“There!” the slaver exclaimed triumphantly. “Did you see how the stick flew for her the moment it sensed an untried pussy was near? Look at it trying to get inside her! Why, if her virgin channel wasn’t so tight, it would already have buried itself to the root in her soft little cunt and started thrusting!” He grinned at Drung. “Which is exactly what you want to do, am I right, Sir?”
“Indeed I fucking well do!” All three of the Trollox’s heads grinned lustfully as the small, piggy eyes watched the stick thrust deeper and deeper into the helpless girl’s pussy. “Fill her up with my shaft and seed, so I will! And I’ll do it again and again until her belly swells with my heir!”
Need couldn’t stand any more of this. Though he had spent the last ten cycles ignoring and avoiding everything female, his heart twisted at the sight of the girl’s agony and shame as the obscene alien phallus twisted between her legs, trying to work its way inside her.
She must have sensed his pity for her eyes found his—dark eyes with golden flecks, he saw—eyes filled with tears.
“Please,” she whispered brokenly. “Oh, please make it stop! It hurts. Like…like it’s breaking something inside me!”
Need saw red. Rage dropped over his vision and a protective fury burned through him.
“That’s enough!” he roared. Leaning across the stage, he grabbed the bone-white end of the stick, which had nearly managed to get all of its thick, knobby head into the little female’s pussy, and pulled it free.
The girl cried out and the assistant jerked her back roughly as she tried to escape. Meanwhile, the stick jerked and twitched in Need’s hand, also trying to free itself. He held it tightly, refusing to let it get back to its intended target. There was a smear of dark crimson blood on its throbbing crown.
The slaver was on high alert at once.
“Here now!” he exclaimed angrily, glaring at Need. “Give me that! Do you know how rare such instruments are? And how expensive?”
“Forty thousand credits,” Need spat at him, still holding the struggling stick clenched tight in one fist. “I’ll pay it right here and now—the entire sum. But the girl is mine and you and your fucking instruments don’t touch her again.”
The slaver’s eyes widened…then narrowed greedily.
“Forty thousand, is it?” he asked and turned to Drung. “Do I hear forty-one?” he inquired.
The Trollox glared balefully at Need.
“No, Gods damn you,” the middle head grunted. “Forty thousand is too rich for my blood, so it is.”
“Well then.” The slaver nodded. “Forty thousand it is then. Sold to the Kindred gentle-male with the tender heart.”
Need was no gentle-male and he knew it, but he said not a word. The price he was paying for the little female was all his savings—every bit he’d earned and put by during his ten cycles as Navigator and First Mate of The Dark Star.
But though the hole in his credit account was going to be substantial, all he could see were the tears standing in her dark, gold-flecked eyes and all he could hear were her soft words, begging him to make the damn stick stop hurting her.
Speaking of the stick, he was still holding it, he saw with distaste. He lobbed the damn thing into the crowd, prompting the slaver to cry angrily and point for his assistant to fetch it.
As he did, Drung gave Need one last baleful glare.
“You’ll be sorry, Kindred—so you will,” he snarled. Then he turned and stumped heavily away into the crowd, pushing the spectators in his path aside as easily as a male pushing through bracken weeds.
Two
Lan’ara tried not to sob as she was finally released and allowed to cover herself. She tried to pull the torn gown closed around her body, but it had been tight to begin with and now she found it wouldn’t cover her full curves.
She bowed her head and pressed her thighs together, trying to ignore the throbbing, burning pain she felt there. Her shoulders ached too, where that awful Torg had yanked them backwards. It almost felt like he’d been trying to pull her arms from their sockets! Every bit of her was in pain—not just her body but her skin and bones…her very soul felt bruised.
Closing her eyes tightly, she wondered what would happen to her now. Would the male who had bought her be kind…or cruel? He seemed to have some compassion for her, for he’d torn the awful stick out of her and thrown it away where it couldn’t hurt her. But her recent experience with males had taught her that any one of them could turn cruel in a heartbeat—none of them were to be trusted.
Lan’ara couldn’t help thinking that three days ago, she never would have believed such a thing as being kidnapped and sold on an auction block could happen to her.