Outlaw
Outlaw
Heart’s Desire…or Soul Destroyed
By
Angela Verdenius
(Sci-fi Romance)
Copyright 2003 Angela Verdenius
Second Edition 2018
Cover by Melody Simmons
ebook Edition License Notes
No part of this book may be reproduced or copied without prior consent of the author & publisher.
All characters and towns are figments of the author’s imagination and bear no resemblance to any person living or deceased.
Table of Contents
Foreword
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Coming
Bio
Other books by this Author
Foreword
This is a previously published series undergoing a complete revision/re-edit/rewrite, bringing it up to date with more modern times, and involving some changes that are big or small depending on what is needed in comparison to when it was originally created.
These stories are romances with action, set on distant worlds and in outer space, with a variety of heroes, heroines, and interesting side-characters (both funny, good and bad), most of whom later feature in their own books. Not heavy on sci-fi technology, the stories are very much character driven, and so saying the intimacy between the couples range from sweet to hot, depending on the storyline and the characters. Like real people, they are all different.
Though it’s a series, each book is a stand-alone story with a different couple.
I hope you take pleasure in reading what I took pleasure in creating, whether this is your first time or a revisit.
Oh, and if you’re not Australian, you will find some of the spelling different. I’m an Aussie, and I spell the Aussie way, so if you think you’ve stumbled upon an error, it may not be!
Cheers
Angela
Chapter 1
“Who loosened the chains?” The man roared in the distance, waving a fist at the dark tent behind him.
“Slave and criminal traders.” With a grunt of distaste, Darvk continued to push his way through the crowded market place.
Grimacing, Maverk followed his friend. “This is the only thing that bothers me about trading. Crowds I don’t mind, but smelly ones…”
“You weren’t worried about the smelly crowd in the tavern last night, or that sultry wench who was blatantly seducing you.”
Maverk smiled wistfully. “She was a feisty little piece.”
About to reply, Darvk’s attention was diverted by sudden yelling and swearing. He groaned as the crowd, smelling the scent of excitement, turned as one and surged between the haphazard stalls, carrying he and Maverk along in their midst.
Realizing there was no choice but to go along with the flow of people, Darvk jostled to the front for a better view of the cause of the commotion.
On a raised platform, a young black-robed boy was using iron tongs to gingerly gather up glowing coals from an overturned iron bucket.
A masculine cry of pain was followed by more curses.
Curiosity aroused, Darvk gazed at the tent flaps. “Someone in there is giving the slavers trouble.”
“Can’t handle your trade goods anymore, Bok?” someone jeered.
The man on the platform whirled around, eagerness replacing his snarling expression at the sight of the crowd gathered attentively below the raised platform. “People, I have a treat for you. Come closer and see the outlaw I have for trade!”
“Let’s go.” Disgusted, Maverk made to leave.
“She is a treat, my friends, firm and strong.” Bok gestured to the tent. “Beautiful as only her race can be and just as dangerous. Only the brave among you will bid for this beauty!”
“Not yet,” Darvk said.
Surprised, Maverk eyed his friend. “‘Tis not like you to be interested in slaves and outlaws.”
“I just want to see her.”
Bok’s head disappeared between the tent flaps then drew back to face the crowd. “Bring her out.”
The crowd waited in curious silence as the tent flaps parted to reveal a young slave trader with heavily muscled arms. The thick chain in his fist was attached to the neck collar of the shadowed captive standing between the two slave guards.
“Bring her forward,” Bok commanded.
The slave guards jerked the chain harshly, forcing the outlaw into the sunshine. The heavy cuffs and chains that bound her wrists and ankles rattled loudly in the expectant silence.
The reaction was everything a money-hungry slaver could hope for. The watchers gasped in shock when they saw the golden death mask that covered her face. It was secured in place by a gold band that fitted over the top of her head.
“It’s a Reeka outlaw!” a woman shrieked.
“They’re all supposed to be dead!” yelled a short squat man, small eyes darting greedily up and down the tall, straight figure of the outlaw.
“Most have been hunted to extinction.” Bok smiled triumphantly. “This is possibly the last one alive.”
Darvk studied the lass standing so still. He’d heard about the Reeka Warrior Women, a race trained to fight and kill, who had lived on Comll before being outlawed. They were mercenaries hired by warring leaders to seek out and destroy the enemy.
“’Tis said the Reeka wenches murdered the men they bred with as well as the sons born,” Maverk murmured.
Aye, Darvk had heard the same. ‘Twas known that the female babes were raised to be warrior women, ruthless and deadly. The death mask was moulded into replicas of the owner’s features and placed on their faces for burial at death. A rather macabre touch.
Bok leered. “Yes, a Reeka. Strong and healthy, with fine legs to walk or run for miles and strong arms for heavy labour. Who will pay for the privilege of owning one of the Reeka warriors?”
“Show us her face,” the hefty smithy demanded. “Is she as pleasing to the eyes as legend says?”
“Judge for yourself, friend.” The golden death mask was swept off to a stunned silence followed.
