Purity (Pure and Tainted) (37 page)

Chapter Thirty-one

Boone stood in the doorway for a long moment, shoulders slumped,
eyes burning. God…to think he had lost her just like that. How was it even
possible? How could it be that they had gotten to her in time to keep her from
getting purged—killed—and he had still lost her?

Slowly, his head came up.

“No,” he growled, his voice thick with rage. “No, I don’t fucking
accept this. I
can’t
fucking
accept this
.
K
,”
he shouted, striding after her down
the metal corridor. “If you think I’m going to just let you walk out of here,
walk out of my life forever without—”

His words were interrupted by a thumping sound and a muffled
exclamation of pain. Then he heard K yelling something and…was that
barking?
What the hell was going on?

Boone broke into a run. He rounded the corner and skidded to a
stop when he saw K lying on her back on the floor with something small and
furry dancing all over her chest. Another animal just like it was prancing
around her feet.

“K?” he asked, bewildered. “What the hell…?”

“They tripped me.” Her black-on-black eyes were wide. “The first
one ran right under my feet and tripped me so this one could jump on me!”

“Oh, you naughty boys!”
Mom
came
racing up the hallway, completely out of breath. “I’m sorry, Boone!” she
gasped, panting. “I know I shouldn’t have taken them but we were halfway from
Minotaur when I found them hiding under my bed and then they were so sweet and
quiet I just couldn’t bear to give them up. Really, they’ve been no trouble at
all until just now but when they heard K’s voice on board again they just
seemed to go crazy.
Especially that one.”

She pointed at the small furry animal enthusiastically licking K’s
face.

Finally Boone’s stunned eyes made sense of what he was seeing. He
took a closer look at the tiny furry animals with their big pointed ears and
bushy tails and understood.

“The voxes!”
He bent down to scoop up the
excited little creature still prancing around K’s outstretched legs. It
immediately began bathing his face with its long pink tongue. Its eyes whirled
like jewels, flashing colors at him—deep gray, muddy brown, angry black…

My feelings,
he realized suddenly.
It’s showing everything I feel.
And
right now he felt gutted—completely destroyed and enraged at the thought of
losing K.

K!

Quickly he turned to her. The vox she was holding on her chest
looked up at him and howled mournfully. Its eyes spun even more quickly than
the eyes of Boone’s vox.
Stormy bluish-gray, bruised purple,
sickly green…the vox’s eyes registered everything she felt.

And what she was feeling was a far cry from nothing.

Suddenly K seemed to realize she was being watched.

“What are you doing? Why are you staring at me?” she asked sharply,
scrambling to her feet with the howling vox still in her arms.

Boone gave her a long look. “I always said these little guys told
on you, didn’t I? That’s why you didn’t like them.”

“What are you talking about?” she demanded.

“You know what I’m talking about.” He reached out with a free hand
and cupped her flushed cheek. “K…”

“Boone, I…” Her voice began to tremble and a single tear escaped
one of her black-on-black eyes. She brought her hand up to his. “Oh, Purity, I
can’t do this. I’m sorry. I…I…thought…”

Boone took the vox from her gently and handed both of the yipping little
creatures back to Mom. “Here. Take them away—K and I have to talk.
Really
talk this time.”

“I don’t…I can’t…” K protested as he led her back toward his
quarters.

“You can and you will.” Boone closed the door and sat her firmly
on the sleeping platform. “Now talk. And this time don’t lie to me about what
you feel. This time tell me the truth.”

* * * * *

“I don’t know what you expect me to say.” K looked away from him,
her insides churning. To be caught in her lie so easily! To be told on by those
yipping little creatures she’d warned Boone about back on Minotaur!
If only…

“I expect you to say you love me,” he said softly. “Because I love
you and I think—I hope—you feel the same way.”

“I told you…” K took a deep breath. “I don’t even know what love
is.”

“Then just tell me how you’re feeling—
what
you’re feeling.
Right now.
And don’t
lie and say nothing,” he said sternly. “We both know that isn’t true.”

“All right.”
K’s shoulders slumped. “But it
won’t change anything. It’s just…just going to make things harder.”

“Nothing could be harder than thinking you don’t care, darlin’,”
Boone said gently. “Go on…tell me.”

