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  Guided by the voice of the Sovereign that seemed to be always hissing in her ear, she found the spot on the cold, dark crater where she was to land. There was an atmosphere dome there—mostly concealed—but she was able to find it and align the door of her ship with one of the airlocks. She heard the click as it locked into place and felt a surge of eagerness from Sovereign X'izith.

  “Yes, yes…good, my Queen. You’ve done very well. Now come to me…come through the airlock and enter the honeymoon chamber I have prepared for us.”

  Brynn turned off the ship’s engines. Then something—she didn’t know what—made her turn off the stealth mode too. Maybe it was the little voice inside her head screaming at her to stop, Brynn wasn’t sure. She only knew that she couldn’t stop—not now.

  She had come too far. She must be filled.

  On the way out of the ship, she glanced at the table where she and Varin had eaten so many meals. He’d been cleaning his weapons there, before he went to check on the instruments in the control area and his chip countdown had begun. It seemed like a thousand years ago now—though it was scarcely more than a single solar week.

  The long, silver knife Varin had used when he rescued her from the Hive—the one he’d used to cut off the Sovereign’s barb—was lying there on the table, gleaming in the soft light.

  On impulse—perhaps the same one that had caused her to turn off the ship’s stealth mode—Brynn grabbed its braided black leather handle. She held it down by her side where it was easily concealed in the folds of her nightdress.

  “Come to me,” hissed the voice in her head. Had the Sovereign seen what she had done? Brynn supposed she would find out—she couldn’t delay any longer.

  With the little voice screaming in her head and the Sovereign’s buzzing tone in her ears, she stepped out of the ship and through the airlock.

  It was time to be filled.

  * * * * *

  Bereth flew his new Kindred ship with frenetic speed—pushing it as fast as it would go. He didn’t have far to fly, though. Before he knew it, the dark crater at the moon’s South Pole was looming in his viewscreen. He searched frantically, seeing nothing but blackness and dust.

  Where are you, Brynn? Where did you go?

  Was it already too late? Had the monstrous insect thing he’d seen in his vision of the past swooped her up and carried her away?

  Then something silver glinted in the corner of the viewscreen.

  Bereth turned his ship towards it at once and came in closer. Sure enough—it was the ship he and Brynn had come here on. He’d seen it sitting in the docking bay often enough to recognize it, even though he didn’t remember flying it or spending time with Brynn on it.

  It was docked beside a mound of gray dirt that was just a little too round to be naturally occurring.

  Atmosphere dome! he thought and knew at once this must be where she was. Inside the dome—inside with that insectile abomination that wanted to implant her with his fucking grubs!

  A surge of protective possessiveness washed over him. He had to get to her—had to save her!

  He started landing procedures at once. Brynn was his to protect and he’d be Goddess-damned if that fucking monstrosity was going to lay its claws on her.

  He just hoped he wasn’t too late.

  * * * * *

  The tunnel wasn’t cold and dark as Brynn had expected. Instead, it pulsed with a febrile warmth that made her skin crawl. There were lights hanging from the tunnel walls—huge, dimly glowing things that seemed to be filled with black, pulsing shapes. They were what was giving off the light and the damp, humid warmth.

  Brynn didn’t know what they were until she saw one of them move…and realized the light and heat source was alive. It was a monstrous bug—an insect with a hugely swollen abdomen. The black things inside its pulsing belly were its guts, writhing in peristalsis as it digested whatever awful meal it had eaten last.

  She thought of Amalthia and her swollen, pregnant belly, thought of the grubs bursting out of her, tearing their way through her stretched flesh with their tiny, sharp, bloody jaws.

  The voice in her head screamed at her to go back, but she couldn’t. The compulsion to go on and the hissing voice in her ear were too much to resist. Still, her hand tightened on the handle of the concealed knife. It might not be much of a weapon against a monster like Sovereign X'izith but it was all she had.

  Maybe while she was being pierced, she could also do a little piercing of her own.

  The thought made her numb with fright…and dizzy with lust. To be filled…to be pierced…to be impregnated with that awful spawn…Brynn feared it would drive her mad. As mad as Amalthia had been at the end, grinning and screaming through her red-stained teeth as her “children” gnawed their way out of her swollen belly.

  But still Brynn couldn’t stop. Her feet carried her down the low dirt tunnel, past the living lights, towards the voice which she could now hear with her ears and not just in her mind.

  “Ahhh, my bride! My Queen….come to me. Come to the chamber I have prepared for you.”

  The tunnel sloped sharply downward and then ended abruptly—opening into a large, round cavern which appeared to have been carved out of rock. It was ringed with the living bug lights and in the center stood the Sovereign.

  There was no pretense this time—no mask and gloves and clothes to hide what he really was. He stood there in his glory—in his horror—revealed completely at last.

  In her attempt to explain him to Olivia and Sophia, Brynn had looked at pictures of Earth insects, trying to point out the ones he most resembled. He was, they had decided, like a cross between a cockroach and a wasp with the long hard shell-like wings of the former and the narrow waist and stinger of the latter. His head, bulbous and triangular, resembled that of an ant with its curving, serrated mandibles, mobile, twitching antennae, and huge black, soulless eyes. His entire body was shiny black slashed with crimson and his long, chitinous legs were lined with coarse, wiry hairs and tipped with gripping claws.

  Between his legs the long, black breeding barb was fully engorged, leaking its clear venomous fluid that smoked and steamed when it dripped upon the hard stone floor.

  “Brynnalla my Queen,” he buzzed, extending four of his long legs outward in a gesture of welcome…of enfolding. “Come to me,” he hissed. “Come and be filled as I know you long to.”

  Brynn studied his breeding barb and Goddess help her, felt an answering rush of heat in her core. Her pussy throbbed with need and her body burned and ached with emptiness. At the same time, her hand tightened even more on the handle of the knife.

  “Come to me,” the Sovereign hissed again.

  Brynn went.

  * ** * *

  Docking with the atmosphere dome was simplicity itself but the urgency had grown so great inside him Bereth fumbled with the controls in his haste. He didn’t know how long he had before his intrusion was noticed. He also didn’t know how long he had until Brynn was impregnated by the murderous grubs she’d spoken of in halting whispers. Or if she already was.

  No, she can’t be! I’ll save her—I can’t be too late!

  Feelings were stirring in him—memories buried under layers of forgotten years were beginning to come to light. There was still something missing but he felt he might somehow get it back.

  But first he had to save Brynn.

  He ran through the airlock, blaster at the ready, expecting to encounter the huge sentries his faulty memory had suddenly shown him. But there was no one and nothing—nothing but faintly pulsing light of a sickly greenish color and a humid heat that seemed to breathe from the walls themselves.

  Faintly, he could smell Brynn’s feminine scent. She had been here then—and not long ago. Then he heard a high, evil voice hissing in Standard…

  “Come to me, my Queen. Come and be filled!”

  “Brynn!” Bereth shouted. Throwing caution aside, he went rushing down the long, low tunnel, his blaster gripped tight in one hand. The