Roran Read online

  He only wished he didn’t have to tell Kasra that Haemeg was dead. Their relationship began as a casual one, and their bond grew over time. Despite the fact they saw each other infrequently, they loved each other.

  Roran had only seen her a few times in person, but he was sure that Haemeg mentioned him frequently. He already knew how it felt never to see his friend again alive; he didn’t relish inflicting that pain on Kasra.

  Chapter Two

  During the few days before reaching, Ideshan Roran spent the time reviewing Haemeg’s ship’s logs, specifically the coded parts. Those were the entries that might give Roran clues to whatever Haemeg did that got him killed. This was more than a simple assassination. It looked like payback. Although the murder could be staged that way. Even though the cameras in Haemeg’s quarters showed their faces, Deeto had not yet gotten identification on who these men were, or where Roran might find them.

  Roran had good copies of their faces, loaded into his com tablet, in hopes that he could get an ID from someone in his travels. He had no trouble getting landing clearance on Ideshan due to his reputation for bringing contraband into the Sargus Empire from the Consortium.

  The Consortium banned selling all tech to any planet in the Sargus Empire for their perpetuation of slavery. The Consortium prohibited the sale of most products to the world’s that comprised the Sargus Empire.

  Ironically, battleships from the Sargus Empire were bombing Farseek while their diplomats were signing the peace accords to end the war between the Transtellar Consortium and the Sargus Empire. In that agreement, the Sargus Empire would end slavery throughout the empire in return for the Consortium resuming trade with the Empire.

  Roran had received information from his superiors regarding a new alliance with the United Galactic Alliance of Worlds that governed the sectors on the far side of the Sargus Empire. The Sargus Empire was also sending slavers to their worlds abducting sentient humanoids to work their farms and factories that were never automated. The Empire based their whole economy on goods and services provided by slaves. That is people they stole from other worlds like Farseek and faraway worlds in the United Galactic Alliance.

  The two entities put the squeeze on the Sargus Empire. They sent a combined strike force to Sargus Four to assassinate Arbentine Sargus and defeat any resistance of his military. The Consortium immediately outlawed slavery in all sectors of the Sargus Empire. However, simply declaring it wouldn’t make it so.

  The Consortium and the Alliance split the former Sargus Empire, each taking half the sectors to govern. They still had to convince the Sargus Empire military to stand down and surrender so they could concentrate on ending slavery on the individual worlds.

  The Farseek Brigade tried to do that on their own. As good as they were, the Sargus Empire forces nearly overwhelmed them by their sheer numbers. The Consortium and the Alliance asked the Farseekans to stand down.

  That didn’t sit well with the Farseekans, who negotiated a compromise. So, they joined the Consortium Defense Force with their dreadnaughts under the Consortium command as they had been during the war.

  Roran would always think of himself as a Farseek Warrior. He was proud of his Uatu heritage.

  Roran found Haemeg’s lover attending the bar at her tavern in Port Ideshan city. Second meal was over, and third or evening meal was still a few hours away. A lone male was nursing a large mug of ale and doing something with his com tablet at a table at the back of the room.

  “Roran, what brings you here. It’s been a long time.” Kasra gave him a welcome smile as he approached. She frowned at his grim expression when he didn’t return her smile. She knew from the look on his face; she didn’t want to hear the next words he said.

  His eyes began to water. “I am so sorry, Kasra,” he said with a catch in his throat. “Haemeg is dead.”

  “Oh, no! No,” she began to cry. “How, when?” she said at the end of a sob.

  “Murdered, by a trio of thugs, he let into his flat at Bekket Station. We have their faces on the vid, but we haven’t been able to identify them.”

  Kasra took a moment to force back her sobs and wiped the tears from her face with her hands. “Show me.”

  Roran drew a shaky breath, and took out his tablet, unfolding it to make the screen bigger. He touched something on it then turned it to Kasra.

