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  It took heavy damage, enough that it didn’t bother to return fire. It shot straight towards Bi’is space, racing to escape.

  Terig scowled, his teeth flashing in the darkness of his beard. “I missed their engines. Fuck.”

  “It was a nice surprise, nevertheless. The Bi’isils will be fumigating that ship for years due to the spontaneous shitting that just erupted.” Nako grinned at Ulof’s guffaw, enjoying that elusive smile. His Imdiko was having a good day.

  He got back to business. “What’s the reading on that prince’s ship?”

  “Dead. There should be enough air for whoever’s on board to keep him alive for the next hour. A little less, if there are more than two on board.”

  Nako aimed his attention at his com officer. Nobek Atar reported, “No com signal. Their com emitter was disintegrated in that last blast. We have no way to question the little fuckers, unless it’s done in person.”

  Weapons Commander Sesin strolled onto the bridge as the report was completed. And it was definitely a stroll. Or maybe a saunter. At any rate, his gait was as lazy as the eyes that blinked in his fleshy face.

  Nako ground his teeth together. “So good of you to join us, Weapons Commander. Lead a team to that cruiser. Bring the ranking member to me. Kill the rest.”

  Sesin glanced at the shuttle on the vid. He did a double-take. The bastard hadn’t even bothered to follow events once he was alerted to the bridge. He’d had no idea they were dealing with Kalquor’s second-oldest enemy. “You want a live Bi’isil, Captain? Brought to this ship?”

  If only the fool had elected to return home when Nako had abandoned the fleet. “I do believe that was my order. Do I need to repeat it?”

  Ulof eased a step away. Girek and the navigator, Nobek Ruek, watched the unfolding drama with avid expressions. Nako hated repeating himself, and everyone knew it. Any time he had to give an order twice, it was usually accompanied by a severe beatdown.

  Even Sesin realized the threat he was under. He bowed, his greasy black hair swinging forward to hide the scowl Nako was certain had erupted. When he straightened, he’d reverted to his usual expression—a kind of lethargic malice, as if he hated everything in sight but couldn’t be bothered to destroy any of it.

  “Subcommander, you’re with me. Have two security officers join us.”

  “Yes, Commander.” With a half-grin for Nako, Terig followed Sesin off the bridge.

  Ulof took his leave as well, his arms full of his and Nako’s lunch trays. He gave a parting shot as he left. “I look forward to hearing how this plays out. Maybe you’ll get lucky and Sesin will accidentally space himself.”

  Nako bit back a retort, though he shouldn’t have accepted his head cook insulting a senior executive officer. But Ulof was right. It would do the raider so much good to lose Sesin.

  Terig had to step up, because that worthless piece of shit Sesin wasn’t long for this life. Not the way things were going. Sooner or later, he’d screw up bad enough that there would no longer be any question of him being relieved of duty. Terig was next in line for the position, and there was no way Nako would skip over him to promote someone else. Not if he was to maintain order on the raider.

  It’s past due my Nobek put his past behind him and reclaimed his role as a leader.

  Chapter 3

  After Sesin gave his orders to the boarding team in Security’s staging area, Terig had to talk fast. “Commander, I agree it will save time and effort to attach an umbilical passageway between the raider and the shuttle. Unfortunately, we may end up facing hostile Bi’isils and their slaves. That would mean a firefight. We might lose the high-ranking prisoner the captain wants, as well as have to fend off an attempt to capture our vessel.”

  The weapons commander blinked at him, slow-witted with laziness. Speaking quickly, as Terig had, usually confused Sesin enough that he went along with whatever his subordinate suggested.

  He’d better agree with me and change his plan. Otherwise, Nako would have more than enough reason to lose his shit. Terig’s Dramok had enough crimes on his head without adding a murder charge to the list.

  As Terig waited, the dullard scowled. Sesin weighed his options for more than three seconds, for a change. He pushed himself to five before he relented.

  Finally, he nodded. “Fine. We’ll take a shuttle over and board from that.”

  “Good call, sir.” Terig knew Sesin had capitulated because he disliked the amount of energy he’d have to expend to repel an attack. The weapons commander had turned indolence into an artform.

