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  There were no females on Vandar raider ships. Only young warriors without mates or families to distract them. Our female needs were met by visits to the hedonistic planets beyond the Zagrath Empire—places where females were free with their affections for coin. Our ships were for battle and nothing else. So why had I violated this tradition and taken the female?

  It wasn’t like I hadn’t been responsible for the deaths of females before. As much as we tried to limit our punishment to Zagrath military, there was always collateral damage. And in a war that had spanned generations and showed no signs of ceasing, there would be much more to come.

  “Do you wish us to disable the freighter further?” Corvak asked, his eyes darting down—the only acknowledgment of the female beside me.

  I jerked my head quickly. “Leave it. They are no threat. They would not be foolish enough to enter Vandar territory again, and they could not track us even if they did.”

  The female—Astrid—twitched slightly, but only I felt it. I glanced down at her fair hair, fighting the urge to stroke my hand down it. Only I knew that I would not have killed the female captain. I had wanted to test her courage in the face of death and what her ragtag crew would have done.

  I’d wanted to determine how loyal she was to the Zagrath. Instead, this small female had thrown herself at my mercy, and something about her sacrifice had touched me.

  Of all those on the command deck of the sad freighter, she had been the last one I would have suspected of such bravery. Even though I surmised that the captain with the fiery hair was her sister, this slight female was clearly not a fighter. Yet she had offered her own life and had not backed down. There was a strength behind the fear. What had surprised me most was my own desire to see more of it. I’d felt drawn to her and the flash of determination behind her green eyes. The sweet curves I had detected beneath her clothing had not hurt, either. Nor had the fact that her scent made my cock hard and my heartbeat quicken.

  It had been a long time since I’d felt the thrill I’d experienced when I made the deal with her. My pulse had raced, and blood had rushed hot through my veins, as if I was on a hunt. Even now, my body hummed from the closeness of her as she walked beside me across the flight deck, her footsteps making fast taps on the steel floor. Glancing over, I saw that many of the other warriors were also casting furtive looks at her, their gazes roaming the curves covered snugly by her clothing. Fury flared within me, and my hand went instinctively to my axe before I remembered that the warriors were my own, and I could not fault them for being intrigued by the creature.

  Tvek. I uttered the curse in my head. What had I been thinking to bring a prisoner of war aboard my ship? She was right. Vandar did not take prisoners. Only the Zagrath enslaved. We had no brig. To commit an offense worth imprisonment meant being put out an airlock.

  I blew out a breath. My decision had been impulsive and foolish—something I would have expected from one of my younger brothers. Not the actions of a seasoned Raas.

  She stumbled slightly, and I grabbed her elbow to prevent her from falling. When she chanced a glance up at me, her eyes were rimmed with red and streaks trailed down her cheeks. My gut twisted. I was unused to tears. I pressed my lips together and looked away. Another reason taking her was a mistake.

  When we reached the first sprawling metal staircase, Bron eyed me, then her. “Should I take her to…your quarters for you, Raas?”

  She trembled next to me as she took in the dark, soaring space of our ship, with stairs crisscrossing overhead in the shadows—a far cry from the well-lit freighter with its curved walls and tight corridors. “I will take her myself and meet you on the command deck.”

  “But, Raas—“

  I cut Corvak off with a flick of my wrist. “You have your orders. I expect to be back on course when I return to the command deck.”

  My order was followed by sharp clicking of heels, then the loud rattling of the stairs as they started up. Astrid flinched. The echoing sounds of the cavernous warbird must have been an assault to someone used to the steady rumble of a freighter.

  I rested a hand on the small of her back, reminding myself that I was much larger than her and considerably more powerful. “Vaes.”

  “You said that on my ship. What does it mean?” Her voice was soft and shaky, but curious.

  “Come,” I said, trying to keep my face serious when I saw confusion cross hers. “It means ‘come with me.’”

  She nodded, moving forward as I led her up the stairs. “You speak the universal language, but still use Vandar?”

  I grunted. “Some Vandar words are better.”

