Page 9 of Primal Vow

Rhys had been hauled into their camp as a captive, and then tied up to the stake. The younger Borraq warriors who'd escorted him here had deferred to their leader, the imposing man who had looked into Rhys's eyes and chosen to keep him alive. Rhys had heard the warriors call their leader by a name: Taryn.

Taryn was nowhere to be seen now, as the warriors sat around the campfire to eat their meal. Rhys was left alone at the edge of the light, bound and forgotten.

He had never felt more despair in his life.

It wasn't the prospect of his impending death that filled him with hopelessness. No, he'd faced enough close calls in seedy space stations to be familiar with the specter of death. In those moments, he'd always been able to see a way out, a slim chance to slip through fate's fingers and survive.

No, what filled him with despair was the reason for his capture.

Rhys had thought that he was a member of the human race. But in the moment when the Borraq had attacked, and his fellow humans had looked at him then abandoned him to his fate, he'd realized the truth.

He was just a tool to them. Disposable, there to perform a task and then to be thrown away when he was no longer useful.

Humans were supposed to be the dominant species of the galaxy, with their colonies and their starships. But in that moment, as they'd looked at him and seen not a fellow man, but just a replaceable part, something had broken inside of him.

He couldn't bear the thought of it. Rhys refused to be small. He refused to be a cog in a machine.

Screw them. He was going to prove all of them wrong. He was going to survive, and he was going to carve out a better future for himself, one where he actually mattered.

He was going to be something more.

The ship they'd come down on wasn't going to take off again — it was deliberately junky, to slip through the Borraq defenses. But the others had said that there was a pick-up point, a place and a time where another ship was going to get them.

That was Rhys's plan. Escape this pack of alien murderers, find the other humans somewhere on the most dangerous planet in the system, and make it to the pick-up point in time to get back to human space.

Simple, right?

Now, he just had to figure out the first part…

As the Borraq warriors ate their meal, Rhys assessed his surroundings. In front of him, the campsite gave way to wild jungle beyond. He was small, much smaller than the Borraq, and fast… If he got to the jungle with enough of a head-start, he might be able to disappear into all that dense undergrowth…

Someone approached him.

Taryn was back.

Oh, god. Even for an alien, the man was something else. The firelight played over the sleek, golden lines of his muscles, his powerful frame barely contained by his alien garb. His eyes were a piercing green, the color vivid against his skin, like jewels in a gold setting. Two long horns rose from his head, curving back into dangerous points. They framed his stern, handsome face like a crown.

Rhys swallowed.

"Please," he said as Taryn double-checked his restraints. "I'm no harm to you. I mean, look at me! Just let me go, and I'll never bother you again."

Taryn looked at him with visible scorn. "You humans have no honor," the Borraq warrior ground out in a deep voice. "Sneaking onto our sacred homeworld like vermin, violating Vasz for your own greed."

It was the first time Taryn had actually spoken to him, and Rhys recoiled at the venom in his words. He opened his mouth to protest, but what defense could he offer? What Taryn said was true.

"You're all the same," Taryn continued, his lip curling with disgust. "Warlike beasts, conquering and pillaging wherever you go. Our warriors have bled defending our world from your kind."

Something hot and uncomfortable washed over Rhys. He wanted to argue, to insist that not all humans were like the ruthless miners he'd fallen in with. But the truth was, he had no idea — his entire life had been confined to the grime and desperation of the colonies and space stations. He didn't know anything about the front line of the war.

"I... I'm not like that," Rhys stammered, hating how feeble his voice sounded. "I was just trying to survive, to pay off my debts. I don't want to hurt anyone."

Taryn's piercing green eyes held him, unconvinced. "And yet here you are, violating our lands and threatening our way of life. You cannot plead ignorance, human."

Rhys winced, half from the sight of his chances sinking even lower — and half from real pain. The pain in his shoulder flared, aggravated from the way he was bound.

He took a shallow breath, trying not to aggravate the injury. The last thing he needed was for Taryn to see any sign of weakness or vulnerability. Rhys was already at the complete mercy of these alien captors. He couldn't afford to make them think about disposing of him.

Gritting his teeth, Rhys met Taryn's piercing green gaze with a defiant stare of his own. He refused to show even a flicker of the pain lancing through his shoulder with every shallow inhale. His dark eyes remained steady, his jaw set in a hard line of determination.

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