Stallion of Ash and Flame (Siren Publishing Classic) (10 page)

Trail wasn’t at all certain in these moments of complete unbridled pleasure if he could take the snug satin heat of her. He felt as delirious as the time he’d been temporarily lost in the portal, a glitch in the frequencies which had him whirling and floating weightless and in a state of nirvana for a few minutes. He’d been rescued, tossed through by the hand of his Guardian Spirit.

When she vise-squeezed his thighs with hers, he reached up and took her breasts captive. Her nipples jabbed the center of his palms, causing a tide of barbaric need to seize him. Need for her. For how she could ride him.

“Yes,” she breathlessly whispered.

Leaning into his hands, she stroked up his arms and over his shoulders, her palms molding his muscles, bold for her. She slid her hands beneath his head, passionately cupping. The heels of her hands gently cradled his temples, and her eyes glowed with the intensity of a goddess. His breath rushed inward as he beheld her.

“Give me a ride, Seneca,” he roughly growled.

“Ride ‘em, cowgirl,” she crooned. She moved her hips, a supple smooth rhythm. Gradually her tempo increased, her sheath powerfully undulating along more of his shaft, until finally the rim of her opening clenched his cockhead each time.

“Seneca.”

God, could his need be revealed more starkly than how he’d just spoken her name?

“Hold your horses,” she murmured, in the throes of her own arriving orgasm.

Given he was a horse, her words struck his funny bone, ratcheting down his ferocious bone for her, and allowing him to revel in how she rode him. He fastened his gaze on her face. Her eyelids had fallen shut and her face glistened with a sheen of sweat. Her copper-fire hair entranced him. Gorgeously mussed, it fell around her body in its own spirited waving dance.

“Oh, Trail.” She breathed out his name as her bliss flushed her body. He watched her rapturous sensations rise upwards, changing her features to the sublime loveliness of an angel. She dissolved around him, collapsing forward.

His hands refused to give up her breasts, and he held her up. His orgasm split his loins apart with a fury that stunned him. The savage blackness roared over him, and he shouted through his clenched teeth.

The moment he could, he rolled them on their sides and embraced her. Instinctively, he gathered her closer, snuffling her hair, then burying his nose in the wealth of silky strands. They lay together in utter silence except for their rapid breathing.

Using his discipline, Trail extended his sixth sense, searching. He almost jerked upright as he witnessed a human man walking through her stable. Not wanting to frighten her, he studied the figure while tuning into the reaction of the horses. Their non-response clued him in. The man was a holo projection. Trail flashed his awareness through the figure, feeling the parameters of the projection. Someone tested his abilities. The density of particles used caused the furtive-acting man to appear absolutely real.

Someone must be suspicious of him, wanting to know his real identity. He zoomed his awareness along the beam pathway, backtracking. Though it was a risk, he needed information on their enemies fast. The moment he entered the cavernous amber-illumined room, he saw the semi-circle bank of controls and the dot-like lights signifying the state of the craft.

The Hjorior male stood holding the two amulets in his palms, an arrogant taunt. Eight feet in height, he wore the thin, pale gray robe of his station. He stared straight ahead, his eyes brilliant as polished obsidian in the long gaunt length of his face. His posture and the tilt of his groomed beard appeared to censure anyone who dared not worship at his feet.

“Underwater or in space?” Trail asked telepathically, wanting to know the location of the craft.

“Underwater, V’Trailuc. Why are you with the woman who was gifted with the ancient technology keys used by the Anunnaki?”

“Why are you in possession of them? Or are they particle replicas?” The amulets disappeared, answering Trail’s question. “What do you want, Hjorior?”

“Your assistance. I can show you where the amulets are, at this time. Of course, I cannot guarantee they will not be moved. I can also tell you only the woman’s touch can retrieve them.”

“If that is the truth, how were they stolen from her?” Trail sensed for the vibrations that would tell him if the Hjorior spoke falsely.

“Those who turn the forests into ash and cinder, those you battle to save your world’s portal, they have created a platinum-energy shield and hold the amulets for trade.”

The Hjorior allowed a knowing smile to crease his stone-like face. Trail’s vaporous presence had scintillated with his brutal surprise.

“Assistance?” Trail demanded.

