The Dracons' Woman (2 page)

“May I ask you a question?” Lariah asked.

The steward nodded.  “Certainly.”

“Do you live on Jasan?” she asked.

The steward grinned, an open expression of genuine warmth.  “Yes, Miss,” he replied.  “I do have that privilege.  And, as a citizen of Jasan, I welcome you and hope that you find our world to your liking.”

Lariah couldn’t help but return the man’s smile.  “Thank you,” she replied sincerely, “for the welcome, and the kindness.” 

The steward nodded his head deeply, almost a bow, and swept his arm toward the exit.  Grateful that her heartbeat had returned to normal, Lariah tightened her grip on her bag again and, feeling more optimistic than she had in months, stepped off the shuttle and onto Jasan at long last.

Barc Landon was feeling twitchy.  His supervisor had already caught him standing around watching passengers disembark once today, and two other times over the past week.  He really didn’t want to lose his job.  It had taken him longer than he’d thought possible to reach his current rank of Class 3 Security Officer on this backward, end of the galaxy planet, but it was an easy job in a quiet port with fair pay.  Better than the job were the “fringe” benefits of being stationed on a planet with such a shortage of women.  The oh-so-secret interstellar traffic in kidnapped off-world females was his real reason for being on Jasan, and it was more profitable than his wildest dreams.  All he had to do was turn his head now and then when certain cargo holds were emptied.  Even better than the money, (which was very good indeed) were the occasional opportunities to sample the charms of some unlucky female before she was whisked away to begin her new life as a sex slave.  Of course, he got to sample only those who were so difficult that they pissed off their handlers, but he didn’t mind that at all.  In fact, he preferred it.  If a female got them irritated enough, they not only let him be as rough as he wanted, they encouraged him.  Just thinking about it made him hard as he allowed his concentration to wander for a few moments.

A brief flash of a black uniform out of the corner of his eye brought Barc’s focus back with a jerk.  He breathed a sigh of relief when he identified the black uniform of a maintenance tech, not his supervisor, but he took a step back into the communications alcove anyway.  He could not afford to get caught out of his area again today.  As a single human male, and non-citizen, his security job was the only reason he was permitted to live on the planet.  If he lost the job, he’d be transported out of the system so fast he might not even have time to arrange transfers of his secret bank accounts.  He could do it off planet, but that might bring a bit more attention to them than he would like.  After all, why would a lowly Class 3 Security Officer with Inter-System Transport Lines have so much money?  If he transferred the money directly, it would be a lot safer. 

Barc’s twitchiness increased ten-fold and he broke into a cold sweat as he thought about the loss of all of his money.  He almost gave it up and walked away.  Almost.  Reason saved him from such a foolish act at the last moment.  If the woman he was supposed to be watching for got by him, it wouldn’t matter how much money he had stashed.  He would never live long enough to spend a single credit of it.  Barc shuddered at the thought.  By the time he saw his target step off the shuttle, Barc had worked himself into a state of nervous desperation that was impossible to hide.  He didn’t even try.

Garen Dracon watched through the view-port as the sleek, private shuttle carrying his parents lifted slowly off the ground, hovered for a moment, and then suddenly shot into the sky in a blaze of silver light.  He clenched his jaw tightly to prevent a sigh from escaping, and turned to his younger brothers.

Treyen, the middle brother, had the same expression on his face as Garen knew was on his own.  Jaw clenched tight, shoulders stiff, eyes filled with a sadness that most would never notice behind the otherwise stern expression.  Valen, the youngest of the three, was the only one who didn’t bother trying to hide his feelings at their parents’ departure.  His face was just as stern as his brothers’, but he didn’t hold his sigh in. 

“It sure was nice having a woman about the place for a change, even if she is our mother,” he said softly. 

“Yes, it was,” Trey agreed.  “I just wish she hadn’t been so sad for us the whole time they were here.”

Garen knew his brothers were waiting for him to say something, but the conversation he felt coming was not one he wanted to have.  He slapped his black Stetson against his denim clad thigh, put it on his head and turned away from the view-port. 

