Chapter Four

Monica spent the first half of her trip back to the colony focused completely on the possibility of pursuit. She wasn’t able to maintain a full run, but she did her best to keep her pace between a jog, a sprint, and a fast walk. The end result was that she was able to see the walls of the colony come into view before dusk.

Her emotions flipped at that point from terror to relief—and fury that the bastards sitting safely behind the walls hadn’t made any attempt to launch a rescue mission.

She had to stand outside the gate for a good fifteen minutes while the security robots surveyed the entire perimeter to make sure she wasn’t a lure the barbarian’s had used to fool them into opening the gates. Finally, the gates were opened a narrow crack to allow her to squeeze through and then they were sealed once more.

Monica was surrounded at once by security bots and escorted to a quarantine area where she was to be observed, poked, prodded, questioned and monitored for a solid month while they waited to be sure she wasn’t carrying any alien contagions before she was allowed to mingle with the colonists again.

* * * *

Noelle was still basking in the heated, liquid pleasure that had suffused her the moment the huge, brawny and beautiful, but terrifying barbarian had pressed his hard mouth against hers. She thought she’d been more stunned to stillness, at first, than anything else.

She’d been too terrified to spare a lot of time for thought—like why the barbarians were attacking and what their objective was. The women of the village were fierce in her book, and if the flying barbarians frightened them, then they must have something really horrible in mind.

Not that she’d actually formed those thoughts into anything coherent, but they’d been whipping around her mind while she’d been running and screaming her head off.

Then, instead of ripping her in half, he’d snatched her against a rock hard male body and kissed her—sapping every ounce of energy from her body and completely scrambling her wits.

It had almost seemed as if she was floating away when he’d carried her back to his ship and inside, as if she floated downward to land on the bed like a feather.

Only limp.

Heated desire had ramped up the stoked furnace inside of her when he’d peeled her dress off and tossed it aside.

And then … nothing!

Confusion pierced her ardor as she watched him leave.

She stared at the door for a time, willing him to return, hoping he would come back and put out the fire he’d started.

When he didn’t, the heated bubble began to deflate of its own accord. Slowly, her focus shifted from the throbbing of unrequited passions to utter puzzlement and then a healthy mixture of confusion and fear as the strange paralysis wore off completely.

What the hell had just happened?

And where was the barbarian taking her?

The surveyors hadn’t discovered any cities advanced enough to account for the flying machine these ‘barbarians’ had arrived in.

It hadn’t detected any males, for that matter.

* * * *

It had been a good raid, Drak thought with satisfaction as he stood by the gangplank and counted heads. They hadn’t lost a single man—as least not yet, although there were a couple that had had to be helped back to the ship—and it appeared that at least half the men had managed to capture a mate.

They’d had strong incentive.

There was not enough time to search out another village. This was a one time, hit or miss sweep and they all knew it. If they failed to capture a mate it would be another full year before they got another chance since they only took women in the winter. The spring trip was for returning them.

That thought brought his mind back to his own captive. In truth, it hadn’t strayed far from the strange female in his cabin since he had taken her onto the ship.

Arousal, never far from the surface since the moment he’d taken her, was almost instantaneous and both gratifying and irritating.

On the one hand, he enjoyed that heat pumping through his blood, the sense of anticipation, the excitement.

The distraction annoyed him, however.

He had a healthy appetite, but there was a time and place for everything and he wasn’t accustomed to being distracted from important matters by pleasures of the flesh—or anticipation of enjoying them. He prided himself on his self-control, on ruling mind and body rather than being ruled by his desires.

He was no spoiled, self-indulgent creature of whim! He was a man of intelligence, education, and reason!

Honor and duty above all!

That was his family’s motto and he had always taken it and his birthright as ruler of Alvarone very seriously.

He was still distracted as the last of his men boarded the ship for home and he followed them up the gang plank. After struggling for some moments to focus on seeing to it that all of the captive women were secured in the hold and that the injured men were attended to by the medicine man and made as secure and comfortable as possible, he finally turned control of the vessel over to his captain and headed to his cabin.

He wasn’t surprised when he entered to see that his captive had recovered from the kiss, dressed herself, and vacated the bed, but he was surprised that she hadn’t found a weapon and she didn’t even attempt to catch him off guard and attack as he entered the cabin. Instead, she was standing by the porthole looking out and apparently completely calm.

She didn’t even verbally assault him when he came in.

He halted abruptly in his tracks and surveyed her curiously. “We are about to take off,” he said finally. “You will need to secure yourself.”

She studied him for a long moment, almost as if she was mentally interpreting what he’d said. But maybe she was only considering if it was some sort of trick? “Where?”

