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This book is a work of fiction and is intended for adults only. Some scenes may contain explicit material that could make some readers uncomfortable.

Any names, businesses, places, or events in this work are fictional. Any similarities to living or dead people, incidents, companies, products, or organizations are purely coincidental.

~*~

Readers please note that this book has been reformated for Theo. If you find an error or five, please email isoellen.writes @ gmail.com to fix them. Thanks so much for your support.

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CHAPTER ONE

UNLUCKY MOONS

Corrin Erinnsdotter had no luck.

Nanny had said so. Her family and everyone in the village of Rivrtonn knew it. As a toddler, when Corrin fell and scraped her hands and knees, Nanny would lift her up, kiss her sores and tell her she had no luck. When she got old enough to help her sisters around the house, every time she dropped a dish her oldest sister, Kate, would shake her head and say, "I can't give you anything proper to do, you have no luck."

Those words were a curse over her life.

Nanny loved her; it was only her superstitious way. Born under the unnatural light of a double eclipse, during harvest season at the stroke of midnight. All the universe lined up to single out the seventh daughter of the seventh daughter of Erinn. In the sky, the Mother and Father moons turned red with omen. When her poor mother died twelve hours later, Corrin's lifetime promise of bad luck descended in a permanent stain. Corrin thought it was silly to think the two moons of Dorsus would care enough about one girl child, in one tiny river town, to turn red for the entire world to see. She'd later learned in school that a double eclipse happened for perfectly good scientific reasons. Just as a mother who had a home birth without a doctor present could bleed to death if the afterbirth wasn't properly taken care of.

Until the day she died, Nanny bemoaned Corrin's lack of luck. Every bad thing that happened in her granddaughter's life boiled down to that one fact. "I love you, my dear child. But you have no luck. Someday, I pray someone loves you enough to give you theirs."

She'd asked Nanny why she didn't give Corrin her luck, since her grandmother loved her most of all. Corrin lived in the big house with Nanny, her six sisters, and her grandfather. As the youngest, only Nanny and Grandfather had time for her. Nanny said that if she could give Corrin any decent luck, she would. Her youngest daughter was gone, and all her other children lived beyond the mountains in the steel cities. Nanny was alone. She, too, had run out of luck. Nanny said she'd done the best she could, but a good strong man was the only answer. So, Nanny and Grandfather set aside a large dowry for her.

Corrin had asked why her father didn't come back from the steel cities and give her his luck. For some blasted reason, it seemed to Corrin that the men were the ones who had all the luck. They owned property by themselves, sat on the town council, and decided who to ask to marry.

Nanny never answered that one.

The stories of Corrin's mother and father's love were legendary. People talked about the couple around the community celebration fires as an example of the greatest love they had ever seen. There were even songs to immortalize them. The village people often spoke of the lucky man from the city who came to learn the antiquated craft of net fishing with the rustics who followed the 'humble life'. He married the fisherman's prettiest daughter, refusing to leave her behind when it was time for him to go.

In fact, he built her a big house and decided to stay with her.

He hadn't had any trouble leaving his seven daughters behind after his beloved died.

Nanny, for all her belief that a good man would solve Corrin's luck issues, worried that her father's house and the money to support it would not be enough to catch one. As Corrin grew, she decided a good man wouldn't care about money or property any more than a good man might abandon his children.

Nanny didn't always make the most sense. But, she'd been married three times herself, was full of practical knowledge, and willing to share all the details of her experiences with the granddaughter who loved her most of all. Corrin had been a little disgusted, perplexed, and a great deal intrigued by those stories. Nanny said when a man gave her his luck, it would feel so good she wouldn't want to stop— that was how she would know. The process sounded far too intimate and messy, but Nanny assured her it was worth it.

Nanny was gone two years now, having followed her river fisherman husband to the grave. Rivrtonn was small, the number of bachelors limited. The only man in the village to ask for Corrin was the pig farmer, Barthollo. Wealthy and established, he took after his pigs in manners and appearance. Corrin didn't think he would give her his luck. No, his plan was to stick his thing in her to warm himself on winter nights and fill her with his piggy sons. He'd said as much on his last visit.

With her parents and grandparents gone, Corrin still lived in the big house with her oldest sister, Kate, and her third oldest sister, Beth, and both their husbands.

Her other four sisters lived in their own homes in different villages further south on the river. Though Corrin avoided her own home, a large two-story wooden structure during the day, she made a point to sit at the head of the table each night and eat with what remained of her family. By inheritance, the house, the farmlands connected to it, and the bag of gold set aside to support it, belonged to Corrin as her dowry.

Kate and Beth, bossy and judgmental, were merely guests. They lived with her because in Rivrtonn Village, young ladies did not live alone. It wasn't done.

Kate forked steaming cooked fish onto Corrin's plate. Years had passed since anyone allowed Corrin to lift the dishes. Even the wooden trenchers split when she got a hold of them. The rule embarrassed Corrin, but she found it difficult not to agree.

Unlucky things happened when she came in contact with dishes. With stair steps. With new clothing.

Since her grandmother's death, her oldest sister had taken over the household. She bossed their one servant and decided how things were done. Twelve years older, acting as Corrin's second mother, it had felt like a natural progression. Corrin wouldn't think it a bother if only Kate had fewer ideas about the future.

"Barthollo was here to see you this afternoon, and I had to tell him that you were fishing. Again," Kate said. The plate of fish passed on, she spooned boiled beans onto Corrin's plate. Kate knew that Corrin did not like over-cooked, mushy boiled beans. Yet a big heap of them went right on to Corrin's plate.

The one thing that Corrin was good at was fishing. The trout on the table had come from her catch that morning. Kate disapproved of the manly pastime, but she never turned away a string of fish either.

"I don't want to see him." Corrin reminded her.

"Sister. You are getting on in years. It's a long time since you should have been married and he is a very good match. No one else has asked for you. You know he doesn't care about your clumsiness or bad luck. He will offer you a good life." She poured water into Corrin's cup. Kate liked to remind her, often, of her age and unmarried status, while at the same time treating her like a child. She made a solicitous effort to take care of her baby sister, out of the goodness of her heart.

Not a week ago, Corrin had lifted a cup to her mouth to have it slip out of her hands as if greased with butter. In dismay, she'd watched it shatter into a thousand pieces on the floor. The dishes had belonged to Nanny. She'd let Kate treat her like a child in this one thing.

"I don't like him, don't want him, have no intention of marrying him. This house is mine and I will live here happily, as long as I like." She gave her family a tight smile. "You are welcome to move out whenever you want."

Beth said from across the table, ignoring the offer to move. "You are too independent. You stomp through town like a boy, stink like a fisherman, and act like a ruffian. You're rough and clumsy and do nothing to make yourself better!"

Beth's words were a common refrain spoken repeatedly over the last two years. "You are as pretty as the rest of us. Grandfather always said you look most like Mama, who was the beauty of the village. Your dark brown hair would be nice, if you only cared to oil it before you braid it, to make it shine and bring out the gold strands. And while you are very tall, you're not as tall as that goat girl from the North. Men might like you if you only tried a bit. We could go to the dance in Mayriver or the next picnic at Reed and find someone better than Barthollo. But you refuse. I don't understand you."

