Captain Ingzan is a bigger fool than even I reckoned him to be.
Mistake number one: he didn’t kill me after he took Aren.
He gives me a hearty clap on the back and says, “She wasn’t yours to keep anyway.” As if that makes up for what he did. The vile act he was seconds away from committing. “I think we’ve had enough of this cold waste,” he tells the lads. “Back to the ship!”
The thought of what almost happened to her fills me with a hot rage. It settles into my stomach like a clenched fist. If I had not endured years of training, I would not have the discipline to hold my anger. I would not have the discipline to keep from dashing the captain’s brains on the nearest rock.
And it’s hard, because this planet has a lot of rocks.
One thought is keeping me sane, and I repeat it over and over again like a child’s prayer: I will see him dead, I will see him dead, I will see him dead.
We march. Now that he’s got a prize, it’s time to quit the planet and get back on the ship.
Mistake number two: he thinks that he’s got a prize. He thinks the human female is his new toy.
Ingzan holds her leash. He has draped the purple tapestry over her shoulders, covering her body. He’s got enough devious, animal cunning to know that parading her naked through the columns of marching warriors is a bad idea. Most of the lads are still probably half-hard underneath their breeches and Ingzan doesn’t want them to be stirred to rash acts.
But the only one he has to worry about is me.
I look at the sky. That faint yellow that I warned the captain about yesterday has concentrated. Darkened. Turned the sky to an angry storm that is ready to burst.
In this sector, a dark yellow sky means only one thing. Acid rain.
Several planets in this sector are ripe with volcanic activity, spewing vile plumes of sulfur into space. If the planet has no atmosphere to trap the gasses, they’ll spread out until the molecules are drawn in by the gravitational pull of another nearby planet.
The gasses will eventually scatter again, but if it rains while the atmosphere is clogged with that much sulfur… it will pour down pure sulfuric acid.
We could have been safely back in the ship by now, if Ingzan had listened to the counsel I gave him last night. If Zuro had backed me up. But Zuro knows that our captain prefers flattery to harsh truths, so he insisted no rain will come.
The sky is a deep shade of yellow, the color of a jaundiced eye. The air is ripe with the stench that stings the nostrils. There’s a chance that the sulfur clouds will disperse—that the threatening rain will evaporate. But I don’t believe for a second that we’ll be so lucky. Not the way my luck has been going.
That’s when I feel the first cold sting on the back of my head, like a pinprick. One of the lads hisses and slaps the back of his shoulder, like he just got bit by a particularly ferocious insect. I look at my captive and am grateful to see that her skin is protected by the purple tapestry. Her wild curly hair swirls around her head and I can only hope it will help keep the rain off her face.
I feel responsible for her—that all the bad things that have happened to her are my fault. I think of her smooth, pale skin marred by the acidic droplets falling from the sky. I try to reassure myself. She lives on this void-cursed planet and must have encountered these sulfur storms before.
Then, as if the void itself rips open, rain pours from the sky. Sheets of it come down. The ground is blanketed by hissing smoke. The smell is beyond foul—like the decaying runoff from the sewer pipes, like the rotting refuse of a butcher’s shop, like the breath of a dying man.
I can’t stop to think. My body reacts. I fling myself at Captain Ingzan, taking him to the ground. In the fall, my limbs tangle with the female captive’s limbs. The three of us land in the dirt with a squelch. The mud that is already beginning to pool is caustic, clinging to my skin and making me feel like I just landed on the surface of a baker’s pan. I sweep them both into my arms, and run into the shadows.
We are near a grove of trees—although their branches are mostly bare and they resemble an old pitchfork more than a form of vegetation. That is our good luck. I hustle the captain and Aren to the base of one tree. Its scant branches offer no protection from the stinging rain, but that’s not why I take them to the trees.
Ingzan is flailing his arms, trying to wipe the water off of his skin like he’s a foraging osoid who just sniffed and snorted his way head-first into hive of thrumming, angry apioids. My captive (and, yes, she is and will always be my captive, I don’t care who holds her leash or what is tattooed on her shoulder) is faring much better. The purple tapestry around her body is made from khoro fur and those creatures produce a thick, oily substance that coats their fur. We call this substance olin and it is of great use as a wax to weatherproof certain polymers and fabrics. The rain will eventually eat through her garment, but it will take some time.
I take my anankah and slide the charger switch. I feel it thrum in my hands, the energy building inside the core. But I only want a small blast.
As I aim it, Ingzan cries out, shielding his face like a child trying to ward off a blow from an angry nursemaid. The coward.
“Shut up,” I growl. I should point it at him, but instead I aim at the base of the tree and deploy a charge. There is a low thwump as the bark splinters and the innards of the tree are revealed.
We are lucky to be nearby a prew tree, though any of the spiky-needle trees would have sufficed. Any Zalaryn raider knows what trees are prized for their strong timber and what ones are worthless. Prews and others like it are no good for timber. They grow upon trunks that are weak and are filled with mealy pulp. If you slice a tree, thick white sap will leak out and woe if you get any on your hands, as it will burn and itch.
Even so, I holster my weapon and dig both of my hands inside the tree, scooping out two handfuls of the white pulp. My hands tingle for just a moment, but as the rain falls, the pain stops.
I smear it all over my face, my arms, my chest. I reach in for another handful and apply the thick goo to my legs. There’s a bare spot on my back that I cannot reach that still stings with the sulfuric acid, but it is a minor annoyance.
