Craving: A SciFi Alien Mail Order Bride Romance (TerraMates Book 8) (22 page)

I had disobeyed a direct command. I risked not only my promotion but my life. And still I did not care. Terra had a hold on me that went against my will. She was an elixir I could not help but drink from, both potent and healing.

And that made her even more dangerous than I originally thought.

Yet still, I could not pull away from her, even though I knew it meant I risked everything I had worked for.

I wanted to stay like this, just the two of us.

And then I remembered the plan – what was happening as I distracted the Commander of the Fortuna.

And I knew once she found out, Terra would never forgive me.

Perhaps it was for the best. I was just a soldier. Even if I wanted to claim a woman, to light bond with one, it could not be her. She was a Commander and above my station.

Reluctantly, I let go.

* * *

T
ERRA

I have to go. The men are expecting me back on the ship to count out the ammo.

I bit my lip. My mind replayed Jidden's last words to me before he slipped away and I returned to civilization – what was left of it with the Surtu in charge.

Now that I was alone in the gardens, the full reality of what just happened hit me. I was ashamed and conflicted. I wanted to believe our fucking had meant something, that it wasn't a careless act and I had not betrayed my people. I was having a hard time casting my guilt away, especially after the way Jidden left so suddenly.

There was no connection between us, I realized. I had imagined it, trying to justify my lust.

That made me a traitor.

Standing up from the branch, finally regaining my strength, I tidied my dress, then went to the creek to splash water on my face, withholding the tears that threatened to pour out of my eyes by focusing on what Jidden had said.

Count out the ammo.

We had surrendered peacefully. Why would they still be concerned about how much ammo they had? Unless they were planning another attack, perhaps on the neighboring space station.

Is
that
why they wanted the Fortuna? Were we hostages of the Surtu's new command center?

Jidden and his ship were no envoys. I was sure of it now. We had been playing each other.

I rushed back, following the creek away from isolation, back to where the lights of the space station guided my path. I had to get to Gallia. She could help me warn Earth. The time for recognizance was gone. We had to strike. If we didn't take back control of the Fortuna, more ships would land and it would be more than we could handle.

Suddenly, I was grabbed from behind and dragged back towards the shadows. I would have fought back, used the skills I'd fostered since childhood to defend myself, but I didn't need to. I knew who took me. I had been dragged around by her many times before in combat training.

It was Bellona.

"I need to leave," I said when she released me.

Suddenly, the ground shook. Another ship had landed. With luck, only one.

"Like now," I added.

"It's too late," she asserted, her fiery amber eyes lost somewhere between anger and sorrow. "They've already attacked."

I fell against a tree, willing myself to stay calm. I had to focus. Otherwise, I was no help to anyone. "They attacked the Fortuna?"

Bellona nodded, her anger winning out. It was almost scary how red her eyes became when they were ablaze.

I had been wrong. The Surtu weren't using the Fortuna to attack our neighbors.

They were attacking us.

They must have figured out who we were. Or they had always known.

That meant Jidden...

I didn't want to think about it. It didn't matter. He didn't matter, right now.

"Are our sisters fighting back?" I asked.

"Of course," Bellona snapped, scowling. "This is what we trained for. We're Earth's first line of defense. But our weapons...compared to theirs? I thought it was smart, training us to be stronger than a blaster and how to use our agility to our advantage. But I was wrong. It wasn't smart; it was suicidal. What was Earth thinking?"

"Maybe the Fortuna was never about combat," I speculated. "Maybe we were only meant to be intelligence. The first line of defense wasn't weaponry; it was knowledge."

Great job I did, allowing the enemy to distract me when I should have been gathering more information for Earth.

Bellona must have read my expression. "Hey, don't do that. Don't let them defeat you. You did what you could. In the short amount of time you had, a lot of information was uncovered. Their ship was scanned. We learned about the Surtu hierarchy. It all helps Earth build a stronger guard. We may be the first line of defense, but we aren't the last. Even if we fall, Earth still has a good chance of surviving. And so do we."

"How?" I asked. "How can we possibly survive this? You said it yourself. It's a suicide mission. We can't compete with their blasters."

"That's what's strange," Bellona said, baffled. "They haven't killed anyone. Not yet. They're rounding the women up. It's more of a siege than an attack. I'm not really sure what's going on. That's why I'm keeping to the shadows. The more we know, the better chance we have to save our sisters."

The weight on my shoulders lifted. It wasn't by much, but it allowed me some composure. "So no has died?"

Bellona allowed herself to smile. "No woman has."

This was good news. "And how many ships have landed?"

"Just the one other, from what I can tell."

"But it makes no sense." I worked the siege around in my mind like a math equation. "We had surrendered peacefully. Why are they suddenly acting hostile?"

"They were always hostile. We just didn't know it."

"No," I said. "I mean, yes, they were likely always hostile. But something else is going on here. Okay, let's assume they know we're not women of the cloth but actually a space station of femme fatales. Why not attack upon arrival?"

"They needed time to scout."

She was right. I could see it. They wanted to gain our trust so that they could scout the station for our weaknesses before taking our weapons. "This isn't about executing the women," I concluded. "This is about disarming us. They must have known we meant to attack."