  Another nod, and we walked in silence, winding through the open-weave labyrinth of the ship. Astrid occasionally peered down at the maze of stairs, her grip of the steel handrail making her knuckles pale. We left the stairs and entered a cage-like corridor and finally reached a large, oval-shaped door.

  I pressed my hand to a round panel to one side and the gray doors parted in the center, sliding open silently to reveal my private quarters.

  “Vaes,” I said again, when she paused on the threshold, her pupils flaring as she peered inside.

  “This is where…?” She bit her lower lip.

  “These are my quarters. This is where you will stay.”

  She swallowed, nodding and taking a slow step inside.

  As much as I wanted to sweep her up and carry her to my huge, round bed, with its headboard made from shields and battle axes welded together, I did not. I let her walk inside on her own, her steps tentative as her gaze swept the space from side to side.

  “There is no couch?” she asked finally.

  I cocked my head at her. “Couch? I do not know this word.”

  Her cheeks colored. “Like a place you sit, but wide and long with cushions.”

  I scanned my living space with its ebony tables and straight chairs. Like most things on my ship, the furnishings were hard and sleek. And as on the rest of the ship, the lighting was dim. “Do you require one of these couches?”

  “I thought maybe I could sleep on the couch, so I wouldn’t have to kick you out of your bed.” She’d turned away from me and was facing the bed, which extended out into the center of the room.

  I felt a flash of both amusement and irritation. “You will not be kicking me out of my bed, female. Did you not understand our deal?”

  “I wasn’t sure…I mean, I thought maybe…”

  My heart started to race again, my hunting instincts firing. I came up quickly behind her, winding an arm around her waist and jerking her close to me. I used my tail to circle her legs so she could not kick me. “You do not need to think so much, Astrid.” Her breath became quick and shallow. I stroked a finger down her cheek, breathing in her intoxicating scent. “All you need to know is that you are mine now. You belong to a Raas of the Vandar. Your life will be on this ship and with me. In this bed. Do you understand now?”

  She moved her head up and down. As I held my hand splayed across her stomach, her rapid heartbeat vibrated into me. Just like prey before it was caught. My cock swelled as she wiggled in my grasp, reminding me how easy she was to overpower, and the tip of my tail quivered in anticipation.

  I closed my eyes and inhaled the smell of her hair, resting my chin on it and tucking her into my body as she trembled. Perhaps she understood for the first time that there was no escape. That this was permanent. “Say it.”

  “Say—?”

  “Say that you are mine,” I growled. “I need to know that you understand.”

  She sucked in a ragged breath. “I am yours, Raas.”

  My own pulse steadied. “You do not need to call me Raas when we are alone. My name is Kratos.”

  “Kratos,” she repeated, as if trying to memorize it.

  “Raas is my title. You only need use it when you address me in front of my warriors.” I shifted my hand up so that my thumb brushed the swell of her breast.

  “What does it mean?”

  “Warlord.
” I whispered into her ear, cupping one breast as she shivered in my arms. She clearly thought I intended to fuck her now. “Although there is nothing I would like more than to bury my cock inside you, I am needed on the command deck. I will not be claiming you now. You can breathe.”

  Her body relaxed slightly, a sigh leaving her lips. The sound she made almost caused me to rethink my statement. Maybe I had time for a small taste of the female. But before I could move, the ship lurched violently to one side, and we both flew across the room.

  Chapter Five

  Astrid

  My ears were ringing as strong hands lifted me off the floor. My leg hurt from where I’d crashed into the corner of a low table, but as soon as Kratos pulled me up, I knew it wasn’t broken. Sore? Definitely.

  The ship continued to shake, but at least it wasn’t sending us flying again. Sirens as deep and sonorous as the Raas’ voice echoed overhead and the dim lighting flickered off and on, plunging us into darkness before flaring back on.

  “Are you hurt?” Kratos held me by the shoulders, scouring my body with his eyes as unabashedly as he had on my sister’s ship.

