Okay. Why the fuck can I hear you? Am I asleep? Is this a dream?
If it was, she’d take it. She could really use some comfort and reassurance right now.
Mating bond. Able to talk when touching. Love is a human emotion.
Oh? Does that mean you don’t want my love?
No. I wish it.
Well? Do you have anything to say in return, Goliath?
I am bound to you. I protect you. Live for you. Without you, I am nothing.
All right. That will do, I suppose. Inwardly, she was dancing for joy. So we’re talking through the mating bond? Seriously?
Yes, trouble. I am serious.
Wouldn’t it be easier to wake up and talk to me face-to-face?
I cannot.
Why not? What’s wrong? What did those bastard Arans do to you?
Arans? What Arans?
She explained tracking his communicator and finding Cocoa, who led her to where he was being held in a cage with Arans standing guard.
Cocoa said you were sold in the auction to them.
Someone must have drugged me. Where are we now? How get free?
Cocoa helped me rescue you. We’re on our ship and he’s flying it.
She explained how they’d freed him, how Pinky turned up for his medallion, providing them with the distraction they needed to escape with him.
Mate, you should not have. They could have hurt you.
I had to get you free, Zandar. I cannot. . .I cannot imagine my life without you. Please don’t die.
Will not die. Am fine. Just drugged.
So you’ll wake up when the drug wears off?
She sensed his worry through the bond before it sharply disappeared. Shit. If he was worried, then she ought to be terrified.
Zandar?
I know not. I think. . .take me to Zerconia, mate. Healer help me.
Zerconia? But what if they arrest you? Panic filled her.
They wait until I awake.
She guessed that was right. And what other options did they have?
How do I get us there? Do you just put in co-ordinates?
Put it in autopilot. He managed to show her images of what to do, for which she was grateful.
How come you didn’t talk to me through the mate bond before? I was so worried about you.
Bond still too weak. Skin touch. Go set autopilot then sleep, mate. You tired.
Typical bloody alpha male. Even though he was drugged and unconscious, she was still worrying about her.
You come first. Always. Go, mate. Then come back safely to my arms.
18
As they grew closer to Zerconia, her nerves grew. What if they turned her away? What if they shot them out of the sky without even finding out who they were and why they were there? What if Zandar was wrong and they did arrest him? What if they took him from her?
Okay, okay, she needed to calm down.
She needed to be strong for Zandar. He had to be feeling helpless and worried right now, stuck in his own body. Every day she’d woken up hoping that he would be awake and aware, but whatever drug he’d been given wasn’t wearing off.
“Come on, Georgie. Where is that badass bitch?”
She’d kind of disappeared the moment that she’d realized she had no idea how to do any of this without Zandar. But she was going to get her back. She paced back and forth. Zerconia looked so close on the little map thingee, but she still couldn’t see it out the window.
She’d barely slept or eaten these past six weeks as they’d made their way here. She hadn’t expected the journey to take this long, but apparently, they’d been traveling away from Zerconia all the time since they’d left the transporter. Plus, they’d had to make a couple of long stops to get repairs to the ship done. Cocoa had helped her negotiate each time or she’d have been completely lost.
Luckily, she managed to get food and drink into Zandar even while he was unconscious. And the bathroom situation? Better left unspoken. Thankfully, they hadn’t run into any crazed unicorns or slavers. Cocoa had actually complained about how boring things were. For her, boring was good.
A loud beeping made her jump. “What the fuck was that?"
“Communication,” Cocoa told her, pressing a button.
A strange voice came through a speaker. “Ship 4523852, please identify yourself.”
“That’s us, right?” she said to Cocoa.
Cocoa sent her a look and pointed at a button. “Press. Talk.”
She cleared her throat and tried to pretend she wasn’t about to pee herself.
“Um, hi, I’m on that ship. My name is Georgie. I’m, uh, Zandar’s mate. I don’t. . .I don’t know his last name. That’s weird, right? We’re mated and I don’t know his name.”
