“You alright?”

Noelle shuddered. She still didn’t know exactly how she felt about what had happened, but she didn’t really want to think about it. “Sure.”

Jules frowned, glanced up and down the corridor and then entered the room and bolted the door. “He said I’d get a beatin’ if I tried to help you again,” he muttered.

Anger flickered through Noelle. “For trying to help me?”

Jules looked self-conscious. “He said he was proud of me but I coulda been hurt if it was anybody else and he was my sovereign besides.”

Noelle relaxed fractionally. “Well, he’s right. You shouldn’t have gotten into the middle of it. You could’ve been hurt.”

“I was afraid he’d hurt you.”

Noelle opened her arms to him. To her surprise, he rushed toward her and threw his arms around her. “All the more reason you shouldn’t have,” she murmured. “Because if he was a bad man and willing to hurt me he would’ve hurt you, too.”

Jules burst into tears. “I want to go home! I want my mother! Kadin said I’d never see my mother again. He hasn’t seen his mother since Father brought him here and neither has Terl!”

Anger flickered through Noelle that Kadin had told the child that, whether it was true or not. She soothed him the best she could. “Poor baby! I’m so sorry. I wish I could help. You shouldn’t listen to Kadin. He’s … homesick and angry and it apparently makes him feel better to be mean to other people.”

“I’m not a baby!” he growled, pushing away.

Noelle bit her lip. “No. You’re right. Sorry.”

He studied her suspiciously for a moment, then glanced toward the door and moved closer to speak in a low voice. “We could go. I know how to get to the ship. I found a secret way.”

Noelle felt like her heart would leap into her throat and choke her. Homesickness washed over her in an almost physical wave. She knew she shouldn’t even consider what the child was saying, but she’d wanted to go home so bad before she’d pissed Drak off that it was hard to try to be reasonable. “Bab … Honey! We’ll just end up getting in more trouble and then who knows what he’ll do to punish us!”

Jules tilted his head. “He punished you? What did he do? Beat you? Is that why you’re moving so funny?”

Noelle felt her face turn beet red. The blood pulsed in her cheeks like a neon sign. “Uh … no, not really. I mean … of course he didn’t beat me!”

“What did he do then?”

It was impossible to turn any redder. “Well .. . uh … he just wasn’t nice and then he said he’d make me regret it if I betrayed his trust again, and I don’t really want to find out what he might do … if you know what I mean.”

Jules nodded. “He said I’d get ten lashes on my buttocks—publicly—and I want to go home! He’s bound to get mad again and I don’t want nobody looking at my buttocks!”

Noelle was outraged, even though it was a threat/promise and not something Drak had actually done.

Not that her own grandmother had been against corporal punishment. She’d said people remembered pain a lot better than they remembered lectures—or even good things. And she’d been right. One painful, humiliating spanking was all it had taken to convince her not to take unnecessary risks.

But was this unnecessary?

Jules had a point. The chances were probably way better than even that both of them were going to get on his wrong side again.

Besides, she wanted to go home, too, and it was like an ache now that Jules had planted the seed suggesting she might could.

And then there was the pregnancy issue! She still wasn’t convinced he could get her pregnant. Especially now that she knew the plumbing didn’t match! But she wasn’t about to risk having any child of hers raised by aliens with such archaic customs!

“I tell you what—show me and I’ll consider it.”

Jules grinned and threw himself into her arms, hugging her tightly enough to set her sore muscles to throbbing again.

Instead of leading her to the door, however, when he pulled away he headed to the far wall and began to feel along the molding. Abruptly, a door appeared, showing a dark, cavernous maw. Stale, frigid air wafted into the room.

Noelle’s jaw dropped. “OMG! That’s where the damned drafts were coming from! How did you find it?”

Jules put a finger to his lips to silence her. “I got lost,” he whispered. “And I thought I’d found the way to the great hall, but instead I discovered I was outside this room.”

Noelle stared at him, feeling hot embarrassment creep into her cheeks again. She cleared her throat. “When was that?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Not long after I came.”

Relieved, Noelle turned her attention to the door. Generally, she could count on Drak not coming back after he’d left in the morning. She usually left the room and went downstairs and met up with him again in the great hall for the evening meal.

But he had made that threat? promise? Suggestive comment? About her needing to keep her strength up.

She decided to bolt the door—just in case. And then she dragged a few pieces of furniture in front of it—just in case.

When she’d thrown on her warmest clothing, she bundled up the remains of her breakfast and shoved it into a pouch and tied it at her waist. “What about light?”

“I didn’t have one when I found it. If you wait a few minutes, you can see well enough to find the stairs. And then we won’t have to worry about anybody seeing us.”

“Good thought.” She considered it. “Unless your eyes are better than mine and then I might end up breaking my neck. Well, we can try it. If it’s too dark we can come back and find a light of some kind.”

She discovered there was no going back once they stepped inside and closed the hidden door. Either there was no latch on that side or they couldn’t find it.

“Shit!” Noelle muttered.

Jules giggled.

Noelle felt a little hysterical herself. It was as black as pitch. She knew she was standing on a narrow landing and she could end up at the bottom really fast if she wasn’t careful. And now she’d begun to think her decision might not have been one of the smartest impulses she’d ever had.

What if they couldn’t get away?

And Drak discovered they’d tried?

Jules was going to get his fanny beat publicly and she was going to have another session of BDSM so Drak could he was master of her destiny and she didn’t know if she could handle it or not!

Not that she hadn’t thoroughly enjoyed it in some respects, but there was no getting around the fact that it had seemed nearly unbearable at times and went on far longer than she’d wanted.

And if he caught her he might think she was begging for more of the same or worse!

Shaking that thought off—galvanized to act by it—she began to search for the next step with her foot. Jules was already half way down the damn stairs from the sound of it!

He was right about the light, though. There was just enough filtering into the shaft from somewhere to make it possible to detect outlines.

It was still frighteningly nerve-wracking. Her knees were wobbly by the time she reached the bottom.

Jules was impatient and pushing her to hurry. “Are there anymore things I could fall down or over?”

“It’s just the tunnel now.”

Lava tube, Noelle wondered? Or man made? Because it seemed likely to have side shafts if it was an artificial tunnel—like a mining shaft. “You’re sure there aren’t any side tunnels where we could get lost down here forever?”

“I didn’t find any. You need to be very quiet because I don’t know how close anybody is and there’s usually a guard at the cave where they keep the ship.”

Well, thank god she had the little man helping her! She would’ve gotten herself caught ten times already!

Chastened, she let the young boy lead her and they moved as quickly as possible. It seemed to take a very long time and Noelle was doing a lot of mental calculations. Using her PMAI to recall her arrival, she calculated that it had taken them around thirty minutes to reach the castle, but that had been on the back of an animal and through snow and along a pass. They were clearly traveling through the mountain rather than around it even if they were on foot. The distance should be shorter. But would it be faster since they were on foot?