Page 17 of Decadence

“Whoa.” The warrior held up a placating hand. “Don’t want you to be late for anything. I just noticed you had an aura about you.”

“Aura?” Ikriss’s left eyebrow twitched.

“You look like you want to go and kill someone specific.”

“Don’t we all?” Ikriss said carefully, restraining the tension that threatened to creep into his voice. He glanced at Lodan as his headache intensified, forcing him to clench his hands into fists. His claws shot out, tearing through the material of his gloves, puncturing his flesh and drawing blood.

The pain lancing through his hands gave him a moment of clarity. Ikriss took a deep breath and tried to center himself. He needed to be at least half-rational for this infernal meeting.

“We’re going fishing on Earth,” Lodan said with a tight smile, and although his tone was light, his golden eyes were as cold and as sharp as iceblades. Ikriss knew of many that had suffered greatly after underestimating the pilot because of his calm, easy demeanor. “You look like you could use a swim in a frozen ocean. It’s always a good cure for temporary insanity. Why don’t you come with us?”

“I might take you up on that offer if this meeting doesn’t run too long,” Ikriss replied. A quick trip to one of Earth’s frozen poles sounded highly tempting. He hadn’t yet had the chance to sample the planet’s wild edible creatures, and the Aikun in him longed for a real hunt, even if it was just catching these so-called fish.

“We’ll wait for you. We’re between missions, and Alexis has kicked me out for the time being. Apparently, we can be overbearing, and all human females need something called alone time.” A rumbling laugh rose from deep within Nythian’s chest. “Strange creatures that they are. She’ll be longing for me soon enough.” His eyes narrowed with curiosity. “Who’s the meeting with?”

“Humans,” Ikriss shrugged. He was to deliver an official communication on the rescued females from Darkstar Command—which in this case, consisted of himself and Tarak—to the human authorities.

An insignificant formality, nothing more.

“You’ll have to tone down that killing aura, then.” Nythian’s expression turned serious. “Don’t scare the humans too much. They have a tendency to lash out when backed into a corner, even if it’s futile.”

“Not always,” Lodan said cryptically, flashing his fangs.

Ikriss drew upon cycles and cycles of strict training and discipline to ignore the throbbing pain of his headache and the strange energy that coursed through him—a mixture of anger and lust and a hunger for violence. “I didn’t spend all those revolutions working mil-intel on foreign planets just to become some tactless imperial fool,” he growled. Compared to most Kordolians, Ikriss had a lot more exposure to different planets and cultures. It was part of the reason why Tarak had no trouble trusting him to deal with the various mundane tasks of officialdom and alien relations. He was probably better off dealing with the skittish humans than Tarak anyway, because the General’s forceful personality could be overly intimidating to weaker species. Ikriss was usually a little better at hiding his true nature. “I will handle the humans. There will be no incidents. Tarak will be arriving shortly to oversee the punishment of the remaining Ephrenian crew.” Ikriss bared his fangs. “And I will take you up on that fishing trip.” Anything to quell this cursed headache. Submerging into the near-frozen dark, silent depths of some foreign planet’s ocean sounded like his idea of bliss.

He looked forward to such solitude, because it would give him enough sanity to contemplate the small problem of a certain female called Sienna, who had triggered his fucking Mating Fever.

He’d held her in his arms when she was weak and almost broken.

Then he’d seen her made whole again, with her strength and pride and determination restored. She’d wrapped those things around herself like a glorious raiment, and he found himself struggling to resist the desperate plea in her strangely colored eyes.

I just want to go home.

She wanted nothing to do with him.

And yet she had no idea of what she’d just unleashed.

She had no idea of the storm that could engulf her.

“Well, this is gonna be interesting,” Nythian said softly, making a small gesture of farewell with his hand.

“Indeed.” Ikriss glanced at Lodan. The First Division warrior had grown uncharacteristically quiet. “And it is time I taught you the proper Aikun way to fish. Works on every planet.”

“Bet you a thousand credits it’ll be different on Earth,” Lodan murmured. “Nothing goes to plan in this cursed place.”

The pain in his head was making Ikriss’s vision go blurry again. He ignored it and started to walk. “But maybe that is for the best,” he said as he glanced over his shoulder. “Otherwise, we probably would have destroyed half the Universe by now, would we not?”

Chapter Six

“Just let me go over that one more time.” Sienna frowned as she tried to wrap her head around the cover story. She was intentionally speaking in Universal, which she’d been practicing ever since she’d returned from that unsettling meeting with the Kordolian. If that was what they spoke around here, then she wanted to understand everything—and be perfectly understood. “I was hit in the head from behind by a malfunctioning delivery drone while I was walking down the street? Knocked out cold. Woke up in hospital with a concussion and memory loss. For some mysterious reason that I don’t understand, the hospital didn’t contact my next-of-kin right away. What the hell?” She frowned. Was this story even plausible?

“That’s pretty much it,” said the woman sitting across from her, who had introduced herself simply as Riana. She’d appeared in the guest lounge alongside a female Kordolian medic called Zyara. They’d both taken a lot of time and effort to introduce themselves to all the rescued survivors, and Sienna had found herself quickly at-ease with Riana’s slightly awkward but warm chattiness and Zyara’s understated, gentle approach. It was only after she’d revealed a whole bunch of personal details about herself that it had occurred to her that perhaps this disarming Riana was the one Ikriss had sent to ask the questions.

If that was his way of getting information out of her after his about-face, then he was one sneaky bastard.

Now Riana was alone with Sienna in her quarters, helping her to prepare for her return to Earth. Well, the human was mostly alone. A guard was stationed outside. Sienna had caught a brief glimpse of him as Riana entered. Massive and fierce-looking, he was decked out in sculpted obsidian armor that molded to his powerful body. Intricate tribal-looking scars were carved into his face, and he wore an expression that could freeze over hell itself.

He hadn’t said a word.

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