Come on, Georgie. Quit rambling.
“Zandar has a brother, Que. Do you know him?”
There was silence.
“Please stand by for further communication.”
Stand by? She wasn’t really going anywhere. Georgie paced back and forth across the cockpit. She let out a cry as she turned and nearly walked through the holographic image flickering in the room. What the hell?
“Who are you? How did you get there?”
The male was huge. He had golden hair and tanned skin. He was kind of attractive but serious-looking.
“Hello, Georgie. I am Dexanon Xa’a, Emperor of Zerconia.”
“Holy shit. I didn’t think I was going to be speaking to you. Listen, whatever you think, Zandar did not attack Elise. He’s not guilty.” She spat the words out quickly.
“It is all right, Georgie. Deep breath. Calm.” His voice was deeply authoritative and she found herself matching her breaths with his. “We know Zandar is not guilty of harming Elise.”
“You-you do? How?”
“Elise was hurt by the captain of the human transporter. He threatened her son to make her lie about Zandar hurting her.”
“Oh no, poor Elise.” She must have been terrified.
The Emperor raised his eyebrows. “You are not angry with her? She caused Zandar to kidnap you when he escaped.”
“He didn’t kidnap me.”
“There is vid of you over his shoulder. You fought him.”
She waved her hand through the air. “He’s always picking me up and carrying me over his shoulder. It’s his thing. Anyway, I helped him escape. Oh, the guards that he killed during our escape, you see he. . .”
“There were no guards killed during his escape,” the Emperor interrupted her rambling.
“There wasn’t? That rat, he didn’t tell me they weren’t dead.” She placed her hands on her hips. “Gonna have words to say to him.”
“Georgie?”
“Yes?” she asked distractedly.
“Where is Zandar?”
“That’s why we’re here. See, he was taken by the slavers who enslaved him the last time, the Arans. Anyway, someone drugged him and he can’t gain consciousness. I was going to put him in the regen chamber, only I didn’t want to make things worse. But he told me that it wouldn’t work anyway. He thinks he needs an antidote to the drug in order to wake up.”
“He still speaks?”
“Only through the mating bond, when we’re touching skin-to-skin.”
The Emperor frowned. “I will alert the healers. Zandar’s brother will be pleased you are both here. He has been searching for you.”
“He has?”
“Yes. He and his mate attempted to find you on Diclac.”
She wondered how close they had been to finding them.
“Zandar can’t remember much of his life before he was enslaved by the Arans,” she told him. “He says they rescued him from a ship that crashed. But I think he really would like to come home. To meet his brother.”
The Emperor nodded. “You may land the ship now. I will meet you with our head healer.”
“Oh yeah, there’s another problem.”
“What is that?”
“I don’t actually know
how to fly this thing.”
* * *
She nearly kissed the ground as she walked off the ship and out onto the main port of Zerconia. Apparently. That was what the male Zerconian who’d guided the ship down had told her. Thankfully, he’d been able to do it all remotely once she’d granted him permission to hack into the ship’s systems.
She didn’t kiss the ground, though.
And just as well, because as soon as she stepped out, four people started walking towards her. One was the Emperor; another was a big guy with dark hair that matched the scowl on his face. She immediately scowled back at him, hoping he wasn’t Zandar’s brother.
The third person, she realized, was a short woman with strawberry-blonde hair and a big grin. Slightly behind her stood a dark-skinned scary-looking male. She instantly froze. Here was the person she really needed to watch.
“Hello, Georgie!” The woman spoke first, giving her a cheerful smile. To Georgie’s surprise, a small baby with a shock of white-blond hair was attached to her front. “I’m Zoey. This is my son, Cadman.”
“Hello,” she said back hesitantly. She hadn’t moved Zandar yet, wanting to meet these people in person first.
“Where is Zandar?” the dark-haired male snapped.
