Alien Romance: The Alien's Captive Bride (Alien Protectors Book 6)

by Zena Zion

  Her legs weren't strong enough to hold someone so much larger than her and he pulled away from her, escaping the flurry of punches she was throwing at his head, but she was back on her feet a second later, teeth bared. The confident expression on his face had faltered.

  There was surprise there now and, to Jasmine's dismay, the light of genuine excitement in his eyes. He lunged at her, clumsy and eager, and even with as quickly as it was happening, Jasmine could tell he'd left that move wide open intentionally. He wanted to see what she could do. He was toying with her. Well, he was going to find out exactly what she could do in the most painful way possible.

  She ducked under his under his arms and instead brought her head up hard underneath his chin. She heard the painful click of his jaw as his teeth clicked together and he reeled backwards, blood from his bitten tongue running over his lips. But even as he wiped his mouth clean his expression was still that of a kid at Christmas.

  "It has been years since I've seen my own blood," he said, grinning, "I did not believe in fate until this moment."

  Despite herself, Jaz felt a thrill of excitement herself. There was never anything as satisfying as a one on one brawl with someone who could handle themselves. And this guy could more than handle himself. Jaz hadn't almost forgotten the danger in her eagerness to see what this guy could do, and consequently wipe the floor with him.

  When he came at her again, this time she could tell he was holding nothing back. He hit her like a freight train and she hit back with all the force she had. He wasn't shrugging her hits off either, but he kept coming back for more.

  They rolled across the bed in their struggle, grappling and springing apart only to crash back into one another a hundred times. Her strong thighs gripped him, holding him where she wanted him, within reach of her fists. His powerful hands left bruises behind as they grasped her hips, throwing off her attempted suplex.

  She'd never fought like this before, never felt anything this intense. She could feel his heart beating, hammering against her skin, and every labored breath as he struggled to hold her. She knew she was at a disadvantage.

  He was bigger and stronger than her, and in the small, unstable space of the bed, her speed and lightness was no help. But that only made her fight harder, and she knew he was not going easier on her just because of their size difference.

  At last, he wore her down and fell on top of her, pinning her legs, gripping her wrists in each hand to keep her from punching him, though she didn't think she had the energy to do so. He looked similarly exhausted, panting, his heated skin flushed and shining with sweat as he stared into her eyes. She'd never felt so exhilarated in defeat, and she could see that feeling reflected in his eyes. And then, he kissed her.

  For a moment, it was exactly what Jaz wanted. His lips burned with the heat of their struggle, but were surprisingly soft, tender as he took her mouth, pulled her closer. And then Jasmine, the adrenaline wearing off, remembered he had kidnapped her and intended to impregnate her.

  She brought her leg up hard into his unprotected groin and felt the breath rush out of him in pain. He rolled off of her to clutch himself and curse in a language she didn't know, and she scrambled away to the other side of the bed, near the opening in the strange, antler like frame, ready to bolt if he came at her again.

  "Alright, that's enough," she was still breathless, clutching the headboard to stay up, which made it hum and pulse colors again, "It's time you gave me some real answers. And no more of that impregnating bullshit. I'm not making babies with anyone today."

  He just lay there wheezing for a moment, collecting himself, but at last he sat up, propping an arm on his knee and staring at her with exhausted affection.

  "Very well," he agreed, "You've certainly shown yourself worthy of more respect than I gave you. I haven't wrestled like that since I was a kid."

  He smiled at her and Jasmine tried to ignore the way her stomach flipped, enchanted by the way that smile made his eyes crinkle at the corners and made his at first fearsome face suddenly charming.

  "Alright," Jasmine cleared her throat, "Wish I'd know earlier that getting people to respect you was as easy as kicking them in the junk. Why and how did I get here? Where exactly is here to begin with?"

  "I told you before," the strange man said, reclining against the edge of the bed, "I am Gwydion, Aetheling of Taliesin. What you might call a crown prince."

