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EVIL WIND
By
Charlotte Boyett-Compo
© copyright February 2007, Charlotte Boyett-Compo
Cover art by Jenny Dixon, © copyright February 2007
New Concepts Publishing
Lake Park, GA 31636
www.newconceptspublishing.com
This is a work of fiction. All characters, events, and places are of the author's imagination and not to be confused with fact. Any resemblance to living persons or events is merely coincidence.
Dedication
To Angie Evans, who has such wicked dreams of Kamerone…
Forward
In the Terran year of 1994, Bridget Dunne became one of many young, beautiful and highly intelligent women to disappear from her world without a trace. Abducted from her college in Grinnell, Iowa, Bridie woke to find she was on board an alien space craft--along with nine other women--bound for the planet Rysalia Prime in a distant part of the universe far beyond her own galaxy. Bridie was just one more woman taken from her home world to a place where men ruled supreme and women were thought of as chattel to be bought and sold at whim. Because of her college training in the field of psychology, she was handed over to the Behavioral Modification Unit on Frontier Station Kahmsin-14 to work with Dr. Beryla Dean, an eminent biogenetic scientist.
Before Bridie arrived on FSK-14, the women of Rysalia had begun organizing a resistance force to gain their freedom. They needed a powerful man among the Rysalians to ally with them to help them achieve their objective. They also needed to set a honey trap--an enticing female to catch the eye and attention of their reluctant target--and Bridie was chosen because a certain renowned warrior had once given her a lustful glance in passing.
That man had been Prime Reaper Captain Kamerone Cree, the most feared man in the Rysalian Empire. An intergalactic shape-shifting killing machine, Cree had been charged with crimes he had not committed--crimes that had been staged by the Resistance to implicate the Reaper in their rebellion. As a result, he was remanded by the Ministry of Justice to the Be-Mod unit for reinforcement therapy--a torturous series of brutal sessions designed to bring him to his knees, to break him down to his lowest common denominator, and then strengthen his savage behavior. During these sessions, he would come into close contact with Bridie and the trap would be set. Unbeknownst to the Ministry of Justice, the Resistance had infiltrated the behavioral modification sessions and began using subliminal messages to turn Bridget into the only saving light in Cree's dark, painful world. Unable to get her out of his mind or keep his treacherous body from desiring her, the Prime Reaper developed an uncontrollable urge to have her for his own--consequences be damned--and he sets out to do just that.
Neither Cree nor Bridget reckoned on a developing love that would bind them together for all time. Manipulated by the Resistance with deep-seated subliminals and psychotropic drugs, the two lovers would find themselves embroiled in a rebellion that would see hundreds of thousands of men dead in the space of two hours time and their world now run by women who wanted to eliminate Cree from the equation and place Bridget into the hands of his worst enemy.
But no one had counted on a ragtag assortment of warriors who would rescue Cree from his planned execution and spirit him into the barren darkness of space in search of his woman. Having overtaken the ship on which Bridget was being held Cree dispatched his enemy, reclaimed his woman, but in the bargain was forced to terminate three women warriors whose race would issue a death warrant for his capture. Unaware he has been declared the most wanted man in the universe, Kamerone Cree wants only to live in peace with the woman he loves more than his own life.
Fleeing to Bridget's home world where it was now 2062, Cree, his men and a handful of Terran women who had aided in Cree's escape from his near-death at the hands of the Resistance, must blend in seamlessly into this new world. Fate is with them and they are able to make new lives on Terra.
On the way to Terra, Bridget gives birth to Cree's child, creating problems neither she nor the Reaper knows how to solve. Unable to hold his son for fear the beast within him will harm the child, Cree feels useless in this new life. He is a warrior whose talents can never be utilized on Terra. Unhappy, bored, and restless, he finds himself being stalked by a mysterious woman he knows is an alien bounty hunter. Realizing she must have been sent to bring him back to Rysalia Prime and a horrifying fate reserved expressly for him, his uneasiness spills over into his family life, alienating him further from Bridie and their child.
When Cree is captured by his dreaded adversary Dr. Hael Sejm right from beneath Bridget's nose and spirited back through time and space to his intended execution, Bridie is driven to her knees with fear for her husband. She knows all too well what will happen when the Reaper is returned to Rysalia. She turns to Tylan Kahn, the one man who can help her.
Once more Cree's friends find a way to attempt his rescue and leaving their adopted world behind, set out to reach Cree before his fate is sealed.
