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The men hurt me sometimes, but I didn’t care anymore. I learned they used to do this sort of thing to a group of women, creating their own little harem for their every little need. Now, they only had me, which meant the entirety of their cruelty was focused on me.
Everything I’d ever cared for was torn away from me. My sisters. Kaze. My old life. Nothing was left. I just hoped Kaela could remain safe from it all. I hoped she never left the caves. She was safe there.
We hadn’t wandered too far from the river. Every time I looked at the water, I pictured Kaze’s face and I hoped for death. I hoped that one day, the men would take it too far and my world would turn black forever.
The river was an ever-present reminder of my mistake. The men liked to be near a constant source of fresh water and had camped out under an overhang not far from it. One of them had dragged Kaze’s body away some time ago and disposed of it. They’d never told me where. I missed him. I wished we’d had more time.
It was late one night, and the men were roasting a dead rabbit over the fire. Even though it smelled delicious, it didn’t really matter to me. It wasn’t like they fed me often anyway. It was enough to where my clothes were starting to fall off of me. I could see my ribs protruding far more than I ever had. My hipbones stuck out more than I had ever seen before. Kaze would have told me I was far too skinny. I would have agreed.
I focused on the reds, yellows, and oranges of the fire and listened to its loud crackle, occasionally watching as an ember popped and floated through the air. It landed close to my foot, which was cuffed with a steel anklet chain to a tree, a way to keep me from running away, I suppose, not that I wanted to. I had nothing to go back to. The cuff was tight, marking my ankle with a red, raw ring that hurt and was just starting to scab, so I tended not to move.
A twig broke off deeper in the woods and I lifted my head lazily, wondering if I hadn’t noticed if one of the men had ambled off, but they hadn’t. All three men were sitting around the fire, talking about what sort of disgusting thing they would force me to do next, after they ate all the good rabbit and fed me whatever scraps were left over, if any at all. There usually wasn’t much, but I’d gotten used to the gnawing pain of hunger in my belly.
The human men didn’t stir. I wondered if they had heard the snapping sound, but none of them moved or indicated that they had. I shrugged. Maybe my head was playing tricks on me. It wouldn’t be the first time.
I was tired. I wasn’t sleeping much. Every time I tried, I’d wake up screaming from the nightmares and then one of the guys would kick me for making noise and waking them up. My ribcage was bruised from it, making it hard to breathe.
I heard another twig break, this time in a different direction, and I began to grow nervous and hopeful at the same time. Maybe Kaela and the others had pinpointed my location? Maybe they’d come to save me after all? Or maybe some other less cruel group of humans had come to find me? Did I even deserve to be saved at all?
Somewhere deep inside, I hoped it was a bear, come to kill us all.
My eyes struggled to look out into the darkness, but still I saw nothing. After enough time had passed, I thought that maybe it was just my mind playing a trick on me and that I hadn’t heard anything after all. Maybe I had finally gone completely insane.
I went back to watching the fire, hearing the crackle of the flames and the trickle of the river next to us, and then I zoned out for a little while, until I heard another twig snap in the distance, closer this time. To my right.
I stilled, looking slowly in the direction of the sound, noticing the men didn’t move this time either. They were too loud, eating their rabbit and drinking some sort of homemade hooch. I didn’t listen to what they were saying. I didn’t care.
Soundlessly, I curled up, watching a figure move somewhere not that far off, right along the tree line. The outline of the individual was barely discernable, nearly invisible at times, but I could tell, whoever it was, he was looking straight at me too.
Chapter Two
Roan
The moment I saw her, I knew I had to have her. My superior vision took her in, even though I knew she couldn’t quite make me out. She was filthy, marked with bruises ranging from deep purple to black, and her cheeks were stained with dirt from her tears. She was clothed in what looked like a dirty beige dress; I could see her gaunt arms and the outlines of her ribs, her skin pale in the moonlight. I knew some Vakarrans treated human women very roughly, but I didn’t approve, and I would never tolerate my men to engage in such behavior either. It made me so incredibly angry, to see a treasured human female suffering like that. I wanted to kill them. Earth was lucky we’d come for them. Mistreatment like this was frowned upon. Damaged merchandise. No good for carrying our children.
We were Vakarran. Some ten years ago, our military had captured Earth and taken the humans as our own, the men to serve us and the women to breed. Our genetics didn’t allow us to sire females, only males, so we were a race of conquerors, constantly on the search for new sources of compatible females. Earth was our most recent conquest and it had supplied a good many women for our species for some time now. I’d even heard news of a breeding colony established in the Andromeda galaxy lightyears away, where a small select group of women were being implanted with human female embryos, so that we’d always have a constant source of mates.
I hadn’t been given the good fortune to be assigned a female by the upper divisions yet, but I knew I’d be given the opportunity sometime soon. I knew my woman would never bear my mark like that. I’d never strike a woman across the face, give her a black eye, or chain her to a tree. She’d submit to me because she respected me, not because she was treated as viciously as this. She would be mine, both in body and soul, utterly and completely.
“What are your orders, Roan?” Taraik asked beside me, using our telepathic link to communicate. I knew my brethren were just was horrified as I was, and that they were just waiting on me to give the orders now. We were going to rescue that woman and take her for ourselves.
“Flank all sides. I’ll take the north. Taraik, the west. Xandaar, the east. Zac, you go straight to her and get her to the tree line as fast as possible while we take care of these good for nothing human bastards,” I ordered.
“What if she resists?” Zac asked.
“Use whatever means necessary, including the tranquilizer cartridge,” I replied, and Zac nodded. Using the tranquilizer gun wasn’t usual with human females, but we had to make sure to get her out of here without damaging her. She looked so fragile that I was afraid we’d hurt her more if we weren’t careful.
The four of us spread out, using our camouflaged skin to blend into the forest around us. I knew where each of them was, the four of us had been together for so long as a team. The seconds ticked by and we all moved closer, careful not to make a sound. My comrades and I closed in, walking from shadow to shadow until we were mere feet away from the dirty human men, who were ravenously chewing on rabbit bones. Fuck, they smelled like sewage. It was revolting. One was even sucking the marrow out of a long bone and I sneered in disgust. Utterly fucking barbarian.
I saw Taraik shake his head. He was a bit of a clean freak, so I knew he was probably itching to take care of these men as quickly as possible.
Xandaar’s eyes searched around us, analyzing our surroundings for other threats that may affect our current mission. He found none as I’d already assessed the area myself.
“We’re clear,” he replied, and the three of us moved in.
I knew Zac was moving in behind us, gathering the female for our own, but now, the only thing I could focus on was the men. I trusted Zac would be successful.
The dirty human men had rudimentary bullet guns in their belts and the three of us moved to take those first. We moved fast, much quicker than the humans, and divested them of their weapons without them even noticing. I pushed the one I’d taken into my belt. The fool hadn’t even loaded it.
