“No!” Brynn shook her head, her long hair whispering over her shoulders. “No—stay away from me!”
“Princess—or should I say my Breeding Queen, for that is what you are now—my Queen, please behave yourself. And do not make things…difficult.” On the last word, X'izith rushed forward and seized her arms in his two upper hand/pinchers. With his two lower pinchers, he grabbed her legs and parted them, despite her struggles to be free.
“No! NO!” Brynn shrieked. Kicking and fighting, she fishtailed her body, trying to get loose from him, trying to get away from the horrible, huge, insect body that was getting closer and closer to her own.
“Be still!” X'izith hissed. “I do not wish to mentally incapacitate you as I did the captain and crew of the ship that brought you here—it would be bad for the royal grubs. But if I am forced…”
His barb began to tilt upward, its sharp, dagger-like point aiming for the opening between her legs. The tip, still dripping clear venom, got closer and closer to her most vulnerable, delicate area.
“You’re not putting that thing in me!” Brynn shouted at him as loudly as she could. “I don’t want anything in me there ever again! Get away from me! LET ME GO!”
“You heard the Princess,” growled a familiar voice. “Let her go, you fucker!”
To her surprise and disbelief Brynn saw Varin’s face, his broad shoulders looming behind the monster’s back.
A dream—it has to be a dream. A fever dream brought on by the Blood Honey and desperation, she told herself but she couldn’t stop herself from speaking, even though she knew it must be an illusion.
“My Kindred,” she whispered, her eyes filling with tears. “Varin…oh Varin, is it really you?”
“What?” X'izith started to turn but suddenly there was a bright silver blade in Varin’s right hand.
“I said let her go!” he growled and slashed out, his arm coming down in a brutal, scythe-like motion.
X'izith let out a high-pitched unearthly shriek and suddenly the long, dripping, black breeding barb was lying on the ground, now dribbling smoking venom from both ends.
All four of the claws gripping Brynn’s arms and legs tightened unbearably for a moment and she was certain the huge bug was going to rip her into four quarters in his agony. Then she found herself dropped like a pile of dirty laundry on the ground as X'izith doubled over, clutching between his long, chitinous legs and shrieking so high and loud she felt her eardrums might burst.
“No!” he shrieked. “My barb! You cut off my breeding barb!”
“You shouldn’t have been sticking it where it didn’t belong,” Varin snarled.
He rushed around the fallen form of X'izith, still thrashing in agony, and grabbed Brynn by the arm, hauling her to her feet.
“Princess,” he said. “Can you run?”
“I…I think so.” Brynn still felt light-headed from the Honey, sure this must be a dream. “Are you real?” she asked Varin.
“I’m real and we’re both going to be really dead if he gets over that before we get out of here,” he growled. “So hurry up, Brynn—let’s go!”
He led her, staggering and stumbling, out of the Breeding Chamber which inexplicably opened for him when he tapped the sphincter-like door. Brynn wondered why and if it would have opened for her if she’d gotten close enough to it to try it. But before she could wonder much, they were through, passing by two dead sentries and running on the frighteningly narrow bridge over the pits.
Brynn staggered once and almost fell, but Varin pulled her back, his right hand locked around her upper arm in a death grip.
“Listen,” he muttered to her as they came to the end of the bridge. “We might have to fight our way out. If that happens, stay behind me and keep up. I can’t pull you along—I’ll need my good hand for shooting.” He let go of her arm to resheath his long, silver knife and pull out a blaster instead.
“Your good hand?” Brynn shook her head woozily. “I don’t…don’t understand.”
“You don’t have to. Just tell me you can keep up.” He looked at her earnestly.
Brynn’s skin still felt horribly hot to touch and the edges of her vision were still tinged with red from the Blood Honey. But she refused to let the strange daze that had fallen over her when she was forced to drink it to take over again.
She lifted her chin.
“I can keep up, Varin—just please, get us out of here!”
