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  Awakening the Warriors

  www.escapepublishing.com.au

  Awakening the Warriors

  S.E. Gilchrist

  Set in the world of the bestselling title Legend Beyond the Stars, an erotic novella about two warriors who have lost the ability to desire, and the human woman who is about to wake them up.

  Fran must have been crazy to leave her ordinary, safe life and volunteer as a colonist to terra-form a new earth. Now she is trapped in a prison cell on an alien planet a zillion miles from home and bound for a hideous death in notorious research chambers.

  She has one chance of escape: awaken the long dormant sexual urges of the Darkon Warriors shackled in the next cell.

  It’s a desperate job, but someone has to do it.

  About the Author

  SE can’t remember a time when she didn’t have a book in her hand. Now she writes her own stories where her favourite words are …‘what if’ and ‘where’? She combines passionate romance with action and adventure set in dangerous worlds. Her heroines are valiant and know exactly what to do with their alpha heroes.

  She writes in the romance genres of sci-fi/futuristic, fantasy, post apocalyptic/dystopian, ancient history. An Aussie to her backbone, SE lives down under in the beautiful Hunter Valley of Australia.

  Her first release, Paying the Forfeit, a short erotic romance story set in a post-apocalyptic world, was published by Momentum Publishing in e-book format.

  Legend Beyond the Stars is her first single title (major) release and is book 1 in the series Legends of the Seven Galaxies, published by Escape Publishing in e-book format.

  Awakening the Warriors is the second short story set in the world of Legends of the Seven Galaxies.

  Website: http://www.segilchrist.com/

  Twitter: @segilchrist1

  Facebook: SEGilchrist

  Acknowledgements

  I’d like to thank and dedicate this story to my writing buddy, Marianne Theresa, for selflessly critiquing this short at a particularly difficult time in her life.

  This one is for you Mr and Mrs MT.

  Dedicated to Marianne Theresa.

  And my family, always.

  Contents

  About the Author

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Also Available From Escape Publishing…

  Chapter 1

  Star Time 6036: Besa System

  “I so don’t want to die in this cell, a zillion miles from home, in a galaxy I’ve never heard of.” The words burst from my lips as I gripped the bars and stared in first one direction and then the other along the dim passageway. I leant my forehead against the cold metal and squeezed my eyes shut, fighting the ache in my throat.

  A burning torch set into a metal brace on the opposite wall spluttered, spitting stinking oil onto the flagstone floor. I pulled back from the stench, released my grip and turned round to look at the other inmates.

  Females—all of us.

  Four different races, including humans like me. The probable significance made my stomach muscles cramp. If I had anything left in there, I would have retched. Relia, one of the Purkons, rose to her feet and crossed the floor. She laid a tentative hand on my arm, a fleeting gesture of unspoken understanding. For some reason I remembered my mother making a similar gesture when my pet rabbit had died, years ago, when I was just a school kid. Pain clutched my heart in a hot embrace and I rubbed the palm of my hand against my chest.

  Relia said, “Come, Fran, rest.”

  I nodded. Lifting my hand, I ran a finger over the narrow translator collar encircling my neck and followed her. A faint noise had me swinging back to the bars, my heart stuttering like a misfiring engine. The sounds became louder and I recognised the tramp of booted feet.

  A Jurian female hissed. “They are coming. What will we do?”

  What could we do? Trapped by three stone walls far too thick for even a combined effort to move and metal bars, all we could do was wait and pray to whatever gods or goddesses who would listen.

  But it appeared some other poor bastard was their target, for the footsteps stopped further down and a gate opened with a protesting screech.

  Relia folded her arms over her chest, her wide sleeves falling back to reveal the glow of her mottled pearly-white skin. Her green sloe-shaped eyes met mine and she said, “The cell of the Darkons.”

