Battling Rapture (2 page)

“What I wouldn’t give for some hard liquor and an automatic
assault rifle right now.”

She imagined she was engaged in a faceoff with the air
patrol craft. The drop to the ground wasn’t far. For now, she would wait them
out. The ground hovercraft stopped below her. Khaki uniforms and scraggly hair
were all she could make out of the aliens below.

They didn’t climb up.

The air patrol craft shifted positions, lowering to her line
of sight. Then it fired repeatedly on the area of rock directly below her
perch. The ground shook and she fell back. The ledge gave way and she grabbed
hold of the loose boulder with her free hand and hugged the edge with her other
arm. She and the boulder slid down the incline.

If it flips, I’ll be crushed.

The speed at which she traveled was mind blowing. She felt
every bump as the boulder careened down the slope. Brown and green blurry
images of trees whizzed past. Her stomach and its contents rolled, fell and
rose again. The boulder scraped and clattered against rock, yet all she heard
was the
whoosh
of air passing her ears.

Suddenly, the boulder stopped and pitched forward. She was
flung through the air. What was probably seconds felt closer to minutes of
freefalling. She landed on her side. Hard. She was shaken, but managed to raise
her gun hand. Her fingers were numb. She fired off two shots. Purple blood
sprayed from the chest of the first Trogo to reach her.

Pain lanced through her body and she almost dropped her arm.
Almost. She fired until the clip was empty. Snarls and yells greeted her ears.
Bodies littered the ground, but more came. She couldn’t make her body get up.
Behind the Trogo, she could see men and women trapped in the cages on the rear
of the ground hover vehicles. She’d stumbled onto a patrol.

Adrenaline coursed through her system. Niki had her knife
out before the next Trogo grabbed her. She missed his heart as he twisted and
she only managed a gut stab. That wouldn’t kill him.

She was jerked roughly to her feet and handcuffed before she
could throw her first punch. Her knife was stuck in the Trogo’s belly. She
leaned back against the Trogo holding her upper arms, lifted both of her feet,
and kicked the one before her with all her strength. He fell back against his
comrades. They went down as though they were bowling pins.

The one holding her jerked her forward and to the rear of
the hovercraft. She spit on the pile of Trogo attempting to stand on the way
past.

“It took twenty of you to subdue one girl. You suck and your
friends are dead.” For once having the last word didn’t make her feel better.

* * * * *

He wouldn’t tell Venn he had brought his younger sister to
an almost lawless casino. Rhine looked around the B’wor’s Luck. It had all the
prerequisites of a place to lose your money or your life. The walls were dark
enough to hide anything which might splatter on them. The lights stayed dim.
The haze of
tryzu
smoke created an artificial fog which secluded pockets
of tables.

The old, sturdy tables were dented, watermarked
tiont
wood. The chairs looked comfortable, black, ergonomic and obviously designed to
keep players in their seats for long hours. The scantily clad barmaids who
pushed subpar liquor were the hallmark of any low rent establishment on a
casino moon.

In the front room, hawkers enticed players to play at their
game tables and try computer games. As Rhine scanned the room, he occasionally
caught the hawkers’ eyes. He made sure his teeth were bared. The longer,
sharper and harder teeth of a hypersensitive were common knowledge. The hawkers
looked away quickly.

Play-for-credit machines lined the walls and randomly
whirled and buzzed with sounds and flashing lights. They hurt his
hypersensitive eyes and ears. The mood was boisterous.

They passed from the larger room to a smaller room in the
back. The noise and lights fell away as if it were a waterfall. Each sound was
measured, used or discarded here by patrons, based on whether or not it moved
them closer to more credits. The United Universe’s common currency was only
half of the motivation here. The other was the lure of the winning hand. All
the serious card players congregated here in the back room.

Somewhere on this casino moon was the Huntu’s newest first
lady’s kinswoman. His cousin Venn’s wife, Camryn, was an Earth woman, the love
of his cousin’s life and a former slave. Venn had hired the crew of the
Dovian
Heart
, a group of anti-slavery mercenaries, to search for the woman. Rhine
had been dubious in the extreme about the likelihood she would be found. Niki
Sawyer could have been on the beleaguered Earth or on one of the hundreds of
thousands of inhabited planets scattered throughout the United Universe. She’d
been identified quickly, surprising him more than he wanted to admit.