“Going to do my best.” He brushed her cheek lightly with his left hand, which was gloved. “You’re brave, little one. We’ll get out of this, I swear it.”
“I believe you,” Brynn told him. “Let’s go.”
They ran for their lives and somehow, she managed to keep up.
Chapter Twenty-three
The scent of agony, which his injury released, drew workers—both sentient and not—to X'izith’s side. Both the high and low orders milled outside the Breeding Chamber uncertainly while he screamed and cursed and thrashed.
The low-level worker whose job it was to administer Blood Honey to the Breeding Queens skittered around the walls and ceilings, distressed but not sure what to do. In its panic, it ate part of the severed breeding barb, chopping it up into bite-sized mouthfuls with its mandibles. X'izith looked on, unable to stop its mindless cannibalism because his pain was too great to control even the lowest under his dominion.
They will pay, he swore to himself as the agony rendered him helpless and shamefully vulnerable. By the Nameless Ones, they will pay and pay and pay…
At last the high-level worker he had given special access to came scuttling in through the irising aperture of the Breeding Chamber and stopped at X'izith’s side.
“My barb…” he managed to gasp out.
The worker understood at once—it forced the mindless one down from the ceiling where it was shaking with unease and, by means of chemical signals, instructed it to disgorge the numbing Blood Honey over the pitiful stump which was all that was left between X'izith’s legs.
As the fierce, stinging anguish at last began to diminish, X'izith was finally able to speak.
“Where…are they?” he rasped. “My Breeding Queen and the one who came and took her—the Kindred—where are they? Stop them!”
But a quick chemical consensus of the Hive revealed that they Princess and the one who had stolen her had been allowed to pass through, mostly unmolested. Although they had had a short scuffle near the entrance of the Hive, they had, in the end, escaped.
X'izith swore in the language of the Nameless Ones—those Gods of Nothing and Darkness that watched with greedy joy over the wanton destruction wrought by the Hive.
“How could this have happened?” he demanded of the worker who was grooming his antennae with nervous compulsiveness.
“Apologies, my Sovereign. It appears that the male who stole your Breeding Queen somehow convinced one of the non-sentient markers to spray him with the belonging scent. He was able to pass through the Hive with no difficulty, I am afraid—though he still killed several workers and sentries along the way.”
“Unacceptable!” X'izith raged. “How could he know our ways?”
“Did you not say he was a Kindred?” the worker asked. “While waiting for you to complete the courtship rituals on the planet Galen, I accessed information about his species. I thought it wise since I heard the name mentioned several times in conjunction with the Princess as I monitored your dealings.”
“Yes, and what did you find?” X'izith buzzed angrily.
“That there are few on this side of Night’s Window—the vast cosmic dust cloud that many call the Blind—but very many on the other side. In fact, they are the flesher species I was telling you about—the one we were sent information on via a strange signal that came to us from the other side of the cloud.”
“Ah, yes—I do remember you saying that to me.” X’izith nodded. “But I was eager to go and breed my new Queen.” He made an angry, chittering sound. “Now she is gone and with her, any
chance I might have of implanting my royal grubs.”
“Your severed barb might be reattached with enough Honey,” his worker pointed out carefully.
“It might if it was still intact. If that mindless fool had not eaten it!” X'izith made an angry gesture with three of his arms at the non-sentient worker quivering in the corner. “Have that Blood Honey worker thrown into the flesh pits.”
“It shall be done.” The high-level worker complied with his request, calling two more tall sentries to dismember the squeaking, writhing worker and cast its still-twitching pieces into the dark pit. Then it returned to its master. “All is as you ordered, my Sovereign.”
“Good.” X'izith found himself somewhat mollified now that at least part of his rage had been vented. But he still had more—much more to do. “We must mount a search party to look for my Breeding Queen,” he told the worker. “We must get her back!”
“But my Sovereign, that may take some time if they have a craft with hyperlight speed travel.”