  They armed themselves and left the raider. Twenty minutes later, they arrived at the drifting Bi’isil craft.

  There was no resistance when they attached an umbilical between the two small ships. Terig triggered the enemy vessel’s hatch, his blaster at the ready. It opened without a pause.

  No contingent of Bi’isils and slaves waited to defend themselves. What Terig could see of the dimly-lit cabin beyond was a confusion of tables and upholstered seating arrangements, everything a uniform, featureless gray.

  “Huh. Maybe they’re all dead.” Sesin kept his hopeful voice low.

  “The hull’s intact. Interior from this vantage point looks whole, though the jolt might have knocked them senseless.” Terig wasn’t buying it though. Someone had to be ready for their boarding party. His well-honed senses insisted on it.

  Sesin swept into the Bi’isil ship, crouched to keep from banging his head on the low ceiling. Terig and two other Nobek security officers hurried after him, pointing their weapons in different directions to cover the space.

  Silence reigned, as if the disabled craft held its breath. The smell, heavy in the sweltering heat within, was all that assaulted them. The rancid stench of Tragoom overlaid the dry odor that reminded Terig of dead bugs. And there was something else, a sweetish-salty aroma he couldn’t put a name to.

  The cabin was empty of life, and less than a second after their entrance, the group turned toward the opening to the cockpit. Sesin stopped short, and Terig walked right into his back. Choking off a curse and the abrupt urge to snap his superior’s neck, he shot to one side. He crouched low, using an overstuffed chair in the cramped, overly furnished cabin as cover. He pointed his blaster at the slight figure which had surprised Sesin.

  Fuck.

  Neither Bi’isil nor Tragoom. She was a creature more legendary for the lack of her kind in Terig’s spacegoing life. He’d seen a few Earther women, but mostly on vids. He’d caught a few quick glimpses of the small females during leave on Kalquor or other colonies. Never up close.

  His pulse pounded in his ears. More distracting, it drummed in his suddenly alert cocks. He drank her in during a split second of shock.

  Her hair was the pale gold of hazy noon sunshine in the summer. It flowed in ocean waves to just past her slender shoulders, framing a vision made of pastel blue eyes, high cheekbones, pink lips, and a quivering chin. The silver metal collar circling the long column of her neck spoke of her slave status. Her legs, elongated by the high hem of her sheath dress, seemed to go on forever, though she would only stand to Terig’s nose. She faced them with her legs far apart, as if bracing herself for some shock. Wide open, the lines of her perspiration-dewed inner thighs pointed up, to lead him straight to her…

  Then the moment was over, duty reasserting itself in the Nobek’s stunned brain. He was the only one to regain his senses, judging from the drop-jawed silence of the other warriors, including their supposed leader, Sesin.

  Terig’s voice was harsher than usual. “Where is your Bi’isil master, Earther?”

  Her gaze settled on his face, and he wondered what she thought of him, with his exposed arms and lean face mapped with old scars. Such a pretty thing should have been repulsed by so many marks of violence. Yet she showed no revulsion, only the type of fear he’d expect from someone facing the unknown. She wore the demeanor of a woman trying to decide if she encountered friend or foe.

  “The last time I saw my master
, he was bleeding to death on the floor and calling me names I’ll not repeat.”

  Her soft, twangy voice tickled Terig’s ears. “On the lab station?” It was the closest Bi’isil habitation to the border with Kalquor. A spark of respect for more than the woman’s looks sprang to life. “You attempted escape, and no one activated your collar to stop you?”

  “My collar is broken. They couldn’t use it against me.”

  A low groan emitted from the cockpit beyond her. Apparently, the other three Nobeks had snapped out of their surprise while Terig and the woman spoke, because everyone went on alert. Stiffening at the change in the Kalquorians’ attitudes, the Earther shifted, covering more of the passage between the two sections with her slight body. She moved her hand, which had been hidden behind her skirt and incredible thigh, to a defensive posture.

  Terig fought off a grin, but not because of the knife she held. It was an impressive blade, nearly as long as her forearm, stained with a greenish-black substance he assumed to be her former master’s blood. Its triangular point was meant for business. Serious killing business.

