With a cry, he dropped his blaster and fell backwards, both hands grasping for his streaming nose and injured third eye which had both been caught by one of the heavy bars.
Ty didn’t bother with him other than to step over his supine body. The Rage was like a red curtain over his vision now—obscuring everything but his target. He swooped into Ellina’s cell like an avenging angel and curled his fingers around the High Priest’s thick throat.
Dead—he was going to choke the bastard until he was fucking dead for daring to come anywhere near his female!
Slowly, he began to squeeze.
* * * * *
Ellina gasped as Kikbax got a knee between her legs and started to lift her skirts. Was this really how her first breeding would happen—as a rape? Would she really be tied to the repugnant Lord Kikbax for life? Gods and goddesses, she would rather die.
But then Ty was there, looming over the High Priest’s shoulder and his big hands were encircling Kikbax’s throat.
The High Priest’s eyes widened in surprise—all three of them—and then he began to choke. He gasped and let Ellina go, reaching instead to scrabble at the strong fingers squeezing his windpipe closed, but there was nothing he could do. All three eyes bulged from their sockets and his face began to turn purple.
As Ellina watched, her heart pounding, he sank to his knees with Ty still choking him. The big Kindred’s pale eyes had gone a fiery red and the fury in his face was frightening to behold. He squeezed mercilessly, ignoring the High Priest’s garbled pleas and wild thrashing. Clearly nothing was going to distract him from his goal of seeing Kikbax dead.
Ellina wanted nothing more than for him to kill the bastard who had almost raped her, but the practical, Potentate part of her mind woke up and started thinking.
“Stop!” she cried to Ty, trying to distract the big Kindred from his murderous rage. “Stop, Ty—I need him alive. We need to hold a public trial and replace him. If you just kill him, the head of the priesthood automatically goes to his next in command and we don’t know if that priest is in on the plot too. We need to get to the bottom of this. So don’t kill him!”
At last her words seemed to be getting through to him, because she saw Ty’s grip on the High Priest’s neck loosen. Kikbax gasped and fell to the floor, unconscious but not dead, Ellina hoped. They really did need to get to the bottom of this whole plot—she had to purge her kingdom of treachery once and for all.
“Oh, Ty…” she gasped and went to him, stepping over the fallen form of the High Priest to do it.
“Ellina—my Potentate. My Goddess.” The Rage cleared from the big Kindred’s eyes and he swept her into his arms, holding her so close Ellina could barely breathe.
She didn’t care though—she only wanted to be near him. To breathe in his warm, spicy scent and know that he would never leave her again.
But as she pressed her face to his broad chest and inhaled deeply, a new voice interrupted them.
“Well,” it said. “I was told to come here on a rescue mission but it appears that you’ve already rescued yourselves.”
Chapter Forty-eight
The voice behind them made Ty turn, Ellina still in his arms, and they both saw Commander Asher of the Kindred Elite Espionage Corps standing there, a rueful smile on his face.
Ty stared at his old friend, feeling the last of the Rage drain from him completely.
“Asher?” he said blankly. “What are you doing here?”
Asher nodded at him.
“As I said, rescuing you. Sorry I’m late,” he added. “We had to fight our way through a force of Chorkay soldiers who I think are the ones that were dismissed from the Royal Guard for not stopping the assassination attempt at the coronation.”
“Yes, they’re all with the High Priest.” Ellina nodded down at the fallen figure on the floor of the cell. “Did you take care of them? And how did you happen to come just when we were in such dire need?”
“Well…” Commander Asher got a bemused look on his face. “That’s kind of a strange story…”
“I called them,” Tisa said and Ty knew Ellina could hear her. Their link was restored, so her words were being relayed to Ellina’s mind by Lor, who had won his battle with the High Priest’s chewchie and was sitting beside his mate, licking his wounds.
“You did?” Ty looked at the little creature in wonder. “You called them, Tisa?”
“She certainly did,” Asher said, grinning. “And she’s got a loud voice for such a little creature…woke Lisa and me from a sound sleep in the middle of the night from sixty light years away.” He shook his head. “I thought the end of the universe was coming at first until I understood what was happening.”
He explained how Tisa had talked through both his own chewchie, Gruff—who was currently sitting on top of his head—and his mate Lisa’s chewchie, Isabel at the same time.
“She demanded I come help you,” he said. “And I got here as fast as I could—only the High Priest’s guards were in the way.”
“Which is why I had to help again by opening the lock,” Tisa said primly. She cocked her head at Ty. “And you said I was too small to be of any use.”
Ty gave her a reluctant grin.
“I was wrong about that, little girl,” he admitted. “When the Goddess said she was going to send help, I thought she was talking about Asher or some other Kindred warriors.
