The First Chapter of The Once and Future Lover

 Hi! Thanks for stopping by my blog.

This is an excerpt from a novel-length erotic romance in Wicked Games, an anthology of my erotic novellas which will be published in April, 2014. Please note that this book is not intended for readers under 18, so if that’s you, please head to Pintress or YouTube or whatever. You do not need to be here. 

Anyway, The Once and Future Lover is a prequel to my Mageverse series about the vampire Knights of the Round Table. It tells the story of how King Arthur and his knights became vampires, while Queen Guinevere and Morgana le Fay became witches. It also deals with what exactly did happen with Lancelot… 

I hope you enjoy it!

The Once and Future Lover 

By Angela Knight 

Chapter One

Gwen dreamed of death, of blood and terror and grief. She jolted awake. In her panic, she almost shot from the bed, but her husband’s brawny arm was wrapped around her waist. She stilled, his breath warming her nape.

Arthur Pendragon slept as he so often did, curled around her, surrounding her in his swordsman’s hard strength.

He’s not dead. It was only a nightmare. Going limp as a soaked rag in her relief, Gwen turned her head to press her cheek against his broad bare chest. His heart thudded in her ear, steady and strong and comforting. Like Arthur himself.

As her dream panic drained away, she heard the deep voices of the guards out on the balustrade murmur something to each other. They sounded unusually tense.

Gwen stiffened as reality hit her like an armored fist. Today was the day Arthur would fight to the death.

Against Mordred. His son, heir, and enemy.

Her stomach curled into a sour knot. She had to pace, do something, or she was going to start screaming. What if this morning's dream had been more than a nightmare? What if it had been a vision?

Slowly, carefully, she eased Arthur’s warm, muscled forearm from around her waist, swung her feet to the stone floor, and rose, trying not to wake him. They’d been up late last night, making love out of desperation as much as desire. Arthur needed to sleep every minute he could.

A cooling breeze poured through the open shutters of the chamber’s sole window, which overlooked the courtyard where he and Mordred would do battle in a few hours' time. A shaft of blue dawn light spilled in, illuminating her husband as he sprawled in tanned, brawny nudity across their bed.

Arthur was not a tall man, though Gwen suspected he was actually more muscular at thirty-seven than the nineteen-year-old she’d married, back when they’d called him the Princeling King. He still drilled with his knights every morning, going full out with sword and shield. Whenever she pointed out the likelihood of being hurt in such practice, he’d snort. “I’ll not grow too soft to sit a horse.”

Her beautiful man. Her handsome king.

Responsibility more than age had salted Arthur’s hair with gray. More pewter threaded the beard that framed his lushly sensual mouth, and sprinkled the soft, dark thatch that covered his powerful chest. Still, the hair on his groin was as dark as ever, a sable ruff surrounding the long cock she’d always adored, the heavy balls she loved to cradle in her palm.

If he dies, I might as well crawl into the grave with him.

Gwen had seen too many battles over seventeen years as Arthur’s queen. She knew what happened when an older man fought a big brute nineteen years younger, and it wasn’t pretty.

The wizard Merlin had promised power to the winner of today’s battle. Arthur wanted that power to better protect his people from the invading Saxons, not to mention a Celtic warlord named Varn who had been a thorn in his side for the past two years. Then there was the collection of former rulers whose kingdoms Arthur had conquered more than a decade before, any one of whom would love to topple the High King.

As for Mordred… Well, he just wanted an acceptable excuse to kill his father. Anything more was just gravy on the goose as far he was concerned.

Arthur deserved better than a bastard son who hated him.

If only I’d been able to give him the heir he needed. The most important job I’ve ever had, and I failed him.

Three pregnancies. Three miscarriages.

Barren. A term that conjured images of winter fields covered in dead, brown stalks. Devils and angels, how Gwen loathed that word.

A familiar bitter sting gathered behind her eyelids, and she clenched her jaw, blinking hard, forcing her twisted features to smooth. You will not cry. You will show only smiling confidence. You will not make Arthur doubt himself.

Doubt can kill a man in a fight like this.

Mordred had enough advantages as it was. Gwen wasn’t going to hand him another arrow for his assassin’s quiver.

Wheeling, she paced naked across the chamber. All too soon, they’d have to walk out into the courtyard below to face the prince’s challenge. Gwen only hoped Mordred didn’t win. Not only would his victory be a catastrophe for her and Arthur, it would be a disaster for the country.

Her mind flashed back to a night months before, when Mordred had tried to convince Arthur to declare war on the Picts. The king had refused.

“Our people are enjoying the longest stretch of peace we’ve had in thirty years,” he’d told Mordred. “Let them savor it a little longer.”

“Peasants.” Seated at Arthur’s right at the Round Table, Mordred speared a bite of mutton on the tip of his dagger and ate it with a wolfish snap. Chewing, he sneered. “What do we care for the opinion of peasants?”

Arthur eyed him. The Table went silent as courtiers, knights and ladies listened for their king’s response. Sitting at Arthur's left, Gwen watched the two men just as attentively.

“My son, peasants are the ones who do most of the dying in war. Marching armies too often murder peasant children, rape peasant wives, and burn peasant crops, leaving the survivors to starve. A good king doesn’t start a war unless it’s the only way to secure peace.”

Mordred dipped his head as a practiced courtier’s smile lit his face. “I will remember your wise council, Father.”

Arthur turned away to speak to Lord Kay. As Gwen watched, Mordred stared at him, rage and malice flashing across the face so much like his father’s. Then he saw her watching him, and the fury vanished, leaving behind the smiling Mordred she'd thought she knew. The man who, for all his arrogance, was the embodiment of a dutiful son, willing to lead patrols and drill the men while his father handled affairs of state.

At the time, Gwen had told herself she must have been mistaken. Mordred had to have been reacting to someone else, anything else, not the father who loved him. Clinging to that belief, she hadn’t told Arthur of the hate in his son's eyes.

Last night she’d learned the king had seen enough to have his own doubts. Arthur had ignored them because he’d remembered paranoid accusations his own father had leveled against him when he’d been the prince and heir, though the thought of treason had never even crossed his mind. When he’d begun to entertain doubts about Mordred, Arthur had decided paranoia must be one of the hazards of kingship.

He’d been wrong.

Gwen squeezed her eyes closed. With a queen's ruthless discipline, she concentrated on making her mind as smooth as a frozen lake, feeling no fear. No doubt. No pain. Feeling nothing.

“You know,” a deep voice purred in her ear, “you do have the most beautiful rump I’ve ever seen.” Arthur’s big hands cupped both her bare cheeks. “I made you queen for this arse.”

But there are better things to feel than nothing. She turned her head to smile up into her husband's wicked grin. If he was working just a little too hard at it, she'd do them both the favor of refusing to notice. He's not dead yet. And neither am I. "At the time," she drawled, "you told me it was my eyes that won you. Or perhaps my mouth."

"And so they were. You're a woman of many parts." He slid his arms around her and leaned down to take her lips in a kiss so passionate, it made a fine distraction. She opened her mouth with a sigh and leaned into his warm strength. His tongue slipped inside her lips, explored sensitive flesh, teased with gentle strokes. Heat gathered between them everywhere they touched, dancing along the surface of her skin, coiling in the tips of her breasts and between her thighs.