I get another handful and crouch down near my captive. Her skin is unburnt. I untie the knot that holds the purple garment closed and peel it back. She is nude underneath, pale and perfect, like a statue carved in the days of old. She is drawn up, hugging her legs tight against her body with her knees underneath her chin. I know that in this position, if I look between her ankles, I’ll be able to see a glimpse of her sex—and it takes all of my will to keep my eyes locked on hers.
“Here,” I say, and proffer the handful of prew pulp to her. “Rub it on your skin. It counteracts the acid.” I know she can’t understand me, but I don’t know what else to do. I motion to my own skin and pantomime rubbing it on. She looks puzzled, but she takes the pulp and begins to slather it on her body. As much as I’d love to watch her as she straightens up, tall and lean, and massages the pulp into her breasts and buttocks—as much as I’d love to be the one to do it for her—I close her garment back over her body and leave her to it.
“Smear the pulp onto your skin,” I tell Ingzan. He is still cowering, as if he can get the rain to stop by wishing hard enough. “It will shield you from the acid.”
“How do you know this?” he says, but he wastes no time slathering the stuff on his exposed skin. His brows relax and the pinched look of pain on his face starts to fade at once.
“It’s an old raider’s trick,” I say. “A lot of the planets in this sector rain down horrible things. Poison gas builds in the atmosphere, then mixes with the rain.”
“This is like something the nursemaids make up to scare little children. Fiery rain from the void itself. But this tree pulp is a miracle. A true miracle. Get the lads!”
But most of them have already followed me to the grove of prew and have mimicked my actions, trusting that whatever I was doing had to be better than doing nothing but let the acid eat into their flesh.
After a few minutes, we’re all appropriately covered in the pulp and protected from the rain. Something in the tree pulp neutralizes the acid. Void knows how it works; I only know that it does. An old raider showed me years ago when our party was caught in conditions much like this.
“Good showing,” Ingzan says, clapping me on the back.
That’s the third mistake he makes: thinking that I was trying to help him. That I pulled him specifically into the grove of trees. That, of course, is utter foolishness. He only came along for the ride because he was holding my captive’s leash.
It was Aren that I meant to sweep into my arms and carry away to the grove of prews.
“Back to the ship,” Ingzan declares. “Let’s get off this planet before the void takes us all.”
“Captain,” Zuro says, sauntering up alongside the captain and me. “My comm-panel shows that in six days hence, the raid on the protein farm will commence. Shall I set course for Zalaryx?”
My ears prick immediately. Only six days? Holy void. That is a piece of information that Xalax needs. There’s one large protein farm on our planet and he will need to reinforce it. The protein blocks constitute the bulk of our diet. If it’s destroyed, there’ll be panic and riots—if we’re lucky. Famine and death if we’re not.
“No,” says Ingzan. “Captain Looq has a ship full of raiders. They’ll take what they can and burn the rest. Let the weaklings starve.”
“Yes, Captain,” Zuro says, a vulpine smile on his face. “Any warrior who cannot feed himself does not deserve the gift of life. Where, then, shall I set our course?”
“Wherever there are more humans like this,” Ingzan says and rattles her leash. I’m seized with a fury that burns my soul as hot as the stinging acid from the sky. “I plan on wearing her out and I’ll need a replacement.”
“Sir,” Zuro says, speaking slowly. “She is Marked. Your father’s reign—and by extension, your reign, since you are heir—cannot be tainted. You cannot be seen as kings who act as if they are above the law. She must be delivered to the auction house, purity intact.”
“Yes, yes,” Ingzan says, waving a hand, as if Zuro was a fussy nursemaid reminding Ingzan to use a napkin during his meal. “I remember your wise counsel. Her purity will remain intact when we eventually deliver her to the auction house. But she’s got two more holes we can have some fun with, doesn’t she?”
“Yes, sir,” Zuro says, his smile more despicable than ever, as if he is pleased with himself for being able to leech onto such a powerful and cunning captain. “We sure can.”
“Once we get onto the ship and have a chance to clean up this damned pulp, I’m going to break her in—teach her how to properly pleasure a Zalaryn male. If she’s any good, maybe I’ll even bid on her after my father has secured the crown. The heir to the High Throne should have a mate, after all. When I’m done, then the lads can have a turn.”
“How gracious of you, my captain,” Zuro says and boards the ship—presumably to set course for a nearby planet with plenty of females.
“Come on, Kroda,” the Captain says to me. “You can go first—after me, of course. As a reward for getting us out of that rain storm before our skin melted off.”
“Thank you, Captain,” I say through gritted teeth. My jaws ache from clenching them—a sick vein pumps black blood through the side of my head.
I need to send a comm to Xalax about this attack on the protein farm. He will barely have time prepare a counter-attack.
But I will not be able to set up the homing beacon from inside the ship. The ship will have signal-jamming devices and message interception software running.
If I am to contact Xalax about the invasion, I must stay behind.
Once the Screaming Talon takes flight, I can set up my comm-device and send the beacon. Ayvinx will come and get me and we’ll send a comm to Xalax—telling him to fortify the farm and prepare for battle.
But if I stay behind… she’s got two more holes we can have some fun with, doesn’t she?
My stomach burns with anger. I can’t board the ship and save her and still contact Xalax.
I have to choose.
The anger turns to hate and I swallow a mouthful of my own bile. Because I don’t have a choice, not really. I am honor-bound. Duty-bound.
I cannot put the life of one human female above the lives of countless citizens on my home planet.
I have no choice at all.