The fight pit, bleachers and bar only filled half the space of the former warehouse. To the left of the bar were various sizes and shapes of tables with seating that ranged from rough-hewn benches to stools and a variety of chairs of different styles and shapes. These were spread over a bare concrete floor.
Mostly women sat at the tables in groups. Some were mates to males watching the fights while others were whores from the brothels brought to the matches by males also there to watch the fights. It was a chance for the women to get out and socialize with other women.
None of the males would risk letting their female out in the village alone. That was partly for their own safety and mostly because women were property on Julconi, especially the ones in the brothels.
Kragyn took Reanne there and introduced her to Varnis the brown amphibian bartender and two of the females he knew. Varnis was humanoid but had a kind of froggy face, but with eyes closer set and facing forward.
Although he looked and spoke like a male, Varnis was actually a hermaphrodite so was his love mate Sprell. The two of them lived in one of the old mining caves not far from Kragyn’s, and they fostered eight discarded humanoid children. Varnis worked the bar for Bardo for extra food rations for the young ones.
Varnis and Sprell couldn’t breed because they were genetically incompatible, but they were sexually compatible. “That is why we take the children,” Varnis told Reanne. “Hoker makes the females give them up when they are weaned. They are too young to fend for themselves.”
“None of the fathers want them either?” Reanne asked.
“Very few,” Varnis said, shaking his head. “Some of the newborns are killed before they take their first breath.”
“Oh, God! That’s horrible! Oh, my God!” Reanne was utterly horrified as it painted a vivid picture in her mind.
“I didn’t mean to upset you,” Varnis said.
“I don’t know why I should be so shocked. It just gave me a horrible vision, people on my world kill babies, too, usually before they are viable.”
Kragyn put his arm around Reanne and drew her against him. “No one will take our young if we ever have any,” he murmured into her ear. “Not all the young born here are killed or abandoned. Others are living in the old mines who have young they are raising as well.”
Reanne nodded meeting his gaze. Then, he surprised her with a lingering kiss on the mouth, not that she minded. She enjoyed his kisses immensely, though she suspected he had done it mainly to show the other males that she belonged to him.
She understood that it was a defensive measure, and she didn’t mind at all. It didn’t escape her notice that she also drew envious looks from some of the females at the tables as well.
Reanne was more worried about Kragyn being hurt than other males bothering her.
All of the females were claimed, some by fighters. Part of the bar was reserved for those females to observe the matches unmolested. There was a bouncer there to assure their safety.
Since only four fighters had come, there would be only three matches. One of the contenders was at least head and shoulders bigger than Kragyn. His purple scaled body rippled with well-developed muscle definition. Reanne looked at Kragyn and then the other guy, shaking her head. The other two competitors were only a little bigger than her mate, but already she didn't like it.
The referee called the four into the ring and offered them each a container to pick out a colored stone. It appeared that there were only two colors. Those who drew like colors would fight each other. The winners in each of those matches would fight each other for the prize, a hunting crossbow with ten bolts.
There was a former slave in the village who made them on his homeworld. He’d been sent to Julconi for selling them on the side for money to buy passage off the planet and out of slavery. Only he got caught.
Kragyn was the only fighter that was homo sapien. The other three, even purple scaled guy, all had human-looking faces with slight variations.
The purple alien was fighting the more human looking of the other two. Kragyn was fighting the other who had a face that made Reanne think of a Klingon from Star Trek. They fought barehanded and barefooted without shirts.
While the purple alien was bigger and looked stronger, it seemed clear that he was not a trained fighter. He took more punches and kicks than he gave, and they didn’t seem to be affecting him. The smaller being danced in and out of Purple’s reach as he landed blow after blow. Purple roared his annoyance. Then he seemed to move a little faster as the other alien danced around him, starting to land more blows when his opponent moved in to attack. Purple scales finally connected a punch to the head, and the dancing guy went down for the count.
