by K. A Knight
Before I can think on that further, a server comes to our lounge carrying a tray with nine glasses and nine shots.
“You trying to kill us?” Joss jests, taking his glass and shot.
“No, he’s just showing off,” Kronk jokes.
“Me? Show off?” I reply, pretending to be appalled by his insinuations. “I’d never…”
“Just shut up and grab your glass,” Xal grumbles, a smile playing at his lips.
“Fine, fine.” Everyone grabs their shots and holds them over their glasses. “To our mates! May they be ours until the end of our days.”
“To our mates!” they cheer in unison. I drop the shot in my glass and watch as a burst of flames shoots up from my cup. I wait until it dies out before bringing the glass to my lips. Opening up my throat, I take a large drink, but startle when the flavour of the pravvar is off.
My stomach churns as I sit my cup back down, having finished the pravvar in one gulp. Nausea takes hold of me quickly and I feel like I might be sick.
“I gotta get some fresh air,” I choke out, sliding my chair back.
“Want some assistance, Ryx?” Vrid asks. I wave him off and stumble through the bar. My vision starts to become unfocused as I push my way through the crowds. Some yell at me for bumping into them, and usually I’d have a smartass remark to shout back while demonstrating some bakket skill, but right now, all I care about is getting the vekk out of here.
The double doors come into my blurred vision and I push through them, staggering out into the street. I can hear gasps of surprise coming from the vague outlines of patrons sitting at the outside tables. I grumble something unintelligible and head around to the side of the building.
My back rests against the cold stone and I slide down, my legs no longer able to hold me. I become worried as my body numbs, my limbs no longer reacting to what my brain tells them to do.
My eyelids flutter as I struggle to stay awake. My heartbeat slows and I try to shout for help, for my Klan, but my lips will not respond. I fall sideways to the ground, my head smashing into the stone. Just before darkness consumes me, I hear footsteps and a sinister voice rasp, “You should never have let me live. You took my face, and for that, I will take your life.”
31
Carmen
It’s late, too late. They said a few Earth hours, but it has to be almost ten by my calculations. Where the fuck are they? Something is wrong, I just know it, I can feel it in my gut as a knot twists inside my stomach. Worry flows through my veins. I’m anxious. After spending every waking minute together since I landed here, the absence of their presence suffocates me. I wish I could convince myself that I just miss them, but I’d be lying.
Shiloh and I had such a good few hours, just chatting and catching up on everything we have missed in each other’s lives since arriving in Oxious. I told her about my mates, and she told me about hers. It felt like old times, giggling as we told stories through the night. Sharing our hopes, our dreams. It felt right, normal even. I’m so glad to see her happy, but as the time wears on, I grow grimmer and grimmer despite her trying to distract me.
Pacing the floor, dragging Shiloh with me by our bound wrists, I zone out her comforting words. She tries to explain for the hundredth time that they are just drunk and forgot...but these aren’t human men. These are aliens, our mates, they wouldn’t do that. They are warriors, for fuck’s sake…fuck, let them be okay. If they are safe and just got lost in their cups, then I’m going to kick their asses for making me worry like this.
If they’re not...
“Seriously, Car, will you stop? My feet hurt and that weird thing in your hand is scaring me,” Shiloh laments with a huff, stumbling along behind me. I hold my oprey in one hand to defend us if the need should arise. My Klan’s warnings of stolen mates and Drykken rang through my head until I’d grabbed the weapon.
When a noise comes from outside, I spin, placing Shiloh behind me and holding my oprey out the way you would a knife, hoping I’m wielding it correctly. The door opens to reveal my Klan and I deflate. I grin at them, but it soon disappears as they file in with Shiloh’s mates, all looking grim...all but one.
“Where’s Ryx? You didn’t try and sell him, did you? I know he’s annoying, but he sure is pretty,” I joke...but it falls flat.
While I’m talking, Shiloh’s mates unclip us and she steps back with them. My Klan looks between them before Kronk pushes Vrid forward. He sighs and steps closer. “Carmen, about Ryx—”
“Where is he?” I hiss, stepping towards them, that knot in my stomach tightening.
