AydarrGoogle Read online

  “I have no doubts about your spirit. What more can I say to set your mind at rest? I’m not used to my honor being questioned.” He didn’t seem upset by her antagonistic attitude, or offended. “I swear by the Great Mother of us all, no one shall touch you without your permission, other than to help you heal.”

  At the end of her strength, she nodded. “All right then.”

  The night was a jarring collection of moments—times when she feared she was dying, times when she burned with fever or shivered uncontrollably with cold. She saw the vermore and screamed, trying to fight it, searching for projectiles to throw at its glaring red eyes. Disturbing hallucinations of the nest of baby vermores plagued her, crawling over her in the bed, making her skin itch. She found herself catapulted through time, dropped in the midst of the pitched battle on the planet Fantalar, terribly wounded buddies falling to the left and right. She was wounded, crawling to reach the safety of the Sectors lines…the torment of mind and body went on and on. Every worst nightmare she’d ever had came to haunt her.

  Each time she was recalled from the depths of the poison-induced madness by the golden glow of Aydarr’s eyes, his voice calling her name, commanding her to fight off the dark fantasies of her mind. When she was hot, he bathed her in cool water. When she shivered so hard her teeth chattered, he wrapped himself around her, cocooning her in his warmth, his delicious scent in her nostrils, clearing her mind for a few precious seconds of relief. He made her drink water, held her hair away from her face when she couldn’t keep the fluid down, rubbed her back, talked to her about things she couldn’t remember later, but the soothing nature of his voice calmed the anxiety and terror ripping her apart from the inside.

  The world narrowed itself to her madness and Aydarr fighting it for her.

  Finally, she slept wrapped in his strong arms.

  Aydarr adjusted Jill carefully in his arms, to make her more comfortable but not waken her. “How is she?” This last set of hallucinations had seemed less potent, and she’d been quietly sleeping for a little while now.

  “The crisis has passed,” Timtur said, checking the pulse of his sleeping patient. “She’ll survive, mostly due to her strong will and your stubbornness.”

  “Don’t forget your potions and power.” Aydarr gave credit where it was due. This Jill was a fighter, a soldier even, given how many of her hallucinations involved combat scenarios obviously based in reality. The worst moments had been when he could tell she was losing her grip on life, slipping away. He’d debated allowing her to go—the oblivion of death might actually be kinder than what life in this place would hold—but he found himself unable to relinquish her. She wanted to fight. He told himself that, and it was a truth but not the entire truth.

  He’d never seen a woman who attracted him so powerfully, from the first time he saw her as he jumped into the vermore’s pit and found her doing battle against the huge predator armed with nothing but rocks. Well thrown too. Aydarr smiled to himself. She has excellent aim.

  This woman would be a fearsome ally; a comrade to guard a man’s back as well as warm his bed. He smiled ruefully. If she first accepted the man of course. Petite she might be, but she’d made it abundantly clear she belonged to herself and a man would forget her boundaries at his peril.

  The alien females brought in on occasion by the Khagrish to provide instruction and demonstration of sexual seduction techniques as another, different kind of tool of war were hard bitten denizens of the interstellar sex trade. Not warm, not soft. Those women were willing to lie with Badari males for the price paid, but were there only for the most rapid encounters possible before departing in their clan ships without a backward glance. Not women he’d want to go into combat with, or even touch if the choice was his. The female Khagrish at the complex occasionally took a fancy to an unlucky Badari male and commanded his presence in their quarters. Those encounters were nightmares of another kind.

  Aydarr’s bleak thoughts were interrupted by a murmur of pain from Jill, so he adjusted how she was lying to make her more comfortable and covered her with the softest pelt. There was no telling why the Khagrish had dropped this woman from the Sectors into his pack’s section of the Preserve. He’d have to be guarded and cautious in how he dealt with her. His responsibility to the men he led demanded nothing less.

  But he felt powerfully drawn to Jill, which had given him the strength to do battle for her life this past day and night, to keep her anchored in this world. Anchored to him if he was being honest about his motives.

