Page 30 of Gladiators of the Vagabond Boxset

Abigail

He was hurt again! I couldn’t stand seeing that awful Frek hurting the guys in the cells like this, especially not Ziame. I knew I had done something stupid when I tried to defend him, drawing attention to the fact that I was not scared of him—that I cared.

When he started to collapse, I had only a short moment to panic, and then he was on top of me.

We fell to the hard floor like a ton of bricks; I expected that to hurt a lot.

I practically saw my life flashing before my eyes.

Ziame had to outweigh me at least three times, I was going to get crushed!

That is, if he didn’t poke an eye out with one of his horns or spikes.

Somehow, my head landed softly on his arm, and I managed to get my hands between us to push at him.

He didn’t budge, of course, far too heavy.

I barely heard Frek when he said something; instead, I focused on how I felt.

Was I really in one piece, with nary a bruise on me?

Oh, wait, had Ziame just shifted his weight?

Ziame’s arm cradled my head, my face was in his throat, and his legs were on the outsides of mine. One long arm stretched out above my head, his bicep brushing my hair. He didn’t feel heavy at all; I should be crushed, but I most definitely wasn’t.

As Frek shifted his attention to the male who looked like a gargoyle, I tucked my face close to Ziame’s throat.

He smelled so damn good, spicy and familiar.

Already, the scent symbolized safety to me, and I was certain that if I could bottle it and sell it on Earth as cologne, I’d make a fortune.

It was so damn good, especially pressed up close like this.

I didn’t miss the fact that, finally, after a long, interminable day of shivering from the cold on that cot, I was at last toasty warm.

His scales felt warm where I touched them, and with his entire body engulfing mine, it was like I had my own personal heated blanket—maybe a little heavier than I liked, but not all that uncomfortable.

The Krektar finally left the cellblock, and I took a chance and whispered very softly against Ziame’s throat, “Are you awake?” There was no way he was this light—he was propping himself up somehow—but he was doing an admirable job making it look like he’d passed out.

My suspicion was confirmed when I felt his muscles tense a little beneath my fingers. “I am, my Abigail.” His whisper was even softer than mine, and it sent a little shiver down my spine, goosebumps breaking out where his breath coasted across my skin.

“Did you fake fainting?” I poked at him, and now there was the softest little growl. It sent a shudder of relief through me; that growl meant he was all right—he hadn’t suffered any bad repercussions from that shock collar.

“I did not! I faked losing consciousness.” I laughed quietly. Of course, males the universe over were sensitive about such things. That kind of normal thing made me feel like he wasn’t nearly as alien as he looked. “Well, can you get up now?”

There was a brief pause, and I listened to the background noise of the males in the cell block as they argued.

They were debating the merits of killing the guards one by one, the way Ziame and Sunder had done.

“Not yet, little one. It needs to look real.” Oh well, I wasn’t really complaining. I happened to like being warm at last.

“Are you alright?” I asked him, aware he’d just suffered through a hell of a lot of pain. “Why did you do that?” I didn’t want him to take risks like this. He was my only protection in here; if he got himself killed, I didn’t know what would happen to me.

“Fine, I am tough. Don’t worry.” He shifted his head a little so that his face was angled more my way; it was now pressed into my wild mess of curls.

I heard him sniff, and I inwardly cringed.

Without a shower for God knows how long, I doubted I smelled as nice as he did.

“We need to whittle down as many guards as we can before we try to escape. That is why.”

Oh, that made sense. He’d caused the death of three guards since I’d gotten here, which took the number down considerably. It was, it seemed, the same thing the other males were now debating. “Twelve left, then, plus two confined to bed rest who are still injured from the fight with the pirates.”

Ziame didn’t immediately respond to my statement, but I could feel the tension radiating from his body. “How do you know?” he asked, and I felt a stab of hurt at his suspicious tone.

“I asked the doctor, who’s a slave too, by the way.” I recalled the eager way he’d shared what he’d known with me, how his creepy eyes had gleamed with excitement. I was certain the doctor was on our side when we staged our escape—if we even got the chance.

“The doctor touched you again!” Now he sounded angry, and it finally made him move.

He flowed to his feet, let out an angry roaring sound, and shook his head so that one of his horns rattled against the bars to his side.