  “I’m fine,” I lied. I ached from hitting the table and then the floor, but I wasn’t going to whine about it. Not when he’d hit just as hard and seemed unfazed.

  His face twisted as he glanced back at the door. “We are clearly under attack. I need to return to the command deck.”

  Under attack? The sour taste of bile rose again in my throat. I’d been on the Vandar ship for all of ten minutes, and we were already under attack?

  He gazed down at me, his hands gripping my arms too tightly. “You must stay here. Do you understand?”

  For a moment, I wanted to beg him to stay with me. I wanted to feel his arms wrapped protectively around me again even though I shouldn’t have wanted him to touch me. I pushed aside my strange impulse and nodded. Where did he think I was going to run off to on a spaceship, anyway?

  “Got it.” When he hesitated, I added, “I promise not to go anywhere.”

  “I will hold you to that promise, female,” he growled, and ran out of the room, the doors sliding back together to make a solid oval of metal, with only a faint seam to indicate that it was not a wall. Another hard jolt had me stumbling to the side and landing on the foot of the bed. If a perfectly round bed could have a foot.

  It’s going to be fine, I told myself. You’re on a Vandar war ship. They’re known for being some of the toughest ships in the galaxy. No one ever talks about Vandar ships being blown out of the sky. Do they?

  I gave my head a brusque shake, as if ridding myself of the fearful thoughts crowding my mind. It didn’t do any good to be scared. There was absolutely nothing I could do about it. There was nothing I could do about any of it.

  Kratos was right. My life was on the Vandar warship now. It had been my decision to take the Raas’ deal, and I had to accept it. All of it.

  As the ship trembled from what I suspected was more weapons fire, I rubbed my sweaty palms down the front of my dark pants. Part of me had hoped that the Vandar had taken me as a slave, even though I knew his people didn’t do that. Even though I’d seen the desire in his eyes, part of me hoped I was wrong. The other part of me I tried to ignore because I knew it was stupid to be attracted to a creature so deadly.

  Kratos expected me to sleep with him in this bed, and do plenty more than sleep. I tried to calm my breathing and keep the panic from choking me.

  What would happen when he found out that I’d never been with a man—or alien—before? How would he react when he discovered that I wasn’t some experienced woman who knew how to pleasure him, but instead, a twenty-year-old virgin, whose total sexual experience consisted of some fumbling kisses and awkward groping?

  “Crappity crap!” I wished I could curse as eloquently and vividly as my sister, but the words felt foreign on my tongue. I stood and walked across the glossy, black floors, the movement helping to slow my brain’s frantic ping-pong of thoughts. Even though the siren still droned, I began to hum as I walked, holding my fingers in my ear so I could hear the soothing sound.

  Since the Vandar didn’t take prisoners, I couldn’t imagine what they’d do to one who was deemed useless? Would I be put out an airlock, or dropped off alone at some remote outpost? Neither option was appealing. I hummed louder.

  Kratos wouldn’t discard me. Not after he’d broken his own rules to take me. Right?

  “You can do this, Astrid,” I told myself. It was the same pep speech I’d given myself so many times over the years, usually before I had to do something I knew I’d be horrible at.

  I clenched my fists. This time I didn’t have the luxury of being bad or losing focus. If I wanted to survive, I needed to make this Vandar happy. Whatever that took.

  “You don’t have to love him,” I reminded myself. “Or even like him. You just have to screw him.”

  That advice sounded eerily close to advice my sister had given me once about holding on to my virginity. She’d thought I needed to just do it so I could move on from the bad, first-time sex to the good stuff. At least that was how she’d put it. Tara didn’t have many hang-ups when it came to her sexuality. She didn’t have many hang-ups, period. Unlike me. I was basically a bunch of hang-ups held together with body fat.

  When I reached the end of the room, my gaze was drawn through a wide arched doorway. Since the siren had stopped sounding, I dropped my fingers from my ears and stepped into a spacious bathroom, almost sighing out loud when I saw the half-moon-shaped, sunken tub to one side.