“I feel…I feel…like I might die when I think about life without
you,” K started in a low, broken voice. “I want to be with you all the
time…touching you…feeling your arms around me, holding me. But I know…I know
that can never be. Because even stronger than my desire to be with you is my
desire not to hurt you.” She took a deep breath. “That’s why…that’s why I
couldn’t shoot you. The
drugs from my suit, the High
Sentinel…everything from the outside was
telling me I had to blast you.
But something in here…” She put a fist to her chest.
“Wouldn’t
let me.”

“Oh, baby…” He lifted her chin and looked into her eyes. “Sounds
like love to me.”

“It doesn’t matter if it is or not.” K shook off his touch. “If I
take off my suit and finish out my cycle, I’ll kill you. If I leave it on, I’ll
have to take years to train it—years during which we can never fully consummate
our relationship. Years when you’ll never even be able to
touch
me. You’ll be stuck with a sexless robot. How’s that for
love, Boone?”

“I told you I have a solution for all that,” he said gently.

“You said you
thought
you
had something that
might
work
.
And you said it would take months to
test it. I don’t
have
months, Boone.
I have a few hours—half a day max before I start having complications from
wearing an unconditioned suit.”

“Wait a minute, wait a minute…” He held up a hand. “What do you
mean ‘an unconditioned suit
?’
Start from the
beginning.”

K took a deep breath and explained everything Hesler had told her.
“So I only have a few hours before I start having problems. How sure are you
that your formula will work?”

“Not sure enough.” Boone looked grim. “Not sure enough to bet your
life on it, K.”

“Then we’re stuck.” K felt a lump in her throat again and tried to
hold back the tears. “There’s nothing we can do. Oh, Boone—if only you’d let me
go. It would have been easier if I never had to tell you this.”

“The hell it would,” he said roughly. “At least now I know you
want
to be with me. That you still
care.”

“Yes, I care. Even if…even if we can’t do anything about it,” K
said quietly. She sighed. “What were you working on, anyway?”

He ran a hand over his face tiredly.
“A DNA
swap.
I was going to take some of your DNA and give you some of mine. I
thought that would help me keep up with your Erian mating cycle and, uh,
service you as many times as you needed me to. And getting some of my DNA would
calm you down a little.”

“That sounds perfect,” K said wistfully. “If only it was
perfected—if only we could use it now.”

“I just need a few more weeks to test it,” Boone protested. “Are
you sure—”

K shook her head. “I told you, I only have a few hours. I have to
get back to the Tainted ship and have Hesler teach me to train my suit. And
once the training process starts it can take five to seven years to complete.”

Boone took her hand. “I’ll wait for you, baby,” he said roughly.
“I don’t care if it’s five years or fifty years. I’ll wait until you can take
it off again. It’ll just give me that much more time to perfect the formula.”

“Boone…” K gently withdrew her hand. “It’s not just the training
period—after I get the suit perfected, I’d still have trouble touching, even
after I was able to take it off.”

“So what are you saying?” he demanded. “What are we talking
about?”

“I’m saying it could take me years to be able to have skin-to-skin
contact again,” K told him.

“I’ll wait,” Boone said stubbornly. “As long as it takes, I’ll
wait.”

“I can’t ask you to do that,” K said gently. “Even when I could
take off my suit and touch again, there’s no guarantee I’d be able to enjoy it.
Hesler, he…” She cleared her throat. “He told me he’s had his suit trained to
perfection for five years and he
still
doesn’t
want to touch anyone. He can do it—but he doesn’t want to.”

“Well, has he even really
tried?”
Boone asked. “I mean maybe if he gave it a chance—”

“He went through one entire sex cycle,” K said softly. “He said it
was Hell.
The worst kind of Hell.”
She shook her head.
“I don’t want to feel that way about you, Boone. And I don’t want you waiting
for me on the off-chance that I actually can enjoy skin-to-skin contact again.
It’s not fair to you. I can’t do it—I
won’t
do it.”

Boone stood up abruptly and started pacing. “Damn Hesler. That
black suit wearing bastard,” he growled.
“ How
do we
even know he’s telling the truth? He’s trying to recruit you, K. How can we
trust his word?”

“He’s an honorable man,” K said in a low voice. “He did offer me a
place among the Tainted but he didn’t try to pressure me to take it. He—” A
sharp pain suddenly lanced through her. K winced and put a hand to her abdomen
..
“He’s not lying. I…I’m starting to feel the pain again,
Boone.”

“Where?
Where does it hurt?” He looked at
her anxiously. “Are you sure it’s the suit?”

