Instinctual (Rise of the Iliri Book 2) Read online

  Rise of the Iliri

  Book Two

  Auryn Hadley

  Spotted Horse Productions

  Instinctual is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2016 by Auryn Hadley

  All Rights Reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher and the copyright owner constitute unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

  Published by Spotted Horse Productions

  First Edition: May 2016

  Cover Art by Spotted Horse Productions

  Edited by Sarah Williams

  Just when you think you know yourself, that's when everything changes. The only stability we have is our ability to adapt. You see, we aren't as civilized as we like to pretend. Inside, we're all still beasts.

  If you can remember that, then you'll be able to find yourself. It matters. Il bax genause.

  Chapter 1

  Her knuckles rapped against the door. Sal glanced at the orders she held, reading them again. Rarely did anyone but the top officers of the special operations units ever get to meet with Ran Sturmgren. She couldn't think of a good reason for him to request her presence, and quite a few bad ones sprang to mind. Her ears flicked forward at the sound of feet crossing the room, and Sal shifted to stand at attention. The door opened.

  "Corporal Salryc Luxx?" the aged man asked. He looked down at her kindly. The top of her head didn't even reach his shoulder.

  "Yes, sir."

  "Please, come in." He stepped back and gestured for her to make her way inside.

  A pair of simple chairs sat before a heavy wooden desk. Sal stood behind them, her chin up, her ears carefully held still while the general made his way to the padded chair on the other side. He nodded at her and sank slowly into it.

  "Sit. Please."

  She perched on the edge of the boring wood chair, her orders still in her hand. Pushing her white braid over her shoulder, she waited, thankful he couldn't smell her emotions.

  "Relax, I don't bite," he joked, reaching for a pad of paper. His hand paused and he glanced back at her. "That was a bad joke. I hope it wasn't offensive."

  "Humans rarely bite, sir," was all she said.

  He sighed and nodded. "You're making fun of me, aren't you?"

  "Just stating a fact, sir."

  He smiled at that. "Ok. Fair enough. Now, you've never been in my office before, so let me explain the rules. I call you by your rank, we're talking officially. I use either your name or your call sign, and we're off the record. I offer you a drink and it's a social meeting. Understand, Corporal?"

  "Yes, sir," Sal replied.

  "Good. Now, would you care for a drink, Sal? That is what the Black Blades call you, right? Sal?"

  She nodded and flicked an ear at him, inhaling his scent. He smelled like nothing but human. There was no fear, no anger, and no concern lingering on his skin. "Thank you. I would love one," she told him professionally.

  "Whiskey?"

  She shook her head. "It's made from grains. That doesn't set well with my kind, sir - "

  He wagged a finger at her, smiling. "Nope. You broke the rules already. It's Ran."

  "Sorry," Sal said, trying again. "I don't handle plants well. Fruits are better, but not by much. Ran."

  "I see. So, that's why Blaec makes sure I have a bottle of mead in the office. Will that work?"

  "Thank you, Ran. That would be wonderful."

  He stood and moved the bottles around on his shelf, returning with a small clear one and a short glass. While he poured, he said, "Now, you need to learn to relax, Sal."

  "I thought I was."

  "Nah. You're as tense as a dog guarding his bone."

  Sal nodded and leaned back in the chair, curling her feet under her. Ran pushed the glass of mead across his desk and Sal took it, sipping carefully. "Why am I here?"

  The general didn't reply until he'd filled his own glass from a different bottle. He glanced up at her and took a long gulp, sucking in a breath at the bite of the liquor. "I wanted to meet the reason your Lieutenant found his spine. He blames you."

  Her ears twitched in surprise and her pale eyes widened slightly. Hoping he didn't see that, Sal gave him a slow and careful nod, waiting for the catch.

  "I'm not sure what to think about your revelation to the, well, the world basically, that the Black Blades are all iliri, but I am happy to see your recent combat effectiveness rating go up. What's the story, Sal?"

  "We're that good."

  "Bullshit." The General looked her in the eyes.

  Sal tried to remind herself that he didn't mean to challenge her, but she couldn't bring herself to look away, either. "It's just the truth," she told him. "We're better than you."

  "Are you so good then, that a new elite soldier could make the best unit in the Conglomerate of Free Citizens four percent more effective?"

  "Yes."

  He chuckled. "That's not the answer I expected."

  "Doesn't mean it isn't true." She could not pull her eyes from his gaze. No matter how hard she tried to blink, her body refused.

  "What else?" He leaned closer.

  Sal clenched her jaw, stifling her urge to growl, and stared. His eyes bore into hers, his lids squinting slightly at the intensity, and his muscles strained to get closer. Her lip pulled upward in a snarl she couldn't prevent. The bastard was challenging her. Her! Sucking in air, she smelled nothing but the calm scent of human, but he refused to even blink.

  "Back down," he warned kindly, the tone of his voice at odds with both the words and the expression on his face. Slowly, carefully, he lifted his left hand from his lap, a long resin dagger clenched in his fist, and set it on the desk. "You'd never make it."

