Page 15 of Hunted By Khor (Alien Mate Hunt #1)

T hey've been following us since dawn. Not trying to hide anymore, just maintaining distance. Vek leads, his green scales catching the early light. Two others flank him. The yellow male from yesterday and someone new, blue-black scales that shift like oil on water.

“More now.” Khor doesn't look back, but his spines twitch with each sound they make. “Young hunters grow brave in numbers.”

“Will they attack?”

“Not yet. Waiting for opportunity. For me to be distracted or weakened.” His tail sweeps the ground, erasing our tracks even though it's pointless. They can smell us. “Crater harvest provides both.”

The landscape changes abruptly. Red sand gives way to black glass, volcanic rock that looks melted and reformed a thousand times. Each step requires careful placement. The edges are sharp enough to slice through what's left of my boots. My feet will be bleeding soon.

Ahead, the horizon shows a column of smoke or steam rising straight up. No wind to disperse it. The crater. Still a day away, but its presence dominates everything.

“Stop.” Khor kneels beside a formation of yellow-white clusters growing from cracks in the volcanic glass. “Sulfur crystals. Beautiful and toxic.”

The crystals are perfect geometric shapes, almost architectural in their precision. They smell like rotten eggs mixed with something medicinal.

“Touch them and lose sight. Temporary if lucky. Permanent if not.” He uses his blade to indicate how they grow. “Powder from crushing them burns worse. Thrown in eyes, causes blindness and pain that makes victims claw their own faces.”

“Useful information.”

“Educational purpose only.” But his eyes track where my hands go as I pretend to adjust my pack. “Of course.”

While he checks our path ahead, I break off three crystal clusters using fabric to protect my hands. They're lighter than expected, brittle. Easy to crush into powder. I wrap them carefully, separately, and tuck them deep in my pack where they won't break accidentally.

The volcanic rock gets worse as we climb. Not a mountain, more like waves of frozen lava creating ridges and valleys. Some places the rock is smooth as mirrors. Others are nothing but razored edges. My feet are definitely bleeding now. I can feel the wetness in what's left of my boots.

“Here.” Khor stops at a particular formation. The rock here is different. Pure black, almost purple in direct light. “Obsidian. Sharper than your Earth steel. Sharper than anything except molecular edges.”

He demonstrates, using a piece to slice through leather like it's air. The edge is so fine I can't actually see it, just the line where light bends wrong.

“Warriors used to make weapons from this. Before metal working. Before civilization.” He hands me a piece, carefully. “Can cut through scale. Through bone. Through almost anything if applied correctly.”

The obsidian feels wrong in my hand. Too light for its size. Too sharp for safety. I wrap several pieces in layers of torn fabric, then leather over that. If they cut through the wrapping, they'll cut through me.

“Your feet are leaving blood trails.”

“I noticed.”

“Vek will notice too. Blood scent carries far here.” He looks back at our followers, still maintaining their careful distance. “Need to tend them.”

Khor makes me sit, removes what's left of my boots. The damage is worse than I thought. Multiple deep cuts, some to bone. The blood is steady, not pumping, but enough to leave clear trails.

He works without gentleness, cleaning wounds with something that burns worse than the cuts themselves. Then a paste that smells like the sulfur crystals but darker. The bleeding stops immediately. The pain doesn't.

“Will scar.”

“Everything scars here.”

“Yes. But these will be your first true Pyraxian scars. Marks that say you survived the volcanic fields.” His thumb traces one particularly deep cut. “Valuable.”

A sound from above makes us both freeze. Not our followers. Something else. A chittering like insects but wronger. Wet somehow.

“Down. Silent. Now.”

I press myself into the rocks as something passes overhead. The shadow it casts is wrong. Too many limbs. Moving in ways that hurt to track. The chittering gets louder, then fades as it moves toward the crater.

“Sketh-kar. Heading home after hunting.” Khor stays still for another full minute before moving. “Means we're close. Also means they're active. Not good.”

“I thought they stayed near the crater.”

“Usually. But mating season makes them range farther. Hunger drives them out.” He helps me stand, tests my weight on the damaged feet. “Can you walk?”

“Do I have a choice?”

“Always have choices. Could carry you.”

“And give Vek the perfect opportunity? No.”

We continue, slower now with my damaged feet. The obsidian fields give way to something worse. The ground here is covered in what looks like glass spheres, each one the size of my fist. They crunch under our weight, releasing puffs of metallic-smelling gas.

“Volcanic pearls. Step carefully. The gas is...”

A scream cuts him off. Behind us, one of Vek's companions has stepped wrong. The yellow-scaled male is on his knees, clawing at his throat. The gas from multiple broken spheres surrounds him in a cloud that glitters in the light.

“Stupid youth.” Khor watches without sympathy. “Gas causes throat to close. Not fatal if calm. Very fatal if panicked.”

The yellow male is definitely panicked. His companions try to help, but that just breaks more spheres. Soon all three are coughing, stumbling back the way they came.

“Will they die?”

“No. But they'll be careful now. Maybe.” We keep moving. “Or maybe they'll do something stupider. Young hunters usually choose stupider.”

The sun reaches its peak when we encounter the other pair.

They're resting in the shade of a rock formation that looks like frozen splash patterns.

The male is huge, bigger than Khor, with grey-green scales that have a sickly sheen.

The female is human, or was. Her transformation has gone differently than mine or Senna's.

Where Senna had patches of scales, this female has.

.. wrong skin. It looks melted in places, reformed. Her eyes are blank, staring at nothing.

“Gresh.” Khor's voice is carefully neutral.

