Berrr's Vow (17 page)

“Let’s kill her,” one of them snarled.
“Human animal.”

Shanna took a deep breath, trying to not scream out again from the pain of being held up by her arms and her hair, feeling as if all of her hair was being torn out of her head. She needed the air in her lungs to fight. The one behind her made the mistake of moving in closer to grab her around her waist, letting go of a fistful of Shanna’s hair so she had room to move her head a little.

Shanna put her head down and then threw it back hard, pain reverberating through her skull when it slammed into the blonde woman’s chin behind her. She heard something crunch, not sure if she’d cracked her cranium or the other woman’s jaw, but knowing it had hurt both of them a lot when the other woman cried out louder than Shanna did. The arm around her waist loosened and the other hand in her hair let go completely.

Shanna twisted in their arms, her foot going for one of the woman’s knees, and slammed her heel into it hard. The woman’s grasp on her arm loosened enough that Shanna’s weight dropped and tore her free of her grip. Landing awkwardly, Shanna twisted to face the one who still clutched her other arm. Shanna threw a punch at the woman’s throat, striking her, and caused the woman to choke. Unfortunately, she didn’t let Shanna go when she stumbled back, falling in her frantic battle to get air from the blow, and they both went down to the floor.

Something hit Shanna in the back before she could recover from having the air knocked from her lungs from the hard landing. She knew with wide-eyed pain that it was a bare foot that had kicked her hard, crushing her chest more into the floor. The next blow was to her side. She was sent rolling along the floor from the force of the kick, sucking air in her lungs, and then another kick came to her hip.

Shanna rolled under the bed and kept rolling. She stopped for a second, panting, and frantically looked out to see where the hell they were. Three were down but she saw three pairs of feet move toward the other side of the bed she was at. Shanna rolled the other way, even knowing she was going to have to practically climb over one of the women who were already down, the blonde woman who still gripped her jaw and sobbed.

Shanna made it to her feet before one of the women jumped up on the bed to come across it at her. Shanna made a split-second decision and charged for the open bedroom door. Sprinting in terror, she took off running, leaping over Ovoly who was still down and almost skidded into the doorframe as she made the turn. She ran down the darkened hallway into the living room. The front door was in sight when someone slammed into her from behind, taking her down hard with a tackle.

Pain tore through Shanna when she sprawled on the unforgiving hard floor. She ordered herself to fight, to get up, but the heavy weight on her back shifted, causing her more pain as she was crushed. The woman grabbed Shanna’s hair, yanking hard, and all Shanna could do was move her hands under her face, knowing what was coming. Her head was slammed forcefully down toward the floor but smashed into her softer hands instead of the tile.

A snarl sounded somewhere above her from another direction. It meant two of them had her and hot tears filled Shanna’s eyes with the realization that they were going to kill her. Berrr was going to know what they’d done but it wasn’t going to save her ass since she was done for. She hurt too much to fight and the bitch on her back was too heavy for her to even get a real breath. She saw spots swimming in her vision telling her she was about to lose consciousness from lack of air.

The weight suddenly was lifted off her. Shanna gasped in
air,
her lungs burned for it, and lay there with her forehead on her throbbing hands that still hurt from catching her head. Panting, she sucked in air and waited for another kick to nail her side or her head. She wanted to throw her injured hands up to try to protect her face and ears but she was terrified if she did they’d try to smash her face into the tile again.

A hand gripped her arm and started to turn her over. Shanna sucked in air again, knowing if she didn’t at least try, she was going to die
. I’m not a quitter and I’ve had to fight all of my life to survive. I’ll be damned if I just give up now because I’m tired and I really hurt damn near everywhere.
As her body turned, Shanna used the last of her strength to tuck her knee up to her chest. She kicked up at the person who gripped her as she jerked her head to look at them to see where to kick.

It wasn’t a woman, she realized an instant before a large hand flashed out quickly and caught the ball of her foot just inches from his knee. He was bent over her, a big guy Berrr’s size, and as she stared into his bright blue gaze she realized he resembled Berrr too, only younger. She instantly knew she was staring up at one of Berrr’s sons.

