Colliding Worlds Trilogy 02 – Implosion
Part 2 of the Colliding Worlds Trilogy
Berinn Rae,
author of
Collision
Avon, Massachusetts
This edition published by Crimson Romance
an imprint of F+W Media, Inc.
Blue Ash, Ohio 45242
Copyright © 2013 by Berinn Rae ISBN 10: 1-4405-6115-X
ISBN 13: 978-1-4405-6115-3
eISBN 10: 1-4405-6116-8
eISBN 13: 978-1-44056116-0
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, corporations, institutions, organizations, events, or locales in this novel are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, used fictitiously. The resemblance of any character to actual persons (living or dead) is entirely coincidental.
Cover art © istophoto/klubovy; 123rf.com
For the piano man.
With thanks to:
Jennifer Lawler, Jess Verdi, and Barb Wilson for making my stuff look good;
Elle J Rossi for critiquing my stuff;
My husband for hearing about my stuff (over and over); and
You for reading my stuff.
Thank you.
Prologue
Beyond our world lies the unknown. Countless planets with endless possibilities. On one of those worlds, many galaxies from our home, an epic war has started a chain reaction, sending the war on a collision course with Earth. In the bloody aftermath of the Noble War of Sephia, the conquered Draeken flee, and the triumphant Sephians give pursuit. The first habitable planet in their path is a small, temperate planet called … Earth.
We are no longer alone.
Not yet public knowledge, the gold-skinned Sephians have reached a precarious peace with our military in their efforts to drive the winged Draeken from Earth and to extinction. As human-Sephian forces peck at Draeken defenses, we quickly learn that things are never as simple as right and wrong, good versus evil.
A Draeken commander reaches out to a human leader tied with the Sephians in hopes for peace. But simmering tempers at the clandestine meeting quickly erupt into a disastrous battle. In the ensuing chaos, a Sephian warrior-woman is captured by the most feared of all Draeken, a man with deadly secrets and deadlier intentions. As tensions within the Draeken ranks rise, the chance for a world war looks inevitable.
And it’s a war no one may survive.
Draeken Hidden Camp in the northwest United States
Nalea lay on her side, feigning sleep, until the guardsman walked past her cell, whistling an old tune that reminded her of Sephia. The tips of his leathery wings brushed the floor as though bored, matching the slow, staccato rhythm of his steps echoing through the hall. His senses would be dulled from the monotony of his late night shift. Hers were primed.
She forced herself to breathe deep and steady as she waited … and waited until his footsteps faded into the silence booming in her ears, signaling that this was her chance. She’d had months to memorize the guardsmen’s schedule. If the gods were on her side, the hallway would remain empty for at least another hour.
Now!
Her body tensed. She sucked in a breath and surged toward the barred door of her cell. Her muscles were alive and ready. Her hair was short. It would stay out of her way. The lights were dimmed for the night. They wouldn’t blind her sensitive eyes. A good thing now that her dark glasses were destroyed. With one last silent prayer to the gods, she pressed against the bars that kept her imprisoned within her enemy’s Earthside stronghold.
The cold metal protested movement. She pushed harder, and the barred door swung outward. Her escape mechanism fluttered to the floor, and her breath hitched.
It worked!
Hard to believe a little piece of Earthside plastic was all it took to bypass superior Draeken technology. Wync, the jackass guardsman on shift, had been too busy taunting her for being wingless as he escorted her back to her cell after interrogation today. He’d failed to notice her sliding the lens from her dark glasses against the locking mechanism as he pulled her cell door closed.
An alarm should’ve sounded immediately. Fortunately, the Draeken were facing an energy shortage, just like her people — the Sephians — were. Otherwise, the system would’ve sounded an alert if the bolt was blocked in any manner. She smiled. She had no problem taking advantage of any chance for escape.
Nalea crept from her cell, carefully pulling the door closed behind her to avoid raising suspicion. She didn’t even glance back at the small cell that she’d called home for nearly a year. After tonight, she’d never be imprisoned on the other side of that door again.
Flattening herself against the wall, she peeked around the corner and down the hallway, looking first left, and then right. To the left she would find freedom and could be miles away before her captors noticed her absence.
She turned right instead.
Some things were more important than freedom.
Her bare feet made no sound on the cold floor as she hurried down the hallway. Every step was deliberate and quick. She knew this way well, the empty cells, a locked supply room, even the guardsman station where Wync had undoubtedly stopped by to catch a quick nap. Scowling, she’d wished she had more time to ensure the racist would breathe his last.
You’ll get yours, Wync. Some day.
It wouldn’t be much farther now. Long seconds passed before she reached the door she sought. She double-checked the sign to the right of the closed door. It read
Lord Commander Roden Zyll.
