Illicit Desire: Outlawed Realm, Book 2 (13 page)

Her limbs went watery, but it didn’t stop Arez from grabbing the stun gun, prepared to use it on anyone who tried to harm him.

Lukan regarded her with pride and amusement. Finished with the guard, he went to Arez, kissing her throat. “You intend to protect me now?”

“With my life if I have to.”

“No.” He gripped her arm, his mood suddenly dark. “You’re going to survive this. We both are.”

She nodded, not wanting to ask how. As far as she knew, there was no place in the Palace to hide. Once the other guards discovered what had happened in here, they’d alert the rest of the security force, and they’d all be searching for her and Lukan. Stun gun or not, he couldn’t fight them all.

Arez stared at her door.

“There’s no reason to worry,” Lukan murmured. “These two were the only ones watching this section of the Palace. With the others at their stations, they won’t know what I’ve done until it’s time for the slaves to prepare for tonight.”

He took the weapon from her and grabbed his satchel. From it, he removed a piece of paper and a glove. Not leather like the guards sometimes used when they punished a slave. This glove was of a clear, flesh-colored material. With the items in hand, he slung the satchel over his shoulder. “Time to leave.”

The words rushed from her before Arez could stop them. “To go where?”

“Outside the Palace.”

Shock caused her to step back. She grabbed the lip of the table to keep steady. “You said the rulers leave slaves out there to starve. How will we survive for more than a few days without food or water?”

He grabbed her hand, lacing his fingers through hers. “I brought what’s needed while we wait for Nikoli to find us and open a portal.”

“A what?”

“I’ll explain later.”

Arez held back, wanting to know now. “Who’s Nikoli?”

“A good man who’ll do all he can to help us.”

“But—”

“No more questions. Come.”

He pulled her past the guards and into the hall. One of many. Fetters hung from bolts in the dark stone, the manacles always ready to imprison a slave for punishment, the lashing meted out to deliver pleasure, pain or both.

Whips of various sizes stood as silent sentinels to her and Lukan’s escape, the faint light of candles the only illumination to guide them past countless doors and ominous shadows.

Chapter Seven

Lukan dashed down the hall, forcing Arez to keep up. Like him, she ran on the balls of her feet to avoid making unnecessary noise.

Yards ahead of them, the hall branched to the left and the right, both similar in appearance.

“You need to take the one to the left,”
Meelo had warned hours earlier.
“The hall on the right will lead you deeper into the Palace rather than to its exit.”

A bead of sweat wriggled down Lukan’s face, running into his eye. He blinked rapidly to ease the sting. At the intersection, he halted, wanting to make certain he was correct in his recollection of what Meelo had said.

Forcing down a swallow, he lifted the map, bringing it closer to one of the candles.

Arez pressed against him, her fingers squeezing his. “What is that?”

He spoke as quietly as she had. “A drawing of the Palace, showing which way we need to go.”

“You can read the symbols on it?”

“Letters,” he corrected. “Words.”

“I don’t understand what you’re saying.” She sounded more ashamed than afraid. “Where did you get the drawing?”

“Meelo gave it to me. He’s the scientist who created us.”

Arez asked no more, following Lukan into the left hall.

It was longer than he’d expected, stretching into the distance with no end in sight, not matching the map’s scale. Had Meelo been incorrect in his memory of this place? Lukan’s steps slowed, then stopped. He glanced behind them. His and Arez’s shadows wavered with the flames’ flickering lights. A musty scent permeated the air, along with the fragrance of jasmine oil and leather.

“What’s wrong?” Arez whispered.

Lukan shook his head, knowing he had only two choices. To doubt Meelo’s directions and try to find his own way out, or to trust the man who’d risked everything to help him. Images of Meelo’s injured arm and scarred face flashed in Lukan’s mind. He heard Meelo’s worried pleas for Lukan to be careful. He could still feel the man’s and Damir’s last embrace.

The map, not his own sense of direction, had to be correct.

“Come.” Down the hall, he and Arez ran, decreasing the space between them and freedom. Minutes later, he saw it. Ahead was another intersection, the same as shown on the drawing. He hadn’t made a mistake in following it.

His feet pounded the stone. He sucked air through his teeth to avoid making any unnecessary noise.

To his side, Arez made a strangled sound as her steps faltered.

Lukan heard what she did. Voices came from the left. In a moment, the guards would appear around the corner.

He shoved her into the shadows near a door, protecting her with his body. Not daring to breathe, he listened, expecting to hear men running this way, because they’d learned of his and Arez’s escape.

She whispered, “What are they doing?”

The mild tapping noises revealed their unhurried pace.

One of them spoke. “Which room is she in?”

Lukan recognized the guard’s voice. In the past, he’d taken Lukan with as much force as possible to prove his power, demanding Lukan welcome pain, thank him for every humiliation and punishment, bow to his authority more readily than he would a ruler’s.

Never again. Hatred swept through Lukan, rage so deep he could barely keep still. Arez grabbed his arm, keeping him from doing anything foolish.

The other guard spoke. “She’s in the last one at the end of the next hall. We go to the right when we reach it.”

They were coming this way. To get to the room they wanted, they’d have to pass Arez and him.

Lukan turned, gauging the distance he and Arez would have to run in order to reach the previous hall and hide there. It was too far. They’d never make it.

Arez pushed against him, trying to get free.

“Stop it,” he growled. “We can’t run now. They’ll see us.”

“Not you. I want them to see me.”

“No.” He used all of his strength to keep her to him. “You’re not sacrificing yourself for me.”

“I wasn’t planning to. I can distract them, Lukan, if you’ll only let me. You can use your weapon on them.”

From the other hall, their footfalls sounded louder.

