“The color of the fire-berry?” Nyoki’s chin notched up. “I can spin the jewels to be an exact match.”
“Really?”
“’Tis a vow amongst Galians.”
“How long will it take?”
“The gemstones I require must be bartered from one of the far sectors before it can be spun.” She pursed her lips in thought. “’Mayhap one moon-month? Leastways, two at most.”
“I’m not sure how much longer I’ll be in Crystal City. If I pay extra credits can you send it by yoma when it’s finished?”
Nyoki waved a hand. “I have never charged a customer more credits for delivery do they dwell within Galis. For a certainty I shan’t start now.” She grinned. “’Tis true then that The Gy’at Lis still rely upon the yoma for travel and deliveries?”
“Klykka insists on keeping everything as utilitarian and basic as possible. She doesn’t believe warriors should ever rely on technology so very little in our sector is based on it.” Kari grinned back. “So yeah, we still use the flying monkeys.”
“There’s no method of instant transport available in your sector?”
“We have holo-ports for humanoids coming to and going from our sector, but no transporters once you’re inside. From there it’s all done by yoma.”
“I may just deliver the zokas myself. In all my moon-risings I’ve yet to see a yoma in person.”
“They are much bigger standing next to you than they look in the sky.”
“Now I know ‘twill be I who makes the delivery. I needs must see this!”
They chatted for a few more minutes after which Kari paid the necessary credits for her purchases. “It’s been a pleasure, Nyoki.” Kari smiled. “If I don’t see you again before I leave Crystal City then I hope to see you in my sector.”
“You will, galishi. ‘Tis a vow, that.”
Kari admired Klykka more after her conversation with Nyoki Zha’Ri than she had before, which was saying a lot. She’d never understood her adoptive sister’s insistence on retaining such Spartan ways, but she got it now. Klykka was actually quite genius. If Galis ever came under attack, the Gy’at Li sector would be the toughest to breach let alone conquer. Technology couldn’t be used against them, making the yoma the only available transportation system. More loyal than dogs to their humans, the flying monkeys of Gy’at Li would defend their humanoids to the death.
Kari strolled back toward the purple, crystal dwelling that was her temporary abode. Lost in thought, she didn’t realize she was being tracked.
Or that the one hunting her could barely contain his fury.
Chapter Ten
Kari walked into the nearest entrance pod of the purple, crystal edifice. The doors to the pod whisked shut behind her. She held up her palm so the transporter could identify her and instantaneously spit her out on the 700th floor. Stepping out of the transport, she heard the pod whizz shut.
“You permitted another warrior to touch you.”
Kari yelped. Her eyes round and heart racing, she whirled around to face the intruder.
Her breath caught in the back of her throat. It was him. He hadn’t forgotten her after all. Half elated to see him and half wary about his presence in Klykka’s penthouse, she latched onto the latter. “How did you get in here?”
“Why did you permit another warrior to taste you?”
“I asked you a question.”
“Why?” he barked.
Kari’s nose wrinkled. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
His golden gaze was frightening in its intensity. His musculature, intimidating on a normal day, was increasingly so tonight. She could see his vein-roped arms cording and tensing, which only served to exaggerate her wariness. He looked ready to kill her where she stood. Swallowing roughly, Kari instinctively took a step back.
“You permitted another warrior to lick your channel.”
She blinked. “My channel?”
“Aye. Your channel.”
She ran a shaky hand through her hair. “I don’t even know what a channel is and you never answered my question.” She forced her chin up and feigned a sense of control over the situation she didn’t feel. “Until you answer it, I’m done listening to this.”
“I have my ways,” the giant murmured. “Leastways, you paid no heed to your surroundings when trekking back from the bartering stalls. ‘Twas not difficult to enter the transport behind you.”
How did a man so large walk so quietly? There she went swallowing again.
For some reason, until this moment, Kari hadn’t noticed all his tattoos. There was more than the skull on his forehead—his chiseled arms were covered in them. The effect would have been arousing under normal conditions, but in this circumstance it only added further intimidation to his already commanding presence.
