Page 1 of Fifth (Intergalactic Warriors #5)
FIFTH HAD been told Earth was dangerous. He had not expected its danger to stink of weakness.
The slavers reeked of rust, sweat, smoke, and sour drink, yet strutted with the false swagger of predators who believed themselves untouchable.
They thought they were strong. They laughed when they saw him—tall, broad, silent in the shadows of their crude camp—as if he were a spectacle instead of a threat.
He’d learned of them only recently, overhearing traders whisper about a black-market ring that trafficked in humans.
Believing this was the way to claim a bride, as his brothers had, he descended to Earth and walked into their camp prepared to order one as if it were custom. To him, it seemed the properway.
The slavers had dealt with off-worlders before, though rarely. Smuggling and ruthlessness had made them bold enough to trade beyond Earth’s borders. His presence startled them, but it didn’t scatter them. They knew enough to recognize profit when they sawit.
But they’d never dealt with one likehim.
Armor lay close to his skin—flexible weave that drank the torchlight—yet he wore no helmet, no cloak.
Let them see what came for them. White hair cut close to the skull.
Amethyst eyes that didn’t blink when guns leveled.
The subtle ridges at his temples that marked his position as Fifth, his unit’s Enforcer.
He stood like a drop-shuttle buried in rock: immovable, patient, humming with restrained force.
He remembered his brothers’ first meetings with their human mates—Third’s woman laughing in defiance, Fourth’s cursing, First’s mate stepping through the chaos of a battlefield to lay her hand on him, claiming both the warrior and the wreckage as hers.
He remembered the sharp bite of envy when his own Final Flight had been stripped away and he had no mate.
That ache echoed now as he stood in the filth of the slavers’ camp, knowing he wouldn’t leave until he'd found what they had found.
“Freak wants a bride,” their scarred leader sneered, spitting into the dirt.
The camp froze, then erupted. Men barked out laughter, some in disbelief, others gaping that an alien giant would ask for something so absurd.
“Says that’s why he came down here. Straight from the stars to pick himself a little human wife. ”
The others roared. Weapons slapped thighs, chains rattled in rhythm, avicious cadence they’d performed a thousand times.
Some pointed as if he were a sideshow oddity.
Others pretended boredom but shifted their weight toward exits, the bodies of men who thought they were safe trying to find new angles of escape.
Locus let the sound roll past him. Their words meant nothing. His purpose burned.
He thought of his brothers in Alpha Unit—First, Second, Third, and Fourth—each bound to human women who had altered them, steadying their strength and giving them purpose beyond battle.
He craved the same bond. Amate. Human. He had convinced himself this brutal marketplace was the path, that claiming one would bring him what his brothers had found.
So he endured the taunts and stench, determined to leave with a bride.
What mattered was the line of females they dragged into thering.
Ten of them. Different shapes, different scents, wrists bound, herded like cattle. Some stumbled. Some wept. Afew cursed. Fear thickened the air, metallic and sharp. They had heard of monsters. Now they saw one. Shock rippled—gasps, flinches, eyes wide with horror.
And then—
Her .
The one who didn’t cry. Didn’t beg. Didn’t lower hergaze.
Hannah.
A guard whispered her name, and it struck him harder than a shout.
She stood near the end, chin tilted, shoulders stiff as armor.
Pale skin, pulse racing, blue-gray eyes steady, scanning weapons, exits, men.
When her gaze landed on him, she faltered as though struck.
Her body jolted, eyes widening, lips parting on a breath she couldn’t quite catch.
Terror and awe twined in her scent, disbelief sharpening her features.
Ahuman confronted with the impossible—an alien towering beforeher.
He didn’t look away, but absorbed every flicker of her reaction. Andknew.
This one.
Memory pricked him. His brothers’ lives had pivoted on moments like this, on a look, abreath, aheartbeat that chose. He had thought himself past all that—flightless, futureless—but the sight of Hannah cracked something stubborn inside him that still knew how towant.
He stepped forward before thought, ignoring the rifle butt slammed into his side, and pointed. “I choose her.”
The camp erupted. “That one? She’ll burn you alive.”
“Pick a softer one.”
“Take the blonde—she won’t fight you.”
“Bet he doesn’t make it past dawn.”
“Bet she kills him first.” Laughter tangled with wagers.
