by Treva Harte
One of the men reached forward to grab at Stefani, who was already striding toward the man who had dared give her orders. She turned and bared her teeth.
Hissssss! He jerked his hand back, shaking his thumb. A spate of unknown though obviously angry words followed. Some of the other men snickered. Stefani turned on her would-be captor.
“You want more of that, you bad man?” Stefani pulled out a kitchen paring knife.
The captor backed off, with what looked like bewilderment on his scaled face. He hissed out something that sounded almost plaintive, but didn’t get any closer to Stefani. She waved the knife again, daring anyone to touch her.
Wonderful. Ara wanted to scream. A tiny child outdid the rest of them in defiance. What was wrong with the grown women of the group?
Quinn looked like he was ready to giggle himself for a moment. A corner of his mouth almost twitched, at any rate. Then he snapped out, “I told you to obey! Woman, take your daughter and keep her out of our way. We swat pesky gnats when they get too close.”
That…that mewt breath! He’d lied to her, now he dared to fling orders at them all. Ara knew she ought to try to control her anger. Last time she’d let go, the whole castle had been thrown in an upheaval. But she’d never been very good at tolerating stupid bullying. In fact she rather welcomed the hot rage boiling inside her. It was better than the iced fear in her stomach a few minutes ago.
“Beast!”
“Ara --” Maryam, holding a squirming Stefani tight, turned her head toward her. Well, Ara wasn’t a six-year-old to be protected. She refused to listen to Maryam’s silent command.
“No. I won’t be silent and try to soothe the enemy. They’re going to do what they want with us no matter what we say or do. Quinn, we allowed you in for my favor. While you were in the keep, you must have been looking for our secret exit.” Ara took a step closer to Quinn, ignoring the hissing of the other men. He stared down, impassive and remote as he always had been. He was a liar.
And she’d been a fool. She’d wanted to please him. Been desperate to please him. Despaired because she thought she hadn’t. She ought to hate him for kidnapping them all, but their night together was what she would never be able to forgive him for. “You used me and betrayed all of us. Cold-blooded lizard!”
Her hand lashed out to strike Quinn’s face.
Jewel had never thought of herself as one who would shirk the harshest reality, but for the second time that day Jewel shut her eyes, unable to bear to see what would happen.
Silence. Still more silence.
Jewel heard the hissing of the Bellizans again, but this time there seemed to be amusement in the sound. Jewel decided she was insane, but her eyelids opened anyhow. She had to look, see what horrible torture was being inflicted on a sister.
She blinked. The enemy leader was kissing Ara. His embrace might be more chokehold than tender caress and his mouth looked tight enough on hers to draw blood, but it was a kiss nonetheless. Jewel felt her own blood heat at the ferocity and length of the encounter.
Ara wasn’t fighting. At least not now. Her arms were around his shoulders and she was pressing herself as closely to him as he was pulling her to him. Jewel wondered that the air around them didn’t crackle from the electricity.
On and on. Was all the air around them being taken away? Jewel gulped for air as if it must be. Quinn’s hand stroked down over Ara’s back, cupped her buttocks tight and pulled her close against him. That was just how Mio had pulled her closer. Goddess, she knew how that felt. Jewel squirmed. The heat of a male body, the male strength that held you helpless ‑‑ it was overwhelming. Frightening. Arousing.
Drowning. She couldn’t breathe now that desire filled up her lungs. Quinn’s tongue ‑‑ a lying lizard tongue, she tried to remind herself ‑‑ flicked against the fullness of her inner lip. Teased against the roof of her mouth.
Noooo. Ara wanted to push him away. She would. As soon as she twined her own tongue around his. Once she let her fingers run against his ears. He had such sensitive ears. She could make him moan with just a light touch against a lobe. He always returned the favor. Oh, Goddess. Just like that. As soon as she stopped trembling she’d back away from him.
When he released her instead, she almost fell.
