Hard Sands: Warlords of Atera Read online

  Hard Sands

  Warlords of Atera

  Celia Kyle

  Contents

  Hard Sands

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Hard Sands

  She may be a gift from the Goddess, but he doesn’t want her. So why can’t he let her go?

  Kalinda got on the Intergalactic Mating Agency’s ship with one destination in mind—a distant space station where she’s to meet her new mail order mate. Nothing in her plans includes crash-landing on a backwards, undiscovered, lizard-alien inhabited sand planet. Roughing it wasn’t what she signed up for and she wants off Atera. Well… maybe after she spends a little time with the Warlord Nakan, first. He’s a sexy, muscular, overwhelming gray-scaled presence that she wouldn’t mind exploring. But when she’s done with him, she’s figuring out a way off this godforsaken planet. She doesn’t belong on Atera no matter what the hottie lizardman may say.

  Nakan does not have time in his life for a mate. With his sire recently deceased, he must care for his tribe and fight off challengers to his position as Warlord of the Hard Sands. A mate? And an alien human female, at that? No, he has other responsibilities that need his attention. Gift from the Goddess or not, Kalinda of Earth is not for him. It does not matter that her curves call to him or that her strange alien form appeals to him in ways no other female ever has and stirs his blood like a true mate.

  Yet Nakan’s denial leaves Kalinda vulnerable. There’s a male who wants everything Nakan holds dear—his position of Warlord, the territory of the Hard Sands, and more important to him than anything else… Kalinda.

  Chapter One

  The ship’s blaring alarms wrenched Kalinda from sleep, throwing her into instant wakefulness and sending adrenaline surging through her veins. The glittering, smooth protective glass of the stasis pod remained in place above her, bio signs flickering across the embedded screen. Through the clear panel, she spied flashing red lights that flickered in time with the high-pitched squeal of the alarms. She wasn’t sure how long she’d been in stasis, but the bright red lights and rhythmic screeching of the alarm told her they hadn’t placidly reached Nyx Station as planned. For some reason the ship had woken her.

  The ship shook and trembled while screams—feminine screams—reached through her closed stasis pod to assault her ears. There were no bellows or deep shouts from the male crew that had been in attendance when they were put under. No announcement or pleas from the captain to remain calm. All she heard were the cries of the other passengers—all women.

  Kalinda pounded on the top of her stasis pod, her screams joining the others when it wouldn’t budge. She kicked and hit the clear cover, demanding to be freed only to find herself still held captive—awake but unable to do anything.

  The ship bounced and jerked, a rumbling roar joining the cries that filtered through the walls of the pod. They’d hit a planet’s atmosphere, turbulence shaking the ship so badly it felt as if it’d tear apart at any moment. Trapped in her stasis pod, there wasn’t a thing she could do but wait. Instincts and training urged her to rush to engineering and help with repairs, restore main power and get the engines back online to help save the falling ship. Maybe stall their free fall.

  But she could do nothing.

  She clung to the inner rails in the pod, holding onto them for dear life. A massive lurch of the ship nearly sent her colliding with the lid, but she tightened her hold on the rails. It was obvious the stasis field had failed and the safety systems were inactive now. She couldn’t imagine how badly the ship must have been damaged for them to go offline.

  One of the other women aboard the IGMA Tranquility shouted orders, doing her best to organize the panicked and injured women. A wave of dizziness overtook her for a moment, the world seeming to spin.

  Was the ship actually spiraling?

  More shouts. More panic. Women became visible through Kalinda’s top as they scrambled and begged for safety—an end to the madness.

  The yells for the crew didn’t last very long. Just until it became evident that the escape pods—and ship’s crew—were long gone.

  Abandoned. A sick feeling churned in Kalinda’s stomach. Utterly abandoned.

  Unable to escape or find safety, the others retreated to their stasis pods, climbing inside and pulling them shut as if they’d protect them during the crash. Kalinda clung to the sides of hers and gritted her teeth, squeezing her eyes shut as they drew closer and closer to the ground below. Until the ship finally struck the planet’s surface. Bruises formed on her pale skin as she bounced within the stasis pod. She screamed and cried, helpless in the darkness with no way out. No one to save her. A small voice in the back of her mind wished for a fairy tale rescue—a warrior in shining armor to save her as the ship tumbled across the ground, completely out of control.

  In the aftermath, the women explored the broken remains of the ship. One of the others—Sheri—asked Kalinda if she could open the hatch and Kalinda was thankful she could put her engineering experience to some use. She flipped up the access panel next to the hatch, bypassed the controls, and then both pushed, using their weight and strength to force the portal wide. Pale sand spilled in through the crack and a peek out the door revealed an endless expanse of white.

  And the lack of the rest of their ship. Half had been completely torn away as they’d tumbled into the alien planet’s atmosphere.