Damn, Jidden was good. The way he had called our weaponry trivial, the way he had tested us in the docking bay to see if we would resist or play the game...it was all a ploy.

As was the way he had distracted me.

"I'm such a fool," I said under my breath.

Bellona stared out into the distance, towards the inner station where our sisters battled against the Surtu. I could tell it was taking all her will not to go and fight, but she was right – the more we knew about what was happening, the better chance all the women on board the Fortuna had at surviving.

"They're going to take us as slaves," Bellona announced. "That's why they're not executing us. We're going to be like the women on the colony. That's what they need us for."

It hit me then, exactly what all of this was about. The revelation was strong, sending me into shock. "What they need us for," I echoed, closing my eyes, imagining the women on the colony being shipped off to some unknown planet like cattle. "That's why they're here."

"Go on," Bellona encouraged. I had her full attention.

"The women. They need the women. I don't understand why, but I'm sure of it. Think about it – on the colony, they killed all the men. Only the women and children were taken as slaves. That's why the Surtu didn't attack the Fortuna. That's why they've gone through all this trouble to strategize a way to take the station with as few casualties as possible. And it's why they haven't attacked Earth with their fancy technology. They can't risk hurting the women. They need us."

I knew Bellona agreed. I could see it in the way the flames in her eyes jumped from anger to rage. "One of them has Lucina. I'm afraid of what he's going to do with her."

My heart stopped. "What?" I asked.

"While our sisters were being rounded into the Grand Hall, one by one as they fell, I watched as a man with hair a much dirtier shade of red than my own grabbed Lucina. He didn't take her to the Grand Hall. I don't know where he took her. I lost sight in the rampage."

I had trained to be a warrior since I was a little girl. I don't know when my mind flipped against war or when I began to believe that there was a better solution. It had probably occurred while I was reading, when my adolescent mind was full of ideals, preferring the joy of peace over the tragedy of combat.

But that changed the moment Bellona told me about Lucina. An animal instinct took over and overwhelmed my intellect. I marched away from the gardens, towards the inner station.

"Wait!" Bellona called behind me. "You can't save her, not without getting caught. I need your help."

"You are like a shadow," I said, more serious than I had ever been before. "If anyone has a chance of escaping capture, it's you. But I'm not meant for the shadows. I need the light. If something happened to Lucina, I'd never forgive myself."

"I understand," Bellona said solemnly.

Before I could say anything further, she slipped back into the unknown.

I charged ahead, towards my quarters where I had hidden several weapons. Even if they had trashed my room, the Surtu would not have found them.

I had hoped that amongst the fighting, I could slide towards my quarters without being noticed. A warrior with a sword was worth much more attention than a mousy brunette treading quietly against the wall. But as soon as I entered the corridor of the inner station, I realized my mistake. Few women still fought, and their numbers dwindled quickly.

There was a rhythm to the battle. Soldiers with blasters would cause a distraction while others came from behind and disarmed the women. It was like watching poachers capture a rare cat, handing the creature carefully so as not to harm its coat.

"Stop there," a soldier yelled behind me. I kept walking, praying he was talking to someone else, but then he grabbed my shoulder and spun me around. His face had the same mythological quality to it as all the Surtu, but his smile was grotesque. "Look, it's the pretty Commander. I think I'll claim you for myself."

"You can't claim her," Jidden proclaimed, appearing beside him. "No soldier can. She is a superior, she is extremely intelligent and her has a high rank. She's not meant for soldiers like us."

A small part of me was relieved to see him. The bigger part of me wanted to slap him.

He'd used me.

And I'd let him.

"I never heard that before," the soldier said, refusing to move. He had me pinned in a corner, and he knew it.

"Do you really think the Fleet Captain and his financiers will approve of a light bond between someone like her and someone like you?" Jidden challenged. "Do you think they'll just give her away that easy when they could have her?"

The soldier faltered. It was the hesitation Jidden was looking for. He knocked the blaster out of the soldier's hand. It would have been my moment to run, but there was nowhere to go. More soldiers filled the corridor, blocking my path. All I could do was watch as Jidden and the soldier started to fight.

Please be okay, Lucina, I thought, feeling sick at the thought of her locked away with one of these monsters.

The stories from childhood were TRUE. The Surtu were monsters. They were the kind that stole the souls of women in the middle of the night.

I didn't want Jidden's help, but I knew I was safer in his hands than any other, so I was horrified when the soldier pulled a knife from his boot. The hilt was encrusted with a crescent moon. It was one of ours, taken from the hand of one of my sister warriors.

With the knife firmly in his hand, the soldier took a swipe at Jidden, but he missed. He tried again, but Jidden kept dancing around him, much quicker and more capable.

When the soldier lunged forward one last time, Jidden dodged and caused the soldier to stumble. The move ended the fight, but not in the way either man intended.

The soldier fell straight into me.

I felt the blade go through my abdomen, but I didn't feel any pain. I was in too much shock. The hilt glowed against the florescent lights of the corridor, calling my destiny out to me. I was mesmerized by the glow, reminded of how I thought the Surtu ships looked like glow flies out in the distance from my kitchen window.

Then the glow wavered, dimming as I bled.

I remembered Jidden picking me up in his arms, but that was the last thing I remembered.