They stared at each other. Quinn’s eyes fascinated her ‑‑ so brilliant, so intense. So fiery right now. Ara wet her lips. His eyes followed her movement, narrowed. Goddess, was he going to kiss her again? She didn’t want ‑‑ Goddess, she did. Want.
Then he stepped back even further. Curse him. Why did he always step back at the last moment?
“And I’ll use you again, my sweet little enemy, if I choozzze.” The hiss rasped. “‘Twould make a lovely punishment and leave no real lasting marks for the slave traders when you’re sold. What’s more, whether I am lizard or not --” He flicked his tongue carelessly out and back inside his mouth “‑‑ you’d enjoy it.”
Chapter Two
“Where are they?” Ulrich scowled.
“The trail is clear enough. They didn’t expect anyone to follow.” Mio stared hard at the ground.
“I want to know were they are. I didn’t say the trail wasn’t clear.” Though Ulrich wasn’t so sure. None of his men were able to track things the way this street rat could. The boy could stare at a bent twig, grunt and take a turn in the overgrown forest without thinking twice.
Mio touched the ground and scowled. “I don’t know where they are, but they’re about a half day’s journey ahead of us. We must hurry.”
Hurry? It was only the boy’s ability to track the women that kept Ulrich from either leaving Mio behind or picking up the street rat and carrying him along under his arm. He’d never allowed anyone in his troop to be as slow as the youth with the dragging leg.
Ulrich let out a soft snarl of frustration. He never blamed any of his men for things beyond their control, either. He wouldn’t do it now, though he longed to shake the fellow.
“You needn’t huff down my neck.” Mio glared up at him. “I know I’m holding you back. I’m doing my best. I need to find them as badly as you do.”
Ulrich would have snarled again and louder if he hadn’t seen the tinge of color in the boy’s face.
“Why?” Ulrich slowed his pace down to match Mio’s.
“Why what?”
“Why are you so anxious to find the lady Maryam?”
“Maryam? Oh.” Mio cleared his throat. “I’m worried for all of them. But I do have a special fondness for her.”
None of the women in Castle Bloomingdell could ever have seen this boy. Mio must have fashioned some fantasy from glimpses of women when they were seen from the castle walls. After all, Ulrich had been the only man to enter that keep for many, many months. And even if Mio had wormed his way there, the way he had to Ulrich’s own tent, Maryam wouldn’t look twice at a child. She’d eat Mio up and spit him out without even knowing she’d done it. Wouldn’t she?
Ulrich didn’t like the hot, angry, worried twist in his guts. “What type of fondness?”
Mio grinned and then sobered again after he stared at Ulrich’s face. “You should ask the lady. But truthfully, I’m more concerned for another of the women.”
“Another one?” Sacred name, how did someone who would never be admitted to Castle Bloomingdell in the normal course of events know all these women?
“Yes…sir.”
Men were allowed to a lady’s favor only if they won the tournaments that showed their strength and bravery and agility. Ulrich had battled his way to women by the rules. How had this street rat become familiar with all the keep’s women?
“You needn’t look at me as if you want to use me for fencing practice. I have only the greatest respect and reverence for Lady Maryam. I do love her --”
“What?” Ulrich’s arm went out.
“Wait!” Mio ducked. “I’m her son!”
“What?” Ulrich’s arm dropped to his side. “You?”
Sons never stay
ed near the castle of their mother once they neared puberty. To do so meant death.
Then again, street rats might dare anything. Ulrich cleared his throat. Street rats who bore an unmistakable resemblance to Maryam. The angry twist inside him eased. There might be more to the boy than Ulrich had first thought. After all, Mio had Maryam’s blood in him. He might have come to something with a proper teacher and mentor. Ulrich had trained countless boys. He could have tutored Mio and doubtless kept him from crippling himself. He would have done a proper job of it and not left a likely lad to live on his own, taking up bad habits.
How had he come to live on his own? Had Maryam connived to keep her son close by? Ulrich almost smiled. He wouldn’t put it past the woman if she saw a way to manage it.
But no. She’d have seen to it that the boy was better off than he looked to be right now. Mio must have done this on his own. That fit, too. If he had half the will his mother did, he’d always want things done his own way and flame the consequences.
