If they made it out alive, Tasha owed Commander Bifen one hell of a gratitude fuck. After sharing boyhood memories of picking people’s pockets in the marketplace, Tasha had insisted he teach her some tricks. He’d also been the one to tell her about containments, notably the one time he’d escaped a prison camp situation during a training exercise.
And here she’d thought his best assets were his rough hands and big fat dicks. She’d underestimated Bifen’s uses to her.
Tasha got to the pole. The sounds of chaos continued on the other side of the floating vid. Women were screaming and Ket was yelling. The director’s cries of, “My equipment! Stop breaking my equipment, you idiots!” rose from time to time.
Tasha yanked the key free of her bra. Adrenaline pumped through her veins, making everything crystal clear. She slammed the key – actually a metal strip with an identification drive embedded in it – into the slot that sat in the panel at chest height. There was a distinct hum as the force field shut down. Tasha stepped through and pulled the key. The barrier reactivated, the air between this pole and the next shivering as it was pushed aside.
“We did it!” Noelle cried, her eyes shining.
“Hush,” Tasha cautioned, turning and running for the darkening woods. “We’re not out of danger yet.”
Once in the cover of the woods, she angled for the path she’d seen beyond the landing pad. Tasha reasoned it had to lead to civilization somewhere. Her feet thudded through the growth. Twigs and branches snapped as she ran through the undergrowth.
I’m making too much damned noise, she worried. But judging from the continued shouts coming from the compound, the melee was still going on. Speed was much more important than quiet at the moment.
She found the path. The cleared ground shone in the shadows as twilight deepened to night. Tasha’s back ached from Noelle’s weight, but she didn’t dare put the child down. She had to get as far away from the compound as she could.
The sounds of chaos faded behind her. Tasha gasped and made her burning legs keep pumping. Then Ket’s shout blasted loud, almost as if he was only steps behind her.
“The princess! Where the fuck is the princess? Check the shelter!”
More dim shouts. Tasha ran harder than ever. She’d have to soon leave the path and try to hide their trail if they had any hope of getting away. A hope she didn’t have a sliver of.
Ket’s furious roar came again. “Check outside the containment!” A pause. “They’re not fucking in here, are they? Look for them!” Another pause. “Get off me, you cunt!”
Then came the horrible sound of a blaster shooting. A woman’s scream pealed through the growing night, drawing a sob from Tasha’s burning throat. Noelle moaned.
The Nobeks would soon be on their heels. Tasha didn’t have a chance in hell of escape, but she couldn’t give up. If need be, she’d send Noelle on and try to divert the pursuers. For now, she veered off the path and wove her way through the dark maze of trees and brush.
In the dying light, Tasha caught sight of a tree branch lying on the ground. It was shaped nearly like a bat, and she needed a weapon. She stopped and set Noelle on the ground. Her back screamed in relief as she grabbed the branch.
Holding it with one hand, she grabbed child’s wrist with the other. “Come on, Noelle. We’ve got to keep going. If you see somewhere we can hide—”
Before she could finish, a tall dark figure stepped out from behind a tree. It rushed at her. Tasha shoved Noelle behind her and swung her stick with all her might. The figure jerked back out of range.
A deep voice called out. “Stop, Matara.”
“Fuck you, asshole. Come on, big man. Not afraid of a little Earther girl and child, are you?” As sure as she was that she would lose any fight with Ket’s men, Tasha burned to beat the hell out of someone.
“Wait. Is that the princess? Shit!” The silhouette’s voice was shocked.
Tasha realized that he had come from the opposite direction of the prison camp. She stopped trying to brain him and peered uncertainly in the gloom. She couldn’t see very well, but the man’s face didn’t seem quite right. One eye looked slightly askew, and the corner of the mouth on that side looked twisted downward.
He stood frozen for a moment, his attitude that of someone listening. When he spoke again, concern filled his voice. He looked in the direction she and Noelle had come from as his body’s attitude went on alert.
“They’re coming for you. Come on, we’ve got to move!”
