was an emptiness in its great crimson eyes, which turned black as it stopped moving.
But the beast was the very least of Iris’ problems.
When his mount was perfectly still, the king dismounted, sliding with muscular agility down the wing of the beast until his boot clad feet hit the ground with a puff of charr and dust.
He was at least nine feet tall, and handsome, but what did handsomeness matter when his heart was as black as the pupils in the dragon’s eyes. A shudder of disgust and despair rushed through her. She knew better than to look upon the king. She also knew better than to run. The secret to being good prey was to stay perfectly still when predators were close. She’d learned that long ago, watching rabbits and foxes who evaded the jaws of hounds.
She stopped her breath and listened. The king spoke in a booming voice which carried easily on the breeze. He was holding something in his hand. Something which sparked and glowed, a crystal of some kind.
“Someone survives,” he said, lifting up the crystal. “I detect a life sign.”
“Impossible, sire,” one of the other soldiers said. “We surrounded the village to ensure there were no escapes.”
“Survival is never impossible. Someone is alive. Someone defies the sentence of death.”
Iris felt the king’s eyes on her even though there was no way he could see her. She was crouched behind a big tree stump with plenty of foliage which she knew from experience made her impossible to see. If Iris knew how to do anything, it was to hide.
But he was seeing, or at least, sensing her. He knew she was there. She felt the knowing, and saw the glint of those impossibly blue eyes. For a terrible second, they locked gazes.
Turning on her heels, Iris ran. These were her woods. She had explored every inch of them, knew every gully and root intimately. The knowledge would do little if the king took his fiery metal mount and began to burn the world around her, but she did what all prey has done from the beginning of time. She sensed that her chance of escape was narrowing to nothingness, and she chose to run rather than wait for the predator to come upon her.
Chapter 5
There was a skittering throughout the forest, the horror of nature beholding what sentient creatures were capable of doing one another. The smell of smoke had frightened the inhabitants. He knew every four legged creature would be fleeing the area, but he had a feeling that there was a two legged one somewhere in the mix. He had felt eyes on him, intelligent, angry eyes. Those never belonged to an animal. They could only belong to a sentient being. Perhaps one allied with the humans who had just been swept up into the belly of his ship while their village was turned into soot and cinders.
“Sire?” Sergeant Nanite came up behind Archon. He was a bold, bearded, beast of a clawed male with more fur than scale. Only on a far-flung planet could a mutant with actual fur be considered for the position of sergeant. “We have safely stowed all the villagers in your ship, transported them up with the flash drives. They are all sedated and awaiting transport.”
“There was someone here,” Archon said. “I want each and every one of these villagers. I want people to wonder for centuries what happened to the village of flames.”
“Village of flames?”
“That's what they’re going to call it, I’ve decided. The village of flames. Every single one of them gone in an instant. Probably should have refrained from burning it, now you mention it.”
Nanite had not mentioned it, but he didn’t like to say. Contradicting a king who had just destroyed a village was not the way to career advancement, or general continued existence.
“I doubt anybody escaped your net, your highness, but if they have it is of little importance. The rebel village is destroyed. All will know that you are not one to be defied.”
“I would have thought they already knew I was not one to be defied,” Archon drawled, his eyes scanning the dark trees for hints of human life.
Archon’s senses were far keener than his general’s rationale. He had felt the eyes of the prey on him. He had felt the way they searched him. Saw him, not as the generals did, or as the charred and fallen villagers did. There was something in that gaze he wanted to feel again.
“I want