The Complete Alien's Bride

by Yamila Abraham

  She absorbed the revelation. That could make things simpler, but didn’t she have a duty to love them both?

  “I’d have to sleep with both of you.”

  “Yes,” he said softly. “I wouldn’t tolerate you shirking that duty with either of us.”

  His voice remained soft as he said it, but her shoulders tensed.

  Hern pulled his hand free from her. “We’re still in orbit over your world.”

  She blinked. They were in outer space?

  He rose. “I hope you’ll decide stay with me—but I can’t share a defiant gift with Xaroth. We’ll remain a while longer on Lord Elentinus’ vessel so you can be sure of your decision.”

  She nodded with her lips sealed. The thought of going back to the slave colony was so revolting she might have become physically ill. She shut out those thoughts. Not yet. Don’t give up on this chance.

  Hern stepped to her door and then turned back. “I’ll find you again later. I must explain things to Lord Elentinus.” He hesitated. “I hope you’ll decide to stay, Selena. I…I find you enchanting.”

  His words caused a flutter in her belly followed by an ache in her chest. There was already that spark—that dangerous spark. One that would knock some of the reason out of her decision-making.

  He left.

  Selena remained in her seat to think while tearing at the skin of her cuticles. She replayed their conversation in her mind, discovering new questions that she burned to ask.

  “I was going to tell you everything,” Maritza said. “The first big hurdle was getting your adjustments done. I didn’t want you stressing over that when so many other things were going to be dumped on you. The surgery was the easy part, you know?”

  Selena frowned, but she had to admit Maritza was right.

  They were seated on cushiony chairs in an atrium where the wall in front of them was a giant window. It rose up to join with the ceiling, rounding off at a peak above their heads. Maritza had brought her there so she could see Earth. Only a corner of the planet was visible in the starlit void, swaths of blue and green hidden below clouds.

  Selena took some coaxing to be brought out of the bedchamber. She felt like a nervous cat in a new house. She needed much more time to grow comfortable before she wanted to explore.

  “I don’t appreciate how I was knocked out,” Selena said.

  “I know,” Maritza said, while staring outside. “We don’t get much consideration. You have to always expect the worst, and then be grateful when things aren’t so bad.”

  She scoffed. “Things aren’t bad for you. They treat you like you’re one of them.”

  “One of their women.” Her shoulders rose and fell with a deep sigh. “I’m probably the luckiest bride in the Dak-Hiliah Empire. I admit it. Lord Elentinus and I have this bastion of peace far away from the home world. We have the most perfect loving relationship you can imagine—but I was still kidnapped and forced to marry him against my will. I’m still forced to ovulate at double speed so two zygotes a month can be harvested from my womb to be artificially gestated.”

  Selena gasped.

  “I’ve got over thirty kids out there somewhere. I’ve only been allowed to raise two of them myself.”

  “My God…”

  “These are the sort of things you have to put up with—you have to make your peace with. You don’t have any choice. We’re not in control here. Earth surrendered to the Dak-Hiliah. We’re the spoils of war.”

  “I could never give away my babies.”

  Maritza flinched at her description. “If you can’t handle that then we should stop wasting time with you and find another girl.”

  Tears bubbled up from her chest. “Can’t I just—be involved in their lives somehow? Make sure they’re okay? That they’re loved?”

  The beginnings of a sneer touched the edge of her lip. “I think you should just go home, actually. You’re freaked about the two husbands, and now this stuff. You’re a mess already and you don’t even know the rest of the bullshit you’re walking into.”

  Frustration added itself to her sorrow. “I don’t want to go back.”

  “It’s not all about what you want. There are more things at stake here.”

  “Damn it! Then you should have thought about that before pulling me out of the colony. Your sweet, loving, compassionate—whatever husband told me if I didn’t come willingly I would be put to death for escaping.”

  She glanced to the side. “Yeah. That sounds like something he’d say.”

