Ruth's Bonded (Ruth & Gron Book 1)
Read Ruth's Bonded (Ruth & Gron Book 1) Online
Authors: V.C. Lancaster
Ruth’s Bonded
By
V.C. Lancaster
Text Copyright © 2015
V.C. Lancaster
All rights reserved.
Ruth hit the floor with a bang.
Judging by how quickly the floor had risen up to meet her now aching shoulder,
she’d fallen a little less than a storey. The pain wasn’t sharp enough for a
break, but she wouldn’t be surprised if she’d dented something. She groaned and
rolled onto her hands, trying to get her stunned back to co-operate enough to
get on all fours, or sit up, maybe even stand. The room she was in was dark,
almost pitch black, the only light coming from reflections from the room above,
refracting around the room from the space immediately below the hole she’d
fallen through. She managed to get onto her knees and looked around.
The floor was metal, which explained
why it had made that noise when she’d hit it. She couldn’t see the walls very
well because the light didn’t reach that far, but light glinted off bolts and
seams, which made her think they were metal too. The ceiling was also metal,
with a hole in the centre that was roughly a metre and a half across. Next to
her hand on the floor was a smaller hole, maybe six inches across. Not big
enough for her whole foot to go in, but definitely big enough to trip her if
she forgot it was there. Those two holes seemed to be the only breaks in the
metal monotony. There were no doors as far as she could see, and certainly no
windows. Despite the apparent sterility of the environment, there was still a distinct
animal smell like fur and sweat, as if a hard-worked horse had only just
vacated the space.
She tried to think through that
morning to find the point at which she’d hit her head, or accidentally taken a
tab of acid with her coffee. She’d gone to bed the night before as normal,
turning off the TV at ten to eleven and snuggling under her duvet on the hour.
She’d slept through the night, no flashing lights or tractor beams or little
green men with anal probes had disturbed her. She’d woken up feeling crummy but
resigned, as she did most days, and got up for work. She got dressed, bought
her coffee and breakfast muffin on her way to work as usual. She’d drank some
and had a few nibbles out of the brown paper bag as she walked. The city was
heaving with every employed person trying to get to their desk on time, at the
same time. She turned into her regular shortcut down a short alley, and then?
Then she was here. Or rather, in the
room upstairs. She could remember a shivery, unstable feeling, maybe a bad
taste in her mouth, and her hair standing on end. Then she was stumbling off a
raised platform in a shiny chrome room, totally off balance and with no coffee
or muffin. She immediately had a sense of the walls moving as she was shoved
roughly from behind, and then quickly from the sides. Wobbling sheets of metal
formed a path in front of her, like a run, and she was being shoved down it by
the sheets nearest to her. They didn’t quite come up to her shoulders, so
whoever was behind them must have been very short for her not to see them. They
kept her too off balance for her to gain a sure enough footing to fight back,
and soon enough, they shoved her into the hole and now here she was.
Had she been kidnapped? If she had,
they’d been very efficient, but why take her damn coffee? That was just cruel.
Why take her at all, now that she thought about it? She wasn’t anybody. She
wasn’t important, nobody she knew was important, the company she was currently
working for wasn’t important. She was a temp. She made photocopies. She’d been
in the office less than a month. She was 28 and single, living alone in the
city away from her parents who still lived in her hometown. She wasn’t friends
with any of her neighbours, she didn’t even have a pet. Maybe that was why they
took her: because she wouldn’t be missed.
Oh God, what if she was going to be
sold into slavery? Forced to work in a brothel or something? She didn’t think
she would survive that, but she knew that if that was what was happening, she
would be beaten and restrained, probably given drugs. She’d seen an episode of
CSI
like that. Maybe she’d already been given drugs, and that was why she couldn’t
remember how she got here. But then surely her shoulder wouldn’t hurt so much?
Or maybe she
had
broken it after all, and the drugs were numbing a worse
pain? Either way, she knew she couldn’t stay here. She wasn’t tied up or
gagged, she could bang on the sides of whatever container they had her in and
shout, and maybe she’d be rescued. It had to be some kind of truck she was in.
She really hated herself for going down that alley now.
A sudden clang of metal and the sound
of a bolt being slid into place had her looking up at the hole she had come
from. A hatch of crossed bars now secured the hole she had been thrown through.