Arthur's arms curled around her, tracing the naked rise of her hip before sliding down to cup her between her thighs. One finger stroked her sex with an exquisitely gentle touch that brought heat rushing to her core.

As delicious as that felt, though, she knew they would be interrupted. “My maid and the servants are due…”

“We’ll send them away.”

“…and you did order Lancelot to attend you for new orders.”

“He can damned well wait with the servants. None of them will begrudge us whatever moments we can steal.”

She considered arguing, but Arthur’s free hand distracted her as it traced a leisurely path up her torso, his swordsman's callused palm a little rough. The erotic scrape of his skin along hers made Gwen squirm.

The thought of the duel tried to surface again, but she thrust it down hard. Arthur was right.

If this is to be the last time, let’s make a memory to keep me warm through all the lonely winters. Everyone else can wait.

Especially Mordred.

Arthur found her nipple, twisted it with the perfect pressure. He knew just how hard she liked his touch, when she liked it, and where.

Throwing her head back on his shoulder, Gwen rolled her rump against his erection. “Mmm,” she purred. “You’re very, very…tempting.”

“I could say the same to you.” The hand teasing her sex parted her innermost lips to stroke the delicate flesh. “Sweet as cream, and just as wet.”

Guinevere turned her head and smiled up into his dark, hot gaze. “As I said, tempting.” She let her body relax, let all her fear and tension go. It was a trick she’d learned years ago, before other battles, other wars.

Arthur gave her nipple a harder tug, drawing it out to the edge where pain and pleasure met.

She groaned in delight. It had taken her years to convince him to be even slightly rough with her. His instinct was to treat her as if she had no more heft than a cobweb, easily shredded by careless hands.

A second finger joined the one in her sex, and he opened and closed them as he milked one nipple. The combination of heated sensations maddened and teased. She writhed, pressing back against his hips, until his shaft slid deliciously along the valley between her cheeks.

As Guinevere rolled her hips against him, he groaned. “Watch it, woman. You’ll make me spill.”

“I’ll take that chance,” she panted.

“I won’t.” He pulled his fingers from her juicy sex, caught her by the shoulders, and spun her to face him. She went into his arms with an eager moan. His mouth covered hers, hot and wet and fierce. She kissed him back, starving, loving the feel of his hands cupping her arse, the hard length of his erection.

His tongue slipped into her mouth, and she chased it with her own, suckling and circling it as if it were his cock. He growled against her mouth and lifted her off her feet, cradling her arse in broad, strong hands. With an eager moan, Gwen wrapped her legs around his waist and hooked one heel over the opposite ankle. She started to lift herself with her horsewoman's strong thighs, meaning to impale her sex on Arthur's meaty shaft.

“No, I don’t think so.” Turning to the bed, Arthur spilled her onto her back across the mattress. Before she knew what he intended, he dropped to his knees beside the bed, spread her thighs wide, and buried his face between them. The first long, skillful lick tugged deliciously at her labia without touching her clit. Not quite.

“Arthurrrr,” Gwen moaned. “God, Arthur, let me suck you. I need to…”

He lifted his head long enough to growl. “I think not. I’ve other plans.” He licked her again, then leaned in to find that exquisitely sensitive spot between her pussy and anus. His tongue pressed hard, swirling with surprising force, triggering a tingling jolt up her spine. Her knees went lax. He used his fingers to part her lips and admire her glistening folds. “You’re so pretty here. So delicate. My own sweet rose.”

He leaned in, licking her with that seductive skill of his, exploring her folds with the tip of his tongue, then licking slowly up and down each interior lip.

Gwen shivered and lifted her knees, catching her ankles in both hands to spread herself completely.

He rumbled in approval. Sliding two fingers into her pussy, he pumped in, out, again and again until she twisted in delight, unable to keep still. “You’re so wet,” Arthur growled, his voice deep and dark. “You really want my cock, don’t you?”

“Jesu, yes! Please, Arthur…”

The king grinned, hungry as a fox contemplating a helpless hen. “No.”

He thrust one finger up her arse. The sheer unexpected kick of wicked pleasure ripped a gasp from her mouth. The gasp turned into a groan when he began licking circles around her clit, not quite touching the hard little nub, but swirling close enough to make her body ring with pleasure. All the while, he pumped his finger in and out of her backside in a storm of sensation that intensified as he caressed her body.

Pausing, he brushed her bellybutton, tickling her until Gwen squirmed. “Arthur, you wretch, stop that!”

"Would you rather I do this instead?" Laughing softly, he subjected each nipple to a series of twisting tugs that sent pearlescent ribbons of sensation up her spine.

"If..." She had to stop to pant. "If you insist."

"Oh, I do." Lifting his head, Arthur studied her slick folds with possessive eyes. A second finger joined the one plugging her backside. “One day I’m going to fuck you here. Hard.”

She shivered. “Now. Do it now.” There may not be a later.

Arthur laughed. “No. No, I think I’ll save it for a special occasion.”

Before she could wail a protest, his mouth covered her clit and sucked so hard, his cheeks hollowed. Gwen's climax hit in a storm of fiery sparks that bowed her spine and ripped a scream from her lips. Never mind the servants who probably heard; for once, she didn’t care.

Even as the pulses started to fade, he started finger-fucking her arse in long, ruthless digs. His black eyes watched her face with dark male hunger.

“Fuck me, Arthur.” Gwen gasped, writhing, desperate. Lost. “However you want it, do it. Jesu, please!”

With a low animal growl, Arthur surged to his feet and grabbed her behind her knees. A hard tug dragged her to the edge of the bed. He snatched up a pillow and shoved it under her backside, angling her pussy for his use. One big hand gripped the ruddy jut of his cock and presented it to her opening.

His gaze met hers, hunger stark in his warrior's eyes as he reared over her, broad-shouldered and massive from hours swinging sword and shield.

He entered slowly as he always did, making sure she was ready for him. As if I could be anything else. Gwen tightened her inner muscles, loving the sensation of that thick, meaty cock stuffing her by hot inches.

"Jesu, you feel delectable." Groaning, he brushed his thumb over her clit, first circling it with his thumb, then teasing the inner lips stretched tight around his shaft. He seemed to know every point on her body where he could trigger pleasure. Gwen moaned helplessly as he filled her deeper and deeper, until every inch of that thick member was inside her. Slowly, he rolled his hips, rocking, grinding. “So tight. So hot and slick.”

It took Gwen almost a minute to manage speech. “You are so…” He circled his hips, and her mind went blank. “Good.” That last word emerged as a whimper.

Arthur laughed, low and wolfish. “As are you, my lady.”

His cock…Angels and devils, his cock! Each stroke seared her with distilled pleasure, goading her into rolling her hips against his.

Arthur grabbed her behind the knees. Knowing what he wanted, she rested her heels on his broad shoulders, a pose that tightened her, heightening the sensation for both of them.

