His Human Hellion (Ultimate Passage Book 2) (11 page)

Holy shit. What had she stepped into? An alien with a God-complex. Un-freaking-believably-great. NOT!
“Look, I don’t know about this god bullshit, but I want to go home. Before I go home I want to find Finn. That’s it.”

She paused
. Froze. Something was happening.

A low
drone reverberated throughout her torso the way it did when she would be stopped at stoplights in Houston and someone in the car next to her played a bass beat that thrummed in her body.

Saraz shook as if
he were on a vibrating machine, emitting a low hum. It was like a cat’s purr, but different, lower, deeper, it made her body quiver as if she were on a washing machine that was spinning laundry after the rinse cycle.

His skin turned a dark
er gray color and undulated. He expanded, shifting, changing, his image shimmering. Marissa backed up, as close to the wall as she could, scooching as much as possible with her virtually useless legs. His robe fell away, revealing a set of wings that had a hook on top, midway between the shoulder and the tip, as if a bat’s, but with scales rather than the translucent visage of a bat’s wings. The two maidens fell on their knees, supplicating, praying, muttering some sayings in another language. Saraz emitted a low roar, then on two legs still, he approached Marissa.

Marissa tried to keep from trembling, at least where he could see it.
What the hell was this creature?

He sat on the bed next to her, and as much as she wanted to fear him, there was this raw sexuality that drew her to him.
Not in a way that she wanted, but in a way that seemed uncontrollable, irresistible.

She wondered if he could talk, communicate, if he was human in this condition. She didn’t have to wonder for long.

“What was it you said? God bullshit?” His voice was a deep timbre. His eyes hadn’t changed and they penetrated her, putting her in a greater state of fear.

She needed to backpedal, he was scary, and not happy. “I’m sorry.”

He grunted, sat back, his wings folded behind him, not so imposing, though he was still larger than the largest man she’d ever seen, of that she was sure. If she had to put a name to him–

—to his shape—

—dragon. That’s the closest she could come to describing the creature he became. After Finn and what she’d seen with his changing shape, his ability to take a more human shape, she didn’t understand why this stunned her.
Yeah, tell that to your heartbeat,
because it was making like a captured songbird, and threatening to go into overload.

He squinted, his jaw muscles worked beneath the dark gray scales
, and rose. With creaking and small cracking sounds, he shifted back to human form, once more magazine-model-worthy, except for the eye color and iris shapes. Nude, he bent over to pick up his robe. The two maidens scrambled after to grab it before he could, as if he was a king—god, Marissa reminded herself—who was too good to have to bend over to pick something up.

His smile was
yet again the same beguiling one as before. It struck Marissa that there was a similarity between his shifting to that form and Finn’s shifting to human form. Then she was sad for seeing a parallel and prayed she was way wrong. She didn’t want Finn to be anything like this creature. She mentally shook herself. Of course Finn wasn’t. Finn was goodness. This man—dragon—creature was . . . anything but goodness, if she had to put money on it. “Which is your natural form?” She wished she’d bitten back that question. This was not the time to push buttons.

The smile remained on his face and he didn’t switch back
to his more terrifying form. He paced back and forth. “I am equally comfortable in either, but it seems to frighten other beings when I am in my saural form.”

“Saural?
As in dinosaur? Is that like a lizard? Are you a dragon?”

“Dragons, as you humans think of them
, are myths. More than likely they are myths and legends that have come down from interactions with my kind.”

“You have a kind?
That interacted with humans? On Earth?”
Of course on Earth, dunderhead,
she so wanted to chastise herself.
Where else would humans be, dipstick?
Well, I’m here, right? And this isn’t exactly Earth. How she wished that damned inner voice would shut the hell up sometimes.

He took a step closer to
Marissa. She pressed up against the wall to get further away from him. If she pressed any harder, and if she were strong enough, she’d go right through the stone wall.

He sat on the edge of the bed, his green eyes with their vertical slit narrowed, focused on her. “My kind were originally on
Earth. Are on Earth.”

“Still? Like now? There are—what—dragon types that live on
Earth and change and look like you?”

“Yes. I’m the only one of my kind here.” His face looked sad. His tone had even become sad.

Marissa found herself feeling pity for him even though—and there were many even thoughs: like she felt as if she was a compulsory guest, as if she had no opportunity to exercise free will, and compound that with the fact he was a freaky-scary dude that turned into a dragon-type.

“
Why are you the only one of your type here?”

