Daughters of Lyra: Heart of a Commander (13 page)

The Wraiths would pay for
what they had done.

As they entered the
building, she blasted any Wraith that appeared in her field of
view, her eyes darting about the screen as she struggled to
understand the readings. In the bottom right corner was an image of
what was happening behind her. The Varkan officer was bringing up
the rear, his aim impeccable compared to hers. Her gun shook in the
Heavy Armour’s hands, a reflection of her own trembling. She fought
against it, but her fear was overwhelming. Now was a time to be
strong. Her blood was strong, her lineage that of kings and
generals. She was strong. It was time that she proved that to the
world, even if no one saw it. It was time she proved it to
herself.

She broke through into a
new area and fired off several rounds, holding the trigger to build
a stronger charge than normal. The bolts tore through the Wraiths,
clearing her path, and she pounded on.

An alarm flashed in the
corner of her screen. Two fighter ships were outside. A sonar image
of them came back. She breathed a sigh of relief when she
recognised them as Lyran. She would have to thank her captain when
she returned. He must have called for the fighters the moment she
had left. It would have taken them some time to enter the
atmosphere from the Nebuz-Lyra VIII.

She frowned when she saw
that the path behind her was empty. Turning, her eyes widened when
she realised that she was alone. She couldn’t see the Varkan
officer. She turned on the spot, scanning for him. They must have
been split up. There was no time to go back to find him. She had to
keep going.

She had to find
Van.

She moved through room
after room, sometimes having to shoulder her way through the doors.
The Heavy Armour was too wide for some of the corridors so she had
to find another way around. The building was a maze, half of it
collapsed into nothing but rubble. Most of the ceiling was missing.
The bright sun blazed down, blinding her sometimes in the seconds
that it took the visor of the Heavy Armour to react and
darken.

A heat signature appeared
on her screen and she moved towards the red blip, her gun at the
ready.

Turning a corner and
entering a room, her heart leapt into her throat when she saw the
owner of the heat signature.

Van.

He knelt on the floor, his
arms restrained behind his back and his head hung forwards. Bright
light shone down on him. On the floor beside him were pieces of his
visor. The screen of the Heavy Armour assessed his vitals and she
was relieved to see that while his injuries were severe they
weren’t life threatening. She moved towards him, intent on rousing
him and getting him away before more Wraiths appeared.

Just as she was about to
bend down to break his restraints, something slammed into her and
she flew across the room. The Heavy Armour hit the wall, knocking
it down. She landed in a heap on top of the splintered blocks, her
heart thundering and her breathing fast. Lifting her head, she
scoured the room.

Only Van.

That couldn’t be right.
Something had hit her. She was sure of it.

The red screen of the
Heavy Armour said different. There was nothing there except Van,
and he was still unconscious.

Besides, she didn’t think
he was strong enough to throw a Heavy Armour across the room. There
was something else here. Something phenomenally strong.

Getting to her feet,
Amerii slowly scanned the room again. The diagnostic showed nothing
out of the ordinary. Walls, ceilings, doorways, and Van. Everything
she could see was apparently everything there was.

Not even the sonar was
showing anything different. The corridors around them were
empty.

She stepped down from the
broken wall and began towards Van again.

“
You certainly
are persistent,” a voice said, deep and menacing, straight into her
head.

She turned as quickly as
she could in all directions. Nothing.

“
I dare you to
try again.”

Ignoring the threat in the
voice’s tone, she walked towards Van. She lifted the gun, locking
it tight into her shoulder and moving with it the way she had seen
Van move with his rifle. Wherever her head turned, she turned the
gun.

Still nothing on her
screen.

Her breathing was loud
inside the helmet, hot too. Her heartbeat pounded in her skull. Her
left arm ached from where she had hit the wall.

Although the Heavy Armour
had taken the brunt of the impact, it had still hurt
her.

The moment she was within
arm’s reach of Van, she was struck again and sent skidding across
the floor.

“
Foolish,” the
voice said, taunting her. “Did you think I would allow you to free
him? I am not finished with him.”

Amerii got to her feet
again. Still nothing on the screen. She was beginning to get
annoyed now. Whoever owned the voice should have the guts to show
his face. She ran over his words in her head. Not finished with
Van? He damn well was. There wasn’t a chance in Madjar that she was
about to let anyone hurt him now that she was here.

Her eyes widened when a
bright shape shimmered across the screen of her helmet and
disappeared.

A Wraith?

“
Very
perceptive,” the voice said in her head. It had an amused ring to
it. “For a Lyran.”

She gasped. How did it
know that?

“
You think in
Lyran... a female? Let me see... the princess dear Commander Aeris
was so worried about... his mate.”

Amerii tried hard not to
think anything but it was impossible. Her thoughts flashed back to
that moment in Van’s bedroom when he had claimed her as his mate
and bonded with her.

“
Disgusting,”
the Wraith said and shimmered into being right next to
her.

Before she could look up
at its full height, it had backhanded her, sending her crashing to
the ground again. Her legs twisted in the suit and she cried out
when the muscle in her calf burned with pain. Gritting her teeth,
she pushed herself back up quicker this time. She raised her gun
and aimed at the Wraith. With a roar, she fired round after round
at it, tracking it around the room as it appeared and disappeared,
dodging her.

This Wraith wasn’t like
the others. Instinct told her that it was in command, that it had
been the one to take Van from the compound. She lifted her laser
rifle higher, looking down the sight at the room. The moment the
Wraith appeared, she aimed for its right hand side and just as she
pulled the trigger moved her aim across it to its left. The Wraith
moved straight into the path of the round and let out an unholy
scream as it tore through its arm. Amerii grinned.