  "Gwydion, right," Jasmine scrunched her nose, still processing all those weird names, "And Taliesin is...?"

  "The country you are in," Gwydion provided.

  "I'm in another country?" Jasmine cursed under her breath, "How the hell... And that still doesn't explain you. I know that isn't body paint with all the rolling around we did. What the hell are you?"

  "I thought you might have gathered by now," he scratched his chest lazily with his talons, "That I am not human, nor of your Earth."

  "You're an alien?!"

  He looked at her with a gaze of half lidded amusement.

  "As we are on my planet at the moment, it is you who are the alien."

  "What?"

  "There's a window just there, if you'd like to-"

  Jasmine as already climbing out of the sunken bed, her bare feet pattering on the cool polished floors as she hurried to the opposite wall of the opulent room she had yet to fully take in.

  A wide window was indeed recessed into the stone wall, covered by a wooden shutter which she swung open at once.

  She was hit immediately with a sense of vertigo as she saw the horizon, which was somehow imperceptibly wrong though she couldn't pinpoint exactly why. It was too high up maybe, or too far away.

  Beneath the window a city sprawled, and she could hear the busy noise of people going about their lives. The sound of animals and fires and chatter. But no cars, no machines. There was no hum of air conditioning in this building, though the air was pleasantly cool. Most worryingly, the sun was the wrong color.

  It was a watery blue white and much smaller and farther away than it should have been. She leaned out of the window, just to be certain it wasn't some kind of TV screen just a few inches away, but unless they were using some next level technology to prank her, this was real.

  Or, alternatively, the cancer had just eaten the part of her brain that could distinguish fantasy from reality and she was wandering around a Louisiana bayou right now imagining she was on another planet. It wasn't a pleasant thought.

  Either she was losing her mind or she'd just been abducted by an alien. She stared out at the navy colored trees growing on the distant jade hills and wondered which was worse.

  "The planet is called Dyfed," Gwydion appeared behind her, "That's the closest translation anyway. I had some difficulty finding a way to make our names and titles comprehensible to your ears. Welsh was, in most cases, the closest equivalent I could find. I learned English too, to make things easier for you."

  Jasmine stared at him, beyond overwhelmed. She'd just wrestled with a hot alien prince in his alien bed on his alien planet and she had definitely lost her mind.

  "Why?" was all she asked, staring at him absolute bafflement, her blonde hair, tangled by their fight, stirring in the breeze of the window and sticking to her cheek.

  Gwydion took a deep breath, as though this were a long story he was not looking forward to explaining. She was certain if she hadn't literally knocked some sense into him he probably would have gone on avoiding telling her forever.

  "I have said I am Aetheling, crown prince," he began, "This is not completely accurate. It was at one time, but my father Aergol, who was Tywysog, king of Taliesin, was murdered."

  "I'm sorry," Jasmine said reflexively, seeing from the strain in his eyes that the death was recent, "Does that make you king?"

  He inclined his head in acknowledgment of her sympathy and spoke no more about it.

  "Unfortunately no," he continued, expression bitter, "I was not meant to take the throne for many years. My mother Rhiannon was made regent whil
e debate is held over my suitability to inherit. And in the interim, my uncle has been put forward as a more fit heir than myself. He is of a better age, and well respected. In addition, he has many wives and healthy children, and thus is guaranteed to continue the royal line."

  "But you're young," Jaz frowned in confusion, "You could have just as many kids one day."

  He pressed his lips together in annoyance, looking away.

  "I could," he agreed, "But it is not guaranteed. And the fact is there are many who would find any excuse to put my uncle on the throne instead of me. Which is why I have found a way to rid them of that excuse. And that is you."

  "Me?" Jasmine stepped back, raising an eyebrow, "I don't know how it works here, but it takes a little while for humans to have kids. And we generally like to know the other parent."