“He’s gone,” he admits.
“Gone?” I parrot dumbly.
“Taken,” Xal adds.
The floor drops from under me and I almost fall before Xal catches me. I search their eyes, imploring them to take it back, to say it was a joke, but they don’t.
Taken?
“How? Why? When?” I demand in rapid-fire questions, and Vrid holds his hand up.
“Outside the bar we went to, around five hours ago. We have been looking ever since, but with no luck. We think it was the Drykken. We came back to arm up and go and hunt them before it’s too late. Klan Avuk will be staying with you—”
“Like fuck they will, assholes,” I snap, and their eyes widen, all of them taking a step back, making Shiloh and her Klan laugh. I throw them a glare, shutting them up as I concentrate on my own mates. Anger races through me, fueled by my worry for my teasing mate. God, let him be okay. I only just found him, I can’t lose him...I grasp onto the knowledge that he’s a fighter and one of the best. If anyone can survive, he can. “He’s my mate, I’m coming, not sitting here like some fucking damsel in distress!”
“Carmen,” Vrid begins patiently. “You can’t, we can’t look after you as well. Klan Aruk will use their reach and influence as generals to check the city while you stay with them. We will check the city again, but we already believe we will have to venture into the lands outside Lorenthis to search for the Drykken and Ryx.”
I wait for him to finish before I step closer and press my oprey to his neck and narrow my eyes, forcing my anger back, but I know it won’t help. I need to convince them, and for that I need logic.
“If you leave me to hunt them, you are leaving me alone. Yes, with another Klan, but they aren’t you and they will protect their mate before me. Don’t you think this is their plan? Why would the Drykken care about Ryx other than the mate he has? Huh? Explain that to me. Or are they using him to draw you away so they can get to me?” I plead my case calmly, pressing the oprey closer, and forcing my mate to step back as I take them all in. “That’s some basic ass bitch move, splitting up. We are a family now, a Klan, we stick together. I can handle myself!”
“Little one,” Kronk starts, but seems unsure what to say.
“I. Am. Coming. It’s settled,” I snarl and turn, holding my weapon as I rush upstairs, shouting over my shoulder. “If you try and leave without me, I will sneak out and follow you, putting myself in more danger. Don’t try it.”
“What the vekk just happened?” I hear Xal question, and almost smile, almost.
“Carmen, that’s what,” Shiloh answers with a laugh.
Staring down at the clothes on the bed, Ryx’s bed, I suck in a wobbly breath. Now that we have a plan, I should feel better...but I don’t. What if we are too late? I know I can’t afford to think like that right now, but I can’t help it. I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. My other mates need me now. I need to suck it up and be strong for them, for Ryx.
“It’s okay to be scared,” Xal whispers, and I hunch forward, not even hearing him sneak in. His arms wrap around my body as he turns me, pulling me to his chest as I look up into his worried eyes. He lets me see what’s churning below that silent, calm surface, lets me see how truly scared he is for our missing Klan member. Strangely, it makes me feel better...and worse at the same time. “A warrior isn’t someone without fear, but one able to fight despite that fear.”
/> I sigh, my eyes filling with tears, but I force those tears away. “I can’t lose him,” I whisper.
He nods, his tail coming up and wiping away a stray tear I didn’t realise had escaped. “He loves you too, little mate, do not fret. He would not dare die on you.”
“I n-never said I loved him.”
He grins then, flashing fang. “It is obvious you do, you love us all. Even me, a monster who did not know what love was before you, can see it. We love you too, with all the broken, blackened edges of our blood-covered hearts.”
“That’s the sweetest thing you have ever said.” I grin and he laughs.
“Only the best for you, now, let’s get you ready. It’s time to hunt.”
I nod again and dig deep, gathering all my resolve and strength. I’ve been training my whole life to be their mate, who knew I was training to save them as well?
In this story, it’s the woman who is the white knight...she just so happens to ride in with three giant, purple alien sidekicks.