“A channel,” the warrior grimly instructed Kari, “is what Galians call a pussy.” He took a single step, putting him directly in front of her. “For a certainty you let another warrior touch and lick upon it.”
Kari’s mouth worked up and down, but nothing came out.
“Never lie to me, pani.”
Pani. The Trystonni word for “baby” that differed in meaning upon its context. Since she wasn’t his child, Kari safely assumed he’d just called her by an intimate term of endearment. Channel must have been Trystonni slang for she’d never heard the word before, but pani she definitely knew. She didn’t know whether to feel honored or terrified.
“You mean during one of my last shows?”
“Aye.”
She flung her arm out. “You weren’t there and I had a job to do!” She took another step back so she could glare up at his face. Her eyes narrowed. “I looked for you. Every night I looked! Finally Arista started getting suspicious and asked why I hadn’t let another patron bring me to peak.” Her lips turned down. “I did what I had to do.”
His glowing, gold gaze searched her silvery-blue one. “You looked for me?”
Kari’s face blanched. She shouldn’t be encouraging him. She knew what his kind did to women. She broke his stare and cast her eyes downward.
“You looked for me?” His hand, massive enough to crush her skull like a tin can, cradled her chin and gently prodded it up. “Answer me,” he murmured.
“Yes,” she quietly admitted, “I did.”
His gaze searched hers. She wanted him so bad she could cry.
“You should go.” Kari pulled away and walked toward the doors, preparing to press the button that would summon the pod. She had to remain strong and keep her promise to Klykka. “This can’t happen. This can never happen.”
He didn’t move, just watched her. “I can smell your arousal, wee one.”
Kari blew out a breath. She didn’t know if he meant that literally, but suspected he did. Either way, his thickly murmured words made her arousal a thousand times worse.
“I don’t even know your name,” Kari said feebly. She regained her self-control long enough to wave a dismissive hand. “Not that it matters because this can’t happen!”
“It can. And for a certainty, it will.”
Her eyes widened. “You mean to rape me?”
“I won’t have to rape you.”
She wished her mouth wasn’t cotton-dry because the need to gulp yet again was paramount. “This,” she shakily repeated, “can never happen.” She steeled herself against any argument the warlord might make. She raised a palm. “I know what your kind do to women and it won’t be done to me. You need to leave. Please.”
“What do we do?” he asked. His expression was stoic, but his eyes were amused.
Her jaw tightened. “You steal women. You put those weird necklaces around their necks—” She pointed toward the bridal necklace he wore. “And throw them into harems where they’re never heard from again.”
The amusement didn’t leave his eyes. “Death.”
“Huh?”
“My name is Death.”
Chills worked up and down Kari’s
spine. Talk about throwing a bucket of ice water over the libido. “So you don’t intend to rape me, just fuck me and kill me.” She knew her eyes were bulging because they felt ready to pop out of her head. She reached for the button to the pod, preparing to escape through it. “You people are even more barbaric than legend allows, which is saying a lot!”
What the fuck have I done?! Holy shit! I need to get out of here!
Her heart racing, Kari fumbled for the button to the pod, not wanting to take her eyes off the towering, eight-foot threat looming close to her. She ignored the fact he was staring at her as though she were a simpleton.
“Stay back!” Kari yelled, her hand still blindly searching for the escape button. “Nobody is killing me!” Terrified, she gave the giant her back so she could see the pod’s control. “His name is Death,” she hysterically mumbled to herself while pushing the button. “All the men in Crystal City and I find the serial killer!”
The transporter’s doors whizzed open. She ran inside, only to have a muscular arm unforgivingly snatch her back into the penthouse. The scene was hopelessly reminiscent of Ann Darrow attempting to flee from King Kong.
“’Tis my name, High Lord Death,” he grunted. “’Tis not a bedamned metaphor nor a pronouncement of your impending doom.”