Nodding, he crossed the cabin and pressed the button that opened a pair of chairs concealed behind a panel. Opening them up, he gestured for her to take a seat so that he could secure her harnesses.

“I can do it,” she said stiffly.

Mild! A very mild rebuke considering! Shrugging, he took a seat in the other chair and fastened his own harness, merely looking hers over when she had finished to see if she had done it correctly.

He was surprised to discover she had.

“You have a name?”

She studied him with a bland expression that revealed very little—certainly not the hostility he was accustomed to!

“Noelle. I suppose you must have one, too?”

He was almost tempted to chuckle, but then the question was impertinent and disrespectful! He did not think he should encourage her to behave in a way that would set up the backs of his subjects, to say nothing of his advisors. “Drak, Prince of Alvarone. I am called Drak the Fair.”

She looked like she was struggling not to laugh, which thoroughly pissed him off. She cleared her throat. “Fair as in just? Or … uh … pretty?”

He felt a blush suffuse his cheeks and it did not help his temper. “Of color,” he said tightly. “My sire was Drak the Dark.”

Noelle considered pointing out that she would’ve been more favorably impressed if he’d said it meant just, but she decided against it.

Truthfully, he was fair in the sense that he was a handsome monster, but the keyword was monster. He was a giant beside the average human male, and possibly even beside his own people. She didn’t know. She hadn’t actually seen any males … that she knew of for certain. The savage that had given her the lustful once over may or may not have been male. She’d thought it must be, but he was no taller than the females of the village if that was true, and probably at least a half a head shorter than this specimen.

For all that, the barbarian Prince was well proportioned. Unlike ‘abnormal’ human specimens that were either way above or way below average and tended to be disproportionate, he looked like a very well built human male—perfectly proportioned—just giant sized.

Nor was there anything the least bit ‘monster-like’ about his face. He was well above average in that respect, as well—the average human, that is—in handsomeness of features.

But he was a savage and she was afraid that was where the ‘monster’ would come in. She thought that probably meant that she wasn’t going to like her little adventure and she would, in fact, be lucky to survive it intact.

Maybe that had been a touch of hysteria that had prompted the ill-timed amusement she’d felt when he’d told her he was known as Drak the pretty? Uh … Fair?

She was struggling to think of something she could say that might have some hope of smoothing the feathers she’d ruffled when she heard and felt the engine come to life.

The sound wasn’t reassuring and that had nothing to do with her realization that they were taking off with her. No surprise there! She’d figured that out when the savage had lugged her aboard across his shoulder and dumped her in the cabin. And, if she hadn’t, his order for her to take a seat and strap in had certainly been a huge clue!

What bothered her—a lot—was that the sputtering and choking noises of the engine reminded her of old automotive combustion engines and, for something that was supposedly leaving the ground, that wasn’t very reassuring.

The engine finally ‘warmed’ up to a less phlem-like rumbling, though, before she felt the sensation of movement.

She gripped the arms of her seat a little more tightly.

The barbarian Prince was gripping his as if he thought he was going to fly out of it and that did not make her feel any better.

She realized in the next instant that he had the death grip for a damned good reason! He was anticipating what came next and she hadn’t had an f’ing clue and she wasn’t braced nearly well enough!

The sensation of simply rising abruptly shifted to nearly unbearable pressure as the vessel shot away from the ground, pressed her so hard into her seat that she felt like a giant fist had punched her—well slammed into her and was trying to push her through the back of her seat. The ship around her took on a more haunting, frightening comparison to an old rattle trap combustion engine vehicle as it pulled unbelievable g-forces. The engine only coughed and sputtered and backfired a couple of times on the way up, but it felt like everything on the ship was disintegrating, being systematically shaken apart.

Noelle’s teeth rat-a-tat perforated her inner cheeks painfully until she managed to push the flesh out of the way and clamp her jaws together.

She thought when all the screaming and shaking abruptly ceased that that was exactly what had happened—that the ship had blown apart around her and she was going to feel it any second.

Then she felt herself begin to float upward in her seat!

She flicked a horrified/terrified look at her captor, saw he was looking a little green and swallowed against her own stomach—which felt like it was trying to climb out of her throat.

Thankfully, that sensation was extremely brief. Something like artificial gravity kicked in and her stomach settled back into her belly.

The barbarian threw off his harness, bounded out of his seat, and abandoned the cabin.

Noelle watched him depart with a mixture of relief and anxiety.

With shaking hands, she struggled for a few minutes and finally managed to untangle herself from her safety harness. On shaky legs, she stumbled toward the porthole to look out.

It was just as she’d feared! The crazy barbarians had taken the rattle trap ship right out of orbit! She could see the world she’d been sure would be her home forever more disappearing rapidly into the darkness of space!

“Oh my god!” she gasped. “Where the hell are we going?”

