Chapter 6 #3
The alien who’d stumbled upon Wid tossed him into the boys’ room with enough force to send him back to the floor.
He gasped as his already bruised body took on new pain.
When he looked up, eleven pairs of eyes stared back at him with dawning horror.
It was almost their worst nightmare come true.
They’d known there was a chance of being discovered in the tunnels, in which case, they’d be sunk.
The idea of being caught outside the room but not in the tunnels hadn’t occurred to them—or it hadn’t occurred to him, at any rate.
There’d been no discussion, therefore, as to what kind of plausible story one could tell that would explain a boy’s presence outside of their room without giving away their discovery of the conduit system.
Wid had made it up on the fly when the random Travian had hauled him to his feet and demanded what he was doing lurking around where he had no business being.
“I told him I’d slipped past one of the officers this morning,” he relayed now as he pushed up to his feet.
When he wavered, Joel and Jordan ran up and grabbed his aching arms to steady him.
“Ow!” Ignoring his protests, the other boys led him to the pool and he sank down gratefully in the soothing waters.
“Do you think he believed you?” Joel asked.
Closing his eyes, Wid sank farther into the water. “I don’t know. I don’t even know if he told Kell, but if he hasn’t yet, he will soon.”
Stuart waded in next to him and cupped some water to trace down Wid’s cheek where it’d banged against the floor. “What do you think the captain will do?” His soft voice held fear.
“I don’t know. I don’t even want to think about it.”
That was the God’s honest truth. After so long of careful effort and planning, one stupid slip and he’d ruined it for everyone.
Or, maybe not everyone—maybe just for himself.
At the very least, Kell would keep him on a shorter leash, literally and figuratively.
At the worst, well, he just couldn’t go there.
So he sat and soaked until most of his aches were gone, then got out of the pool and waited for the captain to arrive with as much pride as he could muster.
It wasn’t so long to wait. He was barely dry before the doors opened and the Travian officers came in together, a silent, brooding group.
What little chatter there was among the boys stopped as they watched their captors come to them.
One by one, each boy was leashed, but instead of leading them out, the aliens lined them up and forced them to their knees.
It looked like something he’d seen in old war vids where prisoners were being executed. His stomach lurched in mounting fear.
“No,” he wanted to shout. It came out as barely a whisper.
Then he saw Kell, coming in after the rest, his face expressionless, his gaze boring into Wid.
A deep and primitive part of him wanted to cringe in the face of the approaching being.
He forced himself to straighten his shoulders and stare back.
If he was going to be killed, he’d take it with as much bravery as he could muster.
He wouldn’t give the bastards the satisfaction of cowering like a whipped dog.
The captain said nothing as he approached and didn’t even break his stride when he grabbed Wid and propelled him over to the wall.
Wid stumbled with the pressure, but managed to stay on his feet.
His arms shot out reflexively when Kell shoved him against the alcove where the food was laid out.
He wasn’t allowed to straighten, however.
Kell cupped the back of Wid’s neck with one of his large hands, his fingers biting into the flesh in warning.
Using one foot, Kell pushed Wid’s legs farther out and apart, forcing Wid to bend over the shelf of metal.
For a second, Wid feared the alien meant to fuck him in front of the others in some primal show of dominance.
When he turned to shoot the creature a look of defiance, he saw him pull the leash out of his belt and bend it into a small loop.
No, not sexual humiliation, something much more basic.
In the silent room, the whooshing sound of the leather being swung rang loudly in Wid’s ear.
As did the smacking when the doubled up leash hit his ass.
The strong sting made him wince and gasp a tiny bit.
The humiliation of getting a public beating stung more, though—at least for the first few blows.
Then the pain of the leather striking his increasingly sensitive skin slowly got worse.
After perhaps the first ten blows or so, he began to grunt, despite efforts to remain silent, and his fingers grasped the edge of the shelf.
Twenty and counting, he cried out and struggled against Kell’s unbreakable hold.
Then he lost any sense of the number of blows that rained down on his ass.
They kept coming, steady and relentless.
He could have sworn Kell put more heft into them too as the punishment wore on.
More likely his inflamed ass perceived each strike as being worse than the last. He cursed and screamed and struggled like a madman before the torture ended.
Chest heaving and body shaking, he almost couldn’t believe it was over.
But the blows had stopped. Kell still held him in place, and as relieved as Wid was that the beating was over, he knew a new fear that it might have been the warm-up to the execution.
He cringed as the fingers around his neck seemed to tighten.
He missed whatever signal Kell gave to the others.
Suddenly there was movement in the room.
The boys paraded out, heads down and quiet.
He wondered if they were going to their own punishment and the guilt gnawed at him.
Better that then the fear of what came next for him.
Nothing much as it turned out. Without saying a word, Kell hooked the vile leash to Wid’s collar and yanking him upright, pulled him in his wake.
Kell said nothing to his pet as he headed to his quarters.
He didn’t trust himself to say anything until he knew none of the others could hear him.
It didn’t do for a captain to lose his temper, but lose it he had.
He just wasn’t going to let the others see it.
The human, however, was another matter. Once inside his quarters, he unhooked the leash and shoved Wid into a corner of his sleeping chamber.
The boy went down with a muffled cry and stayed on his hands and knees instead of trying to get up and challenge Kell in any way.
The beating had taken the fight out of him, thank the Mother.
The defiance hadn’t left, though. Panting and shuddering, Wid glared at him over his shoulder.
Kell was sorely tempted to smack that look off the human’s face, but knew if he started down that path, he might not get off it for a long while.
As mad as he was, he didn’t want to kill the boy.
He stalked out of the room and into his bathing chamber.
He took his remaining anger out on his clothing, ripping every stitch off.
Then he took a long time bathing the sweat and tension from his body.
The streams of healing fluid hit him from all angles, pounding his muscles into relaxation.
Would that they could quiet his mind so easily.
When he stared at his feelings he realized it wasn’t just anger he felt.
He hated to admit it even to himself, but deep down he felt disappointed by his pet’s actions.
Hurt, even, the way he did when Marielle scolded him for some transgression.
What a fucked up reaction. Wid was his pet, not his mate.
It didn’t matter how the boy felt about him.
Except it did. The human meant more to Kell than a convenient hole to stick his dick in.
He’d never wanted—or even liked—hurting him.
After the first night, they had developed a rapport over the long time they’d been together.
At least Kell had thought they had. Affection for his pet had grown slowly, yet undeniably.
He’d tried to make Wid’s life with him better—more palatable, more pleasurable.
He’d thought he’d not only succeeded in doing that, but in fostering affection from the boy in return.
Other than with his mate, he’d never spent so much time just lying in bed with another, talking and enjoying his company.
Had all of that been a ruse by the human?
Had his pet feigned his interest in Kell so well that Kell had mistaken it for genuine emotion?
And why the fuck did he even care? He hated the idea that he’d been weak enough, lonely enough, to fall for the ruse.
The best thing would be to turn the boy over to someone else, banish him from his bed and his thoughts.
Yet, the very idea of another male touching the boy raised even more fury inside him.
Wid was his and no other would touch him.
When he returned to the sleeping chamber, Wid hadn’t moved much. His ass undoubtedly too sore for sitting or lying on, he lay curled on his side. With his back to the wall, he faced Kell. The expression on his face hadn’t wavered.
He swept Kell’s body with his stare. “If you touch me tonight, I’ll kill you. Or myself. Or both of us.”