by Tana Stone
Bron looked up at me, his brows pressed together. “It does not say.”
A sound behind us made me turn on the spot. Two Zagrath fighters in full uniforms and helmets had rounded the corner. One held his wrist up to a door panel and the door swished open while the other had spotted us and seemed frozen in shock. I guessed two bare-chested Vandar raiders in battle kilts were not what he’d been expecting.
Before Bron could react, I swung my axe up, hitting one of the Zagrath with the flat side of the blade and knocking him out. When the other swung his laser rifle up to fire, I used it to jerk him toward me, spinning him around and giving his neck a sharp snap. He also collapsed onto the floor.
“We should probably hurry,” I told Bron.
I’d purposefully killed the soldiers without spilling blood, so I dragged one over to a doorway and jammed him into it, doing the same with the other Zagrath and another recessed doorway.
“I’ve got what we need.” Bron held up his device, eyeing both slumped-over corpses.
“We need to get to the medical bay.” I swallowed down my panic that my mate might be hurt. At least I knew the Zagrath would treat her well, since she was human, like them. Then I thought about our young Vandar apprentice in a Zagrath holding cell, and my anger flared anew. Of course, the empire would treat a child like a criminal. “Then we go to the holding cells.”
If my majak disagreed with my strategy, he didn’t say it. Instead, he jerked his head toward the fallen soldiers. “We need a way to get through doors.”
Without hesitation, I brought my blade down again, slicing off one of the Zagrath soldier’s hands below the wrist.
“That should do it.” He nodded toward a nearby corrider. “We go this way.”
We left the drop clothes on the floor. They were little disguise, since nothing about us looked remotely Zagrath. Walking quickly, we passed through a series of corridors that seemed to be deserted. It didn’t take me long to understand that Bron was taking us through back passageways, away from the main part of the ship. When we reached a set of doors at the end of a hallway, I held the bloody wrist to a flat panel to one side, and they parted to reveal a small compartment.
I knew elevators from other ships, but I did not like them. They made warriors slow and lazy. I reluctantly got on and it surged up, making my stomach plummet. Another reason I despised the contraptions.
“We will arrive near the medical bay,” Bron told me as the elevator slowed, reaching for his own battle axe. “We should be ready.”
The doors opened and we rushed out with our weapons drawn. I did not see any Zagrath, but I could hear them. Flattening myself to the wall, I edged forward. The voices from around the corner were raised and angry.
“What happened here?”
“I am not certain, Commander.” The second voice shook. “I was assessing the Vandar child when—“
“The Vandar child was here? I ordered him sent to a cell!”
“Yes, but the woman convinced me that he needed to be checked over.” The second Zagrath’s voice sharpened. “He was injured by a photon stunner.”
Bron tensed next to me. They’d used a photon weapon on the boy? I bit back a growl and forced myself not to leap out and attack the commander.
“So? It doesn’t matter that he’s a child,” the commander nearly shrieked. “He’s a Vandar raider.”
“I’m a medical professional. It’s my job to treat everyone, regardless of species. Especially a child.”
“Well, where are your patients now?”
There was a heavy pause, and I held my breath.
“They must have knocked me out. When I came to, a Zagrath soldier was untying my wrists.”
The commander sighed. “I don’t have time to deal with this now. We’re taking heavy fire from the raiders. It’s not as if the woman can fly an escape pod off the ship. We’ll track her down once we defeat the Vandar.”
Bron tugged my arm, and we backed away from the medical bay. Even though I was on an enemy ship and had no idea where Astrid or our apprentice were, warmth bloomed in my chest that had nothing to do with my scorched skin. She’d tricked the medic to get the boy out of the cell, and then attacked him to escape. She hadn’t run to the Zagrath willingly. She’d been taken here, and she was trying her best to get off the ship and back to me.
After we were in the elevator again and could speak freely, Bron turned to me. “Where do you think she’d go, Raas? You know her better than anyone.”
“She may not be able to pilot an escape pod off the ship, but I would not put it past her to attempt to steal one of the Zagrath ships.”
