by Erin Raegan
The sun was a deeper shade of pink, lighting up the sky like cotton candy. The blue greenery swayed and twirled with the warm breeze that tickled my bare toes. I rolled my forehead along the smooth stone as I studied the rolling hills and mountaintops in the distance. Just beyond them was a massive body of fuchsia water. It made me wish I could dip my toes in it. Earth had many beautiful places. Florida had gorgeous scenery. It was my favorite place back home. I’d seen pictures of my home that were even more beautiful. But here? Juldoris was unlike anything I’d ever seen.
Breathtaking.
My split lip slowly scabbed over as I contemplated my predicament and the dangerous alien holding my life in his hands.
I wanted answers. I wanted a way out. But nothing came clear to me.
I was stuck. And afraid. And angry.
And strangely grateful.
How was that possible?
I knew whatever had happened back in that room was significant. Whatever it was, Chyn hadn’t wanted it. Those two Juldo had threatened my life to get him to comply. And as Lyno had said, I’d seen him move. None of the other Juldo could do that—none that I’d seen anyway. He could have killed them so easily and maybe I wouldn’t have been hurt.
But he hadn’t chanced it. He had given away something he hadn’t wanted to. Something that, from the sounds of it, he’d been resisting. To save me.
He was my captor. My enemy. But now my savior?
Or was it all another game?
Was I getting it all wrong? Somehow twisting it in my head in order to see something I wanted or needed rather than acknowledging reality? Was I so desperate for a little hope that I looked for it in everything?
He’d saved me, then he’d shattered my relief by scaring the living daylights out of me.
Slow steps behind me had me stiffening and clutching the wide stone rails on either side of my dangling legs.
“Get dressed.”
A pile of clothes were dropped at my side, along with a pair of sandals. They were black and silky, the sandals beaded and jeweled. They didn’t strike me as particularly Juldo. They all wore some variation of leather and were either bare-chested or wore a thin, sleeveless tunic like Chyn. Still, the clothes were better than my heavy jeans and thick torn shirt in this warm weather.
The steps retreated and I drifted my fingers across the silk lightly. Not silk at all, but softer somehow. It would feel amazing against my skin.
I stood, shaking out my sore limbs, and went into the toilet room. It was the only place with a drawn curtain.
I quickly realized that though the clothes were much nicer than my ratty ones, they didn’t provide a ton of coverage. The top hugged my breasts tight to my chest, covering them completely, and tied around my neck, leaving my shoulders and arms bare, as well as my lower stomach and nearly all of my spine. It was held together at the bottom by two strings that tied at the small of my back.
The bottoms hung low on my hips and were almost booty shorts with sheer fabric draped down the fronts and backs of my thighs and cuffed at my ankles, leaving the sides of my legs bare. I was pretty pale and I worried about exposure to the sun if we were leaving the castle.
I could feel my ass cheeks peeking out from the tight shorts, and my arrogant ass-claim to Chyn yesterday sprung to my mind. This felt like another game of his. A dare even. It made me want to shred the clothes into bits and put my clothes back on, but I wouldn’t back down this time. I’d made so many mistakes yesterday. I couldn’t afford to repeat those mistakes again today.
If I refused, was that considered a break of my vow? If so, I needed to make him believe I was compliant. At least for now.
I strapped the jeweled sandals onto my feet, winding the strings around my ankles. Then I stood, looking for a mirror. There was a shiny row of fogged gold disks along the wall, but they weren’t as clear as mirrors. That was probably for the best. If I saw all the cellulite I was rocking, I may chicken out.
But I could tell my hair was a rat’s nest. I braided it loosely down my back and draped it over my shoulder, securing it with a loose string from my old shirt, and took a deep breath. Nothing could be done about my split lip or the ugly bruise darkening my left cheekbone. I feathered my fingers over my freckles and smoothed my brows, shoring myself for the day and whatever might come.
I was out of that cell. I wasn’t starving, though I was a bit hungry. I’d had a bath and an okay night’s sleep. I was physically better off this morning than I was yesterday.
