Vengeance (13 page)

“Look,”
he rolls onto his side, his chains clanking loudly.  I wince,
praying that it does not disturb Bastien’s rest...or
unconscious state. I can’t really figure out which one he has
slipped in to.  “No one asked you to be the leader here,
sweet cheeks.  Maybe you were a big shot back on Calisted but we
don’t need you here. I don’t want to be friends, and I
sure as heck don’t want you thinking you are responsible for
me.”

A smile tugs at my
lips and then a laugh escapes.  Hyde’s gaze widens with
surprise.  “Something funny over there, Queeny?”

I nod.  “Sweet
cheeks?  Really?  That’s my new nickname?”

Hyde rolls his eyes
and crosses his arms over his chest.  “Don’t you go
thinking that I’ve got the hots for you, ‘cause I don’t.
 You may be nice to look at but you don’t have to worry
about me fawning over you like the rest of these idiots.”

“Good to
know.”  I cover my smile as best I can but he grunts in
response, still annoyed that I laughed at him.  “Still...don’t
you want to get back home?”

This time when he
shrugs my smile vanishes completely.  “What’s so
great about home anyways?”

“Really?”
 I shake my head, amazed at how bullheaded this man is.  “You
call being torn from your life and thrown into a pig pen like this
better than being on Calisted?  What the heck happened to you
back there that made you so bitter anyway?”

He turns and fixes
me with a glare that does little to veil his hatred.  “You
really want to know?”

“Yeah.  I
do.”  I say right back.  I’m not going to back
down to this man, to give him even the ounce of an idea that I won’t
go toe to toe with him.  It’s not in my nature.

“Fine.”
 He juts his chin toward Bastien.  “He’s the
reason my life sucks.”

I blink, sure that I
haven’t heard him correctly.  “You’re blaming
a guy who’s just been beaten to a pulp for why you are here?”

“No.”
 He pushes up to a sitting position, crossing his legs before
him.  He snuffs and turns to the side to spit out a glob of
phlegm.  I refuse to look away from him, no matter how
disgusting he decides to be.  “I blame him for everything
before
the attack.”

I
consider his words, trying to piece together what little I actually
know about Bastien.  Kyan told me that he is commander of the
outer rim base located on the green moon of Alenida.  His
mission was to ensure no enemy ships were allowed to enter our
airspace and to train an elite force of soldiers who would one day
become my personal guard.  Beyond that, and what little details
I have surmised from my dreams I know nothing else.

“You were
stationed on Alenida with him?”

Hyde snorts and
shakes his head.  “Oh, we go way back before that.”

I rub my temples,
knowing that if I am going to get any information out of him I’m
going to have to play his game.  “Alright.  Tell me
what happened before Bastien became commander in the outer rim.”

What
I expected as a snide retort rather comes out as wary silence.  He
watches me, his gaze trailing over the features of my face.  “You’re
playing dumb now, right?”

I blow out a
purposeful breath, counting to five before I shake my head.  Hyde
laughs, throwing back his head.  “Man, he must have done a
number on you.”

“Who?”

Hyde’s
laughter cuts off.  “Bastien.  Kyan.  Someone
did it to you.”

My fingers clench
against my arms, my broken nails beginning to pierce my skin.  “I
suppose you expect me to take the bait and ask who did what to me.”

He leans forward,
his blackened gaze wide and searching.  He opens his mouth and
closes it twice before he finally frowns, looking as if I have just
stolen his glory.  “You really don’t know, do you?”

I
sigh and close my eyes.  “Now
you’re
doing a number on my head, you know that Hyde?”

I hear him move and
lower my hand to find him rising up onto his knees.  His
expression has shifted slightly and it makes me wary.  “Do
you recognize the name Niyah?”

For a split second I
almost feel like the name means something to me, like a name heard
years before but I can’t grasp any image to attach to the name,
but then it’s gone, lost to nothingness.  “No.”

Hyde nods his head
slowly, almost as if he expected this.  He raises a hand and
points a single finger at Bastien.  “And you’re
telling me that you hold no feelings for this man?”

I look toward
Bastien and feel a stirring within my chest.  Protection.  Pity.
 Guilt. Yes, I feel those things, but there is something more
there too, isn’t there?  Something that I can’t
quite place a name on and yet I can’t dismiss it entirely
either.  