“That’s Moroco,” Zoey explained. “He’s the head healer here on Zerconia. Don’t worry, his bark is worse than his bite. He’s a really good healer; otherwise, no one would put up with him except for his mate. I tried to bribe Saffron to smother him in his sleep, but she wouldn’t.” Zoey sighed as though in disappointment.
“I’m really happy to see you. Que and Keely are going to be over the moon. They’ve been so worried about you guys. Elise lives with them now. See, everyone thought Zandar died years ago from mating fever, so to learn he was alive was a shock. Then, of course, he disappeared and we found out he didn’t attack Elise. . .whew. But we couldn’t find him or you. Now to find that you’re mated to him. . .well, I guess he didn’t go crazy from mating fever and go off to kill himself.”
“Kill himself?” she squeaked. “Mating fever?”
“Oh, there’s a few things you don’t know then. I’ll fill you in while Moroco gets a look at your mate.”
“Where is Zandar?” Moroco barked, making her jump.
“Oh, Cocoa, can you bring him out?”
Noodle chose that time to bounce out and climb up onto her shoulder.
“Oh my God, is that a monkey?” Zoey gaped at Noodle, who blew his tongue out at her. She spotted Moroco and the Emperor staring at the monkey with a mix of disgust and horror. But Zoey just grinned. “That is awesome. Monkeys are the best.”
Noodle chattered at her.
“This is Noodle.” She turned as she heard movement behind her. Out stepped Cocoa, using the hover cuffs they’d put back on Zandar to guide him out. “And this is Cocoa.”
Moroco immediately started to move. He barked orders into his communicator and a hover stretcher soon arrived. They must have had it close by. Zandar was placed on the hover stretcher and then Moroco was guiding him away at a run. The Emperor moved with them.
“Hey, wait up!” she called. Where were they going? They couldn’t take Zandar away from her. Panic swelled inside her.
“Wait, Georgie!” Zoey reached out to grab her arm.
“Let me go. I have to stay with Zandar. Where are you taking him? What are you doing?”
“Easy, honey.” Zoey’s smiled faded, concern filling her face. “They’re taking him to the medical center to check him over. I promise no harm will come to him.”
“I need to be with him. He can only communicate through me.”
“I can take you there. But are you sure you don’t need to get checked over? To be honest with you, you don’t look that great.”
“I don’t need to be anywhere but with Zandar.” She was slightly light-headed and queasy, but right now, none of that was important.
Zoey nodded. “All right. Come with me. I’ll get you there quick. There’re some perks to being the Empress of Zerconia.”
She froze and looked at the other woman. “You’re the Empress of Zerconia?”
Zoey grinned. “Oh, did I leave that part out?”
19
A noise at the doorway made her raise her head from where she’d been resting it against Zandar’s shoulder.
“You cannot go in there!” someone protested. It sounded like one of healers.
“I demand to see my brother,” a deep voice rumbled through the door.
She tensed. His brother? Was that Que? She was wondering why she hadn’t seen him yet. Then again, Moroco had been conducting a barrage of tests on Zandar while asking her a billion questions. Sometimes she’d had to use their mating bond to ask Zandar for the answers, since she’d had no idea.
But despite all the tests, it seemed they weren’t any closer to an answer about what was wrong with him and it was really starting to worry her.
True to her word, Zoey had gotten her here quickly, then she’d made certain that no one tried to remove her from Zandar’s side. She’d had to leave, but she’d sent Georgie a change of clothes and some food. Zoey was bigger around the waist and half a head shorter, so the pants looked more like three-quarter pants, and she’d had to use her belt to keep them from falling off.
She hadn’t bothered to attempt to eat, though. She knew it would just come back up.
Why couldn’t they figure out what he’d been given? Moroco had confirmed that the drug was keeping him in a kind of stasis and that a certain antidote was needed to waken him, but he didn’t know what that antidote was.