That didn’t make Reanne particularly happy, because she had a feeling that Kragyn would be fighting him next. First, he had to fight the Klingon, who looked to outweigh him by twenty kilos. He looked formidable, but Kragyn told her he didn’t think the alien was a trained warrior.
Chapter Eleven
Reanne looked on with some trepidation as Kragyn stripped off his t-shirt and handed it to her then strode out to the middle of the ring to meet his opponent. As soon as the clacker sounded, the alien and Kragyn started circling each other warily. The Farseek warrior held his hands poised like a martial artist rather than a boxer.
The alien feinted a couple times testing Kragyn out, but the warrior simply dodged him. Reanne suspected the alien knew Kragyn’s reputation because he had won a lot of fights before her arrival. Finally, the alien charged him, almost like a raging bull.
He hit Kragyn with a glancing blow, but the Farseekan landed two punches and a kick solidly. The alien came back at him, aiming punches that Kragyn readily blocked.
Reanne frowned as Kragyn seemed to miss a ripe opportunity to land some blows of his own. As she watched him closely, she felt sure he was doing it on purpose to draw out the fight and to save his energy for the next battle with the purple guy.
Kragyn even let the alien knock him down, but tumbled to his feet. He was finished playing then, and the fight ended in about thirty seconds. He barely seemed winded when he returned to Reanne by the bar for his break before the next fight. The bartender offered him some kind of fermented concoction, but Kragyn only wanted water.
He put an arm around Reanne as he sipped from the bottle of water while she eyed the purple-scaled alien across the ring near the fighter’s entrance. He was big and strong. She’d seen how he knocked out his other opponent with one blow. Even a man of Kragyn’s skill could be hurt. She didn’t like that thought at all… Because she was starting to care for him. Hell, she had begun to care for him the first time he kissed her.
All too soon, the clacker sounded, and Kragyn went back into the pit to face the big alien. It appeared that he wasn’t as clumsy as he seemed in his last fight. He knocked Kragyn down a couple times, but he didn’t stay down. The Farseekan surprised everyone by taking the purple alien down.
“Stay down, stay down,” Reanne murmured, wanting the fight to be over. The match was wearing on Kragyn, and she didn’t want him hurt. Then he was. Purple hit him in the face and laid open a cut over his eye. Blood dripped into his eye and ran down his face.
Reanne gasped. Then she realized, purple was bleeding too, but his blood was a translucent green. Kragyn wiped the blood away with his forearm and surged against his adversary. He seemed to have gotten a second wind, and he had moves like Reanne had only seen in an old Bruce Lee movie that she watched with her father.
Minutes later, the purple-scaled alien was down for the count, and Kragyn was declared the winner. While he was presented his prize, Reanne asked the bartender for a bowl of water and a clean cloth. He also gave her a single-use tube of salve that would seal the cut and stop the bleeding.
It had slowed some when Kragyn came to the bar and sat on the barstool for Reanne to clean the cut and apply the styptic salve. She then washed the blood from his face and where it dripped down on his chest. Once he was cleaned up, he
put his shirt back on.
“I think that Pridann was a Cretu. He was a better fighter than he let on. I had to actually work to beat him.”
“I’m just glad he didn’t hurt you any worse. Are there even any doctors here?”
“Doctors?”
“Medics---healers.”
Kragyn shook his head.
Reanne cast him a look of distress.
“I know,” he murmured. “It’s not just me I have to care for now. All the more reason to teach you to defend yourself.”
The bartender brought Kragyn a fresh bottle of cold water which he drank with relish. “Teaching you to use this crossbow will be helpful. It’s a weapon you can use from a distance.”
Kragyn finished his water as the crowd finished dispersing from the pit. “Varnis, as you can see, I now have a female to care for. She is solmatu, and now I have more than just myself to consider. We are still bonding, so I’m taking some rotations off from the pit.” He gave Reanne an intimate look.
“Bardo isn’t going to like it,” Varnis warned.
