{Desert Fortress | Hours Later}
The brunette whimpered and trembled. Nox cradled her body to him on his proxy throne for Earth. His fangs were buried deep in her throat. He’d dosed her with extra hemoglobin and allowed the wound to clot, drawing out his pleasure. And adding a little kick. Her bright blue eyes were wide as tears spilled from them.
“Say it again, and I’ll give you more time,” Nox promised. He chafed the black ribbons tied along her arms. She’d grown cold. In his enthusiasm, he’d taken too much already.
The anonymous CoN donor opened her mouth, blood trickled out of her lips and tested his resolve as she asked, “Is my King pleased?”
Nox liked the way the words rolled off her tongue. When he licked the blood from her lips with a kiss, he noted her pallor against the black wraps hugging her breast and hips. Beautiful, on the verge of death, but not as beautiful as Rayne when he would repay her audacity.
The sounds of footsteps outside the tent did not alarm Nox, but amped up the entertainment pay-out.
Finally.
He seized the female by her hair. She cried out as Nox ordered, “Come in, General.”
Korac entered the tent with a comm device in hand. At the sight of his second-in-command, tears gushed from her eyes which pleaded to Korac for help. Pathetic. Nox tossed her to the floor at his feet. He growled, “Stay. There.” To Korac, he asked. “What do we have, today?”
With not a single glance spared in the woman’s direction, Korac appeared unphased. “They’re heading to Enki, sire. Presumably to find nacres for themselves.”
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“Good, good. Right on schedule.” Nox relished the satisfaction of watching his toys put themselves back in the box after he’d finished playing with them. He smoothed the black hair on the human girl at his feet like a dog. “What do you say, General? Should we put up a front at the conduit?”
Korac smirked. “Well, we wouldn’t want them to catch on.”
“See to it, personally. At least then you’ll have another shot at your girl.” Again, Korac was unphased. Nox’s second-in-command and personal guard for most of his adult life kept such a level head. But Nox knew better, and he drew so much satisfaction from twisting the knife. He knotted his hand into the girl’s hair and lifted her from the floor. She whimpered and pawed away his grip. “I want it to be a fair bet, after all.”
“Your majesty.” Korac bowed and waited for dismissal, patient as ever.
His eyes never left Nox and never looked at the girl. So impressive. He sat her in his lap, facing the sizeable strategy table in his tent. “She’s not a very good likeness to General Callahan. Can you find someone who can deliver one to me? The last seventeen were all so disappointing.”
The girl struggled then. She simpered, “King Nox, please let me go. I have a two-year-old boy—” Earlier, he told her not to speak out of turn, and her voice was grating on his nerves. He hit the back of her spine, and she fell to the floor with a bonelessness he admired in a woman. Her unconscious body made a thud when it hit the dirt.
Korac never missed a beat. “Do you wish me to take the hellkites for the conduit fight? They’re getting restless for a hunt.”
“Yes, do. And then send them out into the world. They can eat as they please while the Progeny trample all over Tritan territory,” Nox answered, bordering on bored and inconvenienced.
Korac ticked off on his fingers as he said, “So, arrange the confrontation, walk the dogs, and find you a girlfriend? Is there anything else?”
The Icarus’ barbs always caught Nox off guard. He barked out an unexpected laugh, hearty and full of genuine mirth. It banished his conflicted interests in his General for the time being. “Go on before I add another task to your chores. Dismissed.” Something was missing in this fantasy. What was it? He called after the other Icarus, “Korac?”
“Sire?” The General turned back without hesitation.
“Bring me one with a little more fight to her.”