Pleasure pealed through her in bell-like reverberations of delight. Reaching up her body with his free hand, he caught the peak of one breast. Arthur knew just how to pull and tug the way she liked it best. Sensation piled on sensation with every hard thrust, until she hurtled into pleasure, the deep, hard pulses bowing her spine. Gwen screamed in delight, barely aware as her king drove to the balls, head thrown back with an orgasmic roar.

###

Arthur collapsed on the bed beside Gwen, breathing hard, his heart pounding, his skin sweat-slick. For a moment he was content to simply listen to her pant. “Why are you breathing…so…hard…?” he joked. “I did all the work.”

“I…offered,” she gasped. “You…turned me…down.”

“Good point.” Scooping one arm under her, Arthur hauled her over on top of him and tucked her blonde head under his chin.

“I’ve got…an…idea,” she panted, her heart thundering against his chest. “Let’s…just stay…right here. All day.”

“Tempting…” He managed to catch his breath, at least enough for a feeble attempt at a joke. “But I’d hate to disappoint the boy.”

“Fuck him.” The violence in her snarl made him blink. “You have given him quite enough as it is.”

“Apparently he doesn’t think so," Arthur said, keeping his voice light despite the desolation he felt. "And he is my son.”

“But he isn’t mine.” As he blinked, startled, she gestured wearily. “Forgive me."

"Nothing to forgive." But he frowned, for her outburst was telling. She had never reproached him about siring Mordred; for one thing, he and Gwen had yet to meet when he'd slept with the boy's beautiful mother. He'd been a callow seventeen then, fresh from his first major battlefield victory. Morgana, a year older, black-haired and beautiful, had been summoned to use her Druid healer's skills to save his best friend's life. Lancelot had lived, and the young king had celebrated his victory between the pretty healer's thighs.

What neither Morgana nor Arthur had known back then was that they were actually half siblings. Evidently, Arthur’s father, King Uther Pendragon, had fathered Morgana during an assault on her Druid mother. They’d only learned the truth last week, when the wizard Merlin had sensed the incestuous connection.

Ten years after Mordred’s birth, Morgana had brought the child to court as she sought to become Camelot's healer.

Gwen, of course, had known Mordred was Arthur's son the moment she saw him. His mouth, his nose, the shape of his jaw, all bore the Pendragon stamp. Most other women would have been outraged at being presented with a husband’s by-blow, no matter when he'd been sired. Instead, Gwen had greeted boy and mother with joy. From then on, she treated Mordred as her own.

For all the good it had done. Arthur sighed, absently caressing his wife's bare shoulder. “I would I knew what happened. Where I went wrong…”

She shook her head. “It wasn’t you.”

“It wasn’t Morgana either. She…”

“My queen?” Gwen’s maid called through the door. “It’s time. We have the water for your bath…”

Before Arthur could object, Guinevere scrambled out of his arms and grabbed the dressing robe she’d left draped on a chair. He rose reluctantly and reached for his own robe. “Wife, there are times you are too bloody efficient.”

###

The king groaned in pleasure as he sank into the huge bronze tub that required a team of servants to fill. The water was pleasantly cool, giving the building June heat. “God’s balls, that feels good.”

Gwen dropped her robe and stepped into the water between his knees, then settled down opposite him with a sigh of appreciation. “This tub has to be the most wonderful gift you’ve ever given me."

“Including the emeralds?”

She considered the question, head tilted, expression judicious. “Those were truly beautiful…” Her smile turned wicked. “But I do believe the view from here is even better.”

“I can say the same of you, though honestly compels me to admit that necklace was as much a gift for me as for you. I do love the sight of those stones against your pretty breasts.”

“And here I thought you were just generous.”

“Oh, I am.” He grinned at her. “I’ve also been fascinated by those lovely tits since the day I met you.”

Gwen gave herself a glance far more critical than the view deserved. “They are not as firm as they were when I was sixteen.”

“Those were a girl’s breasts, my dear. Now they are a woman’s. Don’t underestimate the attractions of a lover who knows what she’s about.”

Gwen laughed. “Flatterer.”

“You know better than that. I’ve never had the patience to think of pretty lies. The truth is so much easier to remember.”

He smiled and relished her return smile of appreciation. Her oval face looked soft and lovely, her large blue eyes smoky over full lips. Her maid had used combs to secure her hair atop her head in a messy pile of blonde curls. If there was any silver among that gold, he’d never found it. Her body was still as lithe as a girl’s, her breasts pert, her legs long, lovely and strong.

His one regret in seventeen years of marriage was that he’d never been able to give her the child she’d wanted. And now, of course, it was too late.

We’re left with Mordred, unless I can contrive to kill him.

The thought made his gut coil into a sick knot of guilt and pain. When he was growing up, his own father’s love had seemed as unreachable as the moon; he’d been determined to serve his son better. I should have saved myself the effort.

Mordred had grown up to be as big a cold-blooded bastard as Uther. More so.

At least Uther hadn’t wanted Arthur dead…

###

Knotting the thick leather belt around his waist, Arthur strode into the sleeping chamber, his chain mail hauberk ringing softly. As he closed the door behind him, he could hear women's voices as the maid dressed Gwen's hair.

Knuckles banged the balustrade door in a decisive knock. “My liege?”

“Enter, Lance.” He sat down on the bed and began pulling on his boots.

His dearest friend strode in, dressed in a mail shirt almost as finely made as Arthur’s, his helm tucked under one arm. At thirty-nine, he was a big, dark-haired man, hard-eyed and steady, as well as the best swordsman Arthur had ever known—and the king had known many fine warriors over the years.

“My lord Lancelot.” Arthur gave him a formal nod and dropped into one of the chairs sitting beside the cold fireplace.

Lance had never been slow at picking up on cues. He promptly dropped to one knee and bent his head, though as boyhood friends, they weren’t normally so formal. “My liege, how may I serve you?”

“Be seated." Arthur waved him toward the high-backed wooden chair Gwen normally occupied. "I would give you your orders before I begin this day’s work.”

“Of course.” Lancelot rose to his feet as easily as if he wore wool rather than chain mail. The knight looked impassive as he sat down, but tension tightened his eyes.

Arthur could make a pretty good guess what he was thinking. “You have my permission to speak, Sir Knight.”

Lance paused as if choosing his words carefully. “Am I still your champion, my liege?”

Arthur lifted a brow. “Have I told you you’re not?”

“I wondered if I had given some offense. It is a champion’s honor to fight for his liege. Unless you don’t believe I can win?”

“Unfortunately, that’s not the point. Merlin made it clear I must prove myself worthy to drink from this enchanted cup of his. If I refuse the challenge, none of my court will be allowed to attempt it. Given the political situation, we can’t afford to spurn any advantage.”

"That cup’s still not worth your life, sire."

"Don't assume the rest of the court shares your opinion. Immortality is a damned powerful lure."

"True, but your subjects love you. You are fair, quick to rein in abusive lords even when it costs you politically, and generous with those who need it, whether noble or peasant." He believed every word he said, too; Lance had never stooped to flattery.

Arthur grunted. "My father was a stone-hearted bastard, but on one subject he was absolutely correct: if God grants you a crown, He expects you to serve as much as you're served. Which is why I cannot allow myself to be branded a coward before my entire court."