  Scorching heat burned through the open hatch. Dry air made Kalinda cough and choke. Twin suns blazed from above, practically cooking them with the high temperatures. Kalinda’s vision blurred, the brightness blinding her. There was a flash of white light and then—

  * * *

  Their first night on an alien world and Kalinda couldn’t get comfortable, lying under a makeshift tent propped against the side of their crashed ship. The others slept all around her, exhausted from the crash and their attempt to gather food, water, and supplies necessary to their survival. Some held out hope that they would soon be rescued but Kalinda knew better. She had examined the wrecked hull of their ship and the communications equipment that remained. There was no chance of getting a message out—a call for help. Even with her skills, there were no supplies on hand that she could use to build something from scratch.

  Kalinda stirred on her pallet, the sense of being watched drifting over her in a gentle wave. Just one of the other women… That was her first thought anyway. Then a cool breath bathed her face. Cool, not warm like she expected from another human. She opened her eyes and there—leaning over her and overtaking her vision—a hulking gray-skinned alien with a reptilian face and pale gray scales. The alien was naked except for leather straps and belts that crisscrossed his body, weapons dangling from each one. He leered at her, his gray eyes roaming over her body from head to foot and back again, and she shuddered beneath his stare.

  Claw-tipped fingers grabbed at her, wrapping around her arms, and she screamed. She kicked and twisted in his grasp, fighting to be free of the lizard-like alien, but he held fast. He pinned her to his chest and pressed his blunt,
lipless mouth to her neck. Something cool rubbed her skin and she shuddered, imagining what touched her and hating every option her mind conjured. She cringed and snapped her eyes closed, still struggling for freedom, but the beast refused to release her.

  At twice her size, she wasn’t surprised that he held her with ease. Trying to fight this being off was like a bird attempting to escape a crocodile’s jaws. The alien’s scales scraped and rasped against her skin while his claws dug into her pale flesh. At any moment he could rip out her throat and spill her blood on the cold, pale sands, and no one could save her. A glance around the area proved the futility of attempting to gain her freedom. Kalinda wasn’t the only one held captive by a lizard beast.

  A strange voice sounded in the darkness, guttural rumblings coming out of the darkness and forming words she couldn’t understand. Someone snatched her attacker and hauled her from his arms. She tumbled to the ground and then scrambled backward until she felt the hard hull of the ship at her back. Then she froze in place, unwilling to take her attention off the one who held her prisoner only moments ago. In front of her, two gray-scaled aliens shouted foreign words at each other. Even her TransComm Implant couldn’t decipher the words. She didn’t understand anything they said, but based on the tone and aggressive postures, they argued with rising heat. One even drew his sword and held the other at bay with the sharpened blade.

  More reptilian aliens appeared, some covered in red or brown scales intermingled with those with gray scales. The red aliens pulled the gray aliens away from the group of humans. Some brandished weapons and shouted in threatening tones. The threats didn’t faze some of the gray lizardmen.

  Then another strode into the group, taller and more muscular than all the others. He stood rigid and raised his chin as he stared down at them—shouting in a commanding tone. The other gray aliens shrank back and lowered their heads, weapons quickly sheathed.

  The tall, commanding alien looked at Kalinda and her breath caught in her throat. There was something exotic—thrilling—about his slitted eyes. It was strange and alluring at the same time. Kalinda had never been more frightened in her life, but at the same time, this strange creature drew her. Drew her heart. Drew her soul. If only…

  * * *

  Kalinda woke with a start, a small hand gripping her shoulder and nudging her. A yelp escaped her lips before she could silence the sound and she jolted upright, arms held in front of her. Her breathing came in sharp gasps and adrenaline rushed through her body, surging in her veins to consume her. She quickly scanned her surroundings and soon relaxed.

  “Are you all right?” Ivy—one of the women from the ship—backed away from her. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

  Kalinda looked to her friend and released a relieved sigh. She took one breath and then another, searching for a calm that seemed just out of reach after her nightmare. She placed a hand over her heart and willed it to slow. “It… it was nothing.” She shook her head, banishing the lingering effects of sleep. “Just a bad dream.”

  Ivy grimaced and nodded. “I’ve had my share of those.”

  Kalinda closed her eyes and focused on her rapid heartbeat, hating that it continued to race out of control. She’d been dreaming of their arrival and first night on this alien world. At the time, she’d known nothing about the strange aliens or the new world they inhabited. It’d been a true living nightmare filled with frightening beasts that could have torn her apart at any moment. She was fortunate that she hadn’t been harmed but that didn’t dissolve the niggling fear at the back of her mind that told her she wasn’t safe just yet.

