Eluria's Enforcer (The Argadian Heart Trilogy Book 1)
Read Eluria's Enforcer (The Argadian Heart Trilogy Book 1) Online
Authors: Adrianna Dane
Devon Andromeda, a
nanus-altered Argadian Enforcer of the First Level, is assigned the mission to
hunt down and eliminate Eluria Zydon, a rebel leader, who also happens to be
the daughter of an Elite Tribunal Commander. Enforcers are altered and trained
assassins who retain no memories, or humanoid emotions which would hamper their
purpose. Aggression is the only emotion unblocked in an Enforcer; the Tribunal
directs their existence.
Eluria Zydon’s life is filled with more than
enough memories and emotions for both Devon and herself. She lives with the
guilt of past injustice and her life has been dedicated to finding the cure to
set Devon Andromeda and those like him free. It is a payment she hopes will
also free her soul once and for all from her tormenting past.
Confrontation on the lifeless planet, Serdion,
will change them both forever. An explosion delivers Devon into Eluria’s hands.
An experimental drug opens the floodgates to Devon’s emotions...and his memory.
The first emotion he faces, and must learn to control is desire. Eluria has
been trained as a twilight companion and has the knowledge to help him harness
his passions. Will he accept her help? Or is his only intent to complete his
mission...her death...
This
story is a work of original fiction. All names, characters, locations, and
incidents are products of the author’s imagination, or have been used
fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, locales, or
events is entirely coincidental.
All
rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without
written permission from the author.
This
book remains the copyrighted property of the author.
Copyright
©2016 by Adrianna Dane
Cover
Art by Laura Gordon
This
story was originally released in February 2005 by Amber Quill Press/Amber Heat
CAUTION:
This story contains
explicit sexual situations and strong language. You must be over the age of 18
years of age to read this story.
The Argadian Heart
Trilogy
Eluria’s
Enforcer
Kierra’s
Thread
Ravager’s
Redemption
Eluria’s Enforcer
By Adrianna Dane
Dream Romantic Unlimited, LLC
Danger, Will Robinson, Danger!
Those were the first words that filled Devon
Andromeda’s thoughts as he swerved the hovercade to avoid another fireball. The
fragment of memory caught him unaware. Come and gone that fast. Lately, there’d
been a number of uncomfortable, yet similar image flashes breaking his train of
thought. None joined, none threaded to emotion. Confusing.
Whoosh! Boom!
Another fireball
exploded on the uneven earthen track ahead of him, almost blinding him. Again
he yanked the wheel around and swerved away. He’d need to pull over until the
firestorm subsided or take the chance of disabling the hovercade in a nest of
craters left in a fireball’s wake.
Haydon!
He wished he could engage the
hovering capabilities of the vehicle; he would get to his destination much
faster. But there was too much instability in the atmosphere of the planet even
without the storm. Why anyone would use Serdion for a hiding place, he couldn’t
fathom. In Devon’s opinion, Serdion was on the verge of splintering and was as
dangerous as they came. Intermittent firestorms bombarded the planet’s surface
leaving deep gouges in their wake.
He was too close to his target to take unnecessary
chances; he’d had come too far. Pulling over to the side of the track he, he powered
down the vehicle. Leaning back, he closed his eyes, attempted to empty his
mind, knowing patience would net him the prize.
Having achieved the rank of First Level
Enforcer, there were none who possessed Devon’s level of skill. Enhanced
through Nanus, all emotion and memory forever locked away, he’d been reborn to
serve the Argadian Tribunal, the highest power on Argadia. Enforcers were
molded from adolescent Argadian youth, each chosen carefully by the members of
the Elite Tribunal.
Devon was selected in his seventeenth year.
So they informed him. He retained no personal memory of the event. There were
only three emotion levels allotted to an Enforcer. Stasis. Aggression. Killing
Frenzy. Memory was viewed as an impediment to an Enforcer’s usefulness.
Enforcers were controlled and monitored by the Tribunal. And terminated
efficiently if they became dysfunctional.
Devon rose to First Level Enforcer status
because of the number and intricacy of missions he’d completed successfully.
And lived.
These breaks in memory disturbed him. Once
this mission was complete, he would present himself for assessment and
reprogramming. As required, he’d reported the memory breaks to his commander.
The only reason he wasn’t at the Nanus refusion facility now was because of the
apparent importance of this mission. He’d been specifically requested by a
Tribunal member.