Restless, he rose and began to pace the chamber, his mail ringing. “Another thing—what if Merlin decides to repeat his offer to Hengrid and his Saxons, or even Vran and that gang of bandits he calls an army? I have no desire to face un-killable warriors with the strength of ten.”

“So you believe Merlin's cup can do what he claims?”

“You don’t?” Arthur leaned a shoulder against the wall and eyed his friend.

“Merlin has worked some impressive magic,” Lance admitted. “But so did that magician who came to court two summers ago, the one who claimed he could bring the dead to life. Him you sent packing with a boot in the arse.”

The king frowned. “Merlin is not some simple trickster. He proved that last week.” The wizard and his partner, Nimue, had stepped through a mystical gate in the air into the Round Table chamber. Arthur had wondered if they’d been fooled somehow—until Merlin opened a second gate to the Chanel, then invited them all to step through. The king shook his head in remembered awe. “Leagues covered in a heartbeat. You were as wonderstruck as I.”

Lance braced his elbows on his knees, his expression troubled. “But what if it was some sort of illusion…?”

“We all stepped through that gate, Lance. We smelled the sea, heard the boom of the surf. That shell Gwen brought back is right here. Still smells of the ocean.” Flipping open the jewel chest that sat on the mantle, Arthur grabbed the oyster shell and held it up. “Is this some fairy trinket, spun of air and moonlight?”

Lance being Lance, he didn’t back down. “No, Sire. But even if Merlin does work magic, that does not mean he isn’t playing some deep and lethal game. We cannot afford to lose you. I don’t want to bend my knee to Mordred.”

“Do you think I’m that easy to defeat?” Arthur hurled the shell against the far wall so hard, it exploded in a rain of shards.

“No, but I do think Mordred is three inches taller, at least a stone heavier, and nineteen years younger. Any one of those things you could overcome, but all?" He shrugged.

“Lance, I've been making war since I was fifteen. Hell, you were there, fighting beside me. Mordred may be built like a bull, but I can scheme rings around him.”

“You can strategize rings around him. Don't underestimate Mordred's talent for scheming. And if he does kill you, what happens to the rest of us?” His lips tightened. “Especially Queen Guinevere.”

First chapter of ENFORCER

My new book, "ENFORCER," will be published in UNBOUND on Tuesday, March 5, 2013.

Here's the first chapter of it.  In Enforcer, Chief Enforcer Alerio Dyami and Enforcer Dona Astryr try to defeat the murderous Xerans in the climax of the TIME HUNTERS trilogy. At the same time, Alerio and Dona try to find their way to love despite all the forces working against them.

The dark, narrow stairway stank of murder. The reek seemed to coat her tongue with rot and terror, turning each breath into a bloody assault. Dona Astryr ignored the nauseating taste. She was too busy listening for the killers who’d butchered everyone in the house.

In the crowded town square beyond the house’s neat white shutters, a crier read the American Declaration of Independence in a rolling baritone. The Philadelphia crowd hooted and stomped for the more inflammatory lines, bellowing support for the Continental Congress. If there were any Tories among them, they had the good sense to keep their snarls to themselves.

A fist-sized evidence ’bot zipped past Dona, riding the blue glow of an anti-grav cushion as it searched for murder victims. She snatched the ’bot out  of the air in a blur of cyborg speed. If there was a killer on the second floor, she didn’t want the device giving her away. The ’bot lit up, about to beep a protest, but Dona thumbed a button to mute it. ’Bot in one hand, shard pistol in the other, she cocked her head and scanned with every sensor implant she had.

Just below the roar of the crowd, a female voice whimpered pitifully in despair and pain.

Somebody’s still alive. Dona thumbed off the shard pistol’s safety. And they’re damned well going to stay that way.

 

Had to be Lolai Hardin. According to her dossier, the temporal guide owned this house, using it as a hostel for the time-traveling tourists who hired her to show them life at the time the Declaration was signed. The United States was considered the direct ancestor of the Galactic Union, and its historical milestones were major tourist attractions.

Hardin’s latest tour group had gotten a hell of a lot more than they bargained for. A vicious attack by forces unknown had left thirteen people dead or injured. Hardin’s two twenty-third-century employees were among them. Only Lolai herself was unaccounted for – a bit surprising, since she’d been the one to send the courier bot that had alerted the Enforcers that her tour group was under attack. She’d suffered at least one minor wound before she sent the bot; a bloody thumbprint had marred its smooth, white surface. Hardin's fingerprint.

Damn, I wish we could have gotten here before the bastards attacked. Unfortunately, nobody had ever managed to prevent this kind of massacre – and plenty of people had tried. You just couldn’t change history no matter what you did.

Of course, Lolai could have been working with the attackers. Could have been bought off or intimidated into cooperating. She could have been the killer. That whimper suggested otherwise.

But maybe Dona could save her. Victim’s condition? Dona started up the stairs in a padding rush, soundless as a ghost.

Extremely serious, replied the computer implanted in her brain. Sensors detect multiple stab wounds and extensive blood loss. She must have medical attention in the next 3.2 minutes, or she will die.

Which wouldn’t necessarily end the poor woman’s life. If Dona could get Lolai into regen at the Outpost infirmary within seven minutes of the time her heart stopped beating, she could be brought back. After that, brain death would be too extensive for regeneration, and she really would be dead.

Victim’s location? Reaching the top step, Dona paused for another scan.

First bedroom on the left.

Any sign of the attackers?

No.

That meant nothing. The killer or killers could be sensor-shielded, invisible to both Dona’s eyes and implants.

The evidence ’bot jerked in her hand, trying to escape. She stuffed it into one of the pouches on her armored belt and padded silently toward the bedroom door.  

Damn, I wish I had backup.

Unfortunately, every other Enforcer on the ten-agent team was either busy searching the house’s first floor or dealing with the two critically injured victims.

So I go in hard and pray I won’t find some bastard waiting to play “Let’s Kill the Time Cop.” Dona braced a meter from the bedroom’s locked entrance, lifted her shard pistol, and slammed an armored boot against the thick oak door. Propelled by cyborg muscle, the door crashed open and banged against the wall. “Temporal Enforcer!” She shot through the opening, crouched low, weapon ready.

Oh, fuck.

An arc of bright scarlet splatter marked the wall on her right. A small round rug squelched under her boots, bleeding streams of red across the polished wooden floor.

To her left, a naked woman lay spread-eagle on a canopied bed, wrists and ankles bound to its tall cherry posts. Dozens of wounds marked her breasts, belly, and thighs, drooling blood like witless red mouths. Her attacker had been particularly vicious with her face, cutting off her nose, slashing her cheeks and lips. It would take a DNA scan to identify her with any certainty, but Dona was willing to bet it was Hardin. Weight and height were right, anyway.

Send a message to Doctor Chogan, Dona told her implant as she padded toward the bed. Her feet left bloody footprints across the polished pine. We’ve got another survivor confirmed, condition critical.

One of Lolai’s eyes opened, rolling with terror until it fixed on Dona. The other appeared glued shut by dried blood. A tear spilled as her crusted lips moved soundlessly.

