Alien General's Fated: SciFi Alien Romance (Brion Brides) (17 page)

Ryden called for a unit with him. He wasn't sure if they could hold off the Host, but it was worth a shot. If the hive mind got past him, there would be little difference anyway.

"Protect her at all costs," he ordered the captain of the unit. "She is your first priority."

He saw Aria go very pale at that, but it wasn't up for debate. She was too valuable, both to Ilotra, and to him.

They ran along dark, empty corridors. The center kept reporting on the paths the Host was taking. It didn't seem to want to run from them, but neither did it go back into hiding.

Ryden knew sooner or later he'd have to face the hive mind anyway and it was definitely better to do it while the Host was alone. It was a strong enough champion on its own without hordes of Clayors throwing themselves on his blade to stop him from fighting. The only problem was trapping a creature that looked at the world with thousands of eyes.

When he saw the Host, Ryden motioned for Aria and the unit to stay behind and he went on. He could sense jealousy in a few of his warriors. That was good, a hunger for glory was always a good quality in a Brion warrior. His valor squares pulsed approvingly.

The Host turned when he approached. It didn't appear afraid or even careful. As a member of a species who loved hard-fought victories, Ryden thought there was something fundamentally wrong with an enemy simply baring its neck to him.

The Host was
almost
literally doing that. It carried the battle knives, but otherwise it seemed to have brought nothing. No armor, no backup. Ryden would have been insulted if he hadn't been so sure the Host was provoking him on purpose.

None of it mattered.

He was a Brion. That meant only going forward in any battle worth fighting and this one surely qualified. Ryden pulled his tall spear free, giving it a few practice twirls to get the feel of it like he always did. The Host watched him come with an amused, but interested expression.

"You can't truly mean to take me on alone," it said.

"I was about to tell you the same."

The Host laughed. Somewhere around them, the sound echoed back oddly. Ryden signaled, but his warriors had already noticed it too. A few stayed with Aria, but more ran into the nearby hallways to look for the hidden Clayors. The Host nodded appreciatively.

"Maybe I shouldn't," it said.

"We'll see," Ryden replied. "I see you've finally made it."

"Oh, them?" the Host asked, starting to circle him. "They've been close by for a while. If four armies came across the galaxy, my armies can do it too. But I was waiting for the best moment to act."

"And that is now?" Ryden asked, watching as the Host finally drew its own weapons. "When there are four armies instead of one."

"Three more is three more commanders who want to lead. Three more factors in any plan. I am
excellent
at multitasking. How about you, General?"

Ryden didn't answer. He dashed forward, sliding the last few feet to the enemy, stopped by the knives at last. He'd skidded to a stop with his spear now inches from the Host's heart, but it still appeared to be unconcerned. They were locked together, Ryden pushing up while the Host was trying to hold the spear away from himself.

"I see you've been studying me," it hissed. "Aiming at the right heart."

Ryden broke the lock off, giving a deadly swing that made the Host back away fast.

Not invincible then
, he thought.
There is something else
.

"Do you really think I'd let someone study me?" the hive mind asked then, a genuine insult marring his voice.

Ryden jumped up when the knives clashed together inches from where he'd just crouched. The Host approached, an angry expression on his face.

"I am great at perception too," it snarled. "That includes perceptions others have of
me
. To think... even you, who I thought was better than the rest, would underestimate me like this. I show you what I choose to show you."

Ryden blocked the next swing of the knife and caught the other. The look on the Host's face was nothing short of surprise, but he didn't get to enjoy it for long. The Host pushed himself off him and the next second, a strike so impossibly fast it seemed to defy time cut a gash across his cheek. Somewhere far away, he thought he heard Aria scream.

It had been a while since Ryden had tasted his own blood. He let it trickle down to his lips, licking it into his mouth, feeling the coppery taste. That, and hearing Aria's voice, had brought him back to reality. The Host was playing with him again. He had barely noticed they were slowly edging closer to the hangar with the shield generator.

