by blood wind
Cree tore his gaze from the big man. “Aye,” he sneered. “I've the Resistance to thank for being in this pest hole as you call it.
They've singled me out to torment.”
Lares smiled, rubbing his hands together as though he were about to be given a juicy bit of gossip. “And what did we do to be sent here, Jackal?”
The Prime Reaper let out a long breath. “I did nothing but garner their gods-be-damned notice, is all.” He jerked his head around and fixed Lares with a steely glare. “They've been trying to get my ass for the last year. Thanks to their tender mercies I spent two weeks of a living hell inside a Behavioral Modification Unit having my mind altered!” He clenched his jaw. “When I find out who is responsible for that piece of work, I'm going to strangle her.”
“The Multitude,” Lares mumbled.
“The Multitude?”
“You have never heard of them?”
“Aye, I have heard of them, but what have they to do with what we're talking about?”
“I believe the Resistance on both our worlds are being run by them.”
“It does not matter,” Cree drawled. “I am sworn to fight any and all enemies of the Empire, sorceresses or not, and the women of the Rysalian Resistance have gained my undivided attention!”
“What if your woman is one of them?”
Cree's eyes widened and he turned a fierce face to his companion. “She would not be!”
“How do you know she is not?”
“I know!”
Lares looked at him for a long moment, and then lowered his voice to a forceful whisper. “But how do you know?” The Reaper opened his mouth to defend Bridget, and then snapped it shut. The Necromanian was right; how did he know?
****
SWEAT RAN down Cree's face and salt trickled into his eyes, blinding him. He stopped, rested the handle of his pickax against his thigh and armed away the sweat, leaving long dirty streaks on his forehead and right cheek. Breathing raggedly from his work breaking rocks, he hunkered down on his haunches and let his head drop from the sheer exhaustion. He was hotter than he could ever remember being; tanned as deeply bonze as the three Diabolusian prisoners who were glaring at him from the entrance to the cave. It hadn't taken him long to discard his black jumpsuit that first day three weeks earlier. Aye, he thought tiredly: he was hotter than he had ever been, but in far better shape, too. He had developed muscle groups that he had not even known he possessed. His biceps were rock-hard, bulging, from the steady day-to-day application of pickax to rock. You could bounce a Serenian gold piece off his thighs, they were so tight with firm muscle tone. The thick calluses on the palms of his hands were the only drawback to the hard labor, but he had earned them; worked through the blisters that had formed, broken, ran, dug deep into the tender flesh, then formed again until there was a horny layer covering the once-soft pads of his palm heel and fingers. His chest had begun to bulge after the second week and he doubted seriously if he could even fit into the jumpsuit when it was time to leave this hellhole.
The stealthy crunch of rock nearby brought Cree's head up and set off an alarm in the back of his killer's mind. He looked behind him, saw no one, but realized there were no longer three Diabolusians glaring at him. He pushed up to his feet and reached for the pickax. The worn smoothness of the thick handle was comforting.
“On your left,” he heard Raine say in a low voice as the young man sidled toward him from the other side of the garden plot where he had been pulling weeds. The young Serenian nobleman was carrying a hoe in a practiced grip; fighting for his chance to be left alone among the murderers and rapists of Helios 12 was nothing new to the handsome political prisoner.
“What the hell do they want?”
“Who knows?” Raine returned in a bored voice. “Do those dogs have to want something, Cree?” As the three Diabolusians began moving toward the rock pile, Lares showed up as if by dark magic. Oblivious to the Necromanian's presence, the Diabolusians parted: one heading for Raine, two making their way toward Cree.
“I do love a fight,” Lares said beneath his breath and smiled. The white of his teeth against the ebony of his skin looked like the gaping maw of a Viragonian. His opponent never knew what hit him.
