Deceived Read online

  Dark had learned and by the time he’d been old enough for primary classes, he had a tough shell around him to keep others out. The other children knew not to touch him—a lesson he reinforced by breaking one boy’s fingers when the bully wouldn’t let him alone. He’d been suspended for several weeks for that but it was the one time Dark remembered his father expressing pride in him.

  “Did what you had to do—good for you, son,” he’d barked, clapping Dark on the back so hard he almost fell over. “Don’t let them get behind your walls and you’ll be fine. We might make something of you yet.”

  It was the first time his father had showed him any physical or verbal approval and shortly after that, Dark was allowed to accompany his sire to the kitchen of LorElle and start helping with the prep work. It was there that he fell in love with cooking, for it was the only way to be close to his father—who closed himself off from everyone but their mother, when she was alive and closed himself off entirely after her death.

  So Dark had learned his lessons from his father early and well—keep your walls high and your knives sharp. But sitting there in the darkness, cradling his younger brother who was weeping his heart out, Dark couldn’t keep his walls up anymore.

  Circling Creek’s thin, birdlike wrist loosely in a finger and thumb, he had deliberately let down his walls for the first time since he had built them up in primary ed.

  Pain had blazed into him, pouring like fire through a funnel into his guts. His own grief for his mother was like a dull, grinding ache—a constant sorrow that never went completely away, even when he was asleep. But Creek had intense emotions and their mother had been his whole world. He hadn’t been born a Pain Taker like Dark, so their father had allowed her to baby him and cuddle him as she had not been able to do with her oldest son. Creek felt her loss like a knife wound to the heart—a stabbing agony that went on and on and never dulled or lessened. A pain so great it was breaking him.

  It almost broke Dark too.

  As he sat in the darkness and let his brother’s pain flow into him like a poison tide, he felt as though he might die of it and yet he couldn’t stop. Couldn’t yank his hand away and leave Creek to face the pain himself.

  I love him too much, he thought, dizzy and sick with the piercing, stabbing, blinding ache of both his own pain and his brother’s. It hurts more to see him in pain than it does to take it on myself. I have to take it all—have to ease his ache.

  As so he did, though it weakened him so much he could barely get out of bed the next morning. But that night, for the first time since their mother had died, Creek slept peacefully. And looking at his little brother’s sleeping face, the lines of pain and loss temporarily smoothed from his forehead and his young body completely relaxed in sleep, Dark knew it was worth it—worth the intense agony of taking his brother’s grief inside himself, worth the weakness that followed—worth everything just to give Creek a little bit of peace.

  It was a cycle that repeated itself often. For though he could take the emotional pain of the loss for a little while, it always returned. It was never so bad as that first time, however, and after a while, it lessened considerably and Dark learned to live with it.

  His father, of course, had no idea of what he was doing. To him, Dark was nothing but an extra set of hands in the kitchen when he could be spared from watching his brother—a convenient extra prep cook whom he barely saw. He buried his own grief in work and let his sons fend for themselves—why would he know or care what Dark was doing?

  Dark had grown to resent his father even as he emulated him. By the time he was twenty-five cycles old, he had a restaurant of his own on Rigelus Prime, far from his sire. Creek had come to work for him and by the time Dark was twenty-eight, he had earned the first ten of the coveted Marks of Honor. He’d been planning on earning another ten and surpassing his father in every way—not that the old bastard would probably notice.

  And then the Ambassador from Yonnie Six came and his life became wildly skewed.

  She and her entourage ate at his restaurant—Tour’femm—and found both the food and the head chef to their liking. She had waited for him, surrounded by guards with blasters, and caught both him and Creek in the alley after closing time.

  Before Dark knew it, both he and his little brother were sold to the ruthless Mistress Hellenix to work in her kitchens. He had done some of his best cooking there—better even than he’d done when he knew the critic from Frip was reviewing him. That was because the sadistic Mistress was quick to criticize and free with her pain whip when she didn’t like the end result of Dark’s tireless work.