  Selena’s eyes bulged. Then she grit her teeth. “I’m here now. For better or worse. I’ve got the hope of actually being with someone who would cherish me—and the hope of possibly having a life that doesn’t involve digging up potatoes all day or letting some pig with three wives bang me whenever he wants so I can experience the joy of being a single mother.”

  Maritza’s face softened into an expression of sympathy.

  “I want to make this work.” She wiped a tear on the back of her hand. “I have to try.”

  Maritza leaned back in her seat and fixed her gaze back on the window. After a long silence she blew out a deep, staggering breath.

  “Okay. Let’s try.”

  Some of the tightness in Selena’s throat abated.

  “General Xaroth was raised by Dak-Hiliah parents. A warlord father and a mother who was abused under the rules of the high druid Shindray. Like most of the idiots in that situation Xaroth thinks his childhood was hunky dory. He thinks the more power women have the weaker men become.”

  Maritza picked up a small tablet she’d brought with her and began to read in the Dak-Hiliah language. “Shindray decreed that by subjugating their wives men would eradicate the compassion, indecision, and hesitance that had made the empire weak. Men were to see women as enemies who sought to destroy their character. Women were to be mothers, housekeepers, and caregivers who would remain confined to the home. Men were prohibited from having idle conversations with their wives. All discussions had to be limited to matters pertaining to the children or household. Husbands and wives were to sleep separately, eat separately, and limit intimacy to sexual intercourse. Husbands were to beat their wives severely for many possible infractions such as leaving the house or initiating prohibited communications.”

  Selena’s lips parted. Maritza set down the tablet and looked at her.

  “The new druid, Pakpo, said that these rules don’t apply to the human brides. However, he hasn’t made any new rules to replace them. A lot of the men, probably Xaroth too, are just carrying on the way they always have.”

  Selena tried to absorb the lecture. She cracked her knuckles while contemplating things. “Hern didn’t act like he was following these rules.”

  “General Hern doesn’t want to follow Shindray anymore. That’s why he and General Xaroth have so many problems. Hern knows that Shindray’s bullshit is the reason his race is practically extinct. The idiot druid caused a gender war. But Xaroth was raised in a Shindray household by a warlord who taught him that women were the enemy. He wants to keep the new brides as slaves to prevent them from doing damage.”

  Selena felt perplexed. She couldn’t fathom a mighty general who was afraid of women.

  “General Hern and General Xaroth have the exact same rank in the empire. They both command the Dak-Hiliah military.” Maritza gestured with one hand as she spoke. “I guess Xaroth used to be the only general but the soldiers broke into two factions that were starting to fight with each other, so Hern was given the same rank as Xaroth to cool off the disgruntled soldiers. Hern and Xaroth are supposed to lead the army together, but Xaroth won’t cooperate with Hern. Right now they’re just taking turns leading. Hern led the army against the Instajants, which is why he’s getting you as a reward. The next big move the military makes will be Xaroth’s turn. Hern doesn’t like how he leads. He can’t get through to him. They’re like enemies or something. Hern wants them to be united.”

  “Oh,” Selena said.

  “
Yeah, so, that’s where you come in. Hern wants to share something ‘precious’ with Xaroth so they can stop feuding and just cooperate. Right now it’s hurting the empire for the military to be divided like this. Hern is trying to bridge the gap so they can be as strong as they used to be back in their golden age.”

  “Hmm.” She considered a moment. “The Dak-Hiliah want to conquer the whole universe. That’s their goal, right?”

  “They think their gods named them the rightful governors of the universe. So yeah. They want to conquer everyone.”

  “Why would I want to help their military get stronger?” She shook her head with a gesture of confusion. “They’re our enemies.”

  “Yeah, I know. Fuck their army. You and I don’t care about their army. That’s not what this is about.”

  Selena blinked at her.

  “What we want is for idiots like Xaroth to get off team Shindray and join team Pakpo. Remember Pakpo? The new druid who is making things better for the women but can’t do everything fast enough because he’s just a little boy?”

