Hostile Genus: An Epic Military Sci-Fi Series (Invasive Species Book 2) Ben Stevens (best contemporary novels txt) 📖

More than once, he’d thought about bolting for it, just running, but his fear kept him frozen in place. This hesitation had turned to a glimmer of wicked hope. He’d remained crouched behind the stone retaining wall, hidden from Lily Sapphire and her sunbeams. From there he’d watched as Sofia, his wife—his poor, estranged wife—led the counterattack. He’d watched as the sunbeams blinked out of existence one at a time, like the fading stars of dawn’s approach.

When this is over, I should honor my queen and raise her up… or maybe I’ll kill her in her sleep so that she can’t lord my error in judgment over me…

At one point, he’d dared to turn and peek over the wall to glimpse the stage. He had watched from the shadows as dozens of his vampires rushed the starlet-turned-sorceress, and his curiosity had gotten the better of him.

Good. She is trapped. Soon, then. Don Luis had smiled inwardly, and ducked back down behind cover, satisfied with what he’d seen—a flickering globe of golden light, protecting her and her whelp from the tooth and claw of New Puebla’s justice. He needn’t be a sorcerer himself to know that her shield wouldn’t last for much longer.

Now then… This other one…

She appeared not to notice him, but then again, she appeared not to notice anyone. Her eyes were locked in a thousand-yard stare, and the decorated skull of her face was as devoid of expression and effort as the desert was of rain, only reinforcing that appearance. She looked as one lost in thought, in a daydream, yet no one touched her. She deftly dodged claw, fist, and bullet equally, as if she and her combatants had practiced every day for a year to dazzle judges at some synchronized death-dance competition.

There is no way I’m going anywhere near that. The thought had just crossed his mind when he saw his wife squeeze the head off a fleeing soldier and then proceed to push her way through the troops to get herself a piece of lady Death.

She’ll get herself killed… The prospect of seeing his wife slashed apart frightened him as much as it amused him. The mental image of her bloody head rolling across the ground, coming to a stop and then looking up at him as he watched her life force evaporate like spilled water on the hardpan plain flashed across his mind’s eye. He realized that he was hard.

Yet… There would be no glory or satisfaction. Sofia was a good deal stronger than any man out there, but if she fell to this painted one, then the odds of him following his wife into the forever-sleep increased dramatically. In one of his rare moments of opportune brazenness, Don Luis Fernando saw something in the midst of the chaos that everyone had missed.

He realized what he must do, and leapt from his hiding place into the thick.

It was too late for Sofia. In her passion, she had lost all sense of tactics and timing. She raged at the men in her way and shoved them aside. The cyborg bitch didn’t seem to notice her. Hungry lust flashed across her eyes, and she waited just a second as Lucy turned her back to deal with another kamikaze sentry and then lunged… right into the tip of Lucy’s Macuahuitl.

A small gasp, more of surprise than pain, escaped Sofia’s mouth. Lucy looked coolly over her shoulder into Sofia’s face. The melee seemed to freeze for a second, the vampires and men around them not sure what to do with their leader incapacitated. Sofia could see the light from the nearby scattered fires reflected in Lucy’s eyes. For the first time since the night's combat had begun, a hint of emotion rippled across the placid sea that was Lucy’s face. Sofia didn’t miss it, even though it was barely there—the genesis of a smile at the far corners of her full lips.

“You are as much of a killer as I am… A wolf like me…” Sofia managed to hiss out, the surprise in her voice there for all to hear.

“Not a wolf. A jaguar,” Lucy whispered just loudly enough to reach Sofia’s supernatural ears, and then she spun in a tight circle, pulling her obsidian-bladed club from Sofia’s stomach and bringing her second one to bear at the queen’s neckline.

Lucy waited a moment longer than she should have and watched with barely hidden satisfaction as Sofia’s head sailed into the crowd of stunned onlookers. She brought her war-clubs into a defensive cross guard and eyed the crowd, testing them, daring them. Will they rally toward me again, or has the fight gone out of them? she wondered, and then the electricity hit her in the small of her back like a punch from a Heavy Mech.

Running across the entire length of the plaza from the outside perimeter to the stage was a thick braid of power cords covered by a small wooden ramp to prevent tripping. Don Luis had had it built to provide power to the impromptu stage. This Día De Los Muertos witch-woman was damn near straddling it as she stood there, pretending first not to see, then stabbing his wife in the belly.

This was his one chance. He moved with preternatural speed, nothing more than a blur that zig-zagged across the blood-soaked pavers, with only an imperceptible pause as he stooped mid-stride to rip and tear the electric braid free from the wooden half-hex that covered it and bound it to the ground. Like a bolt of lightning that streaks across the sky, making its jagged way from cloud to ground, Don Luis moved through the survivors of the melee and connected with Lucy. She didn’t even have time to hear the snapping and sizzling of the live braid, nor did she detect the subtle shift in the air currents as the king of New Puebla raced toward her. She had erred and