“It has to be. Hesler said it wouldn’t control the hormone surges
for much longer.” K gasped as another pain lanced through her. “Purity, it
hurts.”

Boone knelt in front of her, staying protectively close. “Damn it,
this would be so much easier if Hesler was lying. Are you all right? Do you
need to lie down?”

“No…” K pressed a hand to her abdomen gingerly. “I think…I think
it’s backing off a little now. But I should probably go soon.”

"So I'm losing you all over again."

K felt a lump in her throat. "We're losing each other,"
she pointed out quietly. "Oh, Boone…"

He let out a harsh sigh. “I just don't want to see you go off with
Hesler and his band of Tainted knowing I'll probably never see you again."

"It's not his fault," K whispered.

"I know. I just want someone to blame, I guess." Boone
ran a hand through his hair. "I shouldn’t be so hard on Hesler. Without
him, we never would have gotten you back at all. I was sure those damn Purists
would purge you the minute they got their hands on you.”

“Oh, they didn’t want to purge me,” K said bitterly. “They wanted
me because of my blood. Apparently the Empress of Eros has the ability to
completely control her people. And he said as soon as I was ready he would have
the current Empress assassinated and—” She stopped abruptly and pressed her
hand to her mouth.
“Purity, Boone—the Empress.
My mother.
The High Sentinel said he already had people in
place around her, just waiting to purge her!”

Boone jumped up. “I’ll have Loki open a channel, see if we can
reach Eros from here. Maybe if he boosts the signal…”

“Help me!” K reached out a hand and he pulled her up carefully.
“We have to warn her, Boone. I may not like her but I don’t want to see her
killed.”

“Come on, then.” He lifted her into his arms and headed for the ship’s
command center.

“Loki,” he roared as he ran. “Loki, open a channel to Eros. Hurry,
before it’s too late!”

Chapter Thirty-two

“I still don’t understand why you’re having me do this. I thought
we wanted to get
away
from Eros,”
Loki grumbled as he set about boosting the signal.

“We do.” K was openly agitated, pacing back and forth and wringing
her hands. Boone wondered how her pain was and hoped it wasn’t getting worse. “But
we don’t want the Empress to die in the process.”

“Die?” Rolf gave her a startled look. “Why would she die?
How?”

“Never mind,” Boone growled. “Just open a channel and be sure they
know it’s the princess calling.”

K gave him a look and he shrugged. “Sorry, darlin’—I know you
don’t want to be called that, but we need to get through to her and we don’t
have time to go Loki’s round-about way this time.”

“I’ll have you know I have excellent connections,” Loki said
snippily. “Still, if you insist on going the pretty-pretty-princess route and
waving your precious golden crown…” In another minute he was speaking rapidly
to what looked like a minor official at the court. The man kept denying his
request until Loki motioned for K. “Come over here and show
yourself
,
Princess Paladin. They won’t believe me.”

K stepped forward and addressed the man on the viewscreen who was short
and plump with curling green whiskers.

“It is I, Princess Krissana. Let me speak to the Empress
now
.”

“Your majesty!”
The man turned as green as his
whiskers.
“At once!
I’ll fetch her at once!”

The next moment the regal image of the Empress was filling the
viewscreen. Boone gave K a look to see how she was taking it—seeing her mother
again after her escape from Eros had to be traumatic.

To his relief, she seemed calmer now. Probably seeing her mother
alive and unhurt had gone a long way toward making her feel better. But the
first words out of the Empress’s mouth were anything but calming.

“Krissana!”
Her voice cut like a knife and she
glared at K with unmistakable anger. “How dare you run off like that just when
the planet was used to having you back?”

“I had to leave,” K said, lifting her chin. “You had my whole life
planned for me and it wasn’t a plan I wanted to follow.”

“And I suppose this is better?” The Empress gestured at her black
skinsuit. “Going back to the enemy? Turning traitor after all I did for you?”

“The only thing you did,
Mother,
was to try and separate me from the man I love and
dictate exactly how I would live my life,” K shot back. “That wasn’t acceptable
to me. So I left.”

“And went back to the Purists,” the Empress snapped.

“No, I was
captured
by
the Purists,” K corrected her through gritted teeth.
“While I
was fulfilling my promise to Boone to rescue his sister.”
For someone
who wasn’t used to having to deal with anger, Boone thought she was handling
herself rather well.