He realized the Host's plan a second before he nearly walked off a pathway across another great hangar. Ryden had to shake his head clear, grinning as he did.

"Nice try," he called to the clearly furious hive mind. "Brions learn many things. Telepathic powers and how to throw them off are among them. You shouldn't have used the term
perception
. That was a mistake."

It had been a close call though. Ryden had known that the hive mind could play with minds as soon as he figured out why they weren't able to find the Clayors with the scanners. The hive mind didn't have a power that could have shielded all of the enemies from his sight. That wasn't necessary. All it had to do was alter the perception of the person
watching
the scanner.

Hiding in plain sight, Ryden could appreciate that. It was a nice trick. It also meant he had to look in front of his feet carefully and not let the Host distract him.

In the next second, the Host was on top of him and there was a knife so close to his throat he could feel the unnatural, alien coldness of it. The Host pushed down with its entire weight, desperate to cut his throat, but instead of trying to claw himself free, Ryden put all of his strength into his blow. The spear kicked the Clayor right off him and he rose, rubbing his throat. The Host did too, enraged.

Ryden was pleased. It meant the Host had stopped playing jokes and was ready to fight him for real. He watched the enemy bring the knives up on guard, and he let it attack. Stopping both blades with one spear was difficult, but Ryden was very good at doing things that should have been impossible.

He caught the first blow, sliding the butt of the spear under the Host's arm, twisting it around until the creature dropped the knife with a snarl of pain. The other came up to strike down on him, but Ryden parried that easily, slamming his spear into the Host's face in the next moment. It staggered back, the shock visible on its face.

There, he'd known it wouldn't be that difficult. The Host—and the hive mind—relied entirely on numbers and sheer mass, but they were never a match for skill. Ryden came forward, and slipped into another vision. This time he sensed it. The Host was in a hurry; it was hastily made. The hallway he was in was all odd, the colors were off, and generally it didn't fit anything he'd seen before.

The Host was right in front of him. All he had to do was stab him through the heart and there would be no more Clayors—

Aria screamed. The sound was so piercing it cut straight through to his core, made his heart race. Ryden looked around, trying to see where the scream had come from, but the vision made seeing anything impossible, really. He growled, turning to the Host, who was smiling again.

"You can't win this," the Host said. "You may overpower me now, but soon you won't do even that. And until then, I don't even have to touch you to break you."

The scream was louder this time. Ryden turned, cursing. There was urgency in that voice, a true, honest, naked fear. He couldn't bear to think of Aria in any danger that might make her sound like that.

The Host was leaving, retreating. Ryden started to follow him when the scenery changed around him again. A quick look explained exactly why Aria had screamed.

They were in one of the collapsed hallways around the hangar and the roof above them was shaking.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Aria

 

Aria had been trying to stay out of the way. As soon as most of the unit accompanying her joined the fight, she was looking for a place to hide from the terrifying champion facing Ryden. On the one hand, she'd had enough of being a victim already, but on the other she had no intention of getting in the way.

When the last of her guards went to aid their companions and Ryden started coming back her way, still fighting with the Clayor, Aria retreated. She wasn't really watching where she was going, only that it was away from the fight taking place.

But it certainly hadn't looked like that! She would never have walked into one of the sealed-off hallways. In fact, weren't there doors to stop her from doing so?

Aria hadn't realized her mind had been tampered with until the veil was lifted from before her eyes and she found herself in the middle of rubble and debris. She screamed, mostly because the roof above her threatened to come down and there was nowhere to go.

She didn't know what was going on up there. Maybe it was the hive mind's plan, perhaps it had just been convenient, but it no longer mattered. All that was clear was that she'd be buried under tons of rock and metal.

And then she saw Ryden. The general was coming toward her, a cut on his cheek coloring his neck red. He looked ferocious, so much so that Aria took a terrified step back.