With that, he became nothing more than a motion in the gathering darkness. Tasha had no chance to pound him with her branch before he got to Noelle. He lifted the child in his arms. Noelle squealed and the soft patter of her tiny fists on the man’s shoulder was like light raindrops falling on leaves.
“Tasha! Help me!”
The man grabbed Tasha’s hand and pulled her along with him into the trees. “Quiet, my princess! You must not fight me if you want to get out of this alive. I’m not with your abductors.”
“Did my daddies send you?”
“No, but I’ll see what I can do to get you home to them.” He tugged harder on Tasha’s hand. “Keep up, Matara.”
He ran through the trees, half-pulling, half-dragging Tasha along. She felt the strain of her legs as she fought to keep up. Part of her mind recognized that the man was trying to help her. The other part that hadn’t caught up to current events felt panic that the strange Kalquorian had Noelle and was running off with her. Both parts urged her to run as fast as she could after the man.
They raced through the trees. Once in a while Tasha tripped over roots and branches, forcing them to pause. She’d recover her footing and they were off again.
At last Tasha fully realized she had come upon help, as improbable as it had been. Though she couldn’t make out her rescuer’s features too well, his almost silent passage through the forest that she blundered through told her he was most likely a Nobek. At least with a member of the warrior breed she would have a fighting chance against Ket and his men if they caught up.
Her feet suddenly splashed in ankle-deep wetness. The Nobek paused long enough to whisper to her.
“We’ll run in this stream. It won’t completely throw them off your scent, but we can at least slow them down a little. Maybe long enough to hide you. Come on.”
He hurried down the silvery ribbon of reflected light from Kalquor that shone down from the sky. Tasha struggled to keep up, trying to hurry but not splash so loudly as to alert their pursuers. She heaved for breath as she went, cursing her love for food and booze and hatred for exercise. It didn’t help her flagging energy that she’d had little to eat since being kidnapped.
She pushed on nonetheless. She had no choice but to force herself after the helpful stranger.
What felt like hours later, they waded out of the calf-deep stream. The shadow man paused to listen as they stood on the banks. Tasha’s ears strained too. She heard no sign of pursuit, but the man shook his head.
“We didn’t slow them up enough by far. Come on. My home is just over that rise.”
Her heart drumming to know Ket was still on her heels, Tasha followed the man away from the stream, racing through the trees again.
Chapter 10
Wekniz rushed the woman and child into the house. He knew he had no more than seconds to get them hidden somewhere. There was one secret safe room in the home, but it was crammed full of valuable belongings. There wasn’t enough time to put the princess and her cousin in there and not leave a mess for Ket and his band of soldiers to find. They’d figure out pretty quick where the pair were hiding.
As he ran down the home’s main hall, Wekniz heard the sound of a shower running. An insane idea hit, but it was all he had. “In here,” he shouted to the winded woman staggering behind him as he veered into the clan’s sleeping room.
He hurried to the adjoining lavatory, where the running shower had filled the room with steam. The low lighting gave it a dreamlike quality, but Wekniz w
as in the middle of a nightmare right now. Without warning, he flung the stall door open. Nur looked over his shoulder at him, not immediately realizing they had company.
“Hey. What – wait – shit!”
The Imdiko spluttered and grabbed a washcloth to cover his nakedness as Wekniz shoved the wide-eyed Noelle inside. Then the Nobek grabbed the woman and pushed her into the stall too. She and Nur both yelled their surprise. The woman grabbed the princess and covered her eyes even though Nur did a good job of hiding his attributes.
Wekniz shouted to be heard over them. “Ket and his men are coming! They’re looking for the princess, so keep quiet!”
He slammed the door on the astonished trio. Damn it, it wasn’t going to be enough, not with the females’ scents hanging in the air.
Wekniz looked around and spied a spritzer of Nur’s cologne. He grabbed it and started spraying wildly.
The shower door opened and Nur’s head popped out. He stared at Wekniz as the Nobek bombarded the room with fragrance.
“Hey! That’s my most expensive—”
“Stay in there!” Wekniz yelled. He palmed Nur’s face and shoved him back into the stall, slamming the door shut behind him.