  This warrior woman with her short black hair and her incongruous, totally impractical pink nightgown was a new factor in his existence, and one he hoped might signal a change in the status quo. Or else why was she here?

  He knew to the core of his being he couldn’t bear to lose her so soon after finding her. Not before he got to know her as a person.

  Jill woke to the sounds of a fire crackling, birds singing at a distance, and her lying on a bed of furs, atop sweet smelling grasses and leaves, covered by a soft pelt. Disoriented, she stroked her hand across the plush gray blanket and tried to remember where she was, and why panic was revving her heartbeat.

  Centering herself with the mental exercises she’d been given in military training, she sat up, wobbling from light-headedness.

  The handsomest man she’d ever seen left his companions sitting beside the fire and rushed to help her.

  “Feeling better?” he asked. “Do you think you can eat today?”

  His voice and his touch summoned her memories. Aydarr, the man who rescued me from being lunch for the terrifying thing in the pit. There were other memories of him now too, holding her, arguing with her when she wanted to close her eyes and abandon the fight against the excruciating, painful nightmares. “You sat with me all night, didn’t you?”

  “Actually, it’s been two days.” He frowned. “The poison and the antidote hit you hard. I feared for you.”

  “But you were always right there—I heard your voice.” She blushed, remembering how he’d held her safe in his arms as well. “Thank you for rescuing me.”

  A second man she vaguely remembered walked up to them. “I’m happy to see you returned to your senses. I should examine the wound and the bite to evaluate the healing.”

  “As long as you don’t plan to make me swallow any more awful potions.” Licking her lips, she grimaced. “I remember that mud stuff you forced me to drink. My throat is still sore.” Jill extended her leg out from under the fur, happy to find she could move her limbs with ease. “You’re Timtur, right?”

  Aydarr changed position slightly to give the healer room to work, but he kept his arm where it was, bracing her shoulders. “Poison to drive out poison. The drink was necessary.”

  She decided she was okay with Aydarr’s support. There was nothing sexual about his touch, merely lending strength she needed at the moment. “I’m not arguing.” Jill watched closely as Timtur untied the vines holding gray leaves against her entire lower leg and foot. “Take my advice and don’t try it again.” As the medic carefully removed the leaves, she noticed orange stains on her skin from the remnants of a poultice.

  Timtur wiped her leg clean with gentle strokes and peered closely at the bite then the cut on her foot. “Excellent progress. “

  “Thanks to the two of you, I think.”

  The healer made quick work of applying a fresh layer of the mud-like poultice then tying new leaves over it. “Tomorrow we’ll leave the wounds open to the air but, for today, more soaking is required. Stay in bed and rest.”

  He bowed his head and moved away. A younger man took his place, handing Aydarr a bowl of soup that smelled delicious to Jill as her stomach growled. He handed her a crudely carved wooden spoon. “I’ll hold the bowl for you.”

  She ate about a third of the savory liquid before she was too tired to do any more. As he took the utensil from her trembling hand, she reclined on the improvised mattress, unable to sustain a sitting position any longer.
r />   “I’ll leave you to get more sleep,” he said.

  Fighting the lethargy and drowsiness, Jill caught him by the arm. “Stay and talk? I have so many questions.”

  “And I may not have answers.” His grin was wide and cheerful.

  “Where are we? Because this isn’t the world where I went to sleep a few days ago.”

  He leaned against the cave wall. “We have no name for this planet.”

  Odd, if they live here. “You’re Aydarr, right?”

  “Of the Badari. I lead this pack.”

  “Pack?” An odd word to choose.

  He shook his head. “You have much to learn and many of the facts will be highly unpleasant to you, I fear. Upsetting. Timtur will give me a hard time if I overtax your mind so soon with too many details of our situation.”

  Annoyed, she touched the smooth black bracelet on his arm, noticing they all wore one. Tapping her fingers on the matching band she wore, she asked, “Did you put this on me?”