Her sisters had never understood her. They had all the good luck in life. Able to avoid breaking their favorite dishes, stains on their new dresses, tears in their layered skirts, and loose threads in their sleeves. They could can fruit and beans into clean jars without dropping them, sew pretty things without knotting the yarn, walk into town without falling once.

They had all the proper accomplishments of farm wives. Plus, an impressive skill in doling out shortcomings with compliments. When they had their friends over for tea, she heard them do so with such ease that no one even noticed.

Corrin took a bite of her fish. She eyed her sisters and their husbands. They weren't trying to make her miserable; they were miserable people. She knew, from what Nanny had said, from the sounds she heard in the night, and her sisters’ faces in the morning, that there was no joy in their marriages.

Their men were decent, humorless farmers, who thought like old men long before gaining their twentieth year. Kate and Beth had raced to their marriage beds because that was what all the village women did. Everyone knew an early marriage proposal was lucky.

Nanny also said yes to her first marriage proposal. She told Corrin the story. Older, wiser, with fat fists like autumn hams, Nanny's first husband declared to his chosen bride that she was lucky to have a good man like himself. In spite of his pronouncement, Nanny's first marriage, like Kate's and Beth's, found no joy.

If Corrin shed her bad luck, it would come from her husband and a happy marriage. He would love her, wildly love her, the way Grandfather loved Nanny. He was a man who stayed with his wife, devoted himself to her and gave her pleasure. No one sang songs about him or told stories about Grandfather and Nanny around the campfire, but they had loved and laughed and worked together for twenty-five years. They'd made each other happy.

Corrin wanted that too. And her man would not smell like pig manure.

Corrin woke in the dark of the next morning, well before the sun came up. She dressed in her raggedy fishing clothes, hurrying to get out of the house before one of her sisters could stop her and demand she change and stay home to face Barthollo.

There were still stars in the sky when she grabbed her gear and pulled her light coracle into the river. The round boat had been her grandfather's. She was the only one in the family who could use it without getting dumped into the water.

Depending on the time of year, there were the noises of bugs, birds, and frogs to call to the morning Child and sing him awake. The Mother and the Father moons, with their full faces, liked to glare down balefully with eyes of silver, annoyed by the revelry. Everyone knew that once a child was awake, there was no putting him back to bed again until he was good and ready.

Early morning was the best time of the day. The Mother and Father had to make room for the Child, with his bright head of gold hair, popping up on the horizon to chase his hounds across the sky. The exchange of colors on the horizon never failed to leave her breathless. And she always felt it a relief to have the Mother and Fatherdour and watchful, the cause of her curse and drain of her luck-tucked away and out of sight.

Seated in her round boat on her knees, Corrin had just set her net when she heard a noise. A splash in the river that could be a happy trout. When she turned her head, she saw a flatbottom boat sluicing quietly toward her. She counted ten heads and ten sets of wide, mannish shoulders.

Not fishermen, then.

This was her part of the river by silent agreement with the village, like it had been her grandfather's. Locals wouldn't trespass, and if they drifted her way by accident, it would be in a single person craft like her own.

These were men of ill intent. Raiders.

Blasted evil luck.

A month ago, a rogue band of men had attacked and taken over a village up north on the river. Some said they were mercenaries and ex-soldiers, without a general to lead them or a war to fight. With no place of their own, they took over the 'humble life' settlement rather than settle into it kindly, the way normal people did. Rumors on the river said they killed all the able men, married the village head's daughter, drank all the ale and wine. With no regard for winter or hard work, they ate all the food in storage. Which was the worst offense of all.

And now, they were looking at the easy pickings of the river.

She had forgotten all about the danger.

Corrin had her boat, her nets, and a small knife. Dropping the net in the water, fast and silent, she tried to sneak away before they saw her. She felt as small as a turtle. She must have the advantage.

Blue lightened the sky on the horizon, but the Child's sunny head hadn't yet peeked above the tree line. Great shadows unevenly blanketed the river from trees and brush. The Mother and Father hid their faces in conversation behind the clouds, an old couple up in the sky arguing about Corrin's fate. What would they choose this time? It was dark and hard to see. The best time for good fishing. Or good raiding. Or good hiding.

She counted her strokes with her heartbeat, moving to the shore. Her grandfather's coracle had never moved as blessedly silent. Doing as Grandfather had taught her, Corrin's paddle entered and exited the water without a splash or drip, slicing neatly. No sloppy choppy for her.

She was almost there. Almost there. And then her paddle hit something, a branch creating a loud, echoing thump.

By the moons, no. Not now. The circumstances were ripe for a good escape, a chance to reach the shore and shout the alarm. But blasted moons. They'd done it again. Were they up there laughing about her curse behind their cloudy hands?

The sound was distinct. The raiders heard it.

She heard a call, "Ho, there!" They spotted her reaching the shore.

The chase was quick and anticlimactic. Never clumsy with the boat before, Corrin tripped and stumbled out of it. Water and mud up to her knees. Her feet caught in her other net and her knife flew off into the bushes from her hand. The sound of it hitting water and sinking ten times as loud and echoing above the shouts of men behind her. Rushing her.

Her wild splashing. Two steps. Three. No time to inhale deep and scream out obscenities and defiance. Arms went around her, covered her mouth. Her chance to call for help, to warn her village lost.

Of course, they caught her. She had no luck. Not then, and never before.

They gagged her mouth, trussed her up like a goose and stored her on their boat like baggage. With the silence of men used to skulking, nine of them left for Rivrtonn and one stayed to guard her and the boat.

The man stood next to her, eyed her now and then. He didn't talk, but his toothy leer was near enough to the one Barthollo the pig farmer gave her that she knew what he was thinking. His blade moved in his hands, flicking between his fingers, and tossing it about like a magician. He watched the shore, watched her, and they waited.

When the others returned, she heard the bleat of a goat, the muffled clucking of bagged chickens, and the soft crying of people. There was no talking. No jesting. They moved quick and efficient. Two bodies were shoved in next to Corrin, along with the tiedup goat, chickens, and some goods that looked like they came out of a storehouse.

Their boat filled, their raid a success, they rowed away. Four oars working the water with quiet skill and barely-there splashes—these men knew what they were doing.

The sun was up when the boat stopped.

Anxiety twisted through Corrin's gut and her heart beat in her ears, pounding in her head.

Other men greeted them with shouts of, "Hooyah!" Now that they were home and safe, the talking ban was over, and they filled the air with loud, brash male voices all clamoring at once.

"And how was the thieving?" A merry voice boomed the question.

"Never been easier. No watch, no wall, no weapons, not a soul awake except for these pretty little bitches. They will be alerted now that these are missing. I think we should go tomorrow for the rest. Probably one of those smart little towns run by a council where they will have to spend a week arguing about what to do about us." Answered another voice.

They were right, Corrin knew. That was exactly what had happened.

Rivrtonn's council had known about the dangers of the raiders and had been arguing about how to protect themselves for weeks already. It was one of the reasons she had forgotten about them. All the debating and complaining had made the danger seem small and far away. They had time to decide, to set watches and patrols. They had time to think of a defense.

Tomorrow, Rivrtonn would pay for their stupidity with their lives. Just like she would pay for her thoughtlessness and bad luck.