The man was gripping her arm and her foot. His head snapped up, rage pouring out of his glowing blue eyes, right as a loud roar hurt Shanna’s ears.
Damn, the guy is loud when he is pissed,
she thought, rage nearly rolling off him. She followed his glare and saw two of the house helpers backing away with terrified looks on their features. The man’s head lowered to stare at Shanna.

“I mean you no harm. You are seriously hurt. I am not attacking you, human. I am Rever, Berrr’s son, and I am going to pick you up very carefully to not hurt you more.” He blinked. “Will you let me do that?”

Shanna nodded, knowing that Berrr’s son wouldn’t hurt her, only his house helpers would. The man released her arm and her foot very slowly and then shifted to his knees next to her. She lifted up a little as he slid his arms under the back of her knees and her shoulders. She was amazed as the guy lifted her and then stood up with her in his arms from that kneeling position. He glanced at her once and then strode back down the hallway that she’d just run from.

The bedroom was empty when he carried her in but he paused, his furious look darting around the room, and he sniffed loudly. A deep growl tore from his throat as his mouth twisted into a grimace. He walked again, headed for the bed, and he gently laid Shanna down. His arms slid out from under her and then their gazes met.

“I’ll call for a healer and for my father.”

Nodding, Shanna relaxed. “I think I need a healer.” Her hand touched the back of her head, which still hurt a lot, while her other hand rubbed at her side where she’d been kicked. “Thank you.”

He still looked furious as he watched her and sniffed at the room again. “All of them came after you, didn’t they? I know their scents and I smell every one of them in here.”

He could smell them?
She wasn’t sure what to say to that but she nodded. “Ovoly is the leader of that gang. They ordered me to tell your father that I wanted him to fuck them still but I refused.”

The man turned away and stormed for the door. “They won’t be back but I will be in less than a minute. Stay down and do not move.”

As soon as he exited the room Shanna ignored his order and sat up slowly. Her body ached and she knew she was going to have a hell of a lot of bruises on her arms, her back, and her ankles hurt from some of the hard kicks she’d dished out. As she moved her limbs and visually inspected her ankles, she realized she was in better condition than she’d feared at first now that the shock was wearing off.

One ankle was a little swollen but it wasn’t broken. She looked around the room, spotting the two discarded dresses that Ovoly and Aya had left behind in their haste to flee so they weren’t still found in the bedroom.

The only thing she smelled in the room was where Aya had gotten sick and had left her dinner on the floor at the end of the bed. Shanna carefully got off the mattress to test her weight on both ankles. They held and she took a few steps to make sure she could still walk, which she could even if it was a little painful. She reached back to touch her head where it still throbbed but her hand didn’t come away wet, confirming that she wasn’t bleeding. Motion made her gaze dart to the open doorway to see Rever storm back into the room still looking pissed off.

“I told you to stay in bed,” he growled.

“I don’t take orders well, sorry. I wanted to see if I could walk. I’m going to be fine since I don’t think anything is broken. I’m bruised to hell and back but I’m not as bad as I feared.”

The man walked closer to her. “My father and a healer from medical are on their way.” He stopped feet from her to stare down. “Please return to my father’s bed before you fall down. You are human and you are more hurt than you believe. You are in shock from being attacked and are not assessing your injuries properly. While our women still need protection from males they are much stronger than you are and you were outnumbered greatly. They had to have harmed you severely.”

“I think I got them a hell of a lot worse than they got me. Maybe you should go check on them.”

His black eyebrows shot up in shock as his eyes widened.

“Seriously, go check on them. I think I hurt Aya the worst. She stayed down after I punched her in the throat. The blonde one with the bright green eyes might have a broken jaw.” Shanna rubbed her head in the back where it still ached. “Of course better her chin than my skull.”

Shanna found it semi-amusing that he was too stunned to speak as he stared down at her, obviously not sure what to even think. She let her hand drop and just gazed up at him, forcing a smile she didn’t feel.

