Chapter Eighteen
It clicked in Zhor’s mind as he watched the conkerrie make off with Ah-na that this was the two bounty hunters his old friend had warned him about—this conkerrie and the zorph he had stolen Ah-na from were the two who had gone to the village searching for her. And she was in far more trouble than merely being stolen for a mate.
He did not know why he had not made the connection immediately except that he had been in a state of denial from the time Baden had told him her people wanted her dead.
And nearly getting his head bashed in had rattled his brains!
He shook the thoughts. It was pointless to waste time blaming himself for his failings. He had to take her back before the bastard could turn her over to her people.
Always assuming he did not mean to present them with a corpse.
He shook that thought, as well. If he had meant to kill her he could have done it already.
It was cold comfort, but he could not allow his mind to be tied up in useless speculation. He needed to keep his wits about him if Ah-na was to have any chance at all.
It was difficult to merely follow and resist the urge to catch up and challenge the conkerrie, but it did not take a great deal of thought to realize there would be no winners of such a contest. He would have to wait until the conkerrie settled somewhere otherwise even if he succeeded in killing the conkerrie, the chances were high that she would fall to her death. Hemightbe able to pluck her from the conkerrie, but he did not feel very confident that he could.
And beyond that, he would be risking the chance of striking her when he struck at the conkerrie.
No. As little as he liked it, he would have to wait and hope that the conkerrie decided to make camp before reaching the outlanders.
He was in luck. Shortly before dusk, the conkerrie began to glide toward the ground. Keeping watch to make certain the conkerrie didn’t spot him, Zhor dropped to tree top level and kept flying until he was close enough to see where they’d landed. He scanned the terrain then to determine which direction would give him the maximum advantage for an attack and spotted something curious only a mile or so away.
Wondering if this was the conkerrie’s destination, he decided to check it out.
He’d gotten just close enough to determine that it was a compound of some sort—alien he was almost certain—when he slammed into something he couldn’t even see and rebounded, hitting the ground hard enough it rattled every tooth in his head.
He was too stunned and disoriented to move for several moments after he landed.
Raucous laughter penetrated his stupor, however, sending a tsunami of rage washing over him.
* * * *
Annika was still trying to get her ‘land legs’ when Zhor charged through the thick brush and into the small clearing where Ragnor the dragon man was crouched, trying to start a fire. The noise brought the dragon man instantly surging to his feet. He drew his sword from its scabbard as he straightened, meeting Zhor’s attack handily enough to defect the blow Zhor had swung at him.
Annika sucked in a frightened breath that transformed to joy when she realized it was Zhor and back to terror when she saw he was locked in a life or death battle with the dragon man—who was nearly a head taller and probably substantially heavier and with a longer reach.
“No!” she screamed before she considered it might distract Zhor.
The dragon man nearly took his head off when he whipped a look in her direction at the sound.
She clamped both hands over her mouth.
Fortunately, the scream had also distracted the dragon man. Both men managed to recover and counter.
The ringing of the blades of their swords was nearly deafening and the close quarters was almost as detrimental to Zhor as it was Ragnor. She expected any moment that one or the other would trip over her or a bush and go down and it would all be over.
Instead it seemed to go on and on—forever.
She could see Zhor was tiring faster than Ragnor—and no wonder when he’d been hurt by that bastard only a few days earlier.
She had to do something!
The dragon man was going to kill Zhor!
Struggling to get up, she cast around for some kind of weapon and finally found a broken limb that looked sturdy enough to use for a club.
Gripping it with both hands—no choice really when her wrists were still tied together!—she hopped (because her ankles were also still tied together) over until she was close enough to pound on the dragon man with it. Her efforts were too clumsy and too handicapped by her predicament to produce much damage, but she certainly distracted him!
