Arda: The Captain's Fancy

by Annie Windsor

  “At month’s end, I will summon you before the pao, in case you find yourself too distracted to keep up with the time.” Akad massaged his shoulder once more, then flexed his fingers as if satisfied. “After the alliance makes its agreements, and after you have sated yourself, we will convene a pao of our own elders and find a new course.”

  This time, Darkyn nodded, but in his heart, he didn’t agree.

  He was Ta. Feeding the Barung was his duty, and in truth, he was likely the only one with strong enough psi-power to blot out the energy of the void long enough to override natural survival instinct. So, yes, he would mate with this female. He would give biology its due. But no matter how she might burn him, his hallas was no match for his energy.

  Darkyn Weil was munas, made of stone. He had to be.

  In the end, he would do what he had to do to save his world and many others.

  “Give me her clothes, Brother.” Akad nodded toward the jumpsuit. “I’ll send that suit and one of Guardian’s feathers as proof that we have her, along with reassurances that she will not be harmed. For now, that will have to do.”

  “And later?” Darkyn asked dryly.

  Akad shrugged. “Later, I’ll get her another jumpsuit. She loves them, you know.”

  “I didn’t mean—”

  “Ssshh.” Akad put a finger to his lips. “One step at time, and the journey begins. Give me her clothes, and we’ll worry about the next steps later.”

  Chapter 5

  She was moving. Floating. A dark feather drifting slowly into the hungry center of a golden triangle, somewhere out over the Western Sea.

  No…

  Wait…

  Krysta tensed.

  Darkness was chasing her. That pounding, horrid, roaring darkness. She was flying her speeder faster than ever before, pelting forward in utter desperation and terror.

  Three points of light glowed on her companel.

  Planets, separated by light years, yet strangely aligned.

  To the field, someone said. Hold us together! Draw him to the center. Dead center. The innocents are loose, they are singing…

  The voice was oddly smooth and flat, both male and female, and backed by the most beautiful music Krysta had ever heard.

  Akad?

  Was that Chimera song?

  No, wait. Georgia and Elise. Her brothers.

  And more. Infinitely more.

  A chorus, urging her on, to the center of the field, with the blackness rising behind her.

  I’m flying to my doom…

  Krysta ripped herself from her nightmare and drove herself toward consciousness. Away from the hungry shadows, the all-consuming dark.

  And found herself floating again, still hearing soft, distant, soothing Chimera song.

  Someone was carrying her. A careful, tender cradling, as if she were no heavier or taller than a child of five stellar years—yet the step was unsteady, almost as if her bearer were intoxicated.

  Wake. Krysta felt the voice more than heard it. She reached for it with her mind, but hit a wall of pain so harsh she recoiled.

  Careful, Brother, said Akad, who seemed to be speaking from a distance. You must remember she cannot talk with us mind to mind without risking her health.

  A sense of unfocused chagrin filled Krysta, but it wasn’t hers. The first voice said in almost slurred mental tones, My hallas. Forgive my lack of control, and then faded into nothing.

  Hallas. Ancient Ardani for “made of fire,” a compliment given to particularly aggressive warriors. Krysta struggled back toward the bright surface of consciousness and at last broke free. As she woke, she realized she was naked, but no longer blindfolded or gagged. Her hands were still bound, but now in front of her, and her ankles were tied together. The energy bonds seemed a little looser, a little warmer.

  Someone was indeed carrying her, and it was the man who had swallowed her senses whole before she had fallen into her dark dreams.

  Her bare pa-coated hip rubbed hard against the waistband of his breeches and his leather sword belt, and her side was snuggled firmly against a man’s—a warrior’s hard, scarred trunk. Her shoulder pressed into the rough, corded flesh, and each time she moved, she thrilled at the snap of pa, the gentle nudge of the warm stone in his chest, and the criss-crossed marks of many fierce battles.

  By the suns, he felt perfect. His strength pleased and frightened her, and set her heart to funny rhythms. It quickly grew hard to think. She could feel his power like an aura, surrounding him and surrounding her, too, so long as she touched him. Oh, yes, she wanted to touch him more, experience him in every way she could.

