Chained (Brides of the Kindred)

Brides of the Kindred

Book 9: Chained

Evangeline Anderson

KINDLE EDITION

* * * * *

PUBLISHED BY:

Evangeline
Anderson on Kindle

Brides of the
Kindred

Book 9: Chained

Copyright ©
2013 by Evangeline Anderson

Kindle
Edition License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your
personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other
people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please
purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading
this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only,
then you should return to Amazon.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for
respecting the author's work.

Author’s Note #1—
First
of all, please no piracy. It's not a victimless crime—I have a family to
support so please, buy your own copy and encourage friends to do the same so I
can keep writing these books for everyone's pleasure.

Author's note #2—
Most of
you know I'm writing another series as well as the Kindred now—a set of
paranormal books called Born to Darkness. If you haven't checked them out yet,
they are on Amazon, Smashwords, and All Romance. The first book is
Crimson Debt
and the second one is
Scarlet Heat.
I'm still working on
Ruby Shadows.
I got about 30,000 words
in and my muse abruptly demanded to write
Chained
instead. So here it is and I hope to get
Ruby
Shadows
out to you at a later date. Sorry!

Author’s Note #3—
This is
the ninth book in the Brides of the Kindred series and there are at least three
more to come—well, I have ideas for three more, anyway. Anyway, I recommend
that you read Claimed, Hunted, Sought, Found, Revealed, Pursued, Exiled, and
Shadowed before beginning Chained or you are going to be completely lost.

Hugs and Happy Reading to you all!

Evangeline Anderson

 
Prologue

In the Dungeons of Yonnie Six

Hell. I’m in Hell—one of the Seven Hells,
but which one?

He tried to think, concentrating on
holding the thought in his head. But the thirst was too great—it drove out
everything else. His throat was parched, his mouth dry as a desert and his
tongue was swollen in his mouth, desperate for even a drop of the life-giving
water which was so tantalizingly close.

The soft rippling sound filled his ears,
filled his entire consciousness. The little brook that ran right in front of
him was both a torment and a desire so strong he could barely stand it.
Sometimes he thought the mocking chatter of the crystal clear water as it ran
over the stones at his feet would drive him mad. Sometimes he was sure he
already
was
mad.

Which Hell? Which of the Seven Hells?
He tried to push his mind away from the thirst and the
water at his feet again.
The Hell reserved for murderers, maybe?
For he
was
a murderer—many times over. And just because most of his kills had happened
within the arenas of the Blood Circuit didn’t absolve him of his crimes. He had
been known simply as Korexiroth—The Demon—there and he had
enjoyed
some
of those deaths—especially the last one. The death of his old master, Phenras.
It had been a pleasure to wrap his fingers around that fat neck and squeeze and
squeeze until he saw the life fading from his master’s dull brown eyes.

A pleasure that had landed him in Hell.

The Hell of Thirst. Is there such a place?

There had to be because he was in it. How
many kills did he have? How many years would he be damned for them? Aside from
the ones in the arena and the murder of his master, he’d been told that he had
killed two guards assigned to escort him to Yonnie Six. But those kills he
barely remembered—they had given him some kind of drug that maddened him.
Still, he supposed it made no difference. The guards were still dead and their
blood was on his hands.

He changed his position and the chains
binding his arms behind his back clinked. The pain collar around his neck
shifted with the movement, sending an agonizing jolt of electric current
through his entire body.

The prisoner gave a stifled groan. That
bitch, Pope’nose, had set the damn thing on the most sensitive setting so that
the slightest motion on his part resulted in a horrific burst of pain. It was
excruciating—unbearable.

Rather than subduing him, however, the
painful shock seemed to galvanize him into action. He growled low in his
throat—a deep, animalistic sound—and thrashed recklessly against the chains
that bound him.

Jolt after jolt of agony struck him but
still he thrashed, fighting the thing around his neck. He swore to himself if
he ever got it off he would make his new mistress pay. He would give her pain
for pain until she regretted her foolish decision to buy him in the first
place.

But even a male as big and strong as he
was couldn’t keep this up forever. At last the prisoner fell to his knees,
panting. He would have hung his head if the damn collar would have allowed it.
As it was, the best he could do was to close his eyes and let his shoulders
sag. Around his neck he felt the pain collar readying itself for the next jolt.
Under it, as always, was the dull burn of another collar—the inhibitor band he
had worn since the age of six cycles. But that was an old pain—one he barely
even noticed anymore.