Their ship is disabled when struck by an asteroid and the warrioresses, who had taken Cree prisoner, are forced to land on the barren world of Montyne Vex to make repairs. It is while they are on that desolate world that the Reaper saves not one but three lives of his captors, thus assuring for himself a state of Attribution--his enemies' lives now belong to him and they are sworn to protect him--no matter what. Now in command of the ship, Cree intends to return to Terra but begrudgingly the women warriors inform Cree his bloodkin are awaiting execution on Rysalia Prime. Cree knows before he can return to Bridget, he must do all he can to save the condemned men. Enlisting the aid of the women warriors and their goddess, the Reaper finds himself once more on the way to a world eagerly awaiting his destruction. With the help of those who were once his sworn enemies, Cree must find a way to save himself and his fellow Reapers from the fiery deaths awaiting them. Only then can Cree return to Terra, taking with him his rescued bloodkin and the warrior women who will never be able to return to their home world because they helped him.
While Cree's ship and the ship of his friends are racing toward Rysalia Prime, the Prime Reaper's eldest bloodson--Khiershon--is having his own problems on their side of the universe. He, too, had been the target of the same race of women striving to bring his bloodsire to justice and has managed to escape just in the nick of time. Traveling with a Terran medivac ship from that worlds distant future, Khiershon will find himself as attracted to a Terran woman as his father before him and will Join with Caitlin Kelly in a ceremony that will bind them together for all time.
As the ship carrying Kamerone Cree speeds toward Rysalia Prime, another bearing Cree's Terran friends in hot pursuit, Khiershon and his crew are also headed for the planet where the bloodthirsty Daughters of the Multitude now rule. Unaware his bloodsire has been captured and is destined for execution on the planet Khiershon is going there to rescue his bloodkin who are to be terminated on the Feast of Alluvial, only one month away.
Chapter One
"He's dreaming again," Lt. Cirolia Sern told her crew mates as she took her seat at the navigational console. She reached down to pet the old weretiger who was never far from her side.
"Strange," Major Akkadia Kahmal remarked. She was toying with the long red braid that hung over her left shoulder. "I was told that Reapers rarely dream."
"If the E.S.U. system hadn't been damaged beyond my ability to repair it," Lt. Melankhoia Chanz reminded them, "he wouldn't be having bad dreams and we wouldn't have to be spelling one another and doing each other's jobs."
"Hey, I'm not complaining," Lt. Augenia Deon spoke up. "I'm learning far more than I ever did at Fleet."
Lt. Renata Aegean looked up from her weapons/defense op monitor. "How do you know it's a bad dream he's having, 'Lia?"
"There are tears running down his cheeks," Sern replied softly.
Dorrie Burkhart--the only non-Amazeen and civilian member among the seven women onboard the Alluvia--looked up from the e-book she had been reading. "He misses his lady," she said quietly.
"Until I met Kamerone Cree, there was no way you could have ever convinced me Reapers were capable of crying," Kahmal stated, "much less have feelings that could generate tears to begin with."
"Kam is not an ordinary Reaper," Dorrie snapped. "He is a man among men and …."
"You're in love with him," Kahmal interrupted. She didn't like the Terran woman and considered her a rival although neither had a chance with Kamerone Cree.
Lifting her chin, Dorrie glared at the Amazeen Major. "I've never said I wasn't. He knows how I feel."
"What is it with you Terran women?" Lt. Cedilla Tyrian, the Alluvia's engineer inquired. "Are you predisposed to fall for men like Cree?" When Dorrie shot her a nasty look, Tyrian held up her hands. "I'm only asking. No insult was intended, Burkhart."
"No more so than Amazeen women are predisposed to want to enslave the men with whom they come in contact," Dorrie snapped. "Terran women like strong men who won't let a woman walk all over him."
"That would be our Cree," Sern said with a chuckle. She glanced down at her pet weretiger. "Isn't that right, Ceatie?"
The old weretiger lifted his head, swiped at his mistress' hand, purred loudly, then went back to sleep at her feet.
"I can't argue the point about the enslavement," Kahmal said. "I do own a breeding farm on Amazeen."
Dorrie blinked. "You do?"
Kahmal shrugged. "I have about twenty-odd men there but they are well cared for. I don't abuse them as do some of our Sisters. The men seem content enough. I've never had to have one emasculated. They are not, however, what I would classify as strong men. I've never had one try to rebel."
"That's because you treat them decently," Deon commented.
"The Major's farm is known for the quality of its breeders," Sern told Dorrie.
"I've utilized the services of one or two of the Major's studs," Chanz reported, "but since the problem is with my plumbing, there won't be any little Chanzettes roaming the hills of Amazeen."