She hoped Noodle and Cocoa were all right. Zoey had taken them both home with her. She just hoped like hell Noodle didn’t cause too much chaos. Or attempt to steal anything from the Empress. She groaned and lowered her head as more noise came through the door.
“You have kept him from me long enough. Let me in.”
Kept him from him? From Zandar? She stood, then had to grasp hold of the bed to stop from falling over as the room spun around her.
Okay, maybe it wouldn’t hurt to eat something.
As soon as the world grew steady, she made her way over to the door and pressed the button to slide it open. Aran tumbled backwards onto his ass, then stared up at her in shock.
“Whoops. Honestly, leaning against a door is a bad idea. Doors move. That’s my piece of advice for the day.” She turned her gaze to the man standing on the other side. She blinked. “You’re Que.”
He looked like Zandar. A younger, less hardened version.
“I am. You are Georgie. May I come in?” He glared at Aran. “I have been waiting a while.”
“Yes, yes, of course. Sorry, I didn’t know you were outside. I would have let you in otherwise.” She sent Aran a disgusted look.
He just sighed.
Que stepped in. Behind him, a small female with mocha-colored skin followed.
“This is my mate, Keely.”
“Oh, hi, I’m Georgie.” She waved at the woman, attempting to give her a smile.
Keely, who was simply gorgeous, gave her a sympathetic look. “Hi, Georgie, we’ve been hoping to meet you.”
Georgie just nodded and walked back to the chair she’d been sitting in before. Aran left with a huff, closing the door behind him. She took Zandar’s hand in hers, rubbing her thumb over the back.
“Probably gone to tattle on us to Moroco,” Georgie told them both.
Que, who had moved to the end of the bed to stare down at Zandar, moved his gaze to her. “Tattle?”
“Doesn’t matter, babe,” Keely told him, walking around to the other side of the bed. “Wow, he looks like you. He got rid of all that hair he had in that image we saw of him.”
“The hair was horrible,” Georgie told them both, brushing her hand over his scalp then resting it on his bare shoulder. “It looked like a family of rats had decided to take residence in it and had chewed the ends.”
Why do you speak of my hair?
&n
bsp; She started then grinned. “He wants to know why I’m talking about his hair.”
Your brother is here with his mate, Keely.
Que turned his gaze back to his brother. His hand hovered above Zandar’s foot, almost as though he wanted to reach out and touch him but didn’t know if he would be welcome.
“The Emperor said you were mated and that you can still communicate with him through the bond,” Keely said. “That’s amazing. Everyone thought that he had been lost to the mating fever and died.”
“Zoey, I mean, the Empress explained that.” Zandar had been on a ship when the mating fever struck and they’d had to lock him up for his own good, but he’d somehow broken out of stasis and stolen an emergency pod, which he’d then crashed.
“The Arans rescued him from the crash and enslaved him,” she told them both.
They nodded. “Koran, who is the chief commander, has told me of your journey,” Que explained.
Good. Meant she didn’t have to explain it all over again.
“I just want him to wake up.”
“He will wake up,” Keely told her. “The two of you can’t have gone through all that for you to lose him now.”
“He is strong. He will get through this,” Que told her firmly, not a hint of doubt on his face. “I wish we had been able to find you both on Diclac.”
She sighed. “Yeah, me too.”
Tell brother take care of you. Take you home to rest.
No, I’m staying with you.
That an order, trouble.
Well, you’ll just have to punish me once you wake up for breaking it.
“We’re glad you’re here now, Georgie,” Keely said. “You’re welcome to stay with me and Que. Although I should tell you that Elise and Hunter are living there as well.”
“The Emperor told me.”
“If that’s a problem, we can arrange something else.” Keely looked over to her mate, who nodded.
“Why would that be a problem?” She stared from one to the other.
“Because Elise accused Zandar of hurting her? She was being threatened by the human captain. He said he would hurt Hunter if she didn’t lie. She feels terrible about it. She’s so worried that you and Zandar hate her.”
Alien Conquest Page 15