  How often had he tasted the sting of her lash—and taken Creek’s pain as well as his own afterwards? For his little brother and no one else would Dark endure the double agony that came with his curse. And he endured it often while they were slaves on Yonnie Six.

  He had feared he would live his life in bondage but then a miracle happened—his cruel Mistress had traded him and Creek for another slave and at last Dark and his brother were free.

  Dark had planned to go straight back to Rigelus Prime. He didn’t know what might be left of Tour’femm but he was determined to go back to the life he had built for himself and finish earning the Marks of Honor. He would put everything he had endured at the hands of his sadistic Mistress to the far back of his mind and forget it, he promised himself. As for Creek, thanks to Dark’s gift, his brother had been mostly spared from the horror. He ought to be able to live his life as well. They would run the restaurant together and forget and be happy—or at least be free.

  Then came the dream.

  The dream of the girl with the bruised face and frightened look—the dream of the Shannom-rah—an ancient artifact desperately needed by the Kindred of the Mother Ship. They had to get to the rainbow crystal which was capable of storing trillions upon trillions of personalities before their enemy, the Knower did.

  And Dark had volunteered to go.

  Because of the dream. Because of the voice he’d heard whispering, A life for a life—you must go, warrior.

  But, not because of the girl, he told himself firmly, as he looked out over the assembled crowd in the Replicant brothel. Not her. Never her.

  He’d been failed by females all his life. His mother who died and left him with an uncaring father and a helpless brother to take care of…the Yonnite ambassador who had stolen five long cycles of his life…the Mistress who had beaten him when she was angry and done…other things when she was pleased.

  No, he had no time for females, Dark told himself. No time, no patience, and no need. After this assignment he would go back home and live out the rest of his life the way his father had—working in the kitchen of his own restaurant to make the best cuisine he could, seeking the elusive Marks of Honor, and never, ever taking a mate.

  Wonder what Creek’s doing now? Is he prepping for Last Meal service tonight? he thought, listening to the crowd murmur among themselves over the pumping music. The auction was about to begin and expectations were high. The Replicants were lined up in neat rows around the perimeter of the large room and everyone was eager to get started. Most of them were female—because most of the buyers were male—but there were a few male Replicants on the far side of the room. Dark was at the end of their line. His handler—the brothel employee who had smuggled him in for a princely sum—was long gone and now he was on his own.

  Can’t believe I’m actually going through with this! If it wasn’t for that damn dream…

  This wasn’t the first time Dark had been auctioned off—he’d been sold to Mistress Hellenix at the Flesh Bazaar five cycles before. Even though he was being sold of his own volition this time and the assignment would be temporary, he could feel his nerves beginning to fray.

  He was starting to sweat, the fine droplets of perspiration beading on his forehead just below his black hair. He usually wore it long but he’d had it cut short on the Kindred Mothership—the better to emulate the neat, artificially handsome Replicant
he was supposed to be.

  Replicants were humanoid-seeming androids manufactured by the Knower, the enemy of the Kindred people. It was a powerful AI who had taken over an entire Kindred planet and killed all the inhabitants—but that had happened in another timeline—one Dark didn’t remember.

  It was a complicated matter but no more complicated than what he was involved in now—passing himself off as a Replicant in order to get to the Shannom-rah and keep it from falling into the wrong hands—the Knower’s hands.

  But I must only be sold to Gorn G’rime, the current owner of the Shannom-rah, he reminded himself. It was a good thing this was a silent auction with the bidders walking around the spacious room with black marble floors and glaring neon lights decorating the walls, where the brothel usually held its late night orgies. Hopefully this way he could make a case for himself and Gorn would want to buy him.

  It was well known to the Kindred Council that the Trollox had plenty of money—enough to have bought the Shannom-rah in the first place, which was considered a priceless artifact. So he could certainly afford to outbid everyone else at the auction if he liked Dark.

  As he had that thought, his future owner (he hoped) came into view.