"When I'm ready to retire, I might check out the men the Major owns," Lt. Augenia Deon said entering the conversation. "I'd like to have a couple of little girls to teach."
Dorrie shook her head. "You women make it sound like you're just heading over to the corner market for a loaf of bread and a jug of milk. You're no better than the Rysalian Empire when all is said and done."
Kahmal frowned. "I suppose if you look at it in that way, we aren't so different than the Empire was except in that they enslaved women, trading and selling them like cattle."
"Isn't that what you Amazeen do?" Dorrie countered. "Don't you trade and sell men like they're cattle?"
"Men are pigs, not cattle!" Aegean joked and everyone--including Dorrie--laughed at the jest.
"I can't argue with you there," Dorrie admitted. "The exception being Cree."
"It's good to know you don't consider me a pig."
The women looked around to see the Prime Reaper leaning against the bulkhead, his arms crossed over his brawny chest. Since his only pair of boots had been destroyed during one of his Transitions from humanoid to wolf-like creature, he was barefoot as he stood there and that made him even more strikingly sensual to the women. They wondered how long he'd been listening to their conversation but not a one of them dared to ask.
"No, you're not a pig. A stubborn mule," Dorrie suggested, "but never a pig, Kami."
Rolling his eyes at Dorrie's use of an endearment he allowed only from his lady, Bridget, Kamerone Cree turned his attention from her to Kahmal, the Amazeen bounty hunter who had been dispatched to Terra to bring him back to Rysalia Prime for execution. "May I have a word with you, 'Kadia?"
"Will it take long? We're not that far from Diabolusian air space and I'd like to be on the bridge should we be hailed," Kahmal told him.
"Not long," he replied and pushed away from the bulkhead. He turned in the direction of the Long Range Cruiser's lounge, just off the bridge.
"He looks worried," Dorrie said to no one in particular.
"Perhaps his dreams disturbed him," Kahmal mused.
"Be gentle with him, Major," Chanz said with a laugh. "He's a delicate little flower."
"Aye, right," Kahmal said with a snort. "He's about as delicate as a Chalean fly trap."
Taking a seat at one of the tables in the lounge, Kamerone Cree stretched out his long legs, crossed his bare ankles, and relaxed as much as his nightmare would allow. His acute hearing had taken in Kahmal's statement and he thought perhaps the Amazeen women were beginning to know him better than he would have liked. When the Major took a seat beside him, he slipped casually into her consciousness and wasn't surprised to read her concern for his state of mind.
"Stop worrying about me," he said quietly.
"Ain't gonna happen. Whatcha need, Reaper?"
"I have a favor to ask of you," he said without preamble.
Kahmal braced her elbows on the table and leaned forward. "All right."
The Prime Reaper drew in a long breath then let it out slowly before he spoke again. "Should something happen to me and I am unable to return to Terra for whatever reason, I would like to make sure Dorrie is kept safe. I want you to promise me you will take her back to Terra and not let them put her in some gods-be-damned convent."
"You have feelings for this Terran woman?" Kahmal asked, a part of her chaffing with jealousy.
He turned to meet her gaze. "Not in the way you mean, no, but I feel a responsibility toward her. I would like to know she will be free to live her life as she sees fit."
Kahmal stared into his amber eyes and became lost in the sadness she saw lurking there. She ached to reach out to him, take him in her arms, and comfort him but she knew he would not allow it. The only comfort he sought was many light years away. The only peace he would ever know would be in the arms of Bridget Dunne.
"If I am able to take Dorrie there, I swear to you that I will," she promised him. "If it looks as though there will be no way to return her to Terra, I will see to it she is taken somewhere there are worthy men." She smiled. "Perhaps Serenia or Ionary."
He nodded. "The man she had on Terra was Serenian. She would interact well with such men. They are strong enough to hold their own with her."
"Serenia it is, then," Kahmal agreed. Her palm itched to touch him but he was sprawled in the chair with his arms crossed defensively--some might say protectively--across his chest. "Is there anything else?"
He unfolded his arms and tugged down the zipper of the dark green flight suit Kahmal had loaned him. It was one of hers and though it fit him perhaps a bit too snugly, the pant legs were long enough to cover his tall frame. Reaching inside the inner pocket, he pulled out an envelope, looked at it for a long moment, and then handed it to Kahmal. "I would like this to be given to my lady should it be that I will never see her again."
Kahmal took the envelope--still warm from his body heat--and saw that it was sealed. A part of her longed to read what he had written but under no circumstances would she ever intrude on his privacy. She knew if there was no way she could ever return to Terra, the envelope, and its contents, would be destroyed.
