Imprisoned

  The big Kindred sighed and dropped his hand.

  “Never mind for now, but eventually you’ll have to let me see to that cheek of yours. I’m afraid you have a zygomatic fracture.”

  “A zygo—what?” So he had just been trying to examine her? Was that really all?

  “Your zygomatic arch—your cheekbone—may be fractured,” he explained and frowned. “How did that happen anyway? I didn’t see it.”

  “Tapper punched me.” Ari kept her voice low. “I…I’ve never been punched in the face before,” she admitted. “Not even during a combat match. We, uh, used to compete in Ton-kwa—my brother and I.”

  “I see.” Lathe nodded gravely. “I’m afraid being punched in the face is the least of your worries at BleakHall. You’ll have to be careful if you want to get along here and follow the code of conduct.”

  “Code of conduct?” Ari frowned. “What do you mean? No one has mentioned any kind of code to me.”

  “And they won’t either—it’s something you’re expected to learn quickly or already know.” Lathe shrugged. “Some of it is easy—you have to be polite and deferential to the other prisoners. If you bump or brush someone or step on their foot, apologize immediately to avoid a conflict.”

  “Got it.” Ari nodded. “What else?”

  “Well…” Lathe counted them off on his fingers. “Don’t piss in the communal shower—that’s disrespectful to everyone. Keep your cell clean and your bunk made up. No unopened food containers in your personal area—that draws insects and the Goddess knows this place is hellish enough as it is without an infestation.”

  “I agree.” Ari nodded. “Okay, I can do all that. Anything else?”

  “The most important thing is to stay out of gang territories unless you have permission to be there. For instance, the Serpents—whom you’ve already met—” Lathe spoke dryly, “Claim Cellblock S, table 30, and run the hovercar parts work-hall. The OhNos run the library, sit at table 8 and claim Cellblock N. The Spice Lords claim Cellblock D, sit at table 11 and run the pornography ring.”

  “Wow, that’s a lot to remember,” Ari murmured. “Uh, pornography ring? The prison officials allow that? I thought BleakHall was owned by Mistresses from Yonnie Six. Doesn’t porn objectify women?”

  “They have to allow it—they’d have a riot on their hands if they tried to take away the porn,” Lathe said grimly. “You can’t lock over a thousand hardened felons away for life with no access of any kind to females and not give them some outlet. Males have urges—hungers—that have to be met somehow. That’s why they don’t allow any female staff at BleakHall at all—not even female Horvaths as guards and you can imagine what their females look like.”

  “Pretty much like the males?” Ari guessed.

  Lathe nodded. “But even that would be too much temptation for some of these desperate bastards. If a female—any female—somehow got into BleakHall she’d probably be raped to death in the first fifteen minutes.”

  His words, spoken in that matter-of-fact tone, sent a chill like ice down Ari’s spine.

  “That’s a horrible thought,” she whispered, putting a hand to her throat, unconsciously checking the projection bead of her look/touch, imbedded in her ID. She was glad she was getting out of here today. The power supply for the little bead wasn’t infinite—in fact, she estimated she had less than a week before it ran out. But of course, she didn’t need that long since she planned to be floating off in her transport bubble with Jak just after lunch.

  “It is horrible,” Lathe admitted soberly. “But you have to remember, most of the prisoners in here are misogynistic bastards—they hate females.”

  “Because they come from Yonnie Six where women rule?” Ari said.

  Lathe nodded. “And most were sent here by their Mistresses for one reason or another. Mostly rape and murder,” he added darkly.

  “And you…” Ari cleared her throat. “Do you feel that way about women? Do you hate them?”

  Lathe looked shocked.

  “No, of course not—I’m a Kindred,” he said, as though that explained everything.

  Ari shook her head. “Wheezer told me that was the name of your race when he was helping me get processed yesterday but I’d never heard of them before. What does being a ‘Kindred’ mean?”

  “We protect and revere females,” Lathe explained. “We are a race of genetic traders—our DNA makes our people 95% male, so we are always looking for new females of different races to bond with.”