* * * *

Meal time came and went, punctuated only by her growling stomach. Noelle was torn between embarrassment and disbelief that her inner clock was still demanding food—at a time like this!—and resentment that no food was brought so that she could scorn it.

She hadn’t had a lot to eat since she’d been captured by the first group of savages. For one thing, whatever it was that they’d been given to eat didn’t appeal in either appearance or smell. For another, they were still eating rations they’d brought from Earth. They hadn’t had time to either acclimate to a new/different/alien diet or check the food to discover which foods would be safe for humans to eat and which weren’t.

She’d felt like she was taking her life into her hands with every bite she took and she and Monica had decided that the safest way to handle the food issue was to only take one bite and wait to see if they survived it. (The assumption being that one bite wouldn’t be enough to kill even if the substance happened to be highly toxic to humans—which was a risky assumption at that considering their were toxins on Earth that required far less than a bite to kill.)

Unfortunately, the damn warrior woman came back to collect the offerings before they’d had the chance to eat more and the next food brought hadn’t been the same.

Sooo… three days in captivity and only a bite of food here and there.

Her appetite should have dwindled, given those circumstances alone. With extreme emotional distress added to that, her nerves should have been too tattered to allow for any kind of appetite.

And yet here she was on an antiquated spaceship that didn’t look like it had been space worthy for a hundred years that was probably going to spring an air leak, implode, explode or crash whenever they got where they were going, and all she could think about was food!

Well, and sex!

Not that she wanted sex!

Especially with a savage that was twice her size!

But she figured that must be what she’d been captured for. All of the savages had chased down women and brought them back onboard the ship—she’d heard the screaming and cursing when the men had brought them in. What else could they have in mind?

Unless they preferred women for sacrifices?

She couldn’t think about either possibility without feeling a panic attack coming on.

But there was no escaping whatever fate they had in mind.

She needed to get a grip!

There were two choices of a place to sit—the bed—which she wasn’t going anywhere near!—and the uncomfortable seat she’d used at takeoff. She settled in the chair, closed her eyes, and tried to force herself to relax by focusing on slowing her breathing and calming her thoughts until her pulse was less frantic and erratic.

She wasn’t going to get rescued. She thought she might have, eventually, if she had just been captured by local barbarians, but these weren’t local. Wherever they taking her, she didn’t think the people of the colony would be able to find her.

Granted, Monica might have been right in her assessment of the situation and rescue wouldn’t have been something she could count on where she’d been, but it had at least been a possibility! Now it definitely wasn’t because the colonists would have no way of figuring out where she was given that the range of their tracking implants had been calibrated to an area within twenty miles of the colony itself.

So she was on her own and she was going to have to keep her wits if she was going to survive!

That bracing thought required unfastening the harness and a making another trip to the facilities—which she’d, thankfully, found on her own through a narrow door that didn’t look big enough for the barbarian to fit through.

So maybe he hadn’t shown it to her because he didn’t know it was there? Because it was dusty and musty enough that it didn’t look like it had seen much use in years.

Actually, the entire ship smelled of fuel—frightening!—and dust—not comforting at all!

What did that tell her?

Not a hell of a lot when she couldn’t seem to gather her wits to analyze the situation.

Frowning, she struggled with the puzzle pieces she had. It would’ve been easier, she thought, if she’d had more than a couple, but she had what she had.

The aliens looked like the aliens on the colony world—well, some of them. As it was on Earth, there seemed to be several different races with different hair, eye, and skin colors. But these were recognizable, in her book, as being from the same origins and they didn’t appear to have evolved in a way that suggested there’d been a significant separation over time that would have necessitated diverging physical traits.

And yet, they were clearly separated! The ship was proof positive that they didn’t even share the same world—she didn’t think. Otherwise, why would they be in space?

It seemed inescapable that these barbarians were from the sister world simply because it was closest and she couldn’t imagine the ramshackle thing she was in making it any further! She was surprised it had made the first leg of the trip intact!

That sister world was horribly inhospitable, though! That was why they’d settled where they had. The other world had been just a little further out, but that was enough to make it bitterly cold in the winter and not terribly warm in the summer. Those inhospitable temperatures would translate to more fuel burned during the long, bitterly cold winter to just keep the colonists relatively comfortable and a short growing season that, when the colonists were entirely unfamiliar with the techniques needed to grow plants in this particular soil, could mean starvation and a complete failure of the colony.

New Earth—or K’naiper as the natives referred to it—was the best choice for a successful colony, the safest.

They’d thought.

They hadn’t actually expected the natives to be hostile, though. She supposed that was because they had a skewed perception of their self-worth. They’d thought the natives might be afraid of them—at first—but could be won over with minimal effort—gifts of trinkets and so forth. And the natives would be so grateful to have god-like beings living among them they would probably be more of a nuisance (worshipful) than any kind of threat!