"There are two notes within the envelope," he explained. "One is to my lady and the other to my son."
At the mention of the son he had never been able to hold in his arms, to kiss, his forehead crinkled with sorrow.
"Cree …" Kahmal began, "I--"
"Even if we are successful in rescuing my bloodkin being held on Rysalia Prime and with the grace of your goddess we escape unscathed, my son will be nearly a man before I see Terra again," he said, the misery in his voice there for anyone to hear. "I will have missed his first words, his first steps, all the little things that will make him Jaelin Cree."
Kahmal felt tears gathering in her eyes. She was the cause of this man's suffering and it bothered her more than she could admit to anyone, even herself. "You have to believe you will return to Terra, Cree."
"I know you said you did not kill Tylan Kahn and I believe you. I also have to believe he has been able to care for my lady and our son as I would have." He squeezed his eyes shut for a moment and when he opened them, there was such grief shimmering there, Kahmal wanted to sob. "Kahn loves Bridget and he will make her a good husband if I am unable to return to her."
The Amazeen Major could not endure his sorrow another instant without letting him know he had her if for some reason he could not make his way back to Terra. She put her hand on his shoulder. "Cree, you …"
He hung his head. "I know how you feel," he said softly. "There is no reason for you to say it."
"But I want to," she insisted. "I …"
"Please, don't," he asked. "I belong to Bridget and I always will. There will never be room for any other in the chambers of my heart. If I can not be with her, I will be alone."
She saw a single tear easing down his lean cheek and it hurt her so deeply she had to dig her fingernails into her palms. "Was the dream that bad?" she asked.
For a long moment he did not reply but when at last he began to speak, the hurt in his voice broke her heart.
"We were walking hand in hand along the seashore. Bridie loved to swim but I would not allow her in the water because I could not join her. If something happened and she started to drown, I couldn't save her."
"You can't swim?" Kahmal asked.
"The parasite won't allow us to learn. It fears the Reaper might drown and it would be destroyed in the bargain. That is why we can't swim."
"Did you and Bridget go often to the seashore?" She loved listening to his Ry-Chalean brogue.
"There is a place called Savannah and we went there a few times. She liked to sit on the sand and watch the waves coming in." He cocked a shoulder. "I must admit I found it a tranquil experience."
"So was that where you were in your dream?"
"I don't think so. The surroundings were strange. I'm not sure where we were or if that place even exists. Besides, the whole scenario was off."
"In what way?"
Cree held the picture of the dream beach in his mind's eye. The image disturbed him more than he was willing to admit and he shivered.
"Are you cold?" Kahmal asked.
"There were ice floes in the water," he said so softly she had to strain to hear. "I could see them all the way to the horizon yet the day was bright and sunny, a warm wind blowing over us and I knew what was coming."
From out of his past three words came hurtling toward him and slammed into his consciousness with lightning speed: "Stage Three complete!"
"Cree?" Kahmal asked, watching the horror invading his golden eyes. When he didn't respond, she reached out to shake him.
"It was the sessions," he whispered. "I was reliving the sessions in the Be-Mod 9 unit."
Kahmal had read the dossier on the Prime Reaper Kamerone Cree and knew he had spent weeks in a Behavioral Modification Unit being tortured by members of the Resistance under the guise of assault therapy to re-enforce his training. It was there he had met Bridget.
Cree plowed a hand through his thick brown hair and Kahmal saw his hand was shaking.
"I felt her hand jerked from mine and then I was out in the middle of the ocean, staked down to one of the ice floes as it bobbed on the waves," he told her. "There were thick spikes through my palms anchoring me to the ice. I heard Bridget calling to me, begging me to come back but I couldn't move. I was staked to the ice."
"You were reliving the therapy sessions," Kahmal said.
"I heard the wave coming toward me and I lifted my head to see it. It was huge, blotting out the sky. It bore down on me and when it broke, the ice floe flipped over and I was beneath the water, my hands pulling free of the spikes."
He had been drowning, water flowing down his nose, his air cut off by the invading thickness. He was sinking beneath a wavering, frigid surface, ice floes hovering just beyond his reach. The water was filling his lungs, inflating them to bursting, filling his body cavities with the freezing liquid. The harder he fought to reach the surface and the cleansing air that would free his blocked lungs, the deeper he plunged beneath the white surface until all light was blocked out.