“It’s a long story.”

That reminded her when she asked Finn about himself and his life, and he replied that it was a long story. She’d asked for the condensed version and received some story about aliens. She wasn’t going to ask for the short version again. “I’m listening.” Her stomach grumbled. Loudly! Way too loudly.

“You’re hungry. When did you eat last?”

“It was . . .” She paused to think on it. “When I was on Earth.”

“That can’t be good for
Bearer. Your baby needs to eat.”

“
I still don’t get that whole thing. My baby is Bearer? What’s that about?”

“
Of course she is. She and you were prophesied about. You’re in the Sacred Writings. I dreamed of you. Of her.”

He was freaking her out
, talking some crazy shit? She had no clue what to say. If she said what she was thinking, she’d be sure to antagonize him, because right now she had him pegged as bat-shit crazy. He couldn’t possibly know the gender of her baby. Marissa’s thoughts rampaged through her mind, uncontrolled and disjointed.

He snapped his fingers. The two Asazi women returned, still scantily clad, breasts
bobbing, pubic areas playing peek-a-boo, eyes downcast, not looking at their master, their god, or whatever he was.

“Bring our guest some sustenance. And something to drink.” He dismissed them with a wave.

She had so many questions, she didn’t know where to begin, but she had to start somewhere. “My baby is a girl? How do you know this?”

“The prophecy.”

“Of course.” She kept her tone from being sarcastic, though she wanted to be sarcastic. “Naturally.” A part of her wanted to believe him though, because if the baby was a girl, then she could safely give birth on Earth.

“
Yes, she will be the first Asazi girl with wings.”

“Wait.” She remembered what
Finn said. “Asazi girls don’t have wings.”

“That is what will make her special, and will make her worthy of being my mate.”

“Hold up, you son of a—” Did he just say that her baby would be his mate? And that she would have wings? And he
knew
that the baby was a girl? The list of incredible things said by Saraz was getting longer and longer. “Wait. My baby will be your mate? What’s that about?”
Over my dead body,
she wanted to say, but wasn’t sure she needed to worry about the ravings of a lunatic shape-shifting guy who spouted nonsense. “Can we go back to your people, your kind, and how they are on Earth? And why are you here?”

“I was banished. Punishment for my misdeeds, for breaking the
tenets.”

“What did you do? And how did they send you here?”

“I fell in love with a human woman. We mated. We had a children, they had children, an entire line . . .” His face bore a look of disappointment. “A line of what my kind called half-breeds. They punished all of us from Earth, me and my descendants. By the time they banished us, of course, my woman was long-passed, dead. But all her progeny, all our progeny, and I—we were all banished to—this place. This place created by my brothers.”

“Outer space? Another galaxy?”
Marissa wondered if his answer would yield a solution to her returning to Earth. She leaned closer, ready for an answer, anything that would help her get home.

“You will name the child Alithera.”

That cold bitch that visited her in the cell. Sure, like I’d want my daughter named after her.
“What?” Where did that come from? Marissa froze. That name again. Was that a tradition kind of thing, naming girls Alithera? What did it mean? “Why?”

“That’s the name of my next true mate. A true breed for me.”

Yeah, she definitely wasn’t going to tell him about the Asazi woman called Alithera. Sometimes ignorance was bliss, even if you were just pretending to be ignorant. “So you will keep me captive until my child is born?”

“Yes. She will be the mother of my son, my path to redemption.”

Marissa grabbed her shins, pulling her legs close to her body, she laid her head on her knees. This was too much. She couldn’t even begin to fathom the concept of what would happen fifty years from now with her descendants. She peeked at him from between the curtain of her hair.

He really did seem to believe the stuff he was laying on her. He was taking all of this seriously. And that mean
t getting away wouldn’t be quite that easy. She closed her eyes, rubbed her forehead on her knee, pressing it in, trying to push away the headache that was threatening to overtake her. “And after she’s born? Who would raise her?” Even as Marissa voiced the words, she know there was no way in hell she was staying. She’d go make it on her own in Midland before staying here and living up to this madman’s idea of domestic life.

When he didn’t answer, she looked up at him again. His cat-like eyes were on her. Or maybe they were snake-like. Right now she couldn’t think straight enough to sort that out. She needed rest, and time to think, time to formulate a plan.

“Could I go to my cell?”

“You have no cell. You are not in prison. You are free to roam about at will.”
He waved an arm about in a grandiose manner.

