Unleashed by the Defender: A Kindred Tales Novel

by Anderson, Evangeline

“You see? Do you see?” Lady Bittlebum crowed. “Even the Nightwalker knows he deserves to be put to death!”

  “No, he doesn’t!” Imani insisted.

  Watching the vid of herself with J’are had given her a strange feeling—and a new understanding of the events that had transpired between them. She was still upset with him but she had seen the way he fought with himself, seen how he had tried to hold back the change.

  “Sit down!” she sent through their mental link. “I mean it, J’are! I didn’t expose Mistress Bittlebum just so you could throw yourself on the mercy of the court and get killed for your trouble!”

  “I forced you and ruined your life—I should die for it,” he sent back.

  “No, you shouldn’t! Now SIT DOWN!”

  Imani sent her last words with the force of a mental shout. At last the big Nightwalker sank back into his seat, though he still looked upset and she could feel the waves of self-recrimination coming from him.

  “Are we going to continue now, Councilor?” Judge Thoughtgood raised an eyebrow at her.

  “Yes.” Imani cleared her throat.

  “Really, your Honor, after that outburst—what more do you need to hear?” Mistress Bittlebum interrupted.

  “Mistress Bittlebum—when I want to hear from you, I’ll ask,” the judge said sharply. She waited until the other Mistress sank back into her seat, red-faced and fuming at the rebuke, before turning back to Imani. “All right, go on Councilor Williams. Please tell me why I shouldn’t have your client executed for committing such a vile offence as penetration?”

  “Because it’s not against the law in his culture—or in mine,” Imani said quickly. “Here on Yonnie Six, allowing yourself to be penetrated by a male is the worst thing a Mistress can do. Though I know for a fact, that some of them do it anyway—in the privacy of their own bedrooms,” she added.

  “Well…” Judge Thoughtgood cleared her throat. “There have been…rumors from time to time. Proceed.”

  “On Earth, where I come from, male penetration of a female is the norm,” Imani said. She turned to look at Lady Bittlebum. “Mistress Bittlebum made a critical mistake—she thought she could shut me up by shaming me. And while, I admit, it’s not pleasant to have a courtroom full of people watch me having sex, I refuse to allow any shame or fear to stand in the way of telling what I know.“ She pointed a finger directly at the yellow-haired Mistress. “Which is that Mistress Bittlebum murdered Lady Zangelo!”

  “Lies! All lies!” Mistress Bittlebum shouted, her face getting redder and redder. “She and that brute of a Nightwalker should both be summarily executed!”

  “Once again, Mistress Bittlebum, I will determine who—if anyone—is sentenced to execution. This is my courtroom!” Judge Thoughtgood exclaimed. She turned back to Imani, two spots of angry color burning in her cheeks. “Now then, Councilor, if you’re going to make such dramatic accusations, I certainly hope you have some evidence to back them up.”

  “As a matter of fact, your Honor, I do,” Imani said coolly. From an inner pocket of her dress, she withdrew the opalescent ring she’d found on Mistress Bittlebum’s dressing table the night before.

  “Oh—my ring! Your Honor, that’s my ring!” Mistress Bittlebum exclaimed. “I must insist that she return it to me at once—she stole that from my room last night!”

  “Yes, I did,” Imani said calmly. “But I think before I give it back, Judge Thoughtgood needs to see what it recorded.”

  She stroked the round, marble-shaped jewel set in the center of the ring and it opened and let the spy fly out. It buzzed out into the center of the room and, when Imani stroked the ring again, it began projecting a 3-D image of the lemon-haired Mistress from the night before.

  “Oh, you’ll be leaving, all right. But not with that cloak,” she said, brandishing her blaster at Imani and J’are.

  “Your Honor, I must protest!” Lady Bittlebum exclaimed, starting up from her seat again.

  “Silence, Mistress!” Judge Thoughtgood snapped, glaring at her. “You were allowed to show embarrassing and incriminating evidence involving Councilor Williams. Now, it seems, it is your turn.”

  “But—” Mistress Bittlebum began.