“He is my
protector.  Of course I care about his wellbeing.”

Hyde’s eyes
widen and then he lowers his head and chuckles, deep and throaty.
 His long black hair falls over his eyes as he begins to cackle.
 “Oh, that is rich!”

He slaps his knees
and stomps his foot against the ground.  Though he continues to
laugh I can feel waves of anger flowing off of him.  I wait
impatiently for him to look at me once more.  When he does raise
his gaze to meet mine I am surprised to see tears glistening along
his lower lashes.  “Do you have any siblings, Queeny?”

“No.”  I
could tell him that Eamon, Toren, Zahra and Aminah are the closest
people that I could call to a normal family, but I don’t.  The
information and the feelings attached to them are far too personal to
share with a guy like him.

“Didn’t
think so.”  He wipes his arm under his nose.  “You
see, a brother has a solemn duty to always protect his kin, no matter
the cost.  Sometimes he can do his job without too much trouble
but others...well, let’s just say sometimes it can get messy.”

I
blow out a deep breath and draw my legs up toward my chest, preparing
for what I assume to be a rather lengthy lecture on why and how this
has anything to do with me.

“That
guy over there seemed like a nice enough guy at first. Heck, in the
beginning I even approved of him.  My little sister was thrilled
to have finally found her genetic match.  I gotta admit I was a
bit concerned when I found out that he was not only from Earth but he
was my commanding officer.  Contrary to what you might think, I
used to know how to take orders.”

“Somehow that
doesn’t even seem possible.”

He
smirks.  “Yeah, well I did.  I was a good soldier.  I
did my work.  I fought enough battles to lose count. Life seemed
good.  Niyah was happy; at least I thought she was.”

“So what
happened to change all of that?”

His gaze hardens as
he raises a hand to point at me.  I scoff and roll my eyes.
 “You can’t seriously be blaming me for this now
too.”

Hyde’s grim
nod sends chills racing down my spine.  “You may not
remember your life back on Earth as well as you think you do, but my
memory is just fine, Queeny.”  He spits to the side again
but this time I think he does it out of disgust rather than
necessity.  “That guy over there up and ditched my sister
for you and that’s the truth of it.”

My mouth gapes open.
 I blink rapidly, trying to decide if Hyde is just pulling a
sick prank on me or not.  Judging by the vein pulsating down the
center of his forehead and the ruddy tint to his cheeks he is not in
the joking mood.

“I have never
met that man before last week. What you say is impossible!” I
protest.

Hyde pushes out his
lower lip and runs his finger along it.  He pushes up off the
floor and rises to his full height. It’s the first time I’ve
seen him stand and I realize that he is probably a few inches taller
than Vondran and certainly taller than me.  “Just cause
you don’t remember him doesn’t mean I’m lying.  You
nearly tore apart Drakon’s city because he tried to kill
Bastien.  Rumor has it you snatched him back from death on the
night you killed Aloysius.  The way I figure it, if he hadn’t
done some sort of voodoo magic on that brain of yours you’d be
shacked up with Bastien instead of your current husband.  Funny
how things turn out, huh?”

“I don’t
see any humor in that insinuation at all,” I growl.

He tilts his head to
look down at me with a knowing gaze.  Goosebumps rise along my
arms.  “Question you gotta ask yourself now is that if you
do get those memories of yours back, how you gonna live with yourself
knowing that he’s lying right there because he was fool enough
to throw himself in harm’s way for you again?”

I
sit with my head turned away from Hyde as I curl in upon myself.
 Sleep refuses to come.  There’s no way it could
after what the things he implied earlier.  It’s not like I
can’t read between the lines.  Hyde believes that I’m
a home wrecker, but that’s insane.  I don’t even
know his sister, and I sure as heck don’t remember Bastien even
being near Drakon’s city.  I went in to save Eamon,
period!

A groan from behind
me captures my attention. I roll over and feel my breath catch as
Bastien shifts.  Hyde throws me a knowing gaze as I start to
rise but decide not to feed into his fantasies.  Instead I cross
my legs before me and call out to him.  Bastien doesn’t
move again but his breathing has changed.  It is still labored
but in a different way...in a more lucid, pain laced way.

