Page 21 of Only Rogue Actions
Twin fists of disgust and anger punched into my chest.“People,” I growled.“You’re huntingpeople.”
“Not just people,” Roderick corrected.“The finest warriors in the galaxy.Erzton, Imperium, Techwave, I don’t discriminate.”
His dark gaze trailed down my body, and a thoughtful look filled the lord’s face, as though I was a side of beef he was inspecting for his dinner table.“Although I’ve never had the chance to test my skills against an Arrow before.Well, former Arrow.But let’s not quibble about titles and semantics.”
“Oh, no,” I snarked.“We wouldn’t want to do something as gauche as that.”
Roderick started pacing back and forth and swinging his hammer from side to side.Once again, the lunarium shimmered a pale red in a reflection of his power, which scraped against my telempathy like a piece of sandpaper.The Erzton lord was a strong psion, which made him a dangerous enemy, and his polyplastic armor and lunarium war hammer gave him a huge advantage.
“I’ll admit that I was surprised when I was first approached about asking you and Vesper to train here,” Roderick said.“But then I realized the opportunity was too good to pass up.”
“Whatopportunity?”I growled again.
A smug smile stretched across his face.“An opportunity to test my skills not only against an Arrow but against one who has the added power of a truebond.You truly are a remarkable creature, Kyrion.One of a kind.Even rarer than a red Tropics tiger or a blue Frozon wolf.”
I wasn’t one of a kind.I was a bond of two, tried and true.I was the cold blue moon to Vesper’s white-hot star, as Lady Verona had once said, and right now I was much more worried for my partner than I was for myself.
“Where’s Vesper?”I demanded.“What have you done to her?”
“Vesper is a seer, not a psion like you, Kyrion,” Roderick scoffed.“She’s hardly worth the effort it would take to hunt her down, so I let Jeffrey handle her.He had a new toy he wanted to test out on her.”
My hands clenched into fists, and it took every ounce of my self-control not to lunge forward, wrap my hands around the bastard’s throat, and choke the answers out of him.“What sort oftoy?”
Roderick shrugged.“Jeffrey was recently gifted a Black Scarab by some new friends of mine.He plugged it into the maze control panel last week.He’s still working out a few bugs in the system, and he’s just beendyingto test it out on someone new.”
Ice rushed through my veins.Vesper was trapped in the maze with a Black Scarab and no stormsword to defend herself.I thought of the shock that had stabbed into my chest earlier.That must have been Vesper coming face-to-face with the Scarab.
Vesper?Vesper!I called out through the bond.
She didn’t answer, but the velvety ribbon of her in my mind was still warm, strong, and firm.Whatever had happened, the Scarab hadn’t hurt Vesper, which eased some of my worry.Still, I needed to get to her as quickly as possible, which meant getting past Roderick.
“So you got Jeffrey to force me into this garden so you could do what, exactly?Fight me?”I shook my head.“That won’t end so well for you.Trust me on that.”
Roderick arched an eyebrow.“Why?Because you have the storied power of a truebond and I don’t?Truebonds are highly overrated, Kyrion.Trust me on that.”
A knowing smirk stretched across his face, and a sickening realization knifed through my gut.“You lured another truebond couple into the maze.”
Roderick nodded.“Unfortunately, one of the maze technicians discovered what I was doing in the facility after hours.Jason threatened to go to the gossipcasts unless I bought his silence.”
“What did you do to him?”
“I told Jason to meet me here so I could transfer the credits to his account.Jason was foolish enough to leave Caleb, his younger brother and truebonded partner, alone at their apartment.As soon as Jason left to meet me, a few of my trusted Hammers stormed the apartment, captured Caleb, and brought him here.I told Jason what I’d done, and he rushed into the maze to try to save his brother.But it was too late, and Jeffrey’s Black Scarab had already torn poor Caleb to pieces.”Roderick clucked his tongue in mock sympathy.
More ice rushed through my veins.I hadn’t known Jason and Caleb, but I knew what a broken bond could do to the remaining partner.My father had gone mad with grief over the loss of his connection to my mother.So had Adria Byrne, an Arrow who’d been bonded to her brother, Dargan, when Vesper killed him during the Regal midnight ball.Oh, yes.A severed truebond usually wreaked utter devastation that very few people could survive.
Roderick’s lips puckered in thought.“Looking back, I really should have battled Jason first.He was by far the superior warrior, but after Caleb was killed, Jason didn’t put up a fight at all.He just held Caleb’s body, rocked back and forth, and sobbed.At least, until I broke his jaw with my hammer to shut him up.”
Roderick shrugged again, as though deliberately luring two people into his maze for the sole purpose of killing them was of no more consequence than playing a video game.That’s exactly what this was to Roderick, a bloodygame.Only he didn’t even have the decency to play fair, given his armor and war hammer.No, Roderick Battis only wanted to play if he was certain he could win.Fucking coward.
“You want to fight an Arrow?”I jerked my chin toward his chest.“Then take off the armor and drop the hammer, and we’ll see who the better warrior truly is.”
“Nah,” Roderick replied.“I was smart enough to lure you into my hunting ground.That already makes me the better warrior, Kyrion.But I’ll be happy to prove it to you.”
He lifted the holoscreen on his left forearm to his lips.“Open the gates and disable the traps in section forty-seven.”
Several soft whirs sounded.Around the biodome, the metal walls slid back, revealing the various paths.
Roderick lowered his arm and looked at me.Once again, that strange, disgusting eagerness wafted off him and twinged my telempathy.“You have a choice, Kyrion.You can stay here and fight me, or you can go back into the maze and try to find Vesper—”