Raine held his own against a Diabolusian knife-wielder who did his level best to skewer the Serenian. McGregor danced just out of reach of the gutting blade. A well-aimed and savage swing of the Serenian's hoe handle nearly caved in the man's chest and left him in agony, gasping for breath where he fell. Raine hawked up a gob of phlegm and spat on the man then stood back to watch Cree.
“I kill you, Iceman!” the Diabolusian hissed in broken Rysalian.
“You can try.”
Lares joined Raine and draped a friendly arm over the young man's shoulder. “I like the way this Ry-Chalean jackal fights, son of the McGregor!”
“He's good. There's no doubt about that,” Raine agreed, flinching as a particularly brutal uppercut caught the Diabolusian under the chin and slammed him against the wall of the Indoctrination Hut. “And he enjoys it, too.”
“Men were born to fight, my child,” Lares sighed dramatically. “If not for our little pissing contests, where would we be? We must size our cocks against one another else we-”
“McGregor! Taborn!”
Raine and Lares turned to find the Warden waving them to work. They thought of ignoring him, but Cree was only moments away from defeating his opponent. It was a foregone conclusion. With a look and shrug at one another, they headed to their assigned tasks. Neither of them saw Raine's adversary come slyly to his feet, his dagger clutched in his fist.
From the window of his quarters, the Commandant watched with appreciation as the Reaper crashed a powerful fist into his enemy's face to send the hapless man tumbling to the hard-packed ground; but out of the corner of his eye, he spied movement and swung his gaze that way. His eyes widened. Frantically, he rapped on the window. “Cree!” he shouted, not realizing he couldn't be heard through the thick solar reflective glass. “Cree, behind you!” Having been absorbed with the fight up until then, Cree did not hear or see the man sneaking up on him. He had no idea of the danger he was in until it was too late. Commandant Jahannum saw the Reaper start to turn, finally sensing something was not quite right. It was at that moment-already far too late for Cree to save himself-that the wicked six-inch long serrated blade of the stiletto drove deep into the Reaper's back, barely missing the spinal cord, but slicing open Cree's right kidney, and the warrior collapsed like a broken toy.
****
REAPERS NEVER dream; they are programmed not to. Dreams can be deadly enemies to a warrior, for in that unconscious state in which a day's, a year's, a lifetime's mistakes and worries dwell, lay mystical answers the Empire would rather the Reapers’
not have. The symbolic nature of a dream -with its hidden meanings and vague, ambiguous inferences -can undo the strictest regimen of Behavioral Modification. Even in drug -induced nightmares-the substances of which are part and parcel of what happens during reinforcement therapy-the relevance and implications are controlled so the warrior experiences only what he has been instructed to experience. His dreams, in other words, are controlled. In reinforcement therapy, those controlled dreams mirror only the warrior's worst fears; there are no pleasant thoughts allowed to interfere with the protocol.
But in uncontrolled dreams, one of which at that very moment Kamerone Cree was passing through on his way back to consciousness, the relevance and implications were being stimulated by the Resistance implanted device in his hypothalamus.
****
SHE WAS waiting for him at the door when he returned home.
She was smiling, her arms open wide to welcome him.
Her body was warm and soft and infinitely satisfying as she slipped into his arms and pressed her cheek to his.
"I have missed you, Kam,” she whispered. Her arms went around his waist and she held him tightly to her. “I have been so lonely without you."
He heard himself groan: a savage, possessive sound meant to convey to her his urgent need. Swinging her up into his arms, holding her high against his chest, his mouth came down on hers in a kiss that took away both their breaths. He plundered her mouth with his tongue; she met his thrust for thrust with her own.
"You are my beloved,” she breathed against his mouth. “The only man I shall ever need."
Though he had traveled the universe over many times; sped through the stars to distant worlds and returned unscathed; the few steps into the bedsuite were the longest trip he had ever taken. He could hear his ragged, excited breathing; listened with blatant male pride to hers. Her body in his arms was an exquisite torture, the likes of which he would gladly suffer for the rest of his life.
