“A ship! I need a ship!” he roared.
“You can take mine!” Iyanna said quickly, pressing an unlocking mechanism into his hand. “It’s the shuttle closest to the Docking Bay entrance and it’s already got the coordinates for the animal sanctuary coded in.”
Brux snatched the key from her so fast her fingers barely brushed his palm. Then he looked at Commander Rarev.
Rarev held his gaze for a long, charged heartbeat. Then the lion—faced commander gave one sharp nod.
“Go,” he said. “The Mother Ship will fold space for you. And we will pray to the Goddess that you aren’t too late.”
Brux didn’t wait for another word.
He spun and raced down the hallway toward the Docking Bay, the restraint cuffs already falling away behind him as one of the warriors deactivated them. The living corridors of the Mother Ship blurred around him—arched walls, flowering sconces, woven—root floors all flying past in a streak of green and purple and gold.
He ran as hard as he had ever run in either form and all he could think about was Kiera.
Kiera tied up somewhere, and frightened…Kiera calling for help…Kiera alone with that stinking bastard Higgs.
A low, savage growl built in his chest as he ran. If Higgs had hurt her—if he had laid one hand on her, one filthy hand?—
Brux’s vision went red at the edges as Rage threatened to take him over.
If the woman he loved had been hurt or killed, he would go completely primal–he knew it.
He would let the beast have its head and use every ounce of the animal strength he had been trying so hard to keep chained— to tear the male apart with his bare hands. He would rip him limb from limb and leave the bloody pieces for whatever scavengers prowled the edges of Plo’nix’s hills.
The thought didn’t calm him in the least–it only fed the Rage growing inside him and made him run faster.
Kiera, he thought wildly, racing toward the Docking Bay and the waiting shuttle. Hold on, sweetheart–I'm coming!
And may the Gods help anyone who got in his way.
29
KIERA
Kiera was shivering so hard her teeth wouldn’t stop chattering.
The cold had gotten to her fast—much faster than she would have believed possible. It bit through her t—shirt and jeans as though they were made of tissue paper instead of cloth and sank straight into her skin and bones. Her fingers felt clumsy and numb already. Her nose burned every time she inhaled. Even the inside of her mouth tasted cold, metallic and sharp–as though the freezing air itself had a flavor.
She hugged herself as best she could with her bound hands and forced herself to think. She had to get a grip–panicking wasn’t going to help.
The first thing to do was get untied if she could. Then she could get up, move around, maybe find a way out…or at least keep from freezing to death before anyone came looking for her.
Though who would come looking? she thought miserably. Iyanna would think she was waiting at the sanctuary for the shuttle. Brux—oh, Brux—was still on the Mother Ship. Nobody knew where Higgs had taken her.
No, don’t think about that, she lectured herself. Think about the ropes and how to get out of them.
Kiera looked down at her hands. They were tied in front of her, at least, which was something. Higgs had apparently decided that her wrists bound together and her ankles tied were enough to keep her helpless. He probably thought the freezing cold would do the rest.
Well, maybe for some girls, she thought fiercely. But not me.
Clumsily, because her fingers were so cold they barely seemed to belong to her anymore, she bent forward and began fumbling at the cord around her ankles.
The synthetic line was slick and stiff and bit into her fingertips, but after several agonizing minutes of tugging and twisting and swearing through chattering teeth, she managed to loosen the knot enough to get one boot free.
“Oh, thank G-g-god,” she whispered.
The words came out in a little white puff of vapor.
