Hold Me Never (Holding Never) Read Free Page B

my
trembling body. I don't feel any pain anywhere. No blinding,
burning pain.
    A hissing sound near my foot makes me recoil. I let out
a yelp. The branding iron is lying inches from my ankle, sizzling on
the ground.
    I recall the thundering of hooves that I thought I'd
heard while I was screaming myself hoarse. That sound wasn't just in
my head, was it?
    I turn around cautiously, and stifle another shriek.
There are half a dozen soldiers on horseback behind me.
    They are dressed in the black uniform of the Emperor's
Imperial Army. The Imperial Army is the Emperor's juggernaut, an
unstoppable, merciless sledgehammer used to bludgeon and crush
opposing forces and innocent civilians. There is nothing human about
them. Every one of those black-uniformed soldiers is a cold-blooded
killer, a murderer of innocent, courageous lives, a monster.
    I close my eyes, the world careening and spinning
horribly to come crashing down on me. Whatever these soldiers are
here for, it is not to save me. My fate has only gotten worse.
Whatever they have in store for me, will be worse, far worse than
anything Officer Goddot can do to me.
    “ Oh! What
do we have here?” comes a nasal, taunting voice.
    The speaker dismounts and steps in front of Officer
Goddot, who has gone quite pale and seems to be shrinking in his
boots. I blink at the soldier who is now circling Officer Goddot and
smirking at me.
    The soldier's helmet hides his nose and forehead, but I
can see his narrow, gray eyes and weak, wobbly chin. He is dressed
in black, like the rest of the soldiers, but his build is willowy and
his complexion much too fair. From his thin frame protrudes a
paunch.
    Despite the danger hanging over my head like a noose, I
can't help thinking that this is the most unfit and unlikely soldier
of the Imperial Army that I have ever come across. The soldiers of
the Imperial Army are all weapons of terror and destruction. Most of
them look like they could crush a man's skull with just one hand.
    Except Officer Goddot—who is no longer a soldier,
just an officer overseeing a tiny, godforsaken factory. Downgraded
from fighting to a desk, or rather, conveyor-belt job.
    He doesn't look anything like a soldier. He just
looks like a bully.
    My eyes flick from the skinny solider to the other five
soldiers behind him.
    Oh.
    Those look like soldiers all right. Big, broad and bad.
    Yet, that pasty-complexioned, whiny-voiced soldier seems
to be the leader of the group. He is swaggering to and fro, his gray
eyes darting from Officer Goddot to me, as if sizing the both of us
up and wondering who would be more fun to terrorize.
    His small, narrow eyes settle on me.
    “ Release her,” he orders.
    The two soldiers standing behind me move immediately to
obey the order. My hands are released from the wooden board and I am
dragged to kneel in front of the soldier.
    He looks down his nose at me, his features scrunched up
in a frown. “Pretty little thing,” he pronounces at
last. “It'd be such a pity and a terrible waste to mar such
exquisite beauty so thoughtlessly,” he says over his shoulder.
“Why would you do such a terrible thing, Officer Goddot?”
    Officer Goddot blubbers some incoherent response, his
eyes registering fear and shock.
    I steal a glance at the soldier standing over me.
    What has he got to fear from this scrawny soldier?
There must be much more than meets the eye.
    And meeting his eye is what I should not have done.
    As I tilt up my head to stare at him, I see his eyes
widen a fraction as our gazes clash. His thin lips curve up slowly
and his eyelids lower. The look in his eyes is unmistakable. I know
that look. I have seen that look before, and I will never forget it.
My whole body tingles and tightens into a dead knot, my hands
balling into fists at my side. It is the look I saw on the face of
that Commander when he laid his greedy, lustful eyes on my mother.
The look of an animal in heat. The look of a predator.
    I see the same look now on the