Page 12 of Nansar
She didn't let go. Didn't step back. She leaned in, throwing every ounce of her weight behind the thrust, driving the spear deeper still. Her face was a mask of grim determination—no tears, no trembling, no mercy. Just pure survival instinct.
Bronto's legs gave out. He toppled like a felled tree, hitting the ground with a bone-rattling thud that sent dust billowing into the air. His body convulsed once, twice, then surrendered to stillness.
Only then did she release the spear, stumbling back on shaking legs, her chest heaving.
I stood there like a statue, my blade still half-drawn, utterly redundant.
By the ancestors.
I'd watched seasoned warriors freeze when facing a Kaelaks enforcer. I'd seen battle-hardened prisoners falter before Bronto's particular brand of cruelty.
This slip of a human—this fragile-looking female who'd just dragged herself from the wreckage of a crashed pod—had ended him in seconds.
Impressive was too small a word for what I'd just witnessed.
She moved toward the corpse, reaching for the spear with trembling hands, adrenaline still singing through her veins.
"Wait—" The word left my mouth before I could think better of it.
Fatal mistake.
Her head whipped toward me, eyes gone feral, and she bolted.
"No! Stop!" The command tore from my throat as I lunged after her.
My longer stride devoured the distance between us in heartbeats. I caught her around the waist, and the impact sent us both crashing to the ground in a tangle of limbs and desperation. She was smaller than me, lighter, her body fitting against mine in a way that would have been intoxicating under any other circumstances. But right now, she was all wild fury—a cornered predator fighting for her life.
"Get off me! Don't touch me!" Her fist cracked against my jaw with surprising force, then my shoulder. Each blow carried the weight of her terror and rage. Not especially painful, but noticeable. Impressive. She twisted beneath me, trying to drive her knee into my groin. "Let me go!"
"I'm not going to hurt you—"
"DON'T TOUCH ME!" The scream ripped through the air, raw and primitive, edged with a terror so genuine it pierced straight through my chest like a blade.
I caught her wrists, pinning them as gently as I could while still maintaining control, and shifted my weight to give her breathing room. The last thing I wanted was to add to her fear. "The Prime sent me! Admiral Cullen Blackwood sent me!"
She went utterly still beneath me, her wild eyes locking onto mine. This close, I noticed flecks of silver in the gray depths, felt the rapid flutter of her pulse where my fingers circled her wrists.
"What?" Her voice cracked, vulnerability bleeding through the fury. "My father?"
"Admiral Cullen Blackwood," I repeated, keeping my tone as steady and calm as I could manage. "The Prime and Duke Ako sent me to find you. To get you to safety."
For a long, suspended moment, she simply stared up at me, her breath coming in ragged gasps that I felt against my chest. Then something shifted in her expression—not quite trust, but the sharp edge of terror softened, replaced by wary calculation.
"Get off me," she said, quieter now but no less firm.
I released her wrists immediately and pushed to my feet, stepping back to give her space. She scrambled away, putting several feet of rocky ground between us, her eyes never leaving mine. I noticed her hand resting on the hilt of a blade sheathed at her hip—ready, watchful, still prepared to fight if necessary.
Now that the immediate struggle was over, I could really see her.
And ancestors help me, she was breathtaking.
Dark auburn hair, wild and tangled from her ordeal, framed a face that was all elegant lines beneath the smudges of dirt and blood. Those gray eyes—sharp, alert—watched me withthe wariness of prey assessing a predator. The Alliance-issue jumpsuit she wore was torn and filthy, but it clung to curves that made my mouth go dry. Beneath the grime and damage, I could see the lean muscle of someone who'd spent their life training, fighting. This female was no pampered lady playing at soldier—she was a warrior through and through.
Beautiful didn't begin to cover it.
The thought slammed into me unbidden, and my horns began to tingle with that telltale warmth, the sensation crawling across my scalp like wildfire. I almost raised a hand to scratch at them before I caught myself, forcing my arm back down. Not now. Absolutely not the time. I clenched my jaw and shoved the awareness aside, focusing instead on keeping my posture non-threatening, my hands visible and away from my weapons.
"Don't touch me," she said again, and this time it sounded less like panic and more like a line being carved in stone.