“I’m Temporal Enforcement agent Dona Astryr,” Dona told her, giving the room another quick, wary scan. Bed, armoire, washstand with china bowl and pitcher wreathed in painted roses. No attacker – or at least, none visible. “I’m going to get you into regen.” Bad as her injuries were, a few hours of regeneration would heal everything but Lolai’s memories.

The woman’s lips moved again, but the only sound she made was a low wheeze.

Where the fuck is Dr. Chogan? Dona wondered as her eyes flicked over the room again. Maybe I should just pick her up and Jump back to the Outpost. Comp, would she survive a temporal warp in her current condition?

Negative, the neurocomp replied. Given her wounds, an unprotected Jump would probably cause systemic organ failure and brain death. It would be better to wait for Dr. Chogan to bring a regeneration tube.

Frowning, Dona watched the woman’s bloody lips move. Her single open eye looked desperate. Leaning closer, Dona told her comp to amplify audio. “What did you say?”

The words emerged in a painful, wheezing hiss of superhuman effort. “He’s . . . still . . . here!”

Dona spun, bringing her shard pistol up as a figure in red and black temporal armor melted into view like a ghost. I knew it. Botfucker was hiding behind a sensor shield. She fired before he finished his big reveal.

A spray of needle-sharp tritium  shards hissed across the room to hit the killer’s chest. Instead of carving him into hash, the metal flechettes bounced off the suit’s armored scales in a chorus of musical pings.

She knew that red and black armor. A Xeran. Figures. Jolting aside,  Dona barely avoided the spray of flechettes he fired back at her. The bastards did a major upgrade of their tech a month ago. Their armor’s probably better than ours. 

Ducking, she listened to a second spray of flechettes hiss overhead.

It was a diversion. The Xeran charged in a blur of red and black and muscle. The impact of his powerful body knocked her breathless as they reeled backward, hit the bed, and tumbled across the victim’s bound and helpless body. Lolai wheezed in pain. Crashing to the floor, the two cyborgs rolled, each fighting to aim a shard pistol somewhere vital.

“Bastard!” Dona snarled into the Xeran’s black faceplate as she managed to jam the muzzle of her weapon against the underside of his jaw. The armor’s scales were thinnest there to avoid interfering with turning the head. He grabbed her gun hand with crushing strength and wrenched it away.

Fuckit , I’ll go for a head shot. Ignoring the fragile fingers threatening to snap in his crushing grip, she twisted her wrist until the weapon scraped over his faceplate. Backup! Dona snapped to her neurocomp. Dammit, get me some backup!

Requesting backup . . . Chief Dyami says the agents downstairs are also under attack. He will have to fight his way free before he can assist.

The comp was right. Shard fire hissed and whined downstairs, along with the thump of colliding armored bodies. A familiar Vardonese war cry rang out over the shouts, followed by a deafening crash. The Xerans responded with a chorus of curses. They sounded pained.

Chief Dyami really didn’t like people who murdered unarmed tourists.

That’s why you don’t piss off time cops. Dona peeled her lips off her teeth in something that definitely wasn’t a smile. Especially me. Despite the Xeran’s attempts to force the weapon away, she braced the shard pistol’s muzzle against his visor.

But before she could pull the trigger, her foe’s polarized plastium faceplate went transparent, revealing a twisted smirk she knew all too well. “Hello, baby. Miss me?”

Ivar Terje.

Dona stared at him for one suspended instant of disbelief that promptly dissolved into howling rage. “You ’bot-buggering traitor!” She slammed her left fist into his throat, aiming for the larynx, meaning to crush it right through his armor. A killing blow, especially propelled by genetically engineered strength amplified even more by the nanotech implants woven among muscle fibers to reinforce and strengthen them.

Ivar gagged, losing his crushing grip on her weapon hand. He didn’t die though.  

Dammit.

Dona wrenched free to slam the pistol into his faceplate so hard, the tough plastium cracked into a spider web of jagged shards. Good. She couldn’t shoot him through it. Once it was gone…“You almost killed me, you son of a bitch. You ruined my life, my reputation, my career. They thought I was a traitor because of you!” Another furious swing sent more cracks radiating across the reinforced plastium, but the visor still protected her enemy’s hated face.

The third blow had every last superhuman erg of Dona’s cyborg strength behind it. Her ex-lover’s faceplate finally shattered in a spray of jagged, glittering fragments. “I can’t believe I was ever stupid enough to love you!” She aimed the pistol between his eyes, her finger tightening on the trigger…

Ivar slapped the muzzle away from his face. The blow looked casual, but it sent her heavy pistol sailing across the room as her arm went numb from hand to shoulder. Now, there was a data point she could have done without. Oh, seven hells, he’s been playing with me. He’s easily three, four times as strong as I am. Maybe more.

That must have been some tech upgrade.

“You’re worse than a traitor. You’re a fucking fool.” Thrusting one booted foot against her belly, Ivar kicked her airborne. She sailed over the bed and crashed down into the midst of the washstand, pottery exploding, wood splintering into tinder from the impact of her armored body. Her helmeted head hit hard enough to dent the wooden floor. She tasted blood.

The battleborg rolled to his feet with a grace astonishing in a man so massive. “Every lie I told you, you believed. Love you? Why in all the hells would I love you?” The contemptuous jerk of his head made light glint off something inside the dark confines of his shattered helmet.

She squinted. A pair of objects glinted bright and sharp among the disordered, sweat-darkened tufts of his red hair. Something that looked almost like…

…A priest’s horns.

Xeran religious orders marked rank by the size, number and length of their surgical horn implants. He’s a Xeran priest now? They accepted him into their priesthood? A traitor? Dona rose from the wreckage of the washstand, though her back howled in bruised protest. Sinking into a crouch, she drew a knife from her boot. The blade chimed, a pure, high note that somehow sounded menacing. Well, not for long, you treasonous son of a bot.

Temporal Enforcement’s techs had improved the quantum weapons they’d invented six months before. The originals had been battle axes even Dona could barely swing, but the new blades were far lighter. And just as capable of cutting through heavy combat armor.

Another deep male roar sounded downstairs. For a split second, Dona felt comforted. Somewhere the Chief’s kicking ass. Just like I’m about to. Tech or no tech.  

Her quantum dagger hummed a higher note as she circled Ivar, boots crunching through broken crockery. “You’ve had this coming for a long, long time, you son of a bitch.”

“No, you’re the one who’s about to get a taste of what you’ve had coming.” He bared his teeth. They flashed at her from the darkness of his broken helmet. “So, are you still fucking Dyami?” Misinterpreting her shocked expression for surprise, he curled a lip. “Did you really think I didn’t know you were betraying me with that sanctimonious Warlord prick?”

“I never…” she began, before she realized she didn’t owe him explanations anymore.

“Don’t waste the oxygen.” Ivar lunged, crossing the distance between them in a blur of battleborg speed. “I always knew you rutted with him, you little bitch-whore.” His fist flew at her face.

Dona twisted, avoiding the blow by millimeters as she drove the quantum blade at his armored belly. He knocked her wrist aside, and she went with the blow, spinning aside before his backhanded blow could hit her head. “I never betrayed you, Ivar,” she gritted, knowing she was wasting her breath. “You were the one who spat on everything you ever claimed to believe in. Me. Chief Dyami. Your Enforcer’s oath.”

