Devilish Dot Read online

  The trees below, when not coated in ice, were either purple or a blackish-blue—colors rarely seen in any vegetation back on earth except for maybe flowers and the occasional eggplant. Four suns hung in the skies—they were far away—so far away that the heat they radiated couldn’t penetrate the bitter coldness of the atmosphere—but they were there. Foreign, bizarre birds flew by, weird looking animals with multiple heads stampeded below…

  No. Dot was most definitely not on earth.

  She didn’t know where they were, where they were going or, most importantly, what would happen to her once they got there. The endless scenarios swimming through her mind ranged from being dinner to becoming a gargoyle’s sex slave. She didn’t know which possibility was worse.

  If her captor killed her quickly and waited to make a meal of her post-mortem, well, she didn’t want to die but at least that was a merciful death. Now if he preferred his food fresh and still alive while eating…

  She whimpered. Sweet lord, please don’t let that happen!

  Unfortunately, becoming the gargoyle’s sex slave didn’t seem any more appealing than being human sushi. Both ways lay torture. She could feel his stiff cock underneath her naked bottom—she was using it as a seat for goodness sake!—and lordy, lordy was his manhood huge. He made her well-endowed sex toys look like prepubescent boys. For the first time in four years, Dot grimly understood just why Henry had fainted when she’d held up Dirk. She felt a bit on the dizzy, swooning side herself. Fate, it seemed, had a perverse sense of humor.

  And by the way, God, when I was fantasizing all those years about being swept off my feet by an extremely tall, muscular, hunky, alpha male kind of guy…this was NOT what I had in mind!

  Apparently she should have been more specific in her platitudes to the higher power, she thought tragically. But it was too late, and she knew it.

  They began to descend. Dot’s gaze immediately honed in on the cave they were heading toward. She shivered, her eyes widening, as she wondered what exactly would happen to her in this cave. The memory of what had transpired in the last one was still fresh in her mind. It had only ended, after all, but a few hours ago.

  Dot had no notion as to what vile plans the gargoyle had in mind for her, but one certainty was crystal clear: he had no intention of releasing her. It didn’t take an educated guess to figure that much out. Not with the way he was holding onto her as if he might never get a hold of a plumper, better meal.

  With a heavy heart and stoic resolution, she realized that the giant wouldn’t let her escape him alive—

  Ever.

  * * * * *

  At long last they reached the Zyon hunting grounds. Vaidd realized that a celebratory feast for his return from gorak most likely lay in waiting within the sanctum—the large gathering place deep within the village’s innermost cavern where all ceremonial and religious gatherings of the pack occurred. His fellow Barbarians would be expecting his return from gorak. What they would not be anticipating, however, was Vaidd’s homecoming from the sleep of the dead with his Bloodmate in tow.

  That his woman happened to be a primitive…

  Verily, ‘twould be the talk of all Khan-Gor. There was but one other female primitive—Nancy—who dwelled within the whole of the ice-planet, and forever was her Bloodmate keeping her close to his side. Vorik took no chances that another male might wish to steal her for vorah theft did happen every now and again. ‘Twas rare, for a true mating was what Barbarians coveted, but the depths a Khan-Gori would sink to when nearing the end of another lifetime and still without a Bloodmate…

  Like Vorik, Vaidd would take no chances with his wench either. He had waited a full lifetime to find her—that he was possessive of her was an understatement for a certainty.

  On a roar his people would understand announced his return from the sleep of the dead, Vaidd landed on two feet at the mouth of Zyon Rock—the entrance to the pack’s village. He could feel his Bloodmate tense up, understood that she knew not what was to transpire.

  They needed to mate. Their blood needed to mingle. Until it did, she would have no comprehension of his words, his pack’s language. And he would have no understanding of anything she spoke to him either. But once their blood did mingle, they would be able to communicate freely. ‘Twas the way of the all-knowing gods.

  Setting his Bloodmate down on two shaky feet, he stood her before him. The entryway at Zyon Rock was a wee bit cold to her delicate humanoid form, yet bearable.