Bron angled his head at me. “Can she fly one?”
“No.” I touched a finger to my marks. “But trust me, she is more determined than she looks.”
The elevator doors slid open, and a group of Zagrath fighters stared at us, their laser rifles aimed at our chests.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Astrid
“How would I know?” I looked down at the controls of a Zagrath shuttle. “I told you, I’m not a pilot. I only ever did navigation, and I was pretty bad at it.”
My hands shook, and my mouth felt like I’d swallowed cotton—sensations I hadn’t experienced since I’d left my sister’s ship. Working on the bridge had often made me so nervous I’d get clammy palms or the jitters, but I’d hoped I’d left that behind when I’d left the freighter. I guessed not. I hummed to myself in an attempt to calm my nerves, but even my humming was shaky, and my burning skin wasn’t helping things.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” I whispered. That seemed to help, so I continued to say fuck over and over.
Krin sat next to me in the small cockpit, one leg bouncing up and down. My cursing obviously wasn’t doing anything for his nerves. “You must know something. If we don’t get this ship moving soon, the Zagrath are going to find us.”
I blew out a long breath. “Don’t worry,” I said, more to myself than to him. “We picked the oldest, most beat-up shuttle they have. I’m sure this is the last thing they’d want to use in a battle.”
The boy cast his gaze around the worn cockpit. “Are we sure it can fly?”
I wasn’t, but I hoped the Zagrath wouldn’t have a completely useless vessel sitting on their hangar deck. It hadn’t been in the repair area. “Of course, it can fly,” I told him with more confidence than I felt. I put a hand on his bouncing leg to still it. “We’ve made it this far, haven’t we?”
He met my eyes, finally nodding. We’d managed to wind our way through the ship without being stopped or questioned. It helped that the Zagrath were in the midst of a battle, and that I’d made Krin pretend to be wounded so that I looked like a medic taking him for treatment. At least, that was what we’d hoped it looked like, and the soldiers rushing by us had been too distracted to notice or care.
“Don’t worry, Krin. I promise I’ll get us home.”
Home. Did I really think of the Vandar ship as home? It seemed bizarre that I could be more comfortable on a raider warbird with its dark shadows, labyrinth of iron stairs and open passageways, and constant echo of warriors bellowing to each other. But I knew the Vandar were more than these things, and Raas Kratos was definitely not the brutal warlord the galaxy thought he was. At least, not to me.
My pulse quickened as I thought about the imposing Raas, his dark eyes flashing as he looked at me. I knew he was out there on the Vandar warbird, and I knew the horde had returned for me and Krin. As much as the Vandar despised the Zagrath Empire, I believed Krin. The Vandar never left a warrior behind. Or a mate.
My heart fluttered in my chest. I should probably be freaked out that black tattoos were appearing on my skin and marking me as the mate of Raas Kratos, but I wasn’t. Aside from the burning sensation I hoped was temporary, the thought of being his—really being his—thrilled me. My heart was already his and I think it had been for a while, so I was glad my body had caught up.
I narrowed my eyes at the controls again. I ju
st needed to figure this out, and I could get back to him.
“Come on, Astrid,” I whispered to myself, hearing my sister’s voice in my own head. “This is not that hard. You know this.”
Tara had said the same thing to me in some variation probably a thousand times. Usually, it made me cringe because I knew it shouldn’t be that hard. I also knew that ships—flying them, navigating them, fixing them—had never been my jam. Not like they’d been Tara’s. Another way we were completely different.
“You okay?” Krin asked me.
“What?” I saw the concerned look on his face and realized that me talking to myself was probably not all that comforting. I closed my eyes and steadied my breath. I had to do this, for Krin, if no one else. The Zagrath would definitely toss him back in a cell if they caught us.
“Maybe the Raas can fly it,” Krin said, interrupting my thoughts.
“I’m sure he could,” I muttered, opening my eyes, “but he’s not exactly here right now.”