“Oh my God! Oh my God!” Kari screamed, her body flailing against his hold. Her heart threatened to beat out of her chest. “Somebody help meeeeee! A serial kil—” She abruptly stopped kicking and fell limp. She was silent for a long moment while she steadied her breathing. “Your actual name is fucking Death?!”
“Nay. Just Death. Not fucking Death.”
She frowned at his shitty attempt at humor. “That’s the stupidest name I’ve ever heard! What the hell was your mother thinking, naming you that?! And put me down!”
“’Tis not the name bestowed upon me at birth.” He set her on the ground. “’Tis the name I was given by my Master whilst a slave.”
Kari blinked. She turned around to face him. His golden gaze had dimmed somewhat, melting the righteous indignation straight out of her. “You were a slave?”
“Aye.”
“And now a high lord?”
“Aye.”
She shook her head as if to clear it. “Why didn’t you discard your slave name and reclaim your birth name?”
“And so I shall when he has died at my hands.”
Now he was definitely talking about killing someone, but this time Kari wasn’t frightened. Nor could she blame him. The warlord had to be talking about the man who’d once owned him and lord only knows what the giant endured while in chains.
She’d never been more confused in her life. Her brain screamed to run, but her body wanted to stay exactly where it was. The chaotic state of bewilderment she’d been thrust into was dizzying in its force.
Kari had to make a choice and she had to make it now. Listen to her head and obey Klykka as she always did or follow her heart and succumb to eight feet of temptation. Why, why, why did this man who haunted her every thought have to be the one species of male she couldn’t have?
He must have realized she was in turmoil. The giant slowly ran a massive hand through her hair. “The color of the fire-berry,” he softly rumbled. “’Tis as beautiful as you.”
Kari closed her eyes and sipped in a few calming breaths. She was tired of fighting him off in her dreams and had even less desire to fend him off in reality. This thrust and parry pretense was exhausting and futile. She knew what she wanted; she’d realized it the first moment she saw him.
Kari opened her eyes and slowly looked up. There would be no more lying to herself or to him, no more running from what “the gift” screamed was right. Klykka might never understand her choice, but neither did The Gy’at Li have to live with the “what-ifs” Kari understood would forever haunt her if she walked away from this moment in time.
She gently cleared her throat. Her gaze searched his. “I’m not calling you ‘Death’.”
He studied her face. “Why not?”
“Because I’ve been in this galaxy for seventeen Yessat Years and the only time I’ve truly felt alive is when you’re looking at me.”
Silence.
The tension was thick, but the burden of pretending had been lifted from her. When the warrior remained silent, Kari experienced a moment of trepidation from her honesty. In the end, no matter what happened, she decided she wouldn’t regret being true to herself.
“Isar,” the giant finally murmured. “My name is Isar Kal Draji.”
Her eyes softened and her heart skipped a beat. “Isar,” Kari whispered. “That’s a beautiful name.”
“I would that I could put my necklace on you. Leastways, you are safe, pani, for I will not test you as a Sacred Mate until the evil has been vanquished.”
She had no idea what most of his words meant, but she rightly concluded he wouldn’t steal her away and throw her into a harem. She just wished that knowledge felt as liberating as it should.
“You are a virgin,” he said thickly.
The sudden change in topic threw her for a moment. “No.” She looked away. “It’s been a long time, but I’m not a virgin.”
“You do not carry the scent of a warrior.”
Her head flew back up. “You can smell that?!” Did Trystonni males have heightened senses like animals or something? “And I didn’t say I was with a warrior.”
“A humanoid of a lower species?”
Kari frowned. “Of my species, yes.”
There went his eyes, dancing again. The change would have been imperceptible to anyone not closely studying him.
“My people do not consider wenches of any species to be lowly. Leastways, only their males are below our notice.”