“Kam.” she spoke his name over and over again as he laid her on their bed. Her green eyes were liquid emeralds as he tore away his jumpsuit to reveal to her the extent of his need.
“Make me truly your woman, Milord,” she begged him. “Lay claim to what you want.” It made the blood pound in his temples to rip the silky transparent gown from her shapely body; the sound of the material ripping in his hands excited him and he threw back his head and howled in triumph.
“Kam!” she pleaded with him. “Please!” Her hips writhed on the bed in a wanton display of her own arousal. Her arms came up to receive him.
He fell on her, splaying her legs wide with his knees. His jutting member stabbed unerringly upward into the moist center of her, striving for the core of her internal heat and she closed around him: imprisoning his cock inside her body.
With a brutal thrust that sent them both over the edge of sanity, he rammed into her as far as his shaft would go and his world burst around him like a nova. His seed spurted deep into her and took hold: he had claimed her as his own. Throwing back his head, he bellowed with the release of his passion, feeling her nails drag wickedly down his bare back.
"Mine!” He shouted to the heavens and all the gods who had denied him this pleasure for so long. When he lowered his head, he saw her staring up at him with rapt wonder and knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that he had fulfilled and sated his woman as he had been meant to do. And he knew she would be his forever; that he would move heaven and hell to keep her at his side; that he would do whatever it took to make her his.
"I love you, Kam,” she whispered to him.
He lowered his head and took her mouth, plying feather-soft kisses on her bruised lips.
"I love you, too, Bridget,” he whispered back.
****
THE HEALER reluctantly put her hand on her patient's forehead and pushed aside his sweat-dampened hair. His devastating handsomeness was not lost on Dr. Imogene Mathis nor was the sharpness of his gaze as his lids suddenly snapped open. She snatched away her hand as though he had tried to bite her.
“D-don't try moving,” she told him “You were stabbed and I had to remove one of your kidneys.” Cree felt as though a red-hot poker was pressing into his lower right side. The pain was excruciating, but there was a deeper, rawer agony lapping at his consciousness that made him try to push himself up. When he did, agony rocketed through his body and he gasped with the force of it. Every muscle in his body was cramping and every bone throbbed deep in its marrow.
“I said not to move, Captain,” the Healer snapped. “Try that again and I'll have you clamped to the table!”
“What did you do to me, woman?” he gasped. He gripped the edges of the table. “How long have I been out?”
“Two days,” she answered and watched the disbelief cloud his eyes.
“I have to get up,” he said and tried again only to find he was too weak and in too much pain. Why can't I block out this pain? I should be able to block it out.
“You aren't going anywhere,” Dr. Mathis informed him. “As a matter of fact, I doubt you will be able to be transported back to FSK-14 at the designated time.”
“You have no idea what you've done to me,” he grated. “What you've set in motion!”
“I saved your life.”
“Leave me,” he ordered. “Now!”
“I most certainly will not! I have to-”
Cree swung his head toward her and his eyes were wild. “I am going into Transition, bitch! Do you want to be in here with me when that happens?”
The Healer gawked at him, saw him begin to transform right before her eyes and barely made it out the door before the most godsawful sound she would ever hear sent her screaming for help.
“Lock him in!” she shrieked. “Lock him in! He's going through Transition!” The guards made no move toward the medical hut door. Not a one of them wanted to be anywhere near a Reaper going into Transition. To a man, they ran in the opposite direction, shoving each other aside as they made for safety.
Lares grabbed Raine's arm as the young man made to go to Cree. “We may have developed a friendship with the Reaper, but he would not know that now.” He cast a look toward the medical hut from which an undulating howl came. “He would not know us now.”
“Listen to him!” Raine breathed. “It sounds as though he is dying. We have to help him!” The dark man shook his head. “He is transforming from human to beast, son of the McGregor. He has done it many times and will continue to do so as long as he draws breath.” He shuddered. “There is no help for him in this world.” Raine hung his head. “How can he bear it?” he asked, his voice breaking.