There was more hallooing and shouting after that, while Corrin and the two others were unloaded as cargo, lined up for inspection. The men were taller than the fishermen and farmers she knew, dressed in piecemeal black armor and showing the burns of battle— as ugly and stinky a group as she'd ever seen. Stealth and skill in the night, with the dawn here, they turned into noisy, lawless rabble-rousers. The worst kind of men. Corrin recognized them from Nanny's stories.

They poked and pinched her and the other maids with the same interest as they did the goat and the chickens. Corrin knew exactly what was coming and couldn't decide how she was going to face it. Fight? Hope they kill her? Or give in, suffer through it like a wedding night with a pig farmer?

Nanny, in all her talking, had warned her about dealing with bad men. She'd suffered the cruel selfishness of her first husband, and the cold indifference of the second who had been forced on her by in-laws.

"You are so accustomed to bad things coming your way that you are terrible at being afraid. Unlike your sisters, who squeal at every noise, and worry about every convention, you grab a log to bash the bad things. You must be careful, my dear. Some men will hate you for your fearlessness, and some will want you for it. Men will enjoy causing pain and disgust. It's better to fake the fear with them because it will be pleasing and you'll get less pain. Some see fearless as a challenge, and they will want to break you, till you are blank and doe eyed. Both are the kind that will use anything to get your reaction. Pay attention, my dear. With your luck, you'll be tossed between the two."

The way these thugs were talking, it sounded like she'd be dealing with more than one of them. Nasty, thieving animals, how did they have the luck to snatch her up when not a one of them was worth a wooden coin? What had she done to deserve to be born under two blood moons?

"Alright there, now. Can you cook? Don't lie, now. Our last woman burned the meal. Didn't go well for her. Need someone who can cook something decent. You damn simple people and your damn humble ways. What is wrong with solar power? Electricity? Hydron energy? Any one of those is better than wood and fire." He bent over Corrin, getting close as he took out her gag and gave her a whiff of his stinking, unwashed self.

She hadn't thought it possible for a man to smell worse than Barthollo. But this man had clearly rolled in refuse and dead bodies.

She spit and tried to wet her dried mouth. "I can't cook anything but porridge and fish," she told him.

"That's what I do. I cook," said a small voice behind her. It sounded familiar. Corrin couldn't see who it was, and tried to twist, but a booted foot landed on her hip, keeping her still. She looked up at the dirty bearded face of one of the men who'd caught her. His gap-toothed, friendly grin made her shiver.

He told the other girl, "Good then. Good. Do a good job and you will be rewarded."

Corrin didn't believe that for a minute.

Gap-tooth picked Corrin up and threw her over his shoulder. The pointy, angled thing on his armor dug in her middle and robbed her of breath. She'd never look at potatoes sacks the same way again.

"I'll take this one," he said, smacking her hard on the butt. Her whole body jerked, and she let out a scream that made him laugh. She needed to decide what to do, right now.

How was she going to survive this? Was it worth surviving?

"You'll take 'em both and put them in the big house for now. Boss said to save them for later. There's only three, anyway. He will want them first. You know how he is."

"Greedy son-of-a-bitch, isn't he? He took an extra one, plus his new wife last night!"

"You're welcome to fight him for them."

Gap-tooth grumbled at that, a mix of foul curses. He took her into what they called the big house. It was nothing like her home in the village. This building looked just like the council lodge, where the whole village gathered for meetings, weddings, and other celebrations. This one had a loft area and a hearth.

Gap-tooth dumped her on the bricks. It hurt. Before she could recover, he rolled her to her back and had his hands on her breasts. He squeezed handfuls of her flesh, fingers digging in, watching her face and feeling for her nipples. She tried to squirm away, but there was no place to go.

"All soft and fresh. No tears for me? You think you are a fighter then?" he said.

At that, Corrin found her tears, scrunching up her face. He would be the kind that wanted to cause her pain, to punish her for not wanting him the moment she saw him, for not thinking him man enough. "Please. Please. I'll do whatever you say." She let the words tumble out.

At this he smiled, stained teeth showing, gap on display, pleased with her. Pinching her nipple hard, he tugged and rolled it as if to see if it was real flesh. She couldn't help her cry of pain. "Oh, I see you, girl. Frightened bitch. You will do what I want, all right. I'll have you, when he's done with you. I'll have my bit of you."

"Don't hurt me. I'll do whatever you say," she whimpered, closing her eyes tight. A cold rage built inside her, turning her face red.

Nanny said compliance would get it over fast and reassured her that drunkards didn't last long. If she and the other girls were left for later, there was a good chance celebrating and drink would be involved. Corrin would fight. She couldn't do it.

She didn't have it in her to just lay there and be violated.

"Can you untie me? It hurts so bad. I have to… I have to go, to pee. Please. I'll be good. Don't hurt me." She tried to look weak, afraid, and helpless, not like a person planning to bash his head in against the bricks and escape at the first opportunity.

He laughed. "Piss where you are. The boss will untie you and get a surprise." He groped her some more, squishing and squeezing, before leaving her.

Corrin laid back, curled up in a ball, hiding her face as best she could. She knew this village. If she could get a boat and get away tonight, she'd get to Rivrtonn in plenty of time to warn them what was coming. They couldn't fight, but they could flee.

She just needed some blasted luck for once.

~*~

CHAPTER TWO

RAIDERS

The golden head of the Child had disappeared from the sky, but Corrin was still tied hand and foot. Her body hurt. Her mind hurt. The hours ate away at her counterfeit fearful, helpless expression replacing it with fury. She'd worked her hands and her legs raw. It felt like the knots were only tighter. When she inched away from the hearth, a man at the table grinned at her.

Using a foot to her hip, he rolled her back.

They'd untied the other girl, young Dianna, who had come from the North just that spring with instructions to find a husband. She got caught in their net when she went outside for wood for the morning fire. Jenn, the cook, had probably been milking the goat. The three of them were easily overwhelmed and taken from their homes. Corrin could see them both, along with women who already lived in the village, serving the mercenaries.

The outlander men were having a high old time. Their boss entered like a king. He had on a worn old military jacket full of pins and ribbons from a war fought in space that took place in her father's youth. He looked too young for it, even though there were creases at the corners of his bloodshot eyes when he bent down to examine her.

Pinching Corrin's chin between his fingers until her lips puckered, he forced a kiss on her that brought the stinging bile from her empty stomach burning up her throat.

"I'll have this mouth on me tonight. Those tits and that ass." He shook her head, forcing a nod. "You'll do what I want and more, won't you, village girl? Fresh and sweet. I bet you're a virgin, saving yourself for your husband like the other two, aren't you? Never seen so much virgin cunt. If we'd known the joys of the 'humble life', we would have come sooner."

A man at the table started laughing. "I hope there are more in the other towns. At this rate, you will take all the cherries for yourself, Boss!"

The boss picked up a random cup from the nearest table. "To the Peace River Villages and all the virgin cunt you can dream of!" he toasted.

All the men cheered, celebrating coming to the river towns, where all the villages were easy, stupid pickings. No watch. No alarms. None of them had any defenses to speak of and were only able to fight back with farming tools. The raiders planned to just walk into Corrin's hometown and demand a tithe of women and more of the wonderful drink they'd found in farmer Nolan's shed: grain alcohol. They'd make slaves of the conquered instead of killing them, their leader decided magnanimously.