“Let’s go,” he said shortly.  His brothers fell into step alongside of him, Trey on his left, Val on his right, each half a pace behind him, a formation bred so deep into their bones that none of them gave it a thought.  Even here, in this high-tech spaceport filled with travelers from a dozen systems all around them, even after centuries of living as ranchers on Jasan and blending in with the human and humanoid populations, the three brothers looked, moved and thought as warriors.  That was something they could never change, and wouldn’t even if they could. 

The trio collected more than a few stares as they stalked through the spaceport; stares they didn’t appear to notice.  Over six and a half feet tall each, the three brothers were nearly identical triplets.  They had strong, masculine faces with square jaws, bold noses and high cheekbones.  Their skin was deeply tanned, with a cinnamon tint to it, reminiscent of the Native Americans of Earth, or the Tisla of Sheara 5.  The only differences between the three were the color of their eyes, and a minor difference in height.  Garen, as first-born, was the tallest of the three with golden eyes.  Trey, three minutes younger, was an inch shorter, with blue-green eyes.  Val, the youngest by another three minutes, was yet another inch shorter than Trey with eyes the deep gray of a stormy sky.  All three men had long blue-black hair held back with a leather thong and dark, slashing eyebrows that made them appear stern even when they weren’t.  They all wore jeans, boots and cowboy hats suited to the work they did, and white t-shirts that hugged their broad, muscular chests and shoulders. 

The spaceport was laid out like a wheel with a central hub and dozens of hallways running out from it like spokes.  Many of the spokes ended in a passenger lounge, then a gate which opened to a shuttle landing pad.  As the brothers walked toward the main hub which would lead them toward the exit on the far side of the spaceport, they had to slow their pace a bit to weave their way through the groups of people coming and going. 

Val cleared his throat, warning Garen he was about to start the conversation he didn’t want to have.

“Gregal suggested that maybe it was time we gave up the search,” he began.  In spite of the underlying emotion in his voice, his eyes remained as sharp as his brothers’, none of them relaxing their vigilance as they moved through the crowds.

Garen sighed quietly, but didn’t respond or slow his pace. 

“Leonal and Benal said the same to me,” Trey added.  “We’ve waited so long, and Mom wants grandchildren.  They said she gets her hopes up each year before Enclave that when they arrive, we will have a wife for her to meet.  And each year she is disappointed.  I hate seeing her so sad.”

Garen kept walking as they reached the end of the spoke and entered the busier hub.  He knew what their fathers had said.  He had been told the same thing by all three of them.  The truth was, he had thought about it himself more times than he cared to admit in the past few years.  Did they think he wasn’t tired of being lonely?  That the long years of waiting had not worn on him as much as it had on them? 

“Garen…”  Val began, but Garen suddenly stopped and turned to face his brothers.

“Is that really what the two of you want?” he asked softly.  He stared into each of their faces for long moments, measuring the depth of their desire and frustration. 

Val dropped his eyes first, but flashed them back up at once.  “Yes and no,” he replied finally.  “We want our true Arima, Garen, you know that.  But you know as well as we do that the chances of that happening are about 12 billion to one at last check.  It has not happened for over three thousand years.”

Garen arched an eyebrow at his youngest brother.  Val shrugged.  “I know you are as aware of the statistics as I am.  But damn, Garen, how long are we going to wait?”

“Aren’t you tired of dreaming Garen?”  Trey put in.  “I am.  Watching everyone we know take wives and have families makes it harder, especially knowing that we could have it for ourselves.  Right now if we want.”

Garen nodded.  “Yes, we could,” he agreed.  “We could take a wife, a human woman like our mother, and have male children like everyone else.  There is nothing wrong with that.  I revere our own mother as you do.  But do you really want to do that, knowing that we, of all of our people, have a chance to find our Arima?”

“
Perhaps
a chance,” Trey corrected stubbornly.  “Many believe that the hope of the prophecy died with our brothers.”

Garen was aware of that.  There were times when he too doubted.  “We agreed to wait,” he said. 

“Yes, we did,” Val replied, “and we have waited.  For centuries.  Will we wait forever?”

Garen shook his head.  “I believe that we will find her,” he said quietly.  “I believe that she exists, or will exist, and that we will find her if we wait long enough.  What if we take a wife, and then we find her?  What then?”