  "You are my Amorent," Gwydion stared at her, green eyes intense, willing her to understand, "There is no human term for it. The closest I could find was 'soul mate.' But even that falls short. If we are together, there will be children. There can be no doubt. And the throne will be mine. You need only accept, and you will be Amorentessa, destined lover of the King and Queen of all Taliesin."

  "So it is necessary for me to accept then?" Jasmine asked pointedly, "I can refuse? Cause you certainly didn't make it seem that way before."

  Gwydion looked away, purposely keeping his face blank to hide his embarrassment, Jasmine assumed.

  "I had hoped you would simply accept your role when I showed you I wanted you," he said, "As my Amorent, you should have desired me from the first moment our eyes met."

  "Sorry," Jasmine shook her head, "Humans don't work that way. Or at least, I don't. And it sucks about your inheritance, but I have zero interest in getting knocked up by an alien right now.”

  With her prognosis, she thought grimly, she wouldn't live long enough to carry a baby to term anyway. The thought chilled her heart and reminded her, whether this was madness or reality, she wouldn't be able to enjoy it either way. It was pointless to get invested in any of this when she could drop dead at any minute.

  "I will not take you back to earth," Gwydion said, anger in his gaze, "You are my Amorent, and you belong here. You will see that soon enough."

  "To hell with earth," Jasmine shrugged, staring out the window at the strange horizon, "I didn't like it that much anyway."

  If she was going to die, she might as well do it surrounded by incredible things. Even if she was imagining them, it was better than the alternative.

  Suddenly, he grabbed her by the shoulders, turning her roughly to face him.

  "Look at me," he demanded, gripping her tightly, "Don't you feel anything when you look into my eyes? Can you honestly tell me you feel nothing?"

  She glared back at him in defiance, firmly ignoring the way her stomach flipped, and then slammed her heel down hard on his instep. He released her with a shout of pain and she ran from him, snatching a sheet out of the bed before sprinting for the nearest door. Screw him and his soulmate bullshit! She wasn't going to spend her last days alive with some asshole who wanted to get her pregnant!

  Chapter Three

  The palace was a strange place, and stranger the further into it Jasmine ran. Halls of polished marble and elaborate engravings too fine to have been done without lasers and machine tooling led to kitchens where servants were cooking over open fires, without a sign of a food processor or a stand mixer or even refrigeration.

  When she looked out the window, she saw sleek a sleek, gleaming craft she could only assume was a space ship, being stowed in a wooden stable next what looked, from this distance, like some kind of horses. The stable itself looked weirdly tacked on next to the clean, modern lines of the palace. It was almost as though two time periods were coexisting here.

  And then there were the people. Though humanoid, they all had tails like Gwydion's, and similar coloration, though the colors varied, some tending more towards red and orange, others almost purple.

  All had horns, though the horn shapes varied more than their skin colors. The servants tended to have more and shorter, often forming thorny crowns around their heads, rising out of thick, dense black hair.

  The nobles she passed (she assumed they were nobles by the quality of their clothing) tended to have only two horns, though they were generally longer than the servant's. She saw the golden tattoos on almost everyone, though those on the nobility were more complex.

  They stared as she hurried past them, wrapped in her bed sheet, but when she tried to talk to them none of them seemed to understand her, and the words they spoke back were beyond incomprehensible.

  They were barely describable, like they were speaking at a frequency just out of what her ears could comfortably hear. A few tried to pull her off somewhere but, frustrated and suspicious, she pushed them away and kept going, hugging her sheet around her tightly, no longer certain what she was looking for. She didn't want to go home, but neither did she want to go back to the bedroom with Gwydion.

  She hated feeling so lost and helpless. It made her want to scream or break things, anything to feel like she had a little more control over this situation.

  "Miss Lane? Excuse me?"

  The polite, English voice caught her so by surprise that for a moment she didn't realize it was calling her name, albeit in a form of address she hadn't heard since her high school principle. She turned, confused, and saw a tall older man standing behind her.

  His horns and golden tattoos were almost identical to Gwydion's, but his skin was a far cooler shade of tan fading into deep maroon purple. His dark hair was straightened and swept back from his handsome, friendly face. He looked only a little younger than her father, Jasmine thought.