  “Yes, they’ve been here before, but I don’t know who they are. They met Haemeg here a couple of times, but they sat at one of the back tables. He never introduced them to me. I just figured they had a job for him.”

  “That’s my guess. The vids from outside his flat showed that Haemeg let them in willingly, like maybe he was expecting them. They jumped him when he turned his back to pour them drinks. Haemeg put up a helluva fight because all three of them were hard-pressed to take him down.” Roran shook his head. “Then, they made him pay for it.”

  “Goddess of the Light!” Kasra started to cry again. “We were going to be legally bonded and make a family when his service contract finished.”

  “I know this will bring you little comfort, but I’m going to find them and kill them.”

  “You do that,” Kasra murmured vehemently. “And make them suffer. Now, if you don’t mind, I would like to be alone.”

  Roran nodded grimly and left the tavern without looking back. He sympathized with her grief, but he had little comfort to offer when his sense of loss was still so painfully acute. As he headed to Port City Auction House, he knew he would find little comfort there.

  He checked in with his merchant’s ID and headed for the holding chambers. There were two for females and two for males. He strolled through the two that held males first. He found no Farseekans in either group, so he went to the Chambers containing the females. They were sitting on benches wearing only collars with leashes fastened to the wall. Roran counted more than a dozen different species of humanoids. No Uatu Farseekans there.

  Chapter Three

  When he passed into the second chamber, he felt like he had been gut-punched. Then his cock twitched. He looked up and down the two rows of female humanoids, trying to find the source of his sudden arousal. One of them was his, or his cock wouldn’t have responded. At least it never had before when he walked through the slave houses. The other chamber had just as many attractive naked females, and none had affected him like this.

  Five were human, but with variations of skin and hair color rarely seen in this part of the galaxy. Roran moved from one to the other and paused in front of each. The fourth exuded a scent that confirmed his reaction. She was pale-skinned, almost white compared to his light orange coloring.

  Her hair was golden brown with pale highlights, and her gold-flecked brown eyes stared straight ahead. She was oblivious to him or her surroundings. The barbarians must have set off the Chalivian shock collar she wore. She was practically catatonic. Must have resisted. Good for her.

  Roran reached down with his index finger curved under her chin and tilted her head up so he could see her face better. Her expression didn’t change, but she was beautiful. Of course, he would think that. She was solmatu, his soul mate. Unfortunately, there was only one way he could get her out of here without getting them killed or captured. He would have to buy her.

  The price would be high, but he probably had enough credits. He’d been saving for star rotations to buy land on Farseek when he gave up spying. Finding solmatu was rare enough that most Uatu Farseekans would give all they owned to free them. He had heard, humans like his female came from a part of the galaxy beyond the far side of the Sargus Empire. She could have been in stasis for star-spans. Unlike the Picans, the Chalivians found it less trouble to keep the beings they sold as slaves in stasis until just before they reached auction houses.

  It was probably better that she was oblivious, so she would not remember being displayed naked for bidding. Hopefully, the effects would wear off a couple of spans after they left Ideshan.

  The auctioneer took a span to offer his solmatu fo
r bid. She had caught the attention of more than one bidder. It took over half of Roran’s savings to capture the winning bid. He didn’t care if it took all of it, he wasn’t leaving Ideshan without her.

  When he went to the exchange room to pick her up, one of the handlers gave him the leash after his payment went through the Ideshan CommNet and the bill of sale posted to his tablet.

  “What about garments? You expect me to take her out naked?” he demanded. He didn’t want males ogling his soul mate while they traveled back to the starport.

  “We only sell slaves here. They do not come with clothes. It’s up to the buyer to provide them whatever they wish them to wear once the sale is final,” the slave handler said smugly.

  “What about a plastic blanket?”

  “No blankets.”

  Roran growled. He so wanted to punch the snarky male in the face. He huffed a disgusted sound and shrugged off his jacket.