Now that he was down on his knees, the
sound of the brook was maddeningly close. How he wished he could have just one
mouthful of that cool, clear water! His entire body cried out for moisture and
it was so close…so
close.

Slowly, ignoring the stabbing shocks
delivered by the collar, the prisoner bent down. His hands were chained behind
his back but he had some slack, enough to lower his face to the surface of the
brook. He knew it was no use but he couldn’t help himself—he had to try again.

Taking a deep breath, he pushed his face
into the clear, cold surface of the water. And he felt it—felt the chilly
wetness caress his cheeks and eyelids, felt the blessed moisture at his parched
lips.

But while the water caressed his mouth, it
could not pass his lips. He stuck out his tongue, attempting to lap at the
water like an animal dying of thirst, but not a single molecule of the life
saving liquid touched his flesh.

The prisoner gave a low, hoarse moan. He
pressed his face deeper into the bubbling, chattering brook but though he felt
the cool chill of the water caressing his skin, not a drop of it actually
touched him. It was as if there was a barrier—a thin but impenetrable membrane
between himself and the moisture he so desperately needed.

The dust. It’s the dust.

He knew it was true. The fine, silvery
gray dust that coated his entire body, even his hair and eyelids, was the
culprit. It formed a barrier between him and the water and until that barrier
was breached, he would go on thirsting forever.

He sat up again, ignoring the horrible
shocks of the pain collar, and leaned away from the brook. It was the worst
kind of torture to be right beside the brook, to be able to actually
put
his
face in the water, without being able to drink any of it.

Hell,
he thought again.
I’m definitely in Hell.

He closed his eyes, wishing for release, desperate
for a respite, however brief, from this horrible agony. Sometimes he managed to
sleep, though only in snatches. The moment his head started to nod the pain
collar activated and jolted him awake. But in those brief moments of peace he
had seen something…no, some
one.
He couldn’t see her entire face—she wore
a strange apparatus of glass and metal which covered her eyes. A cyborg then,
maybe, with mechanical oculars. If so, she was a very pretty one. And why
anyone would bother to build a cyborg with tousled, honey-blonde curls and
full, curving hips, the prisoner couldn’t guess.

Still, the sight of her, however brief,
soothed him. When he saw her, he forgot his torment and agony, forgot even the
thirst. He knew she was only a dream but still, maybe if he kept his eyes
closed he would see her. He would stare into her face and finally find the
secret color of her eyes…if she had any.

He would—

* * * * *

See me. Oh my God, he
can
see me!

Maggie Jordan sat straight up in bed—and
promptly banged her forehead against the bottom of the bunk directly over her.

“Ouch!” She rubbed at the spot on her
forehead which was probably going to swell. But even the knock on the head
couldn’t dispel the awful dream she’d been having.

It was the man again—the prisoner who was
chained in place. He was in terrible agony and thirsty…so
thirsty.

If only I could save
him…ease his pain…give him a drink…

She shook her head, trying to clear the
crazy thoughts.
Just a dream,
she reminded herself. But still, it had
seemed so
real.
Especially the prisoner’s terrible thirst…

Just thinking about it made Maggie want a
drink of water herself. Well, it was time to get up anyway. She fumbled for her
glasses and put them on, bringing the world into focus. Her tongue felt swollen
in her mouth as she staggered out of the tiny cot, trying not to bump anything
else as she went.

The room she was in had been designed for
two as evidenced by the bunk cots which took up most of the small space. Maggie
supposed she could have taken the top bunk instead but then, she just would
have hit her head on the low ceiling instead and probably fallen out as well.

Maggie was what nice people termed
“accident prone.” Her fiancé Donald, just called her clumsy. She’d always been
horrible at sports or dancing or anything athletic. Luckily, she was very
strong academically, having earned a doctorate in both Xenobiology and
Xenobotany by the age of twenty-five. That was the main reason she found
herself here now, cramped up in a tiny space ship and on her way to explore a
distant new world.

It was a lot to take in—a lot of stress as
well as a lot of excitement. Which was probably why she kept having the
strange, spooky dream about the thirsty, muscular man with pale blue slitted
eyes who stared at her.