Hopefully.
When I finally emerged from the bathing room, Chyn was sitting on the bench at the foot of the bed, hunched over with his elbows resting on his knees. He was wearing his leather pants and long sleeveless coat. The fingers of his right hand were lightly running over the raised burn on the underside of his left forearm. I stopped by his shoulder, looking at the dagger-shaped brand.
“You will not leave my side when we leave this room.” He looked up at me in warning, his lips pressed tight. It was then, for the first time, Chyn looked at my body. Really looked. His eyes ran from head to toe, slowly, leisurely, inspecting every inch. And I felt it like a phantom touch. “It suits you.”
I looked at him warily. That was either a compliment or another thinly veiled game.
I didn’t reply.
He sighed and stood, taking my hand.
I quickly snatched it back and curled it behind my back. “Do we have to go that way?”
He glared at me.
“I can’t afford to throw up again,” I explained. I needed to keep last night’s food safely in my stomach.
I didn’t want to analyze how he could move. It was alien but also outside of the realm of alien I had become accustomed to. In my understanding, it was practically magic, and not the sleight-of-hand kind. The miracle kind. I was already having trouble coping.
Also, I didn’t think I could handle those shadows touching me after what I had seen. What I now knew they were capable of.
“I will feed you when we arrive.”
“Where are we going?” I pushed.
He glowered at me in warning.
Right, I guessed questions were borderline disobeying? Good to know.
He reached for my hand again and I involuntarily stumbled away from him. Self-preservation.
But Chyn didn’t have patience for my fear. He marched to me and pulled me against his broad chest, wrapping his warm arm around my bare back. His lips grazed my ears. “Deep breath and hold.”
He leaned away and waited for me to suck in a fearful breath and hold before he misted us away. My eyes clenched tightly, then I was shoving away from him and the misty shadows. This time I held my feet, not quite as dizzy, and though my stomach cramped, it wasn’t as bad as before. My mouth still watered and I swallowed several times to keep the bile down.
“It will get easier.”
Oh joy, something to look forward to. I held up my thumb. After I wiped the water from my eyes, I looked around and felt more bile rise up.
We were on a flat sandy field. Glittery silver grains of sand as far as the eye could see.
Shuffling in and out of the sandy field were crowds and crowds of Juldo and a few other strange alien species mixed in. They walked in groups or alone, shouting or whispering. It was a roar of voices.
And cages. Hundreds and hundreds of cages.
Cages full of prisoners.
8
London
Chyn didn’t let me say a word. He didn’t let me even take in the horror before he loosely grabbed my arm and dragged me through the crowd.
The sight of those prisoners was burned in my brain. Their despair and fear would haunt me until the day I died. I stumbled after him, unable to take my eyes off the prisoners reaching through their cages for food, water, help, everything they were being denied.
I vaguely noticed the crowds of Juldo quieting as we passed, shuffling out of our way, lining up along our path. I’d never felt so helpless in my life. Not even when my
mother and I were fighting for our lives. There was so much suffering around me, I was drowning in it.
By the time we reached the end of the caged area, my breaths were stuttered and erratic and I was tripping behind Chyn, unable to make my feet function properly. He didn’t slow for me, but he didn’t drag me either. His grip was firm but not tight, and it held me up more than restrained me. If it weren’t for his support, I probably would have hit the ground face first.
At the edge of the sandy field was a cliff. Chyn went right to the edge, not stopping. I would have felt afraid, as though we would fall right off the edge, if I could have felt anything more than bleak dejection.
Tohn had told us there were species far worse than the Vitat, but I hadn’t believed him. Not until now.
Instead of falling off the cliff’s edge, there was a narrow staircase carved into the side of the cliff. Chyn maneuvered me to the inner edge and guided me down the stairs.
