Silent Warrior by Lindsey Piper

forehead hit the grimy floor. Pain shot through Hark’s mind like the crack of a hammer between his eyes.
    Jawahar wrapped the chain around her thigh, just where the joint fit with her pelvis. He tightened it with enough force to cripple her. Silence screamed. Another wrenching tug. Hark, still pushing through and past and around the minds of at least a half-dozen people, noticed where Jawahar had crumbled the pitted concrete that secured his chains to the wall. He’d been as patient as a Sath. Waiting. Now he had Silence in a grip that could rip her leg clean off.
    She screamed again. Hark was nearly blinded by her pain, but it must’ve been a shadow of her agony. He leaped forward, seeing that her shield was their nearest weapon. He shoved his arm into the leather loop and swirled against her attacker. Chunks of the man’s forearm flayed away. It was his turn to scream.
    Jawahar’s grip on the chain loosened enough for Silence to scramble away. She was still on hands and knees, gasping, swallowing sobs Hark could feel in his mind.
    He wanted to go to her, but Jawahar came first. Hark cut the loose chain with the serrated shield. A manacle still dangled from the Indranan’s wrist. Three other chains remained in place—left hand and both ankles. He wasn’t going anywhere.
    We have unfinished business, dead man.
    A mental snarl was all Hark heard in reply as he raced to Silence’s collapsed body. The chain had pinched inward, cutting the skin of her upper thigh. Near her carotid artery? He couldn’t remember what happened to Dragon Kings who bled to death, but he wasn’t about to play science experiment. He peeled back her thick leather trousers. She helped him, although her strength was failing. He could feel her mind slipping into a haze where thoughts winked out, overcome by pain and panic.
    He ripped off the layers that protected his chest until he found cloth. A quick tourniquet. Just get the bleeding to stop. Then he took her face between his hands. No telepathy now.
    “You move a Dragon-damned muscle and I’ll use the nighnor on your stubborn head. I happen to like your head, so don’t piss me off.”
    “Where?”
    “Four more goon guys, blondie.”
    “It’s dark. You hate it.”
    “We’re not dying down here. Not by some second-rate Indranan asshole, and not by third-rate killers.” He dredged up a grin. It felt like smiling past a mouth full of glass shards. “Besides, we’re way too cool for this place. Next time we’re naked together, it’ll be on satin sheets.”
    “I’ll keep Jawahar and my pain away from you.”
    “See? Too cool.”
    He kissed her forehead. Nothing could be done about the smudges of blood he left on her cheeks. Their kiss would have to do as he retrieved his weapons and charged into the darkness.

9
    A lthough she wanted to reach out to her lover, Silence carefully avoided Hark’s thoughts. He was alive and he was still fighting. That’s all she needed to know. Instead she kept her mind fused with that of Jawahar, despite her disgusting task. She caught glimpses of the moment when he’d pushed Shiro Kawashima into a closet and pressed his big body against the young man. Maybe thirteen? She was revolted by Jawahar’s excitement, then and now, as they remembered it in tandem. His raging hard-on. His mounting anticipation at the pitiful sound of the boy’s whimpers. His thrill when yanking down one zipper, then another.
    He forced Shiro to face the wall.
    Silence clenched her eyes and hurled her pain.
    Across the narrow space dividing them, Jawahar grunted. She kept her attention focused there. The throb burning around her upper thigh became a bludgeon. She pummeled him with fire and agony. His resistance crumbled, until she caught sight of what had happened after he’d stripped Shiro from the waist down. Men had come for Jawahar. Men with cattle prods and whips, followed by a father with the fury of a thousand stars going supernova.
    Jawahar was the one whimpering