Page 31 of Captured By the Dragon Warlord (Fated Mates of the Sarkarnii Warlords #2)

“ S o, let me get this right.” Rosalie furrows her brow. “There’s something in the sectors trying to kill Sarkarnii?”

“Basically, we’re all going to die.” Maggie drops her head back. “I knew it.”

“We are not going to die.” I shake my head. “If nothing else, I don’t think the Sarkarnii would allow it.” I look around my friends. “They’ve already saved us twice.”

“I don’t like being a damsel in distress,” Lydia grumbles.

“None of us do, but until we get our hands on their laser guns, we’re all damsels,” Rosalie says.

“The Sarkarnii will not give you weapons,” Cestapal says.

Everyone looks at her.

“They fear females,” the little Paralnyi says. “They think you will bite them and envenomate them.”

“There are parts of a Sarkarnii I would bite.” Maggie releases a dirty chuckle Sid James would be proud of.

“Bloody hell, Maggie…” Lydia raises her eyes to the ceiling.

“What?” She adopts an air of filthy innocence. “I’ve seen you look too, Lydia .”

“When there are bare bums everywhere , where am I supposed to look, Maggie ?” she retorts.

Maggie grins. “Now you’re getting it,” she says.

Lydia throws a cushion at her head.

Good to see they’re getting on.

“Have any of you seen one of these on your travels?” I hold out the steel-colored tube.

Lydia reaches out for it. I put it in her hand.

“Careful. Apparently it contains something called paraxio. It’s a narcotic which affects the Sarkarnii.”

“I didn’t think anything much affected those big beasts,” Rosalie says. “Save for that horrible alcoholic drink they have.”

“Have you met Lord Dante?” Cestapal splutters. “He’s the very definition of narcotics.”

“Not yet. We only got here in the last few hours. His warriors said he was on a mission.” Lydia shrugs.

“He was in the mines with Dexx and me. He was the one who told us what this is…sort of.” I point to the tube which Lydia is studying.

“I’ve not seen anything like that,” Rosalie says, “but then so much stuff is new, I probably wouldn’t remember.”

“Send a picture to Kerra. Get her to ask Darax,” Maggie suggests, waving her comm device. “These take photos too.”

“They do?”

“Maggie uses it to curate a bum gallery,” Rosalie says with a long suffering sigh.

“It’s going to be my new business venture when we get back to Earth.” Maggie laughs. “A Sarkarnii bum gallery.”

“Good luck with all of that.” I laugh.

“I think…” Lydia is still staring at the tube. “I don’t know, Scarlett. There’s so much scrambling gone on in my brain. Maybe I’ve seen one, maybe not.” She sighs.

“Perhaps I can help,” Cestapal says. “My species has an ability to calm fractious thoughts and help recover memories.”

“Do all raccoons have this ability?” Rosalie stares at Cestapal like she’s grown a second head. “Because if so, I think we should have been told.”

“I am not a rack-oon,” Cestapal says with almost practiced weariness. “I am Paralnyi .”

“You called her a raccoon too, didn’t you?” Maggie says to me in a loud whisper.

I put my hand in her face and push her back against the cushions.

“I’m that fed up with not knowing what’s going on in my brain, I’ll try anything,” Lydia says quietly. “What do you want me to do?”

Cestapal approaches her, puts her little paw on Lydia’s forehead, and she slumps to one side.

“Nice trick,” Maggie says, eyes wide.

“She will sleep now. Her mind is tired, so many walls,” Cestapal says.

“And what did you find out?” I ask.

Because clearly mind reading is perfectly normal in this galaxy, along with turning into dragons and aliens like six foot cockroaches.

“Do it on me.” Rosalie claps her hands.

“I really don’t…” But before I can stop her, Cestapal puts her hand on Rosalie’s forehead. Her eyes close and she rolls down the slope into the bottom of the pit.

“And you?” she asks Maggie.

“Come near me and you’ll discover what humans do to raccoons.” Maggie growls.

Cestapal shrugs her little shoulders.

“About Lydia?” I attempt to bring the conversation back around from violence, given the Sarkarnii already bring enough of it.

“She was a prisoner of a species I’ve never seen, but they were aided by the Veseli and the Madar. It seems she may have seen a cage filled with these devices.”

“So, it’s something to do with the evil professor Kerra saw?” Maggie sits forward. “When we were prisoners of the cockroaches?”

“What do you think it means?” I ask Cestapal.

“The Sarkarnii did this galaxy many favors with their presence,” Cestapal says. “But with power, there are enemies.”

“I can’t imagine there are many species in this galaxy who can take on a Sarkarnii and survive,” Maggie huffs.

My heart swells a little that she feels this way.

“The Veseli and Madar are from this galaxy, but the other creature is not.”

“Do you think something came after the Sarkarnii? Through that wormhole they’re always going on about?” Maggie asks.

“I thought the wormhole had closed behind them, which is why they didn’t go back?”

“The Sarkarnii were unable to return to their galaxy through the anomaly which brought them here,” Cestapal says. “It doesn’t mean others haven’t opened it.”

“But from what Dexx has said to me, he’d do anything to change things back for his crew. He’d go looking for any new wormholes.”

“Kerra says Darax has been monitoring the galaxy for a long time. There are anomalies but nothing which amounts to a wormhole.”

“I wonder,” I say, “if this can be all related somehow, including us ending up here.”

Maggie shrugs. “I’d still like to open the butt gallery, so if you fancy finding out, be my guest. We’re stuck being paraded around like prize chickens for the foreseeable, but you’ve got connections .”

She shoves her left finger back and forth through the loop made by the thumb and finger of her right hand.

“I really, really hope you end up mating with a Sarkarnii, very soon,” I retort.

“Not. A. Chance,” Maggie says emphatically. “I’d rather encounter the cockroaches again.”