Kari swallowed with a little less difficulty. His speech reeked of unintentional arrogance, but she could live with that. It didn’t matter what value or lack thereof he placed on male humans because the chances of him ever meeting one was in the zilch-to-nada range. She didn’t agree human men were lesser beings than warriors, but she wearily admitted any male paled in comparison to the tattooed one standing before her. At least where she was concerned.
“’Twill hurt,” Death said.
Kari blinked a few times. She wasn’t following his train of thought. “What will hurt?”
“The first time I impale you.”
She wet her lips. The apprehension and doubt was returning.
“Leastways, I will be gentle with you when I breach your maidenhead, but once your channel accepts my shaft inside and you are a virgin no more, I make no vow that I can continue to be gentle.”
He hadn’t even touched her and already she was wet. She blew out a breath.
“Make no mistake, pani. You are mine and your virginity belongs to me.”
He really viewed her as a virgin. She hesitantly wondered just how well endowed the giant was.
“Remove your zoka,” Death said thickly. “Then lead me to your bedchamber.”
This was everything Kari wasn’t supposed to let happen—and everything she wanted more than air to breathe. She raised a beleaguered palm to her forehead. “What the hell is happening to me?” she dramatically wailed. “Seventeen Yessat Years I’ve been in this crazy place and the first man I’m attracted to is causing me to lose what’s left of my mind!”
“Remove your zoka lest I remove it for you.”
Her clit pulsed. She shouldn’t break her vow to Klykka, but every word he uttered made her arousal grow stronger. “Isar…”
“Don’t force me to test you,” the warrior warned. His words were spoken in a deep, gravelly timbre with a hint of reverberation—much like a computer-synthesized voice back home—and they made no sense to her. “Do you pass the test, ’twill make it nigh unto excruciating for the both of us when I must leave to hunt him.”
“Test me? I don’t understand what you’re talking—hey!”
Kari yelped as her zoka and sandals fell to the ground. She was completely
naked. “What the hell happ— Did you do this?” Nobody had warned her that Trystonni warriors possessed telekinetic powers! She was clearly out of her league here. “How did you…”
The giant’s expression, for once not stoic, looked pained. She didn’t understand anything that was happening, or why being able to remove her clothing with his mind was significant to him, but for reasons she couldn’t explain the thought of him hurting was unbearable. Her face softened. “Isar…”
“You are mine,” he rasped out, “yet I cannot claim you. ‘Tis cruel irony, this.”
Kari had no idea what he was talking about, but the emotional pain he was suffering caused her heart to wrench. His glowing, golden eyes dimmed again—an indication she’d come to realize meant he was in agony. “Isar,” she murmured, “I don’t understand…”
“’Tis best you don’t. I shall carry this burden alone, pani.”
Kari’s gentle gaze soaked up the sight of the man standing before her. Isar was eight feet tall and probably four to five hundred pounds of solid, honed muscle. His dark hair was inky black and, she remembered from the night at Mettle Tavern, silky to the touch. His golden-brown skin, so sexy, accentuated the golden hue of his again glowing eyes. His jaw, rigid and masculine, was perfect in its angularity. Even the skull tattooed onto his forehead, which had undoubtedly been branded on him by the bastard who’d once enslaved him, only added to his appeal. It was barbarically tribal in appearance, the skull figure only apparent by the lines and curves that formed it when standing close to him. The black leather vest he wore called attention to his powerful chest and arms. The matching leather pants failed to hide his intimidating musculature, as well as his massive erection.
Kari bit her lip. She hadn’t even seen his penis yet, but judging by the obvious bulge, she doubted he’d fit inside her without killing her.
“Do not fear me, little one,” Isar murmured. “I would never bring harm to you.”
“I know,” she quietly admitted.
Kari hesitated for a brief moment. She had promised The Gy’at Li she would never do this, but when the vow had been made Kari couldn’t have possibly realized the powerful effect this man would have on her. She could feel his emptiness, his loneliness, as if it were a tangible thing. That shared experience only made the inexplicable bond between them stronger.