Barbarian Lover(47)

More hushed whispers. Then, the alien guard speaks, his tone angry. “My masters are out a great deal of money with nothing to show for it. You have destroyed their property.”

A gasp escapes me. “Property? They’re not property. They’re people! You can’t just take them against their will!”

“And what of the animal skin you are wearing?” the alien growls at me. “Did you ask its permission?”

“That’s different.” I have a sinking feeling I’m losing this argument.

“The shipment my masters deposited here has been stolen from them,” he says again. “They are out a great deal of money and have many clients waiting for their purchases. My masters are honor bound to return their property to them.”

I grip the laser cannon tighter, a sinking feeling in my stomach. The aliens stare at me with black, calculating eyes. I notice one of the orange ones keeps eying my gun.

“Your ship is very old,” one comments. He takes a step forward, his own gun held casually in hand.

“Stop or I’ll shoot,” I tell him, my voice wavering.

“I think you are lying,” the one guard says, still approaching. The other two aliens watch him calmly, weapons in hand. “I think your ship is not armed. I think we will take you, and then you will lead us to the others.”

“You can’t! We can’t be removed from this planet,” I say desperately. “Look at my eyes! Our symbionts—“

“You lie,” it says, and strides forward.

I lift my laser cannon to fire again, just as the alien in the distance lifts his gun. Something hot zings my hand, and the gun goes flying out of my grip. I’m smacked to the ground with a forceful blow, the air knocked out of my lungs.

“Kira,” Aehako bellows behind me, and I hear the sound of feet slamming into the snow.

“No,” I gasp as one of the aliens kicks my gun away. He steps on my wounded hand, pinning me to the ground. As I watch in horror, he raises his gun and fires, and I hear two shouts of pain. “No! Aehako!” Ignoring the brutal pain in my arm, I twist around to see.

The two men are flat on the ground. Haeden’s lying in a pool of blood, his leather tunic smoking. Aehako is face down and unmoving.

My chest constricts with agony. “Aehako! No!”

The birdlike Little Green Man chirps a question. Are they dead?

The basketball head tilts his head, and as I watch, I see Aehako twitch and lift his elbow, trying to rise up off the ground. There’s no sign of Harlow. I’m relieved. She’s hiding in the ship like I told her to. “Not dead yet,” the guard says and lifts his gun again. “I will fix that.”

“No, wait!” I scream in the alien language. “I’ll go with you. I’ll take you to the others! Just leave them alone!”

The guard lowers his gun and looks over at his master.

An irritated chirp sounds. They don’t matter. Just bring her.

The boot lifts off my hand, and a strong arm hauls me off the ground.



AEHAKO



I fight off unconsciousness as wave after wave of crashing pain moves over me. The intruders moved so fast. I barely saw them raise their strange weapons before Haeden and I were flattened on the ground. I hear Kira’s cry of worry, and her frantic jabber in the strange language.

Then, silence. I try to sit up, but my body won’t obey. It’s like an invisible net has been cast over me. The blackness I’ve fought against so hard claims me.

One thought rings through my mind even as I succumb: they’ve taken my mate.



• • •



“Aehako?” A small, cold hand taps my cheek. “Wake up. Please.”

Pain blazes in my side. I’m still face-down in the snow, and my entire body aches as if I’ve drank three skins of sah-sah. With effort, I push against the earth and roll myself onto my back, squinting at the late afternoon sunlight.

A face swims into view. Pale, freckled, with a bright orange-red mane. Not Kira. I struggle to sit up, and her weak human hands try to assist. “Are you okay?” she asks in a tremulous voice.

“I am not dead,” I grit out, though my ribs might complain otherwise. I run a hand down my side and pain stabs through me again. Punctured with one of their strange weapons, but not a fatal wound. It aches and bleeds but will not kill me. “Where is Kira?”

The girl’s eyes fill with tears and she sniffs hard. “Gone. They took her.”

Agony pounds in my chest. No. Not Kira. Not my sad-eyed, soft mate. I’m helpless and filled with rage all at once. “I must save her.”

“Your friend…he’s not doing so well.”

I look around. Off to one side, Haeden’s body is slumped. There’s a dark stain under him that makes my chest clench with new worry. “Is he—“