  He smelled of soft-hide and sweat, of bayspice and the invigorating scent of Arda’s blue pines. Krysta took a slow, deep breath, drinking in his male aroma like an aged berrywine. Her pa pulsed in time with his forceful strides, sparking and jumping in a way she hadn’t experienced before. Her neck and chest burned, and her nipple throbbed along with her ever-hot quim. She was so, so wet.

  Whoever this barbarian was, she wanted him to stop walking and take her now. He didn’t even have to untie her. He just had to fuck her hard and without mercy, right on the dirt floor.

  Dirt floor…hut…moon…oh, no that fergilla barbarian is NOT carrying me naked to his lair!

  Krysta’s eyes flew open. Her heart pounded hard enough to make a painful pulse in her throat. Darkyn Weil was carrying her, but not into a lair. Through a door into a—a bathchamber?

  She struggled in his grip. “Put me down,” she demanded in the old speech, her voice hoarse from ragged want and prolonged thirst.

  The bastard didn’t answer her.

  Wearing a besotted, distant expression, he carried her straight across the room, small by Camford standards, and placed her on what appeared to be a toilet. His actions were so swift and sudden she sucked in a breath, surprised to find the air heavy and damp. She coughed from the shock, and her bladder nearly ruptured.

  “Do as you need,” Weil instructed in a thick, deep rumble, gesturing to the toilet before he turned his broad back, strode once more to the door with an uneven gait, and stumbled out.

  If Krysta hadn’t been so busy relieving herself, she would have leaped up immediately and made a dash for freedom. Even as she considered this course of action, the energy bonds on her ankles and wrists dissipated—only to reappear and multiply to block the doorway and the bathchamber’s domed ceiling window, high above her head.

  “Fergilla!” she shouted after Weil wherever he had gone, and half-expected an energy bond to break loose from the door, fly over, and cover her mouth.

  It didn’t, at least for the moment.

  Seething, Krysta dispensed with nature’s call as she catalogued the layout of the chamber. Four walls, with three-sconce candles flickering a hand’s length apart. Throw-rugs in geometric patterns. She occupied a lone toilet opposite the door, and beside that was a bidet for cleaning. On her left was a sink and a mirror that looked to be planted directly into the wall and edged with sandpearl and live vines. On her right she found a natural round pool circled by inlaid stone, uneven and uncut but polished to remove the rough edges. A few jars decorated the stones, along with sea sponges and soap crystals. In the pool, the water bubbled occasionally. Steam rose in plumes, giving the air a splendid dampness that was more what she was used to breathing.

  “Like home,” Krysta said aloud.

  She stood, feeling strangely dizzy, walked under the domed window, and gazed up through the shimmering energy bonds. Stars glittered back, familiar in pattern but not in angle, since she was viewing them from a place utterly foreign to her. When she edged against the natural pool until she touched the wall behind it, she could make out the curve of a brilliant blue-green planet.

  Arda. Joy rose even as despair lunged to kill it. Home.

  When Weil came back, she would need to find some way to overpower him and escape.

  “Overpower him.” She laughed at herself. “Yes, Krysta. That makes as much sense as tryi
ng to swim the Western Sea from shore to shore.”

  She felt so unsteady and distracted she would do well to battle a besotted three-foot Nostan. Krysta rubbed her eyes, trying to clear her thoughts and calm the heat in her pa. Was the steam from the natural pool some sort of intoxicant?

  Something was making her drunk, and making her body ache for satisfaction in a way she couldn’t ignore. At that moment, she would have given an arm for a good kala saddle or three hours with a few randy warriors.

  Or ten minutes with that arrogant bastard Weil, on his back, hard and ready for a ride.

  “No.” She hugged herself and pinched her pa-covered nipple, trying to settle her thoughts. She couldn’t want Weil. She needed to wound him, to escape.

  Right.

  Weil would snap her in half, if he was so inclined. Which he hadn’t been, thus far. What little she had seen of him, he was acting not at all like a cunning military chief. In fact, he reminded her of Fari these last months, even drunker than she felt, unbalanced and—

  “Knador!” Krysta’s hand flew from her nipple to her mouth. She nearly fell into the natural pool as reality struck her. How could she have missed all the signs so completely? Her vision of the Outlander leader before she actually met him, her reaction to that vision—and then to him, the way he behaved in their few moments together…

  Gods, no.