“So much the better,” X'izith snapped. “The delay will give my barb time to regrow—a long and painful process as I’m sure you know.”
“Regrettably, yes.” The worker groomed his antennae sadly. “I will see that a search party is sent out at once.”
“Do not be overly concerned if they do not find her immediately,” X'izith buzzed. “Upon reflection, I recall that she had a good first dose of the Blood Honey. Though the Kindred male has stolen her away, she will not easily shake the effects. The Honey will bring her to Heat and the Heat will bring her back to me eventually, whether we find her or not.”
“True, true… Do you have any other orders, my Sovereign?”
“Yes…” X'izith clicked his mandibles angrily. “Send out another party—a war party—through the Blind. Use our fastest ships—the ones able to generate wormholes at will so that they can get there almost instantly. I want to find these other Kindred and make them pay. I will harvest them in a way that makes what we did to Galen look gentle and kind. They will die, every last one of them—fodder for our flesh pits. Do you understand?”
“Yes, my Sovereign.” The worker bowed low, grooming—always grooming. “It shall be as you say. For the glory of the Hive, that it may live forever.”
“That the Hive may live forever,” X’izith repeated grimly. “And all others must die.”
Chapter Twenty-four
“Master? I’m afraid I was naughty while you were gone.”
Elaina looked up appealingly as her new mate, Terex came into the bedroom where she’d been waiting for him.
They were bonded now, and Elaina had moved up to the Mother Ship to be with him, though she still went back down to Earth to visit her sister often. She found she liked life among the Kindred and their wives but then, she’d always enjoyed working in the HKR building among the huge warriors—it was no surprise that she would enjoy their company now that she had a Kindred warrior of her own.
Especially such a dominant one.
“Master?” she murmured again, looking up from under her eyelashes. She knew Terex still felt a little tug of guilt sometimes when they “played” this way—it was against the Kindred ethos to be anything but tender and gentle with a female. But since contracting a form of the Need—a sexual disease that made her desire domination and punishment from a strict Master during their mutual mission—she found she craved more than just vanilla sex from time to time. And with a little prompting on her part, Terex seemed willing enough to give it to her.
“What did you do?” He put his hands on his hips and frowned sternly—an expression that sent shivers of desire through Elaina’s entire body.
“Um…” She sat up straighter on the edge of the bed and thrust her breasts out, well aware that the sheer white silk robe she was wearing did almost nothing to cover the tight peaks of her nipples. “I…I was…”
Terex walked over to stand in front of her. As big and muscular as any Kindred male, he loomed over her, making Elaina feel positively petite, though she was actually the normal height for a woman.
Gently but firmly, Terex lifted her chin and looked into her eyes.
“Were you touching yourself, Elaina?” he growled softly. “You know I told you to leave your little pussy alone while I was gone. Did you disobey me?”
Elaina dropped her eyes, her heart pounding. God, she knew he was just playing the stern Master but Terex’s deep, growling voice made her so hot, especially when he was being strict with her.
“Answer me.” His voice was so soft she could barely hear it but so intense it sent a shiver of lust straight through her.
“Yes, Master,” she admitted at last. “I…I was.”
“You were what, exactly? Tell me, Elaina—I want to hear you say it.”
“I was…was touching myself. Petting my pussy while you were gone.” She looked up at him, biting her lip. “But I didn’t mean to, Master. It’s just that the Need was so strong this morning after you left. I couldn’t help myself.”
“Don’t make excuses to me, Elaina.” He frowned, his deep blue eyes flashing. “You’ve been a very naughty girl and now you’ll have to be punished.”
“Yes, Master…” Heart banging like a drum, Elaina hung her head. But inside, she was on fire. God, this was what she wanted—what she needed. For her Master to take her in hand and punish and pleasure her until she came for him again and again. For him to spank her and fuck her and fill her with himself until she couldn’t hold anymore…
“All right then.” Terex sat on the bed beside her and patted his lap. “Come here, Elaina. I want you over my knee with your ass bare for a spanking.”