The target had eluded or disposed of all
previous Enforcer attempts at capture. From the chip they’d implanted in his
neck, Devon possessed all the pertinent data he required to identify, locate
the target, and…disable it. The photosimiles transmitted to him gave Devon
pause and caused him an odd sense of confusion.
Over the years of his services as an
enforcer, a lone image had haunted him somehow through stasis visions. Female.
Tall. Seductive. She’d floated within his stasis mind, beckoned him. Fleeting
bits, quickly vanishing, soon forgotten. Until recently.
He’d often wondered who the female was.
There’d been nothing to connect her to him as far as he knew. For some unknown
reason, he’d never mentioned her image to anyone. It was solely with the
implantation of the chip Devon was now able to name her.
If he’d been susceptible to the passion
emotion, he would experience desire for her. He knew of the emotion’s affect on
a man, understood its purpose, but had never personally experienced it. Not
that he hadn’t been trained in seduction techniques. In fact, he had a
reputation for being quite skillful in that area when an occasion warrented. It
didn’t require feeling the emotion to use it against an opponent.
Nanus programming allowed his khout to
stiffen on his thought command when seduction mode was required. His ability to
pleasure and fully satisfy had served him well to elicit necessary information
from informants.
Devon’s thoughts returned to the target. He’d
wondered if the stasis visions stemmed from yet another fracture in memory. It
disturbed him the way the images continued to invade his mind. It represented
an imperfection. He was no longer an imperfect being as existed before
conditioning.
The fact Devon still lived and had risen to a
rank no other had been able to achieve in the last twelve years was evidence of
that level of performance. No, imperfection could not be tolerated.
When they’d implanted the chip with her
image, aggression consumed him. Foolish female. Now knowing her identity, he
reasoned she’d sought to disable him through his stasis visions. She’d
obviously thought she could elicit a softness in him and deter him from his
mission. Perhaps distract him long enough to kill him.
Her name was Eluria Zydon. One of the rebel
leaders to a group of young, idealistic Argadians who had recently led a new,
futile insurrection attempt against the Elite Forces. As expected, it ended in
swift and bloody defeat. The Tribunal had hoped to wipe out the whole cell. But
it was discovered shortly thereafter that Eluria Zydon survived, and had
disappeared.
Fortunately, the Tribunal was able to plant
an informant within the Freelion rebel organization, and information had
finally been received as to her whereabouts. She’d been adept at eluding him so
far. Unusual for a rebel. But then again, Eluria Zydon had slipped by more than
one skilled hunter. Devon had tracked her movements for months, and it
ultimately led him to this desolate, ravaged planet.
The information chip also informed him she
was the eldest daughter of an Elite Tribunal Member. A dishonored daughter, her
purity compromised, and for a number of years she had supported herself as a
twilight companion, one who provided skilled sexual release to those who would
pay a twilighter’s exhorbitant price.
It was not uncommon for those in power to
contract for a twilighter’s services to provide long-term companionship when
transferred for duty to one of the lesser planets. Devon surmised her skill as
a twilighter was what allowed her to breach his stasis. In some instances,
twilighters were known for their unique enhancements beyond simply physical
pleasuring and companionship.
It was her father, High Commander Zydon
himself, who sanctioned the mission and requested Devon specifically to carry
it out. Eluria Zydon had been an embarrassment to him for years, but now she’d
become a danger as well—apparently more than just a worrisome thorn in the High
Commander’s side. One that would not be allowed to continue.
Upon arriving on Serdion, Devon drove past
field after field of flattened desolation. There was no longer life on Serdion.
Elite Forces conquered this planet long ago. All inhabitants had been moved to
Argadia to serve the Tribunal. Hence, even with its obvious instability and
dangerous environment, it often served as a perfect hiding place for those
seeking refuge from Argadia’s brand of justice. Although there were several
smaller planets more conducive to life, Serdion was positioned an equal
distance between Ednos, the rebel stronghold, and Argadia, the home planet.
His informants indicated this was where
Eluria’s transport unit had landed. Each time he thought he had her location
pinpointed, she’d changed transports, requiring him to wait until new
information filtered out to him. Hopping from one planet to another, to this
point she’d successfully thwarted his attempts to capture her.
Not this time. Finally, he’d tracked her
present unit here. There’d been no indication of lifeforce nearby when he’d
discovered her ship. It had not proven difficutl for him to gain entry to the
conveyance. He’d efficiently searched it for anything useful, then destroyed
the unit, making certain she was left with no way to escape the planet, or to
change transports before he located her. He’d followed the trail left by her
land conveyance.
