Captive of the Horde King by Zoey Draven

Chapter Three

It seemed like hours until I spied lights in the distance.

An encampment, I realized, as we drew closer and closer.

The moon was already sinking into the star-speckled night sky. It had to be the early hours of morning and though I was exhausted from the day’s events, I hadn’t been able to relax or sleep. The jostling, rough movements of the black-scaled beast had ensured my discomfort and it had been hours since I could feel my legs or my backside. Surely I would be bruised in the morning.

The camp was mostly quiet once we reached the perimeter, but I spied many Dakkari males still awake, huddled around tall, gilded cauldrons of fire. The Dakkari didn’t believe in burning the earth, but seeing that enclosed fire made my belly churn. I never wanted to see fire again.

The encampment was surprisingly large. It surprised me that there was a camp, a base for the roaming Dakkari. No one had ever heard about one. The camp alone was larger than my entire village and we had a population of 86.

85now, I thought silently to myself.

Large, domed tents of tanned animal hide dotted the flat land, the camp positioned at the edge of a darkened forest of black trees. I had only seen trees once before and I stared up at them, amazed at their height.

Loud trills echoed in the night sky, making me jump. The horde king’s hand tightened on my belly briefly before he made a responding trill, loud and deep, from the back of his throat. I felt it vibrate through his body, against my back. The rest of the horde that traveled with him followed suit.

A signal, I realized.

More Dakkari emerged from their tents, some completely nude, which embarrassed me. But what surprised me the most was that females and children were among them, traveling with the hordes.

As the horde king guided his beast into the camp, winding around the tents towards the forest’s edge, Dakkari surrounded them, lining up along the makeshift road. My head swiveled from side-to-side, looking at unfamiliar faces. I felt their eyes on me, felt their curiosity, or perhaps their animosity.

But the males cheered with that loud trill as we passed and I jumped when I felt foreign hands on my legs. The Dakkari people—males, females, and children alike—reached out their hands to pass it over the horde king’s creature, over the horde king’s legs, and by extension, my own.

Finally, once they passed most of the tents, he stopped his beast with a firm tug of the golden chains near a wide enclosure. My lips parted, my chest squeezing, when I realized it was an enclosure for the beasts, with numerous troughs of raw, pink meat and clear water filled to the brim. I stared at that raw meat, thought of my hungry village with our dead crops and withering Uranian Federation rations, and turned my head away. Their beasts were eating better than we were.

There were hundreds of them, all enclosed within the single pen, but they had ample space to roam. The enclosure was larger than the entire encampment. I saw hundreds of red eyes in the darkness, their hides glimmering in gold paint.

The horde king dismounted with a surprising grace, handing the gold reins to a Dakkari male who came to greet him. Reaching up for me, my new keeper grasped my waist and easily swung me down, setting me on my feet beside him. I swallowed a hiss when the pain registered, everything stiff and sore from my waist down.

The horde king turned from me and gently took his beast’s snout in his wide palm. He leaned close, looking into its red eyes, and murmured something in Dakkari, his voice soft. The beast made a chirring sound in its long neck and was led away by the other Dakkari male. Once inside the pen, it immediately went to eat from one of the nearest troughs.

Without a single word—he hadn’t said a single word to me since we’d left my village—the horde king led me to the largest domed tent in the entire encampment. Stationed outside were two Dakkari males, who inclined their heads in greeting to their leader, ignoring my presence completely.

The horde king jerked his chin at the thick flaps of the tent, his eyes on me. Then he turned to the guards and spoke in Dakkari, probably along the lines of ‘make sure she doesn’t escape.’

Like I could.

There wasn’t a doubt in my mind that if I escaped, the horde king would return to my village and kill my brother as retaliation, perhaps more villagers in the process. I had accepted my fate, had agreed to it, had promised that I would serve him. I intended to, but I felt my soul slowly begin to wither at the prospect of it.

With that in mind, I stepped through the tent flaps, under the watchful gaze of the horde king. He was testing me, I realized. He wanted to see what I would do.

Screw him, I thought. There was a fire still within me, an anger. As long as I held onto that, my soul would stand a fighting chance.

Warmth enveloped my cloaked body when I stepped inside the tent. I hadn’t quite known what to expect, but my widened eyes took in luxurious surroundings, some luxuries I had never seen before.

Like plush carpets that lined the floor, soft beneath my booted feet—the soles of which were failing. Like wax candles that drenched the tent in golden light or little vases of hot oils that filled the space with a light, delicious fragrance. Like an actual bed set up on a low pallet draped in soft furs and cushions, not a simple pile of blankets on the floor like back home. Like a row of chests on the floor that glimmered with gold and the horde king’s treasures.

For a long moment, I simply stood on the threshold of the tent, taking in my new surroundings. My new prison. Because I couldn’t forget that this tent was still my cage, one I’d willingly chosen.

I didn’t dare to touch anything, though my fingers longed to stroke the soft furs on the bed. So I simply stood, waiting, glancing at the front entrance of the tent every so often. But the horde king didn’t appear, which relieved me.