  Selena nodded.

  “These generals run the military, which is most of Dak-Hiliah society. We’ve got one guy with tons of power so scared of women he’s keeping his followers in the dark ages. The soldiers under him are the future husbands of the babies we’re having and the girls growing up in your colony. They need to wise up. Xaroth needs to start drinking the women’s lib Kool-Aid so he can start changing the attitudes of the soldiers who are loyal to him. You need to make Xaroth realize that women aren’t a threat to his manliness or whatever.”

  Selena boggled at the archaic product reference, and then fumed. “How can I do that?”

  “By making him love you. Making him know that he doesn’t have to fear you. Be someone so sweet and accommodating that he won’t want to be a Shindray asshole. Make him someone who wants to be able to have conversation with you, cuddle with you—you know? Don’t be the enemy wife his mother was who had to be crushed by his dad. Be the wife he wants to be friends with.”

  Selena closed her eyes. She had no words to respond with.

  “Look, I’m not trying to overwhelm you. You were going to be a nice wife to him anyway, right? I’m just saying that making him happy is a little more important now.”

  “I don’t know if I can handle this.”

  Maritza made a sound of exasperation.

  “But I’ll try.” She scowled at her. “That’s all I can do is try. I…I went after this because my future in the colony was going to be a nightmare. I needed someone I could love, and who would love me. I didn’t ask for the rest of this garbage.”

  Maritza crossed her arms.

  “Like I said, it’s not all about you.”

  Maritza offered to give her a tour of the celestial yacht after their conversation. Selena shook her head. She was eager to get back to the chamber she’d woken up in. She needed to feel relative safety while she thought things through.

  A robot brought her more food, but Selena didn’t emerge from the sanctuary of the curtained bed to receive it. She was too overwhelmed to cry. Deep shuddering breaths came out of her again and again while she rested her face in her hand. What had she gotten herself into?

  The lights dimmed in her room automatically a few hours after she’d returned. Selena peeked out of the bed to see if someone had come in to lower them. Not only was the room vacant, there weren’t any discernable lights to have been lowered. Apparently the entire concave ceiling gave off an ambient glow.

  It must have been nighttime. Selena felt too knotted up inside to sleep. If she were still in the slave colony, thousands of slaves would be settling down in their bunks all around her. Lucretia would be trying to get her oldest to sleep after bathing her babies and putting them in fresh diapers. The elderly woman in the bunk under Selena would be slathering her aching muscles with ointment that cleared the sinuses and made her eyes water. Selena would try to distribute her weight on her worn mattress so she could find a position comfortable enough to sleep in. Soon her bunkmate would begin to snore, but Selena was used to that and could sleep through it. What would wake her was her bunkmate’s tossing and turning every two hours or so when she snorted awake.

  Look at what she had now: a huge comfortable bed in a luxurious room with an immaculate bathroom. She could expect a reasonable amount of comfort at her next destination too. Half of what she hoped for, a better quality of life, was already satisfied. The other and more important half was to find her prince.

  Back in the colony she’d had Charlie Lee after her: a man with a constantly runny nose that he liked to wipe on his shirt. He told Selena he’d be kind enough to knock her up whenever she wanted, but he wasn’t going to take her as his fourth wife or be involved with their children. Lucretia had accepted such offers from similarly repugnant men enough times to be the single mother of four children. Selena refused. Even at the threat of punishment—the hope for true love was more important to her.

  Now she had not one but two mighty generals eager to wed her.

  “Feast or famine,” she mumbled.

  Her current situation wasn’t a feast, however. It was getting a tube shoved down her throat to be force-fed.

  There was a tap at the door she recognized as Hern’s hallmark. She made herself emerge from the bed to greet him. He stood at the threshold when the door slid open until she invited him in.