Boy had they been wrong!

She shook that thought and dragged her mind back to picking at the puzzle.

The truth was, they’d been puzzled about the solar system they’d targeted for their colony before they left Earth. The ‘sister’ worlds orbiting in the system’s Goldilocks zone seemed to be in stable orbits, but they were far closer than any others they’d found—almost close enough that one could’ve been a satellite of the other at some point.

Or it was possible that the two sisters had originally been a single, much larger planet that had been split apart by a major collision with a planet-killer asteroid.

Was that where the technology had come from? Was that even possible?

There was no doubt that the circumstances were dyslexic! The technology looked ancient, but it was definitely from a very advanced civilization—it wasn’t entry level space travel. As antiquated and rundown as it seemed now, this ship was clearly capable of interplanetary use and had been used for that purpose in the past.

Neither the natives of New Earth or the men aboard the ship, supposedly from the sister world, displayed customs or accomplishments that suggested it was a civilization in ruins, regressing. So maybe they’d hit bottom, or close, and were on the rebound?

Or maybe the ship didn’t represent accomplishments of this race at all but were gifts or maybe remainders of a different civilization all together? Or maybe stolen goods? These men were clearly raiders—much like the Vikings of history on Earth.

Could they have simply stolen it?

She thought they could have. She could see the possibility of an alien race setting down to explore or establish a colony and getting overrun by the giants.

Who then forced the pilot/original owners/designers to teach them how to use it?

She didn’t think that was beyond their capabilities either. They seemed pretty … persuasive!

But had it happened that way?

She needed way more data to determine that, she decided.

Unfortunately, she realized that that unknown factor wasn’t just a matter of assuaging her scientific curiosity. It could make a world of difference to her.

For if they were an advanced civilization on the rebound, then they would surely not be as savage as they seemed? Surely they would be open to reason?

She considered that for a few moments and revised it to maybe they would be open to reason.

She thought that might depend on how well their campaign for survival was going.

* * * *

His captive was not native to their world, Drak concluded. He was as certain of that after only a few minutes in her company as he had ever been of anything.

She spoke the language, the most commonly used language among the people of the sister worlds, but she didn’t speak it as a native would. The way she enunciated the words was entirely foreign and he’d also noticed that she seemed to mentally interpret the things he said before she responded.

Of course, he supposed that could be explained away by caution, but the amusement she hadn’t managed to hide was hardly the act of a female of caution!

Nor did she strike him as being slow-witted.

No, as bizarre and unbelievable as it seemed on the surface, he had to conclude that she absolutely wasn’t a product of either of their worlds, which meant that, regardless of the similarity to their people, she was of a different species altogether.

And the other female that had been with her was conclusive proof to his mind!

But where had they come from?

And what did that mean in regards to his hope/determination to mate with her?

He had no real interest in producing more off-spring. He had his heir and two other sons to secure his line.

And he still felt an odd little jab of disappointment at the thought that he might not be able to successfully join his line to hers.

He dismissed it. He was far more interested in the ‘practice’ than the accomplishment!

That thought brought him to an unsettling conclusion!

She’d looked very much like a Flaxen woman, despite her size, but could he count on her being the same where it counted? He hadn’t actually examined that part!

He was tempted to check that out immediately, but a very little thought made him reconsider. He was not going to be pleased, at all, if he discovered she was not made to suit him sexually and that wasn’t something he had any desire to share with the crew!

And he wasn’t sure he could contain his disappointment!

It would be better, he decided, to wait for more privacy, particularly since he found the flight unsettling to begin with and might have difficulty focusing!

In any case, he decided dismissively, she had a mouth. If all else failed, there was that!

Not that he was going to be happy about that necessity, but his raid would not be in vain! He would not return from the death defying trek empty-handed.

Having settled that much in his mind, his thoughts returned to the puzzle of her origins and her potential as an asset.

The precise ‘where’, he realized, was not something he was likely to figure out with nothing to go on, but the ‘how’ of it was like a slap in the face or a douse of icy water—a stunning revelation that was made more shocking by the time it had taken him to arrive at it!

Her people must be builders of ships like his—capable of crossing the black sea of space!

Except theirs would not be technology rescued from rusting heaps of a bygone time! Theirs would—had to be—better, stronger, capable of more speed and distance!

He was discomfited by the fact that he had been so focused on his physical attraction to her that he had previously overlooked the importance of her as an asset.

But that hardly mattered when no one could be aware of it beyond him and he had realized it quickly enough to consider how best to handle his prize from what might possibly turn out to be the most important raid of his entire reign as Prince!