The information sent to Venn from the crew of the
Dovian
Heart
indicated Isor Ja, an itinerant gambler and lackey for the region’s
number two press gang boss, had purchased his new cousin’s kinswoman. Rhine had
been waiting in space, ready for the message that the
Dovian Heart
had
found Niki. He’d changed course immediately and set out with his cousins Tor,
Gunter and Olaf. Unfortunately, he also had an extra crew member. Bronwyn.

She was untried on a mission like this one. If Isor Ja
wouldn’t allow Rhine to purchase Niki Sawyer, Rhine fully intended to kill him
and take her. They tried to give Camryn what she wanted. She wanted her
kinswoman. She was nearly sick with wanting her.

The desire to give Camryn what she wanted was why, when the
small Earth woman asked if Bronwyn could continue her coming of age trip
instead of being returned to Ordan, both Venn and Rhine had folded. They had
pretended to be swayed by Camryn’s argument that Bronwyn would be with family.
He knew the truth. They were fools for her every request. Outside of her
brothers, who would protect the girl more fiercely than her cousins and the
ruling cabinet of her Tribe, she’d asked?

When he returned home, he would practice saying no to Camryn
each day until it was easy.

At least Bronwyn looked the part of a badass. They’d all
donned black leather and the girl had emulated Camryn’s style by wearing thin
leather pants under a bisected skirt. Extreme eyeliner and black lipstick,
combined with the fact that as an Ordanian she was taller than most men in the
casino, eased his mind on how tough she looked. Besides, Bronwyn had come into
the world with icy disdain in her eyes and a cold sneer on her lips.

He kept her close to his back and Tor stationed himself
behind her. Anyone would have to be a damn fool to come against four armed
Ordanian men and one mean and armed Ordanian woman.

He scanned his surroundings again, blocking the maelstrom of
emotions which swirled around the room. He wondered if the patrons would
control their feelings if they knew empaths walked among them.

“This place is a dump,” Bronwyn said.

For once, he was happy to see the contempt on her face.
Without Camryn to make her smile, the girl had no other expression.

They needed to find Isor Ja. Each man and Bronwyn had his
image on their communication pads from an old warrant. Sweaty, unwashed bodies
and
tryzu
smoke created an aroma which curled his lip and caused his
eyes to water.

“How are we going to find him in this crowd?” Gunter asked.

“We have to guard the little one here,” Rhine said.

“I’m almost as tall as you. How is that little?” she asked.

“I mean age, Bronwyn.”

“I’ll cover the door,” Gunter said quietly. “Contact me on
the com link if you find him.”

Rhine was proud of his new communications links. They had to
be special ordered because Ordanian hearing was so advanced that a regular link
sounded as if someone was screaming in their ears. Rhine nodded and they set
off to the right side of the room. They wound slowly through the tables. Anyone
in their way moved. Those who glanced at them looked away quickly. Being bigger
and scarier was satisfying in the extreme.

A familiar scent assailed his nose at the same moment
Bronwyn gasped. He hurriedly searched the room. It smelled as if they had
bottled Camryn’s scent, cut the layer of sweetness with an extra dose of spice
and then sprayed the rear of the room with it.

“There,” Bronwyn whispered.

She quickly pointed to a table behind a haze of
tryzu
smoke and surrounded by several species he knew to be hypersensitive. The scent
of the Earth woman would be too much for them to resist.

He barreled through the aliens. As he neared, he got his
first clear look at a woman who had to be Niki Sawyer.
Now we’ll have two of
them to defend.

She was exquisite. She looked like Camryn, yet she…didn’t.
She had the same Rhinonian
colbruna
-colored skin and long, curly brown
and black hair. Their features were almost identical at first glance. Niki’s
face was symmetrical, her eyes large and brilliant, her lashes long and her
lips full.

But her brown eyes were also hard and her mouth was
implacable instead of just stubborn. She stared at the back of Isor Ja’s head
as if the force of her gaze would be enough to shatter his skull. She radiated
a controlled anger which was almost frightening coming from such a beautiful
woman. He glanced down. Isor Ja had her hands chained behind her. She wore a
sheer sheath in a shimmering rainbow print and ankle shackles. The bastard
hadn’t even given her shoes for her feet.

