Ragnar had known that very morning.

The harbinger had opened his eyes, coming right out of his dreams into reality without any disorientation in between like he always did. And he'd known, with an internal gut feeling that had never steered him wrong that it was the day when he'd find his fated mate.

The idea didn't fill Ragnar with the appropriate anticipation, at least not the joyful one.

All Nayanor warriors wanted to find their mate. It was the proof that they were deemed worthy by the gods to continue the bloodlines of their dying species. It was also the chance to get to experience the fated bond, the joining of two souls born worlds apart and then brought together.

Instead of expectation, Ragnar felt nothing.

It gave him pause, something that hadn't happened to him since the day Doroc had died. The harbinger took a moment to look at the sword he'd taken from his brother's cold, dead body.

Doroc hadn't unsheathed it.

It meant his brother's soul was lost in the eternal darkness that ruled past the realm of life. No warrior who died without their blade in their hands would receive the honor of meeting the gods in the afterlife. Doroc hadn't been buried facing north and although he'd been a harbinger, Ragnar had been the only soul to see him into the ground.

"Harbinger," a voice cut into his thoughts and Ragnar forced his mind back into the here and now.

Captain Garom was standing respectfully before him, ready to hear his battle plan for the raid on Terra. The bridge of Ragnar's ship, Nomadin, was bustling with life as they made for the terrific little planet that yielded the best stock of females.

The wormhole was closing behind them. The Galactic Union and their patrol ships would be able to track them now, Ragnar knew that, but they would be hopelessly late.

"Proceed, Garom," he ordered, his deep voice bringing a hush to the bridge as they awaited his commands.

Ragnar could smell their fear. The grief too, after all those years. They'd liked his brother, although that was probably the wrong word to use for Nayanor sentiment. They'd all thought his brother was a strong leader, a powerful harbinger.

To die at the hands of his own fated was a shame so great none of them had uttered Doroc’s name from that day forward.

"Are our destinations picked out?" he asked the clerks responsible for plotting the fastest course to the Terran settlements he'd chosen.

"Yes, Harbinger," the answer came at once.

They didn't like him much, but Ragnar didn't need them to. As long as they feared him, everything was as it should be.

"ETA?" he asked.

"Ten minutes, Harbinger."

"The Union?" Ragnar went on, observing the screens in front of him.

The scanners of the Nomadin were drawing up maps of the Union fleets, with a special chart for disposition, strength and possible enemies. Nayanors were a mighty warrior race, but the Union had plenty of those as well.

Brions especially would have been a red flag on the screens, the only race in the galaxy Nayanors begrudgingly recognized as dangerous. Not just because their warriors were as fierce as Nayanors were, but because of the accursed fifteen flagships, as big as small moons and nigh indestructible.

There was a time for battling them, testing their speed and agility against the guns of the Brions, but this was not one of those days.

Ragnar was on a raid and gathering as many females as possible was the only priority.

"The Galactic Union has sounded the alarm, but all the patrol fleets are far," the officer on the bridge reported. "Terra itself is still blind, their systems won't catch us before we emerge from the asteroid belt."

Ragnar accepted all that wordlessly. His bright eyes scanned the displays, watching for any larger threat that he should be concerned about, arms crossed over his chest.

Captain Garom had the misguided idea to try and engage him in a conversation.

"All targets look good, Harbinger," he said. "With a high female population. Especially the area up north that's cut off from the rest of the planet. Is that where you will be headed, sir?"

"Yes," Ragnar replied tersely.

The image of Ramor was still bothering him. The harbinger considered memories like that a weakness, a sign he wasn't as immune to emotion as he wished to be. Especially when the bloody, macabre vision swam before his eyes.

Finding his brother after Ramor hadn't answered any of the calls marked the single time in his life when Ragnar had felt completely stupefied. He'd frozen on the door of his brother's quarters, looking at him lying in a pool of his own blood, his throat cut. Light gray eyes to match his still wide open, still unbelieving.

What a fool. What an utter fool.

Ramor's sword was resting against the wall, right in his brother's reach. There hadn't been any sign that he'd tried to grab it. The female – his fated – had blinded Ramor with love and weakness. Ragnar still couldn't wrap his head around that.

"Hopefully there will be many fateds there for our warriors," Captain Garom said, oblivious to the fact he should have stopped talking a while ago.

Ragnar turned very slowly, his eyes narrowing. Captain Garom did his absolute best not to take a step back, but the harbinger could see how much he wanted to.

"Yes," Ragnar said, his deep voice dark and mirthless. "Hopefully. Let us also hope the warriors have learned by now that the females are a necessity for the continuation of our species, nothing more."