“Sure, he is.” Krin pointed a small finger out the side of the cockpit’s wraparound window.
Leaning forward, I peered across him toward the wide, hangar bay doors. My mouth gaped open. That was definitely Raas Kratos swinging his battle axe over his head, while his first officer fought off Zagrath soldiers by his side.
“How did they get here?”
Krin just grinned broadly. “I told you they wouldn’t leave us behind.”
Even though there were considerably more Zagrath soldiers, the Raas and his majak were quickly dispatching them, even fending off blaster fire with their circular axe blades. Watching them slash and duck, almost moving in unison, made it hard for me to close my mouth again. I stared openly for a few moments before Krin nudged me.
“Vaes.”
“What do you mean, vaes? Where are we going?” I waved a hand at the cockpit. “We’re the only ones in a ship.”
Krin shook his head at me, as if he was disappointed in me. “Just because you can’t see the Vandar ship, doesn’t mean it isn’t here.”
“The invisibility shielding?” I looked out across the hangar bay again, searching for signs of an invisible spaceship. My gaze caught on something at the far end, a rippling of the light. “There.” I pointed to the area. “Is that it?”
Krin followed my finger, his eyes brightening. “I think so. That’s probably where the Raas and his majak are heading. If we want to get off with them, we’d better go now.”
I followed the boy, rushing out of the Zagrath ship and making a beeline for the Vandar ship we couldn’t see. Out of the corner of my eye, I spotted Kratos and Bron fighting their way across the hangar bay. More Zagrath had joined the fray, but they were easily felled.
I desperately wanted to call out to Kratos and let him know that I was okay, but I knew better than to disturb him in the middle of a battle. Instead, I kept running around ships and dodging startled Zagrath crew as they repaired vessels or prepared to board fighters. When we were almost halfway across the expansive space, sirens began to blare overhead.
“They know we escaped,” I yelled to Krin.
He craned his neck back to look at me, jerking a thumb toward the Raas. “They know they have Vandar intruders.”
He was right. More Zagrath soldiers streamed through the hangar bay entrance and headed right for Kratos and Bron. My stomach clenched at the sheer number of well-armed fighters.
I grabbed Krin’s arm and brought him to a sudden stop. “We have to help them.”
He saw the Zagrath reinforcements and his small jaw tightened. “I don’t have any weapons.”
My gaze scoured the hangar bay for anything we could use, but there was nothing that could match a blaster. We might be able to throw a bunch of wrenches at them, but chances were good we’d end up being shot or taken captive before we could do any real damage.
“I have an idea.” I tugged him with me as I ran even faster toward the invisible Vandar ship. “Can you get us on the ship even though we can’t see it?”
He nodded, but his expression was wary.
“Don’t worry,” I yelled over the wail of the sirens. “I’m not going to try to fly it. We just need to create a distraction.”
Krin grinned. “I’m good at distractions.”
When we reached the area where the light shimmered strangely, Krin pressed his hands to the invisible ship until he reached some sort of latch. As the ramp lowered, I could see the inside of the Vandar ship, which was not covered in special shielding.
Krin and I hurried up the ramp and ran to the cockpit. Peering out the front, I saw that the nose of the ship was pointed toward the battle raging between the two Vandar warriors and the dozen Zagrath.
“Perfect,” I muttered under my breath.
Krin engaged the engines, clearly more familiar with Vandar vessels than with enemy ones. “What’s your idea for a distraction?”
The sound of the siren was muffled inside the ship, but I still had to raise my voice. “I’m going to shoot at them.”
Krin’s gaze went out the front of the ship to where the fight was getting closer to us, then he blinked at me a few times. “I thought you weren’t good with ships.”
I glanced back at the fight in time to see Raas clutch his side, although he did not lower his axe. He’d been hit. Sweat poured off both warriors, and blood ran down Bron’s face. The Zagrath were advancing and more soldiers were rushing in behind them. As skilled as Kratos and Bron were, I knew even they couldn’t fight them all off.