  “Speak one more word and I’ll hold you in contempt of court!” Judge Thoughtgood said sharply. She turned her attention to Imani, who had paused the recording, which was playing out in the clear space in the middle of the courtroom before the judge’s podium. “You may proceed with your evidence, Councilor.”

  “Thank you, your Honor,” Imani said quietly. She stroked the ring again and the spy fly continued projecting.

  She hadn’t intended to record any of the events of the night before. In fact, she’d forgotten all about the ring until she’d been undressing after they got back to the hotel. She’d been playing with it to distract her mind while J’are was passed out on the bed—his feral side apparently all worn out from bonding with her—when the spy fly had flown out and started projecting.

  Imani had figured out how to work it and had been immensely surprised when she’d seen what it had recorded. Now she watched with satisfaction as Mistress Bittlebum’s entire confession of the murder of Lady Zangelo played out for the judge and all the rest of the court to see. Her recording might not be as lascivious and X-rated as the one Lady Bittlebum had played of Imani and J’are, but it was certainly much more incriminating.

  The recording ended right after Mistress Bittlebum had locked them in the simulation room—for which Imani was grateful. She really didn’t want to have to watch herself and J’are having bonding sex again. It was too damn embarrassing!

  After the spy fly stopped projecting and flew quietly back to its ring, there was dead silence in the courtroom. Finally, Judge Thoughtgood turned to Mistress Bittlebum, who had been getting redder and redder in the face as the recording played.

  “Well, well—it would seem we have solved the murder of your very good friend,” she remarked, raising an eyebrow. “What do you have to say for yourself? You know the penalty for killing another Mistress is death.”

  “Death, yes.” Mistress Bittlebum rose suddenly. She was stroking her lemon-yellow hair, which Imani now knew was a wig, in a reflective way. “Death, but not for me,” she said.

  Turning to the three morphids she had sitting in a row beside her, she waved her hand over their antennae and shouted,

  “Kill them—kill them all!”

  Forty

  The courtroom exploded into violence.

  The morphids seemed to be everywhere. One bounded towards Judge Thoughtgood, only to be stopped by the bailiff, brandishing a blaster. But before she could get off a shot, the morphid closed its shiny pink, serrated mandibles around her neck and sawed off her head.

  Blood fountained out of her neck and Imani had a moment to see the surprised look on the bailiff’s face as her head fell to the floor. Then she realized another morphid was headed in her direction.

  She braced herself for impact but J’are was suddenly there, putting himself between her and the huge insect.

  “No you fucking don’t!” he growled, his eyes blazing. “Stay way from my female you fucking bug!”

  He gripped its two front legs, holding it back, but the morphid leaned forward, its serrated mandibles snapping in his face.

  Imani’s heart was pounding and there was an acrid taste on the back of her tongue—the taste of fear. How long could the big Nightwalker hold the overgrown insect back? She couldn’t help remembering documentaries she’d seen before, about how ants could carry ten times their body weight. Were Praying Mantises that strong too?

  J’are had fought one of these before, she reminded herself—on the first night she’d been here. But he had been in his feral state then and now he seemed to be still in his thinking mind. Would it make a difference?

  “J’are,” she sent through their link. “Go feral if you have to!”

  “No—I’m never going feral again.” His mental voice was filled with strain as he fo
ught to keep the mandibles away from his neck. “I hurt you the last time I did. I’m locking that side of myself away forever!”

  “J’are—”

  She was interrupted by a scream from Judge Thoughtgood. The third morphid was stalking her, while the second one—the one that had ripped off the bailiff’s head—was fighting with the two Horvath guards who had rushed into the courtroom when they heard the struggle.

  And standing beside the shocked Prosecutor, who was looking at the bloody scene in a daze, was Mistress Bittlebum. She was laughing and stroking her hair, Imani saw. It reminded her of a villain in an old silent movie laughing while he twirled his mustache.

  Have to stop her—have to stop this! But how?

  At that moment her attention was dragged to the morphid J’are was fighting with again. She felt a surge of pain and rage from the big Nightwalker through their link and saw, with horror, that the alien insect had managed to get its mandibles locked around his throat. In fact, the only thing that was keeping it from cutting off his head was the thick leather pain collar around his neck.