  The man thought she was his soul’s mate.

  Worse than that, her body and deeper mind agreed.

  Krysta pinched her legs together, denying the extra fire and moisture in her quim. Suicide suddenly seemed like a plausible option. Biology be damned, there was no way she would accept this! No way she could. She would not betray the Tul’Mar name or its cause, or her people. Or poor, poor Kolot, who took a death-wound to save me from this…this…yellow-eyed pirate!

  There had to be a way out of this damnable bathchamber.

  Krysta rushed to the mirror and tried to unseat it from the thatch, vine, and brilliant, white sandpearl holding it in place. It wouldn’t move. She pounded on it with her fists to break the glass and even tried kicking it, but to no avail. The mirror wouldn’t break.

  Maybe the pool.

  She turned to dive in, intending to swim to the bottom, but at that instant, the energy bonds on the door vanished. Darkyn Weil, naked from the waist up, stalked in, still unsteady but carrying a tray of fruits, sauces, bread, paste, and several carafes and cups.

  For a moment, Krysta was dazzled by his utter male beauty and uniqueness. That hair—gods, that alone drew her full attention. Night-black with streaks of shining yellow-white. She wanted to run her fingers across the streaks and see how they felt. As for the rest of him…all scars and hard muscle. He had taken off his amber double-blade and left it elsewhere, and he had loosened the ties on his breeches to make room for an obvious erection.

  Against her wishes, her pa sizzled, making his sizzle in response. His full, sensual mouth curved upward in a predatory smile, and his eerie, feral eyes narrowed with surprise and obvious desire.

  Gods, help me be strong. Krysta fought an urge to plunge her fingers into her quim and stroke her clit. She would not acknowledge this beast as her soul’s mate, not while he held her hostage.

  Even if he had noble intentions to rescue the universe from some very real threat…

  Even if he had saved Georgia, Elise, and Katryn Ilya from certain death…

  Even if he hadn’t meant to kidnap her…

  Even if he was, without question, the sexiest man she had ever seen, bar none…

  Krysta squared off with Weil, figuring her odds for slamming the tray into his chest or face, dodging past him, and getting through the now-open door. Her mind felt like a falcon on a tether, fighting and flogging against reason and control.

  I’ve seen that falcon, yes. Krysta’s thoughts swirled. She’s his, and she doesn’t like me.

  Weil set the tray down on the ground, his eyes fixed first on her swollen nipples, then on her wet, aching quim.

  Energy bonds reappeared on the door—and on Krysta’s wrists, jerking them behind her as if powerful hands had seized her own and snapped them neatly into place. The shock made her thrust her breasts forward for balance, drawing a smile of appreciation from Weil.

  Crying out with rage, her first impulse was to kick Weil in the bollocks the minute he approached her. She tried to take a step, but her feet were fastened firmly to the dirt floor. And so, there she stood, naked and furious, facing her enemy in a forced parody of military at-rest.

  “You will not strike at me,” he said in emphatic though slightly halting modern Ardani. He folded his massive arms over his pa-mark and the odd glowing stone at its center.

  “Why?” Krysta asked through her teeth. “You can’t take a blow from a woman?”

  Weil’s eyes narrowed another fraction, giving him a definitely dangerous look.

  This only fueled Krysta’s anger—and her desire.

  He walked forward slowly, and Krysta realized the bonds on her wrists were extending down now, fixing her arms in place so she couldn’t even lean forward to butt him with her head.

  Weil stopped less than an arm’s length away.

  Krysta felt a sharp, hot pinch on both nipples. She gasped and looked down to see yet another stream of energy sliding back and forth across the hard, nubbed tips.

  “Red like sweetapple wine,” he said, continuing in modern speech, growing more smooth as he spoke. “And this one…” The energy ribbon flicked against her pa-coated breast as he licked his lips. “A dusting of magik.”

