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I contemplated calling out for help. I wasn’t sure if the Zunatorian was trying to kill the beast to protect me or have me all for himself. The warriors were possessive like that, I had heard. Some of them weren’t at all like the gentle giant, Theor who took me into his home and realized that being mated to him wasn’t my will, and instead, he treated me as his student and often times, his equal. His neighbors certainly looked down on him for it. It didn’t matter anymore. That issue was a thing of the past. I had much bigger problems to deal with now.

I was sure I was going to die in this quicksand. Even if I did opt to cry out for the Zunatorian’s help, I worried that I was too far submerged for him to be able to pluck me out.

Judging by his frame and the skilled way he fought against the beast, I could tell that he’d had training. His long, ink black hair flowed halfway down his back, straight as an arrow. He had golden eyes that glistened whenever he moved his head in my direction.

I glanced down at my body, halfway buried by the quicksand now. The sand and the mud had a sulfur smell that was extremely nauseating. I didn’t want to suffocate and die in this trap. I began to cry, searching for any neighboring trees, branches or limbs. I was scoping for anything viable to cling to and pull against—anything to resist succumbing to this torturous death.

I started thinking about how I’d rather have been sexually assaulted and slain by the beast instead of dying by the quicksand. At least then, it would be a quick death, but it would be over fast. The quicksand would be an excruciatingly slow death. I began to envision the air leaving my lungs as I drowned in a thick, swampy substance.

The mud was merciless. It was up to my chest now and it would soon cover my neck. If I was going to find anything resourceful to rope my hands around to while I still had hands to aid me, it was now or never.

I was practically paralyzed with fear. My breathing intensified, my shoulders rising and falling rapidly as I attempted to hunt down a low lying branch or twig or tall blades of grass. There was nothing.

It was time for me to relent to the idea of death.

You would have died anyway. You’re at your strike three. Four. Five, maybe.

I’d made it past the first set of aliens who had killed Roult, and I’d escaped the brutal attack of the beast, but the universe wasn’t going to give me a free pass three times in a row. Everyone died eventually—some sooner than others.

It was my time.

I took a deep breath, still weeping silently. I began to lower my arms, keeping still as a last resort to stop myself from sinking any further.

Something swiftly cuffed fingers around my wrist and yanked me out of the quicksand with a mighty and gravity defying tug. I heard a male voice grunt and murmur in the Zunatorian tongue.

I looked up into the the sculpted face of the same Zunatorian who had just been fighting the beast. I had been so frozen in terror about my ending life that I had lost track of what the pair fighting were doing off in the distance. I didn’t see any sign of the beast anywhere. Had it run off? Accepted defeat? Been killed?

The Zunatorian peered down at me with contempt that confused me. His hair was beautiful and sleek. His skin was golden hue with electric pulses transmitting beneath the flesh. His mosaic eyes were piercing—captivating.

He still held me above the quicksand. I dangled limply in front of him like a fish on a line as the Zunatorian studied me with a sour glare. I was completely soaked with mud. It was literally dripping off of me.

He opened his mouth and uttered a single word that sent an icy chill through my bones.

“Murderer.”