Tara The Great [Nuworld 2]
Read Tara The Great [Nuworld 2] Online
Authors: Lorie O'Claire
NUWORLD:
TARA
THE GREAT
Lorie O’Clare
Chapter One
What a meeting. It was all Tara could do to keep her eyes open while she drove her
motorcycle home. Her position as future ruler of all Runner clans could be taxing to her
impressive stores of energy. She had just endured a tiring session with the clan leaders,
fulfilling one of her responsibilities to meet with them once every cycle. They usually
conferred through a Runner transmission on their landlink network, but since several of
the clans were in the area, Tara suggested they meet on the Blood Circle Clan site
outside Bryton.
Thus had begun a frustrating afternoon as she reviewed the same material with the
Gothman and Runners more times than she cared to think about. Neither warrior race
understood why she was willing to negotiate trade rights for oil with their adversaries,
the Neurians, even though the natural resource was needed desperately.
Not that Tara held a warm place in her heart for the Neurians. Not long ago their
leader had held her captive as part of a conspiracy woven by one of her own Runners.
Six cycles of her life had been stolen, as she lay drugged in a Neurian shed.
Tara
shook off her troubled thoughts. This was business. Runners and Gothman
needed to establish trade rights with the Neurians.
She’d known from the outset that Runner leaders, as well as Gothman, would be
hesitant to start negotiations with the southern race. Patha, her papa and the greatest
leader the Runners had ever known, always said starting something new took patience.
The resistance she’d encountered would test that patience to the maximum. Her
associates’ arguments danced in her head.
“After what they’ve done to you?”
“We should be declaring war.”
“How can you possibly believe they can be trusted?”
Tara
struggled to push aside the troubling thoughts as she drove her motorcycle
into the backyard of the large house she shared with her Gothman claim, Lord Darius.
He had grown up in this house, and their babies had been born in it. Although Tara’s
nomadic Runner blood would always be with her, she felt this was her home now, too.
“Mama! Mama!”
“Hi, babies!” Tara climbed off her bike, smiling at her twins.
“I’m not a baby. I’m a big boy.” Two-winters-old Andru frowned.
“That’s right. You sure are.” Tara knelt and grabbed her son.
“Me, Mama. Hold me, Mama!” Little Ana ran from the other side of the yard.
Tara
grabbed the little girl, and pulled her into her arms, as well. “Where’s Syra?”
She planted a kiss on each cheek and glanced around the yard. Their blond curls tickled
her face as she walked through the yard looking for her niece, who only had sixteen
winters, but usually proved to be a good nanny to the twins. At the moment, the
teenager appeared to be missing in action. “Don’t tell me you two are playing outside
by yourselves?”
The two children watched their mama with large gray eyes as Tara carried them
into the house.
“Is Syra in here?” Tara plopped the twins on the kitchen floor, then straightened as
she addressed Hilda.
Darius’ mama turned and straightened her long gray dress over her stout figure.
“She went out with the twins a short bit ago.” Hilda squatted, slipping a cookie to
each child. “I daresay she hasn’t had that much time to disappear, no.”
“Will you watch them for a minute?”
Hilda nodded, shooing the children into the living area where they would have
more room to play.
Tara
returned to the yard. Nothing seemed out of place as she walked across the
lawn. “Syra?” As she neared the tool shed in the corner of the yard, a noise triggered
her attention and she quickly pulled open the shed’s door.
“What were you doing in there?” Tara asked, as she took in Syra’s appearance.
Syra’s black Runner outfit looked disheveled, and the teenager pulled at her black
shirt to straighten it. Her headscarf wasn’t secured well and twisted, so the girl had to
tug it in order to see what she was doing. “Nothing.” Syra offered a sheepish gaze with
her green eyes peering through her headscarf, which still didn’t quite cover her head as
it should.
Tara
grabbed her niece’s shoulder and pulled her the rest of the way out of the
shed.
Syra groaned, but remained quiet.
A very uncharacteristic trait for the girl, Tara thought. She barely had her niece into
the sunshine when she noticed another figure standing in the shadows of the shed.
