Page 77 of Taken to Voraxia
The first of the Niahhorru steps forward towards Krisxox, who releases a low, animalistic growl deep from within his chest. His ridges are fully black again, but just as the Niahhorru raises all four of his fists, there’s a suddenzingand a terrible twisted cry echoes from beyond this room of horrors.
The Niahhorru start to turn and as they do, I feel a lightness come to my cheeks as I spot a familiar face in the shattered doorway.
Ridges as black as space add an unsettling contrast to the different colors, liquids,bloodssmeared across his cheeks and chest and arms and loincloth and legs and boots and swords.How many has he killed? Do I want to know?
I call out, “Raku!” But he does not look at me. He focuses instead on the train of Niahhorru all lined up to attack.
Krisxox starts forward, but stops, his gaze ripping down to Svera in his arms. She’s still unconscious and Krisxox is looking at her while his body is straining forward as if there are two very different desires warring within him and he can’t seem to settle on a decision. But then one is made for him.
A rumbling sound fills the entire room, shaking it, and I realize that it isn’t Xoran growling — it’s his Xanaxana. Loud and deep andmine. I feel my chest singing in response. A subtle hum ringing in my ears. I feel lightheaded and dizzy with it. And then when more blood drips into my eyes I feel dizzy for a whole different set of reasons.
“Xoran,” I whisper when I see him take a cut to the chest from a Niahhorru carrying a longsword. It doesn’t seem to slow him at all. Another one produces an ion gun, but Xoran raises his forearm and a holoshield appears in time to block it.
As he cuts his way forward, I see Xa’Raku behind him, carrying a weapon that looks more like a saw with electric tines. She wields it with both hands, looking like a whirling dancer as she slips and slices her blade over the bodies blocking her way.
There are xcleranx behind them carrying a range of weapons from my droherion swords to ion guns to other weaponry I’ve never seen and can’t name. Things that look like high tech versions of whips and chains and daggers. The Niahhorru fight madly though, and make a gruesome stand.
I close my eyes at a point, or maybe I pass out, because when I open them again, Xoran is striding towards me across a floor of bodies, so many sightless silver eyes staring listlessly around at nothing.
The urge to puke again hits me, but I take a steadying breath and refocus and when I do I smell the rich, spicy nectar that is Xoran, and I know everything will be okay. I’m safe. We’re all safe.
“Xoran,” I exhale. I can feel his heat brush against me through the table. My eyes slip closed again. “Thank you. Thank the stars…”
He doesn’t speak. My eyes flutter open. One of his huge, six-fingered hands moves towards my face, then drops, molding instead around the hard edge of the table that’s keeping me pinned. The moment Xoran pulls up on it, a groan bubbles up from the Niahhorru lying half-dead near me.
A xcleranx approaches him, sword drawn. Xoran barks, stopping him. “Leave him for questioning. I want to know about this gravity drive that allowed them to take my Mi…” His voice catches and then it breaks. He swallows audibly. “That allowed them to take my Rakukanna from me.”
With nothing else, and with what seems like no effort at all, he rips the entire table away and catches me as I collapse forward. He gathers me into his arms, into his warmth, kicking the table behind him.
The urge to sleep drifts over me, but just before it does, I lean into his neck and whisper against his jaw, “Be careful with me, Xoran. There’s a baby inside…”
22
Xoran
I stare down at her in our bed, knowing that my ridges won’t be anything but the darkest black until she wakes. Lemoria assured me she was fine. Thattheyare fine.
My chest clenches and I can see in the dim light that my ridges have blossomed with color for a moment before returning to darkness.They are fine. They. There’s a they. An us, if she will still have me.
I would not blame her if she did not. I failed her and she was injured and because of the pregnancy I could not put her in the merillian tank even though I wished it. The concussion to her skull and the slight fracture of the delicate bones in her chest will have to heal on their own.
When I find Rhorkanterannu I will burn him alive, just to the point of debilitating pain, then I will do it all over again. And again. And again…
“Mmmph,” she breathes. My whole body clenches and I rush forward. The furs are piled high above and below and around her and I carefully ease myself onto a pillow near her right and exposed shoulder.
Beneath the delicate orange glow of the light overhead, her red skin looks like the innards of a flame, her hair the silk of the xamxin river at its stillest.
I want desperately to touch her, but I do not know if she would approve, so my hand hovers over her for a moment before falling to her curls.
I gently sweep them back from her face and my xora stirs. Just the barest pressure of my fingertips against her skin is enough to make me want to rut her endlessly. But I can’t.She doesn’t want the one who failed her. She will not want me.I try to remember that in the bowels of the ship, she called for me to help her.But I was late. I allowed another to injure her.
“Mmph,” she says again, sounding sleepy and slightly pained.And it is my fault.
“Miari?” I murmur, tone one of pure hope.
“Xoran,” she breathes and I feel her body begin to shift, pushing itself prematurely from sleep.
“You must rest.” I slide my hand down the length of her body, feeling her curves through the thickness of the fur that cloaks her.