“She’s beautiful,” Maverk whispered, awed.
Dimly, Darvk registered the heart-shaped, impossibly lovely face, but it was her eyes that made his heart pound with an unknown force.
Large and heavily fringed with black lashes, they were the deep colour of the violet flowers that grew abundantly on the riverbanks of his home world of Daamen. Her eyes were impossible to read due to the distance that separated them, but there was no denying the glimpse of wildness lurking in their depths.
Reaching behind her, Bok brought forth a thick braid to drape over her shoulder and sleeveless leather bodice, artfully placing it between her breasts so that the tip touched her belted waist. “Imagine having this hair loose and wrapped around your hand. Gentlemen, do I hear a bid?”
Hands shot up everywhere.
“One hundred dinnos!” the short, squat man shrieked.
“One twenty!”
“One fifty!”
The Reeka showed no emotion.
“Come.” Bok lifted her small, rounded chin with his hand. “Beautiful, wild and chained, what more could you want?”
She moved suddenly, dropping her head to snap at Bok’s arm.
Women in the crowd screamed and the watchers at the front stumbled back.
On the alert for an outburst, the slaver novice cracked taut the chain a
ttached to the neck collar, jerking her head away at the last minute so that her small white teeth just grazed Bok’s skin. The slave guards kicked at the back of her knees making them buckle, bringing the captive outlaw to her knees. A cruel grasp in the golden hair yanked her head up.
A strange pang of anger simmered to life inside Darvk at her treatment.
“She’s a wild dog!” an elderly woman yelled. “You should have killed her, not brought her here for trade!”
A low murmur of agreement rose from the fickle crowd.
Some of the men who’d previously bid eyed the young woman doubtfully.
“Come, come!” Bok cried out heartily. “Kept in chains, this beauty will be helpless!”
“She wasn’t so helpless that she couldn’t attempt to bite your arm off.” An old man cackled.
Jeers and hoots of laughter greeted this.
The slave trader remained undaunted. “She’ll be a tasty morsel for someone man enough to buy and bed her. See those delicious mounds of breasts straining even now at her bodice.” Bok pointed crudely and every eye in the crowd followed his finger. “Just imagine, my lusty friends, the Reeka warrior chained to your bed, helpless to do anything but wait for her lord and master to come.”
The gazes of the men became lustful again, lecherous eyes raking the kneeling figure.
“It’d take more than chains for me to bed that hellcat,” Maverk commented without rancour.
As the hesitant bids begin again, Darvk noted the lass’s gaze drift scornfully over the sea of faces.
“Sweet mercy, she’s remembering us!” A woman exclaimed as she stepped back onto Darvk’s foot, making him wince. “If she escapes, she’ll murder us all in our beds!”
The warrior pinned her with a feral look and spat a guttural sound, causing the woman to squeal and scramble back into the nervously shifting crowd.
“See the spirit in her?” Bok said swiftly. “The pleasure in taming this warrior woman will last for a long time!”
The bids came faster.
Darvk’s heart jolted as the lass’s gaze skimmed dismissively across his face, moving away before returning to stare. The violet eyes darkened to a deepness that touched his soul, and sympathy for her welled up. Proud and strong, bound in chains, would her spirit eventually break under repeated rape and hard labour? Revulsion filled him. Or would she be killed by whoever bought her? After all, an outlaw’s life was of no value, only the novelty of ownership.
The tall, stooped brothel owner leered. “I could use her at my place. Chained down, I’m sure many of you young stallions would gladly pay to mount her.”
Whistles and cheers greeted this. Darvk saw the words register in her expression, the flicker of fear quickly replaced by coldness as she looked at the brothel owner.
“The wench will kill him if he buys her and she escapes someday,” Maverk observed.
“The wench is frightened.”
“Can’t blame her.”
“She faces a life of bondage and rape.”
Maverk glanced at Darvk. “You’re not thinking…” His brown-eyed gaze darted to the outlaw. “Oh, surely not!”
“Three hundred dinnos!” Darvk raised his hand.
Bok’s eyes narrowed calculatingly.
“Three twenty.” The brothel owner sneered.
“Three fifty.” Darvk countered.
“Four hundred.’
A smile crept across the slaver’s cruel lips.
“Five hundred.” Darvk said.
Frustration was clear on the brothel owner’s face. “Five twenty.”
“Six hundred.” Darvk’s attention was fixed on the lass who didn’t acknowledge the high bidding being carried out for her.
The brothel owner swore and pushed his way through the crowd.
“Six hundred to the Daamen trader!” Bok laughed delightedly.
“You are insane.” Maverk ploughed his hand through his long, shaggy blonde hair. “Six hundred dinnos for a savage, even if she is beautiful. The wench’ll cut your throat given the chance, and laugh in your face at the same time.”
The two traders watched as the outlaw was hauled upright and dragged back into the tent.
“Come forward, friends.” Bok gestured to them.
Entertainment over, the crowd drifted away.
~ * ~
“What is your name?” Bok asked.
“Darvk of Daamen.”