“My oath? Only an idiot would buy that beefershit.” He curled a lip and paced to his right, circling. Looking for an opening. “Unlike you, I’m not that stupid.”

He’s so busy sneering, he forgot to keep his guard up. Dona’s eyes narrowed, focusing on the left hand he’d dropped out of a proper defensive position. The only chance she had was to hit him hard and hit him fast.

Even before the Xerans upgraded his nanotech, Ivar was a combat class battleborg, easily a foot taller and fifty kilos heavier than Dona, every gram genetically engineered and nanofiber-reinforced.

But she was faster. Dona drove the quantum dagger at her foe’s massive chest in a blur of merciless strength.

He hit her with such staggering speed, she didn’t even see the blow coming. The stiletto cartwheeled from her hand as Ivar slammed a punch into the side of her head, knocking her off her feet and sending her skidding into a corner.

If not for her helmet, the blow would have shattered her skull.

The battleborg was on her before she could scramble up and away. Dona threw up a forearm block, but his fist still hit her right in the center of her visor. It cracked as her head bounced against the floor. Flat on her back, she counterpunched anyway, a diversion for the kick she planted right between his legs. He only snarled and started pounding her as she tried to twist aside and rise. Punch  after punch thudded into her head and torso, smashing her back against the floor.

Starbursts of pain thundered through Dona’s skull, but she ignored them as she fought to scramble to her feet. Managed it somehow, reeling upright, slamming punches and kicks into Ivar’s big body. He didn’t react to the blows at all. Seven hells, it’s as though he doesn’t even feel them.

And it was possible he didn’t, if his implant had blocked the pain. Yeah, I’m fucked.

A blur of red hit her face so hard, her skull seemed to detonate. The world seemed to blink.

Lifting her head, she realized she was flat on her back in the middle of the room. And she had no idea how she’d gotten there.

Ivar stepped into view and loomed over her, a savage grin on his face.

Oh, fuck. Frantic, desperate, Dona drove both feet into his gut in an effort to kick him the hell away from her. He didn’t even try to block the double kick. Barely even rocked on his heels.

“You’re dead, bitch.” His eyes glittered with a rage that was not entirely sane.

He’s going to kill me. He’d already made far too much progress toward that goal. The room revolved around her, and her head throbbed with a relentless kettledrum pounding.

Warning! her neurocomp blared. You have sustained a severe concussion. You cannot continue to take blows to the head without suffering traumatic brain injury.

And what the hell do you suggest I do about it? Terror spiced her rage like sawpeppers, tongue-searing and bitter. A punch she never even saw exploded against her faceplate, snapping her head back as the plastium shattered. Shards peppered her face, but she barely felt the sting as she staggered. Even with the helmet’s protection, Ivar was bouncing her brain around inside her skull like a grav-ball.

The comp’s right. He’s beating me to death.

Ivar rose to his feet, hauling Dona upright with a hand around her throat. He rammed her into the wall with such force, white flakes rained around her shoulders as the plaster cracked like dried mud. Stunned, disoriented, she hung in his grip as he reached up and did something to the underside of her jaw. Her helmet lost its grip on her skull. He pulled it off her head and tossed it aside to hit the floor in a series of rolling thumps.

Oh, fuck. Blearily, she peered at him, hanging limp in his hold, barely able to focus on his face as the world swung around her.

Grinning like a skyshark, Ivar drew back one huge fist for the blow that would likely shatter her skull.

Red alert! her comp squealed. Take defensive action immediately or…

Gods curse him, I am not going to let this bastard butcher me. I will fight him to my last breath.

Drawing on the last dregs of her strength, she swung a clumsy fist toward that hated smirk. He merely swatted the blow aside.

“Is that the best you can do, cunt?” Ivar laughed, eyes glittering hot with knife-edged pleasure. “Then I guess you’ll die.” He cocked his fist back for one final blow…

And vanished.

Deprived of his support, Dona fell, tried to catch herself. Hit the ground anyway in a heap of knees and elbows. Dazed, barely conscious, she lifted her aching head.

A couple of meters sway, Alerio Dyami hammered punches into Ivar, relentless as a metronome. The traitor reeled as he fought to protect himself, arms jerking in a futile effort to ward off crunching blows. He’d lost his helmet, and his face was almost as bloody and bruised as Dona’s. Each blow tore a grunt of pain from his lips. Battleborg tech notwithstanding, Ivar was no Vardonese Warlord.

Alerio was a Warlord, however, and he was pissed.

Safe, Dona thought in dazed relief. I’m safe. The Chief won’t let him kill me.

Darkness rolled over her in a black flood. She didn’t feel her head hit the floor.

Chief Alerio Dyami stalked Ivar Terje around the scene of the fucker’s latest crime, the instinct to murder growling in his heart.

The bastard needed killing. Deserved it. Alerio fully intended to give him those just deserts.

A nude woman lay bound to the bed, blood smearing her body from multiple stab wounds. Alerio’s sensors told him the slick gleam on her spread legs was Ivar’s sperm.

But even as that crime filled him with a cold, righteous fury, what really drove Alerio insane was the sight of Dona Astryr lying in a bloody heap. If he hadn’t been forced to fight his way through all those Xeran priests downstairs, he could have spared her the savage beating Ivar had so obviously dished out.

The minute his neurocomp received Dona’s call for help, Alerio ordered the implant to send him into riaat. The stew of biochemicals the computer pumped into his bloodstream had instantly thrown him into the berserker state that made Warlords so feared.

Ivar certainly should fear him, because riaat increased Alerio’s already considerable strength by a factor of ten, while making him almost impervious to pain. All of which made it easy to beat the blood out of a traitor who richly deserved it.

One of Ivar’s eyes was already swollen shut, but the other glittered feverishly at him. “You’re such a fucking hero, aren’t you?” The battleborg’s bloody lip curled in a sneer. “But you didn’t save the bitch on the bed, did you? Or the ones downstairs. Even the kid. We butchered them all, and there’s not a fucking thing you can do about it. You can’t change history. No matter what you do, no matter when you Jump, they’ll die because we killed them. You failed, Chief.” He laughed. “Big hero. Big, noble Warlord. Utter fucking failure.”

Alerio ground his teeth against the need to kill. Get control, dammit. He wants me blind stupid with rage. He wants me to make mistakes. “You’re right.” He forced himself to retreat one step. Then another. Getting room to fight like the calculating warrior he was instead of a berserk killer. “I didn’t save the fourteen people you raped and murdered.”

But despite his battle for control, his murderous fury must have shown, Ivar’s gaze flickered, and for an instant, Alerio saw fear flash through his enemy’s eyes.

And that was the opening he needed. Oh,’botfucker, you’d better be scared. Alerio whipped into a spinning kick.

Ivar ducked, throwing up a forearm in an attempted block. Neither effort kept the Chief’s boot from slamming into his jaw. The battleborg crashed into the wall behind him, almost went down. Alerio, still balancing effortlessly on one leg, reversed the kick and snapped the toe of his armored boot into Ivar’s jaw.

The battleborg crashed backward, shattering the wall’s plaster but somehow managing to keep his feet.