Great. Free to roam a medieval, possibly underground castle that’s inhabited by concubines and a dragon-king-creature. Wonderful!
And where would she go, back to the bowels of Midland where things wanted her dead? Then again, his statement did bring a question to mind. “Are you not worried that I will escape?”

He cocked his head, as though the question itself was a curiosity. “Why would you want to leave a perfectly safe environment and risk your life and your baby’s life in
Midland? Where Kormic and Asazi soldiers roam and attack anyone they suspect? You would have no friends there. I don’t believe you’d make a foolish choice like that.”

The two women entered carrying trays of food. They opened a tray jack made of light-colored wood and woven leaves and set the trays down.

Suddenly, whatever was on the platters mattered to Marissa far more than the idea of making a plan to escape. That could wait for a short spell until she’d eaten, gotten some strength back, and when she could figure out why her legs collapsed.

The women put the trays near her, within reach. There were different types of meat and vegetables. None of which looked like what she ate on
Earth, but they smelled delicious. She piled some on a plate using the ladles and looked around for a fork. Maybe they didn’t use forks. She picked up a chunk of meat and ripped off a chunk with her teeth. She swallowed the delicate, melt-in-your-mouth bite. “Very good. Thank you.” She finally remembered to thank her host. He nodded his acknowledgment.

“I have so many questions.” She tore into more meat.

“You will have plenty of time to get the answers.” He plucked a red morsel off the tray, some type of crunchy vegetable and popped it in his mouth.

“I have an Asazi friend I need to find. He will be looking for me.”

“He won’t be able to find you. My lair is hidden from all.”

“Lair? Is that like a den?”

He laughed, looking around. “Does this resemble a den? A cave?”

“No, it’s more like an upscale castle that I’d have expected a lord to have during the dark ages.”

“Not a bad analogy, given your limited exposure to other cultures.”

“I’m not all that limited.
” She’d watched National Geographic and Discovery and History Channel.

“I didn’t mean human culture. There are other cultures, clearly. Ones you are not familiar with. My own, Asazi, Kormic. And others.”

Finn

Finn ran through the tunnel leading to Lesser League exit until he couldn’t run anymore. He paused, panting, wishing he could fly, cursing that the tunnels were too narrow and too low-ceilinged to allow for flight. He walked, staying close to the walls, listening for anyone who may be looking for him.

“You thought no one would anticipate your plan?”

He whirled around. While he was looking behind him, making sure he wasn’t being followed, Talik had been in front. He pounced out of an alcove, a TripTip in his hand, at the ready.

Even in the dim lighting of the tunnel, even with the reddish-orange glow of Talik’s skin, it was easy to see the bruises that splotched his face. Marissa had left her mark.
Pride surged through him.

“Why are you here?” Finn raised the Asazi weapon he’d taken off the guard. He’d rather not fire. Noise would not serve him well now. Stealth was key.

“Because I knew you’d come.” Talik stepped one pace closer, knife hand up, eyes focused on Finn’s hand, on the weapon. “If you fire it, you won’t get far, you’ll be chased like the kratan you are.”

Kratan
. Finn’s eyes narrowed. Talik had compared him to a kratan, a rodent that scavenged dead bodies, eating that which even the scavenger birds would not. “I see Marissa made a dent in your face. How does a little human female get the jump on an Elite-trained Asazi?”

A nerve ticked in Talik’s jaw, betraying his
irritation. Finn fought the smile that threatened to emerge. The first lesson from Elite training, it would seem, had been forgotten by Talik. Never let the enemy penetrate your emotions.

“Perhaps you should consider reentering training.” Finn tossed the weapon from one hand to
the other. Talik’s eyes tracked the weapon. The vein pulsed harder, faster. Finn’s attempt was successful. He was getting to Talik, making him angry.

Almost as long as Finn’s arm, the weapon would serve as a club, since he was reluctant to shoot it.

“Reentering training. That is interesting coming from an Elite who became involved emotionally with a Target. Your Target 41 is asleep on the forest floor. Just like I left her, if she is still alive.” Talik’s grip on the blade tightened, his knuckles a paler shade of orange than the rest of his hand.

Finn refused to let Talik’s comment get to him, though he wanted badly to know what happened to Marissa.

“You’re right. She did put up quite a struggle.” Talik raised the other hand to his bruised face. “But by now, she’s probably fed the kra—”

Finn struck. The weapon bounced off of Talik’s jaw. Talik fell backward, his eyes rolled to the side, he pushed off the tunnel wall and lunged for Finn.