I remained frozen on the floor, and he leaned in suddenly, picked me up with his huge hands, and then retreated with me into the darkness surrounding our cot.

The cell block had descended into silence at his outburst, so everyone could hear me when I said indignantly, “Don’t manhandle me, you big jerk! The Doc only checked if I was hurt. Like I said, he’s as much a slave as any of us here!”

Ziame huffed loudly as if he didn’t believe me. “He put translators in your ears without sedation? It’s barbaric!” His anger on my behalf was kind of nice, but it was beside the point.

“He didn’t have a choice!” I yelled back, sitting up on my knees on the cot and planting my hands on my hips as I squared off with him in the dark. A surge of adrenaline filled me, but I wasn’t scared at all. It was a little exhilarating.

“He talks?” someone asked, and then someone else said, “Go female!” “Did you know he could talk?” “What arcane magic is this?” demanded a last voice, and then Ziame let out another loud roar that had me clamping my hands over my ears and silenced all the gladiators.

“I could always talk,” he huffed in a pissed-off voice, and I heard something click; then two thin tendrils of fire curled away from his face, lighting up his angry countenance for a moment.

He cast me a narrow-eyed look and then started pacing in the dark.

His tail swished into the light at the front of the cell with each pass, the spikes flared up.

Then, there was a loud sigh, as if he were surrendering to the inevitable. “I was just biding my time,” he explained to the stunned gladiators, who had all gathered at the front of their cells to catch a glimpse of him.

“How is this possible?” asked a male standing two cells over. It was the one who closely resembled a fox on two legs. “You’ve been faking a lack of intellect all this time?” He sounded incredulous and slightly offended.

“Hey, watch your tone!” I snapped, offended on Ziame’s behalf that this male had thought so little of him.

A wicked grin spread across the fox’s face, followed by a round of chuckles from the other males.

Heat scorched my face. I was unsure how to respond to any of this, but I sure knew I didn’t like that they’d thought so lowly of him.

“Abigail,” Ziame said with a sigh, “that is what I wanted him to think. It means I did it well.” I knew that; didn’t mean I liked it.

The gargoyle male had rolled to his feet and flared out his huge bat-like wings. “I had a feeling. I met one of your kind once,” he said in that heavy baritone. His voice sounded much like rock grinding together. “You have a plan to get your female out?”

My eyebrows shot up. I’d heard how Ziame had been referring to me as his, and I’d noticed some of the other males say it, but it hadn’t sunk in until this statement.

Then, to think that that gargoyle male was talking of escape solely for me, as if that was the primary concern… That was strange and oddly flattering.

“I have a plan,” Ziame said simply. Then, his green gaze shot to the immobile body of the blue-haired, cannibal creature.

No, wait—I suppose it wasn’t cannibalism, as they weren’t the same species.

It just seemed really wrong, as the Krektar were sentient, even if they were cruel and horrible slavers.

When Ziame focused on me in the semi-gloom, I could only see the outline of his huge, horned head and the glow of his green eyes.

“Abigail found out the number of Krektar left.” When he didn’t elaborate, I realized he wanted me to share the numbers myself.

I rose to my feet, feeling better when I stood at my full height—and then some—on my stilettos.

“Twelve, and two injured, confined to bed rest,” I said, and then I added, “The doctor can remove the collars, circumventing the tamper-proofing, but it takes time—time we won’t have when escaping.” There was some muttering and one voice claiming that made things impossible.

Ziame shushed them all just by making a soft growling noise. Instantly, all eyes came back to him, drawing the attention of the other males. “We get our hands on one pain controller, and one of us can keep countermanding their orders. We can keep fighting.”

That sounded like a worst-case plan—to risk getting disabled in a fight over and over? But this seemed to cheer up the fox-like male. “That sounds doable. Let’s all think about it. We can surprise the two guards in the gym easily.”

There was some more talk then, but Ziame didn’t mingle further. Instead, he returned to where I was standing next to the cot. “Take off your stilts and sit down. We should eat and then sleep.”

I gaped at him in the dark. “Stilts?” Then I had to laugh as I touched the long, pointed heel on one of my stilettos. “Stilts” was apt, I supposed.