Alerio took a gliding step forward and punched him squarely in the face with a left-right combination that rocked Ivar’s head on his shoulders. “You’re finished,” the chief growled. “You’ll spend the rest of your life in a penal colony, thinking of all the women you’ll never fuck.”

Ivar steadied himself, one corner of his bleeding mouth lifting in a smirk. “It’s not going to be that easy, Chief.” A punch blurred out of nowhere, blooding Alerio’s mouth and making his skull ring.

Huh, Alerio eyed his opponent’s vicious grin. Guess he’s got a little more left than I thought. He’s definitely stronger and faster than he was the last time we 

fought.

“The Xerans gave me an upgrade,” Ivar told him smugly.

Alerio curled a lip. “It’s not going to save you, asshole.”

“Yeah, well, yours definitely won’t save you, Chief. You, or any of those fucking tourists you’re so determined to protect. We’ve got T-suits, motherfucker.” He grinned, smug confidence in the bloody curve of his split lip. “The whole temporal plane is our little playground. We can screw and kill every tourist who falls into our hands. And we will.” His glinting eyes narrowed and went cool. Almost sane. 

“Unless you turn yourself in to the Victor’s . . . justice. You. Your little whore Dona. Those abominations, Nick Wyatt, his Warfem bitch Riane. Jessica and Galar Arvid. All of them.” Now that eye went damned icy. “And most of all, we want the T’Lir. So be a hero, Chief. Or watch me kill everything that moves.” Energy began to swirl around him, preparing to coil into a temporal warp that would shoot him across time and space.

Fuck, he’s getting ready to Jump. Alerio lunged toward his foe. Too late. A deafening sonic boom and a flash of light blinded him as Ivar’s T-Suit armor warped space and time, catapulting the traitor far from the Warlord’s reaching hands.

When Alerio could see again, Ivar Terje was gone.

Jumped. Goddess knows where. He glared at the empty space where Ivar had been. Yeah, run now, cocksucker. Sooner or later, I’ll hunt you down.

In the meantime, Alerio had more important things to worry about. Starting with Dona Astryr. One long pace took him to his agent’s sprawled, unconscious body.

But before he could begin a sensor scan to determine the extent of her injuries, a sonic boom thundered from the floor below. Another sounded, and then another and another, until Alerio felt the whole house sway in the grip of temporal forces like a tree in a storm. The priests were following Ivar’s lead and Jumping for 

home.

And there wasn’t a damn thing Alerio or his agents could do about it.

“Chief,”commed Galar Arvid, his second-in-command, “the Xerans have all Jumped, presumably for Xer. Do you want us to pursue or…?”

“What, chase them all the way back to the Crystal Fortress, where ten thousand just like them wait to kick your ass? Fuck no. Start getting the wounded to the Outpost and the dead into Stasis. We’ll figure out what to do about the hornheads later.”

“Understood, Chief.”

Wearily, Alerio sank to his knees by Dona’s side. She looked like he felt. The Enforcer’s pretty face was battered, both eyes blackened, her lips cut and swollen. Bruises distorted the clean lines of her high cheekbones and delicate jaw. He was almost afraid to scan for internal injuries. He was pretty sure he didn’t want to know. He scanned anyway. And swore.

Com Dr. Chogan, Alerio told his neurocomp.

The doctor answered a heartbeat later. Evidently someone had already fetched her from the Outpost. Good. “What is it, Chief? I’ve got my hands full with Riane. She took a gut wound.”

“Astryr got the worst of it in a fight with Terje,” Alerio said shortly. “She has a pretty serious concussion. My sensors say her brain is swelling.”

“Let me get Riane into regen, and I’ll head up there.”

Dona moaned, a breathy sound of pain that made the muscles in Alerio’s chest clench. It was more than the ache he’d normally feel over an injured agent. Her remarkable violet eyes opened to slits in her swollen lids. Registered him. Tried to widen. “Terje,” she gasped, apparently trying to warn him. “The traitor’s . . .”

“Already Jumped for home,” Alerio told her roughly. “Along with the rest of the Victor’s priests.”

“What about . . . woman . . . temporal guide. . . owns …house. She’s . . .” Dona lifted a wavering hand, gesturing weakly toward the bed and its bloody occupant. 

 “Alive when I . . . came in. Is she . . . ?”

He frowned at the still form. “That’s Lolai Hardin?” only to ask himself an instant later, Well, who the hell else could it be? According to the Temporal Jump plan Hardin had logged with the Outpost, she was the only one unaccounted for.  It had not even occurred to him that the woman on the bed could still be alive, considering the extent of her injuries. Scan her, he told his comp.

No cellular activity, the implant reported. Based on decay, she has been dead too long for successful revival. At least ten minutes.

Alerio cursed himself and Ivar with equal venom. “She’s gone,” he told Dona’s swollen violet eyes.

“Dammit.” A tear slipped down a bruised cheek. “I was hoping I could save her.” Her delicate jaw worked as if she ground her teeth. “Fucking… Ivar . . . wouldn’t let me Jump her… out.” She stopped to pant. “They all died… didn’t they? Ivar and the priests… killed everybody.”

He had no idea, so he commed Galar to ask about the two survivors. When the answer came, Alerio ground his teeth. Devils drag Ivar right to the seven hells. “Chogan did her best, but…no.  Couldn’t even save Hardin’s coachman, much less the boy. Both died in regen.” Which said everything that needed to be said about the savagery of the attack on them, since regen could heal damn near anything.

Alerio leaned over to give her his most determined stare. “The Xerans are going to pay for what they did to these people.” Lifting one delicate, chilly hand, he wrapped his big fingers around it. “We’ll make sure of that.”

“I know. You always get justice for the . . . victims.” Her bruised eyes slipped closed.

“Dona!” Stiffening in alarm, Alerio ordered another scan.

She has a concussion, his neurocomp reported. There is swelling in a bruised area of her cerebral cortex that must be addressed before it becomes serious. Fortunately, her neural computer is compensating, and her other injuries are not life-threatening. She will heal quickly once in regeneration.

Alerio sighed in relief and sat back on his heels, studying Astryr’s battered face. Like most Enforcers—and the Warlord himself—she was a cyborg. A network of biocrystal grew through her brain like a second nervous system, feeding her brain sensor data even as it gave her control of most bodily functions. A lacy sensor network lay beneath her skin, designed to detect everything from the DNA of a murder victim to the temporal warp fields produced by T-suits during a Jump.

The tech didn’t stop there. Nanotech filaments reinforced her bones and strengthened her muscles, making her far stronger than any ordinary human, male or female. Yet even given  all that, Dona was no match for a battleborg like Ivar Terje. His implants were even more extensive, and his muscles were reinforced with nanofibers three times as thick as hers, giving him far greater strength. She’d known that, yet she’d still gone after Terje, determined to save a dying woman even if it meant her own life.

“Chogan!” he bellowed.

“Gods, Alerio, I’m here already.” Dr. Sakari Chogan stalked into the room, trailed by a seven-foot regeneration tube that wafted like a leaf on a streaming blue anti-grav field. The doctor looked pale and grim despite her ethereal good looks, and she’d gathered her iridescent green hair into an untidy topknot that looked as if she’d been dragging her hands through it. As usual during temporal missions, she wore a bright red T-suit marked with a prominent white M for “Medical.” To most opposing forces, no matter how brutal, that would have made her a non-combatant.