Traveling this desolate planet for days, he
tracked her evasive maneuvers. Until today she’d invariably eluded him, but now
he understood there was a subtle pattern to her evasion. She was clever, but
not clever enough. Or she was tiring. One less skilled would not have
discovered the seemingly random movements she used, never resting long enough
in one place for him to target her. But he would have her soon. Anticipating
her next move, Devon was confident that soon enough he would have her.
Yet now another delay. This time a firestorm
hindered the completion of his assignment. And this was a mission he wanted
over. Chasing some scrap of a rebellious female was not what he’d been trained
for. It offered too much down time as he awaited news from his informants, time
in which more fragmented memory scrambled his thoughts. A First Level Enforcer
should only concentrate on the task at hand. Memory and confusion were not
acceptable.
Devon squinted and looked up at the cobalt
sky littered with what appeared to be a diminishing number of fireball missiles
hitting the planet. He turned and stared down the length of the dark, deserted
track. Devon narrowed his gaze as he targeted the brief glow of a soft yellow
light in the distance. It was not the reddish-orange of the tiny, fiery embers
falling from the sky. It was a steady cream-yellow glow in the night,
indicating lifeforce. Possibly a dwelling or an encampment of some kind.
Devon sensed the elusive quarry would soon be
his. He inhaled deeply, centered and narrowed his dark inner power, felt it
surge within him. He focused on the mission, capture…defeat of the enemy…a
quick termination. Hot, sizzling energy flooded and encompassed him. The window
of the hovercade reflected back to him the familiar focused red glow of his
eyes as he simmered with the molten frenzy of battle, the signature of a true
Enforcer. It was a look that made more than one enemy quake.
The familiar power of rage coursed through
him, heating him until it was a fire enveloping him with an intensity that
blistered away all unnecessary thought. He started the hovercade and slowly
directed it toward the beacon of light. Eluria Zydon was about to confront her
fate.
* * *
Eluria sat huddled beneath the overhanging
rock formation, a fire lamp her only source of warmth and light. She didn’t
dare sleep, knowing an Enforcer was on her trail and closing in quickly. With
only snatches of sleep over the last few days, her strength was almost at an
end, and her alertness was not what it should be.
She’d come to Serdion thinking to avoid
detection. Apparently, it hadn’t worked the way she planned. This Enforcer was
better than the others, more persistent, determined. His thought processes more
refined, able to adapt far too quickly to any deviation. He’d kept close,
forcing her to constantly keep moving, and she’d only just managed to stay one
step ahead of him.
This firestorm had halted what little
progress she’d made. She could only pray that it stopped him as well. All
around her the fireballs fell, flashing showers of orange and smoldering to
gray ash, leaving huge gouges in the planet surface.
She’d wound up here because the research team
had discovered the antidote. After all these years of testing in the Freelion
labs, finally it had been perfected enough to try out on a living, breathing
Enforcer. She carried the first precious vials with her. The attack on Argadia
had been a diversion to allow her enough time to flee.
It pained her to think of so many lives lost,
just so she could escape. But this antidote could mean the difference between
their future success and a continued long, drawn out battle against the Elite
Tribunal. The struggle had already cost too many lives.
When she’d discovered what her father had
done, it had started out as a personal crusade to right a wrong. But when she’d
witnessed up close the brand of justice the Tribunal meted out to innocent
citizens, the enforced slavery it termed “service to the Tribunal,” her
involvement had turned into much more than personal.
It was her task to get the vials off the
planet without detection. Another arm of the plan was in place to capture an
Enforcer, incapacitate and transport him to Ednos. They would rendezvous at the
home base of the rebel faction. It was secure, a sanctuary for them, and
offered a secure place to detain a trained Enforcer while the antidote
attempted to unweave the nightmare Nanus enforced.
If they were successful, the Freelion forces
would use the antidote on enough Enforcers to overthrow the Tribunal. They
could re-educate them and gain entry to the Nanus facility, destroying it
before more Enforcers could be molded. Once infiltrated, Freelion forces would
be able to end the terror of the Tribunal’s domination over Argadia.
The plan was solid. But an informant, a
traitor, had breached their security. It was something they hadn’t counted on.
Their strategy was revealed to the Tribunal and everything unraveled. The last
communication Eluria had received indicated the entire cell on Argadia had been
destroyed. They’d also informed her an Enforcer beamer had been attached to her
current transport unit and she was alone with a hunter on her tail.