“Captured, were you?” It was plain the Empress didn’t believe her.

“Yes, by the High Sentinel—my old mentor,” K said. “And while he
held me, he told me of his plan to overrun all of Eros, using
me
as a figurehead. He said that the
Empress is able to control her people through a psy-blood bond. Is that right?”

“It is.” the Empress sounded guarded. “But only one Empress at a
time can rule.”

“Which is why he planned to have you assassinated,” K told her.
“He said he already had people in place around you. I’m calling to warn you
that even though he’s dead, there might be another to take his place. Someone
who would implement the plan and try to have you killed.”

The Empress’s lips tightened but she nodded tersely. “I’ll have my
people screened at once. You have my thanks for the warning.”

“You’re welcome.” K nodded. “And now I need to go.”

“No, what you need to do is come home.” The Empress’s eyes
flashed. “Only you have the exulted blood to rule after me.”

Boone could be silent no longer.

“Which is why she was taken and subjected to a life of unspeakable
cruelty in the first place,” he said, stepping up beside K. “I’m sorry, Your
Majesty, but I don’t think K wants anything to do with ruling right now. She’s
just trying to get over what was done to her by the Purists.”

“What was done to her will be nothing compared to what I do to
you
, giant.” The Empress glared at him
and Boone looked stonily back. “You have no business with my daughter. She is a
princess and you’re nothing but a peasant. She must come back and complete her
cycle to find a mate of proper lineage to rule by her side.”

“Even if I wanted to complete my cycle, I couldn’t,” K said
calmly. “I have only a few hours before my current skinsuit
loses
its power to control my hormones. If I don’t start training my suit to
accommodate my needs by then, I’ll be dead.”

“A few hours it all we need,” the Empress responded coolly. “I
still have all the candidates assembled here on Eros. You can choose between
them the minute you step off the ship.”

“Um, excuse me, Your Majesty,” Loki cut in apologetically. “But
we’re days out from Eros at this point. Even with our hyperdrive going full
blast—”

“That will be unnecessary,” the Empress cut in. “Simply stay where
you are and we will come to you.”

“But how—?”
Loki began.

“Never
you mind
how,
commoner,” the Empress snapped. “I already have the position
of the Tainted ship serving as your escort. Just give me your coordinates and
we will come to you at once.”

“No!” Boone shook his head sharply. “Loki, don’t tell her a
thing!”

“Boone’s right, don’t send the coordinates,” K said, her voice
sounding choked. “I don’t want to go back. If I
can’t…can’t
be with Boone, I don’t want to be with anyone.”

Boone’s heart thumped painfully. “Aw, darlin’…”

“You
will
come back,”
the Empress interrupted, still glaring at K. “You’ll come back and fulfill your
royal destiny and duty at once!”

“You don’t own K,” Boone told her, fighting to keep his voice
calm. “If she says she’d rather live an emotionless life than go back to Eros
and be with a bunch of strange men, you have to respect that. You can’t take
over her life just because she happens to share the same bloodline as you.”

“I most certainly can,” the Empress snapped. “Krissana will take
off that ridiculous suit and pass through her first cycle this very solar day.
She will choose a proper consort and her daughter will be of royal blood.”

“Hate to pop your bubble, Your
Highness,
”
Boone said dryly, “But K’s not coming back to you to choose a consort or
anything else. You seem to have a bad case of selective deafness but let me
spell it out for you—
she doesn’t want to
go back to Eros.”

The Empress narrowed her eyes. “She will come whether she wants to
or not.”

“How dare you?” K seemed to be fighting tears of rage. “I called
you to warn you—to save your life. How can you act like this?”

The Empress gave her a level look. “In time, when you have a
daughter of your own, you will understand, Krissana. I’m simply doing this for
your own good.”

“My good or
your
own good?”
K said bitterly. “You know, Mother, you’re as bad as the Purists,
refusing to think anyone but your own people are fit to live. I’ve had enough
of that way of thinking—I reject it—and you. You’ll never hear from me again.”

“Oh yes I will, in a very short time,” the Empress said grimly.

She looked at Loki and Rolf, who were sitting close together,
sharing the pilot’s chair and trying to look inconspicuous. Slowly,
hypnotically, the golden rings in her purple eyes began to spin. “Loyal
citizens of Eros, do you hear me?” she asked in a low, powerful voice.

Boone watched in alarm as a glazed look came over both men’s eyes.