I watch him for
several minutes, silently begging for him to pass out again.  Despite
my burning need for answers I know that the merciful thing would be
for him to black out and wake once his wounds are healed.

“Seems a bit
odd that they would leave him like that, don’t you think?”

I glance over at
Hyde to see him picking his teeth.  I have no clue what on earth
he’s digging for since he hasn’t had a meal in over a
week but maybe it’s a force of habit.  Something normal
amongst all of this craziness.  Although I would love to be able
to combat his observation I know that he’s right.

“He won’t
be of any use to them in this condition,” I whisper.

Hyde nods in
agreement and flicks something off his fingers.  “Seeing
as how they healed up your boy Reyes over there I’d say that
they have different plans for Bastien.”

I
grit my teeth, knowing that snapping at Hyde for speaking the truth
isn’t going to make me feel any better. I turn my gaze toward
Satal and find him watching me again.  He seems to be intrigued
by me, though I have no idea why.  He meets my gaze fully for
the first time and I realize that although his eyes hold a shine in
them like a feline at night, there is a light deeper within.  A
light surrounded by nothingness.  No emotion.  No soul.  No
humanity.

“Where are you
from, Satal?”

“Oh, don’t
bother,” Hyde remarks, waving his hand toward Satal.  “Guy
doesn’t talk much.  And when he does it’s not about
anything useful.”

“Seggrern.”
 

Hyde and I turn
together to look at Satal.  “Seggrern?” I repeat.
 He nods slowly.   “Is that a city?  A
planet?”

Satal
says nothing more and I find myself nearing the desire to tear at my
hair and scream.  
Why
do these people have to be so difficult?

“Told you,”
Hyde smirks.

Another
moan from Bastien has me holding my breath. This time his fingers
curl into fists and his back arches.  
He
is in pain!

Having
fallen several feet away from me, he is out of my reach, but as I
lift my gaze from over his right shoulder I see that Hyde is well
within distance.  “Help him.”

“Why should
I?” he scoffs.  

I purse my lips,
almost grateful for having the collar to prevent me from tearing into
him.  “Because it’s the decent thing to do.”

Scratching his
beard, Hyde seems to think it over.  I fight to control my
rising temper as he tilts his head to the side.  “Nah. I
think I’m good right where I am.”

The pounding in my
head intensifies as my fingers curl into fists so tightly that my
nails dig into my flesh.  The lights around us flicker.  Hyde
glances up, surprised.  “Hey, did you--”

A sudden intake of
breath from my right startles me.  Marius bolts to a sitting
position, his hand pressed to his chest.  “Marius?  Are
you ok?”

He turns slowly to
look at me with eyes still haunted by his dreams.  “We are
here.”

As I am thrust
through a wide opening in the side of the D’Hatil ship and out
onto a grated platform, I realize that the sauna-like conditions of
my cell were far better than what lay in wait outside.  Sweat
drips from the end of my nose and trails down my forehead to sting my
eyes. My hair feels heavy around my face, plastering to my cheeks in
the stifling heat.  I wish that I could tie it into a knot so I
could experience some amount of relief.

My
hands are manacled before me, chained together so that my palms
crisscross each other. A matching chain runs between my legs,
latching me to my cell mates.  Reyes and Vondran shuffle before
me in a slow, halting gait.  Hyde walks directly behind,
stepping on the backs of my heels from time to time.  Marius
pulls up the rear.

I have seen no sign
of the girls, nor of Bastien.  He screamed in pain as he was
thrown over a Roamer’s shoulder and hauled out before us, his
head hanging so low to his chest that it appeared broken.  I
take a small amount of comfort in knowing that at least he is
alive...for now.

I squint against the
brilliant white light all around, dazzled by it despite the fact that
a thick canopy of green hangs high overhead.  The light seems to
not come from above but from everywhere.  As if the trees and
vines themselves were the source.

“How
is this possible?” I whisper, staring about me in wonder.  Bugs
of varying colors shimmer as they fly past.  Some are no larger
than a fingernail.  Others are the size of my fist. They all
have a fluorescent color to their shells and seem to let off a small
amount of light.  I blink to make sure that the shimmery trail
of light behind them isn’t just my imagination.