Nalea clenched her fists, fighting to remain steady. Precious seconds bled out while she calmed her breathing. Her muscles burned with tension, as though they were warning her,
run!
The ends of her short hair clung to the edges of her sweaty cheeks, another reminder of why she must do this.
Sephians normally wore their hair long. But Roden, thinking to punish her, had her hair cut short after she’d refused to allow him to brush the snarled length. Instead, she’d considered it a personal triumph. Every time she made her captor lose his temper was a step closer to finding his mortal weakness. She hadn’t yet found that weakness, but she’d run out of time. Tonight was her last chance.
He’s only a man.
Focusing on the keypad, she inhaled deeply, closed her eyes, recalling the unique tone each key made as Roden entered them every time he’d brought her to “dine” with him, which was his polite term for non-physical interrogation. He’d yet to raise a hand to her, instead preferring to fuck with her mind, acting as her host rather than captor, all the while hinting for information she’d never surrender.
And so the stalemate had stood for months. Nalea with her silence, refusing to betray her people, and Roden with something up his sleeve, for that could be the only reason why he hadn’t tortured or killed her yet. The only way to win this game was to make her move first.
Convinced of the passcode that she’d played over and over in her mind a hundred times a day, she reopened her eyes, and punched in the six digits her memory had shown her. The small light on the key pad flashed blue before going dark.
Success!
The door opened with a nearly silent
whoosh
that translated into something more like a sonic boom to her ears. The air hardened in her lungs. Would Roden awaken at the sound? Worse, could he still be awake at this late hour?
No turning back.
Defeating the Draeken meant stopping Roden. Steeling her nerves, Nalea stepped inside just as the door closed behind her.
No one rushed her. No sound of movement. It was nearly pitch black in the room, only the charcoal of a cloudy night gleamed through a small window. As her vision easily adjusted to the soothing darkness, she scanned the room. Draeken, like humans, had to wear special glasses to see in the dark. Sephians, on the other hand, evolved on a planet with three moons and no sun. To put it mildly, Nalea had excellent night vision.
And, just as this planet’s inhabitants absorbed the sun’s rays through their pale Draeken-like skin, her people’s golden skin was optimized to draw as much lunar energy as possible. The dark exhilarated her.
On her first day as a prisoner at this Earthside base, Roden had surprised her by giving her a pair of dark glasses to ease her sensitivity to the light, almost certainly in an attempt to build a false trust. Nalea knew plenty about Roden Zyll, a man famous for his viciousness. Yet he was also an enigma. The only thing she truly knew was that he never did what anyone expected.
A Draeken lord, second only to Grand Lord Hillas Puftan, Roden’s strategies were a dichotomy of ruthless assassinations, outright attacks, and — in her case — charming mind fucks. The moment he gave her the dark glasses, she
knew
he had something planned for her. And, that thought haunted her every waking moment since.
Without glasses for protection, Nalea needed to make her escape and find shelter before sunrise, when Earth’s bright day star would blind her. Until the moment of dawn, in this room, she needed no glasses. The darkness felt natural, and it comforted her as her gaze fell upon the man on the bed. With one muscled arm resting over his head, his chest rose and fell strong and slowly, his darkly colored tattooed wings spread out loosely beneath him.
Oh sweet, gods, thank you.
Relief soothed Nalea’s frayed nerves. Retribution was so very close now. She crept first to his desk where his weapons were laid out in symmetric order. Her hand skimmed over the blasters and glided across the knives, pausing at a long blade embellished with etchings. She hefted its weight in her hand, and smiled. It would do.
Keeping her gaze fixed upon the sleeping man, she closed in, step by excruciatingly slow step, holding the blade in front of her. The sliver of moonlight through the window glinted off its dark metal, producing shimmering lines across her golden skin. It would have been better if the clouds completely hid the moon this night. Then, Roden wouldn’t be able to see her coming even if he awoke.
All it would take was one quick slice. One quick slice and Lord Commander Roden Zyll would no longer pose a risk to the Sephians or to the inhabitants of this planet … or to her.
The light across her hand trembled, and she realized she was shaking. She gripped the blade with both hands to steady herself. A whimper threatened to betray her to her enemy. Nalea paused, inhaled, took a step closer, scolding herself for her weakness.
After all, it should be an easy thing to kill a godless Draeken. She’d killed dozens, hells,
hundreds
of the bastards already. Why did this one have to be any different? She wanted to kill Roden. She
needed
to kill him more than any other Draeken. Especially since this particular one happened to be her captor, and something far, far worse … her destined
tahren
. Her soul mate.