  Her ears flicked up and she looked down, accepting her loss as her eyes found the slender blade. Unexpectedly, she grinned. "I could. I may submit, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't make it."

  "I don't really understand your species, Sal," Ran told her, shoving the dagger to the side of the desk. "I'm playing blind here."

  "Not that blind," she pointed out, gesturing to the weapon.

  He laughed and lifted his glass. "Blaec warned me about a few things. Does this mean I have at least a bit of your respect now?"

  Sal took another sip of the mead. "It means you truly out-rank me." She tilted the glass again, then realized that her words likely made little sense to him. "You won, General. I am impressed. I will also obey you, well, pretty much without question."

  "Pretty much?"

  Her answering smile flashed sharp teeth. "I can always challenge you again. Being more dominant does not mean more intelligent, nor does it make you right. We're different, we're not stupid."

  "So how does that work in the Blades?"

  "Well," Sal sighed, wondering how to explain it. "The Lieutenant is the most dominant of us all. He's usually right, and his tactical knowledge is impressive. He not only has more human rank than the rest of us, he has more iliran." She shrugged. "It works just like you'd expect it to if we were humans."

  "How do you fit in?"

  Her head tilted. "I don't understand."

  "You're a female, one of the few, from what I hear."

  The tiny, pale woman glanced down, looking at the blue envelope lying carelessly in her lap. "I don't know." She shrugged. "I may be purebred, but that doesn't
mean I have the answers, sir."

  "Ran."

  She nodded and continued. "I've heard the whispers, too. That's how I even got into the trials. My records sure weren't good enough to get an elite unit to look at me."

  "Nor your listed species. Not many care for your kind."

  "I know."

  "So you're playing blind, too?" His voice was gentle, almost paternal.

  Sal lifted the glass again and took a long drink, emptying it. Carefully, she set it on the desk. The General refilled it and pushed it back at her.

  "This going to be a problem in the Blades?" he asked.

  "Nah," she grumbled. "Just with me." She waved away his look of concern. "Not like that. I hate that I know so little about this culture they all take for granted. I have no idea about my parents, my history, none of it. Half the time, I don't even understand my own instincts." She stopped and glanced up at him. "I shouldn't have said that."

  "It's just a drink between friends, Sal," he reminded her. "Least, I'd like to think of you as a friend."

  "Humans aren't typically friends with iliri."

  "Zep is." Zep was the only human in their unit, and most of the time, the iliri forgot he was different from them.

  Thinking of her big brother made her smile. "Zep's kinda special."

  "Mm. You know what this is?" The general tapped a file on his desk.

  "Probably my personnel records?"

  "That's part of it." He flipped open the cover and turned a few pages. "This is your official military history. Every background check, every report, every promotion. Anything tied to you during your time as a conscript is in here."

  He pulled out a small set of papers then closed the file. "This has been sitting on my desk for a while, Sal. I've read it all."

  Her ears dropped. She knew some of what was in that file and most of it would not be complimentary.

  When she didn't answer, he went on. "You're not what I expected from this."

  "Why do you have my file? I wouldn't think you'd keep the complete file of every soldier in the elites."

  "No," he agreed. "But when you managed to beat Zep in your trials, Blaec Doll asked me for a favor. You know how many times that's happened?"

  "No."

  "Twice. This," he tapped the file, "was the first. The second was after your little escapade in Yager's Crossing. Anyone that mattered enough for Blaec Doll to take an interest in has my complete attention."

  "Fuck," Sal whispered.

  "Yeah, I know about that too, even if it's not in your file."

  Sal looked up at him, shocked. There was no way General Sturmgren could know she was intimate with Blaec, but her relationship with her partner had become rather public.

  "Cyno?" Sal asked.

  "And Blaec," Ran said. "Iliri thing, he told me. I don't get it, and I don't care. Not unless it affects your performance as a unit."

  She chuckled ironically. "We already handled that."

  "There's one thing in here, though, that I think might interest you." He pushed the papers at her, face down. "They're yours. It's not an official copy, Sal, but I thought you might be interested to know where you came from."

  "I grew up in Merriton," she said, confused.

  "Yeah. As a slave of some rich merchant. I have that, too. I mean before that."

  She reached up and took the documents, almost afraid to read them. On the other side, the heading for Lamarck Corp. was plastered boldly across the top. Sal glanced up at Ran once more, then read the first page quickly. The paper seemed to grow heavier as she took in the implications of the words on it.

  "It says they were performing experiments." Her voice was controlled and steady.

  "Controlled breeding," Ran said sadly. "To see if iliri would breed pure."

  "What does this have to do with me?"

  "Read the next page."

  She did. It was a list of offspring. A set of numbers was the only description for parents, followed by gender, date of birth, and date of death. Only a few had the death column still empty. Sal scanned the list of survivors and realized only one was female.

  "I was an experiment?"

  "It seems like that. I'm sorry. I debated giving that to you, but if it was me, I'd want to know."

  She looked up at him with true appreciation, her white eyes fading into her alabaster skin. "I do. Thank you."

  "We know you were purchased from Lamarck Corp. Since there's only one female listed, I can only assume that's you. I'm sorry I can't tell you anything about your parents. The company went out of business about eight years ago."