  I hastened across the room, pressed my back against the wall, then sank onto my haunches. We fell silent, each lost in our private horror and pity as the crack of a whip and the snap against flesh ping-ponged off the pitiless stone walls. A hand slipped into mine and I pulled Margaret, the youngest of our small band into my arms, hugging her tight, as the sharp noises became soggy slaps. Soon the wielder would be slashing against bone.

  Next came the thud of boots laying into flesh. Not once did I hear a groan, a cry, not even a grunt from their victim. The guards laughing and jeering, the relish in their duties obvious by voices high pitched and thick in tone, sent shudder after shudder through my body. How long would it be before they turned their attention to us? Only five days ago (or had it been four?) they had appeared at our cell and dragged away two Relic women and two Purkon females.

  We hadn’t seen them since.

  After what seemed like years to us and must have felt an eternity to the victims, the gate clanged shut and footsteps trudged away. In the heavy silence our fear clung in the air like the filthy stench of death.

  I shivered, aware the dampness from the stones had seeped into the back of my flight suit, making my bones feel as if I was buried in ice. One of the women sneezed and snuffled, then broke into a fit of hacking coughs.

  “If we stay here much longer, we’ll die of cold or disease,” I said. Giving Margaret a final hug, I eased her shaking body away from me. “How are you doing?”

  “I’m okay.” Margaret smiled and the stark fear ebbed from her hazel eyes.

  Her expression worried me. Fifteen years old, she looked as gaunt as an old woman with deep hollows beneath her cheek bones. Not much more than a child and trapped in this madness. Life was not fair. Somehow I had to get her out of here.

  “We have to escape, all of us. Does anyone have any ideas?” Gripping the wall, I rose to my feet. Hard to believe only six months ago, I was doing the fifty-hour work-week thing, living for my career as a geologist working for a major mining company, content with my single existence in Adelaide. And then little Sooty, the cat I’d had since childhood, passed away, leaving me restless. Thirty-three years old and my ordinary life laid out before me in a boring sameness. No family apart from a stepbrother I rarely visited. When I heard about the third wave of colonists heading for a new earth, something stirred, awakened deep inside me.

  So I volunteered. My belongings placed into storage, my medicals passed, the next thing I knew I was walking onto a spaceship. Whatever had possessed me? Sheesh. I still wasn’t sure what I was looking for but whatever it was, I doubted I’d ever find it now.

  For the United Earth Corporation had no idea we were bound for a life of slavery and imprisonment. A few weeks into our journey we were handed over to what I learned were Elite Guards. Three of us, Margaret, another woman called Claire, and I had been separated from the others from Earth, and incarcerated in this hell-hole on a planet called Olman, smack bang in the middle of the Besa System.

  Say again? All I knew was we were galaxies from home and stuck in the middle of some stupid war that had nothing to do with us. Over and over I wondered why they had separated us. Where had they taken the other colonists? Were they also imprisoned? Or
were they dead?

  “I will not make any trouble.” Ana, a Jurian female whined. Her three yellow eyes goggled at me like car headlights at night. “They may punish us.”

  “So, we just sit here and wait. For what?” I snorted, threw my hands in the air and paced to the other side of the room. “No-one is going to rescue us. We’re on our own here.”

  Relia joined me. “The context of your last words I do not understand but I know I do not wish to die yet.”

  “You think they’re going to kill us?” When Margaret whimpered and covered her mouth with her hand, I bit my tongue at my thoughtless words.

  “Worse.” Relia glanced over her shoulder in the direction of the other cell.

  “Experiments,” breathed Ana. Her sallow complexion whitened, making her face look like a mound of week-old dough. “There has been speech on the airways such matters are conducted under orders of the Supreme Leader.”

  “Supreme psycho more like it,” I muttered under my breath before I leaned closer to Relia and added, “The others who were here before, do you think that’s what happened to them?”

  Eyes shadowed, Relia inclined her head.