“Khor. Traveling to harvest?” The grey male doesn't stand, doesn't acknowledge me except for his nostrils flaring. “Dangerous time for it.”

“Payment is due.”

“Yes. Always payments. Always demands.” Gresh pulls his female closer, and she doesn't react. Doesn't even blink. “This one's payment was particularly difficult. Three vials required. Took four attempts.”

I can see why. The female has scars everywhere. Not battle scars. Harvest scars. She's been used as bait or distraction repeatedly. The blank look makes sense now. Her mind has gone somewhere else to survive.

“Your female is not bonded.” Gresh says it like an observation, but his interest is obvious. “Pretty. Intact. Responsive?”

“Very responsive.” Khor's hand finds my hip, pulls me against him. “Violent too. Already blooded three who tried to take her.”

That's an exaggeration, but Gresh doesn't know that.

“Violent ones survive longer. Mine was violent once.” He touches his female's face, and she doesn't react. “Now she's perfectly docile. Took six cycles but worth it.”

Six cycles. Years of whatever he did to break her mind that thoroughly. My hand finds the wrapped obsidian in my pack.

“We need to continue.” Khor's voice suggests this conversation is over.

“To the crater? Today? Bold. The Sketh-kar were singing last night. Means they're building to frenzy peak.” Gresh stands, his female moving when he tugs her leash. An actual leash around her throat. “We'll wait. Safer to harvest after frenzy, when they're exhausted.”

“Some of us are strong enough to harvest during.”

It's a calculated insult. Gresh's scales shift to threat colors, but he doesn't pursue it. Just laughs, the sound like grinding stone.

“Strong. Yes. We'll see who returns with vials and who returns as meat.” He pulls his female past us. She moves like a puppet, no will of her own. As she passes, her eyes focus on me for just a second. There's something in them. Not blank. Calculating. Waiting.

She's not as broken as she pretends.

When they're gone, I release a breath I didn't know I was holding.

“That's what happens? To females who stay?”

“That's what happens with some males. Not all. Not me.” He starts walking again, faster now. “Gresh believes in breaking. I believe in choosing. Different approaches.”

“But the result is the same. Owned females.”

“Result is never the same. She survives. You live.”

The distinction shouldn't matter but does. I think of Senna, bitter but vital. This female, pretending to be broken while she waits. And me, collecting weapons while my body craves its owner.

We find the lava tube cave as the sun sets. It's a perfect natural shelter, carved by ancient magma flows. The walls are smooth, glassy, and retain heat from the day. Too much heat. Within minutes I'm sweating through my torn clothes.

“Strip.”

“It's too hot for sex.”

“Temperature is perfect for sex. But that's not why. Need to check for crystal powder, pearl gas residue. Either could kill you in sleep.”

He's thorough, checking every inch of skin, using more of that burning liquid on cuts I didn't know I had. His touch is clinical until it isn't. Until his hands linger on the inside of my thighs, his thumb brushing where I'm wet despite everything.

“Always ready. Even after walking volcanic hell. Even after seeing Gresh's female.” His breeding cock emerges, already dripping. “Tonic ensures you want breeding no matter what.”

“I hate that you're right.”

“No. You hate that your mind and body disagree. But here's secret: they don't.” He pulls me onto his lap, my back to his chest. “Your mind chose to enter portal. Chose to save sister. Body just makes that choice bearable.”

The position lets him go deep, deeper than usual. I can feel him at my cervix, that pressure that's almost pain but transforms into something else.

“The stone formations are cracking wrong.” His voice is conversational despite being buried inside me. “Have you noticed?”

“Hard to... fuck... hard to notice anything with you inside me.”

“Try. Important to see.” He rocks up, hitting something that makes lights explode behind my eyes. “The cracks follow patterns. Like something underneath is pushing up. Or pulling down.”

Another thrust, another explosion of sensation. But he's right. I saw it earlier. Cracks that spiral. That follow mathematical patterns instead of random breaks.

“Started same time as water disappearing. Connected symptoms.” He speeds up, his knot beginning to swell. “Planet is sick. Maybe dying.”

“Why... why tell me this now?”

“Because when you're full of me, defenses drop. Truth easier to hear.” The knot catches, locks. “The Consortium knows. Keeps taking payment anyway. Maybe taking payment is why planet fails.”

I come around his knot, clenching so hard it hurts. He follows, flooding me with heat that makes the cave's temperature seem cold. We're locked, listening to things howl outside. Not Skarrathi. Something else. The Sketh-kar Gresh mentioned, singing their mating madness.

“Vek is close.” I can smell him even over our sex scents. “Twenty feet maybe.”

“Let him watch. Let him see you claimed and filled.” Khor's teeth graze my neck. “Tomorrow is dangerous. If something happens...”

“You'll be fine.”

“If something happens,” he continues, “run for the ridge we passed. The one with three peaks. Can defend there until another hunter comes.”

“I don't want another hunter.”

“Want doesn't matter if I'm dead.”

His knot pulses, releasing more seed. We stay locked as full dark falls. The cave provides shelter but not safety. Outside, Vek waits. The Sketh-kar sing. The planet cracks wrong.

Inside, I'm full of an alien who bought me, breeds me, and might die tomorrow trying to pay for the privilege. My pack holds weapons that might save me or doom me. My body carries his seed that might be taking root.

Twenty-two days until the portal.

Twenty-two days to pretend any of us survive this intact.

The stone beneath us cracks. A perfect spiral, like something calculated it.

Khor is right. The planet is dying.

Maybe we all are.