  “Yes, the pain collar—use the pain collar! Shock it, Imani—shock it!” J’are shouted to her mentally.

  “But I’ll be shocking you, too!” Imani protested. “I don’t know—”

  “Do it! Set it on maximum and do it!” he commanded.

  Imani fumbled for the pain collar remote, which she still wore on a chain around her neck. It nearly squirted from between her fingers but she finally managed to get a hold on it and press the big red pain button in the middle.

  Immediately, J’are stiffened and she felt a wave of pain rolling through him. The morphid was caught in the pain loop too—its body started spasming and a high, unearthly shrieking sound rose from between its parted mandibles, which were still hooked into the pain collar.

  Imani started to let up on the button but J’are shouted mentally,

  “No! Keep it up—it’s the only way!”

  “But I’m afraid the collar will overload your system!”

  How long could his heart hold out with so much pain coursing through his big body? How long—

  “No! Give me that—I won’t let you harm another one of my children, you little bitch!”

  Lady Bittlebum shoved Imani and grabbed for the remote. Imani started to fall and reached out reflexively, grasping for something to hold onto. By chance, her fingers caught in the looping curls of the lemon-yellow wig the other woman was wearing.

  The wig came off in her hand and Lady Bittlebum shrieked and grabbed at her head—which was mostly bald, with only a few tufts of mousy brown hair scattered here and there.

  “My hair! Give me back my hair, you bitch!” she shrieked at Imani. Forgetting about the pain collar remote, she made a frantic grab for the wig.

  Imani almost let it go—she had the impulse to throw it in the other woman’s face to use it as a distraction. But then something made her hold onto it.

  “Use it, daughter—you know how!” a warm, feminine voice said in her ear.

  Goddess? Imani thought wildly and then images flashed across her mind’s eye—pictures of Lady Bittlebum rubbing one hand over her hair and then over the morphids antennae as she ordered them to do her bidding.

  Gripping the wig tighter, she tore it away from the other woman’s grasping hands and started to go to J’are, who was still locked in a rictus of pain with the morphid twitching on top of him.

  “Here! Come here, my children and help me!” Lady Bittlebum shouted, distracting her.

  Looking up, Imani saw that the two morphids who had been stalking Judge Thoughtgood were coming towards her. They had killed the Horvath guards—the two scaly bodies lay decapitated on the floor in pools of black blood. The judge had dived under her podium and was cowering there with only her tall purple hair sticking out and quivering with fear.

  Imani saw all this in a split second and then the two morphids were advancing on her.

  Her first impulse was to run but then she remembered the wig. She clutched it tightly in her hands and as the first of the giant insects came at her, she waved it over the morphid’s antennae and shouted,

  “Her—get Lady Bittlebum—not me! Get her!”

  The morphid stopped for a moment, as though confused, its antennae twitching as its big black compound eyes switched from Imani to Lady Bittlebum and back again.

  The second morphid came bounding up as the first one was trying to make up its mind. Now Imani had two huge alien insects looming over her. Her knees felt like jelly, she was so scared, but she knew she couldn’t back down now.

  “You fool!” Lady Bittlebum snarled at her, a fierce smile of triumph on her face. “They don’t recognize you as their queen! I raised them from the egg—my children will never turn against me!”

  We’ll just see about that! Imani thought grimly.

  “I’m your queen now!” she told the morphids, fighting to keep her voice from shaking. “I control you. Now go on—get her! Get Lady Bittlebum!”

  As she spoke, she waved the wig over the insects’ antennae again, wafting the musty smell—which she assumed was the pheromone that controlled them—into the air.

  For a moment, they still hesitated. Then the two of them turned at the same time and bounded towards the balding Mistress.

  Lady Bittlebum’s eyes grew wide with horror.

  “Wait, my children!” she exclaimed, waving her hands at them. “Wait, you mustn’t! You can’t hurt me—I’m your mother—your queen! Your—”

  Her words were cut off when one of the morphids jerked forward and snapped off her head with a single neat click of its serrated mandibles. Blood fountained from her stump of a neck and sprayed across the courtroom in a gaudy crimson arc.