“Yesss, Empresss…” Loki slurred, sounding like a zombie. Rolf
mumbled assent as well.

“Send me the coordinates of your ship! At once!” she demanded.
“And you will stay in your current position until I get to you.”

“Yesss, Empresss.” Loki’s fingers were already flying over the
keyboard.

“No!” Boone reached over to slap the kill switch to the viewscreen
but it was too late. By the time the angry Empress faded from sight, the damage
was done.

“Huh?” Rolf blinked his eyes and looked around in obvious
confusion.

“What’s going on? What did I miss?” Loki demanded.

“Well, now we can see that the Purists’ plot to take over Eros would
definitely have worked,” Boone grumbled, looking at the pair of touch partners
who were still blinking owlishly, as though they’d just awakened from a long
nap. He looked at K. “I wonder why it doesn’t work on you?”

She shrugged angrily.
“Maybe because the Empress
and I have the same blood.”

“What happened?” Loki demanded. “What did she say?”

“She asked for the coordinates of our ship and you gave them to
her before Boone could hit the kill switch,” Mom said. “Is there anyway to tell
if she got it all?”

Loki looked down at the control panel. “I’m afraid so. She
did
get it all.”

Boone swore loudly. “Can we take evasive maneuvers?”

Loki shook his head.
“Afraid not, Boone.
Once they’re locked onto our position, they’ll be able to follow us anywhere.”

“This is it, then,” K said dully. “I’ll have to go right away—back
to the Tainted ship. It’s the only way to be free of her.”

“Didn’t you hear what Her Majesty said earlier?” Loki demanded.
“She’s already got the Tainted position pinned down too. Probably she had ours
as well and just wanted a confirmation before her pilots set a course.”

Boone swore again. “I don’t accept this—K can’t be trapped into a
life she loathes so easily. There has to be something we can do—someplace we
can go.”

Loki spread his hands. “Unless you can manufacture a black hole to
suck us all to infinity, I’m afraid there isn’t.”

K winced and put a hand to her abdomen. “How long before we can
expect them? And how do they expect to get to us so quickly, anyway?”

“Must be the new wormhole technology I heard being bruited about
in mechanical circles,” Rolf said thoughtfully. “It would make travel that
would normally take days with a hyperdrive take hours instead.”

“A few hours?”
K looked hopeful. “Maybe I have
time to start training my suit.”

“But what happens if she makes you take it off anyway, after you
start?” Boone demanded. “Her Highness doesn’t strike me as the type to take no
for an answer. Or believe you when you say you can’t take off the suit.”

“I’ll die,” K said dully. “If I start the training and I’m forced
to take off the suit, I’ll die.”

“I won’t let that happen,” Boone said fiercely. “I
swear,
darlin’. I’ll kill whoever comes for you with my bare
hands if I have to. But no one is going to force you to take off that damn
suit.”

“Do you realize what you’re saying? You’re the one who wanted me
out of my suit in the first place and now you’re willing to fight to keep me in
it.” K laughed weakly but the laugh turned into a soft moan of pain. She
pressed a hand to her side. “Purity…”

“I’m not the only one who will fight,” Boone protested, looking at
her anxiously. “I’m sure Hesler and his Tainted will join in if it comes to
that.”

K shook her head. “It’s not fair to ask that of them. They already
rescued me once. No, this isn’t their fight or yours, Boone. It’s mine and mine
alone.”

“Bullshit,” Boone exploded angrily. “You’re the woman I love. Even
if I can’t be with you, I’ll be damned if I stand to one side and let someone
force you into a life you hate.”

K sighed. “It’s my royal blood, you know. It’s ruined everything.
It got me kidnapped by the Purists in the first place, made it impossible for
me to be with you, and now it’s going to result in my death if I’m not careful.
Or else I’ll
wish
I was dead.” She
shuddered and Boone knew she was thinking of the Erian royal mating ceremony
where she would be forced to have sex with multiple partners.

He tightened his firsts in frustration. “It
is
your damn blood. If only you weren’t a royal. Without your ‘exulted’
DNA, none of this would be a problem.”

K got a strange look on her face. “You’re right, Boone—it’s
not
really my blood. What it comes down
to is DNA.
Which is why…
”

“Why what?”
He looked at her uncertainly.

“
Which is why it has to change.
” K looked
up at him. “Tell me more about your formula—about the DNA swap you had
planned.”