Farmer Nolan had been experimenting with a homemade brew this last year, and while everyone in her village said the stuff he produced tasted terrible, all agreed on its relaxing properties. It didn't just relax these men. They'd gone loose and loony with it. They boasted of their prowess while barely being able to lift their tankards to their lips. Women who got too close to them were squeezed, petted, and pulled into laps, but the alcohol had made everyone too drunk to hold on to them, too happy to care when the poor girls squirmed away.

It would be a perfect time for escape.

She had tried to get Dianna's attention, to tell the girl of the plan. Corrin could get away, get a boat, bring help. But Dianna was terrified. Only eighteen years old, sent to work at her cousin's home, she didn't have a brave bone in her body. With a pink, tear-stained face, she'd been told to serve food and drink and that's what she did. Dodging hands and faces as she went down the three aisles of tables. Jenn was a bit more composed, but she was also busy. She looked at Corrin motioning to her and then got called away for something. The other women in the hall wore expressions of bruised defeat after being at the mercy of these raiders for a month. Corrin felt an angertinged guilt. Her village had known. No one bothered to send a boat to investigate, to help, to do anything. Their humble life of peace forbade aggression, and the council couldn't decide if help looked like aggression or not. So they argued. Did nothing.

With the way things were progressing, Corrin was going to be tied up all night, forgotten on the hearth until morning.

And then a horn sounded. A long, blaring alarm, followed by a thinner high-pitched mechanical sounding blast only shorter.

Cut off. Silenced.

As loud and happy as they were, every man heard the racket.

The revelry died away to hushed attention. Looking at each other, eyes wide. They were men of war. That was their sentry's sound. Tables rocked and benches moved as men came to attention.

It was not possible that the village—her village—had sent help. There were three retired fighters among them, too old to work, much less fight. The other towns, up and down the river were the same. People dedicated to the simple ways of land cultivation, hiding from society and its problems. Who could it be?

The loud, outraged shouting and scuffle of feet could not cover the sound of howling from outside.

A sound that cut through the night, promising horror.

Then Corrin knew. These mercenary raiders. These foolish mercenary raiders who had come from the Northern Cities of steel and concrete. Her village had whispered they'd stolen a transport boat to ride down the river from the Blue mountain.

Because that was the only way here. People assumed because it was the only thing that made sense. No one, man or beast, no one came to the river villages by land. No one dared break the Orki Peace Law.

Except a foolish, foreign troop of ex-soldiers who should have known better.

The howling was close. Loud. The noise seemed outside the door and all around them. It filled up the room like a harbinger of destruction. The Orki Originals would kill every man they came across. There would be no mercy. Their law was absolute.

Stay out of their lands.

The mercenaries may have passed through them a month ago, but everyone knew Orki actively patrolled their territory. It would only take one tracker to find the scent of a man, a place where someone may have stopped to piss, or where they slept the night. The Orki would follow that scent to the ends of the earth until the owners shed blood and life for breaking their law.

The Orki were the reason the villages felt safe in their vulnerability. Native to Dorsus, said to be born of earth and stone, as planet Originals, the Orki held their lands sacrosanct. The boundaries immutable. Nothing crossed them by land or air.

The Peace River Villages, all of them, bordered Orki lands by special dispensation. Humans had the right of way on the river and closest lands only. Massive, carved boulders marked where not to pass. There were signs everywhere. No army, no power, no enemy passed through the wild Orki lands. Only fools.

The boss was talking to the man next to him. Deciding. Try to run? Open the doors and fight? Stay here and form a defense?

There was no right answer. They had no chance.

"Dianna, please. Please untie me. Dianna. Please," Corrin whispershouted to the girl. A man looked over at her, frowned, and looked back at his boss. Everyone was standing. Time moved slowly. There were more howls and shouts outside.

Death was coming and Corrin was still tied up like a turkey.

Most of the men were in the hall. The tables had been filled. They had their short swords. A handful had their big fighting blades. Some of them had modern energy-based weapons that were outlawed here. Didn't matter. Those things were useless against the Orki. All of them were redeyed from farmer Nolan's 90 proof distilled drink, unbalanced, and afraid because of it. Early in the day, sober, they'd been orderly and well trained. She knew even sober men didn't stand a chance against the thick skins and indomitable power of a single Original.

The boss grabbed a woman and thrust her towards the closed door. "Open it, beg for mercy. Tell them we want to talk."

She must be a woman from this village. Mature, but comely, with yellow-blonde hair, much of it loose from her braids. She'd been pawed often that night. There was a rip in her bodice, exposing her. Shaken like the rest of them, she didn't care. Preserving her modesty was the least of her problems. "Don't, I can't.

They'll kill me. You broke the peace. They'll kill me."

"Stupid bitch." He growled at her through his teeth like a bear. "Orkis only kill women with their dicks. You'll be fine. Open it." He poked her with his small sword until she cried out, cut, blood blooming on her clothing. "Open. It."

She did. Shoving the heavy door open, weeping with her fear.

Corrin got to her knees, still stuck on the floor surrounded by thick tables, benches, and standing men. She couldn't see past the open door, but it was something that made the men in the room shift uneasily. The sour odor of their fear oozed from their pores, stinking up the room.

"Please. Please." The woman was crying. "They want to talk. They want to avolk! Avolk!" She shouted the last words in Orkish.

If the blonde knew Orkish, she must be related to someone on the council. Every village had a person who knew the language. Corrin, herself, knew about ten words.

Like a giant moving into the room, the dark gray, almost black creature ducked through the doorway, every footstep a loud, heavy noise. There was an animal growling behind him.

Corrin glimpsed the big nose and fanged muzzle of his war beast.

Orki came to the village sometimes, trading deer meat for fish, furs for steel. She'd heard they would offer gemstones for pretty daughters.

People treated them with caution and respect. This was their territory where humans sought a haven from the trials and claustrophobia of the steel cities. Humans were taught since childhood that as long as they kept to the river and didn't cross the boundaries, there would be harmony. Yet it was impossible not to fear them. Huge. Different. Not. Human.

The male who entered the council hall was big, like they all were. Seven feet tall or more, shirtless, wearing a layered fur and leather apron-sized loin cloth that had small bags and lines of bone beads and teeth hanging off it, leather boots up to his knees.

Primitive and barbaric, he carried a massive ax. The thing was bigger than the seat of a chair. With his round hairless head and flat nose and blunt hewn chin, people underestimated his race as primitive. This one looked like he went into every battle headfirst. His face and chest bore the split seam slashes of scars, like leather pieces fit together without stitching.

Corrin's grandfather had told her the Orki were not fools. Their brutish faces may look monstrous and simple minded, but in reality, the Originals were quick-witted, with the ability to learn and remember at a rate that far surpassed the human mind. They could be astute bargainers when it came to trade and acted swiftly if cheated.

Three off-world powers had tried to enslave them and use them for war fodder, and three off-world powers had crumbled beneath Orki rebellions.

"Talk what?" he said in common. "Talk how you die? By ax or by warg. Is decided." His pointed ears twitched in opposite directions as he looked around the room, counting heads.

"We want to trade, will surrender and trade," said the boss, his voice steady though his face was pale.

"No trade. Broke law. Die." He lifted his ax at the man. "Die here. Die there." He pointed outside. "You die. Choose now."