It must have been over two hundred feet in the air. I was usually afraid of heights, but I was too mesmerized by the sheer vastness of the crater we were climbing into. Staircases had been carved into every inch of the sides of the canyon. Thousands of Juldo, thousands, lined the staircases, some climbing down, some up. And there were platforms the size of football fields. Juldo were packed onto the platforms—some sitting on stone benches, some standing. All of them were intermingled with other alien species. A vast array of them.
My father had no idea what was really out here. None of us did. The Vitat, Dahk, and Juldo were just the beginning of an alien society we didn’t even know existed.
Chyn walked us down and down, until we came to a smaller platform about twenty feet from the bottom of the crater. The Juldo mingling there scattered with one look from him, leaving the platform bare. As he directed me to a bench at the end of the platform, he stood tall and looked out over the crater.
Slowly, like a wave, the roar of sound quieted. The bodies stopped, from right next to us to clear across the crater, where they looked to me like ants. Chyn commanded their attention and silence without a word. It was enthralling. All the hairs on my arms rose, and tingles of terror and excitement had me shaking in my seat.
Chyn stood at the edge of the platform and slowly raised his left arm, displaying the brand. A whisper started close and moved across the crater, rising up to echo clear across the canyon.
Chyn dropped his arm, and tiny movements on the platforms and staircases cascaded down into the crater until a row of Juldo at least a hundred deep lined up a few yards away from Chyn, facing him. He nodded, dropping his chin slowly to his chest, and a roar of excitement thundered through the canyon.
Chyn turned his back on the canyon, and the loud conversations started up again like an explosion of chaos. He walked to me and stopped by my side, looking to the left expectantly.
Just then, Vyr appeared with a trail of smoky shadows but also with Tohn and two other Dahk. The two Dahk bent at the waist and hurled goops of bile onto the sandy platform. I knew just how they felt.
As soon as they stood, they squinted in the light and a flick of silk at their eyes shot down, shading their silver orbs. Dahk didn’t do well in bright light. Tohn particularly loathed Earth’s sun. Seeing him shade his eyes now made my lips twitch.
Tohn spotted me, and for a half a second, I considered ignoring him. He hadn’t fought for me. He hadn’t been willing to go against his king. But I wasn’t a petty person, and I could acknowledge that something I didn’t understand was going on with the Dahk and Chyn. And even if Tohn had helped, it wouldn’t have lasted long. As they’d said, Chyn could have gotten to me anywhere they took me anyway. There was no running from someone who could teleport.
I stood quickly and rushed to Tohn, hugging him around his waist. He sighed and squeezed me back but quickly released me. Chyn took my arm and dragged me away.
“Just you, Vyr,” he rumbled. “I have no patience for this.”
“Their king insisted,” Vyr said with irritation.
“And?”
Vyr shook his head. “My loyalties do not lie with only you.”
Chyn shook his head, annoyance lining his face. He looked at Tohn and his buddy. Wohn, I thought? “You are here because I allow it. Test me and I will personally repay your king the favor.”
Tohn glared at him but nodded tightly, as did Wohn.
Lyno stepped onto the platform and watched the Dahk with anger and distrust as he approached Chyn. “Are they aware of the price on a Dahk head here?”
Chyn huffed a dark laugh, grinning maliciously at the Dahk.
“We can handle ourselves, cretin,” Tohn muttered.
Lyno looked at the thousands of Juldo and other aliens with raised brows then back at Tohn, chuckling. He then nodded toward the edge of the platform.
“The first wave is much smaller than I’d anticipated,” Lyno said to Chyn. “I imagine this won’t take long.”
I looked at the large group of Juldo roaming the base of the crater. Small? There were so many of them down there. They were in various states of disrobe and arming themselves. While Lyno and Chyn conversed quietly, Tohn and Vyr guided me back to the bench a few feet from the edge.
I sat between them. “What’s going on?”
Tohn scrubbed his face and shook his head, looking at Vyr.