  “That’s fascinating.” Ari couldn’t help being interested despite herself. “So you can mate with any other race you find?”

  “We’re compatible with many races,” Lathe admitted in a low voice. “What people are you from, Ari?” he asked.

  “Me? Oh, I…my people come from Phobos. It’s not a very big planet but we believe in the equality of males and females—we believe they’re two sides of the same coin,” she said, wondering why she was telling him all this.

  “Two sides of the same coin,” he murmured speculatively and the way he was looking at her made Ari nervous.

  “So, if the Kindred love females so much then why are you in here? I mean, what did you do to be sent to BleakHall?” she asked, trying to change the subject.

  Lathe frowned. “That’s another unwritten rule here—you never ask another male his crime.”

  “Oh…” She looked down, feeling suddenly abashed. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s all right.” He sighed. “The charge on my official documents says ‘murder’ but it wasn’t true until I got here. I swore an oath as a physician to protect life but BleakHall has made a killer out of me.”

  He sounded so desolate when he said it that Ari almost wanted to go to him and comfort him. But she checked the impulse hastily. Firstly because she didn’t need to get any closer to the big Kindred than she already was. And secondly because her wish to put and arm around him and hug him was a female impulse.

  Males didn’t comfort each other that way, she knew. She had seen Jak with his friends before—they punched each other on the arm or slapped each other on the back. But they never embraced and held each other the way she suddenly wished she could do with Lathe.

  “I’m sorry,” she said instead, truly meaning it.

  He shook his head.

  “Killing…torture…pain—they’re all part of life here. Before you came through processing yesterday, I thought I’d become inured to it—desensitized. But I was wrong.”

  “You…you were?” Ari wondered why her heart was suddenly beating harder and her face felt hot and flushed.

  Slowly, the big Kindred nodded.

  “When I heard your voice pleading with that bastard Mukluk yesterday, something seemed to…to break inside me.” He sighed and clenched one big hand into a fist, studying it intently. “I just wish I knew why I…why I feel what I feel.”

  “I thought you didn’t like other males,” Ari said quickly, her heart hammering faster. “You said—”

  “I know what I said and I don’t like other males,” he interrupted. “I just…” He ran a hand through his hair in a gesture of frustration. “This is just really bad timing, that’s all,” he said roughly. “Look, are you hungry? It’s time to go down for First Meal.”

  “I am hungry,” Ari admitted. “But…” She bit her lip. “But I’m scared too. I feel like it’s safe in here—in your cell. Outside…well, anything can happen.”

  “You can’t live your life in fear, little one,” Lathe murmured, taking a step closer to her.

  Ari had the feeling that he wanted to put an arm around her—to touch her in some way and comfort her—the same way she’d had the impulse to comfort him earlier. But he didn’t come any nearer.

  “You have to be brave,” he told Ari. “And believe me when I say that I’ll protect you—with my life, if necessary.”

  “You will?” She could hear her pulse rushing in her ears and her whole body felt warm and flushed and tingly. Why was that? “Even…
” She cleared her throat. “Even though you don’t know why you’re protecting me?”

  “Even though,” he agreed, his deep voice a soft, sincere growl. “Now come on, little one—we need to eat. Have to keep our strength up.”

  “All right.” Ari followed him out of the cell, keeping her eyes on his broad back and hoping he could do what he had promised and keep her safe.

  Fourteen

  Lathe had much to consider as they walked down the innumerable flights of stairs to get to the Mess Hall. The trustees were in Cellblock X—almost at the top of the towering living area of BleakHall—so he had plenty of time to think.

  He had told Ari he had no interest in other males and that was true, he assured himself. Yet that didn’t stop him from wanting to be near the boy—to comfort and protect him and ease his pain.

  He wanted desperately to treat Ari’s swollen cheek but it was clear the boy was still shy of him—still as skittish as a kitten. Which was actually the Earth animal that Ari most reminded him of. With his big, bright eyes and soft black hair and lithe, deft movements the boy was very like a stray kitten who had somehow wandered up onto Lathe’s doorstep.