The hopeless howl of an animal in extreme agony pierced the hot solar wind around them and made men put their hands to their ears to blot out the sound. It was a tormented cry, filled with loneliness and burden, rife with bleak acceptance of its own strangeness.
Lares returned his attention to the medical hut. “I don't think he can.” Part II
Chapter 15
SHE WAS not at the door awaiting him with open arms when he returned to FSK-14 two months later; he had been gone a month longer than planned and she had had no way of knowing why or when he would return. She did not hear him enter his quarters for she was occupied with, and his arrival drowned out by, the sounds coming from the antique music device she so cherished.
He flung his flight bag on the sofa and walked to her door. She was lying across the bed on her back, the earphones of the old CD player clapped over her ears. Her eyes were closed and she was gripping one of his old utility shirts to her chest. He was stunned to see tears running down her cheeks. The sight of her sorrow cut right through his soul.
“Bridget?” he called out, but she did not hear him. He called again and when she still did not respond, he looked around for the CD player, spied it, and then walked over to turn it off. When he did, she opened her eyes, saw him and gasped. The look on her face hurt him deeply. As she scrambled off the bed, putting distance between them, her hand going up to ward him off, the pain deepened.
“How long have you been standing there?” Cree started toward her, wanting desperately to take her in his arms, but when he took that first step, she whimpered. He would have had to be deaf not to hear the terror in the sound.
“When did you get back?” she asked, tossing his old utility shirt to the bed.
He shook his head in answer, turned and walked to his bedsuite.
Bridget reached up to take the earphones from her head. She put them aside and, with her heart thudding like a trip hammer in her chest, she looked down to see her hands shaking. Clenching her fists, she stood there, waiting for him to call to her, to make good on the bargain they had made before he left, but he didn't.
An hour passed. Two.
She heard nothing from his bedsuite. Going to her door, she listened, heart in her throat, but heard no sound from behind his closed door. Hesitantly, thinking perhaps he meant for her to come to him, she went to his door, and after a long moment of indecision, rapped lightly. “Captain?”
“Go away, Bridget.”
She had spent two months wondering what would happen when he returned to FSK-14. Since she had had no outside contact with t
hose on board the station, she had no way of knowing why he was staying away longer than the one month he had been ordered to serve. When the time for him to return came and went, she began to wonder if he hadn't been detained for some infraction of Hell-12 regulations; knowing Cree, that was entirely possible. When the second month had nearly passed, she began to worry about him. There were brutal men on Hell-12 and she had found herself fearing for his safety. Only the night before, she had dreamed of him lying in a medical ward: hurt and alone, calling out her name, needing her. She had awakened with a sense of unease and had gone to his room where she had found an old shirt that still bore the scent of him. She had taken the black garment back to her room, turned on the CD player to try to take her mind off her concern for him, and took to her bed. As she lay there wondering where he was at that moment, she had entertained the notion that he might never return. That knowledge had hurt her more than she had been prepared to accept and she had begun to cry.
When had she lost her fear of him? When had she begun to see him as a man instead of a Reaper? Was it the night he had found her with Konnor Rhye and she had seen such deep hurt in his eyes? The night she thought sure he would beat her, but had kissed her instead?
Yes. Of course it had to have been that night. What woman would not be thrilled to have two handsome men fighting over her-the victor drag her home to his lair, his intent clear? To see the wild possessiveness stamped across her captor's handsome face?
Wasn't that a fantasy of every woman: to be dominated by a male capable of claiming-and holding-her in so dramatic a fashion? It was as ego satisfying to a woman as it was a victory for the man.
That had been a part of it, she reasoned, the fierce possessiveness he'd shown that night. But it had been more than that, too. It had been his gentleness, the way he had touched her had sealed her own fate. It had been his tender kiss; the way his lips had plied hers, brooking no denial that she was his to do with as he pleased. It had been the way he had looked at her, lust smoldering in his dark eyes, that had made her cling to him like a wanton.