"Then she was there in the water beside me, pulling me up, dragging me to shore. I was dead--I knew I was dead--but she wouldn't let me go. We were on the sand. I was on my back, staring into her eyes as she put her lips on mine, breathed life back into my lungs. She saved my life."
Kahmal knew he was unaware that she was stroking his shoulder as he repeated his dream to her. She could feel the tremors rippling through his body and wanted desperately to hold him.
"Just as I gasped my first breath, she and I went spinning through the air and I hit something so hard it knocked the breath out of me. When I came to I was shackled to a stainless steel pole on the plaza in front of the Titaness on Rysalia Prime," he said.
"Where your bloodkin are to be executed," she said, knowing he could not have seen the poles that had been erected long after he had fled with Bridget to Terra.
"There were thousands of women standing there to see me die. Hael Sejm and Captain Chakai were holding Bridie between them. She was struggling to get free, trying so hard to come to me, but it was already too late. There was a flash of fire at my feet and I was burning."
The memory of his scream filled his head. The pain had been so horrific, so invasive, so utterly intense, he had longed for the surcease of life. But just as soon as the flames had enveloped him, blistering his flesh, then burning deep through the epidermis, past the coris, into the muscles and nerve bundles, dissolving capillaries, splitting open veins and arteries and flashing into the very marrow of his bones; just as the pain became so terrifying that he had began to beg for death, she was there holding out her hand to him.
"Come, Kam," she whispered. "Come to me and the pain will stop." He held out his hand, striving to touch hers, hopeful, ecstatic, then she began to fade from his sight.
Cree hung his head. "But she couldn't save me this time," he said. "Her beautiful green eyes couldn't save me and I died in the flames."
Kahmal suspected there was more. "Go on."
He looked up at her and tears were running down his face. "They threw Dorrie into the fire with me. She was pleading with me to help her, to stop the pain, but I couldn't. I woke up hearing her screams."
"It was just a dream," she told him. "We are not going to allow anything to happen to you or her."
"Just promise me," he said, swiping angrily at the tears, "that you will make sure Dorrie is kept safe. Promise me that."
"I swear it on my honor as an Amazeen warrioress," she pledged.
He seemed to relax, letting out a long breath. "That is all I can ask, 'Kadia."
Kahmal tucked the envelope he had given her into the pocket of her jumpsuit. "Is there anything else you want me to do?"
"If you make it back to Terra," he said, "you will never be able to return to this side of the megaverse. Your people might well send bounty hunters after you."
"I've no illusions about what may or may not happen to us, Cree," she stated. "My thoughts are, though, we'll be written off. No one will come after us. You don't have to worry about me or my crew."
"We need to destroy the wormhole," Cree said. "If my bloodkin and I do escape and we are able to get to Terra, I don't want to have to be looking over my shoulder for the remainder of my life and have my bloodkin doing the same."
Kahmal nodded. "I can understand that. Perhaps closing the anomaly would be the wisest thing to do."
"As long as it's open, there will always be a chance our enemies will arrive on our doorstep to wreak havoc with our lives. I'd just as soon not have to spend my time looking for tall women in gray sweat suits."
Kahmal grinned. "I rather liked my gray sweats," she said.
He smiled, too, for a moment then the smile slipped from his face. "Even if I don't make it back, I want to make sure it is impossible for anyone from our side of the megaverse to find their way to Terra again. Our people have caused enough pain and sorrow on that world to last a thousand lifetimes."
"There's only one problem."
"What?" he asked.
"I don't think the Terrans have discovered the wormhole, yet, but I don't know that for sure," Kahmal said. "We did encounter that Terran ship near the Vex when we were on our way to Terra to extract you. We came out of the wormhole practically right on top of them. What if they found their way into the anomaly? They'd have no way to get back to Terra if we destroyed it."
The Reaper's eyes narrowed. "What ship was that?"
"It was an all-female crew," she said. "A Terran medivac transport. They were looking for, ah, friends."
"Friends?" he asked.
"Friends," Kahmal said, her eyebrow lifted. Her face reddened.
Cree's forehead wrinkled. "Oh, friends!" He half-smiled.
"Needless to say we weren't interesting in making their acquaintance," Kahmal told him.
"I'm sure the Terrans were very sweet women," he said. "Just a bit lonely."
"Aye, well they can stay lonely," Kahmal quipped.
"Do you remember the name of the ship?"
Kahmal thought about it for a moment. "The Orion, I believe, but I can't be sure."
"Major?" Chanz interrupted, the vid-com clicking on without benefit of a warning chime.
"Aye?"
"You'd better get up here fast. We've got trouble!"
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