They reached the table just as a player folded and stood. A
yellow and brown amphibious male from Ol attempted to take his place. Rhine
pulled him away by the neck, careful to keep the man’s shirt between his hand
and the mucous covering the Ol’s body.

“Hey, I was—” The man looked up at Rhine. “I’ll find another
table.”

Rhine sat down. “What’s the game? What are the stakes?”

“Ordanian,” Isor Ja said. He glanced behind Rhine at the
others and shuddered. “Ordanian nobles, no less. We aren’t playing for steep
enough stakes for someone like you.”

“We are Huntu. Are you telling me I may not play?”

Silence descended on the table.

“She’s mine. You have your own Earth exotic,” Isor Ja
blurted as he scraped his chair back.

Rhine could feel her eyes on him. Her malevolence was now
directed at him.

“You speak of my new cousin, Camryn, Lady Huntu. Do so with
respect.” Or die was a given.

Niki’s hostility lowered and the look she gave him was more
speculative than murderous. Rhine leaned back casually in the chair. He felt
more than heard Gunter join them.

“What are we playing?”

He wanted to say his prowess at cards was saving the day. In
reality, the Earth woman, Niki, gave him clues to best his opponents. He’d
worked out a system based on how she moved her body. A toss of her hair
indicated a bluff. If she cocked her head to the right, it meant bid higher. If
she cocked her head to the left, it meant hold. Her clues were too reliable for
chance. It seemed the woman had chosen sides.

Rhine didn’t feel at all guilty about cheating. Maybe Isor
Ja wouldn’t mind either if he knew that winning Niki would save Rhine from
slitting Isor Ja’s throat and tossing his body into the casino’s incinerator.

Isor Ja was clearly in trouble. Their fellow players had
abandoned the game, saying the stakes were too steep. Isor Ja refused to admit
defeat. Olaf had already hacked into the other man’s credit account and knew
what his balance was. He’d whispered the information to Rhine five hands ago.

“I raise my bet ten thousand credits,” Rhine said coolly.

Isor Ja was visibly sweating now. “I can’t cover a bet like
that.”

The man didn’t fold, though. Rhine stared at him for several
moments, allowing the man’s anxiety to escalate.

“What do you have that I would want?” Rhine asked.

“I have a cache of
tryzu
.” Isor Ja sounded hopeful.

“
Tryzu
won’t work on an Ordanian. I have no use for
drugs.”

They sat there in silence for a while. Rhine allowed the
tension to build. Isor Ja was a compulsive gambler. When he wasn’t running
errands for his boss, he was hopping from casino moon to casino moon. The
B’wor’s Luck just happened to be his favorite casino.

“Come now, if you can’t match the bet or make it worth my
while, I’ll take the entire pot.” Rhine made to move his credit badge to the
table computer, which recorded each bet and ensured it was paid.

“I have a new single-man fighter.” Isor Ja leaned forward in
his chair.

“If it’s standard issue, I won’t fit in it. Come, man, you
have a perfectly good exotic behind you. I would accept her as payment on the
debt.”

“Fifteen thousand credits. She’s a level one exotic.” His
tone was proud.

Rhine’s lip turned up in disdain. “You’ve already lain with
her.”

“I haven’t. I was waiting for tonight after we partied
some.”

Rhine inhaled. The man was telling the truth. Their scents
weren’t intermingled. He had merely touched her, and by the look of the cut
under the smaller man’s eye, Rhine knew why she was shackled.

“Thirteen thousand,” Rhine said. “Make sure the codes for
her chains come with her deed.”

She was angry again. Didn’t she understand that they had to
play this a certain way? They all needed to make it out alive.

Isor Ja looked down at his hand. “Fine, I accept the terms.”

The table computer flashed green. The bet had been recorded.

“Barbarian’s hammer,” Isor Ja said. He smiled as he laid his
cards on the table.

Rhine glanced down at all five warrior cards. The
holographic images of each armor-covered hulking warrior in red, black, blue,
green and orange bludgeoning an opponent with a mallet-like weapon flashed
repeatedly. Rhine could hear the blood pumping swiftly through Isor Ja’s three
chambered heart.