"No!" the boss barked. "I have internat—gold, credits. Good here and off planet. More than anyone could need. Treasure! There are women for your beds and slaves for your fields. Trade!" The boss insisted.

The giant male shrugged. "You die here." Despite his size, the Orki was fast. The boss had his sword up, but he was too drunk and the ax was already moving. He tried to duck. Instead of his head being cleaved off at the neck by the razor-sharp weapon, he lost everything above his eyes.

Corrin fell back, crying out, shocked at that sight. The violence caused a wave of sound to erupt, a roar in her ears. Down on the floor, trying to catch her breath, her body turned to jelly. Men yelling. Pain. Fear. Blades clashing to the floor. It was a slaughterhouse, the smell of blood and guts filling the air with a grotesque perfume.

That ax—through a man's head like a knife through butter.

Impossible.

She couldn't watch. Couldn't breathe. Opened her mouth, panting. Her head swimming and belly ill. What could she do? Her luck had left her tied up. In shock and fear, Corrin pissed herself, her bladder just letting go after holding on all day long.

An ax had cut the top of the boss's head off! She'd never get the image out of her head. What would they do when they came to her? Slice her in half?

If the mercenaries had gone to her village, they would have done the same to the farmers and fishermen. Used their war tools to just chop, chop them down like wheat in farmer Nolan's field.

Drunk and outclassed, the mercenaries fell to the better soldiers. The Originals ignored all pleas for mercy and calls of surrender.

Corrin heard thumping, slashing, screams of agony, of life leaving the body. But it went fast. The silence was sudden. Another shock. She lay there for minutes, breathing through her mouth, unable to get enough air, with tears on her face. For hours, for seconds. She couldn't tell.

The silence was as horrible as the chaos.

The smell. She could smell the fresh death. The Orki used the village meeting house as a slaughtering barn.

Eyes pinched shut, shivering, and panting, Corrin felt something cold and damp touched the back of her neck, between her shoulder blades. She screamed. Some raiders' blood and gore dripped on her, but she couldn't move or escape. She'd drown in the corpses.

Warm breathy wetness slathered over her, a long lick.

Trapped, bucking in her bindings, Corrin tried to escape it.

What was it? What was it?

A weight pinned her down and more of that strange sensation followed. It was like being rubbed by a thick, rough cloth, from the small of her back to her neck. Shaking, frozen, not sure what it could be, her mind not processing, Corrin was going to turn over and look, but stopped when she felt teeth move around her body.

It was an Orki beast, going to eat her, bite her in half. She shouted obscenities as teeth moved around her. She jerked, wiggled, then stilled, because there were teeth at her waist and her back and when she moved they tightened—Was it eating her?

The huge, wolfish creature picked her up in its mouth. Her chest to her pelvis was inside its maw. It didn't bite down, but she felt teeth, teeth everywhere. "Don't eat me, don't eat me, don't eat me!" She cried over and over, her brain locked in the horror of being bitten in half by a war beast.

She couldn't kick, couldn't beat it with her arms, couldn't fight. Eyes shut tight, crying real tears, Corrin was carried out of the hall and outside by an alien animal.

And dropped at the feet of the Orki with the ax. He said something in his language, barking intermixed with guttural, harsh noises.

The beast growled at him in answer. It put a paw on Corrin, on her saliva soaked back, and rolled her over like a toy it was playing with. "Don't. Don't. Stop it," Corrin said uselessly.

The sky over head was clear, full of stars, two moons, she noted, full. Huge and silver. She hated them, the Father and the Mother. They were up there laughing at her, blessing her with their constant notice and their bad luck.

Orki were everywhere. Holding torches in one hand and spears or axes ready in the other. They were moving things. It looked like dead bodies were going into the council house, and live bodies, women, were coming out. She heard the crying of weeping children.

The beast that had carried her out licked her again. Its tongue was massive, wide as a blanket. It swiped over her face and down her chest, coating her in its saliva.

The Orki talked to it. His voice sounded curious. Conversational. But what did she know of Orki language? He wasn't asking the price of fish or directions to the farmer who sold apples and grapes.

Corrin turned her head this way and that, trying to get away from that fat tongue. Why? Why was this happening to her?

The Orki said something else, and the beast stopped. It sat down on its haunches and laid its massive head across her middle. Holding her still.

Making a coughing noise that sounded suspiciously like a laugh, the dark male said, "Huumon. Searnon claims you as her kit." He looked her over from head to toe. "Why are you tied?"

His voice, when he spoke the common language, was deep and round. He was so big. They were all giants, and she was lying on the ground, but it seemed like miles between his head and his thick feet. Muscles on muscles, the color of wet river stone, the darkest skinned Orki she had ever seen.

Kneeling to look in her eyes, he reached out with one of his big hands, and pushed the loose hair from her face.

The touch, gentle.

"Please," she begged. What else was there to do? He was giving her this chance to talk by asking her questions. "What are you going to do with me? With the women and children? Those men aren't from here. They are raiders, mercenaries, who came from the north somewhere. They took over this village and were raiding, going to take over mine. I'm from Rivrtonn. We didn't break the treaty. No mlolva kompr."

"I know," he said. His eyes were frightening in the firelight, a pale blue surrounding black pupils. They flicked down to her mouth, over her chest, to where the beast lay on her.

"Price must be paid."

"It was paid," she cried out with all her heart, knowing Orkis were merciless. They knew yes and no. There was no mercy. "You killed them all. Please… We didn't do anything. You know we did nothing."

His forefinger tapped her lips. He smelled wild. "Shhh. Not for you to bargain. Your name?"

She blinked at him. "I'll give you my name. Spare the children."

Orki mouths were not made for smiling. His tilted, a lopsided slant. She saw it, the grin at her persistence, in his eyes. "No bargain. Name or I give children to Searnon."

He gestured at the beast. He said it like feeding children to his war beast was the most natural thing in the world.

A great, wolfish gold eye rolled toward her, looking at Corrin at the mention of its name. It rumbled, the canine muzzle lifting to show teeth. The beast understood everything.

"My name is Corrin Erinnsdotter," she said in defeat.

"Corrin Erinnsdotter. Corrin. Yes?" He said it correctly, with a bit of a hum through his throat. Her grandfather had talked to her that way when he was alive, and she was small. An affectionate sound when he was exasperated with her.

"Yes."

"Good."

His hand on her face again. He traced her hairline down to her ear. Stopped. "Corrin smell bad. Need bath."

With that observation, he left her. She saw three of the other war beasts, massive aberrations, bigger than mountain bears, wolf-like, but not wolves. Beyond their size, they had longer muzzles, long pointed ears that were almost Orkish, and instead of fur, they had bristles around their heads and neck that became fur further down. All of them wore saddles, like horses. They circled the group of helpless people as if waiting for a chance to chase one and eat it.

Watching, waiting for the worst. The Orkis that had been talking shouted in the direction of the animals, who seemingly listened. The beasts answered, and then went into the group of people, snatching at clothing, to separate one from the others. Terrified screaming split the night. Corrin watched, helpless, pinned to the ground. As, one by one, each of the beasts dragged away a female from the group. One was just a little girl.

"Oh, no. What's happening? What are they doing?" The animal holding her down, Searnon, rumbled at her as if in answer.

Instead of eating the girls, the beasts separated them from the other survivors, pinned them down with a paw, and started lazily licking them. There was screaming and yelling until the girls got a face full of war beast salvia, silencing them.