  “I guess that makes sense. If they were going to kill us, they would have done it by now.” There was no way I intended to voice the suspicions stewing in my mind. “How many guards do you think come down here to pound on the Darkons?”

  “Errrr,” Relia mumbled. Eventually she held up eight fingers, then shrugged.

  “Say seven or nine of them. Not sure we’d be able to overpower that many soldiers given only a few of us have any fighting skills. What about a weapon?” I cast my eyes about the bare room. Apart from a bench bolted to the side of one wall, there was little else. “Everyone look for something we can use as a weapon.”

  “Why?” said Ana, shaking her fist at me. “You will get us killed.”

  “Ana is correct. If we were soldiers…” Relia stopped, her mouth dropped open.

  I sucked in a breath. “Yes! You’ve thought of something, haven’t you?”

  She looked at me, her face blank, and I couldn’t interpret the expression in her eyes. Goosebumps prickled down my spine.

  “The Darkons are warriors of great repute,” she said. “I have heard some have been awakened. Females from a planet lost to our worlds many cycles past have given them hope.”

  “So?” I swung round and strode to the door to grip the bars once more. Did she mean this race was in some kind of coma? A Sleeping Beauty scenario? I choked off a bubble of laughter. Hysteria alert. To regain control, I quickly muttered the table of geological timelines of every single age under my breath.

  Behind me, Relia cleared her throat and said, “I have heard they fight with renewed ferocity and determination against the Elite Forces. The Supreme Leader has recalled all fleets from the outer rim to assemble a strike against the Darkons’ home world.”

  “I have heard this also,” said another Purkon female.

  “If we can free the Darkon prisoners, we may have a chance,” continued Relia.

  “I assume you are speaking about those poor bastards down the corridor. They could already be dead, and if they’re not, the guards have been beating on them since we’ve been here. God knows, they wouldn’t be in any condition to fight.” I uttered a short, humourless laugh. “We’d have to carry them out.”

  I whirled round. My hands involuntarily clenched at my sides as I took in the scene. The aliens (in my mind that was everyone not from Earth, no matter how human they appeared) had bunched together and they all looked at me. Not a good sign. Reminded me of the phrase—thrown to the wolves.

  The two Jurians nodded their heads in unison like a chorus line. Relia drew in a deep breath before continuing, “If you can awaken the Darkons…”

  Ana and her Jurian pal had their heads together, their creepy sibilant voices hushed as they muttered and poked at the lock with a device that resembled a fork. Despite over an hour of protest and recrimination, all on my part, I had achieved nothing.

  I was still the sacrificial goat.

  The Jurians were still unrepentant re failing to declare the existence of this handy little tool they’d pocketed when one of the night guards dropped it outside our cell yesterday. As they told me repeatedly, unlocking the gates was not the problem. The problem was overpowering the guards and getting off the planet unscathed. It can only be you, Relia’s words knocked about my head like marbles in a bathtub, of the other two of your kind, one is too young and the other, terrified. She has not spoken since yesterday.

  So here I stood outside the other cell, my hands bunched into balls so tight, my nails cut into my palms. Unlike our prison, this one was secured by way of a thick metal door with one square cut out close to the top. The square was covered with a kind of Perspex or glass.

  “It is done,” said Ana, stepping aside. She ducked her head, not wanting to look me in the face. “We will wait in our cell, in case the guards return.”

  Yeah right, leaving me sticking out like a snowman in a desert. They scurried back down the corridor and I stared at the lock, wishing for a pair of Dorothy’s red shoes, doubting my ability to do the task ahead of me. In the silence, my heartbeats pounded a marching tune and I knew time was ticking against us. If I was going to do this, it had to be now. Experience had told us the guards rarely returned for several hours after one of their beating forays. But I no longer took anything for granted.

  My hand shook so badly it took me a few precious minutes to grasp the handle and turn back the lock. Holding the edges of the door with my fingertips, I pushed inch by inch until a large enough gap appeared and I poked my head round. No movement. I opened the door wider and stepped into the cell.