Her victory was short
lived as the Wraith appeared in front of her, grabbed the arm of
the Heavy Armour and hurled her towards the far wall. She hit it
face first, cracking her head against the inside of the helmet. A
warm liquid trickled down from a throbbing hot patch on her right
temple. She screwed her eyes shut as her mind spun, waiting for it
to come to a halt. The blood reached her cheek. It tickled but she
couldn’t wipe it away with her hands inside the suit.

When her mind had stopped
spinning, Amerii picked herself up and then picked up her laser
rifle. The heavy gun had taken a beating, but it still seemed to be
functioning. The sensors on the Heavy Armour showed that the Wraith
had disappeared. Was it waiting for her to try to reach Van
again?

It seemed to enjoy hurting
her.

She turned to face Van
where he still knelt on the floor. He looked terrible. She could
barely recognise him through the blood that coated his face and
neck. It seemed the Wraith had enjoyed hurting him too. Her
mate.

She shouldered her rifle
again.

The Wraith would pay for
that.

Just as she took a step
towards Van, the Wraith appeared in front of him. It seemed more
real this time, more than just a drifting cloud of white. It had
form, shaped like a humanoid but at least twice as tall as any
species she knew. It had eyes, hollow holes that held no emotion,
and a smile that set her teeth on edge.

It bent towards Van and
grabbed his hair, hauling his head up.

“
No!” Amerii
shouted and ran at the Wraith, the Heavy Armour’s steps like
thunder on the dusty ground. She took aim. Her finger closed around
the trigger. Her heart missed a beat.

Before she could release
the round, the Wraith was in front of her, past the muzzle of the
rifle. She could only watch in horror as it reached towards her,
everything moving in slow motion, and its hand moved straight
through her visor and into the helmet. Hot burning fingers closed
around her throat.

Amerii stared up into its
hollow eyes.

As it squeezed her throat,
she brought the gun back and fired.

A dark smile crossed the
Wraith’s face and then faded. Amerii’s breathing quickened as she
blinked and stared up at it. The hand disappeared from her throat.
Its face turned elusive and began to disintegrate, drifting away in
the breeze. She stared into its eyes as they narrowed and then
blinked out of existence.

She still stared long
after it had gone.

Her heart beat
hard.

Her breathing was
shallow.

Her body felt
numb.

A noise snapped her out of
her shock, bringing back the sound of gunfire outside the old
building and the bright sunshine that beamed down at her from the
hole in the ceiling.

She turned and lowered her
head to look at Van. He was conscious, looking up at her as he
knelt on the floor.

Her heart clenched at the
sight of his face so beaten and bloodied. A cut split his lip and
it had swollen. His left eye was almost closed from the swelling
around it and a nasty gash ran across his eyebrow, over the tender
skin of his eyelid. Long strands of his hair had stuck to the blood
on his face. She wanted to clear them away and look after him. She
wanted to tell him that things would be fine now that they were
together again.

There were cuts on his
throat and in the fabric of his suit on his arms and chest. She
thanked Iskara that the suit seemed to have sustained the bulk of
the damage and protected him. Tears filled her eyes but she fought
to hold them back. This wasn’t over yet. They still had to get him
back to the compound and she had lost the other Varkan
soldier.

Walking towards him,
Amerii smiled when he moved so he could continue to look up at her,
even though he probably couldn’t see her through the darkened
visor.

She knelt down on one
knee. It hit the dirt hard, sending a jolt through her. It wasn’t
easy to perform delicate moves like kneeling in the Heavy
Armour.

Reaching around him, she
broke the metal restraints on his arms, the Heavy Armour making
them look as brittle as glass.

“
Thank you,
soldier,” Van said and gripped the arm of the Heavy Armour, pulling
himself up onto his feet.

She held him steady when
he wobbled and frowned.

“
I owe you
much,” he said, voice quiet and hoarse. “Give me your rank and I
will see to it that Varka hears of your bravery.”

There were bruises on his
throat, as though someone had been throttling him. She swallowed,
feeling the ache in her own throat. That Wraith had paid for what
it had done, but she didn’t feel any better. She wanted more. She
wanted to bring it back so she could fight it again and make it
truly pay for inflicting such terrible injuries on her
mate.

“
Soldier?” Van
said.

Amerii smiled to herself
when she realised that he thought she was a Varkan. She pressed the
two sides of her helmet and it extended outwards and then opened up
to reveal her face. Van stared at her, his eyes wide and his lips
parted in shock.

“
Amerii?”

She nodded, amused that he
needed her to confirm that.

“
What are you
doing out here?” he said and then frowned. “You are
hurt.”

He stepped towards her and
she closed her eyes briefly as he wiped the blood from her cheek
and temple. The sweep of his fingers was gentle, tender. It filled
her with warmth and drew her tears out of her. She sniffed them
back and told herself to be strong. The sight of Van so hurt scared
her though. She wished she could hold him, could feel his arms
around her, but she couldn’t in the suit.

Looking at him, she found
he was staring at his fingers and the blood coating them. His eyes
brightened to vivid crimson. She could see the battle within
him.

“
I’m fine,” she
said, wanting to alleviate his anger and soothe him. He looked at
her, right into her eyes, and his frown melted away, his irises
darkening back to normal. “I’m just glad that you’re
okay.”

Her brow furrowed as she
looked at him, seeing all his injuries and wishing there was
something that she could do about them.