The grease under my nails was a familiar comfort. It was the grime of survival, the dirt of a job done right. My fingers, small and nimble, worked the final sequence on the plasma conduit, my knuckles scraping against the corroded housing. Almost there. The power core pulsed with a faint, violet light, a priceless jewel buried in the chest of a dead god. These ruins, the K’tharr called them a sacred temple. I called them a scrap heap waiting to be picked clean.
My name is Liana. I’m wiry, all sharp elbows and knees, with skin browned by a dozen alien suns and hair streaked blond by their radiation. At twenty-four, I’d learned the single most important rule of the galactic fringe: you don’t get what you deserve, you get what you can take. And this core would keep me fed for a standard year.
A low growl, like stones grinding together, echoed from the temple entrance.
Fuck.
I froze, my breath catching in my throat. My heart hammered against my ribs, a frantic bird in a cage of bone. I wasn't alone. I flattened myself against the ancient machinery, my worn leather jacket snagging on a shard of metal. Peeking around the edge, I saw them.
They were massive. Two of them, blocking the only way out. They were K’tharr, built like mountains of slate-grey muscle, each easily seven feet tall. They carried shock pikes that crackled with contained energy, their faces grim masks of duty. My little stun pistol felt like a child’s toy.
I had two choices: surrender and hope for a quick death, or run and definitely get a shock pike up my ass.
Defiance was a disease in my blood. I chose option three.
I kicked off from the console, scrambling up the pile of debris toward a crack in the high, vaulted ceiling. My boots found purchase on crumbling stone. My fingers clawed for a handhold. I was fast. On any human ship, I’d be gone. But I wasn’t on a human ship.
A hand, bigger than my head and just as hard, clamped around my ankle. It didn’t just stop me; it anchored me. The strength was absolute, inhuman. I was yanked from the wall like a weed, dangling upside down, the blood rushing to my head.
“Let go of me, you giant piece of shit!” I screamed, kicking and twisting. My fist connected with a thigh that felt like solid rock. I might as well have been punching a wall.
The warrior didn’t even grunt. He just held me, his grip a vise, while his partner secured the area. He flipped me over with a flick of his wrist, setting me on my feet before shoving me hard against the wall. The air whooshed out of my lungs. He bound my hands behind my back with a metallic cuff that hissed shut.
“Sacrilege,” the first warrior rumbled, his voice a low vibration that I felt in my teeth. “The Alpha will pass judgment.”
I didn’t know much about K’tharr culture, only that they were territorial, honor-bound, and didn’t like off-worlders. And I knew the word Alpha meant the same thing in almost every language in the galaxy: the one in charge. The one with all the power.
They dragged me from the ruins, my boots scraping uselessly against the stone floor. The walk to their settlement was a blur of humiliation. They didn’t speak to me. I was a thing. A piece of evidence. The other K’tharr we passed, tall and imposing warriors and stern-faced females, just watched with flat, golden eyes. They were a people carved from the rock of this planet, and I was a microbe under their gaze.
The throne room was less a room and more a cavern, vast and intimidating. The ceiling was lost in shadows, supported by pillars that looked like the fossilized ribs of some colossal beast. Torches cast flickering light on walls of dark, polished stone. And at the far end, on a dais carved from a single piece of black obsidian, was the throne.
And on the throne, the Alpha.
My captors forced me forward, shoving me so hard I stumbled and fell, landing painfully on my hands and knees on the cold floor. The impact jarred my teeth. I stayed there for a moment, my cheek pressed to the stone, the position of a supplicant. The position of prey.
“Look at him,” one of the guards growled, yanking my head up by my hair.
Pain shot through my scalp, but it was nothing compared to the cold dread that washed over me as I took him in.
He was a monster. A beautiful, terrifying monster.
He was even bigger than his warriors, a giant of slate-grey skin stretched taut over impossible muscle. Short, sharp horns of obsidian black curved back from his temples, framing a face that was all hard planes and brutal angles. He wasn’t wearing armor, only a harness of dark leather that crisscrossed his bare chest, leaving the thick cords of his neck and the sculpted power of his abdomen on full display. A thick, muscular tail, ridged with bony plates, rested on the stone beside him. But it was his eyes that held me. They were the color of molten gold, ancient and intelligent and filled with an absolute authority that pinned me in place.