  My sister’s freighter only had a handful of shared crew bathrooms, with broken faucets and dodgy water pressure. I’d gotten used to cold showers and hair that never felt thoroughly rinsed, but the sight of the tub filled with steaming water made my heart leap. I didn’t know how long it had been since I’d had an actual bath.

  Not that this Vandar tub looked like any I’d seen before. The unusually-shaped tub had four different sections—each filled with a different color of water, and each large enough for one or two people to sit in. Steam rose up from the red water at the end, and bubbles covered the surface of the orange water next to it. The green water was too opaque to see through, but the blue water at the other end was crystal clear.

  I glanced behind me at the arched doorway to the room beyond. Kratos was busy on the bridge, and I didn’t expect him to come running back right away, even though the ship was no longer shaking. He was busy with his duties as warlord, and I was going to take advantage of his absence.

  Acting quickly before I could change my mind, I peeled off my clothes and left them in a neat pile on the black-stone counter. I gave another furtive glance around me, glad that no one could see me dipping a toe in the blue water, completely naked.

  I almost yelped from the cold sting, pulling my toe out just as quickly as I’d lowered it in. “Who sits in water that cold?”

  The Vandar Raas, obviously, although I guessed soaking in ice water wasn’t close to the toughest thing the huge alien did. I shivered, not from the cold water, but from the memory of his hard muscles pressed up against me. And the very hard and very large thing I’d felt on my ass when he’d held me to him on the shuttle.

  I moved to the green water, forcing myself not to think of how large the Raas was, as I dipped my foot cautiously into the murky water. It wasn’t freezing, but it wasn’t warm, either. It was the same temperature as the room, but the water itself was viscous, my foot slick on the bottom when I pulled it out.

  Moving to the bubbling orange water, I was pleased to find it warm. I sat on the edge and dropped down into the pool, my toes reaching the bottom when the water was over my breasts. Now that my face was closer to the water, I could smell a warm, spicy scent emanating from the bubbles as they broke the surface. There was nothing feminine about the perfumed water, but inhaling it made my shoulders relax and my mind drift.

  Memories came flooding in.

  I was on Parnisi III with Tara. It was afte
r our parents had been killed, but before she’d won the freighter. We were huddled around a table in the back of a bar that had long since passed “seedy.”

  She’d motioned to a crust of bread left on a plate from the last occupants of the table, a bone picked white next to it. “Eat.”

  I’d eyed it, starving but not willing to eat the only scrap we’d seen all day. “We should share it.”

  She shook her head. “You need it more.”

  I’d felt the gentle rebuke, but was too hungry to care much. She was right. I hadn’t taken to deprivation like she had. Tara had gotten sinewy and lean over the past months. I had miraculously not lost my curves, as I’d gotten weaker and weaker.

  She’d pushed the crust toward me—the plate leaving a trail of grease across the grimy, wood table—then her gaze had settled on a well-dressed male sitting by himself, and her jaw had hardened. “Don’t worry. I know how to get more.”

  I shook my head, forcing the memory to fade. Tara had always done whatever it took to survive—for both of us to survive. I hoisted myself over the barrier between the sections and slipped into the red water, flinching slightly from the heat, but welcoming the pain. Although my skin burned for a moment as it adjusted, I let out a moan as the water covered me up to my chin.

  I thought of my sister’s face as I’d hugged her for the last time. I hoped I would be able to forget the look of shock and betrayal. I even preferred remembering her rolling her eyes at me to the pain in her eyes before I’d turned from her. She hadn’t understood. How could she? She’d always been the one to sacrifice. No one had ever sacrificed for her. Not until that moment.

  I inhaled the hot steam. It didn’t hold the scent of the bubbling water, but it warmed my nose and tickled the length of my throat. Resting my head on the stone ledge, I let the water wash away all the regret and pain of the day. Regret that I’d been the reason my sister had nearly been executed, and the pain of losing her after all. Even though I was on a Vandar warbird and was now the property of its menacing warlord, at the moment, my sister was safe, and I was content.