  The Trollox were a hideous race in every respect. They had gray skin and some had two heads—each one horned and with glowing eyes. Dark couldn’t help noticing that Gorn’s left head was slightly higher than the right, giving the huge Trollox a lopsided look to his powerful body.

  But having one head higher than the other didn’t do a thing to diminish Gorn’s apparent physical strength. Though Dark himself was seven standard feet tall and muscular, thanks to his Kindred heritage, the Trollox topped him by two feet at least. The horned heads were attached to a massive torso which was bare and covered in glowing spiral tattoos—one for every enemy Gorn had killed, if the research Dark had done was correct. And he couldn’t help noticing that the Trollox had a lot of fucking ink.

  His prospective owner came stumping over on legs like tree trunks. The left head had glowing yellow eyes which scanned Dark up and down while the right head looked over other prospective candidates, glaring with restless red eyes at the Replicants lined up in rows.

  In any other situation a strange male of Gorn’s size coming to look him over, would have sent Dark into high alert. He would have lifted his chin and glared at the other male, giving attitude for attitude, letting him know that he was no easy mark.

  But he couldn’t do that now, he reminded himself—couldn’t stare down the other male or it would be obvious he wasn’t a Replicant. Instead he stared straight ahead, pretending cool disinterest as Gorn looked him over.

  “Well, yer a pretty one, ain’t you?” the Trollox sneered at last in a voice like someone gargling with gravel. “Bet some desperate female snaps you up quick-like so you can fuck her every night, pretty boy.”

  “Your pardon, Master, but I am not built for sexual gratification,” Dark said coolly.

  “You’re not?” The Trollox sounded surprised and his right head stopped scanning the crowd and turned to survey Dark as closely as the left head was. “Prove it!” he demanded.

  Dark had come prepared for this. He had been willing to go on this mission only as long as he didn’t have to worry about servicing anyone—especially the Trollox—sexually. Accordingly, one of the engineers who worked on the Pairing Puppets, which were the androids the unmated Kindred on the Mother Ship used to meet their needs, had created a prosthesis Dark could wear.

  Keeping his face completely blank, he unfastened the leather trousers he was wearing and opened them wide.

  “What the fuck?” Gorn muttered, both heads surveying the exposed flesh.

  The V of black leather showed only a smooth, tan strip of hairless skin—the space between Dark’s thighs was utterly sterile and sexless.

  Of course, beneath the prosthesis—which was made of pseudo-flesh and molded to his skin seamlessly—Dark was as well endowed as any Kindred—all of whom were blessed by the Goddess in order to be able to please their females. But it was impossible to tell that with the prosthesis in place—he simply looked like a Replicant that someone had forgotten to add male equipment to.

  Gorn shook both his heads, the horns on the right head clacking against the horns on the left.

  “I don’t fuckin’ get it,” he growled, glaring with both sets of glowing eyes at Dark. “This is a brothel. What the fuck is the point of you if you can’t fuck, pretty boy?”

  “I am programmed for cooking,” Dark said blandly, refastening his trousers.

  “Cooking, eh?” Gorn glared at him doubtfully. “What’s them, then?” he asked, pointing to Dark’s mouth.

  My fangs—he sees my fangs! Fuck!

  Dark barely stopped himself from slapping a hand over his mouth. Being half Blood Kindred, he of course had the double set of fangs where a normal humanoid would have his canine teeth. They were only supposed to get sharp when he met the female he wanted for a mate but his also sharpened when he felt threatened. And with the two-ton, massive Trollox looming over him, it was difficult to feel otherwise.

  “I am…build for protection as well,” he said, improvising. “If your home has valuable belongings that need guarding, I am well versed in many forms of combat.”

  He expected the Trollox to demand that he prove that too and he was more than ready to take the big brute on—his nerves had been on edge from the moment Gorn stumped over to examine him. Instead, the right head, which had been completely silent up until now spoke.