Fear pumped through her. “You can’t keep me in here!” she yelled. “People are
going to look for me, and then you’ll be sorry!”
She was going to yell some more, but
when she drew in her breath and opened her mouth she was cut off by a loud,
tearing, rumbling growl from behind her. She froze, feeling like ice water had
just been tipped down her back. Something was in here with her. What? With a
growl like that, it had to be something like a tiger, or a bear. Jesus Christ,
had they fed her to it? Were they supposed to fight like in the Colosseum? Was
this a death match, or a snuff film?
Please be on the other side of a
fence
, she thought.
Please...
With wide eyes, she turned to look
over her shoulder into the corner of the cell. Her first thought was
Oh,
thank God, it’s a human
.
Her second thought was
No... Not
human
.
She screamed in real terror and flung
her back against the furthest wall, facing this thing she could barely see. It
looked like a huge man, body-builder big, sitting with his knees drawn up and
his arms folded, dark eyes staring at her. That was what she had seen at first.
Then she noticed that parts of his body was obscured by what she guessed was
dark fur, spreading from the back of his neck, over his shoulders, down his
arms to his hands. What she could see of his chest was also blackened by this
fur that made him almost invisible in the dark. It covered most of his legs and
the tops of his feet, like a hobbit, she thought hysterically. She assumed his
hair was the same colour, but she could hardly see it. She only assumed it was
there because the bald patches of skin like his face and parts of his chest
were the only parts she could see in the poor light.
His face was what said he wasn’t
human, or not fully anyway. He had a heavy brow hiding large, dark eyes, and a
flat, wide nose, but the thing that stuck out, literally, was his mouth. He had
a huge square jaw, and it looked like his teeth protruded out like a gorilla.
He snarled as she screamed, exposing a thick white canine that looked to be
three inches long at least, curving over his lower teeth, making her wonder how
he fit it in his mouth.
When he snarled, she managed to
suppress her screaming into a whimper. Was this a caveman? A Neanderthal? No,
she’d seen models and pictures in museums, and while the face was close, the
fur was all wrong. Cavemen were hairy, sure, but not like
this
. This was
definitely fur, like on an animal, but it didn’t cover his whole body. It
seemed to have some kind of pattern to it, like the light and dark patches on
an antelope designed to confuse predators about the shape of the animal. This thing’s
fur was all one colour, but it seemed to deliberately leave parts of his body
bald, and Ruth wondered why.
She realised he hadn’t moved, only
growled and snarled, so she dared to take her eyes off him and look around for
anything else she might have missed. She was hoping for an escape route or at
least something that indicated he couldn’t get to her, but there was nothing.
The walls were perfectly smooth metal, no hinges or buttons or levers. Her eyes
returned to the beast across from her, her heart pounding. She had definitely,
no two ways about it, been thrown into a holding cell with this thing, and
unless he was a woman-eater, she was just going to have to get along with him.
Gron jumped when the creature smacked
into the floor in front of him. He had probably been dozing, he realised, angry
at himself. He watched as the animal rolled itself onto its front with a groan
of pain. This did not look good. So far, his captors hadn’t thrown anything
larger than a meal into his cell. This thing was big too. Not as big as he was,
but if it was aggressive he could be hurt if it had claws or sharp teeth or
venom. Was he expected to fight it? Eat it? Was he supposed to provide entertainment
for his captors by engaging this thing in bloodsport? He watched it carefully
as it dragged itself into a crouch.
Its body was covered, that much was
obvious. It seemed to have painful-looking hobbling devices on its feet, which
made him realise that in shape at least, it matched him. It was much thinner,
but it had two arms and two legs and only one head on top, as far as he could
tell. He couldn’t tell if the coverings had been placed there by his captors to
keep it warm or protect it, or if the creature had been taken while already
wearing them. Gron knew of species that covered their bodies with fabrics, and
the complexity that he observed now suggested that they were more than just a
coat to keep the thing warm. So, given that it had the same shape as his
people, and wore manufactured coverings, that would imply it was intelligent.