  His cock swelled just staring at her. She was beautiful, so very perfect in every way. Long waves of hair in a hue of light brown he’d never before seen, two gorgeous eyes a deeper, richer color of the same shade. Full breasts. Long legs. Plump in all the right places.

  Lifting a hand toward her in a non-threatening, slow manner, Vaidd palmed her chin and patiently waited for her to meet his gaze. To her credit, she did—no hypnotism necessary. She was nervous, he knew, but she’d still looked up at him.

  Vaidd slowly threaded his lethal black fingernails through the soft waves of her hair. He didn’t smile, but his emotions were there in his eyes.

  I’ve waited so long to find you, little one. Mayhap you fear me now, but soon you will understand that no harm shall ever come to you. Verily, you are the only one in existence who need not fear me. I will protect you with my own life.

  The mental call was in his own tongue, so Vaidd realized she had no comprehension of his words. Yet he hoped her heart understood.

  As his vorah stood there and watched, Vaidd shape-shifted from his kor-tar form and back to his humanoid one. His face hard and stoic, he watched his Bloodmate gasp and back away from him.

  She stood there for a long while, her jaw agape, as if trying to work things out in her mind. He shape-shifted back into his kor-tar form, then again to his humanoid one—this time donning the clothing of his clan, that she might know her eyes were not deceiving her.

  Apparently males of her species were not able to take on other forms. ‘Twas the only explanation Vaidd could fathom for a moment later his wench’s gorgeous eyes rolled to the back of her head…and she fainted.

  Dot blinked several times in rapid succession, unable to believe what she was seeing. One second there was a gargoyle there and then the next—holy shit!—there was a man standing before her. A very, very capital B-I-G for BIG, naked man. He must have stood seven and a half to eight feet tall. His hair was a light brown with golden streaks, his eyes like molten silver. His body was heavily muscled, a jagged scar zigzagging down the right side of his torso. His cock was just as ferociously swollen now as it had been while in gargoyle mode.

  No way.

  She gasped, backing away. There was no way that…

  He shifted again—back to the gargoyle. And then again—back to the man.

  Now he was clothed. Sorta. His chest was bare, but he wore a black and red kilt-like skirt that stopped mid-thigh…huge, massively sculpted thighs! The dark leather boots he was sporting ended just below the knee.

  Dot began feeling dizzy. Until last night she’d never fainted before in her life. Now she wondered if it was to become an average, daily event for her.

  Breathe, Dot, breathe. Slow, deep breaths. Slower. Deeper. Arrrrrrrrg!

  Unfortunately, nothing short of a tranquilizer was likely to make her breasts stop heaving up and down. This was just too much to take in. This man, this-this…thing…spent part of his time looking like a wicked nightmare straight out of a B-rated horror movie and the other part of it looking like a human—an incredibly gigantic human but still a human.

  And she was standing in front of him naked no less! Somehow, when he’d been a gargoyle, her state of undress hadn’t much mattered; it had been like standing in the nude in front of a creature at the zoo. Not a big deal, other than the fact she was likely to become his dinner. But now her nudity bothered her—a lot.

  She was a poster girl candidate for the all-American, Catholic, sexually frustrated spinster for the love of God! She in
vented large, vibrating penises for her pleasure because she was too shy to meet the real deal. Talking to men she didn’t know could welt up her entire body with a case of nervous hives. Standing in front of one naked was not precisely a walk in the park.

  Oh dear God in heaven, why hast thou forsaken me?

  A prayer straight from the drama queen bible, perhaps, but Dot felt as though she had that moment of martyrdom coming to her and then some. Her first instinct was to cover up her various intimate parts with her hands as best as she could manage. She never got that far. The entire situation frayed her nerves like violin strings that had been strung so tightly they snapped at the first pluck.

  Her jaw agape while she stared at the large male as though he had two heads—and for all intent and purposes he did!—Dot’s brown eyes slowly rolled to the rear of her head. Stiff as a board, she plunged straight backwards.

  And, yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death…oh…never mind!

  Arrrrrrg!

  Chapter Six

  Vaidd’s nostrils flared as he roared in his throat, customarily acknowledging his pack members’ boisterous clapping, hissing, and growling. Some shifted into their kor-tar form, some merely sprouted fangs and roared back at him.