“What the hell?” Tara focused on the figure and realized it was Torgo, Darius’ younger
brother, who was watching her warily. When Tara noticed him, his eyes shifted to his
feet.
Fury raced through Tara when she realized Torgo had her niece in the shed when
the girl should have been watching the twins. She balled her hands into fists and took a
step toward the boy, who flinched and looked at her with the eyes of a trapped animal.
“No,” Syra pleaded, grabbing Tara’s arm.
“You’re supposed to be watching my children.” Tara stood in the entrance of the
shed, not budging as she glared at her niece, then at her young brother-in-law.
“I, uh, was… I mean, I just left for a second.” Syra yanked her headscarf from her
head, unable to straighten it without removing it. A guilty blush crept across the pretty
girl’s cheeks. “Don’t tell Papa, Tara, please.”
“Get the children and head to the nursery. I’ll be up to talk to you in a minute.”
Tara
worked to maintain her anger as she watched Syra give Torgo a pathetic glance,
then run across the yard toward the house. Tara now turned her hard glare on Torgo.
“Tara, we weren’t doing anything. We weren’t.” He cleared his throat. “Well, not
much anyway.”
“Don’t you ever take her away from my children again. Understand?”
The boy nodded.
“It will be a humiliation you won’t forget soon if word gets out you were taken
down by a woman.”
“That’s for sure,” Darius spoke from behind Tara.
She turned, not willing to show that she hadn’t heard him approach.
“What’s going on here?” he asked.
Torgo glanced at Tara. “It won’t happen again.” He pushed past both of them and
ran to the house.
Tara
turned and Darius stood in front of her, waiting for an explanation.
She pointed to the shed. “Your brother and my niece were in there.”
Darius smiled and his gray eyes showed their amusement.
“She was supposed to be watching the children.”
“Are the children all right?”
“Yes.”
“Bryton men are simply irresistible.” Darius pushed Tara into the shed.
Tara
pushed back. “They’re too young.”
“And how old were you?”
She pushed harder and walked past him.
The tall, well-built leader of Gothman kept pace alongside her on their way to the
house. “I’ll talk to him, I will.”
“I can only imagine what that conversation would be like.”
Darius grabbed Tara from behind and slipped his hand under her shirt to fondle a
breast.
Tara
wrapped her fingers around his hand, but his grip on her simply tightened.
Tara
fought her body’s immediate reaction. She looked up into dark gray eyes that
appeared to focus on her mouth. “Darius, Syra and Torgo need to learn responsibility,”
she said, then failed to stifle a groan when he bit her neck.
Darius chuckled. “Fine, my lady. Go beat the crap out of your niece.”
Tara
didn’t escape the yard before Darius slapped her on the rear.
Syra sat cross-legged on the living room floor, stacking blocks with the twins. She
appeared appropriately chastised as Tara worked to remain calm and explain that a
responsibility as simple as watching children would help train Syra to be a better
warrior.
“And I doubt you want the future of a Gothman claim if that boy gets you
pregnant,” Tara added. That caught the girl’s attention, who looked up at her with
beautiful green eyes.
“It won’t happen,” Syra whispered.
Tara
prayed the teenager had enough sense to see that it wouldn’t. She entered her
bedroom to find Darius sitting at their landlink.
He glanced over as she sat next to him, on the corner of the desk. “How was your
Runner meeting this afternoon?”
“Fine.” Tara smiled as she studied her claim’s face. “The Blood Circle Clan is
returning. They should be arriving tomorrow.”
Tara
’s clan had been gone for the last six cycles. Patha, her papa, had left at the
beginning of the new winter, with snow still on the ground, and she hadn’t heard from
him or any of her other family members in the clan since. Tara knew they had traveled
toward the mountain range, which lay to the east of them. No clan had climbed the
mountains before, and Tara had worried about them, so she had been elated when
Patha had contacted her announcing the return of her people. Her family was coming
home.
* * * * *
Darius noticed the excitement and anticipation in Tara’s eyes. He knew Tara would