He wished to see its face, but a long
mass of straight and loose-hanging fur blocked his view. How odd, to have a
pelt yet still wear the coverings. Perhaps it was not a pelt, or at least, not one
the creature grew itself. It might be some kind of trophy from a kill that it
wore on its head. He inhaled, trying to catch its scent, which was surprisingly
complex. Dozens of sweet and bitter smells layered over each other in varying
strengths, and only buried at the bottom was the smell of flesh. Overall, it
gave the impression of a very clean animal that had leapt from a stream to dry
itself in a bed of flowers, but no flowers he had ever smelt before.
It did not look at him, and he kept
very still. He did not know yet whether or not it was dangerous. He watched it
begin to look around, at the drainage pipe in the floor and the access hatch in
the ceiling. As it turned towards him, he saw its face and froze. There were
differences between them, yes, but what this new animal most closely resembled
was a Queen. He didn’t know how he hadn’t realised immediately. Yes, her scent
was mostly covered by the sweet smells she had applied to herself, and her
fabric coverings shielded her breasts from his view, but still he should have
realised. This was a Queen. He scowled as he processed this. His captors had
stolen a
Queen
and thrown her into this
hole
with
him
.
Were they mad? Suicidal? Did they not know that her males would come for her?
And what was he supposed to do now?
He tightened in on himself, tried to
make himself look smaller, non-threatening. He did not want the anger of her
males to fall on him as well. It was not his fault he also happened to be here.
He never would have enclosed himself with her by choice. He had been taught
correctly. He respected the laws.
He tensed when her gaze passed over
him, and was surprised when she didn’t react. It wasn’t like she was ignoring
him, it was like she hadn’t seen him at all. Maybe she could not see in the
dark as well as he could, or her eyes just hadn’t adjusted to the darkness
after the light of above. But it gave him the opportunity to study her face
more closely. Yes, they were different. It would take at least two of her to
make one Queen of his kind, maybe even three. Perhaps she was young? But that
wouldn’t explain the differences in their faces. Most noticeably, her teeth sat
back from the end of her nose, which stuck out, giving her a withered, beaky
look. She had two eyes, like him, though hers seemed to be proportionately
smaller to suit her finer features. Her nose looked incredibly delicate, as if
a strong wind might hurt it. Surely it was in danger of breaking, being made so
thin as well as sticking out from her face? But her eyes were surprisingly
prominent, and while he could not tell exactly what colour they were in the
dark, he could see that they were pale, not dark like his. He found himself
thinking that her skin looked soft.
He tore his gaze away from her face,
but most of the rest of her body was covered. Her hands where they supported
her on the floor looked just as delicate as her nose. He seriously doubted she
could even climb to her own tree with those. She must come from a very peaceful
and prosperous tribe, perhaps one that lives by water, and eats fish. Gron had
heard of people like that, though he had never met one. She certainly looked
like she was more suited to water, with her thin and delicate frame. He
pictured her narrow shoulders cutting through the water, her light bones
keeping her from sinking, and decided that must be right.
The barred hatch that covered the
hole above them clanged down as they were locked in together. The Queen looked
up in apparent alarm and began shouting. It was no language Gron understood,
but it was loud. Her voice was abrasive, much higher in pitch than any Queen he
knew.
She drew in a breath to keep shouting
but he interrupted her. “They will only grow angry and punish you,” he said. He
didn’t think it wise to tell her straight away that he would protect her. If
she was a Queen, she would already know that.
She quietened immediately. He frowned
in concern when he saw how stiff she had become. Slowly she turned to look at
him, and he remembered that she had failed to see him in the dark. As soon as
her eyes focused on him, she screamed. It hurt his ears but he dare not move.
Obviously she was frightened. She had not known he was there and he must be
larger than her males, as she was so small compared to him. When she continued
to shriek as if he was killing her, he couldn’t stop his lip from lifting in
contempt. He had done nothing to her, would do nothing, and she was implying he
was not a good, honourable male by screaming and cowering that way. At his snarl,
her scream changed to a whimper, and he watched as her eyes ran up and down his
body. He sat still for her inspection, hoping it would reassure her to know
what he looked like, but it made him uncomfortable nonetheless, and his tail
twitched in his lap.
He was trapped in this small space
with a Queen. He must remain calm, and in control of himself. If she had been
taken, her males would be coming soon. He reminded himself he could not afford
to make a mistake.