After nodding to the young boy standing nearby, who immediately darted inside the tent, Bok leered down at the traders. “Six hundred dinnos. You must want the warrior badly.”
Darvk tossed a pouch up to him without bothering to hide his distaste. “Just give the wench to us.”
Bok quickly counted the money. “She’ll be yours in a minute, friend.”
A sizzling sound accompanied by the sickening stench of burning flesh filled the air, followed almost immediately by a curse and crash.
“Bitch!” The slave novice staggered out of the tent with one hand cupped over his bleeding mouth and nose. “Bitch woman head-butted me when I branded her!” He spat blood furiously.
“Branded her?” Darvk stared at Bok.
“Of course,” Bok replied, unconcerned. “‘O’ for ‘outlaw’. Reekas are also branded with their master’s name; after all, the first master is usually their last. They are notorious for escaping or being killed in the attempt.”
Darvk hauled himself up onto the platform easily, Maverk on his heels. Charging into the tent, they stopped, appalled. The lass’s cuffed wrists and ankles had a chain stretched down to immobilize her, and a gag was tied over her mouth. Rage and pain glittered in her eyes while she twisted in the grip of the two guards.
“That must’ve hurt like hell.” Maverk winced at the sight of the raw, blistering burn on the slender thigh, exposed by the raised leather skirt.
“Reeka women don’t cry.” Bok kicked the woman lightly in the side.
Paling, she jerked sharply, the chains binding her rattling harshly.
“Leave her,” Darvk growled, pulling the gag from her mouth.
Bok started at the voice that cut through his cruel play. “They have no feelings.”
Surging to his feet, Darvk grabbed the front of the slaver’s cloak and hoisted him easily into the air. “She is mine now, slaver. Touch her again and I’ll kill you!”
Maverk’s attention went from Bok quaking in fear at Darvk’s furious expression to the guards releasing the outlaw to spring to their employer’s defence. Instinctively he stepped closer to his friend.
“Idiots!” Bok choked. “Do not leave her!”
Darvk saw the lass start to roll away. The little fool! Where did she think she could go, chained like that? Half of this settlement wanted to kill her, the other half rape her. “Maverk!”
His friend leaped forward, catching her shoulder and twisting her onto her back again. The look of a desperate, feral animal shone in her eyes, replaced quickly by burning hatred. He held her down easily until the guards took over.
Darvk dropped the slave trader with a harsh command. “You’ll loan us a cage to transport the lass back to my ship.”
“Of course, of course. Simet!”
The young boy crept forward from the corner of the tent. “Yes, master?”
“Ready the cage.”
As Simet dashed away, Darvk regarded the lass, so full of hate, fury, and fear he could feel it.
Maverk looked at him wryly. “Well, this should be an interesting trip home.”
Darvk grinned. “At least it won’t be boring.”
~ * ~
Tenia’s branded thigh throbbed, her side aching from the kick that bastard slaver had deliberately aimed there. Right on the festering wound her treacherous uncle had dealt her with her own sword. It was obvious from the wet feeling that the fragile blood clots had broken open, blood seeping into the cloth she’d bound around herself two days earlier.
With distant detachment she recognized the two men as Daamen traders.
They had the muscled build and incredible height of their race; standing easily seven foot, mayhap a bit more.
Her mother had been tall. She’d stood six foot six inches.
Blanking out the sudden vision of her mother’s agonized face the last time she’d seen her alive, Tenia concentrated on the traders. One was blonde. She studied the other trader who’d bought her, studied him the way she’d been taught to study the prey she was to kill. Notice his features, the way he moves and stands, she could almost hear Reya instructing.
But Reya wasn’t here anymore. She didn’t know the whereabouts of her sister.
The trader laughed suddenly, raking one hand through tousled black hair, pushing the long strands back over massive shoulders. The blonde shook his head ruefully.
Tenia turned her gaze to the golden death mask that lay on the floor behind the dark-haired trader, the one called Darvk. Every Reeka warrior had one made on her thirteenth birthday, the age serious training commenced. Unlike most of her sister warriors, she’d managed to keep it with her all this time, but it looked like she was to be parted from it.
Tenia clenched her teeth. Many Reeka warrior women had been hung, burned and buried without their masks. She’d just be one more.
Stepping back, Darvk’s heel connected with the mask. Picking it up, he studied the blank likeness before glancing at Tenia, who looked away.
Bok entered the tent warily. “The wagon and cage awaits you.”
Darvk nodded and hefted the mask in his hand. “This comes with the wench.”
When Bok looked as if he was about to object, Darvk’s eyes narrowed. Bok swallowed and nodded. “Of course.”
Probably going to trade it, Tenia thought sourly.
The guards jerked her upright, shoving her through the tent flaps and hurling her to the ground from the platform with the same disregard as though throwing out the garbage.
Pain knifed through her from her wound and the throbbing brand, but she bit back the cry, forcing herself to concentrate on breathing, trying to blink back the black dots threatening her vision.
Fainting now wasn’t an option.