Kragyn shrugged. “I didn’t say I wouldn’t be back. It just won’t be as often for a while.”
Varnis stole a look at Reanne. “I sure don’t blame you.”
“Glad as I am to find her, I still haven’t found a single soul who can tell me what happened to Farseek.”
The bartender shook his head. “Damn Sargus Empire.”
Kragyn nodded and got up from the stool. Putting the crossbow in the bag, he slung it over his shoulder. “Let’s go.” He reached for Reanne’s hand, and they walked out into the night together.
They walked at a leisurely pace until the road ended. Then Kragyn led her along a path between and around the red hills among the mining caves. It was a good thing Kragyn knew the way. Reanne didn’t think she could find the way in broad daylight. She made a mental note to learn how to get back to the cave from the village.
When they got back into the cave, Kragyn said, “I think I need a nice hot bath to ease some sore muscles. Join me?”
Reanne smiled at him as he set the bagged crossbow on the bench by the cave wall across from the sleeping area. He returned to her side and draped an arm around her shoulders, heading back toward the bathing room.
“After we bathe, we can put our clothes in the pool to wash. The water changes about once every rotation,” he told her.
When they reached the side of the bathing pool, Kragyn pulled his t-shirt off over his head, careful not to rub it over the cut above his eye. Reanne followed suit, and they were both naked in a matter of seconds. She swung her leg up over the side of the pool, balancing with her hand on the ledge and brought her other leg over to stand. She backed away from the edge so Kragyn could climb in as well.
He stood there for a moment, looking as though he was enjoying the view. Reanne knew immediately that this was not going to be just a bath. His hard cock was pointing right at her like a homing device.
Kragyn held out his arms to her, and she waded into them pressing her body against him. She wound her arms around his neck and looked up at him with a sexy smile. He smiled back, just staring down at her face for a moment before claiming her lips in a tender kiss. Probing inside her mouth with his tongue, he swirled it around hers, while plucking at her taut, sensitive nipples with his fingers.
Reanne made a soft sound of pleasure, rubbing her pussy against his shaft resting at the juncture of her thighs. Barely breaking the kiss, they sank down into the water together. Kragyn sat with his back against the side of the pool, and Reanne sat facing him, straddling his lap, landing, so the tip of his cock was poised at her entrance. Still kissing him, she pulled her body tight to his, and his cock slid into her straight to the hilt.
She made a little moan against his lips but didn’t move as she relished the fullness of their connection. “Was that the muscle you needed to sooth in the warm water?” she teased.
“One of them,” he murmured, his voice thick with desire. He gripped her waist and slid her back and forth on his cock. “Mmm, so good.” He held her gaze as he continued.
“Oh yeah…” she murmured back. The way he was looking at her was nearly as much a turn on as his manhood sheathed deep inside her.”
Their coupling progressed slowly over several minutes while they continued staring into each other’s eyes. Reanne’s hands remained at the back of his neck, caressing his neck and running her fingers through his short hair.
She hung on the brink of orgasm panting and murmuring inarticulate sounds. She was close, so close, pleasure rippling through her body with each thrust. “Kragyn!” she gasped as her body stiffened, her eyes pleading.
“Come for me, baby,” he murmured and pinched both her nipples to the verge of pain and pleasure.
Reanne sobbed in release jerking and shuddering around him and against him. “Kragyn… Oh, Kragyn,” she murmured his name in ecstasy. “Solmatu!” I love you. She thought it, but couldn’t say it until she knew it was more than the carnal pleasure, he gave her.
He drew out her pleasure until she quieted against him. Then he fucked her hard and fast until he found his own release, bringing her to a second release as his seed surged against her womb. “Solmatu,” he whispered, holding her against him, caressing her head and back. “My sweet, sweet solmatu.”