32
Xal
Our little mate is dressed like a warrior. Her mouth-watering body is clad in leather again, and strapped with her oprey and bakket as well as a hitrel, courtesy of Kronk. The sleek, silver weapon is similar to that of a gun on Earth, however this one shoots pure energy, vaporising your enemy if you get a clean enough shot. Her eyes light up when she sees it, but she soon turns somber, all of us worried about Ryx, feeling the clock ticking. The longer he is missing, the more danger he’s in. I have faith, though, Ryx is a warrior—our Klan member—and Klan Marix never loses or dies.
Especially not now, not when we finally have something—someone—to fight for. To live for.
We search the city. We had already asked around at the bar we were at before coming back and speaking to Carmen. We begin at the bar near our house and work our way outwards to see if they have heard anything. After grabbing an okkren into the city, we head to Ruvrix, the logical place to start looking since it’s the last place Ryx was seen. But we come up almost empty-handed. So far, all we have to go on is a drunk’s word he saw a Drykken, but his fuzzy memory isn’t strong enough evidence to make us drag our mate into the land beyond the walls of Lorenthis. Out there, everything wants to kill you, so it will be our last resort.
Kronk grabs the Totiv Carmen is talking to, losing his patience when he ignores our mate, and smashes him into a wooden table. “Answer her,” he growls, his eyes blacker than his horns, his body vibrating with the need to spill blood.
“Did you let Drykken through the gate?” she repeats, getting into the alien’s face. She had stood back and let us question the first lot of Totiv, already suspecting the guards at the gate had been bribed to look the other way as the Drykken snuck through into our midst. But in true Carmen fashion, she soon got bored of just watching and took over. The sight of her turns me on, her little red lips twisted in a sneer, her very human eyes blazing with anger. Her hands stroke her oprey, but I don’t think she is aware of it.
"I-I don’t know! I wasn’t on shift last night at the Unok wall, Fres was!” he screams, as his eyes start to pop from his head from the pressure of Kronk’s hand tightening around his neck. Those who were once sitting close by rush away, the main road going almost silent to avoid our wrath, knowing we are not merely playing.
This is serious.
“And where do we find Fres?” she asks, narrowing her eyes on the man as Kronk adds more pressure, making him scream in pain.
“At the bols, the bunks for the unmated! Unit 456!” he shouts, almost begging her as she straightens and nods at Kronk, who lets him go with a disgusted sigh. He kicks the Totiv onto the floor as we start to walk away.
“Stupid human mutt,” we hear him spit behind us. I’m already moving, and just as Carmen turns around, I rip the tongue from the man’s mouth. Blood splatters across her face—not that she cares—and I let go of the man. He shrieks, more blood pouring from the stump in his mouth until Vrid steps forward. He smashes his claws into his throat and pulls it out, throwing it to the ground as he turns again, holding our mate’s hand and leading her away to the bols.
It doesn’t take us long to find the bols. They are spread around the outskirts of the city, cramped and small, with barely enough room for a bed, never mind much else. Carmen counts down the numbers on the bols until she finds the one she wants. I go to kick the door down, but she stops me with a pointed look and a hand on my leg.
I frown and step back as she raises her hand and raps on the metal door. Not two minutes later, it slides open, revealing a half asleep and disheveled Fres, the Totiv indicated to us.
“What the vekk—”
Smack.
I stare at my mate, simultaneously wanting to fuck her and laugh hysterically as I watch her smash her fist into the man’s startled face. He falls back with a yell and Kronk steps inside, followed by Carmen, Vrid, and me. I take her hand and examine her knuckles as Kronk grabs the man. I frown when I see they have split. Her pale skin is so fragile, the scent of her blood making me growl.
“Vrid,” I snap, and he comes forward, whispering to her as he takes her hand. I take his spot in front of a confused, terrified-looking Fres, who Kronk is holding by the back of the neck.
“I’m fine, goddamn it! Let me at him,” she snaps behind me, making Kronk and I smile. Fres glances from one of us to the next, not speaking.