“I see.” Ulrich began to lengthen his stride.
“It’s not really what it seems.” Mio limped behind.
“I have no time for chatter over what seems. Hurry, boy.”
“I am. ‘Tis true we have a more important thing to worry over. It’s going to rain soon.” Mio rubbed his leg. “My bones ache.”
“Doubtless it’s from the walk.” Ulrich looked up at the sky. Was that a dark cloud forming? He couldn’t tell through the tops of the trees.
Rain might wash away all trace of the women’s route. It couldn’t rain! But that did look like a cloud.
“It’s not that kind of ache. We’re going to get a storm.”
Blast the weather and the boy, too. There was an unmistakable boom of thunder in the distance.
* * * * *
“What do you think they’ll do with us?” Reina’s voice trembled.
“Well, they’ve neither killed nor raped us yet.” Ara searched the forest floor for more sallet makings. “That’s a hopeful sign.”
“Unless it just means they are saving us for something worse.” Leesha’s bottom lip trembled. “I can’t sleep for thinking about it.”
Ara didn’t point out that Leesha’s snores had almost blown them out of the women’s tent last night.
“Stefani, go look for Mama’s anklet.” Maryam gave her a little push.
“I want to hear you.” Stefani gave her a sideways look. “I think those men are big babies. I’m not afraid of them. Ulrich could snap all of them in two. Just wait ‘til he shows up.”
“Ulrich doesn’t know we’re gone, baby.” Maryam made a shooing motion. “Go look in the women’s tent. Perhaps I left my anklet there.”
“Perhaps I’ll keep it if I find it.” Stefani grinned and then ran away, singing a childish ditty to herself in a high, cheery warble.
“They’ll be scared!He’ll stomp em, and bite em and chop em.
Cause Ulrich’s baaaad.
He’s bigger and meaner and nastier and bigger and bigger…
AND I’LL HELP!”
As her voice drifted away, the women looked at each other.
“The child could be right. Someone might come after us.” Jewel kept her voice low. She glanced over at the cluster of men who watched them. “We aren’t going very fast. We could be overtaken easily enough.”
“Who would come? Who knows we left?” Ara wasn’t a child to be placated. “And if they did, what would they do to us, finding us outside the castle walls and defenseless?”
“There is that.” Maryam sighed. “We’ve all been dragging ourselves as slowly as we can, but eventually we will get to ‑‑ wherever it is the enemy plans to take us.”
“Whatever will we do?” Reina rubbed her hands on her dress.
“I still have a knife. Not much bigger than the one Stefani had taken from her earlier. But a knife.” Maryam pulled another plant from the ground. “Here, Ara. Make a big sallet. I’m terribly hungry.”
“I have my necklace. I suppose if I were strong enough I could choke someone.” Leesha’s lips stopped trembling as she thought. Her eyes widened instead as if she was amazed at the idea.
Ara was rather amazed that the little mouse could come up with such a plan. A small hope began to curl up inside her. Perhaps she’d given up too soon.
“Maybe we could surprise them and escape.” She barely murmured the words.
“Escape?” Reina nearly shrieked.
Jewel put her hands over Reina’s mouth. Reina quieted and Jewel took her hand away again.
“What would we escape to?” Reina lowered her voice.
“How would we?” Leesha whispered.
Ara laughed. “Does it matter? We didn’t know that when we started this mad scheme. If we can do it, we’ll find out as we go along.”
Jewel suddenly laughed too. “I think we’ll find our way. If we get free, I feel sure I can find Mi…my own keep. Once there, the women of Castle M’Cee will know better than to let these aliens in. We’d be safe.”
“You’re mad.” Maryam began to laugh with the rest. “Quite mad, but you’re all I have. We might as well believe we can do it.”
“They’re only men.” Ara shrugged. “Of course we can do it! If that’s what we want to do, they can’t stop us.”
She hoped.
* * * * *
“Have you thought about what to do with them?” Gor’s voice startled Quinn.