They both dropped their eyes, neither of them having a response to that question.

“Yes, I too am tired of waiting,” Garen admitted.  “I want what you want with the same fierceness of need that you feel.  But this is a chance that none of our people have had since the Dark Time.  It is a slim chance, I know that, but it is still a chance.  I am not yet willing to throw that away.  I
can’t
throw that away.”

Raising their eyes as one, Val and Trey met Garen’s gaze.  “You are right,” Trey said, Val nodding in agreement.  “We cannot throw away this chance.  We owe it to our people.”

“We owe it to ourselves,” Val added.

Garen sighed.  “It is difficult for me as well,” he said.  “But…”  Garen trailed off slowly, his eyes losing focus for a moment.  Val and Trey tensed immediately, watching Garen unblinkingly, all of their senses alert and instantly poised for battle.

Suddenly Garen spun around and began running across the hub, pushing heedlessly through the crowds.  Val and Trey raced after him, Trey gesturing sharply with one hand, hastily tossing up a shield so that nobody would notice them even as they pushed by.  Garen stopped at the entrance to another shuttle spoke, not far from the one they had just exited, and froze for a long moment.  Val and Trey watched their elder brother carefully, neither of them sure what was going on, but both maintaining their vigilance.  Garen began to growl, a low, deep, menacing rumble deep in his chest. 

“What is it?”  Trey demanded as Garen turned to face them. 

“She is here,” Garen growled, a sound quite a bit less than human.  Val and Trey gaped at him.  Garen’s eyes began to glow, the first sign of a blood-rage.  “She is here, and she is terrified.” 

Val and Trey did not ask Garen any questions.  If he said their Arima was there, then she was.  And if he said she was frightened…  Suddenly all three brothers were growling, their eyes glowing, all ready to spill blood.  Garen spun to his left and ran across the hub toward another spoke, his brothers flanking him.  Trey snarled as he finally picked up the scents Garen had caught.  A moment later Val did the same.  They could all smell her now, soft, sweet, like roses and honey, but tainted with the sour scent of fear and the sharp, bitter scent of pain.  It was all the brothers could do to keep from roaring their fury as they raced down the nearly deserted hall in pursuit of their Arima.

The moment she looked into the security guard’s face, Lariah knew that he was the reason for the inexplicable fear she’d felt before stepping off the shuttle.  The fear she’d forgotten about because of the unexpected flood of memories.  He never said a word to her.  He simply grabbed hold of her upper arm in a punishing grip, and took off with her in tow.  The man was only a few inches taller than her own not quite five and a half feet, but he was many times stronger.  Her attempts to struggle free did not even slow him down, and since he was wearing a security uniform, no one paid much attention to the woman being dragged unwillingly through the hub.  She couldn’t even scream since her damaged larynx prevented her from speaking much above a whisper.  She tried hard not to think of that, of how it had happened, what had been done to her, but it was hard not to think of it with this brute forcing her across the spaceport without a word to explain why. 

The man dragged her into another long hallway, this one nearly deserted and subtly different from the others.  The floors and walls were different, more industrial, the lighting harsher, giving her the impression she was in an employee only area of the spaceport.  The man stopped suddenly, pulled a card from his shirt pocket and swiped it through a reader mounted on the wall.  A heavy metal door slid open with a whisper.  He dragged her through the doorway, his hand tightening on her arm when she tried to resist, the pain causing black spots to appear at the edge of her vision.  She tried to breathe through the pain, terrified of passing out.  She had to stay conscious, figure out what was happening, and try to find a way out of it. 

Stopping again, the man carded open yet another door and dragged her through it into a large room with a high tinted glass ceiling.  There were auto-vend machines, chairs and tables scattered around, a few upholstered chairs grouped together.  Lariah realized she was in an employee lounge or lunch room.  She looked around frantically, but it seemed deserted other than herself and her captor.  When she realized there was an exit at the far end of the room, true panic threatened.  Once they crossed this room, he would have her out of the spaceport and any chance she might have of rescue.  Nobody knew she was here, and nobody here knew her.