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For her part, Danni was trying not to breathe at all. Along with being much bigger than the other Riivers, their Leader seemed to have a bigger stench as well. Maybe because he got the first pick of all the fresh carrion, she thought, feeling sick.
“Yesssss,” the Leader hissed, finally drawing back and standing upright so that he loomed over Danni and her two captors. “This one smells ripe for breeding. I will bite her and make her my bride.”
He opened his jaws wide, revealing rows of sharp, fang-like teeth all dripping foul-smelling black ichor.
“No, wait!” Danni gasped, shrinking away from the approaching horror. “You…you can’t use me for breeding,” she said, hoping the huge Riiver would believe her. “I have no womb! I had to have it taken out—so you see, I can’t have any of your…your babies.” Just the thought made her want to gag. “I can’t—I’m physically unable to have any kind of children at all.”
“What?” The Leader drew back, frowning. “You lie, female!”
“No, I don’t!” Danni said quickly. “I don’t come from here—from Soluu Four. I’m from a planet called Earth and I had a medical condition that—”
At that moment, she heard screaming behind her, back at the mouth of the cave. The Leader apparently heard it too because he was suddenly alert, lifting his shaggy head and snuffing the air with his flat, melted nose. Suddenly, he stiffened.
“The Tall One!” he growled, glaring at Danni’s two captors. “You have led him here!”
“What? But no, my Leader—we were not followed!” the one on the right protested.
“We saw no one and smelled no pursuit,” the other agreed. “The H’rakens did not even try to fight us to get her back—the soft cowards!”
Danni felt her heart begin to pound. The Tall One was Bravik—she was sure of it. Twisting her head around, she looked for the big Kindred, desperately scanning the shadows for his big form.
“I do not care what you did or did not smell—I smell the Tall One—he is here now!” the Leader growled. “He—”
At that moment there was a flash of light and the captor on Danni’s left fell with a cry and a smoking hole in his scrawny white hide.
“Bravik!” she cried, trying to tear free of the other Riiver, still holding her arm on the right. “I’m here! I’m here!”
But at that moment, the Riiver holding her clapped his hand over her mouth again.
“Give her to me!” the Leader hissed, reaching for Danni. “Or no—wait—take her to the crawl space in the back of the cave. Do not let the Tall One—”
At that moment, the other Riiver’s head was vaporized as a shot from a blaster hit him square in the forehead.
The Leader shrieked in surprised anger and grabbed Danni by the arms, dragging her in front of him as the headless body sank slowly to its knees.
“Beware, Tall One!” he hissed at Bravik, who was suddenly standing in front of him with a blaster in one hand. “I have your female! I will bite her and make her my bride before you can shoot your murder weapon again!”
As though to prove his point, he wrapped his long, clawed fingers around Danni’s wrist and pulled her arm up, his dripping black jaws poised to bite.
A drop of the black ichor dripped onto the sensitive underside of her forearm and she gasped in pain and writhed in the huge Riiver’s grasp. It was like having hot tar dripped on her skin! Or acid, maybe—something that burned and ate into her flesh, anyway. It hurt.
“Bravik,” she whispered, looking into his golden-bronze eyes.
But they were golden-bronze no longer, she realized, with a shock. There was a pinprick of red in each pupil that was growing ever larger.
Oh my God, she thought blankly. Rage—he’s going into Rage for me!
Rage was the state of berserker fury a Kindred warrior entered when he thought his female was in some kind of danger. But Danni had never expected to see a warrior enter such a state—especially not on her behalf. But there could be no doubt about it, Bravik was definitely going into Rage.
“Let…her…go.” The big Kindred’s deep voice was thick with fury and he almost seemed to swell in size as he stood there, the blaster in one hand, glaring at the Riiver who was holding Danni.
If the Leader was fearful of Bravik’s display of Rage, he certainly didn’t show it.
“I have your female, Tall One,” he hissed. “I can bite her before you can fire your murder weapon and the bite of my kind is death for you. Death or a new life as one of the Shadow Seekers—though you call us ‘Riivers’. Do you wish me to turn her into my bride so that she can bear my spawn?”
Danni saw Bravik’s grip tighten on the blaster and his eyes grew even redder. But somehow he held himself in.