“I take her first,” one of them said—the guard Lukan hated most. “She’s yours after I finish with her.”

“She’ll be of little use to me then. We’ll take her together or not at all.”

He grumbled, “Very well. But I get her cunt before you do. You’ll have to content yourself with her mouth.”

“And her ass. I’ll stretch her so she’ll be able to accommodate even the largest of our rulers.”

The other guard’s laughter rang out. “Stretch her we will. We’ll give her a night she’ll never forget. One she’ll thank us for while begging for more.”

Arez whispered, “Let me do this. It’s the only way. The moment they turn the corner, they’ll see us. They’ll shout for the others.”

Lukan knew she was right but couldn’t bring himself to release her. Arez argued no more. Ramming her elbow into his side, she used her body’s weight to knock him off balance.

He muttered an oath and reached for her, his hand gripping nothing more than air.

Freed, she ran in the direction of the guards. Still discussing the slave they intended to enjoy, they came into view, striding down the hall, though not for long.

Both men stopped, staring at the unexpected sight of a liberated slave. As Arez bolted past them, they turned, their backs to Lukan.

No more than a yard away, Arez halted, facing them, her color high from the run and her quick look of lust. Legs parted, she cupped her breasts, drawing her thumbs over her nipples.

The guards exchanged a glance. The crueler of the two asked, “What are you doing here? How did you get out?”

Arez slid one hand down her torso to her belly and then her cunt, her fingers separating those soft folds. “A guard released me,” she said with the greatest deference. “He told me to come here to find you.”

“Katar,” the other guard blurted to his companion. “It must have been him. He wants to get back at you for the trick you played last week.”

“Does he? And did he think we’d chase this girl without having some fun?”

His colleague laughed.

“Come here,” the cruel one ordered her.

With her face tilted down, Arez obeyed. With little pause, the guards sandwiched her between their bodies, one of them nuzzling her neck, another cupping her mound, his fingers seeking her cleft.

She moaned.

Lukan bolted toward them, his first attack reserved for the man he hated most. The familiar crackle and blue light from the stun gun brought a gasp of surprise from the kinder of the guards. The one who’d used Lukan so mercilessly gaped in shock and stumbled. Lukan punched him twice in the face. The moment he hit the stone floor, Lukan gave him another jolt from the gun, this time between his legs.

His eyes rolled up in his head just as those of countless slaves when he’d abused them into unconsciousness.

Never had Lukan enjoyed a moment more.

He caught up with the other guard, who’d decided to flee, ramming him into the stone wall.

The man clawed it on the way down to his knees. On all fours, he tried to crawl away, blubbering, “Please, don’t hurt me.”

Lukan’s mercy matched what his captors had given to him and countless slaves. One jolt from the gun and a well-placed blow to the guard’s neck made him still and silent.

Arez grabbed Lukan’s free hand. “Are you all right?”

He nodded, too winded to speak. Retrieving his backpack, he shoved it on his shoulder and squeezed her fingers. Together, they raced down the hall. At the end of it, they took a turn to the right as the map dictated.

On and on they ran through the Palace’s maze, constructed this way so no slave would ever find the way outside.

“There,” Arez gasped, pointing.

Lukan swallowed, unable to believe what he now saw—the metal door no more than ten yards away. It was just as Meelo had described, a solid sheet of gray gleaming dully in the candlelight.

Stopping short of it, Lukan gulped air.

Breathless, Arez cried, “There’s no handle, no place for a key. How do we open it?”

“With this.” He slipped on the clear glove Meelo had designed for him, having explained that this door was the same as those on E2, in his and Nikoli’s labs.

“It allows entry to authorized personnel by reading their fingerprints,”
Meelo had said.
“I’ve encoded Vakar’s into this glove. With it, you can leave the Palace at will with no one stopping you.”

Lukan pressed his palm against the cool metal, exactly as Meelo directed. Next, he rested his fingertips lightly on the surface.

Arez kept watching to see if anyone was coming down the hall. “Open it, please,” she whispered.

He tried, but nothing happened. There should have been a faint buzz, then the sound of the lock releasing. Should he pull back his hand and try again? Would that set off some kind of alarm, alerting those inside that an impostor was at the door?

Panic made his hand jerk. He gave the stun gun to Arez for her to hold, then gripped his wrist to keep his hand steady and waited.

A moment passed, followed by another and—

The buzz filtered in between his and Arez’s noisy breathing. With a mild whoosh, the door opened, showing what they faced outside.

Arez stared at a world she’d never seen and hadn’t known existed.

Dark golden rays drizzled down from above, with some of them penetrating the brownish shadows on the ground. Within the small circles of brightness, similar to what the flame of a candle might reveal, were odd objects.

Instinctively, she took a step back.

Lukan clasped her hand. “There’s nothing to fear from the growths. The tallest are trees. The others are plants. Their leaves keep the sun from reaching most of the jungle’s floor.”

His explanation had no meaning, the words unknown to her. What he’d referred to as trees reached so far up, she couldn’t see where they ended. They bore the same yellowish color as the shafts of light trying to filter through. On the ground, what he’d called plants were no less daunting. Were the leaves he’d spoken of those large growths protruding in all directions?

Arez sensed they were. Each leaf was as wide as her and Lukan combined and far taller, dwarfing them.

It didn’t stop him from pulling her outside. The door swung closed behind them. At a run, Lukan led her into the jungle and away from the Palace. Beneath her feet, the ground was slimy, so unlike the hard, smooth stone she’d known all of her life. The air was warm and muggy, similar to what she’d experienced in the place of bathing. There, the scent of lavender, vanilla and jasmine permeated everything. Here, the fragrances were cleaner, less sweet.