It’s nothing, Maggie,
she told herself firmly as she made her
way to the door.
Just an anxiety dream. You’re subconsciously missing Donald,
that’s all.

Of course, the man in her dream looked
nothing like her fiancé. In fact, they couldn’t have looked more different. Donald
was tall and thin with narrow shoulders stooped from leaning over a microscope
all day. The man in her dream looked like he could have broken her fiancé in
half with one hand. He was big and muscular and mostly naked, which was another
weird and disturbing detail of her dream.

Still, Maggie couldn’t think of any other
good reason why she would keep having the same dream night after night. She
told herself it was stress related. After all, she
was
going to be
without her fiancé for at least six months—if not more. Not that Donald would
probably miss her, but still, she was missing him Right?

Right,
she told herself uneasily. She reached for the door
latch… just as the door slid open on its own.

“Ferna?” Maggie stared with surprise at
the tall Kindred girl with dark green hair who stood in the doorway. Normally
she looked amazing—perfect and beautiful and regal. But now her sleeping
clothes were a rumpled mess and her face looked as green as her hair. “Ferna?”
she asked again.

“M-maggie,” the girl gasped and put a hand
over her mouth. “I’m so sorry. I…oh!” She turned away and staggered down the
narrow, short hallway that ran down the length of the ship.

Concerned, Maggie ran after her. She
wanted to ask what was going on but just then Ferna practically dove through
the bathroom door and began noisily throwing up in the small, practical toilet in
the far corner of the tiny room.

“Oh dear…” Maggie hung back, uncertain of
what to do. She always felt so awkward in these situations. At last she came
forward, wedging herself into the little bathroom with the Kindred girl, and
helped to pull Ferna’s long hair away from her face. There was a washcloth
lying by the miniscule sink and Maggie got it damp and pressed it to Ferna’s
forehead when she finally sat up.

“Thank you…” She looked up at Maggie
gratefully and wiped her mouth with a trembling hand. “I’m so sorry…just came
to say…to tell you…”

Her words were interrupted by the sounds
of retching coming from the other side of the ship.

“Oh dear.” Maggie peered down the hall,
concerned. “Is that Ratner?”

Ratner and Ferna were a mated pair of
Kindred—both scientists and both extremely kind, if a little distant. Maggie
was happy to be working with them although she
did
wish the Kindred pair
was a little more approachable.
Of course,
she thought, watching as
Ferna bent before the porcelain throne once more,
this is a little more approachable
than I actually had in mind.

“Yes, it’s Ratner,” Ferna said at last,
wiping her mouth again on a swatch of toilet paper. “We’re both…indisposed. It
must have been the
varla
slugs we had for last meal. They’ve made us
both very ill, I’m afraid.”

“Yes, I can see that.” Maggie wet the
washcloth and rung it out again before wiping the Kindred girl’s sweating face
once more. She was glad all over again that she’d turned down the helping of
slimy, green slugs the Kindred couple had offered her at dinner. If they looked
that disgusting going down, she could only imagine what they looked like coming
up. “Are you going to be okay for what we have to do on Yonnie Six?” she asked,
trying not to think about it. “We’re almost there, aren’t we?”

“Yes.” Ferna pressed the damp cloth to her
face and took a deep, trembling breath. “In fact, we’re in orbit now. That’s
what I came to tell you—Ratner and I
can’t
go deliver the Hurkon collar.”

“You can’t?” Maggie looked at her in
dismay. “I mean, I can see that you can’t
now
but maybe in a day or
two…”

Ferna shook her head. “The appointment has
been made and it must be kept. These people—the Yonnites—are strictly punctual.
It’s considered very rude to keep them waiting.”

“So…what are you saying?” Maggie asked
warily.

“You’ll have to deliver it. I’m sorry,
Maggie…” Here Ferna paused to retch some more although Maggie was positive she
must have already gotten up everything that she had ever eaten and then some.
“I’m sorry,” she repeated when she finally stopped being sick. “But it has to be
you.”

“Me? But…I don’t know anything about the
culture here. In fact, I was told specifically to stay on the ship and away
from this planet,” Maggie protested. In fact, she had been warned several times
and by several people that Yonnie Six was bad news. To hear Lissa—who had come
here on a mission—tell it, the place was a freaking snake pit. Not a good environment
for an accident prone girl like Maggie at all.