  His sire’s eyes widened. As Vaidd strode into the sanctum, the sight of his eldest son’s Bloodmate asleep in his arms was more of a triumph to him and the rest of the pack than even was Vaidd’s return from gorak.

  Their line, unlike that of so many other Barbarian packs, would go on.

  Verily, Vaidd’s mother had entered her fifth lifetime and his sire the seventh. The pack’s matriarch was still within childbearing years, though the patriarch was not. Male Khan-Gori became sterile once they left their sixth lifetime. ‘Twas the way of the gods. Why, none knew.

  Vaidd’s mother had delivered nigh unto two hundred pups in her prime, only three of which were female. Obviously Vaidd’s three sisters could not mate within their own pack—such caused madness amongst the offspring. Never had Vaidd heard tell of a Barbarian finding his vorah in a sister! Leastways, Nitara, Vala, and Saris had yet to find their true Bloodmates. Even when and if they did, ‘twould be another pack’s line that his sisters furthered, not his own. Unless, of course, their mates were not of Khan-Gor.

  “I have returned from the sleep of the dead,” Vaidd rumbled out. His silver eyes were heated, his expression cold and merciless. “With my vorah,” he growled. Using both hands, he held her naked, unconscious body up like a trophy. He waited for the congratulatory noise to dim before continuing. “As the heir to our clan,” he shouted, that all his brothers gathered in the sanctum might hear his voice echoing off the stony, cavern walls, “I have upheld ceremony and waited to join with my Bloodmate until I brought her back to our lair.”

  His sire nodded his respect of the decision. His brothers hissed theirs. ‘Twas not easy for a predator to stay away from the cunt of his mate. The instinctual need to impregnate her had nigh unto overwhelmed Vaidd more than once. The scent of it alone was intoxicating. Holding her naked in his arms had all but driven him mad.

  Mayhap ‘twas not an accident of nature that Khan-Gori females were so few in number. The average vorah could bear up to ten litters throughout her lifetimes. Some, like his mother, bore more, and some less. Should more females come to be, all of them bearing litter after litter of hungry pups, ‘twould take an ugly toll on the food chain for a certainty.

  And so it was that the mated brother of the pack became the Alpha upon the extinction of their sire’s seventh lifetime—even if that brother was not the first-born. Did two brothers within a pack both find their mates—a rarity—the Alpha position was bequeathed to the eldest. Did no brothers of a pack find a mate, again, the Alpha position fell to the eldest. Such was why Vaidd had been named his sire’s heir apparent prior to this claiming. When a Barbarian reached his seventh lifetime and none of his sons had mated, ‘twas when he formally named his eldest the assumed heir.

  Vaidd felt fiercely proud at the offering he was bestowing unto his sire. His father would not join the gods in the Underworld thinking that surely his line was to die off. The she-god of mating had smiled down upon Vaidd. The Zyon bloodline would continue.

  Vaidd’s sire, Zolak, stood up. His voice was booming, his stance proud. “Let us welcome home your brother—my rightful heir!” he announced. “And let us rejoice at the claiming of his Bloodmate!”

  Loud shouts, hisses, and roars filled the sanctum, emotion echoing off the stone walls. Some of the feelings were elation, a triumph that their line would go on. Some of the feelings were akin to despair, for all of the brothers realized ‘twas rare for more than one male of the same pack to find a Bloodmate.

  Vaidd’s hard gaze softened when it landed upon his sister, Nitara. She was so overcome with relief and happiness at Vaidd’s good fortune that her eyes had welled up with tears. Nitara and Vaidd had been born of the same litter—the first litter. ‘Twas therefore no surprise that their bond had always been a close one.

  “Let the claiming begin!” Zolak bellowed, diverting Vaidd’s attention back to his sire.

  Vaidd cradled his Bloodmate’s wee, warm, limp body close to his heart. His fangs couldn’t help but to burst out from his gums, so aroused he was. The smell of her skin, the scent of her pussy, urged the animal in him on.

  At long last, it was time to claim what was his.

