Lost in Barbarian Space(5)

“I am still your warlord, Colm,” Kavon said quietly. “Besides, you have been training more lately than ever before. The warriors complain you drive them into the ground.” Kavon’s intense gaze drilled into him. “You keep driving yourself to be better, to hone your skills and your control.”

“As any dedicated warrior does, warlord.” This was a topic he wasn’t going to discuss with his friend.

“You know I hate it when you ‘warlord’ me. Anyway, you don’t have time to wiggle out of this assignment…they are due here on the hour. Will probably be waiting for us when we return to the estate.”

Kavon slapped Colm on the shoulder. “Come, let’s get this wulver beast back to be skinned and the meat delivered to the kitchens. Then you will need to prepare your sword.”

Colm frowned. “Why? I don’t need my sword to eat a feast.”

“I have promised our visitors a sword-fighting display before the feast. A fitting welcome to Markaria, don’t you think?” Kavon swung up onto his hargon beast.

Colm groaned and grabbed the reins of his hargon. The Great Warrior grant me patience. He heaved out a breath. The training he had planned, followed by a quiet dinner and possibly talking a willing female into his bed, looked like a distant dream.

Now, he would have to spend his time entertaining goggle-eyed outsiders who considered him a dumb, unthinking, fighting machine.

He nudged his hargon into a fast pace. Hopefully he could ride out his frustrations and at least face the skyflyers with his famous warrior control intact.





Chapter Two




Colm stood by Kavon’s side in the great hall. His hair was still wet from washing, and he was wearing new leather trousers—ones not stained with the blood of his hunt.

With his enhanced hearing, he could tell a group was approaching from the corridor outside. Footsteps and quiet murmurs.

Aurina entered first. The former deep-space scout was smiling, her pale skin glowing and her sunset-colored hair falling around her shoulders. When her gaze fell on her bondmate, her smile widened. Today, she was wearing typical Markarian dress—a leather corset and a long skirt that hit at mid-calf. She usually wore trousers and shirts, but she’d had to accommodate for the growing mound of her belly.

Kavon was going to be a father. Colm slid his hands behind his back, his fingers lacing tightly together. He was happy for his friend. If anyone deserved happiness, it was Kavon. But the idea was like salt into a wound Colm didn’t even know he had.

Colm would never be a father.

Aurina’s laughter brought Colm back. When Kavon wasn’t dragging her to their rooms, she spent most of her time helping with Kavon’s mining operations. The woman was fascinated with rocks, and now assisted the mining superintendent.

The man who followed Aurina into the hall was tall and broad across the shoulders, with dark hair. This had to be Niklas Phoenix. If he’d been born on Markaria, he would have been a warrior. To think he was a scholar was strange. His blue gaze moved around the hall in a way that told Colm the man had catalogued everything in an instant.

For a second, Colm didn’t really pay attention to the woman by Phoenix’s side, but once Colm focused on her, he wondered how he hadn’t noticed her the second she’d moved into the hall.

She moved like the darken beasts. A smooth, steady glide with the promise she could explode into action. She wore some sort of dark armor that molded to her tall, slim form. Markarians all had dark shades of hair and dark bronze skin. This woman had hair like moonlight and eyes the color of jewels in a box.

And she was deadly.

Colm tensed, his hand itching to reach for his sword. He was a warrior, and even without his nanami buzzing at him, he sensed danger.

“Be nice,” he heard Phoenix murmur to the woman.

She didn’t respond.

Another woman stepped forward. Colm turned his attention to her and his eyes narrowed.

She looked almost as deadly as the first, even though they were a complete contrast. She wore a black-and-gray uniform, and stood with a straight spine. Where the first woman was lean, this woman’s uniform was filled with toned curves. Colm let himself look. Markarian women were leaner and muscular, so he found the curves…intriguing.

Not that this woman was soft. Far from it. She was younger than the other, and the way she held herself—she kept her feet spread, her balance even—he could tell she was ready to react. She had laser pistols holstered at her hips, and some strange black cylinder dangled from her belt.

Her hair…he sucked in another breath. It looked like sunlight and gold. It was pulled back tightly in a long tail that swayed behind her. Her skin was a golden color, and her face was alert and serious—she didn’t think she was here to enjoy herself.