He reached her. Without saying a word, he caught her in his embrace and pressed her against the wall. Aria squirmed, trying to get away from him. That was decidedly the least romantic situation she'd ever been in! What was he thinking, he—

When the shield popped up from the device on his hand, she felt foolish and stopped pushing him away.

"I'm sorry," she murmured. "I thought you were..."

She didn't finish that thought, too embarrassed to keep speaking. What
had
she been thinking? That the general would choose their last moments alive to abuse her?

"I'm a Brion," Ryden said, with not even a hint of reprimand. "We don't force women."

Aria finally lifted her eyes to him, looking into his deep, stormy green eyes. There was no judgment there, only purpose. She looked at the shield, suddenly seeming so flimsy in his hands. With all her knowledge of the technology that went into it, when facing a collapsing structure, she couldn't help seeing it as nothing more than light.

"Will it hold?" she asked, not entirely sure she wanted to hear the answer.

"I don't know," Ryden said honestly, with a small smirk playing on his lips.

"Why are you laughing?" Aria asked, but despite the roof literally raining debris down on them, she felt her own lips curl into a smile. "We are about to die."

"I do not believe that," Ryden said simply. "I told you. I have no intention of letting either of us die."

That was true. He
had
said that. Aria honestly wished that the world worked like that. It would have been such a nice place if men only spoke the truth.

A huge crack appeared in the ceiling. And for some reason, Aria couldn't stop smiling.

Ryden stepped closer and she felt his scent in her nostrils, his being overwhelming as it always was. She shivered, hoping he put it down as fear. At that moment, Aria would have preferred he thought of her as a coward rather than hopelessly attracted to him like she really was.

Then the ceiling caught her attention again.

"You can't possibly hold that weight," she said sadly.

"I can," Ryden said. "And I will."

"Stop saying stuff like that," Aria told him. "It's not comforting to hear pretty lies before I die. I thought a Brion might understand that."

For some reason, he smiled at that.

"You are quite something," the general said.

He was quiet for a long moment before he went on. "I meant it though. I will not let us die this way. I don't deserve this and neither do you. We will get out of this."

"That's not possible," Aria said, but the general didn't mind her lack of optimism.

"We'll see," he said.

The roof started falling and the general pressed himself even closer against her. Aria forced herself to believe she was only doing it because her life might have depended on it when she wrapped her hands around his chest.

"Hold on to me," the general said. "As hard as you can. No matter what, don't let go. I've got you."

She believed him, like she had from the moment they'd met. Aria tightened her hold, pressed her face flat against his chest, breathing in like he was the only source of air. She felt him bring one arm around her to hold onto her when the ceiling finally collapsed. Aria felt Ryden wince for a moment when a huge piece of the ceiling collapsed on top of them.

He practically slammed her against the wall, pressing her against it, grinding them together in the chaos of noise and rocks and metal and glass raining down all around them.

The shield held. It crackled above their heads, but it did not give in. And neither did Ryden. When Aria dared to peek up at some point, she was shocked to see there was only darkness around them. The amount of weight the general had to be holding up on his own was nothing short of miraculous.

Aria had never felt so useless in her life. She wanted to say something, anything, to let the general know that even if he ultimately collapsed, she appreciated him trying. When no words came from her lips, she settled for hugging him tighter. After a second, she felt him return it.

She was starting to think it would never end, but the noise finally came to a stop. The world stopped breaking apart around them, the pieces of sky stopped falling. Everything went still, including them.

Aria found herself tightly in the arms of the most gorgeous man alive that she could barely breathe. It occurred to her, with morbid self-awareness, that under other circumstances she might have found his presence arousing. At that moment, though, all she wanted was to breathe. To get away, to move. Above all, to know if there even was a world above them anymore.

The general didn't move, though. She gave a testing hug. That was returned. Good, at least he hadn't lost consciousness then. Aria made herself wait patiently, but it was difficult. Not because she panicked, but the exact opposite.