  But at least she understood them now. Since their arrival on the alien world—Atera—her TransComm Implant had finally translated the language. It’d allowed her to gradually learn more and more about them. The Aterans all lived within three territories on their desert planet, each territory led by a warlord. As far as Kalinda could tell, each warlord reigned supreme within his lands. Though from bits of conversation she picked up here and there, it seemed there were political intricacies she couldn’t begin to understand. There weren’t any elections or a system of democratic government, but there were subtle undercurrents that she sensed just beneath the surface. For the most part, though, their new alien “friends” were all warriors. Leadership appeared to be determined by strength and might with the strongest ruling them all.

  “Well, if you can shake off your nightmare,” Ivy murmured. “They’re calling us to breakfast.”

  Kalinda peeked out of the window of the small stone hewn building they’d been given. For the first few days, they’d traveled north across the searing desert. She’d been brought to the Hard Sands along with seven other human women from their crashed ship. The others from the IGMA Tranquility—nearly twenty more—had been separated from them and taken in different directions. With no communication equipment and no way to get a message to the other women, she’d had no contact with them from that point. The Aterans informed her the others were taken to the Red Sands and Living Sands, the other two territories on Atera.

  She’d been assured the women were being well-treated and cared for, but she had her doubts. They were at the mercy of the reptilian aliens. They could abuse the others and there wasn’t a damned thing she could do about their actions. They were at the mercy of the aliens’ kindness and who knew if they even held themselves to morals similar to humans.

  At first, she’d thought they had no technology, and she could have handled their lack of advancement. They had swords instead of blasters and rode animals for transportation instead of shuttles. In their early days, they’d slept in tents during their journey across the desert. It wasn’t until they reached the edge of the northern territory, the Hard Sands, that she’d been shown the truth. She’d been taken into a tunnel where a sleek underground hovertrain had carried them for the rest of their journey. It seemed the Aterans were very advanced but were forbidden to use technology in some areas due to their religious beliefs that she didn’t quite understand.

  Now, in their temporary quarters, there was no sign of advanced technology at all. The furnishings consisted of wooden chairs, tables, and cabinets, and the storage niches were carved directly into the stone walls. There were no electronics, televisions, refrigerators, or anything else to indicate modern society. If she hadn’t already seen the underground trains, Kalinda would have been certain they had a society similar to the medieval times of Earth.

  Gaze still focused outside, she let her attention sweep her surroundings though nothing had changed since the first day they’d arrived. They remained in their mountainous region, surrounded by an endless expanse of hard-packed gray sands, reminding Kalinda of the Mojave region on Earth. The building they stayed in was perched high on the mountainside, carved out of the rock wall. More buildings stretched above and below them on the rocky slopes. Further below them, the hard-packed sands stretched out far into the distance. A few roads led off in different directions, alien hovercraft gliding over the paths. Though the hovercraft were an uncommon sight, with many Aterans riding large, hairy herd beasts called ceaq as they made their way around the city.

  “It looks like a sandstorm is coming.” Kalinda looked out over the horizon. The sky darkened in that direction. The Aterans had warned them about sandstorms and told them not to venture outdoors when one struck.

  “I guess we’ll take the tunnel then.” Ivy gestured toward the back of the building.

  At the rear, a naturally formed tunnel led deeper into the mountain. When they’d been brought to the Hard Sands, the Aterans told them to stay out of the deeper tunnels for their own safety. The tunnels twisted and turned throughout the mountains that led deeper and deeper into the earth. They’d been given free access to the local branches between their dwelling and the central communal areas, leaving all else off limits.

  Kalinda and Ivy headed that way, following the alien markings on the tunnel walls that led them west—a short distance to the main cavern. The pathway was lit by
overhead lighting—the only sign of technology within the mountain itself—but only in the main tunnel. Many of the side tunnels were dark, and she’d spied the lizard-like aliens carrying lanterns when they ventured deeper into the cave system.

  Kalinda stared at the electric lights, still wondering why they were used in the central hallway but nowhere else. At least they appeared to be electric at first glance—white bulbs or crystals that shone with a steady glow—though she couldn’t see a sign of any power source. She made a mental note of the mystery, her engineering curiosity getting the better of her, but there was nothing she could do to investigate now.

  She followed the main tunnel toward the dining hall, passing a number of the unmarked and unlit branches that led deeper into the mountain. Many appeared too narrow to comfortably fit a larger Ateran. Some were clearly hand-carved passages, dug out by the aliens to connect various parts of the mountain city. Then there were others that looked like untouched, natural chasms.

  “Where do you think this leads?” Kalinda paused to peer down one of the passages. The darkness only allowed her to see a short distance though it looked like there was a sharp drop not far down the tunnel. The quiet trickle of water reached her, its softness telling her how far away the liquid dripped. She assumed there was a water source somewhere in the mountains, and that was likely why the Aterans had selected the area for their settlement.