He leaned over her. Listened.
She didn't stir. Her breaths came deep and slow.
A grim smile curled his lips. The princess was asleep.
Karh Blade crawled out of the bed and pulled on his pants. As much he'd like to stay and enjoy the embrace of the warm and curvaceous body beside him, he had other worlds to explore and exploit. Not only this, but people were waiting on him, the kind of people who did not like to be kept waiting. If he were to conveniently disappear, these people would come looking for him, and they would not be happy.
It was time for a bit of reconnaissance, time to start devising his plan to get out of this dump. Yes, despite the perk of a beautiful princess wanting to jump his bones, the place was still a dump. Karh comprised a mental list of priorities. First thing's first. He needed a weapon. A gleam caught his eye, something long and sharp. His eyes lingered on the object: Princess Sauria's hair pin.
***
Zara eyed the woman, Hunter Haux, with undisguised suspicion. Haux let her. She stood blankly, waiting for Zara to complete her visual assessment. There wasn't much to see. Through several rips in the fabric of Haux's faded Naval uniform, Zara could see stretches of pale, white skin. Her black boots were scuffed and dirty. A scabby scratch zigzagged along the side of her neck. Underneath the grime and dust, she might be a potentially beautiful woman, but at the moment, she looked like hell.
Zara decided to hear what the woman had to say. Her situation couldn't possibly get any worse (being jailed and waiting to be sacrificed to some prehistoric god pretty much topped the list of things that didn't appeal to her), so she might as well weigh her options. At least, Hunter Haux looked and sounded human.
"Ticket home?" Zara finally said. "You said I was your ticket home."
"I need a pilot. I've been waiting for, who can say how long?" Haux said. She ran a hand through her genetically-altered sea-blue hair.
"How'd you get here?"
"A group of us were being transferred, and we were ambushed. The craft went critical."
"And you end up here of all places," Zara finished. She allowed the rock in her fisted left hand to relax, just a bit. Haux didn't seem like a threat, and why would the Queen and her minions create a set-up this elaborate? Haux continued talking, and Zara listened.
"The rest of us were wiped out. The people, they're all women here. All blue-eyed, blonde."
"I noticed."
"And they are barbarians. The women from my ship were sacrificed to that thing they call Vanitoth. I got lucky, managed to find these secret tunnels and evade that fate. The men, meanwhile, were used and... eaten."
"Eaten?" Zara said, her mind flashing to Henrik being ushered away by guards.
"Whenever the Queen tires of her toys, she eats them," Haux said. Her words were like stones on Zara's heart, cold and heavy. Zara closed her eyes.
"Tell me about Vanitoth," she said.
***
The creature called Vanitoth moved through the jungles, searching for prey. Black eyes glared at a large, metal gate. The gate was closed, but when it opened, Vanitoth would feast. At the thought, its mouth watered, buckets of saliva leaking from its mouth and dripping to the jungle floor. It lived for the hunt and the taste of fresh blood.
Lips peeled back over teeth like ivory swords stained pink.
It sniffed, huffed, moved on. It would come back later and check the gate again. Until then, Vanitoth would have to find a snack, something to ease the rumbling in its stomach. The earth shuddered under its feet.
Vanitoth hungered. But for not much longer. Somehow, it knew. Soon. Very soon.
***
Karh shoved the hair pin hard into the soft flesh of the guard's neck. It sunk in easily, like a knife through warm cake. A spray of arterial blood gushed from the wound, painted the wall in vivid red splashes. The guard gurgled her last, unheard words. Karh helped the body slump to the floor.
"Like riding a bike," Karh said. Some skills, once learned, were never forgotten. He wiped the thin blade of the hair pin clean on the fabric of the guard's uniform and slid it into the back of his pants. He pulled the guard's spear out of her dead grip and tested its weight in his capable hands. Karh nodded, satisfied.
He moved down the hall, keeping to the shadows.
***
"So your tunnels, they'll will lead us out of here?" Zara asked. Hunter Haux squatted next to her, her one eye gleaming, and rubbed her chin. Zara recognized the tactic. Stalling. A heavy pause prefaced Haux's answer.
"The exits are all heavily guarded. We wouldn't stand a chance even if we managed to confiscate some weaponry. There is, however, an alternative," Haux said.
Another dramatic pause, and then she continued, "There's a gate. No guards. It's our best chance."
"I can tell by the tone of your voice there's a catch," Zara said. Haux licked her lips, as if the added lubrication would make the words come easier.
"It's the gate where Vanitoth enters from the jungle to accept its sacrifice."
"STARFUCK!" Zara cried and threw her hands in the air.
***
She was a tall woman with her long, blonde hair pulled back into a stern ponytail. Her robe was tied tight around her waist and was shorter than most of the others Karh remembered seeing in the throne room. Some kind of jeweled dagger was strapped in a leather belt, and she walked with an air of authority, the kind of person who knew where the exits were and could get to them unheeded.
The end of the spear thrust from the shadowy corner behind a hanging tapestry and bit the soft flesh of the woman's neck just under her jaw. She went all tense and wide-eyed, spine jerked straight.