“I know you and every other guy on this planet think human women are totally helpless but I grew up rough on Earth. I know how to defend myself and I did some damage to the house helpers so you might really want to check on them.”

“I don’t care if they are harmed. They attacked a human my father brought into his house and if you did manage to harm them, they deserved it.”

Shanna was relieved at hearing his words, proving to her that he was obviously pro human. He turned then, studying the room, and noticed the discarded dresses, Aya’s dinner and some blood on the white tile. He slowly turned to meet her gaze again.

“I came to talk to my father about my brother Ral and Ariel. My bound is also pregnant and human so I am worried that our child will be too large for her to give birth to so I wanted to demand that my father have more healers trained to treat humans.” He ran a hand through his long black hair. “Right now Ahhu only tends our family but if something
were
to happen to her or she were not available, it could put our bounds in danger. My brother Argernon is also bound to a pregnant human.”

“Wow. You guys are really potent, aren’t you?”

He shook his head at her, frowning. “I don’t understand.”

“You have great sperm.”

He nodded. “All Zorn males easily get females pregnant. That is why we are only permitted to share our seed with our bound females. Otherwise the planet would be overrun with population we couldn’t support so it became law long before my father became Hyvin. I am sure my father explained to you why he may never give you his seed.” The man’s mouth tensed. “My mother was cruel to force him to
bound
to her but she wouldn’t listen to her offspring on the matter.”

“I can’t get pregnant so we don’t have many talks about why that rule exists.”

Rever glanced down to her stomach region and then he frowned, staring into her eyes. “You had an accident that damaged your female organs inside to make you unable to have offspring?”

“I have an Earth medical implant in my body that prevents me from getting pregnant until it is removed by a doctor.”

“You need to tell Ahhu of this. On Zorn we haven’t found an effective way to control not getting a woman pregnant. Our seed is very hardy and overcomes any medications our healers find to prevent it. She would be very interested in this thing you have in your body.”

“Shanna?”

The male roar of her name made Shanna jump, startling her. Her attention flew to the bedroom door and in seconds Berrr came hauling ass through it, out of breath and doing a fine impression of a dark thundercloud of rage. His blue eyes were filled with pure fury as he came to a halt, sweaty from obviously running. Their gazes locked for a split second before Berrr was in motion again. Rever moved out of his father’s way.

Berrr stormed for Shanna, only taking his gaze from her to glance at the blood on the floor he had to step over, and then he had his arms around her, yanking her off her feet, and he clutched her against his overheated body.

“I’m okay,” she muttered into his shirt, where her face ended up burrowed with Berrr holding her too tightly.
“Seriously.”

“Don’t crush her,” Rever softly stated. “She claims to be bruised but fine. She was walking and talking well when I returned from notifying you.”

Berrr shifted his hold on Shanna, one arm wrapped tightly around her waist to hoist her gently a little higher, his other hand gripped her around the back of her head to force her to look at his face, which was level with hers since he held her far from the floor. His expression was tight with fury but worried too as he studied her face and then their gazes locked.

“I’m really all right.”

Berrr growled and turned his head, glaring at his son. “Where are they?”

“Probably hiding,” Rever sighed. “They were caught attacking your human and they knew you would be displeased. You need to calm before you approach them, Father. I understand your rage but they are women. If they had attacked my Brenda I’d want to kill them but you can’t do that.”

Turning his head, Berrr stared into Shanna’s eyes. “What happened and who attacked you? I want all of their names.”

“Ovoly ordered me to tell you to mount all of them and when I refused they were all ticked at me.”

“It was all six of them,” Rever said softly. “I smelled each of them in here when I first carried her in.”

A vicious growl tore from Berrr as he kept his gaze locked with Shanna. “All six of them attacked you?”

She nodded, putting her hands on his shoulders, and rubbed him to calm him down because he looked as if he needed it. “I’m okay though. I told your son to go check on them because I think I really hurt a few of them. They didn’t expect me to be able to fight back as well as I did but your son saved my ass. They had me on the floor in the living room and I couldn’t get away. He scared them off.”