  And you took him in like a stray kitten too. Only what are you going to do with him once you leave this place? he asked himself as they walked. The nanites are almost finished digging the passage out of here. Will you take him with you when you go?

  Lathe supposed he would have to. He couldn’t leave Ari here on his own now—it would be a death sentence with Tapper out to get him. But would Ari come with him? Would he come to trust Lathe at some point in the future? Right now the boy shied away every time Lathe so much as took a step in his direction.

  Except last night, whispered a voice in his head. Last night he cuddled close to you, pressing against your chest as you held him in your arms…

  But that was because he was asleep, Lathe reminded himself roughly. And anyway, he didn’t want to cuddle with another male—not even one as pretty as Ari. It was just the boy’s damn female scent working on him.

  The scent…That was something to think about too. He remembered Ari saying that his people believed males and females were two sides of the same coin. Could that mean that Ari and his kind had characteristics of both sexes? That they were somehow…both?

  As a medical doctor who flew among the stars and was part of a people who looked for genetic trades as a way of life, Lathe had seen stranger things. There were the Piloth people from Genry Eight for instance—they were male one sex cycle and then they switched to female the next. Or the Vargans of Choth Prime—a subset of their people had sexual characteristics of all three of their sexes—male, female, and okoi. They were called “the blended” and were revered in all levels of the Vargan society where they could breed with anyone they chose.

  Was it possible that Ari came from a society like that—that he had a mixed biology that caused his feminine facial features and scent to be wedded to a male body?

  Lathe had no idea but he told himself it didn’t matter. He had taken the boy under his wing and now it was his duty to protect him. Clearly Ari wouldn’t last a day in BleakHall on his own so until the nanites sent the signal telling Lathe the exit tunnel was finished, he had to be vigilant to keep both himself and the boy alive.

  He just prayed to the Goddess he could do it.

  Fifteen

  When the attack Lathe had predicted happened, it came from behind and it was so fast that Ari almost missed it.

  One minute they were walking through the chow line, pushing their trays and doing their best to catch the globs of food the jerky mechanical arms doled out, and the next thing she knew, Lathe was in a fight for his life.

  Ari was ahead of the big Kindred in line because he insisted on staying at her back, the better to protect her, she supposed. Right behind him in line was a bandy-legged little prisoner with shifty, weasely eyes, hardly taller than Ari was herself.

  As though to make up for his lack of stature, the short prisoner’s upper body was massively muscular. The sleeves of his prison jumpsuit had been torn off revealing arms bulging with muscle, roped with veins, and covered in colorful tattoos.

  It was his arms that had caught Ari’s attention as she was scanning the Mess Hall, trying to be alert for any sign of danger. Although she hoped Lathe was wrong about an impending attack, she had to admit he’d been right about almost everything else to do with BleakHall so far, so she felt she couldn’t afford to ignore his warning.

  Look at those arms, she was thinking as she pushed her tray along. I wonder how much he can lift? He must be massively strong but it makes him look so strange…

  And at that moment the little inmate dropped his tray and jumped for Lathe’s broad back.

  “Lathe! Behind you!” Ari barely had time to scream before the murderous felon whipped a slim black cord around the big Kindred’s neck and pulled it tight.

  Her warning gave Lathe just enough time to get his hands up and his fingers between the black cord and the sides of his neck. But the assassin still got the lethal string around the front part of his throat, yanking hard in an apparent attempted to either strangle the big Kindred or possibly just cut his head off.

  Ari screamed and grabbed her half-full tray, rushing around to beat the would-be killer over the head and shoulders with it as Lathe struggled to free himself. The battered metal tray didn’t serve as much of a weapon but the slippery yellow glop that was on it rolled down into the attacker’s eyes and face, making him gasp and sputter as he tried with all his might to kill the big Kindred.