“She better not have fed the kratan.” Finn rotated the weapon, flipped it, and grabbed the thin end, and using it like a mace, swung for Talik’s head.

Talik ducked. Anticipating this, Finn kicked him in the jaw. This second blow did it. Talik began a crumple to the floor. Finn kicked out with the other boot, caught Talik in the temple and dropped him.

“If she is not alive—if I do not find her alive, I am returning for you.” Useless to make the threat to an unconscious man, but he did anyway.

Finn plunged forward, h
e made it to the exit, pressed for the opening, and was rewarded by the tunnel’s hatch sliding across.

He
pressed for it to close and leapt through quickly. He didn’t want to leave it open because he had friends and family he didn’t want to see attacked by Kormic. Problem was, if he returned with or—he didn’t want to think of the alternative—without Marissa, he had no way to go in. Not from Lesser League. He’d have to go around the long way until he could reach a manned entrance, one where he would be allowed back in.

And if you aren’t allowed back in? If you are forced to stay in
Midland?
He’d deal with that when he got to it. Right now he couldn’t have anything interfering with his objective to find Marissa. He studied the rainforest floor. The dirt was disrupted, the leaves of the ground cover were crushed and trampled. Definitely an altercation. This was probably where Marissa and Talik fought. Clearly Talik didn’t lose as he went back inside.

Finn studied the forest floor, looking for signs that Marissa walked away. All he could find was several footprint
s. She was never alone. Wherever she was now, she left with others. By the sign of it, there were three. Two of the prints were smaller, larger children or women, probably. The other was large. A male. From the scuffed prints it was difficult to discern what or who. One thing was certain, these were not Asazi soldier bootprints. Kormic? He hoped not. Would they harm her? The Kormic hated Asazi, but would they harm a human? Or would they be curious enough to keep her alive?

Finn followed the footprints, fairly certain that the
ones who made these footprints had Marissa, at least when they left here. He trailed the prints and other signs throughout the forest, tracking them, eating edible leaves that were high in water content. Night was falling and the last thing he wanted was to be exposed to any enemies or threats. He crept from one bare spot to another, trying to avoid the noisy, crunchy groundcover. He wished he could fly, but his wings would do him no good in a forest with this many low trees.

A tiny crunch grabbed Finn’s attention
He held his breath, and leaned into the trunk of the nearest tree, hugging it. Unsure what had made the noise, he hoped it wasn’t one of the large jungle cats that roamed Midland at night. Larger than Earth’s lions, they’d make a snack out of him. He froze in place, not moving a limb. He cocked his head to hear better. That’s when the sounds came across.

V
oices. He couldn’t identify the language from this distance, but the timbre told him that they were male. Could it be enemy Kormic? Or even Asazi? Frustration that the Asazi were now a cause of concern and worry, anger built in Finn. It was one thing to hide from a lifelong enemy, but another to have to hide from people who had been his allies and friends all his life. He sunk low, blending into the cover. The voices approached at a pace that let him know they weren’t creeping throughout Midland.

Then he
recognized the language. They were speaking Kormic—a language he’d been forced to learn as part of his Elite training. It almost made him happy to know that they were Kormic. At least with the Kormic he always knew where he stood.

“Any idea where
they went?” A male voice said.

There was
mumbling in the form of a response.

The first male voice spoke again.
“And you are sure they had a human female? How do you know? You’ve never seen one.”

Human female?

The Kormic were silent for a moment. A long moment while Finn’s heart beat so fast he felt he could hear his pulse in the still of the forest.
Human female.
The words sunk in.

More mumbling from the
second Kormic.

The first one’s voice mocked.
“Just because you heard them say she was a female human? You believed them because of that? Who knows if they’ve seen a human before.”

Human female, the words reverberated in Finn’s mind. He was unable to process any other thought.
That was all he needed to hear. They were talking about a female human. There was only one on Kormia, since Nana had passed. And that one could only be Marissa.

He had no choice. He pounced out of the cover, Talik’s
TripTip in hand, grabbed one of the Kormic from behind, the first one, and put the blade to his throat.

“Silence,” Finn commanded the other one in their native language, his tone low.

“Asazi.” The second Kormic’s mumbling voice was a low hiss as he looked at his Kormic comrade. Stunned at having been taken by surprise. “What will we do?” He said to the first Kormic. Clearly he wasn’t the leader between the two, probably not the planner either.

