Page 72 of Crown of Draga

His skin was chalky white, as though he’d never been out in the sun a day in his miserable life. Those clear blue eyes only reinforced the idea. The male gestured toward him and more of those monstrous hounds poured out of the Neprijat ship straight towards Sirus.

A thousand thoughts flitted through his head as he considered all the possible options.

Did the Neprijat really only have one male to each of the ships, or were there more waiting inside once their creatures finished all the work? Sirus dispatched those awful creatures. The plasma blades ripped through the remaining hounds with very little resistance, and his pistol took them down with a shot to the—skull.

Sirus stumbled when he realized they had no eyes, only slits to scent him on the thin air. Those teeth glittered as they got closer. He shredded them all while keeping one eye on the Neprijat walking towards him at a leisurely pace. His warriors had already reached the horde ahead of them and sliced the hounds on the tail of the Royal Army.

The male simply waited until all the monsters were dead and Sirus stood heaving, studying the Neprijat before him.

“Not bad,” he whispered.

Sirus felt every hair on his body raise at the chilling sound of that voice. It was dead leaves rustling in the wind, ancient paper rubbing against dry skin; it was the sound of death. He knew it in his bones.

“After so many centuries of peace you Kalans still know how to fight. Interesting,” The male pulled a long, curved blade from the sheath on his back. “It would be too easy to make you kill yourself, let’s play instead.”

That deadly blade whistled, cutting through the thin air so fast Sirus barely jumped back in time to dodge. He brought up his own shorter blades to block the second attack. His eyes widened when the Neprijat blade didn’t melt or shatter against the plasma. It held against them when everything from metal to stone gave under the force of the heat of atoms in a state of hyper-activity.

He let out a curse as the male fought viciously, swift and hard, giving no quarter. Sirus searched for a weakness, anything he could exploit. The Neprijat landed a kick to his chest and Sirus flew meters before landing on his back hard enough to knock the air from his lungs.

It gave him the distance he needed though. He stood and pointed the plasma gun, finger on the trigger and—

“Stop.”

That quiet voice rumbled through him and Sirus felt his finger still of its own accord, try as he might he could not move the muscles to fire on the Neprijat. Despite how cold it was, sweat trickled from his brow. Real fear tasted like acid on his tongue. He was utterly frozen.

“Point the pistol to your head,” the Neprijat male said, his slight smile showing black teeth, as sharp and glittering as those monstrous hounds of his.

Sirus felt his arm move, his gun angled towards his temple and he knew the rumors had been true. The Neprijat possessed some strange power of persuasion, a wavelength no doubt scrambling his own mind to obey. Sirus didn’t know how to fight it. He couldn’t will his hand to follow his own orders. The barrel of his plasma gun touched the skin of his temple next to his eye where the old scar still remained. The smell of burning flesh had him gagging, but even that he couldn’t do.

The heated barrel melted the flesh on his face and the pain was excruciating. Sirus tried to scream. His throat convulsed but nothing came out. He closed his eyes and offered a prayer to Katsia, and a silent apology to Joslynn. There was no way he could fight this, even with all his cycles of warrior training.

In a few seconds he knew the Neprijat would order him to pull the trigger, ending his own life. And there was nothing he could do about it.

Plasma fire made him flinch. His eyes flew open and suddenly his body was his own again. Sirus lurched to his feet and watched as one of his warriors beheaded the Neprijat before him. Starships overhead fired down on the other Neprijat ships.

The Seprilles had answered his call for aid.

Relief filled Sirus so hard and fast he nearly collapsed. He got on the transmissions and told the Seprilles where to kill, ensuring any more of the Neprijat would be dead. Sirus followed the monsters towards the Treon seat, cleaving them in two while he shouted instructions for everyone to protect their ears. He had no idea if that would work, but they had to try.

The recorders zoomed in on them and Sirus didn’t bother a glance. They had hours of work left to do and an entire family seat to clear with the Neprijat to push back to the borders. Sirus sliced through a hound feasting on one of his warriors. He tried not to look too closely.

The cities would be the worst, those innocent bodies – females and children. They would haunt him.

Treon was nothing but a planet of death now.

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