  “You’re still here.” He paused in the center of the room in a loose suit that looked similar to black silk pajamas. The shimmering cloth hugged to his dense muscles allowing her to see how lithe his body was. Selena stood only a few feet in front of the bed alcove. A wide expanse separated them.

  “I don’t want to leave,” she said. Emotion already began to choke her voice.

  “But do you want to stay?”

  She met his gaze. Tears were starting to make her vision cloudy. “Will you protect me?”

  His lips parted. Then he slowly closed his eyes as though allowing the words to permeate through him. He crossed the space separating them so they stood less than an arm’s length apart. She tipped her head to meet his gaze. A tear streaked down her face.

  “Please let me protect you, Selena.”

  The intensity of his voice caused sobs to bubble up from her chest. She stepped forward to lean against him while she wept. Hern’s arms came around her slowly, as though he were unsure. She clung to him and then his hold grew tight.

  “No one’s ever asked me that before,” he said softly. “I’ve never knew such a thing could cause me joy.”

  “You’re the only hope I have.” It was a continuation of the dialogue in her head. A fact she was allowing herself to accept.

  She felt his chest expand with a breath. They parted and he reached toward her face. His splayed fingers went into her hair at her temple.

  “Is it…fine for me to touch you like this?”

  She nodded.

  “Lord Elentinus told me that means yes—when you move your head that way.” He soothed his hand through her hair. “So soft. Everything about you is delicate, Selena. Breakable. You’re as fragile as a Dak-Hiliah child.”

  “I’m not a child,” she said, though she felt too resigned to pout.

  “I’m extremely aware of that.”

  Selena felt her face darken. She wanted to yield to the womanly feelings he was stirring up. All she could do was give a shuddering sigh. If only he was the totality of her fate.

  He fumed softly through his nostrils. She could tell their circumstances weighed on him also. He leaned down and brushed aside her hair so he could kiss her forehead.

  “I could fall in love with you so easily,” he said. “Even when the concept was something I only knew from old stories. I’m already beginning to understand it—how sweet it can be, when two people are well matched.”

  She looked into his eyes. “It’s all I’ve ever wanted my entire life.”

  His brows became pinched. “I wish I could make your dreams come true.�
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  He turned and took several steps away from her. Selena felt an ache as they parted, but now was not the time to be sentimental. She could sense a darkening to his mood.

  “You deserve better. All your people did. I still can’t understand how Lord Elentinus could have unleashed the Instajants on you. Those monstrous, insidious parasites. I would have found another way to make you surrender. We could have conquered you the right way—compassionately.”

  Selena grimaced through the speech. Her response was automatic, something well practiced during her life in the colony. “We don’t talk about that period. It was the sickest nightmare you can imagine for everyone who managed to survive.”

  He bowed his head to agree. “I won’t pry, my dear. I only thought of it because I know you survived those gruesome years. Aren’t you strong enough now to endure anything?”

  “No.” She raised her voice without hesitation. “We were all destroyed after we came out of that. I mean—destroyed to the point of not even being human anymore. It took years of living in the colony, of holding you guys to your promise that the nightmare was over, for us to be whole again. Then we tried to live, we tried to forget. You guys told us we didn’t have to hold on to any part of what we’d become back then. That was our reward for surrendering—the chance to be normal people again. I put away every part of me from those horrible years. I refuse to be that person ever again. Afraid, helpless, hungry, cold, dirty—you guys told us that was over. You promised.”

  Hern dropped into the chair at her table. He rubbed his hand over his face. “You’re right. You deserve better than this.” His aqua blue eyes lifted toward her. “Part of the reason I want to share a bride with Xaroth, rather than give him one as a gift, is so I can protect you. His last human wife…she killed herself.”

  Selena covered her open mouth in horror.

  “She may have just been disturbed. I’m not sure. After her suicide he became a more zealous follower of Shindray. That’s what caused unrest in our ranks—his raving. He was all but saying that we should deny the authority of our new druid, even if it’s the most obscene blasphemy.”