  On three walls of the room, close to the ceiling, a torch burnt throwing a wavering light over the occupants. My breath caught. I forgot my fear, when I smelt the metallic scent of fresh blood.

  Three Darkon warriors were staked out on top of metal tables. None turned to look at me as I hurried forward, my footsteps sharp in the silence. Were they dead? Was I too late? Some of my panic receded when I spotted the slow rise and fall of the massive chest of the closest soldier. My foot slipped from under me and I lurched against the table’s side. When I glanced down, I gagged at a shallow blood-stained open drain running along the length of the table to a grate-covered hole. My gaze slid to the warrior laid out before me. So hard to tell the extent of his injuries as blood and bruising smeared his naked body. To the left, I spied a metal post bracketed to the rock floor. Shackles and chains dangled from the loop at the top of the post. The guards must drag these poor blokes to the post, chain them and then beat the crap out of them.

  The slow burn of anger seared away the last of my anxiety.

  My skin prickled and I looked back to find the warrior’s eyes open, his gaze fixed on my face and my heart skipped a beat. So intent on his injuries, I hadn’t paid any attention to his physical features til now…

  Back on Earth, he would have had a very lucrative career as a male model. The perfect image of a young romantic warrior with chiselled features, bronzed skin and velvety black eyes that made me think of bedroom antics. A light flickered in his eyes. I reared back. Nervously I sneaked a peek at the other two soldiers.

  “Finnan has passed to the other side,” rasped the warrior.

  My gaze jerked back to his.

  He licked his cracked lips and added, his words becoming hoarser as he spoke, “Quain is in his soporose zone; it assists our healing process.”

  “I’ll get water.” I touched his shoulder with three fingertips, then snatched my hand away as the contact sizzled my skin. I rushed to the door, yanked it open, stared one way and then the other checking the corridor was empty. Seconds later I looked through the bars into our cell.

  “You are finished?” Relia hurried towards me, her thin dark eyebrows arched into twin upside down V’s on her forehead.

  I shook my head. “Give me those two buckets of water and I
’ll need some kind of cloth.”

  A minute or two later, Relia followed close behind as I returned to the cell but she refused to enter. After shoving a bucket through the doorway, she gestured to the end of the corridor. “Should I hear the guards return, I will run back and warn you.”

  “Thanks, Relia,” I said and smiled.

  Chapter 2

  I closed the door behind me and hauled the buckets to the closest table. First, I scooped water into a metal cup then eased one hand behind his head, lifting him before I offered him a drink. He gulped it down, closed his eyes and sighed; a mere whisper of sound but I sensed this small concession had cost him greatly to utter.

  “I give you thanks, sweet one, and you may call me Jerrell,” he muttered.

  No need for them to know my name, I decided and closed my mouth over the words I’d been about to say. Once we were free of here, I’d never see these blokes again.

  After re-filling the cup, I scurried to the side of the next table, my heart pounding like a galloping horse. This warrior, Quain as the other had spoke of him, was older, his features harsh and blunt, his skin weathered. I guessed him to be not more than ten years older than myself. Not that it mattered. I eyed the grim line of his compressed mouth, his square jutting jaw and knew by the aura of power that even in repose vibrated in the air about him; here lay a leader of men.

  I repeated my actions and although he drank with deep, long swallows his eyes remained closed and no sound passed his lips. With care I slipped my hand out from behind his head and hurried back to the first table, not daring to look in the direction of the bloodied mess that was all that remained of their companion.

  Using the strip of cloth Relia had ripped from her tunic and given me, I dipped it into one bucket and set about wiping off the blood and grime from the young soldier.

  I tried to be as gentle as possible as I cleaned his face while he remained quiescent beneath my touch. His stoicism impressed me and I could not deny the flutter of sexual interest tingling in my belly at the sight of his exquisitely cut lips curving into a tiny smile.