as if he’s heard similar tales before. “It dried out and the winds on the surface blew it away. Most of the planet turned into desert. Plant life had trouble coming back.”