“The woman, Seneca, carries a mutated gene we wish use of, one of many we implanted into Earth humans during the time of the Druids.”

“You require her permission.”

“We do. You will explain to her who we are, once you explain yourself.” The Hjorior actually grinned now. “Ah, to break our protocol and be a fly speck on the wall.”

“Fly on the wall,” Trail automatically corrected. As a horse, he absolutely knew flies. “This gene, was it triggered by my presence?”

“It was triggered by our jackal friend, an Anunnaki messenger. I assume she spoke of how she came by the amulets.”

“She did. Does the activated gene allow her to know me as no other human does?”

The Hjorior stroked his beard once. “I do not know, V’Trailuc. It could be your race’s ancient connection as well. The human side, not your equine racial connection to Earth’s Spanish Mustangs.” Another smile appeared and humor glittered in his eyes. “Do we have an agreement?”

“We do. Show me.” Trail burned with several other questions. Now wasn’t the time. He needed to return his mind to her.

“Lend me your eyes.” The Hjorior intoned with a touch of tongue-in-cheek drama in his voice.

Trail joined his psi-sight with that of the Hjorior. A split second later, his awareness had been planted within an immensely long tube-shaped building, the size of several football fields. Obviously, he’d been placed here to see more than where the amulets were located. Swiftly Trail scanned in a three-hundred and sixty degree radius, seeing no being of any kind present.

An odd assortment of equipment partially lined the walls. Telescoping his sight, he investigated. Mining machinery, from super-advanced tech to what Earth humans used to extract precious metals had been positioned, yet appeared to be unused. He recorded it all into his memory banks, then shot his gaze around looking for the amulets.

In a whoosh of hyper-dimensional sound, his psi-sight was directed to another area. Suspended in a plasma-platinum field, the two amulets floated a few inches above a large semi-curved platform composed of nano foil particles. It served as someone’s desk.

Immediately, Trail checked for anything that would let him know where he was specifically. The dome-shaped walls had inset cubicles the size of his fist, most of them filled with data storage slips. Protected by energy shielding, he decided not to penetrate the slips, since his etheric signature could be recorded or sound an alarm.

Feeling the strike of a solar-like beam from above, he focused on the source. The three-legged vehicle hovered, gradually descending through a top entry point in the dome. The entire bottom of the craft emitted a powerful light for landing. Trail rocketed his awareness upwards, halting beside the beetle-shaped craft. Instantly, he psi-recognized the energy of the two beings inside, the Fire Starters. He seared his data-collection frequency through them and soared through the dome entry.

Alarm spiked through him as he noted the precise position of the stars, then spun to look downward. He recognized the location, not ten miles due south of his world’s portal. Not sensing any pursuit, he paused, studying the area around the Fire Starters’ underground facility.

Emptying his mind of any thought, Trail instinctively sent his awareness in the opposite direction of his portal cave. He careened his consciousness above the forest, as if on a joy ride out of his body. If they couldn’t latch onto his thoughts using their psi ability, the Fire Starters most likely couldn’t follow him, even if they had discovered his presence.

Trail felt her concern for him as if thorns penetrated his flesh. But before he returned to her, he zigzagged a reconnaissance above her house and stable. The van remained and only the paint, Chief, sensed his presence. Finding no other negative disturbance, Trail projected a buzz frequency, disabling their surveillance electronics. After watching the van depart, he sank his awareness back into his body. Instantly he felt her luscious body cuddled against him intimately.

“Seneca,” he whispered, “you feel like my heaven.”

She stirred, her fingertips stroking over his cheek. “Remote viewing?” she mouthed to him.

He nodded, then brushed her fingertips with his lips.

“Are they still listening?” she barely whispered.

“They left moments ago. We’re okay for now.”

“Are you okay?” she asked, concern in her sleepy soft voice.

“Yes. I know where the amulets are.”

She started, then tensed. “Where?”

“In an underground base.” He paused, then took a flying leap over the canyon. “An alien race stole them. From what I understand, they want to use them in a trade.”

“Alien race. What alien race? It’s not that I don’t believe in that sort of thing...but—”

She shivered violently. Trail stroked over her shoulders and back, attempting to ease her. “I’m sorry, Seneca, to tell you this in blunt terms. There’s a lot at stake. Not just recovering the amulets.”