  He shook his head. “The Khagrish placed it there, as they did on all of us.”

  “Which tells me exactly nothing.” She took a deep breath. Venting her fear and frustration on this man wasn’t going to help the situation. “I’m grateful for you rescuing me from the bug-eyed thing in the pit and nursing me through the poison venom attack. Can we start the conversation over? The last thing I remember before I had to sprint blindly across the grasslands in a thunder storm and fell in a pit, is going to sleep in my own bed on Amarcae 7. After which I woke up here in the rain. Do you know how I got here? Did—did you kidnap me?”

  “My pack and I weren’t deployed on your world. Others may have been—I have no way to know.”

  The military term gave her pause. Two of the men approached, with servings of meat and fruit on large, leathery leaves, and one carried another gourd of water.

  “These are my enforcers, Reede and Mateer,” he said, as he accepted the food and handed her the water.

  Mateer, a burly guy with a friendly expression, was the man who’d carried her out of the pit. “You did well, fighting the vermore the other day.”

  “Thanks for coming to help—all of you. I’m grateful.” She glanced from one to the other, trying to keep her face pleasant despite the fact she was itching for real answers.

  Aydarr nodded in acknowledgment of her thanks as he chewed a hunk of the meat. He washed it down with a swig of the water then said, “We haven’t decided yet what you are, Jill of Amarcae, but I pledge to ensure your safety to the full extent of my ability to do so. If anything happens to me, my enforcers will watch out for you. Unless you’re the cause of danger to us.”

  Jill inferred from their expressions that the two men weren’t entirely on board with their boss’s decision. “What I am? I’m a human woman, obviously, a resident of the Sectors. Why would I be dangerous to you?”

  “You could be an innocent trapped in this situation as we are, or you could be a trick of some kind, or worse. The Khagrish never take any action without a hidden purpose and placing you here in the Preserve, in my territory, must carry a meaning.” Mateer and Reede walked away in response to a signal from Aydarr. “Time will tell, but I wasn’t going to leave you to die. The Badari have honor, despite what the Khagrish believe.”

  Plucking the water gourd from the spot where he’d set it, she took a cautious drink then a longer swallow, deciding what to ask next. “And who are the other men with us here?”

  “Soldiers. And newly promoted cadets.”

  The two clearly younger men at the fringes of the cave had been watching her with open curiosity but now lowered their eyes.

  Jill did a double take as claws materialized at the tips of Aydarr’s fingers, and he shredded the cooked meat for her, as if he was wielding knives. Then the talons were gone as if nothing had happened, and he handed her the plate leaf.

  She swallowed. “How did you do that?”

  He shrugged as he bit off a chunk of his own meal. “I’m not prepared to explain myself to you. Forgive me for being rude, however. Not offering to share the meat earlier.”

  OK. A bit affronted, Jill scooted further away with her plate and ate a few bites of the savory meat. She set the empty leaf on the sandy floor beside the pile of sweet smelling grasses. “Am I free to go then?”

  Aydarr eyed her. “Why would you wish to venture into the Preserve unarmed and unaware of the dangers here? After what you just went through?”

  “Merely testing the limits of your hospitality.”

  “I would have to risk my men to save you again. No. You’re in my territory, I’ve declared you mine, you will stay safe with the pack.”

  Eyeing his muscular frame and undeniably handsome face, she thought maybe in another time and place she might not have minded meeting his possessive claim. The two of them could have battled this out until they got a few things straight between them and most likely ended up in the bedroom because he was flat-out hot. But the situation here wasn’t like anything she’d ever encountered. It felt like she was in an adventure trideo, and she had to walk carefully. “I belong to myself, for your information.”

  “I’m aware.” He chuckled. “You told me quite forcefully on the first night. This is a highly impractical garment, by the way.” He gestured vaguely at her lacy nightgown.