The Xerans had proven time and again that they didn’t give a damn whether medical personnel were off-limits or not. If they’d gotten their hands on the doctor, they’d have shown her no more mercy than they had Lolai Hardin. Yet that hadn’t stopped Chogan from doing her best to save the injured and obtain justice for the dead.

“Chief?” she prompted him gently. “Mind giving me a hand?”

“Oh. Sorry.” Alerio rose hastily to help Chogan guide the unwieldy regeneration tube over Dona’s unconscious body. When they had it positioned to her satisfaction, the doctor flicked her fingers over a series of controls. The device obediently lowered to engulf the injured Enforcer. Seconds later, a pink healing mist flooded the tube, obscuring Dona’s unconscious face.

Chogan leaned over the huge device, her hands sweeping through its control field in graceful arcs that triggered a series of medical scans. Within seconds, the results flashed into view, scrolling over the three-dimensional schematic of Dona’s body. Heart rate, blood pressure, oxygen levels, cerebral activity, others Dyami didn’t recognize. Some readings appeared in shades of healthy green, but others  pulsed a warning crimson.

“Looks like the ’botfucker banged her brain around pretty hard,” Chogan told Alerio, a frown forming between her swooping green brows as she studied the readouts. “I never did like that bastard. There was just something so bloody mean about him. He hurt people and enjoyed it. Including Dona, lover or not.”

“Yeah, he’s a bastard.” Brooding, Alerio gazed through the tube’s transparent lid, studying Dona’s unconscious face. Her battered features were already healing, bruises fading, cuts vanishing under a tide of pink, healthy skin.

Alerio felt knotted muscles begin to relax between his shoulders. “Terje needs a fatal ass-kicking,”
 

 he told the doctor absently as he braced his palms on the regenerator’s lid and stared into Dona’s sleeping face. Her closed eyelashes looked incredibly thick and dark as they fanned over her cheeks. “Too bad he got away before I could give it to him.”

Chogan sighed. “At least now we know what lies under that slick smile. That’s preferable to being blindsided the way we were when he tried to kill Jessica.”

None of them had known Terje was a hornhead double agent until the Enforcer had damn near strangled Jessica Kelly to death. The pretty redhead’s only crime had been her choice of roommate, a woman named Charlotte Holt, who turned out to be Xeran herself. Charlotte had managed to piss off the Xerans’ so-called “god,” the Victor, by trying to protect an alien race he wanted dead. The Victor had apparently decided to have her killed, along with anyone she might have talked to. Including Jessica.

So what the hell did Holt know that the Victor wanted squashed?

Then there were Holt’s alien friends, the Sela. Big-eyed, six-legged, cuddly little creatures -- with one fuck of a lot of power. The Victor considered them abominations, and he intended to exterminate every damned one of them. Now the Xeran “god” had apparently decided to expand his hit list to include every temporal tourist he could get his hands on, along with Alerio and his Enforcers.

Question is, how the hell do I stop him?

Minutes later, Dr. Chogan, Lolai Hardin’s body tube, and the regenerator containing Dona made the Jump back to the Outpost Infirmary in the usual showy explosion of light and sound.  With them safely away, Alerio rolled his knotted shoulders and headed back downstairs to check on the rest of his team.

He found the nine of them hard at work bustling around the bloody murder scene. To his relief, no one else had been as badly injured as Riane Wyatt, who was already in the infirmary.

We got lucky.

When he was satisfied they’d gathered all the evidence they’d need if this mess ever went to trial, Alerio gave the order to begin the Jump for home. His eight remaining agents began warping out from the wrecked parlor in teams of two, accompanied by evidence ’bots and body tubes loaded with the tourists they’d failed to save.

As was his habit, Alerio was the last to leave in order to cover his team’s retreat. Which, as usual, left him half-blind and completely deafened from the flash and boom of temporal warps. Luckily the T-suits’ dampening field kept anyone more than ten meters away from sensing the effects. No Philadelphia natives would wonder why there was a thunderstorm raging inside the house next door.

By the time it was his turn to Jump, the chief’s ears were ringing so loudly, it was all he could hear. Until the androgynous mental voice of his neurocomp began reciting the familiar string of coordinates that was the Outpost’s space-time address. Outpost coordinates confirmed, he told the implant. Engage temporal warp.

Engaging temporal warp in three . . . two . . . one . . .

It felt like being hit by lightning, a teeth-rattling electrical assault that shook his body until his consciousness blinked out . . .

. . . And . . . he was back again.

Temporal warp to the Outpost successful, the neurocomp announced.

Alerio made no answer, blind, deaf, stomach knotting in violent rebellion, muscles jerking from the electrical assault that was a side effect of the Jump. Bracing his knees, he stayed upright by will alone and waited for his implant to compensate. My team?

All members of the investigation team present and accounted for.

The chief  breathed a silent prayer of thanks to whatever Vardonese goddess happened to be listening.

He’d lost a Jumper once. Riane Arvid’s sabotaged T-suit had bounced her back and forth across Terran temporal space before finally dumping her in the twentieth century. Her suit was dead as a stone by then, unable to generate even the weakest warp field.

To make a bad situation truly gods-awful, a team of Xeran assassins appeared minutes later. They’d have butchered her with their usual viciousness if not for a timely rescue by Nick Wyatt, half-breed Xeran and superhuman guardian of an alien race called the Sela.

The two had bonded as they struggled to elude the Victor’s assassins. By the time Nick helped Riane return to the Outpost, the couple was desperately in love.

Still, almost losing an Enforcer was an experience Alerio had no desire to repeat. Especially considering Ivar’s threats. We can screw and kill every tourist who falls into our hands. And we will. Unless you turn yourself in to the Victor’s . . . justice.

Like hell, ’botfucker.

Blinking the lingering Jump spots from his eyes, Alerio glanced around the cavernous room called Mission Staging. Heavily shielded to control the raging forces of temporal warp, it was lined floor to ceiling with evidence and equipment lockers, as well as regeneration tubes for the injured. Most temporal missions began and ended here, especially those featuring a large Jump team.

Though the chief longed to head for the Infirmary to check on Dona, he controlled the impulse. If his Enforcers managed to bring the Xerans to justice, he was damned if the killers would go free because somebody broke the chain of evidence.

“All right, let’s get the physical evidence stowed,” Alerio said in a command bark that had every Enforcer jumping.

Apparently inured to his growls, Chogan’s medical techs strode out, accompanied by a pitiful parade of body tubes. He ignored them as he rapped out instructions. 

“The evidence ’bots are to be logged in and their contents transferred into evi-stasis. And make damned sure they’re all our ’bots. Last thing we need is to give the Xerans another shot at sabotaging our central computer.”

The last time a spy had attempted such sabotage, the virus he unleashed almost killed every senior agent on the Outpost—including Alerio himself. The horrendous delusions the virus created had almost fragged his consciousness and stopped his heart. Not an experience he wanted to repeat.

Especially with the Xerans playing for keeps.