Chapter Thirteen
A few days later, Kragyn helped Reanne mark out a plot to make the food garden they had discussed. Since they were using the plastic blankets to shade it, they made it the same size as one of them. Raised on a farm, Kragyn was quite knowledgeable about setting it up.
Reanne also knew how to set up a kitchen garden from her own experience growing up in a small town. Her parents’ backyard was big enough that they had a vegetable garden back there every year.
There was a small patch of land just the right size close to the opening of their cave. The half dozen seed packets from Reanne’s backpack were illustrated with the vegetables they grew, but she didn’t recognize any of them. He already had a pile of the same packets so they could experiment with water, shade, and sun to see how they would grow the best.
Four of the vegetables were various kinds of tubers, and two were leafy greens, all of which could be eaten raw or cooked. They used sticks to loosen the soil and make rows. They poured water into the rows of the parched soil them planted the seeds.
Before planting the seeds, they had taken a long walk out into the desert to an oasis of sorts with a small spring pool at its center. It was the one place Kragyn knew where they could find enough long sticks to construct the tent over the garden.
Apart from the hills of the mine caves, and the village, the Dezron continent was desert plain with no other oases as far as the eye could see.
“Is there really anywhere we could go out there if we wanted to get further away from the village,” Reanne asked, looking out over the seemingly endless plain.
“Just beyond the horizon, there are more rock formations, possibly a satellite mining operation. But it’s about three days walk, and we’d have to carry a lot of water to make it across.”
“And find a new water source after we got there.”
“We would be on our own out there. There would likely be no other people, or maybe some loners who had made the trek that nobody remembers,” Kragyn said.
“Seems like we are better off where we are. Do any of the thugs find their way out to the old mines?”
“No one I couldn’t handle,” he said. “Let’s head back.” Kragyn handed her a small bundle of sticks and picked up the slightly bigger one. “I think most of them know that, so they don’t bother.”
“If we ever do have kids, at least they will have someone to play with in the neighborhood. Do Varnis and Sprell ever let them out to play?”
“Sometimes. That’s how I found out about them in the first place. A couple of them wandered by while I was collecting firewood. When they saw me, they got scared and ran. So, I followed them. …Never expected to see a
ny kids here.
“They were living in a bigger cave like ours. Varnis and Sprell came out armed with clubs and their long knife to defend their brood. I just had my long knife, but they didn’t know I could have taken them both with no weapon at all.”
“Of course, you were just there out of curiosity,”
“Yes, so I held my hands up to show I had no weapons, and introduced myself.”
“Why were you chasing our young ones?” Sprell the bigger one demanded.
“I wondered what they were doing out here on their own. I just wanted to see where the kids came from. They must be adopted. They sure don’t look like either of you,” Kragyn said. “In fact, I’ve never seen anyone quite like you before.”
“We are amphibian from far quadrants. I am Sprell, and this is Varnis. We were stolen from our worlds to become slaves of the Sargan Empire.”
“What a coincidence! So was I.” Kragyn smirked and lowered his hands to rest on his hip bones. “Honestly, I meant no harm to your young ones. Now I know someone is caring for them. Where do they come from?”
“They are discarded humanoids from the females made pregnant in the thugs’ sex houses. When their birth control implants fail, they become pregnant. Sargans don’t care what happens to the young ones or us,” said Sprell. “The thugs and sometimes the mothers bring them to us---but some are too young, not weaned and we can’t save them.”
“I know you,” said Varnis. “You’ve fought at the pit.”
“That’s right, and you tend the bar,” said Kragyn. “Sometimes, I get lucky and get more animals in my snare than I can use. When I do, I can bring them to you if you can use them to feed your young ones.”
“We would appreciate that,” said Sprell.
“You can tell your young ones they have nothing to fear from me. I am an honorable Farseek Warrior. We don’t hurt young ones; we protect them.”
With that, Kragyn nodded in salute as was the custom of the Farseek Brigade and turned back the way that he’d come.
Kragyn (Farseek Warrior Series Book 1) Page 6