  Krysta choked back a moan, then regained her wits for a brief moment. “Stop this,” she demanded.

  “Why?” he asked in an infuriatingly calm tone. The speed of the energy assault on her nipples increased. “You can’t take pleasing from a man?”

  It was all Krysta could do not to moan loud enough to rattle the walls.

  Weil closed the small distance between them, coming closer and closer until his sizable erection nudged the top of her quim. “Pity you have such trouble with sensual teasing. I had hoped you had more courage.”

  The insult, the feel of the tanned skins of his breeches against her pa-lined lower lips, the nearness of Weil, of his pa, the way he smelled, robbed Krysta of reason.

  “You bastard. I can take whatever you have to give. What, you imagine your manhood to be some fearsome weapon?”

  Weil shrugged. “Perhaps.”

  And with that, he stepped back, reached down and further loosened the laces at his waist, and let his breeches fall to the floor. With a grace usually reserved for forest cats and Chimera, he stepped out of them and stood still, gazing at her.

  Krysta stared at the length and girth of his cock and actually shuddered with want, with need. Her clit swelled painfully, teased and heated by her desire and her pa. She could imagine that fantastic vision in her mouth, sliding toward her throat. In her quim, driving toward her womb. In her ass, making her scream as pleasure joined with pain to push her to releases she had never before achieved. She wanted to touch it, measure it with her tongue and fingers, then test its soundness every way she could imagine.

  The energy bonds pinched and twirled her nipples, edging her forward. She bit her tongue to keep from coming in front of Weil, though her defenses were beginning to crumble.

  “I won’t force you, hallas.” He reached down and took his erection in hand, stroking it just as she had imagined doing in his stead. “You will ask for me. Maybe even beg.”

  Curses rose to Krysta’s lips, but she didn’t speak them. A new energy bond snaked around her waist. One end dipped into her quim and fastened on her clit, and the other slid between the cheeks of her ass, finding her tightly-closed hole at the same time it seemed to grow another section and reach around, stopping at her wet, waiting core.

  “And I won’t rest on pride, even if you do.” Weil’s black hair with those odd white-yellow streaks hung wild and unfettered. His golden eyes blazed as he rubbed his
cock from balls to tip. “You are the most incredible woman I have ever seen. What I have touched of your essence, your thoughts and soul—you woke a part of me I thought dead from birth.”

  Krysta moaned as the energy ribbon teased her clit and both openings, flicking against them, feeling first like tongues and then like fingers. The ribbon across her nipples formed a delicate suction, alternating pinches between left and right in time with Weil’s strokes.

  “My spirit knows you,” he said with a lyrical beat, as if reciting a poem.

  Krysta recognized at once the start of the ancient Ardani claiming ritual, even though Weil was using modern speech with more and more fluidity.

  Getting it from me, from the forward part of my thoughts. Like soul’s mates do.

  “No,” she gasped, shaking with pleasure as the energy ribbons dipped into her butt and core, spreading to fill her as much as she could stand, then relaxing to nothing and slipping out to leave her empty. “I won’t say my part. We can’t do this.”

  “You feel reality.” Weil rubbed himself harder, making Krysta want to shout at him to stop, to let her do it. “I, too, would deny it if I could. I can’t. Neither can you.”

  All at once, his energy enveloped her, head to toe, from nipple to clit, all along her burning rivers of pa. The energy ribbons delved into her quim and ass again, thrusting with his thrusts, expanding, contracting. Krysta’s mind left her completely, surrendering her to the yellow heat at Weil’s command. She saw only him, his cock, and the look of determination on his beyond handsome face. Her skin and pa melded into molten armor as all of the information Akad had given her came to bear.

  She couldn’t psi-touch Darkyn Weil, but she knew he was no villain, at least not in the sense she had once thought. A man on the edge, yes. A brooding warrior with temper and secrets—yes.

  Her soul’s mate. Her sha.

  She didn’t understand him, she hadn’t grown up with him nor shared battle with him, she hadn’t even spent the time to learn his patterns and dreams—but her spirit did know him.

  Time will remedy the rest, went the old saying, from ages when the Ardani population was more scattered and such blind matings were more common.