Page 39 of Taken to Kor
Shrov. That’s why I gathered them here. Not to talk about Deena, except to tell them that she’s mine and not available for shekurr, but to talk to them about the other one-thousand-seven-hundred-and-forty-three humans we confiscated from the satellite and that are trapped in tanks held in fifty-six different chambers of this ship because there is not one large enough to house all of them.
I clear my throat into my fist as a way to clear my raging thoughts.I will punish Deena for the way she thinks about her warrior’s mark. I will shame her until she understands that she is perfect in all her glorious parts.I shake my head harder. It’s not clearing. Deena is everywhere, everything, all I can see. Her leg. That she views it as a deformity makes me sad. She is not an animal.
“The humans. Ontte.” I nod around at the gathered males, but my gaze is unfocused, distracted.
“You want us to jettison the human males, right?” Herannathon says.
“Centare. I do not.”
Surprise. More of it. And I know that my hoarding Deena will not be the only thing to upset my pirates today. Why I am only sharing this with a few of them first. “The object is to continue the species. If human females prove to be compatible with Niahhorru males, then it stands to reason that the human males may also be compatible with Niahhorru females.”
“But…but…” Tevbarannos stutters. “But…”
Quintenanrretshushes him. “Rhorkanterannu is correct. We need to run tests before we decide whether to jettison them or not.”
“We won’t jettison them, even if they aren’t compatible. We’ll sell them.”
My words are met with hesitation, consideration, then nods. “Very good,”Quintenanrretsays. “And the females? When should we start opening the tanks?”
Hush. They all stare. I hope only in my silence that they prepare themselves for an answer they won’t like. “We need to wait.”
A heavy sigh deflates their earlier enthusiasm. EvenQuintenanrretfrowns at me now. “You don’t want to start opening tanks on the ship? You want to wait until we’re back to Kor?”
“It’s going to be a shroving frenzy,Quintenanrret. Imagine the terror of the human females. As far as I’m concerned, these human females won’t have ever seen anything outside of their own species before. We’ll need Deena to open the tanks and a controlled environment in which to do it. Some place safe, on Kor, that can’t be breached and that our own pirates won’t be able to infiltrate. I don’t need pirates absconding with females of their liking and scaring the shrov out of them. We don’t dishonor females. Nothing that even hints on non-consent. Nothing that even smells of rape.”
“Rape! Seven suns, Rhorkanterannu, what are you talking about? Niahhorru don’t…”
“You didn’t see them, Tevbarannos. Pirates you’ve known for rotations. When we took the Rakukanna and Svera onto our ship, they went mad with lust. Both females were harmed, bleeding, because of us. I was glad when the Raku came for them. We didn’t deserve them, then. We’re going to deserve them when they wake up.”
Silence.
I can see the discomfort swimming throughout the chamber and that’s where I choose to leave it. Herannathon tosses a bolt in his hand up and down, curls his fingers around it, and shakes his head. “Rhorkanterannu’s right. Tevbarannos, you and Erobu weren’t on the ship. The rest of us barely made it off with our lives. And if the Voraxians had killed us, we’d have deserved it for what we did to those females. They weren’t warriors like Deena. They were terrified. There’s a chance — a strong one — that the others will be, too. Deena is special.” His face clouds, lost in thought, as the others are.
My reaction isn’t one I expected it to be. There’s pride there, ontte, but there’s also something else there. Something unexpectedly ugly. I frown. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
His expression suddenly shifts as his gaze latches to mine. He stares at me for a beat until slowly, one corner of his mouth lifts. “Worried,Rhork?”
I start at the moniker. It sounds so wrong coming out of his stupid mouth. Worse, I didn’t even realize he’d picked up on it. I frown harder. “Speak clearly, Herannathon.”
He tosses his bolt, catches it again and pockets it. “You look worried that you might have some competition.”
“Competition?”
Gerannu says, “Of course. There is always competition for females. It’s only natural.”
A meteor shower couldn’t have had the same impact on the atmosphere around me. My plates all lift and I round on the room. I point at Herannathon with two of my hands. “If that’s a challenge, I accept.”
Herannathon steps away from the wall and tension threads the air. No one makes a move to stop us. They wouldn’t. To do so would be to dishonor everyone present. But I’m still a little surprised not even Quintenanrret suggests that perhaps, I’ve already earned her.
That causes my mind to fire with another question — one I haven’t even considered up to this moment. She doesn’t think herself worthy of me. But do I think I’m worthy of her? Have I earned her? My frown is hard enough to cut glass. Meanwhile, Herannathon is laughing as he rolls out his wrists and steps between the chairs.
“How should we…” He starts, but he doesn’t finish. His gaze jerks up, looking past me towards the entrance. “Do you hear that?”
I glance around, following his gaze around the command room, empty except for us. And then comes the distant voice.Voices.Disjointed fragments, they sound like they’re being shouted from the far end of a tunnel.
“Someone activated their token to the whole ship,” Gerannu says. “It doesn’t sound like the act was intentional. Who’s that stupid?”
“I can think of a few pirates.” Herannathon rolls his eyes.