It meant something. Those giant creatures picking out the females. They weren't hurting them. They were… grooming them?

Moments ago, the big Orki had said, 'Searnon claims you as her kit.' That's what it looked like. A mother cleaning her pup. Or, a kit. The behavior was baffling. She watched them, worried, but no harm came to them.

The Orkis were talking. A fast-paced conversation Corrin couldn't decipher started up right behind her head where she couldn't see. She tried to wiggle, but the big beast resting its head on her huffed and glared at her.

"You big brute. Can you get off me? What's going to happen?" She bucked her body in frustration. Her arms hurt, pinned awkwardly under her.

"Be nice to Searnon." The Orki who had spoken to her before said from somewhere out of eyesight. "She does you honor."

"What is happening?" she asked, voice rising with frustrated demand.

The male came back to give her a baleful glare. She'd be an idiot to anger him.

Schooling her features, forcing meekness into her voice,Corrin asked again. "What is happening?"

His eyes gave him away again. She was certain he smiled at her. "Drunk men are easy dead. We finished here."

He bent down, big palm smoothing over her head. "Corrin," he said.

"Yes?"

"You smell bad."

"What? People are dead… the women and children, what are you going to do with them? All you care about is how I smell?" she asked in outrage.

"Very bad."

Did he mean to make her angry? Frustrated, she jerked and twisted and screamed at him. "Will you untie me? Why am I tied? Why me? I stink because you came in and sliced a man's head in half. Right in half! And they left me on the stinking floor, all day and all night, and I had to pee. And when I saw—his head, in half, I about threw up. But instead I just made a mess of myself, it just happened."

She inhaled a deep breath and kept shouting, "And now you say I stink? I've been up since before dawn waiting to be raped and used and murdered and now all you care about is how bad I smell?"

Searnon lifted her head with all the moving about, and the male slid his arms under Corrin's wiggling, rocking body, picking her up off the ground and standing in a single move. She hissed and spit and snapped, trying to catch him with her teeth as she raged at the stupid, mean, horrible, unfeeling Orki monster.

She couldn't stop. Insanity had taken hold of her. Better to make him angry enough to be done with it, get this subjugation over now. She didn't have it in her to lie still and be raped by these great ugly thugs.

He carried her away from the main house, Corrin yelling obscenities at him all the way. They walked through the town, passed dark cottages, all the way to the river's edge. He stopped there and took off his boots and started unwrapping things at his waist.

That silenced her.

"What are you doing?" she croaked. Even with the two full moons, he was hard to see with his dark skin.

He didn't say anything. Just kept unwrapping himself. The loin cloth slipped. He was close enough she could see that low, v-buckle of muscles that pointed to his groin.

Corrin's eyes squeezed shut with a strangled chirp, "Eep! You brought me here to rape me?"

He said nothing. She listened hard for any sounds. The giant creature was bizarrely quiet, but her eyes popped open when she felt him above her.

"Don't!" she screamed when she saw the glint of his knife in the moonlight.

He gripped her bodice in his hand and set the sharp blade there. The material split with the softest hiss. His expression hard, he pulled her top away and the light binding beneath, ripping it from her leather girdle. His mouth set in a line. He terrified her more than the men who'd accosted her earlier. There was no threat, no give, no chance. This was not a male who would later be overcome by drink or his own cock. Piece by piece, he cut her clothes from her. After the top, he flipped her, cut through her girdle, her skirts, and her drawers. Only her boots and stockings, held above her knees with old, frayed ribbons, did not get destroyed. He exposed her nakedness to the air, skin shining like a silver-white torch in the moonlight, revealing the heavy mounds of her breasts, the pink coldpointed tips, the flat indent of her belly, the vulnerable femininity between her thighs.

He took everything off her, quick and painless. Even though there was no blood, it hurt, to be revealed thus, to be exposed to the night by this creature. Another shock on top of another shock. She fought it because that was her nature. Tired, hurting, it didn't matter, she couldn't stop. She would not hold still for this. She would not accept a violation. But the battle was weak on her part, no more than words and mild twisting.

Clothes off, he untied her legs to take off her boots. She kicked him with the sudden freedom, but with his strength holding her steady, her upper body was the only thing to move, scraping across the ground. When the boots were gone, he tied her again with the rope. Her resistance didn't faze him.

Naked. Bound. Helpless.

Corrin cried out, a garbled scream of fear and frustration. If he was going to rape her, she should at least have her arms and legs free. But then she had no luck. None at all. And if ever she needed it, it was now.

Scooping her up in his arms, her naked chest met his. He was warm. Hot to the touch, a fire burning in the bellows of his massive chest. Each sensation took shape one by one in her mind. He was hard under the sleek softness of his skin, muscles curving against her with each breath he took. And he smelled good. Trying to understand these observations distracted her enough that she missed the part where the male walked forward into the river.

She was looking at his face, attempting to connect the appallingly nice feeling of his heat and smell, when he said,

"You stink. Wash." And dropped her.

She fell to his feet screaming, into the water, getting a mouth full of it, her bottom hitting the rocks. She was going to drown. He was going to drown her. The thought was there and then gone. She sat up, gulping air.

He'd dropped her in the shallows, where the water would reach barely to her calves if she was standing.

"Son-of-a-bitch. You bastard, you rotting corpse eating, mangy stupid bastard. That was not funny."

These Orkis delighted in shocks and surprises.

He left her a moment, went to the shore to get something, and returned with a splash.

Deep voiced and disapproving he asked, "Wash Corrin's mouth too?"

She snapped her mouth shut on her curses, growling in anger.

Sitting in the shallows with her, the monster pulled her into his lap. He had something from his gear palmed in his hand that he began to slick over her. Neck. Shoulders. Corrin didn't like where this was going. The feel of his plate sized palms washing her like a baby was too incongruous to begin to assess.

"Untie me, I can do it myself. Why am I still tied? None of the others are tied. My arms are going to fall off." She let herself make outraged, unhappy noises as he turned her like a turkey on a stick to wash the back of her neck, her upper back.

"Corrin is runner," he said.

"I'm too tired to run. And you have those war beasts that can find anything and are faster than any dog or horse I've ever seen. Where would I run?"

He grunted.

"Please untie me," she said again, meaning every bit of the supplicating sound she heard in her own voice. He held her head out of the water with his knee, but his washing hands had now gone down to her bottom. His touches had slowed. His fingers digging in to the flesh he found there. Palming her shape. She wiggled, shifting her hips away from his touch.

"Stop now," he demanded.

"Don't do this. Whatever you're doing, don't." Cold fear went through her. Colder than the water, colder than the air, an icy prick of sudden clarity. She wasn't repulsed by this monster. What he was doing felt good. One hand gripped her neck, keeping her face safe from accidentally inhaling a lung full of river water, the other working over her bottom, his fingers starting to curve between her legs.

"No." She kept trying to wiggle as he worked. Jerking as hard as she could with renewed energy. "Don't. Don't do that. Get your creeping hands off me!"

He pulled her up out of the water and a sudden stinging pain hit her on the left butt cheek. He'd spanked her.

"Stop now," he repeated. She hadn't been spanked since she was six and got into the store of honey and made a mess of the stuff.