His hand didn’t waver. “I choose her,” he repeated.
With a shrug, they shoved her forward. She stumbled, caught herself, and then drew herself up again, defiance sharpening every fragile line.
Midnight hair spilled loose down her back, the torn dress clinging in tatters that bared more than it concealed.
Abruise shadowed one knee, rope burns scoring her wrists.
Fear and fury mingled across her face, the collision of weakness and will.
Hunger stirred in him at the sight of her—fragile, unyielding, acontradiction more dangerous than any blade.
Ropes still bound her wrists when she reached him.
Her scent struck him next, sting of tears, iron of blood, faint floral beneath, the lighter sweetness of some earth-fruit caught in her hair.
Adrenaline surged through her veins. Areflex jolted through him, setting every nerve alight until his skin tingled with heat.
Hunger rose, sharp and undeniable. She was small, delicate-boned, yet the curve of her body ignited something far more dangerous than simple possession—an aching, relentlessneed.
Her breath quickened, though her gaze remained steady, fixed on him as if searching the lines of his alien face for answers buried deep withinbone.
“You’re not like them,” she whispered.
“I am not.” His voice came low, even, the register he used to calm terrified recruits on a shot-up transport.
“What are you?”
“I am Fifth.” A pause. “My brothers call me Locus.”
She studied him, suspicion sharp as a blade. He caught the scent of her fear, metallic and raw, and heard the hammer of her pulse beneath it. Still her gaze never paused, always moving, measuring, calculating. Each breath was survival, each line of her body threaded with defiance.
Her gaze catalogued him—short white hair catching light, amethyst eyes glowing, pointed ears, inverted brows marking him Vettian. She drank him in with disbelief. He endured it, certainty hardening in his blood.
This one.
The scarred leader cut the rope at her wrists and shoved her forward into him.
She struck his chest and stiffened, bracing for pain, but his arm came around her swiftly and held her steady.
Her heartbeat thundered against him, wild and irregular, while heat spread beneath his palm at her hip.
She was soft, curved, perilous, whereas his kind were forged for war, not gentleness.
And yet this fragile resistance unsettled his control more than any weapon could.
He lowered his mouth to her ear. “You are mine now.”
She shuddered. “Like hell I am.”
Laughter roared around them, achorus of men certain she would break. The sound battered against him, but he refused to believe it. She wouldn’t shatter. Not with him holdingher.
This was no mistake. It was the first step onto a path he had chosen.
And it was only the beginning.
He didn’t release her when the slavers scorned and shoved them onward, their insults following like snapping dogs.
Floodlights burned white cones across the packed dirt.
Generators coughed. Smoke trailed up from oil-drums turned to fire pits.
He counted weapons—eight rifles, three pistols, knives everywhere.
Two lookout towers stitched to scaffolding.
Afence with sensors he didn’t recognize, all cheap, all loud.
The camp was a wound that the night couldn’t scab over.
She stayed pressed against his side, rigid as a braced spar. He carried the certainty of his choice forward with each step, deeper into the reek of smoke and cruelty. When she tried to pull away once, twice, he didn’t tighten, didn’t hurt her. He simply refused to let hergo.
Finally, she hissed up at him under her breath, voice sharp despite the tremor in it. “If you think I’m just going to follow you quietly, you’re insane.”
“You will follow. Quietly.”
“You don’t own me.”
His chest tightened. Ownership was wrong. What was true was the drive carved into his bones. She was his to protect. His to free from these slavers. His to keep alive.
“I claimed you,” he corrected. “There is a difference.”
She blinked, startled, then gave a bitter little laugh. “Yeah, well, you’ll have to forgive me if I don’t see the difference. These men are slavers—they sell women like me.” Her voice shook, but she forced the words out. “Until you pay for me, I’m not yours at all.”
He studied her closely, tone flat and certain. “Until I pay, you are correct. You are not mine to claim.” He didn’t miss the hitch of relief that cut through her fear, or the anger that chased it. She didn’t want any version of belonging. Notyet.
Her chin lifted, eyes sparking with both dread and curiosity. “And if you do? If you buy me?”
His grip firmed around her waist. “Then you belong with me, and I will keep you safe. No one else will ever touch you again.” He didn’t add the rest, that safety and belonging weren’t the same thing, that he’d learned the hard way how different those words tasted in the mouth.