Chapter 3 #2
“I need the healers,” he bellowed. “And hot water to my rooms.”
People scurried to obey. Kavon took the steps to his rooms two at a time.
“You will not die, woman, because now you are mine to protect.”
But the woman didn’t stir.
Aurina turned over in the comfy bed, rubbing her face against the soft sheets. She stretched her arms out, her fingers brushing across the furry blankets.
Furry blankets? Her bunk on the Sky Nomad was covered in a smooth synth-silk cover.
She bolted upright.
That set her head throbbing and, with a wince, she clutched her temple, staring around the room.
She froze. Oh, God.
The walls were a shiny, pearlescent gray stone. Sunlight streamed in through a large window, where gauzy, white curtains fluttered in the breeze.
Everything crashed back in on her.
Systems failing. Meteors. The sickening lurch of the crash.
She wrapped her arms around herself. She’d crash-landed. On some unknown planet in the middle of nowhere. Her chest constricted, her breathing turning harsh.
And she remembered hard amber eyes, and even harder arms around her.
Stay calm, stay calm. She’d been in tight spots before. She’d even crash-landed once before after an engine malfunction.
But not so far from known space and that time her brothers had rescued her an hour later.
Her brothers were going to take longer than that to find her now.
She dragged in some deep breaths. Her brothers had the coordinates for the planets she was planning to search. They could scan for her ship. Besides, all she needed to do was find her e-beacon and set it off. It transmitted a frequency her brothers would pick up.
They’d come. They wouldn’t know which of the four planets she’d searched first, but they’d get here. They’d pick up the e-beacon and she’d be back on the Sky Nomad and all this would be a fun, if slightly scary, adventure.
She hoped. Doubts tried to creep in. What if the radiation and meteor storm messed up her ship’s signature? What if the e-beacon was damaged in the crash? What if they read her data wrong and didn’t find this planet…what if, what if, what if.
She pinched the bridge of her nose and forced herself to relax. Focus on the now, Aurina.
She crept to the edge of the enormous bed.
Holy stars, she’d never seen a bed so big.
It was the size of a small moon—big enough for an entire VelocityBall team and their competitors—and was covered in more of those furry blankets.
Her gaze narrowed. If she wasn’t mistaken, they were made from the hide of some sort of animal.
Her nose wrinkled. Ugh, she didn’t care that it felt soft under her fingers… it had come from an animal.
Her feet touched the stone floor. She expected it to be cool under her feet, but it wasn’t, it felt warm.
Then she realized she was naked.
Who had taken her flight suit off? She scanned her body and everything appeared as it should. A few bruises from the crash. A bandage of some sort stuck to the skin on her side. She probed it. Sore, but nothing drastic.
But someone had removed her clothes, seen her naked.
Oh, God, and she was clean. Someone had bathed her.
Feeling exposed, she pulled the huge sheet off the bed. It took a lot of tugging, but finally she freed it and wrapped it around her. A lot of it still trailed behind her as she circled the large room.
On a chair, she spotted her flight suit tossed carelessly over the back.
She hurried over and searched the pockets.
She pulled out her Perman star crystal and ran the rock between her fingers.
Instantly, her racing pulse slowed. She checked the other pocket and when she pulled out her laser stunner, she sighed with relief.
The small, pebble-shaped device fit perfectly in her palm.
It was a scout model, made to look small and innocuous, nothing like a weapon.
Made of a dark, polished metal, it looked more like the polished stones she loved than a device capable of taking down a grown man, alien, or beast.
She scanned the room and then tucked the crystal and the stunner under the plump cushion of the chair. Then she walked toward the window. She pushed the curtains aside, and realized it wasn’t a window, but the doorway to a small balcony. She blinked against the bright sun.
She was on the second story of what looked to be a huge, sprawling stone building.
It wasn’t quite a castle, but it was damned close.
Still, it had a prettier, cozier feel than she’d guessed a stone house would have.
Just beyond the walls of the house, she could make out people working in lush farm fields.
In the distance, she saw the sharp, pointed peaks of a forbidding mountain range.
That way, the land didn’t look green and giving.
It looked rocky and barren, but still striking.
Okay, well, she’d crash-landed on a planet that had people, at least. Maybe they weren’t some high-tech, advanced race, but they had decent shelter and food.
Her gaze fell to the boxes of flowers lining the balcony railings. The bright reds, blues, and yellows made her smile. Stars, she wished her plants on the Nomad looked half as healthy as these.
Ignoring the lure of the flowers, she focused her thoughts.
All she had to do was find her e-beacon.
She needed to get back to her ship. That was the surefire way to ensure her brothers could find her.
Maybe something else on her ship could be salvaged, too.
She’d be her charming best and convince her rescuers to help her.
She heard the door open and spun.
As she watched, a man entered the room. Her heart did a hard kick against her ribs and her eyes widened.
Okay, not just a man, an enormous mountain of a barbarian.
He had hard muscle on top of hard muscle.
He was over six-and-a-half feet tall, maybe six-foot-eight.
He wore dark, slick trousers that molded to strong legs.
His chest was bare, except for a leather harness and bands of what looked like beaten gold at his wrists—and those were decorated with some sort of fur—and more swirling gold around his massive, rock-hard biceps.
That. Bare. Chest. Swallowing, she tried to drag her gaze off it.
He was all sculpted muscle right down to the hard ridges of his flat stomach.
She’d bet all her gems that he hadn’t paid an e-cred to have any of these muscles shaped for him in a salon.
His skin was fascinating too. It was a dark bronze with a metallic undertone that shimmered when the light hit it.
He literally looked like he was made of bronze metal.
“You are awake.”
The deep voice had her looking up into amber-brown eyes. He had a rugged face that was a little too hard to be called handsome. His black hair fell in a rain down to his broad shoulders.
She didn’t need her scout experience to see he was a warrior to the bone.
Her heart started to pound. She hitched the sheet higher.
“Calm yourself.” He closed the distance between them.
Aurina forced herself not to take any steps backward. “Who are you?”
“You are safe now.”
He was speaking English. The pronunciation was a little unique, but it was definitely English. How the hell did the people of some distant barbarian world in uncharted space speak English?
“Where are we?”
“My home.”
Okay. “And you are…?”
“I am Kavon Mal Dor.”
A bit of a mouthful, but it suited the size of him. “I’m Aurina Phoenix.”
“Aurina.” He drawled her name, like he was tasting each syllable. Then he fell silent for a second. “You are a skyflyer.”
He didn’t sound happy about it. “Yes, I guess I am.”
“Your…vehicle crashed.”
“I noticed.” She didn’t mean her tone to be so tart. She shifted and pain shot through her side. Air hissed through her teeth. It hurt a lot.
He reached out and gripped her arm. “Your injuries are still causing you pain.”
“Yes, Mr. Perceptive.” She bit her tongue, trying to breathe through the stabbing pain. Shit, she was supposed to be charming, not testy.
“I will call my chief healer to check you again.”
Healer? Great. When she needed a doctor, she got some barbarian healer instead. Unable to do anything else, Aurina sagged against the warrior and prayed she wasn’t going to be chanted over, or covered in slimy animals that sucked her blood. Clearly, his world wasn’t as advanced as she’d hoped.
She really was on her own.
“I need to get back to my ship.”
He frowned and urged her back toward the bed. “Your…ship is in pieces.”
Her stomach clenched. In pieces? She let him help her back onto the bed. God, if the emergency beacon was damaged, her brothers might never find her.
She’d be stuck here forever.