“You be quiet, and tell me about this human. That is what you will do.” Finn pressed the blade more firmly against his captive’s neck.

Mumbler gasped. “How do you know?”

“He was eavesdropping,” the first one answered. “Now shut up before you give him any more information. He is an Asazi spy.”

“I’m no spy. The only thing I want from you is the information about the human. Then I will let you go. I will not hurt you nor will I tell anyone I saw you.”

“Since when can an Asazi be trusted?” The first Kormic spat his response out between gritted teeth.

Finn couldn’t blame him for his response, at this moment he didn’t trust Asazi either, even if they were his own people. But he didn’t have the time to commiserate about the faults of the Asazi. He pulled the Kormic tighter to his torso. The blade slipped. A tiny line of blood appeared. It wasn’t serious but Finn hadn’t plan to hurt them. “Answers. Quit chatting. This is not a social visit.”

“What is the human to you?” Mumbler asked, as if
Finn had not just ordered them to be silent.

He clenched his jaw. He didn’t want to kill them. Dead men didn’
t provide answers, but they were pushing their luck.

“The human is dead.”

It can’t be.
“What?” Finn’s felt like he was a paper boat in a raging ocean, his stomach clenched, bile rose.

The captive Kormic slammed his elbow into Finn’s torso, striking his sternum, knocking the breath out of him. The other one jumped for his hand, catching it, striking it against a tree trunk. The
TripTip fell, useless. A kick from the first Kormic, and Finn fell to the ground, equally useless.

Useless.

“Stupid Asazi. You fell for it.”

“You lied?” Finn bit back the roar of rage and relief. “She’s not dead?”

“I thought Asazi weren’t supposed to be emotional. You care for a human?”

Finn didn’t respond. His arms were held behind his back by both Kormic, one of them had driven his knee in the small of Finn’s back.

In to time, the Kormic had his wrists tethered behind his back and his ankles bound with a rope shackle that limited his steps to a shuffle.

“And now you have a prisoner of war to take to your chief? A lone Asazi who was wandering
Midland?”

“We are not—” Mumbler began.

“Silence, Corzine.” The first Kormic hissed. “You do not discuss our circumstance with anyone.”

“But he’s our prisoner. It’s not like he will go back to the Farlands and tell them where we are.”

“Brother, stop being so naïve.”

Finn took in their interchange
with interest. What were these two? Were they renegade Kormic? He’d heard that there were times when Kormic sought refuge from their own kind, but he knew that had to be rare. And since he’d never heard of any lasting long, clearly they were not too successful in Midland.

“
You speak our language, Asazi. That means you are a soldier. And you carry an Elite blade.” The first Kormic glared at Finn, his characteristic tawny eyes glowing gold with fierceness.

Though the lower half of his face was human, the skin beneath his eyes and on his cheekbones weren’t skin at all. They were hardened scales, almost like a turtle’s skin, and rose to his hairline. Except the Kormic had no hairline, where hair would grow they had spines. Pointed, triangular spines that resembled a succulent cactus, but ranged in color. Starting with an orange color on top, and then tapering off to a blue-ish green hue as it neared their ears. Ears that had human lobes, but ended with sharp spines like the rest of skull.

The worst thing about having the Kormic as an enemy was their fiercesome appearance. As a child, Kormic gave Finn nightmares. As an adult, they were no less intimidating.

“In honor of Balif we will not kill him.”
The first Kormic announced.

“That and it is not who we are, brother, not
anymore.”

“First let us talk to Raiza. She may not want her life upset by a prisoner.”

“Then let us kill him and save everyone the stress. You know Balif will not let us kill this Asazi, once he finds out he is alive.”

“You know what I wish?”

“That we had the human.”

“How did you know?”

“You practically fall out of your seat when Balif speaks of the human he knew.”

Finn wondered about their use of the word Balif.
The word Balif means foreigner, an odd name for one of their own.

The two Kormic seemed to be walking through the forest, without concern for their safety. Or could it be that there were many others around to provide reinforcement.

“Let us take him to the cave. We will see if Raiza thinks Balif should know. She can help us decide what to do with this Asazi.”

Finn was confused. Who were Raiza and Balif? The Kormic led him on a hike through the forest. They were neither joined by any other Kormic, nor did they encounter any Asazi. He wasn’t sure how far they’d traveled, fatigue had caused him to lose all sense of time. It could have been an hour, or maybe two. For all he knew, they were going in circles.