Her whole being staggered before his gaze and she stared, her eyes widening while her flesh chilled. Trail reached behind her, bringing the bedspread over her body.

“What do you mean ‘there’s a lot at stake?’” She enunciated each word, demand and dread owning her tone.

Trail didn’t know which fire to jump into and consume first. The one under the frying pan or in the deep blue sea. Hell, her eyes looked like the deep blue sea now. Plus, she also looked like she could fry him at will if she became furious enough. “I’m not just a tracker,” he began, searching for words. Damn, he had to find a
set of words that would work.

“What else are you?” She scowled impatiently, yet he’d heard her vulnerability.

He inhaled and gradually released a large breath. “I keep watch on who uses the forests. Particularly, right now, who is setting some of the worst fires.”

“Is that why I smelled smoke on you?” Her look dared him not to answer truthfully.

He nodded. “I’ve known for a
while that an alien race has been setting some of the fires. But I’ve never been able to track their whereabouts until tonight when I remote viewed.”

“Why tonight?”

Dang it, if his filly didn’t ask all the right questions, but all the wrong questions for him.

“A tip from the Hjorior, a race that has been present on Earth since before the time of the Druids.” There, let her chew on that one long enough for him to figure out how to handle her. Though he had a sneaking feeling he wasn’t going to figure anything out beforehand.

“What? Like the Anunnaki?”

It was his turn to blink disbelievingly. And he did. Trail raised up on his elbow regarding her. “Did you know the amulets were of Anunnaki origin?”

She shook her head ‘no’. “They just, just felt so ancient...whenever I held them. I only know the name Anunnaki because they are one of the earliest races of gods talked about by those who study the ancient Sumerian tablets.” She peered at him sharply. “How do you know?” She nailed him with another look. “If that’s true.”

Trail itched to stroke down her hair and soothe her. That would earn him her ire. “The Hjorior clued me in. Then when I remote-viewed the amulets, I knew. Their design is a technological key for operating deep mining machines.”

“Gold,” she stated, her voice ephemeral as the last beams of moonlight. “The Anunnaki created a race of slave humans to mine for gold. What do you know about that?”

“For a time that was true. They became bored and there was already a race of evolving humans here who do not bear a resemblance
to humans now. Against the will of their world’s High Leaders, the Anunnaki group stationed on Earth did experiments, creating a new race of humans.”

“In their own images?”

“Mostly. Humans today look like about fifty percent of that group’s genetics. Gold,” he repeated several seconds later. “The Anunnaki, and other races they were allied with, mined for other metals and gems, as well.”

“How do you know all this?”

“I’m not from here, Seneca.” God, he’d wanted to wait until after he
mated
her. Linking with her as a
mate
could only occur the third time they sexually joined. Hell’s fiery balls, now he had his seduction work cut out for him.
 

I Arrived on Earth

“Alien.” Her breath had remained in her lungs long enough for her to say the word. Now she nearly hyperventilated.

“I arrived on Earth from our world’s portal. Our race is connected to yours. But we’re also very different.” Seeing the color drain from her face, he added, “I am related to the Apache. We share ancient ancestors.”

She grabbed breaths. “Oh.” Propping herself up on one elbow, she clutched her throat. “I knew you were different. But I never suspected...I just thought—”

“Thought what?” he asked, more curious than sin.

“You know. A renegade type.” She let her hand drop away from her throat.

“Renegade,” he repeated in a rasp. Eros god, did he ever want to be his mare’s renegade lover. He wanted to touch her desperately. Their legs still pressed together, but he wanted to caress her face, take her again. Mate her.

Instead, he murmured, “Seneca, only you can recover the amulets.”

She scrutinized his face, trying to determine if he told the truth. “I don’t understand.”

Giving her some room, Trail laid back on one of her plump pillows, his head on top of his hands. “I called them the Fire Starters because I didn’t know who they were, until I remote-viewed them tonight. They’re a space mariner race called the Fystites. They’re known for aggressively establishing trade bases and routes for anyone who can pay their price. Seneca.” He turned his face to her. “There’s a warehouse of mining equipment, all levels of technology. The Fystites aren’t miners. They purchase and sell and transport. They’ve been richly paid to set up the operation, then manage the commerce end of it.”