Wekniz ran out of the bathroom, spraying a thick mist of cologne as he went. He ran back through the corridor, showering the areas the princess and her companion had been in with the musky aroma. As he reached the front door, thuds began to shake it. The visitor announce went off.
“Fuck,” he wheezed and gave the area another few squirts. Wekniz tossed the bottle behind a nearby potted plant.
Readying to answer the demanding summons, the Nobek took a deep breath to calm his wildly beating heart. The cloying fragrance filled his mouth and nose at once, making him cough violently. The door continued to shudder under the fists banging against it. Pretty soon they’d give up and blaster their way through.
“Just a fucking minute, you asshole!” he screamed between choking fits. Amazingly, the thundering booms stopped.
Wekniz clapped a hand over his nose and mouth and got his breathing under control. He thought a room full of smoke must be easier to inhale than Nur’s favorite cologne. Once he’d managed to catch his breath, he ordered the door open.
Ket loomed in the doorway with at least a dozen uniformed Nobeks at his back. Wekniz drew in fresh air, the relief of doing so momentarily overriding the danger he was in. Then he looked over his visitors and his protective instincts rose. He glowered at the hardcase group before him.
“What the fuck do you want, Ket? Your brother isn’t here.”
Wekniz was pretty sure Falinset must have gone on one of his beach walks. If he’d been home, he’d have been in the middle of the bedlam.
Ket gave Wekniz an unimpressed look, not concerned with the man’s obvious displeasure. “Hello, Wekniz. I caught your scent in the woods on our way over.”
“Good for you. I like to hunt at night on my property. Got a problem with it?”
“Funny, since I smelled your stench on Dramok Maf’s land too. As for any problem I might have with your trespassing, it depends on what you may have caught.”
“Not a damned thing.” Wekniz looked over the deadly faces ranged behind Ket. “Speaking of trespassing, what’s with the big crowd you’ve brought to my doorstep? What are combat troops doing in this area?”
“We’re looking for someone. But you know that, don’t you? The trail we followed says you weren’t alone.”
Wekniz played dumb, though he and Ket both knew he was lying through his teeth. “I was by myself. As I told you, Falinset is out. He wasn’t with me on my hunt either, so you are obviously mistaken.”
Ket grinned, a thoroughly unpleasant sight. But then anything to do with Ket’s face was an unpleasant sight to Wekniz. “If you’ve brought nothing home of interest, then you shouldn’t mind if we have a look around.”
Wekniz folded his arms over his chest. “As a matter of fact, I do mind.”
Ket’s grin turned into a sneer. He looked back at his men. They all raised blasters and aimed them at Wekniz.
Ket said to Wekniz, “Let’s try this again. Do you mind if we have a look around?”
All Wekniz had on hand was a knife on his belt and one in his boot. He didn’t own any firepower. He had no choice but to hope for the best, or he’d be nothing but specks of blood on the floor and walls in a few seconds. With a look of pure hatred, he stepped aside.
He warned, “Break one thing, and you’ll pay for it twice over.”
Ket and the men came in. Their nearly identical expressions of predators on the hunt changed as they walked into the fog of Nur’s cologne. Within a moment, the whole bunch was hacking on the strong fumes.
Ket blinked watering eyes as he rounded on Wekniz. “By the ancestors! What is all this stink?”
Wekniz shrugged, taking a little satisfaction in their misery. “Nur is showering. That’s where you’ll find me if you want to make more insane accusations.”
He stomped through the coughing group, heading for the bathroom. Ket’s angry voice followed him. “You stay right here. I don’t want you warning your Imdiko or anyone else we’re here.”
Wekniz whirled around to show his fangs. “If you think I’m letting any of your goons mess with Nur, you are going to hurt badly for it. I don’t care how many of you there are. I will tear you apart.”
Without waiting for a reaction, Wekniz turned his back and stormed to the lavatory. Ket didn’t say anything else to try to call him back. Even that brainless piece of shit knew better than to challenge Wekniz when it came to his clanmates.