He'd spanked her. Corrin couldn't stop her pointless resistance. He touched her where no one touched her, took her clothes, exposed her. He handled her and tossed her about and refrained from answering simple questions. Of course, she kept moving, shouting, cursing him.

He shifted his hold to get better access. And then, in rapid succession, he began hitting her bottom over and over, every part that wasn't under water.

Corrin howled.

Her voice echoed over the river water back to her ears, punctuated by the sound of the spanking. She couldn't accept the outrage, the ridiculous injustice and unfairness of this punishment, of the whole day. Of her whole life.

The stinging became a heated pain. No matter how she cursed him, shouted at him, and raged, he didn't stop, his arm didn't tire, his broad hand hitting her bottom in a relentless barrage. To her horror, tears returned, and her screams turned to broken, breathless sobs. She could do nothing. He would do what he wanted. She couldn't stop him.

Whatever was going to happen would happen.

"Corrin, finished?" he asked. With a shift of his knees, he lifted her head and her hot bottom was covered by cold river water, washing away the heat. "No more fight. Let wash." His voice a deep, threatening rumble in her ear and against her back.

That rumble of his continued. A deep, rough, echoing vibration. She'd never heard anything like it. Not waiting for an answer, he began again. Standing her up between his legs, he faced her away from him and began to wash her. A thick finger brushed between her ankles and the bindings there fell away. Claws. He had claws that sliced through the ropes as easy as her knife down the belly of a fish. Sitting, he had no problem reaching up to her shoulders. Her wet braid was also released, her hair an unraveling wet curtain down her back. She felt his fingers comb through it, move it out of the way. His hands brushed thorough, unhurried touches over her body, gently moving her bound arms, down her sides, again at her bottom.

He tugged one leg. "Open."

She whimpered.

He tugged again, and she opened. He washed her there too, working against her most delicate parts from the base of her spine, between the cheeks of her bottom, over her back entrance, all the way to the front. He turned her, washed her feminine curls until she bubbled with soap, petting his fingers through them. It happened quickly, without pain, but the process was intimate and proprietary.

Disturbing.

He had no right.

The cold air affected her now as much as the heat of her emotions, and the day's exhaustions were catching up with her. She started to shiver, teeth clacking. At the same time her stomach rolled with hunger and she realized how thirsty she was.

Her eyes closed, she was swaying as he washed her chest, both of his warm, hot hands covering her bruised breasts and painfully tightened nipples at the same time. She imagined pushing him away, turning into the river and swimming toward home, her beautiful, abrasive sisters, the sanctuary of her own room and bed.

She cried out, with a sudden shock of pain in her shoulders. He'd cut her loose with a claw to the binding at her wrists. That noisy rumble increased in her ear, while his hands worked over the areas of pain, fingers pressing in on the sore muscles. It felt good and hurt at the same time. Heat enclosed her, world tilting, that rumble a vibration against her whole being when he picked her up. Holding her upright against him, rubbing her soapy body against his own, he walked into deeper waters. He was so hot. The fact that they were both naked, that she thought she could feel his manhood, didn't matter. Corrin's arms went around him without her permission, and she clung to him, inhaling the smell of the river and the Orki's wild scent at his neck.

They went deep. He tipped her head back, ran a quick hand over her face, making sure she was washed everywhere.

"I'm thirsty," she told him as water dripped in her mouth.

"Drink. Slow," he said.

She tried to go slow. But the water was damn cold, her teeth were chattering, and she wanted out.

He shook her when she gulped.

"Slow, little huumon."

She drank again, taking as much as she could.

After, he waded out, back to the shore. He asked if she needed to relieve herself, Corrin decided she did, until he pointed up the bank and told her just to go.

Naked, frozen, soul tired in a way she had never been in her life, Corrin squatted where he told her. He made her wash again, splashing water between her legs. "Poor, Corrin," he said. That growling sound moved through his chest again. He seemed to be able to make it and talk at the same time. It was strange.

But not unpleasant.

After she was washed again, the Orki wrapped her in a wool blanket and a heavy fur that appeared on the shore. Someone had brought it. Someone had seen her surrender and humiliation. Tomorrow she would hate that, hate herself for that, but right now, she couldn't keep her eyes open. She was done.

Sitting on the river shore, almost asleep, he pulled her stockings to her knees and put on her boots. He moved her where he wanted her, and she just let him. Her eyes closed and then blinked open with each different sensation.

The big war beast settled beside her. It licked the side of her head and made a noise. The Orki said something to it. His sturdy arms lifted her again. More movement. Heat at her back and that sound. That growly, purring sound. The blanket and fur were rearranged, tucked around her. Strange rocking back and forth. Sleep.

~*~

CHAPTER THREE

LUCK SO BAD SHE'S KIDNAPPED TWICE

Corrin rested fitfully. She roused long enough to realize she sat on the back of a war beast, in the arms of the Orki warrior who had washed and spanked her in the river. There were stars overhead, land moving by her eyes, lit by the Mother and Father moons. When she blinked open her eyes again, the terrain had changed. Less leafy river cypress, oak, and silverheart, to the taller, thicker green spiny trees of Orki territory. Her fear of the place so deeply ingrained, she cried out in alarm, struggling.

A big hand settled around her neck, enclosing it, and Corrin remembered. She'd been taken by an Orki. The misplaced relief she felt at that was too confusing to contemplate. She closed her eyes and sought sleep again, not wanting to think about what was happening.

They traveled through the night. Her eyes were open above the fur that sheltered her as peach tinged the sky on the foreign landscape. She could see shapes moving all around her, other Orki on their beasts. She counted twelve of them. How many raiders had there been? Tables full, at least ninety men in the council house, plus more stationed outside as guard. Twelve Originals had killed them all. Since she hadn't witnessed it, Corrin wasn't sure that all of them had even participated in the carnage.

The male behind her spoke to another, lighter-skinned Orki, whose ears were pierced with gold hoops. The conversation was short. She understood one word, shelter, out of many.

He tipped her head back with his hand on her throat. The morning light caused the pale blue of his eyes to glow. "Corrin mind self. See Urku-ri.

Not brother."

She frowned.

Thirsty and still hungry, Corrin stayed silent as they picked up speed again. The war beasts traveled with ease through trees and over the rocky, mossy ground. Tireless. Going up hills as easily as they went down. The body behind her tensed and moved with the flow of the beast beneath them, sometimes leaning forward, sometimes back. She felt like a child held in her father's arms, so big was the monster behind her. Fit between his tree-trunk thighs, muscled body surrounding hers, one arm kept her steady, so that she couldn't help but follow the flow of the beast as he did.

She closed her eyes when it looked like they were going uphill, the feeling disorienting. Opening them again when they leveled out, and the morning gave way to shadows and deep darkness as the group entered a cave.

Lighting torches with a whoosh, two riders entered in front of them, revealing a place where the group must rest often. There, animals split around the blackened circle of a fire pit, going toward the back of the cave. In the torchlight, Corrin saw stacks of furs and watertight woven baskets that looked like the work of farm wives.

The Orki at her back dismounted, taking her with him. He settled her on one beefy shoulder. She rushed to grab the fur as it fell away from her nakedness, her butt exposed to the air.

"Please. Don't." She heard another woman cry and looked up to see another girl in the same position.