Vyr watched Chyn closely as he spoke quietly. “Chyn has laid claim to the throne. It was expected after slaying the previous master. But he refused to claim it, causing strife and anger throughout the territory. It is instinct for us to challenge our leader, and had he claimed it following the death of the master, he would have already battled his challengers. Instead he refused them, letting their instinct fester and chafe. It was an insult. Had it been anyone but Chyn, it would have been a sign of cowardice and the throne would have been ripped from him, forfeiting his life.”
“Why is he different?” I asked. And why would Chyn kill the master then refuse the throne? I’d picked up bits and pieces of conversation, but it was too jumbled of a mess in my head for me to connect the dots.
Tohn leaned toward me, his wing curling around my back in support. “He is the Shadow Born Assassin. The most lethal of the Juldo. He will not be easily defeated. They fear him as much as they respect him. No one Juldo would challenge him. Better to attack him as one united front before battling for the throne.”
Vyr kept his eyes on Chyn as he spoke again. “But Juldo cannot unite. We are covetous and prideful—foolishly so. So instead, they’ve allowed their ignorance to grow and override all rational thought. Those who step forward now have in mind to challenge him while he is distracted with the others.”
Chyn watched the Juldo below with boredom and a hint of impatience.
“He has to fight all of them?” I gaped at Chyn. There were so many of them. He didn’t even look a little afraid. He looked bored.
Vyr chuckled quietly. “This is a nuisance for him. He doesn’t respect the Juldo way.”
“Why not? He’s one of them.”
Vyr shook his head. “Chyn is not as he seems. He may look Juldo, but he is not. His ancestry is dated back to the beginning of the Juldo and he is now the last of his line.” He stopped, blinking long and slow. “Nearly.” He corrected himself. “He has no respect for his brethren because they have lost their way. He respects the old ways. Battle for creation. War for dominance. Honor before pride. Combat for power.” He sighed. “They have lost sight of the old ways. The Juldo are as warmongering as they have always been, but once it was for territory, for growth. They dominated their enemies for supremacy. They were not slavers. They were the single greatest force in the known galaxies—and still are. But they no longer have interest in allying with others. Now they hunt those weaker than themselves and use them for sport. They would see all life wiped from the universe, decimating worlds and claiming them as their own until they alone ruled the stars. That is not honorable. It is genocide.” Vyr shook his head. “He is ashamed of them.”
I looked back at Chyn, noting how his jaw was tilted in our direction, and I knew he was listening to every word exchanged between us. “So why not abandon them?”
Vyr smiled sadly. “He already has.”
I blinked away my blurred vision. That was a lot to take in. But I didn’t have a chance to process because something was happening below. Arms thrust in the air, and a roar of approval echoed though the canyon. Chyn shrugged off his long coat and dropped it to the ground. At his belt, he had several daggers sheathed, more at his thighs and boots. Some were short and thin, some long and wide. All of them were wicked sharp. From the waist up, his map of scars continued from his back and around his broad chest. Puckered and shiny, they nearly distracted me from the silver sheen of his veins. He fisted his metal hand then his other, stretching them out and rolling his shoulders. Another roar echoed through the canyon.
Lyno dropped a dark bag from his shoulder and pulled out two short swords, tossing them to Chyn. Who grasped them by their hilts and twirled them so fast, they were a blur of shining silver.
Dropping them by his side, Chyn looked over his shoulder at me, but he spoke to Vyr. “You take her, brother, you will not like my response.”
“I will not break my word,” Vyr replied stiffly.
Chyn looked me over from head to toe, flashing a grin, then leapt from the edge of the platform. I was on my feet and rushing to the edge in time to see him vanish mid drop into a dark smoky mist and reappear clear across the crater’s field, behind the hundred Juldo watching the platform.
From there, it was chaos.
Tohn and Vyr stood at my sides, Wohn and Lyno at my back. I got the distinct impression they were there to guard me. Either to keep me from running—though that seemed impractical—or to protect me. I didn’t even bother trying to decipher it, and I would have just asked Tohn, but I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the herd of Juldo sprinting for Chyn.