  "Do you know what they were studying?"

  "Mm." He locked his hands behind his head and leaned back, staring at the ceiling. "Officially, no, but twenty-something years ago? Was a lot of interest in your kind. Probably either for birth control, or the whole aphrodisiac thing."

  "I don't understand."

  "Iliri females have always been considered alluring. I doubt it's because you have no pigment. Perfume companies paid a lot for supposed pheromones, and the fact that you don't reproduce like us has always been of interest."

  "So they treat us like livestock."

  "Yeah."

  She glared, the anger in her eyes not for him. "And you wonder why we hate you?"

  "No. I don't. The only thing I wonder is how I can help."

  Her lips curled, the smile nearly feral, but it was still a smile. "Let us show them. Help us prove that we're as good as you."

  "What else?" he asked.

  "There's a crate of documents in storage at the Stonewater Stables. It's in iliran. We want to get them to the University of Prin."

  "That I can do. What else?"

  "Stay the fuck out of our way."

  Ran laughed. "Oh, now that I can't promise." He shot her a devious glance. "I plan to do a whole lot more than just get out of the way. Lieutenant Blaec Doll will receive orders any minute that increase your unit size to ten. He has authorization to begin recruitment to find two additional Black Blades – and quickly, before orders come down to prevent it. The trials will have to be held in Prin, though, because Parliament has requested a meeting with him."

  "Why are you telling me this?" Sal made no effort to hide her suspicion. "I'm not authorized for that information."

  "You are now. Unfortunately, he's only allowed to raise you up three ranks within a year. He used that up when he made you a Corporal. With your, um – I think he used the word expert – handling of the Black Widow Company's threat, he asked me for the second favor."

  "How does this affect my clearance?" Sal asked, confused.

  Ran continued as if she hadn't interrupted. "I can't promote you unless I truly believe that you're qualified for the position. No iliri – well, no purebred – has ever held a rank above Corporal in our history. Our little chat today was my way of seeing if you could take it." He smiled and shoved a small box at her. "I think you can. I'm impressed, Sal. You're nothing like I expected. You're twice as lethal and ten times more intelligent, even if you confuse the hell out of me. So, I'm promoting you to Sergeant and raising your clearance to first level."

  Sal looked between him and the small box. Slowly, she opened it and looked at the chevrons inside, then back to the general. "Damn it, Blaec," she whispered to herself.

  "You got Blaec Doll to suck up his pride twice. That's something. According to him, you're the best recruit he's had, and your records show you're a damned monster on the field – no offense."

  "None taken, I assure you."

  "I'm also moving you to Second Officer of the Black Blades."

  Sal sprang to her feet, her ears pinned back to her head, shocking the general into sitting up. "You have no right!"

  "I was asked to," he said, waving her down. "I'm not meddling in your, I think Blaec called it a pack? I'm not about to start moving around your pack structure, Sal. I'm just handling a few things he can't do himself in our human laws."

  "Blaec is making me third?"

&nbs
p; "Yeah. Said he would have made you second, but you convinced him Arctic is still better."

  She looked back at the chevrons in her hand and sank into the chair. "Fuck," she whispered again.

  "Oddly, I don't think that has anything to do with it. I admit, I wondered." He laughed when she took his joke as nothing more than a fact. "I'm behind you, Sal. You, the Black Blades, and all of the iliri in the CFC. I'll stick my neck out as far as you need me to, and we all know that I have pull where your pale skins don't, I just ask one thing in return."

  "What?" She didn't bother to look up.

  "Help me. We don't know much about your kind. You've been secretive for too long." He sighed. "I know it was because you had to be, but it hasn't helped. Humans are scared of that which they don't understand. Give me what I need to help you, all of you?"

  "I can't do that." She glanced up, unable to meet his eyes, and shook her head. "I'll tell you some, but I won't tell you all of it."

  "Why not?"

  "You seem like a decent man, Ran. You're pretty good for a human, but you're still a human."

  "Will I ever earn your trust?"

  Sal thought about that for a long moment. "I don't know." She lifted the documents he'd given her and flicked the edge. "This is a good start, though."

  "Good. Then get to Prin, hold your trials, and show them what you're made of, Sergeant." He stood and offered his hand.

  Sal rose and took it. The feel of his skin was warm and comfortable, nothing like most humans. Her head cocked to the side and her eyes were locked on their grip. Her small, milky-white fingers were dwarfed by his wrinkled, umber palm, but she didn't have the instinctual urge to jerk away. Slowly, she looked up, directly into his deep brown eyes. He didn't blink.

  "I believe you're trying," she said, the words devoid of emotion. "I'll give you a chance, but we've learned not to trust your kind. You like to kill us too much."

  The General chuckled and slowly looked to the ground. "I always knew you'd be different. Good luck, Sergeant. I'll do my best not to disappoint you."

  She turned, marching out as proudly as she'd entered. When she reached for the door to the hall, she paused. He'd just given her back her dominance. He'd dropped his eyes. From the tone of his voice, he'd known exactly what he was doing. Slowly, she looked back to find him waiting.