  Dropping the leash, he picked up her arms and pushed them into the sleeves. Of course, it was way too big for her. The top of her head was only even with his shoulder. The jacket hung almost to her knees, so when he fastened it up, she was suitably covered to go out in public.

  Instead of leading her by the leash like most slave buyers, he put an arm around her shoulders, and the lead in his other hand so they wouldn’t trip on it as they walked.

  Roran didn’t stop to consider how crazy his actions were until after he had settled the female into one of four cabins on his merchant class space cruiser. Even when she came out of her stupor, she might be shell shocked by what had happened to her. It could be a while before she felt the bond they shared and desired him as a mate.

  The abduction could have severely damaged her psyche, maybe enough so that she would reject him entirely. That would hurt.

  He would do his best to soothe her and care for her. There could hardly be a less convenient time for him to find his solmatu. He wasn’t giving up his mission to find whoever killed Haemeg and why, but he wasn’t giving up his female either.

  Roran’s ship ideally ran with a crew of four, but he got by with an android copilot and two multi-purpose robots. Mostly the robots cleaned and maintained the ship and loaded and unloaded freight.

  His android Feenix was an AI-driven entity that was very human-like with doll-like features. He was capable of analyzing a situation and extrapolating a course of action based on observations. The Feenix model was one of the Consortium’s best models designed to extrapolate the best response based on what his human interface requested and or the circumstance.

  “Welcome back, Captain,” Feenix said politely at Roran lowered himself into the co-pilot seat next to the android. “Herminia has informed me that you have returned with a female, and she is in crew cabin number four.”

  “You two don’t miss a thing,” Roran commented. “Prepare to launch.”

  “Requesting launch clearance.” Feenix sent the request via the ship’s AI Herminia, also the name of the ship, i.e., Herminia Trader. “What is the female’s function, Captain?”

  “She is my solmatu, but she is not fully functional right now.”

  “Congratulations, Captain, on finding your soulmate. Does the female require medical evaluation?”

  “I think that would be wise. We will do it after we set a course for Napus. I will go and talk with her first. I don’t know how she will react to you. I would like to prepare her first.”

  “My humanoid form is designed to encourage interaction with organic beings.”

  “I don’t think she has ever seen anyone quite like you.”

  “Where did she come from?” asked the android.

  “Her documentation doesn’t say. I am pretty sure she was abducted from her world by Chalivian slavers. …Probably from a non-space faring world.”

  “If that is true, you cannot return her to that world. Consortium prohibits travel to non-spacefaring worlds.”

  “I told you she is solmatu, Feenix. I felt the attraction as soon as I stepped in that room full of females before I even laid eyes on her. I don’t think I can give her up.”

  “How many Farseekan Uatus have ever rejected solmatu?

  “There is no record of any Uatu ever rejecting solmatu,” Feenix responded.

  “Well, this one won’t either. But after what she has been through, it may take some convincing to compel her to accept it.”

  “Convincing should not be necessary,” said Feenix. “Your pheromones should be all that is needed.”

  “We’ll see.”

  Once they lifted off Ideshan and went into FTL, Roran left Feenix piloting the ship to check on the female he’d rescued. He couldn’t call her his, yet; he didn’t even know her name. The Chalivians categorized the beings they stole by their DNA and gave them numbers instead of names.

  When he went into the cabin where he left her, she was sitting on her bunk with her legs pulled up under his jacket. She looked up at him apprehensively. “Are you my owner now?”

  “No. I bought your freedom because it was too dangerous to get you out otherwise.”

  “But why? You don’t even know me.”

  Roran sat down on the bed beside her and took her hand and held it between both of his as she gave him a startled look. “I want to know you and everything about you. We are solmatu.”

  “I don’t know what that means.”

  “It’s an ancient Uatu word not included in most translation implants. It means soul mate. We are soul mates.”