He watched me, his expression unreadable. His power was a physical presence in the room, a pressure against my skin, a weight in the air that made it hard to breathe. This was a predator at the apex of his world, and I had just been dropped, helpless, into his den.
“This human female was found within the sacred walls of the First Temple, Alpha Xy’lor,” my captor announced, his voice booming in the cavernous space. “She was attempting to desecrate and steal a power core.”
Xy’lor didn’t move. His golden eyes swept over my small, kneeling form. I could feel his gaze like a physical touch, assessing my wiry frame, my grease-stained clothes, my bound hands. He was sizing me up, judging my worth. I felt like a piece of meat on a butcher’s block.
Fear was a cold, slick thing in my gut. But beneath it, that familiar, stupid defiance began to burn. I had survived pirates, slavers, and corporate kill-squads. I would not be broken by some overgrown lizard in a bone chair.
I lifted my chin, meeting his stare. I gathered the saliva in my mouth, and with all the contempt I could muster, I spat on the polished stone floor, just inches from his heavy, leather-clad boot.
A collective gasp went through the assembled K’tharr warriors. My captor’s hand tightened in my hair, ready to smash my face into the floor.
But the Alpha held up a hand. A huge, three-fingered hand with black claws at the tips. The guard immediately released me. The silence in the room was absolute, broken only by the crackle of the torches.
Xy’lor leaned forward slightly, resting his elbows on his knees. The movement was slow, deliberate, every inch of it radiating controlled power. For the first time, he spoke. His voice was a deep, resonant rumble that vibrated through the stone and up into my bones.
“You are brave, little scavenger,” he said. The words were in perfect Standard Galactic, but with an accent that made them sound rougher, more guttural. “Or you are a fool.”
“Maybe a little of both,” I shot back, my voice hoarse.
A flicker of something—amusement? interest?—crossed his face. It was gone as quickly as it appeared. He stood.
And stood. And stood.
He unfolded from the throne, rising to his full, terrifying height. He was a god of rock and shadow, dwarfing everyone in the room. He stepped down from the dais, his movements fluid and silent for a being so massive. He walked toward me, each step a heavy, deliberate impact on the stone.
He stopped directly in front of me, forcing me to crane my neck all the way back to see his face. From this close, I could smell him—a clean, sharp scent like ozone after a storm and something else, something primal and musky. Male. Alpha.
He crouched down, balancing on the balls of his feet. It was a predator’s crouch, and it brought his molten gold eyes level with mine. The sheer intensity of his stare felt like it was peeling back my skin, looking right into my soul.
“The law is clear,” he said, his voice a low murmur that was somehow more intimidating than a shout. “For the crime of sacrilege, the punishment is death.”
My blood ran cold. My defiance faltered. I had gambled and lost.
“But death is an ending,” he continued, his gaze unwavering. “It teaches nothing. Your life is forfeit. It belongs to the clan. And as Alpha, the clan’s property is my property.”
He reached out, and before I could flinch away, his thumb, rough as stone, brushed against my lower lip. The touch was electric, a shock of contact that sent a shiver down my spine. It wasn’t gentle. It was a touch of ownership.
“No,” he said, a strange light glinting in his golden eyes. “Death is too simple for a creature with so much fire.”
He stood up again, turning to face his assembled warriors. He didn’t need to raise his voice. His words filled the hall, carrying the weight of absolute command.
“The old laws will be honored. For her crime, this human will not be executed. She will be subject to the Rite of Binding.”
A low murmur rippled through the warriors. I saw confusion, even shock, on some of their grim faces. I had no idea what a “Rite of Binding” was, but the sound of it sent a fresh wave of terror through me.
Xy’lor turned his gaze back down to me, his face an unreadable mask of authority.
“You trespassed on sacred ground,” he declared, his voice ringing with finality. “You tried to steal what is ours. Your debt is immense. You will pay it with your body and your obedience. The Rite of Binding will make you mine. You will become my property, to serve me as I see fit. You will learn to kneel. You will learn to obey. And you will not be free until I, and I alone, declare your debt paid.”
He looked down at me, a small, defiant human on my knees, and delivered the final, devastating blow.
“Welcome to your new life, little scavenger. You are now bound to the Galactic Alpha.”