  “Says the man wearing a loincloth.” She bit her lip after her immediate response. Probably shouldn’t have admitted I noticed. Impossible not to. The skimpy garment didn’t do much to hide the fact he was built to scale everywhere.

  With no warning, he swept her close, ignoring her instinctive protest and struggle as she shoved back. “But we Badari can easily regulate our body temperatures to stay warm whereas you, human woman, are freezing again. I see your shivers. You mustn’t do too much until you’ve fully recovered. I think you need sleep more than you need to ask me questions and receive what are inevitably meaningless answers to you.”

  Aydarr moved her to the far side of the fragrant mattress, facing the cave wall, and spooned himself around her, one arm holding her close to him. When he didn’t make any other moves, Jill gradually allowed herself to relax into the undeniable warmth he was providing. He was a wall of rock hard muscle behind her and she was cold.

  The cave was quiet. Jill stopped fighting the urge to sleep. Who knew what tomorrow might bring? So far these men had done nothing to harm or threaten her, but neither had they answered her questions. Her hosts obviously understood a lot more than she did about where she was, and who or what the ominous Khagrish might be. Jill fiddled with the bracelet on her wrist.

  Aydarr hugged her closer to him, closing his fingers over her hand. “Rest,” he said in a low murmur.

  CHAPTER TWO

  When she awoke the next time, it appeared to be morning again. She’d apparently slept through yet another day and night. Aydarr was gone. Sitting up to stretch, Jill picked a leaf from her short hair, flicked it away and checked the cave. There was no sign of Aydarr or the other warriors.

  One of the cadets was tending the fire. Realizing she was awake, he said, “We saved you two pieces of fruit. And there’s a bit of leftover meat.”

  She climbed from the makeshift bed, taking the blanket to use as a bulky cloak and walked to the fire, accepting a curiously shaped yellow fruit and taking a cautious bite. The sweetness of the juice was welcome on her tongue. “Thank you. I’m Jill, and you are?”

  “Pratym.”

  “Nice to meet you.” She tugged on the edges of the pelt to cover as much of her as possible, on general principles. She trusted Aydarr, but he wasn’t available to intervene. “I see I’m not the only one who got wounded the other day. What happened to you?” She pointed to his heavily bandaged leg.

  Pratym grimaced, averting his eyes as if embarrassed to admit to a weakness. “We were hunting, and I tripped. The beast gored me before the rest of the pack drove it off. But I can maintain the required pace.”

  “Life appears to be pretty risky here,” she sai
d. “Not boring for long anyway. I’ll be ready for breakfast in a minute.” She headed for the cave entrance.

  Immediately, he rose to block her path. “The Alpha didn’t say you could leave the cave.”

  “Unless there’s a bathroom in here someone forgot to show me, I’m going outside.” She sidestepped around him and kept walking. She wondered how they’d dealt with her needs when she’d been so out of it with the poison and the antidote, but decided not to think about the subject too closely. Timtur was a healer, practically a doctor, right? Whatever was done was in the past.

  He grabbed her arm, and she pulled away from him, clutching at the fur, adrenaline surging in case she was going to have to fight in a minute.

  “Pratym.” Aydarr stood in the entrance, frowning. “I gave no permission to lay hands on the woman.”

  “She was going to—”

  “I’ll escort her.” He moved aside to let her leave the cave then directed her toward a small stand of nearby trees. “You can have privacy here, but I’ll stand watch. We’ll be heading toward Intake soon, to answer the summons. Fortunate you’re much recovered today, so you can travel more easily.”

  “What’s Intake?” She picked a likely spot in the bushes and checked to make sure he wasn’t watching and none of the other Badari were in the vicinity. As he’d promised, he was gallantly facing the other direction, rubbing his arm where the bracelet sat.

  Rejoining him a moment later, she strolled toward the cave and he followed.

  He waved one hand at the rolling grasslands and groves of trees. “This is the Preserve.”

  “Yes, I remember you called it that the other night.”

  “It’s an enclosure with force field boundaries.”