She pushes past me and leans on her toes to get into his face, huffing adorably when she still can’t reach. Grinning, I grab her and hold her higher so she can look into his eyes. Only our mate could look intimidating while held in the air like a youngling, but Fres actually jerks back from her fierce expression.
“Did you allow Drykkens into the city?” she snarls at him, and his eyes widen as he looks at us then back at her.
“Er—”
“I’m going to take that as a yes,” she sneers, as her little fingers wrap around his throat. “You fucked up, you big pink bastard. Those savages took something of mine, and I don’t share well. So, you’re going to tell us everything we want to know, or I’m going to let Kronk here rip you to pieces, starting with your toes and working his way up until you start to talk. And you will talk, I can guarantee that, but it’s up to you if you wish to prolong this.” She rests her other hand on her chin. “I wonder if it will take ripping off your family jewels to achieve that though,” she adds calmly, almost thoughtful. “Maybe we should just start with them?” Carmen suggests, looking over at Kronk, who laughs.
“Whatever you say, little mate, one cock and balls coming right up,” he snarls. His blood lust is riding him hard, switching the large warrior from laughter to anger in a mere second like only Kronk can do.
“Don’t let him die though,” she orders, as he releases the man and grabs his bakket, making Fres jump back. He hits the wall behind him and crosses his hands over his cock protectively.
“Please, please, there is no need. I will tell you!” he pleads.
“Awww, but I wanted to see you bleed.” Carmen sighs. “Fine, tell us.”
Fres gulps audibly, then begins, “I was approached by an outsider, he-he paid me, all I had to do was look the other way for a cycle, that’s it! It’s the wall, it’s impenetrable! I figured what harm could it do?” He panics then, glancing around. “I didn’t know, I swear I-I didn’t know what they would do. It was only when I saw them rushing back over, like a blur of warriors, and the...the, erm, warrior with them that I realised I vekked up.”
She wiggles free and steps closer. “That warrior, he wore a black sash?”
He nods, his second eyelid fluttering over his eyes in his panic.
“The outsiders, the ones who came over the wall. Who are they?”
He swallows audibly then, flicking a look between us as his forked tongue darts out and wets his lips nervously before he spits it out. “Drykken, they were Drykken.”
“What next?” Carmen asks me, her hands gripping one of mine as we sit back, the cries of Fres r
inging in our ears as Kronk and Vrid tear him to pieces. She doesn’t seem bothered by the bloodshed happening across the room, or the growls, more concerned about Ryx.
I give her hand a squeeze. “Now we leave, we go through the wall to the outlands and hunt the Drykken. They live on the move, so it may take a few days, but we will find them, little one, and when we do, we will kill them all.”
I don’t even try to convince her to stay, I know she won’t. She is a warrior like us, she will fight alongside us—for her mate—regardless if we allow it or not. When Kronk and Vrid are done destroying that traitorous bastard, they stand before us, heaving and covered in blood. I drop her hand. “We leave now.”
“Let’s go, little one,” Kronk growls, holding her hand in his bigger one as we leave the bols and work our way through the city, blood from their fresh kill dripping off Kronk and Vrid. Those still up get out of our way, fear and silence trailing in our wake. They know warriors hunting when they see them, they know the bloodshed we will leave behind...and if Ryx is dead...
They know the hell we will rain down on this world.
33
Ryx
The ashy smell of smoke and the coppery aroma of blood permeates the air, waking me from the blackness. I fight the urge to cough, my lungs tight as if I have been inhaling the mixture for a while, when I hear voices around me.
“Vekking warrior my Totiv ass,” someone scoffs. “He couldn’t fight the poison in his drink. Passed out like a drunk after too much grapt.” The laughs of many join his, and I realise they are talking about me. The memories come flooding back.
Ruvrix.
The pravvar.
Stumbling through the bar, knowing something was wrong but unable to fight it. Poison, they said, no wonder I was so weak, my body giving in as the toxin set into my blood.