  “Let go—let him go!” Ari shouted, hearing the panic in her own voice. The inmates all around them were roaring and chanting, but Lathe fought in deadly silence. Slowly, grimly he worked his fingers closer to the front of his neck, where the black cord had made a bloody indentation. Then, with a sudden yank, he jerked the cord forward.

  The motion brought the attackers massively muscular forearms forward too, as though he was throwing his arms around Lathe to try and hug him from behind.

  That one moment of vulnerability was all the big Kindred needed.

  Quick as a striking snake, he turned his head and sank his fangs deep into the muscular, tattooed arm. His attacker howled—a sound of pure agony—and Ari saw his spine bow out and his entire body go rigid with pain.

  Then he began to jerk and seize, his body flopping like a newly landed fish. Lathe flipped him off his back and threw him to the floor where he went on thrashing while thin black foam bubbled up from between his lips.

  “Goddess,” Ari whispered and heard the inmates all around her murmuring in awe.

  “Kill-All…Kill-All…”

  “Medic said he would do it and so he did. Old Hexer’s a gonner, he is.”

  “He’s a Kill-All…anyone he bites, dies.”

  “I wouldn’t want to get cross-wise of those fangs, no I wouldn’t.”

  And through it all, Lathe just stood there, breathing heavily but not distressed. He had a blank look in his turquoise eyes and Ari wondered what he was thinking. How hard was it really for him to take a life? And to take a life in such an awful way, too.

  The would-be assassin had finally stopped moving and was dead now—his blank eyes bulging. His mouth was curled into a rictus of agony and filled with black foam that drooled out onto the dirty metal floor. His body seemed to have wasted away, shriveled from the inside out into a dried stick.

  It was a horrible sight and it occurred to Ari that aside from watching action vids with Jak, she had never seen anyone die before. Much less die in such a violent way.

  Kill-All, she thought, looking up at Lathe, and wondered how close those fangs had been to her throat last night as she slept in his bunk. The very thought made her shiver.

  The first words Lathe spoke after the attack were to her.

  “You all right, little one?” he asked, looking down at Ari anxiously. His voice was slightly hoarse, probably from the slim black cord the attacker had used. “You
fought bravely.”

  “I…I’m fine.” Ari tried not to focus on his fangs, so long and sharp and gleaming in the glaring Mess Hall lights. “You…you did to. Fought bravely, I mean,” she whispered, trying not to look at the dead man at their feet again, though her eyes kept wanting to be drawn back to the gruesome sight.

  “I did what I had to do,” Lathe said grimly. He raised his voice then, and addressed the whole Mess Hall.

  “Hear me now, inmates of BleakHall,” he roared, his deep voice echoing and reverberating against the high metal ceiling. “This male, Hexer, attacked me and he has paid the ultimate price—death.”

  There were murmurs from all sides again and chants of “Kill-All…Kill-All” until Lathe raised his hands for silence.

  “Hexer is dead,” he continued. “And I refuse to treat anyone from his gang, The Rabs, at the Infirmary until the leader comes to me and gives his word not to try and harm me or mine again.”

  He put an arm around Ari and though she wanted to shrink away from the big Kindred, she knew it would be a very bad visual for the rest of the prison. She had just been getting somewhat comfortable with Lathe, she thought, until she saw him kill. Now she was scared of him all over again but she held herself rigidly still and didn’t move as he publicly claimed her and placed her under his protection.

  “Any male who comes after me or Ari, here, will get exactly what Hexer got,” Lathe growled. “To die at the fangs of a Kill-All like myself is not an easy death—every nerve is on fire at the end. Think about that before any of you accepts an offer to kill me.”

  From the wide-eyed looks on the prisoner’s faces, Lathe’s words were hitting home. There was silence for a long moment after he finished speaking. Then he nodded at Ari and spoke in a normal tone of voice.

  “Come on—we still have fifteen minutes. Enough time to eat First Meal if we hurry.”

  Stepping casually over the body of the man he’d killed, the big Kindred picked up his tray and kept moving down the line.