Just when my eyes started to droop, when I swayed on my feet with my exhaustion, the flaps pushed open suddenly and a large bathing tub was brought in by two Dakkari males, not the guards stationed at the entrance. They didn’t meet my eyes. They simply deposited the tub along the empty space to the right, the space that wasn’t carpeted, left, and returned with huge basins of hot water. It took them multiple trips in and out of the tent to completely fill up the tub and once it was filled, they exited.

Then two Dakkari females appeared. I straightened at the sight of them, watching them warily. They were smaller than the males with plaited black hair that ended at their waists. Both females were dressed in a flowing gray shift dress that brushed the tops of their six-toed feet. Behind them, a small slit was cut out to allow for their tails, which were tipped in a dark tuft of hair.

“What are you doing?” I asked in alarm when they approached me and began to tug at my clothing, one kneeling to take off my boots, the other pushing the tatters of my cloak off my shoulders.

“The Vorakkar sent us,” one of the females said in the universal tongue, the one trying to unlace my boots. “He requests that you bathe after your long journey.”

“Ordered, you mean,” I muttered, cheeks reddening. “I don’t need one.”

It had been four days since I last bathed. Water was precious in our village and wasn’t needlessly wasted. I eyed the hot water in the bathing tub with longing, but I wondered if I could keep the horde king at bay for a few days if I refused to wash. Just a few days, to come to terms with my new life, my new purpose.

“You need one,” the female said her lips pursed, as if it was obvious. “The Vorakkar will not be disobeyed, even by you.”

What did that mean?

I was just about to protest again, but then bit my tongue. It was inevitable, just like my eventual relations with the horde king, whose name I still did not know.

Be brave,I told myself, and endure.

A thought occurred to me suddenly.

I would fulfill my promise and maybe when the horde king eventually tired of me, he would allow me to return to my village, to Kivan. Perhaps if I pleased him enough, he would take mercy on me and consider my debt paid.

I knew the likelihood of that was slim. Mithelda once again crossed my mind. She had never returned to our village, though there wasn’t a doubt in my mind that she’d been taken for the same purpose as the horde king had taken me for.

Shoulders sagging, I let them undress me without a fight. Truthfully, I was too tired to fight them, too sore.

Guilt filled me when I slid into the bathing tub…because it was wonderful and because Kivan, nor anyone in my village, would ever experience anything like it. A moan of surprise left my throat, which embarrassed me, because I’d never felt water that hot, never felt the way it could relax aching muscles and envelop me like a warm, comforting blanket.

Pain seared me as well, however. My inner thighs were chafed and raw from riding for hours on end and it stung like hell when the water soothed over the wounds.

I tensed when the two females knelt next to the bathing tub with cloths in their hands. They lathered them with soap, but I said quickly, “I can do that,” when they closed in.

As expected, they ignored me. With thorough strokes that left my cheeks flaming, they washed me from head-to-toe with efficiency, even scrubbing underneath my fingernails and toenails. They washed my dark hair twice with soap and I saw how quickly the water turned brown from dirt and dust.

One of the females suddenly yelled something towards the tent flaps, making me jump.

“Up,” she told me and wrapped me in a large fur blanket. “The water needs to be changed.”

“I’m clean,” I protested.

“Nik, the water needs to be changed. Look at the color.”

And so, I stood as the tub was carried out by three Dakkari males this time, returned once they tossed out the dirty water, and watched with a tight throat as more hot basins of water were brought in.

Such a waste.

Once the bathing tub was full again, the female ordered me back inside and I went through another scrubbing. The water remained clear, however, and I let out a little sigh of relief.

“Do you ache from the pyroki?” the female suddenly asked.

I met her eyes. They were so dark I could see the reflections of the candles in them. The other female still hadn’t spoken a word to me yet.

“The py…pyroki?” I asked, the word feeling strange on my tongue.

“You are raw here,” she noted, reaching beneath the water with her cloth to touch my inner thighs.

Realization dawned on me. “The pyroki are those creatures?”

Her eyes narrowed when I said creatures but she said, “Lysi. Pyroki.”

Lysimust mean yes, I decided.

“I’ve never ridden one before,” I told her softly, “or anything like it.”

“Your body will adjust in time,” she told me simply. “Dip your head again.”

“Why are you being so nice to me?” I couldn’t help but ask when I resurfaced, catching her gaze. Did all of the horde king’s whores—of which I was certain he had more than one—receive this kind of attention?

She blinked at the question, her eyelids painted gold. “The Vorakkar has tasked us with your care,” was all she would say.

Not a moment later, the tent flap pushed back, the horde king in question appearing.

The two females scrambled to their feet, inclining their heads, but not speaking. I froze, naked in the bathing tub. All the air seemed to leave the room as my heartbeat tripled its rhythm in my throat.

“Rothi kiv,” he said in his dark voice, his eyes finding me in the bathing tub and holding.

Immediately, the two females left after draping their washing cloths over the edge of the tub.

And suddenly, I was alone and naked with the horde king.