"Has he hurt you? Are you okay?" Corrin called out. Stupid questions when the woman was begging for mercy, but she couldn't just shout across the cave and ask the woman if her captor had raped her.

A big hand came down on her bottom in a single, painful swat. "No, Corrin. Not for you." She was told. "Worry for self." He warned her.

Each Orki took care of their beast and their bed and, if they had one, their woman. Corrin heard other sounds in the cave that sounded like the three girls from the village.

Lighter colored, shorter males came to the dark one to speak with him. He answered, standing in front of Corrin, trapping her behind him.

The power structure was strange. She couldn't tell if the dark-skinned, scarred male she was with was in charge or not. He seemed to be, as he was the only one who got asked questions. But he also took care of his own beast, went and got food and drink, brought furs for her to sit on, in a selfefficient way that she had never seen from men in charge. She thought the whole point of being in charge was having other people serve you.

He pressed dried meat, a square, sticky biscuit wrapped in a crinkly, paper-like substance, and a water bladder into her hands before going to get more furs. Unsaddled, the war beast jumped up and shook itself hard before dashing out of the cave. Corrin looked at the food and looked at the way the animal had gone, longing for escape.

She was in Orki lands, surrounded by Orki.

Her grandmother said that one day, with her bad luck, she would have to choose. "It's not what any Nanny wants for her beloved."

Her face wrinkled, physical loveliness faded, Nanny glowed with an inner light that Corrin missed every day since her death. "Do not be a fool when trials come, dear girl. If you bash every bad thing that comes your way with that stick of yours, you will have no energy for the real battles, and you might get so busy fighting for your happiness, that you lose every hope of it."

She could run. She would be caught.

She could eat and sleep. She hadn't been raped yet.

When the dark Orki returned, she was eating the sticky square thing, chewing carefully around the seeds and thick chunks of dried fruit. Sweetened with honey, it wasn't bad tasting, yet its weighty consistency made it hard for her to chew. He patted her on the head, pleased to find her where he left her.

"Was that a test?"

"Test, Corrin?"

"Were you seeing if I would run?"

His eyes glinted. She knew he was grinning. "Corrin is a runner," he said.

She snorted. Looking at the cave entrance. With their saddles off, one by one, the war beasts had left the space. But they weren't gone long. Searnon, the first to return, brought a fat rabbit with her, dropping the wet and drooled on dead catch right in front of Corrin.

"Ha! What's this?" the Orki said, making a short barking noise that might or might not be a laugh. He picked up the rabbit and handed it back to the beast, who snapped it up in its huge jaws in a single bite.

Corrin ate everything he gave her and drank half the liquid. After, he asked her if she needed to relieve herself again and she shook her head, hiding her embarrassment, remembering being exposed on the river bank. He drank the rest of the water and handed her a red-dyed sheep's bladder.

"What's this? I'm not thirsty, thank you."

"Corrin, drink little." Crouching in front of her, he took off the top and pressed the spout to her mouth. "Will help."

"Will help what? I'm full. Thank you. I don't want anything else." She leaned back against the cave wall, away from him. His face was right there.

Hairless, without any eyebrows or eyelashes. He blinked, and she saw for the first time that he had two eyelids. Then he blinked again, eyes glaring, and she wondered if he actually had three. His nose pointed down to his mouth like an arrow, an animal-like triangle lacking human nostrils, he had slits. His top lip was thin, the barest line, bottom lip fuller. Inside, were sharp predator teeth. One pointed ear moved forward, toward her, and Corrin felt an impulse to touch it.

Watching her, watching him, his free hand came up to touch her face. When she tried to evade the touch, that mouth of his frowned in displeasure. "Corrin, drink, now."

He had fed her, hadn't truly hurt her, but she didn't want to do it. Nobody made her do things she didn't want to.

Gritting her teeth, knowing this was another pointless battle, Corrin took it and drank.

And choked. It was not what she expected. Sour, slightly lumpy, milky, and fermented. She got a mouthful, forcing it down with tears in her eyes, gagging in disgust. "What is that?

Ugh."

"One more."

"No. That's awful. I can't."

He moved viper fast. One of his big hands grabbed her knee and pulled her flat to her back. Then he rolled her into his lap, pulled the blanket away, baring her bottom to everyone in the cave. A startled yelp escaped her, then a cry of alarm. He was going to spank her again?

His hand came down hard on her butt and then low on her thighs. She was already sore, but he was merciless.

Slap. Slap. Slap. Sharp, measured and loud. Tears beaded in her eyes-she was crying again, feeling lost and defeated.

"Next time you count. Get thirty. Corrin, obey."

He pulled her up with a hand on her neck, a rag doll, nothing compared to all his strength and power. With fisted hands she pushed away from him, touching the soft hide-like skin over the rock pads of muscle. He shook her.

"Understand? Corrin, obey."

"Yes. I understand," she said.

He sat her down, pressed the bladder to her lips. She tried to take a small sip, but he squeezed in another big gulp of the noxious stuff. From texture to taste, it was disgusting. Nothing could wipe away the taste and texture of it. The stuff sat on her tongue and grew hair.

His finger touched her lips, brushed across them, back and forth. The intensity of his gaze burned. No one ever looked at her like that, fascinated, starved all at once.

The barely-there touch created a sweep of pleasant, nervous tingles moving down her chin, under her jaw. It would be so easy for him to break her. Everything about the Orki spoke of strength, power, and skill. The small group of them had decimated the outlander mercenaries in minutes. This dark one alone took out most of them.

Corrin's eyes met his when, too late she realized that the blanket had fallen away. In the flickering torches of the cave, she sat there, exposed, her breasts plump between her arms, peaked nipples pointing right at the inhuman creature in front of her. His finger stopped at the base of her throat, over her pulse. Could he feel her heartbeat there? She couldn't imagine what he thought, what his senses were telling him as he watched her.

A puff of breath escaped her mouth. She said nothing, but as if she'd given permission, that hand was moving again, tracing down further, following the curve of her breast.

Corrin made a noise in her throat, a whimper of protest, horror, fear. It definitely was not a sound of interest or pleasure. She was sure of it. Sure, she didn't want his vile hands on her. Sure, his gentleness was a mind trickery after experiencing his brutality.

This messed up, insane situation troubled her thoughts and upset her body. Made her crazy. She didn't know what she was thinking. Before that finger reached her nipple, before his touch could deepen, or cover the bruises the mercenary had left, she caught up the blanket and lay down on her side, closing her eyes in a sudden desperate need to sleep.

Saying some words in his own language, she felt him move away.

She bunched blankets and furs around her. The place in the cave where they sat had a slight shallow indent, much bigger than herself, where other bodies had rested. Provisioned as it was, the spot must be a regular stopping place. She turned away from Orki voices behind her, facing the wall, shutting them all out.

She had no idea what to do next. How was she going to save herself, help the other girls? What had happened back at her village?

With every raider dead, the threat to them was gone, but her sisters would have no idea what had happened to her. Would anyone know that she and the others had been taken by the Orki?

That the peace had been broken?

She puzzled through the questions, unable to quiet her mind. Her body still hurt, though the discomfort was dull now. Two mouthfuls of that nasty drink warming her gut like summer berry wine. Unanswered questions rolled in her head as the tranquil, fuzzy, relaxed feeling traveled like syrup through her limbs, dragging her into sleep.

~*~

The Quiet Car