  "Did you just speak English?" she asked hopefully.

  "I did," he smiled indulgently, straightening his elegant, sweeping robes, "Forgive me Amorentessa, but I don't believe it's safe for you to be wandering around the halls. Especially in such a... state of undress. The prince has many enemies who would be pleased to see you ended before your time."

  "I'm not your 'tessa," she replied more sharply than she meant to, "And I'm not going to be."

  "I take that to mean you have refused Gwydion?" the man's eyes widened in genuine surprise.

  "Emphatically," Jasmine tossed her hair back, ready to fight him if he tried to tell her she was wrong for it.

  "How interesting," he answered instead, "Do you think it is a human trait that allows you to deny your Amorent? Or was the prince mistaken in identifying you as his mate to begin with?"

  "No idea," Jasmine shrugged and readjusted her sheet, "And frankly I don't care. I'm not his or anyone else’s. So if you've got plans to impregnate me, you'd better rethink them buddy."

  The man chuckled and shook his head.

  "You do not have to fear that from me, Miss Lane," he stepped closer to offer his hand, "I am Efnysien, Penteulu of the royal family. I am your Amorent's uncle."

  "He mentioned you," Jasmine raised a curious eyebrow.

  "I am surprised you got that much out of him," Efnysien chuckled, "My nephew is a man of action. I did not expect him to speak more than two words to you before the deed was done."

  "Yeah I got that impression too," Jasmine gave a derisive snort, "Once I kicked a little sense into him he settled down though."

  "Impressive," Efnysien replied, seeming genuinely astonished, "Gwydion is a powerful warrior. But I am getting ahead of myself. We should get you out of this drafty hall and find you some clothes."

  She considered refusing for a moment, but then shivered as a breeze passed through the hall. This guy seemed trustworthy enough. And she was tired of being naked.

  "Alright," she agreed, "But if I see even a hint of baby making in the works, I will break your nose."

  "A fair consequence," Efnysien agreed, "Please, follow me."

  He showed her out of the hall and through a winding series of rooms until he came to one draped with rich fabrics. A loom was set up in the center, n
ot in use at the moment, and several men and women were sitting on cushions around the room, hand sewing and embroidering, talking lightly to each other in that impossible language.

  Efnysien exchanged a few cordial words with them and they got to their feet in great excitement, some hurrying off deeper into the fabric draped room, others darting around him to get a look at Jasmine. They pulled her into the center of the room and began quite unceremoniously turning her about, poking and prodding her as they took her measurements.

  One squeezed her muscular bicep with a coo of admiration. Jasmine considered punching them, but it seemed fairly obvious they were tailors of some kind, and she didn't want to make a bad impression on Efnysien by attacking people for doing their jobs. Why she wasn't to impress Efnysien she couldn't quite say.

  "So how come you can speak English?" she asked, raising her arms as a woman with spiraling ram horns measured her waist, "So far the only other person I've run into who could do that was Gwydion."

  "As Penteulu, head of the royal family, it is my duty to take care of the prince's intended, as it is my duty to take care of all my family," he replied, "When I learned which planet he had found you on, I chose to familiarize myself with your language, the better to ease your transition into living here."

  "That's good," Jaz huffed in irritation as one of the tailors tugged at her sheet, "I'm pretty sure I'm not going to be able to learn your language. And the prince doesn't strike me as much of a conversationalist. Also, is this really necessary? You couldn't just throw an old t-shirt at me?"

  "I do not know what that is," Efnysien shrugged, smiling politely, "Besides, the Amorentessa should be properly dressed."

  "I told you, I'm not your 'tessa," Jasmine grumbled, still wrestling over her sheet, her cheeks coloring at the tailor's apparent determination to strip her naked in front of Efnysien, "Like, no hard feelings, but I'm not the marrying type. Or the mothering type. Or the relationships at all type."