“Yes, Master,” she whispered again and hurried to obey his orders, arranging herself over his muscular thighs and resting her face on her arms as she leaned on the thick gela-foam mattress.
Terex lifted her sheer silk robe, baring her behind.
“Gods, lavana, love your sweet little ass,” he murmured, rubbing her gently with one large, warm hand.
“Thank you, Master.” Elaina shivered with desire and felt the thick length of his shaft prodding her belly through the tight leather uniform trousers he wore.
His voice grew suddenly stern again. “But I thought I told you I wanted you bare.”
“I am bare—mostly,” Elaina protested.
“What’s this then?” His big hand reached between her legs and Elaina moaned and opened for him. In her haste to get over his lap, she’d forgotten to remove the tiny white lace thong she wore, which was already soaked with her juices.
“These little panties are awfully wet, Elaina,” he murmured, stroking one finger along her heated pussy cleft, exploring her inner folds through the thin lace. “Is that because you were disobeying me and touching yourself?”
“Yes, Master,” she admitted in a breathy whisper. “Yes, I…I guess so.”
“I’m going to have to take these panties off you to give you a proper spanking,” he warned. “Lift up and let me take them off you, Elaina.”
“Yes, Master.” Obediently, she lifted her hips, allowing him to slide the lacy panties down and off.
“That’s good,” Terex growled. “Now Elaina, I’m going to give you five swats. Three for disobeying me and two for not following orders to be bare. Do you understand?”
“Yes…yes Master.” Elaina could barely squeeze the words out this time. She knew from experience that Terex wouldn’t hold back—the blows he rained down on her tender ass would be real and painful—but also exactly what she needed. And with the Need running rampant through her system, she would feel the blows in waves of pleasure as well as pain.
“Very well then. One…” His big hand came down with a smack on her bare bottom, making Elaina jump and moan.
“Oh!” she gasped. God, she hadn’t been spanked since she was a little girl and had never imagined wanting such a thing as an adult. But somehow getting over Terex’s knee and giving herself up to him completely to punish and pleasure, pus
hed her to heights of desire she’d never known before.
“Two…” The big hand came down again and Elaina felt her body jump right to the brink of orgasm. With a moan, she began to grind against him, her body begging for more…more…
By the time he reached number “five” Elaina thought she was going to explode. She couldn’t take it anymore—she was going to come…come so hard…
And just then the spanking ended.
“Terex?” She turned her head and looked up at him. She knew her face was probably naked with pleading but she couldn’t help herself—the Need was riding her hard. Her nipples were hard, pink points and her pussy was so wet and hot she felt like she would die if she didn’t come soon.
“What did you call me?” he growled in a soft, dangerous voice.
“Master! I meant Master,” Elaina gasped. “But please, Master—I need…just need a little more. I’m so close.”
“I know how close you are. I can tell by the soft little noises you make,” Terex told her softly. One big hand reached between her thighs and began to stroke her heated pussy. “And even if I couldn’t tell by that, I would know by how wet you get,” he murmured.
“Oh, God…” Elaina felt like she would die if she couldn’t come now. She was desperate to get more contact with his big hand but Terex refused to allow it, keeping her outer pussy lips spread with his ring and forefingers and just barely sliding his middle finger around and around the swollen bump of her clit.
“That’s right, lavana,” he growled softly. “Being spanked makes you so hot, doesn’t it? Makes your sweet little pussy so damn wet.”
“I…I can’t help it,” Elaina admitted. “I just love it when you’re stern with me, Master. When you punish me and make me come.”
“And I am going to make you come, lavana,” he promised roughly. “But not on my fingers—on my cock.”
Once again Elaina felt a bolt of pleasure and desire shoot through her.
“Yes, Master,” she moaned. “How…how do you want me?”
Unbound Page 21