  “What kind of food do you cook, pretty boy?” The voice of this head wasn’t quite as deep and there was an oily, sly quality to it that made Dark feel he ought to be careful how he answered.

  “What kind of cuisine do you prefer, Master?” he asked blandly. “I am versed in Gelusian hot pot, Chil’bean blood worm preparation, Fondro mung-slop—”

  “Can you cook any Trollox food?” the left head demanded impatiently, its yellow eyes blazing. “I’ve bought Replicants from this place before that claimed they could cook for me but none of them knew hracker-head stew from yarn intestine pie.”

  “I can cook these and many other Trollox dishes,” Dark told him—which was the absolute truth. His restaurant on Rigelus Prime had been right near the Cantha system where most of the Trollox made their homes. He’d had regular Trollox customers—who he seated in a special dining room—ostensibly because the furniture there was heavier and more durable. But in reality, it was simply to hide his huge patrons and their messy eating habits from the view of other customers, who were invariably put off by Trollox table manners—or the lack thereof.

  “Hmm…” Gorn looked like he was wavering. “Well, I do have valuables that need protecting and I don’t want to hire a fucking humanoid chef—fucking untrustworthy they are,” the left head said.

  “And a Replicant with no cock is good,” the right one purred. “We don’t have to worry about him tampering with our breeding vessel.”

  “Fucking true,” the left head grunted. “All right, let’s take ‘im.”

  “I will place a bid that no one else can match,” the right head said smoothly, taking up the bid-pad on the stand beside Dark and tapping industriously with one curved claw. “There,” it said, finishing and putting the pad back. “That should do it.”

  “See you after the auction, pretty boy,” the left head growled. “You’ll be comin’ home with me. But for now, gotta find a few pretty little fuck toys. They wear out so fast.”

  The right head sighed. “They wouldn’t if you’d be a little more careful with them! You always break them right after we get them.”

  “Fucking is fucking,” the left head snarled back. “Ain’t no ‘careful’ about it.”

  The Trollox stumped off, still arguing with himself and Dark breathed a sigh of relief. He hadn’t liked being so close to the big bastard—it made every nerve in his body tight as he prepared to fight a male all his senses swore was the enemy.

 
Better get over that feeling, he told himself sternly. Gorn is going to be your new master so you’re going to wind up spending time with him whether you want to or not.

  Well, hopefully he would be confined to the kitchen and could just send the food out. As long as the huge Trollox only wanted to eat and didn’t care about supervising how the food was made, he should be all right…

  The auction seemed interminable with numerous customers coming to look him over and then placing bids but finally a brothel employee—a humanoid male wearing a button that flashed, Ask me about our double penetration specials!—came over to him.

  “Okay, buddy—looks like somebody put in the maximum bid on you,” he said. “Gotta get you going to your new master.”

  He had a bored look on his face as he unlocked the stay-put manacle from around Dark’s wrist and nodded at him.

  “Come.”

  Dark took a deep breath and did as he was told, walking in what he hoped was the same stiff, robotic gait he saw the real Replicants using. They went through a beaded curtain into a long, dark corridor and he saw a small doorway at the end. For a moment he hesitated—if he went down that hall, there was no going back and he knew it.

  The brothel employee noticed he wasn’t following and turned to frown at him.

  “Come on, will you? I’ve got a million other things to do. What are you—glitchy?”

  That got Dark moving again. He didn’t want the employee to tell Gorn he had bought a defective product. The Trollox would doubtless send him back and then he would lose his chance to get close to the Shannom-rah.

  Goddess, help me, he thought, walking down the hallway. No backing out now.

  He was doing this and there was no stopping until his mission was fulfilled.

  Chapter Two

  The door at the end of the corridor led to the docking bay where many ships of all shapes and sizes were parked. Gorn was waiting near a large, sleek cruiser that had obviously been custom built for his size and weight. Standing around him, their faces blank and their eyes vacant were three female Replicants. Dark was struck by the fact that they all had pale skin and dark red hair. So his new master had a “type.” Interesting.