  * * * * *

  Dot awoke to the sight of hungry gargoyles surrounding her everywhere. She had been strewn out naked on a table, laid in the middle of what looked to be a platter. She knew this was it—sushi city. The only things missing from the scene were an apple in her mouth and various sauces for the wicked beasts to dip her flesh in for their dining pleasure. Instead of chicken nuggets, they’d be getting raw Dot nuggets.

  So this is what will become of me? I gave you my last snack cake, you bastard. So much for generosity!

  Dot’s nostrils flared at the bastard in question. All gargoyles looked alike, but for reasons unknown she could pick her captor out of a line-up that featured one thousand of the things. “I will haunt you from my grave,” she ardently vowed. “And I hope I taste like shit!”

  One of the gargoyles—not her captor—began speaking. He used words Dot could not understand. All of the gargoyles then joined hands in a circle around her, closed their eyes, and bowed their heads.

  Good grief. They had formed a prayer circle around her, no doubt thanking whatever god they worshipped for the bounty they were about to receive! Suddenly she understood what it felt like to be the turkey on Thanksgiving Day.

  At least I had enough heart to buy a turkey that was already dead. I hope I give all of you food poisoning and really super bad indigestion!

  She hoped they farted her for weeks—a reminder not to go snatch innocent women from their vehicles ever again. And if there was any justice whatsoever in this horrible world of theirs, they’d be belching up Dot nuggets until they took their last breaths.

  Dot’s mind began to splinter. She felt one small inch away from insanity. This was just too much. The men-beasts with tails had been bad enough. Now she was being prayed over by a pack of gargoyles before they sat down to dine on Dot a l’orange.

  She began to scream, a deafening, shrill cry that resonated throughout the stone chamber she’d awoken in and gained everyone’s undivided attention. She screamed louder and impossibly more high-pitched.

  Their chanting immediately stopped. They began to hiss, all of them except her captor covering their ears. But even he looked ready to pass out.

  She’d found a weapon! Oh yes! Oh yes! She just hoped her lungs and vocal chords would comply long enough to get the hell out of here.

  Bolting up from her back and onto her feet, Dot stopped screaming and prepared to jump off the table. As soon as her shrieking ceased, the gargoyles all grabbed for her. She screamed again, a piercing sound that made even her wince, as she stood on the platter in a karate “come-get
-me-fucker” position. She moved her arms back and forth like an expert in the martial arts anticipating the enemy’s next move.

  They recovered their ears. She kept up the shrill noise as she jumped off the platter and headed toward the nearest exit.

  Where is the way out? I don’t need any more complications, God. My lungs are about to implode!

  “By the tit of the she-god,” one of Vaidd’s brothers whimpered, “shut thy wench up!”

  “She means to flee from us!” his sire yelled as he kept his sensitive ears covered up. He nodded toward where Vaidd’s shrieking Bloodmate was running in circles, desperately trying to find a way out.

  Vaidd felt nigh close to swooning from the horrid, deafening noise his vorah was making, yet he stumbled as best he could toward her. That, unfortunately, only made her more frantic. Her large, dark eyes widened as she screamed impossibly louder.

  ‘Twas like a kick in the man sac. Vaidd fell to his knees and gasped, trying to regain control of himself that he might regain control of the situation. ‘Twas sorely apparent why primitive wenches were hard to tame—or at least one of the reasons why. Verily, they were possessed of wicked defenses. Vaidd grimly realized that his friend Vorik deserved a Khan-Gori medal of valor for the claiming of Nancy.

  His eyes narrowing into merciless slits, he forced himself up from his knees and sprang toward his Bloodmate. Her screaming grew worse. But, thank the gods, through gritted teeth and a perspiring brow, he managed to catch her. And then he did something he knew every member of his pack would be forever grateful for—he slapped a palm over her mouth.

  The shrieking ceased. All Khan-Gori present breathed a sigh of relief.

  * * * * *

  This time when they put her on the platter, they tied her down and placed some sort of adhesive that smelled like pinecones over her mouth. Naked, her arms had been hoisted above her head and her legs splayed wide open and secured down. Her ass was at the very end of the platter, almost suspended off the table itself.