  Imani didn’t stop to watch the gory scene. Turning, she saw to her horror, that J’are’s big body was still spasming in pain. Oh God, how long had he been under the influence of the pain collar? How long could he be shocked by it without the awful device causing permanent nerve damage?

  Quickly, she fumbled for the remote, which was thankfully still hanging around her neck on the chain and turned the damn thing off. Running over to J’are, she waved the yellow wig over the morphid’s antenna.

  “Get off him—get off him right now!” she commanded.

  “It’s…dead. I think.” J’are’s voice was hoarse and faint and Imani saw he was trying to push the still-twitching corpse of the alien insect off him.

  “Here—don’t try to talk.” Grimacing with disgust, she grabbed the morphid by one thick, hairy leg and yanked on it. The thing seemed to be stuck, however, its mandibles still clamped around the big Nightwalker’s neck. Possibly they were stuck in his collar.

  Gritting her teeth, Imani yanked harder.

  “Get…off!” she gasped as—with a final huge pull—the morphid corpse finally rolled off J’are’s chest.

  It was then that Imani saw the blood.

  Bright red, it was jetting from the side of J’are’s neck. The pain collar had been severed there, she saw, and the morphid’s jaws must have sawed into his flesh after they finished cutting through the thick leather. There was a long, jagged wound bisecting the strong, corded side of the big Nightwalker’s throat.

  “No! Oh, no!” Imani gasped. She was no doctor, but she knew an arterial pulse when she saw one. The steady jetting of crimson could only mean that some vital blood vessel in the side of J’are’s neck had been severed.

  Dropping to her knees, she fumbled at his neck, pressing hard to try and stop the sticky red jets. Why wasn’t his body healing itself? Was it because the wound was too deep—too severe—to mend?

  “Let me go.” J’are’s mental voice was faint but his eyes were clear as he looked up at her. “Let me go, Imani. You’ll be free of me—free of our bond. Just let me go.”

  “No!” Imani gasped, tears choking her. When had she started crying? She had no idea, but now salty streams were running down her cheeks and she didn’t know how to stop them.<
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  “J’are,” she sent through their link. “J’are, hold on!”

  “Don’t want to hold on. I hurt you—I deserve to die,” he sent back. “Please, Imani—let me go.”

  “No, I can’t! I…I love you!”

  As she sent the words, Imani realized they were true. It seemed crazy to think that in the short time she had known him, she had fallen for the big Nightwalker. But somehow it had happened—maybe it was because she had Claimed him—maybe she really was the female the Goddess had intended for him.

  Imani didn’t know. She only knew that now, on the verge of losing him, she finally understood her true feelings for J’are.

  “Don’t go—stay with me!” she told him fiercely. “You have to stay with me so we can raise our baby together!”

  He didn’t answer and she realized he had lost consciousness. Also, the flow under her hand, which she was trying desperately to staunch, had grown weaker. Was it because his body was finally healing itself? Or was it because he had run out of blood to pump?

  Imani was afraid to know the answer.

  “Help!” she screamed at the top of her voice, looking around the bloody, corpse-littered courtroom. “Please, somebody help me!”

  There was no answer but a moment later the double wooden doors of the courtroom burst open and a group of Kindred warriors poured in.

  “What is it—what happened?” It was Commander Sylvan, Imani saw, down on his knees beside her. “We were waiting outside to take you home after the court hearing and I heard the Goddess urging me to come to you. Where’s the injury?”

  “His neck,” she gasped. “The…the artery got cut, I think. I’m trying to stop the flow, but—”

  “Let me see.” Gently, Sylvan moved her hands and examined the wound. “That’s not good,” he said grimly. “We need to get it sealed up.”

  Reaching into a bag he’d brought with him, he pulled out a small device and began using it to seal the wound. It seemed to be gluing the jagged flesh together somehow with a beam of light, Imani thought numbly. But would it be too late?

  “How…how did you know to bring your medical supplies?” she asked dully as Sylvan worked.