“Then I jab you into her fleshy hindquarters?” I guessed.
He grinned, showing all of his sharp teeth. “In a manner of speaking. I'll be watching the interview over the vidscreen, so I'll know how to play it if – or rather, when – I need to intervene.”
Now it was my turn to shake my head. “Thank you for the offer, but you're my second in command, and you've got more important work at hand than babysitting me. If I need you to question her later, you can watch the recording of my interview. But for right now, the best use of your skills is continuing to remotely command our drop-shuttles as they try to pacify the remainder of the colonies. Based on what you've told me, that won't be easy, and your expertise on military tactics against insurgents will be valuable.”
Ranel's smile turned into a scowl. “It wasn't an 'offer,' Dashel. You're right – bringing the other camps to heel won't be easy, and we need to know what this human woman knows, which is why we can't afford to botch this debriefing.”
“And my response wasn't a polite rejection, Ranel, it was an order.” My voice hardened. “In case you've forgotten, I'm the captain of this ship, and what I say goes. You wanted me to take charge? Stal wanted me to show more backbone? Fine. You will obey my commands, or I will prepare another makeshift brig right next to hers and have you thrown in it. Is that understood?”
He was taken aback – and he seemed almost impressed, though he was trying not to show it. He gave me a small bow, then turned and marched off.
I squeezed my eyes shut and pinched the bridge of my nose, feeling a headache coming on. No time for that now, I reminded myself, and slapped the entry panel next to the room we'd arranged for our prisoner.
5
Natalie
I'd been a prisoner of one kind or another my entire life. During all that time, I'd learned that the best thing a prisoner could do to increase the odds of her own safety was to observe everything— every detail of her surroundings and captors, as closely as humanly possible.
My first and most immediately evident observation wasn't particularly comforting: The room I was being kept in wasn't originally designed for prisoners. From the general layout and the patterns of the bolts and fixtures on the walls, not to mention the acrid chemical smells hanging in the air, its intended function was almost certainly as a supply room – a glorified janitor's closet. They'd hastily removed the cleaning equipment and shelves, and on the way in, I saw that they had wired a force field to the access panel, rigging the projector units to the frame just inside the doorway. These field projectors were commonly used in emergencies which involved hull breaches to prevent the cold vacuum of space from rushing in and swallowing everyone aboard.
It was a crude setup, but unfortunately, it would be effective enough to keep me in the room.
All that, though, was just a more elaborate way of stating the obvious: If they had to make a special cage to hold me, that meant taking prisoners wasn't usually their style. Which meant even if I could tell them what they wanted to know – and odds were, I wouldn't be able to – they most likely wouldn't be keeping me around long afterward.
Which meant I had to stall for time. But how?
That led me to my next set of observations. Specifically about the dragon-man who ordered me taken from the camp and kept up here. The one called Ranel was about to hurt me, but the handsome one who was clearly the leader – despite the fact that he looked younger – told him not to. Did he want to extract information from me as he said? Yes, almost certainly. But to do that, he only needed me alive, not unharmed.
So, was he only interested in what I might be able to tell them? Or was there another reason he wanted me in one piece?
I'd seen plenty of males look at me with lust before. As a slave, it was just a normal part of life, to be either ignored or used to my advantage depending on the situation. I'd never met one of these dragon people before, but still, the basic principles seemed to apply. There was something in his manner, something in his eyes, that told me I might be able to successfully seduce him. That, in turn, might give me an opening I could use to escape. Maybe I could find a way down to the surface, locate the Pax embedded there, and help them fight these Hielsrane off.
It seemed like a long shot, but it was definitely my best chance. I'd started my life as a lowly slave at the bottom of the pile, and I'd worked too hard for too long to start over as someone's property to be commanded and abused, instead of seen as a valued worker.
These were the thoughts that swirled in my brain as I heard someone access the door's outer panel. It retracted into the wall, revealing the man I'd identified earlier as the leader. He regarded me warily for a moment, then deactivated the force field and stepped in, tapping a code into the access panel to lock it behind him.
Now that I was even closer to him, I saw that he was more attractive than I remembered. In their humanoid forms, these Hielsrane were quite captivating specimens– their skin highlighted by shiny scales, with colors that seemed to differ from one Drakon to the next, and formidable fangs and talons. They had an underlying ferocity that was almost sensual, and a commanding bearing that seemed to fill the room, but there was something different about this one. My trained eye could see that