Wekniz got to the steam-filled room. Nur made a lot of noise in the stall. He sang as he splashed enthusiastically, his voice so off-tune that the Nobek winced at the assault on his ears.
Knowing Ket would be listening, Wekniz called, “Nur, don’t come out. We have company.”
Nur stopped singing to yell back, “Really? Since when do we get visitors?”
“It’s Ket and other uninvited guests.”
“Now isn’t that great? I just disinfected the house from the last time that idiot stunk it up.”
Ket entered in time to hear Nur’s derisive comment. He snarled at the closed stall door, “I’m not the one bathing in perfume, precious.”
Nur’s sotto voice rang out, echoing off the tiled surfaces of the room. “Oh Ket! What a nice surprise.”
Wekniz smirked even though Ket glared right at him. Nur’s sarcasm was thick enough to cut with a knife. He sounded as unconcerned as anyone could, as if he didn’t have two other people sharing his shower with him.
If the woman and girl will stay quiet, we might get away with this, Wekniz thought.
Ket showed no sign of leaving the room, however. As sounds of the other Nobeks’ searching the house reached them, he stood in the middle of the room, scowling in the direction of the stall as Nur started singing again. With each passing second of the Imdiko proving he couldn’t carry a tune, Ket looked stormier.
After a couple of minutes, two of Ket’s soldiers entered. One frowned at the noise coming from the stall as he reported. “We found no sign of them, Nobek Ket. And we can’t smell anything for that awful cologne.”
Ket snarled at Wekniz. Wekniz gave him a crude gesture in return.
Nur chose that moment to shut off the shower. He poked his head out, his long black hair dripping on the floor. He gazed in chagrined surprise at the number of men – half of them strangers, one he hated – in the bathroom with him.
Irritation came over his handsome features. “Mother of All, it’s ugly times one hundred. Get the fuck out of my bathing facility, assholes.”
Ket started towards him. Wekniz took a step towards the other Nobek, growling a warning. Ket snorted dismissively at him but halted.
He asked Nur, “You wouldn’t be hiding anything in there with you, would you Nur?”
The Imdiko smirked. “Only what you might dream of but can never have.”
Ket shot a lo
ok at the two Nobeks standing in the doorway. Before Wekniz could react the pair sprang on him, knocking him to the floor and holding him down. He shrieked in rage as he fought them, but he could not get free.
Ket strode to the stall and jerked the stall door open, revealing Nur in all his nude glory. Wekniz howled in fury and fear for Nur as he waited for the females hidden inside to be discovered and taken away.
The stall behind Nur was empty. Princess Noelle and her cousin were not in it.
As Wekniz gaped in surprise, Nur roared in outrage at Ket. He grabbed containers of hair and skin products off the shelves inside the stall, flinging them with all his might at the Nobek. His might was pretty impressive as the force of his throws made Ket yelp.
The air was filled with heavy containers. As a men’s grooming technician who insisted on trying out all the latest cleansers, creams, and gels, Nur had a lot of ammunition to draw from. Ket dodged from side to side to avoid the endless barrage flying at him. Welts soon covered his bare arms.
After several seconds of this, he’d had enough. Ket rushed out of the lavatory, yelling at the soldiers holding Wekniz prisoner.
“Get back outside! They must have continued on instead of coming in here. Maybe they’re hiding somewhere on the property. Fan out and find them!”
The two Nobeks pinning Wekniz obeyed, but not before shoving Wekniz’s face to the damp floor tiles, giving his forehead a nasty thump against the hard surface. Then they followed their cursing leader out and down the hall. His shouted orders floated down the corridor, telling them to get their asses outside and search under every fucking stone no matter how small it was.
Nur’s hands closed on Wekniz’s upper arms, pulling him up. “My Nobek, are you all right? Did they hurt you?” he asked breathlessly.
Wekniz got to all fours and held up his hand to silence his clanmate. They crouched frozen on the floor, listening until the door to the outside hissed open and closed.
Alien Hostage Page 11
