“Who the fuck are you?” a girl with deep blue skin and a spiral horn in the middle of her forehead demanded.
“This here’s a special pet all the way from another galaxy,” Shadrack said, speaking loudly. “None of you lot are going to lay a finger on her—she’s worth more than the rest of you put together so no touching or you’ll be sorry, right?”
There was some mumbling among the other women and I got some hostile glares which made me uncomfortable, but nobody seemed inclined to challenge the big Korrigon’s statement.
“I’m from Earth,” I offered uncertainly. “Er…nice to meet you all.”
This was greeted with a lot of blank stares. Great. I’d been thinking that maybe I could talk to the other women and organize some kind of revolt. But I could see right away that wasn’t going to happen.
“You get comfortable, girly,” Shadrack ordered as he shoved me into the crowded room. “It’s gonna be a while yet before the auction starts. Why don’t you spend some time gettin’ to know your fellow pets? You never can tell—sometimes a single Master will bid on five or ten of you at once, so you might be making a friend for life!”
Then he roared with laughter, as though this was somehow funny, and slammed and locked the door behind him.
I looked around the windowless room and then at the locked door and felt my heart sink. I was trapped here until the auction and after that, who knew where I would be going or who I would be going with?
I was in big trouble and, as far as I could see, there was no way out.
FIFTY-NINE
SIR
It took some time to find the signal for the tracking device the Commercians had implanted in little one, but at last I picked it up. I pressed the blue metal finder band to my temples, concentrating hard. If my former pet was anywhere in the galaxy, I should be able to pinpoint her location with extreme accuracy.
The band beeped softly and began to draw a map in my mind. I saw what appeared to be an abandoned warehouse down by one of the main waterfronts. I frowned—I knew that district! In fact, it wasn’t that far from where I was now.
Not only was little one in my galaxy—she was also on my planet, on my continent—she was even in my current city!
“Goddess Eternal be praised,” I murmured, still keeping my eyes closed as I examined the mental map.
Fier’dom,the capital city of the Northern Continent, is large but I knew it like the back of my hand. I had, after all, grown up here when my father had been the Overlord. I was certain I could find the abandoned warehouse little one was in.
A dark thought intruded—but what if she’s not there? What if you don’t find her—you only find the tracking device? What if someone maimed and killed her and you only find her body or parts of her body?
The thought didn’t bear thinking about. Besides, I comforted myself, I didn’t feel that looming sense of impending danger that I had gotten when she was in peril on O’nagga Nine. Her brave little flame burned bright inside me—a remnant of the bond we had been forming together. She might be in trouble but I didn’t think her life was on the line.
I was going to find little one intact, whole and alive, I told myself firmly. And I was going to rescue her from whoever it was who had taken her and bring her safely back home to Earth again. Because no matter how much I wanted her, I still couldn’t have her. It wouldn’t matter though, as long as I could keep her safe and maybe hold her in my arms just one more time.
I couldn’t go get her as I was, though—I would need some kind of disguise. As the Overlord of the entire Northern Continent, my face was instantly recognizable. If I was walking into some kind of underground pet selling ring, I didn’t want to spook whoever was running it into absconding with little one before I could get to her.
Luckily, I had something I could wear—it was a left over from the last Costume Drama I had attended. At the time, I had thought it was a tiresome event—now I was very glad I had gone.
I opened my eyes and called for my private hover-vehicle. It was time to put on my disguise and go find little one.
SIXTY
ELLI
“You’re lucky you got a white tail, ya know,” a voice said in my ear.
I rolled over on the thin blue palate I had chosen because it was in the corner, away from everyone else, and looked at the speaker warily. It was a small woman with bright pink skin and four arms.
She looked like the Mind-controlled workmen Sir and I had seen on our first trip to the throne room, I thought. Torvians—that was what they were called—but she didn’t seem dangerous. It had been hours and hours since Shadrack had shoved me in the crowded room and no one else had said a word to me. Maybe I should try to make a friend, as he had sarcastically suggested.
“Um, hi,” I said. “What’s your name?”
“La’le’la,” she said, giving me a friendly smile and my tail another wistful look. “You’re so lucky to have a white tail!”
“Because it means no one can touch me, right?” I asked hopefully. “I mean, that’s what my old Master told me.”