I gritted my teeth. “I have to do something to save them. They can’t die on a Zagrath ship.” And I couldn’t bear watching Kratos die in front of me. Not after he’d believed in me and listened to my counsel and made me feel valuable for the first time in a long time. I didn’t care if he was a Raas of the Vandar, feared throughout the galaxy and notorious for leaving a wake of death and destruction. He was my Raas.
Krin’s face darkened at the thought. “Do it.”
I studied the console for a moment, hoping that the weapons were located in the same place on all alien ships. I tapped a few buttons and laser cannons emerged on either side of the cockpit. I aimed a little beyond the Zagrath soldiers—in case my aim was bad—closed my eyes, and fired.
“Woo hoo!”
I opened my eyes to Krin’s screams, peeking out the front of the ship and seeing a massive smoldering hole in the hangar bay. I hadn’t missed, but it looked like I’d blown up a quarter of the hangar bay. Zagrath soldiers lay scattered around the blackened blast zone, some staggering to their feet. I couldn’t see the Raas or Bron through the haze, and my heart sank.
Billowing smoke filled the air, and I could taste the bitter char as I swallowed. I was too terrified to ask Krin if the Raas had been hit, my heart hammering in my chest louder than the sirens. I rubbed at my eyes as the smoke stung them, tears pricking the backs of my eyelids.
He wasn’t dead. He couldn’t be.
I turned to ask Krin, but the words died in my throat when I saw the stunned expression on his face, his eyes focused slightly behind me.
Suddenly, I was being lifted out of my seat, large arms wrapping around me as Raas Kratos crushed me to him.
“Raisa,” he murmured. “It’s really you.”
“It’s me,” I said between choked sobs, twisting around so I could look up at him, hardly believing he was really holding me. “I’ve been trying to get back to you.”
He pulled away from me, locking eyes with me and cupping my face in both of his large hands. “I know. I’ve been trying to find you.”
Bron pushed past both of us, sinking down into the pilot’s chair. “If you two don’t mind, I’m going to get us out of here before the Zagrath figure out what happened.” He shook his own head as if trying to dislodge something. “Tvek, I don’t even know what just happened.”
“Astrid blew up the Zagrath,” Krin said, his voice brimming with pride.
As the ship rumbled across the enemy hangar bay and burst out i
nto space, Kratos smiled at me. “I knew you were my most valuable crew mate.”
Chapter Forty
Kratos
The battle was still raging when we returned to the ship, and I was grateful when Bron successfully piloted us through the glowing volley of laser fire. As much as I hated it, I knew I had to leave Astrid and report to the command deck.
When we walked down the ship’s ramp, she glanced at the scorch mark in my side, evidence of a Zagrath blaster grazing my flesh. “I don’t suppose I can convince you to get that looked at?”
Bron came down after us, the gash in his forehead now only trickling blood instead of oozing it.
Astrid grimaced. “Or that?”
I pulled her to me again, loving the feel of her body against mine. It was like I needed to have as much of her skin on mine as I could to prove she was real, and she was with me.
“I didn’t think so.” She sighed, pulling away and gazing at me. “In that case, you should go kick some more Zagrath ass.”
My eyes went from hers down to the black lines curling across her skin. I traced one of the swirls with my finger, savoring the look of my mating marks on her. Without meaning to, I emitted a low growl.
Astrid placed her hand on top of mine, entwining our fingers. “I’ll be waiting for you when the battle is won. I’m not going anywhere, Raas.”
I tightened my hand around hers. “You are mine. You have always been mine.”
She gave me a shy smile. “And now it’s official.”
“It is done.” I had never meant the Vandar oath as much as I did at that moment. The thought that the small female who’d flamed my desires was my true mate sent a rush of need pounding through me and made my cock swell. I crushed my mouth to hers, parting her lips and devouring the taste of her. Her small breathy moan made my head swim as our tongues tangled, and I dragged a hand through her hair, tipping her head back and kissing her deeper.
Only the loud thumping of boots forced me to tear myself from her. I pulled back, panting.