  What made him smile was her pluck. Squaring off with four trained warriors armed with percussion blasters, she didn’t give an inch. Damn if he wasn’t getting hard again, and he blessed the armored crotch of his formsuit for hiding that…though the scent coming off him was a dead giveaway, should she get close enough to smell.

  She wasn’t advancing on them, and it calmed Terig to discover that all she noted was a threat. “Don’t come any closer. He’s with me.”

  “Who’s with you, girl?” Sesin had finally decided to take up his leadership duties.

  “Ob. A fellow slave.”

  Terig knew a smattering of Tragoom, especially the more descriptive terms. He wondered if ob, the word for shit, was really the creature’s name, or a cruel—if apt—moniker forced on it by its master. “We have no use for Tragooms. Stand aside so we can finish it.” Sesin waved his blaster negligently.

  “Fuck you.” She went into a slight crouch, knife at the ready.

  A surge of delight powered through Terig at her defiant words. It didn’t matter how outrageous it was that she would defend a revolting Tragoom, the most worthless species in the universe and not deserving to breathe a single inch of Kalquorian air. He couldn’t help but admire her for standing her ground.

  Gorgeous woman. Likes knives. Possesses terrible taste in companions. Threatens men twice her size. Apparently unbalanced. Maybe I’d have a chance with her after all.

  Unfortunately, Sesin wasn’t as impressed. The idiot pointed his weapon at her. “Last warning, Earther.”

  Terig rose to his full height in fury and knocked his commander’s blaster aside. “Mother of All, you can’t threaten a female!”

  “She’s in the way! She’s protecting a Tragoom, you ass! A Tragoom!”

  “So we’ll disarm and move her. What’s she going to do, cry all over us? Call us names? Use your head for something besides growing hair.” It was moments like this that Terig was almost willing to cave in Sesin’s skull. Even if it did mean he would be forced to assume the lazy bastard’s job.

  The lunk couldn’t even be spurred to protest Terig’s insubordination. Instead, he merely shrugged. “Fine. You do it.”

  “Gladly.” Terig turned his attention to the Earther.

  He made no move towards her, however. She was no longer pointing the knife at him and his companions. Real fear sizzled through him to see the Bi’isil-bloodstained point digging into the fabric covering her chest. She had it at the perfect angle to thrust up into her heart. A red circle—her blood, as scarlet as any Kalquorian’s—bloomed where she’d poked it through sheath and skin.

  “Don’t take a single step toward me.” Her tone was firm.

  No one moved for several seconds, frozen by the sight of a determined female ready to do the unthinkable. She meant it, Terig realized, convinced by that spot of blood staining the tan dress and the hard light in her eyes. Terig calculated his chances of disarming her before she could commit the deed.

  He’d probably be able to stop her. But that slight chance of failure held him in place.

  “You’d kill yourself? For a Tragoom?” Sesin was incredulous.

  “For a friend who’s kept me alive and helped me get here so I can save your empire from destruction.”

  No tremor. No fear. Whatever else was going on, Terig had no doubt the Earther would finish things on her terms. If he attempted to stop her and screwed it up…

  Well, he’d written a version of that story before, hadn’t he? And it didn’t have a happy ending.

  “Good.” She watched them, neither her voice nor the hand gripping the knife wavering. “You see I’m not playing around here. You either guarantee my friend’s life, or I take mine. If he’s to die after all we’ve done to save one another, I die too. And if I die, all of Kalquor dies with me.”

  It was the second time she’d warned that Terig’s people were in danger. Before he could grapple with what her hints might mean, Sesin started toward her. “You’re a woman. You’ll do no such thing.”

  Terig stopped him with a shout, and the other two men grabbed their commander as well. Had they seen what he did in the woman’s expression? That desperate resolve that left no room for bluffing?

  He didn’t wait to find out. “Let me talk to the captain, Weapons Commander. I think he’ll want to know the situation before we make any hasty decisions.”