  She raised her eyes to his. “I think I believe you.” He certainly looked sincere, like he believed in what he said. She felt a spark of attraction as she held his gaze and then frowned as she considered the implications. He seemed to be attracted to her, but she didn’t even know his name. “Who are you? And why can I understand you?”

  “Sorry, I forgot we weren’t introduced. I’m still a bit awestruck that I found you, solmatu. I am Roran Sovaktu of Farseek, a member world of the Transtellar Consortium,” he said. “You can understand me because most slavers inject their captives with language implants.”

  “Becca Clayton, from Earth. I don’t remember how I even got onto that ship. Those beings treated me like livestock,” she said softly, on the verge of tears. “The last thing I remember, I was on vacation at the beach. I probably dozed off under my umbrella. Then I woke up to those creatures.”

  “The Chalivians. They come in a variety of subspecies. Mostly, slavers, smugglers, and pirates.”

  “Where are we now?”

  “We are on my starship, the Herminia Trader.”

  “Could you take me back to Earth?”

  “I don’t know where that is, and I am on a mission. Even if I weren’t, you belong with me. We are soul mates.”

  “But I don’t know you. I shouldn’t even be here. I was kidnapped. Am I just supposed to forget about the life I had there? I have parents and brothers. I had a job; I’m a nurse. And I was buying a house. Now I don’t even have clothes to wear.” Becca started to cry. “All I wanted was a few days off to myself."

  Roran grimaced and moved closer to her. He wrapped his arms around her and just let her cry. He could hardly blame her, imagining that his people stolen from Farseek experienced similar emotions. He wished he could tell her he could take her home, but he knew it might not be the home she left.

  He needed to review the documents that came with her bill of sale to see how long she was in stasis before she was sold. Roran held her as she sobbed a for several mini-spans, wishing he could take the pain away.

  Finally, she pulled back from him and wiped the tears from her red-rimmed eyes, looking embarrassed. “I’m sorry. I’m not usually a crier. But this… My whole life has been ripped away. How is it that beings who can cross interstellar distances practice slavery? How can they justify it?”

  “It’s not right. We’ve been fighting that battle for star-spans. Now, just when we thought it was over, the Sargan’s have reneged on the peace agreement they just signed. They attack
ed my world, and over a million people are missing. Had I been there, I would have been one of them,” he said. “Everything about slavery is wrong.”

  “Yet, you bought me,” she reminded with a touch of cynicism.

  “Only because I didn’t want to get us both killed by trying to steal you. Think of it more like a ransom rather than a purchase,” he explained. “I couldn’t leave you there. Most likely, you would have ended up working on a farm or a factory; or you might have been purchased as a sex slave.”

  Becca shuddered at the thought. “You want me.” She looked pointedly at the revealing bulge in his pants.

  “Because we are solmatu. Your pheromones are affecting me. We are meant to become bond mates for life.” He smiled ruefully. “I assure you, I have honorable intentions, and I never said that before to anyone.”

  She stared at him, apparently at a loss for words.

  “Don’t worry, Becca, we can take things slow. My android Feenix will come to give you a medical check. He is a fully qualified medic as well as an excellent space pilot.”

  “Your android? Is that like a robot?”

  “Feenix is more than a robot; he is a sophisticated artificial intelligence capable of evolving intellectually based on his experiences.”

  “What kind of medical check?”

  “Just a scan. No touching.”

  “Oh, like Star Trek,” she said.

  Roran frowned at the reference, not sure it translated correctly.

  “It was a TV show I watched with my brothers when we were young.”

  Momentarily, Feenix arrived at Becca’s cabin. Three tones sounded to announce his entrance. “He looks like a big mannequin,” Becca said.

  “I am Feenix R157, a special-order dual-purpose manufactured service android,” he stated. “I am specifically designed to interface with humans.”

  “Feenix, this is Becca Clayton. Chavalian slavers stole her to sell as a slave to the Sargus Empire.”