Quinn laughed, short and sharp. “A little too much. So have the rest of you.”
Cunt, breasts, butt, mouth…he hadn’t left any part out when he’d fantasized. Even down to the sweet little whimpers she made. Feathery warm colors began to build up, drift into his line of sight. Damn. The illness had made him more sensitive to seeing them. Lately all his emotions could trigger different hues. They would shimmer before him without warning, letting him know his or another’s inner feelings.
“Well, yes, but I didn’t mean that. We’re all twitching to get inside the bad-tempered little…dears. But what about when we reach port? We won’t be the only ones interested in our treasures. And there are a lot more men at port ‑‑ and all through the country ‑‑ before we reach our House.”
Quinn pursed his lips, made the disgusted hiss that was almost a curse. “I hadn’t expected to bag quite so many. It’s almost too much bounty. One or two could be hidden. If we had a few more, others could be bartered without much loss. It’s worrisome. I still don’t know when the new woman showed up or the old one disappeared to, though we should be grateful. A younger female is far more valuable, of course. Still, they’re already hard to keep track of.”
“Maybe we should sell them when we reach port. People will pay well for them there.”
They could be gone forever. He’d never see her again.
“No.” Quinn assured himself he was thinking only of business. “Anyone from the port city will rob us blind, too. Thieves the place is named and thieves they are. Better to sell them at our leisure, safe from our House, and wait to get the best price.”
“Heh. They’re hard enough to herd along. You can’t get any kind of speed out of them. And if you think the women tricky to watch now, it will be all the more difficult when we have a horde of lust-crazed soldiers, thieves and outcasts at our throats. The port city will be bad enough. Outside that there’s worse.” Gor picked up a stone, rubbed it between his hands. “The Hinterlands is in total disorder wherever the enemy attacked.”
They both knew how desperate their country was. Only the more remote regions, like their home, had relative security. Everywhere else was chaos and waste. Disease and pestilence and poverty. Curse it, no one knew better than they about how desperate a man was when caught between death and poverty.
“Could we use a disguise…?”
Gor laughed, painfully. His strength was none too good any more, though his thought processes were still fine. Better than Quinn’s at this moment. Damn it, the both of them were dying. They needed to sell these women to
gain the medicine that might save them.
If only Quinn could remain detached, focused on his goal, instead of feeling this desperate need to sink himself into that white-silvered wench…
“Disguise them as men? We might get away with it for one or two of them for a few minutes. But look at that one --” Gor pointed to the completely dark one with the large breasts, who was scolding her young child. The other women were scattered around them, laughing. “Who would believe it? And they’d be seen as enemy men as soon as we leave the City of Thieves. If we did fool anyone, they’d be killed in minutes because they are alien males.”
“Not men.” Quinn’s mind began to function, slowly, even as he realized he was looking for a glimpse more of Ara, laughing. He’d missed her, more fool he.
“What then? Animals?” Gor threw the stone he’d been clutching up into the air, high and far. The two of them watched it land several yards away.
Not animals. Not quite. They weren’t that low on the scale yet, though some of the worst weren’t far from it. Many of them were quite valued…and almost as valuable as women.
“Shemen. Prostitutes.” They littered the city and huddled near main Houses, waiting their chance.
“What?” Gor gasped. For a moment a dark mist, signaling Gor’s surprise, swam around him.
Why not? There was many a man who’d have no contact with even the semblance of female sex unless they paid for the services of the almost-female whores. Mighty Name, the best of them looked better than the women he had seen spread out before men on display during the Sylvanian’s time of favor. The Sylvanian women were silly chits, preening and seeming oblivious to their male audience. Shemen were more responsive to male stares. The shemen performed better in bed, too, no doubt.
Quinn ignored the nagging memories of Ara in bed with him, at first so nervous and later so bold. She hadn’t known half the tricks a sheman did, but she’d been ‑‑
“A man would be more likely to see someone dressed like a woman and think it a sheman rather than a real woman. You see more of them.”