Captain Garom stared at him. Ragnar could practically hear the words beating at his teeth, trying to get out.

"The gods gave us the fated bonds, Harbinger," Garom said firmly at last, holding his head high. "To find females who match us the best."

Ragnar appreciated the fact that Garom didn't back down from him. He wouldn't have been a very good captain if he'd cowered instead of speaking his mind, but he was the harbinger. On his ship, his word was the law.

"Females are paired with us to produce strong sons," he said. "They are genetic matches, meant to be compatible. Everything else is luck and luck is the enemy of a warrior."

Garom didn't argue, nodding. Ragnar knew they all remembered his brother as clearly as he did, but their feelings were different. After Doroc's death, Nayanors had become a little less disillusioned about the kidnapped females.

They've been allowed too much freedom. It's good that Mjorn has taken up the charge of keeping the females in check.

Ragnar had been one of the harbingers most firmly in favor of letting the warlord take a firmer hand with the females who tried to escape or caused damage to the gigantic fortresses of Luminos. Mjorn himself wasn't a harbinger. He'd been a mere captain before starting his quest to hunt down the females who caused problems.

Not all of the harbingers had welcomed his enthusiasm, but Ragnar didn't care. Mjorn was always welcome in his fortress. The time for leniency with the females was over.

"I want all the fighters manned in ten minutes," Ragnar ordered. "We move out as soon as we hit the orbit. Captain Goram?"

"Yes, Harbinger," the warrior said, saluting.

"I want all the raiding parties back on Nomadin in twenty minutes, no more. Have it known that any captain who fails to achieve the objectives will be stripped of their rank and possibly their life. It depends on the severity of their failure."

"Yes, sir," Captain Goram said, rushing off to brief the raiding parties who would be joining Ragnar.

The harbinger stayed for a moment to take a last look at the screens. Everything seemed to be in order. The Union was out of the picture, the Terran army was hopelessly late.

Ragnar marched to the main landing bay and boarded his fighter.

He still felt nothing. If the day was going to present him with a female at last, it was good. Ragnar had been impatient to find his fated. He was still young, but the more sons he had, the better it was. The fact that there hadn't been any girls born on Luminos for ages had pushed the species to the brink of destruction.

It was imperative that strong warriors such as him fathered as many sons as possible. They were the future leaders of the raiding parties, promising more females and the continuation of his bloodline.

Ragnar observed the blue-green planet from above, focusing on his target.

The harbinger tried to force himself to be excited about the prospect of finding his fated. Terran females were considered a sign of good luck on Luminos. Several of the other harbingers had Terran fateds and they seemed to be strong enough to endure life on his cruel home world.

The fighter sped up and the first heat signatures began to appear on the screen as the ship breached the atmosphere of Terra. Ragnar set course for two of them out in the open, distantly noting their closeness to the emergency shelters.

So far, Terrans hadn't come up with anything that could hold Nayanors off the precious females.

As they got close to the ground, Ragnar signaled the pilot to keep on patrolling, making sure that none of the females escaped the perimeter.

Then he dropped through the hatch in the floor.

Cold air hit his face, but it was nothing compared to the long night of Luminos – the massive, deadly storm that reigned over the planet every year for a whole month. It was the second reason why Nayanors were still dwindling despite all the raids.

Ragnar landed on the ground, standing after a crushing impact.

Two Terrans stared at him, clearly frozen in the middle of an argument. One of them was male and Ragnar discarded him immediately as nothing more than a body in his way. Except for the hand that was wrapped around the arm of the female.

A red-haired beauty with a divine body and piercing sky blue eyes.

His fated.

She shone like a splash of color in the middle of the gray and white fields of nothing that only served as a background to her breathtaking image.

Seconds ticked by and her arm was still in the grip of the male. Ragnar felt his blood catch fire as everything in him roared at once. The fury that surged through his veins was unlike everything he'd ever known before.

A male, a measly Terran male, dared to lay a hand on his fated mate.

"Back away," the male said, pulling a small dagger as if that was going to save him. "This one's mine."

Mine, the word echoed in Ragnar's head.

The male thought he could come between a Nayanor and his fated. It was clear the Terran wasn't sane, because he didn't seem to understand how very dead he was.

The harbinger's lips curled into a cruel smile. He didn't entirely comprehend the amount of rage that filled him yet. Ragnar hadn't expected to feel anything when he found the female who would bear his sons.

The emotion was still raw and new, but there was one thing the harbinger knew without a shadow of a doubt.

"She is not."