  * * * *

  Piper stepped out of the Kalquorian craft behind the man identified as Weapons Commander Sesin. She kept close to Ob, almost plastering herself against his heavy frame. She could smell the Kalquorians’ hatred for her companion as well as she could Ob’s natural reek. She feared they would renege on their promise not to kill him until he had a fair hearing from their captain.

  At least his collar had stopped tormenting him. He snuffled as if he had a runny nose, but that was normal for Ob. And better to listen to than squeals of agony.

  Her grip stayed tight, if sweaty, on the knife she’d stolen from her master’s head torturer weeks before. She remained vigilant, though her gaze luxuriated in the bright light levels of the raider’s small shuttle and fighter bay. Her skin rejoiced in the cool temperature. She damned near sighed to be free of stifling heat after years of living in the baking, dark environment the Bi’isils preferred.

  As they descended the short ramp to the bay floor, Piper darted a glance at the bearded warrior behind her. Despite his fearsome aspect, fed by many scars and two missing fingers on his left hand, Subcommander Terig seemed the most civilized of the group. And he wasn’t so bad looking, not now that she could see him closer and in better lighting. Once past the scars, he was quite attractive, in fact. Better yet, his gaze was bright with intelligence—more than the brute Sesin, who’d spent most of the time on Prince Yel’ek’s shuttle arguing to kill Ob, even if that meant teaching Piper a lesson by killing her too.

  Terig had made it plain he would not allow that. A reluctant ally, since his glare at Ob told Piper he’d rather see the Tragoom dead as well.

  Not after all Ob’s done for me. Not after all he’s suffered already. That her companion was a finer being than her, Piper knew without a doubt. He was probably superior to these Kalquorians, too.

  She owed him. Once she told their captors what was happening, they’d realize they owed him too.

  When Sesin moved aside so she could see the bay, Piper’s attention was drawn to the couple dozen armed men awaiting them. The group stood in front of a second shuttle that looked boxy compared to the twenty-or-so single man fighters crowding the space. Hard stares moved back and forth between her and Ob, as if the Kalquorians couldn’t decide who deserved their focus more.

  One look at the percussion blasters they pointed in Ob’s direction, and Piper jumped in front of him. She couldn’t shield his bulk much with her small frame. Nonetheless, poking the knife at the spot where cooling blood stuck the dress to her body go
t the threat across here as it had on Prince Yel’ek’s ship. She held steady, ignoring the sting of the cut she’d inflicted on herself.

  “Blasters down, but stay alert,” someone in the middle of the group snarled. He came forward as the others obeyed.

  Heaven help her, she couldn’t keep her mouth from dropping open. The Kalquorian was huge, a scarred patchwork of bulging musculature, second only in size to Ob. In a black formsuit that left his arms bare, Piper didn’t know what part of him to examine first. The face that stubbornly remained handsome despite the marks of past battles? The intense stare that sized her up? The billow of frizzing black hair that appeared as soft as the rest of him was hard?

  Something about him turned her knees watery. Piper couldn’t believe she didn’t collapse to the floor before the power of the raider’s captain.

  His rough voice had been fashioned for crazed battle cries, but he spoke with coarse civility just the same. “There is no need to harm yourself, Matara. I give you my word that if the Tragoom shows no hostile intentions, he will live long enough for you to explain why I shouldn’t kill him.”

  He grimaced, as if saying the words cost him. Piper had no reason to trust him, but his demeanor inspired it.

  Dignity. Nobility. For all the brute force of him, he’s decent. Her instincts yelled their approval.

  Piper lowered her knife. “Captain Nako?”

  He bowed in assent.

  She relaxed a touch. “Thank you for being merciful. I realize Kalquorians and Tragooms have been sworn enemies for centuries, but you’ll find Ob is worthy of respect. He’s kept me safe on the Bi’isil lab station near here for several years. I’d be dead a dozen times over, if not for him.”

  The other Kalquorians exchanged disbelieving glances. Having met Tragooms besides Ob, Piper wasn’t surprised at their reactions. The species tended towards opportunism, willing to kill without conscience. Happy to murder their own kind, if it meant getting what they wanted. Even Ob had been a snarling enemy to Piper once upon a time.