by Roxie Ray
When I was released from the vehicle, I was handled roughly. I complied with every order, but still, I was shoved with the butts of guns to direct my steps.
We were at the palace in the capital, but it did not look as it had when I last left. The lush greenery that had once surrounded the palace was dying, or already dead. The streets were empty, strewn with garbage. The smell of pollution, bitter chemicals and noxious fumes, was thick in the air.
“What happened here?” I asked the warrior on my left. I did not recognize his face, but the insignia on his military jacket marked him as a member of House Halat. They were close to my people—though not close enough, apparently, to prevent him from giving me a scowl.
“You will see soon enough, Ronan Moonsong.” He jabbed me in the side with the butt of his rifle. “Now. March.”
I was taken to the throne room. It was a good sign. At least they had not thrown me directly into the dungeons.
But what I saw as I entered…
By comparison, perhaps the dungeons would have been a blessing.
A fleet of small cubs, barefoot and of pale orange skin, raced in front of me. Their high screams of terror and delight, oblivious to the fact that a Lunarian warrior had just entered in chains, were ear-splitting as they gave chase to each other.
It should have been a relief, seeing tiny feet racing through the halls of the palace once more. Lunaria’s population problem was obviously being dealt with. The humans must have come through. Near the throne, I saw beautiful human females of every Earthan color. Their skin ranged from ghostly pale to sepia, pale brown to deep black.
The problem was, they were nude, and did not look happy about it. Their eyes were full of terror. They did not dare to look at me.
Even as I drew close to the foot of King Brixta’s elevated throne, they did not take their eyes off of King Brixta’s swollen, many-chinned face.
“Ronan! So, you have finally returned to us.” King Brixta patted his belly, which had tripled in size since I had last seen him, and turned his head to snap a mouthful of gilly-fruit from the hands of his closest human attendant, a female with dark brown hair and golden-toned skin. He continued to speak as he chewed. “We have much to discuss.”
“It seems so.” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw human females fanning King Brixta’s now-massive body with giant chickling feathers and fronds from Lunarian palms. One of them was crying. When she turned her face away from me, her skin was blistered and rippled bright pink as though she had been badly burned. “If I may ask—”
“You may,” King Brixta rumbled. “But remember your place, Ronan. First, you must bow to me. After all…I am the king.”
King for now. I knew now my birthright. The four hands the moons and my lineage had granted me may have been cuffed and bound, but what I had learned on Edon made things difficult as I forced my shoulders down and bent at the waist.
Bloated, slobbering and surrounded by crying, brutalized females—this was not the way for any male to act. King Brixta was no true king. Not even a warrior.
But still, despite myself, I bowed.
“Good. Now—I suppose you are wondering what you have missed, correct?”
“This is not Lunaria as I remember it,” I admitted. “Our ship crashed on Edon. For fifteen days, we were stranded there—”
“Ah. Edon. Yes. I am aware of the differences in our times. You are a keen observer, Ronan. Much has changed here.” King Brixta grabbed the wrist of the crying human and pulled her onto his lap. With the tips of his claws, he stroked down her back as though he was completely unaware of her tears. “Have you met my wives?”
“You have married all of these women?” I kept my voice level and calm. It took every remaining ounce of my will to do so. Already I was wasting the rest of it to avoid wrapping the chains on my wrists around King Brixta’s fat neck and throttling him where he sat.
“Polygamy is legalized now. A welcome change, do you not think?” King Brixta chuckled and pinched the rump of the human on his lap. It only turned her gentle tears to hopeless sobs—not that he regarded them. “Or, well, polygamy is legalized for me. When your ship went down…ah, Ronan, at first, I was furious. But then, to appease me, Earth sent so many more females—more than I could even count, let alone bed!”
“The High Council must have been pleased.”
“The High Council? Oh, Ronan. You have missed so much! They are all imprisoned now. Most are dead.” King Brixta shrugged. “They were opposed to how many of the females I initially intended to claim—so I dealt with them and claimed the whole lot. And look!”
King Brixta threw his hands out wide, knocking the female on his lap to the floor. No one moved to help her up. After a moment, she scrambled to her feet on her own and limped away, sniffling through her tears.
“These cubs, then…they are yours?” I glanced down as a chubby-cheeked cub tumbled to the floor at my feet. I stooped, offering him my chains so he could pull himself up. He did so—then gave me a kick in the shins for my efforts before he ran away.
“Every cub on Lunaria is mine,” King Brixta corrected—to my horror. “I, and I alone, have saved Lunaria. With the help of the human ideologies, I have industrialized it as well! Now, our males need not worry themselves with the abundance of mates. They can spend their energy working in our factories, freed of the concerns of family and breeding! As the moons intended.”
I fought back a growl. What did this false king know of the moons? Of their glory?
With the gut he had amassed in these last fifteen years, I doubted King Brixta even knew the sight of his own cock anymore.
“What of the Slave Trade Commission?” I could not discuss religion with King Brixta. To do so would only make me want to put my fist through his face. “Surely they do not approve of you making wives of these females.”
“Fell through shortly after your ship crashed!” King Brixta clapped as though that was something worth applauding. “Lunaria and Earth banded together to defeat both the Rutharian fleet, and all who might oppose our new agreement on the place of females within the galaxies. Jointly, Earth and Lunaria rule most sentient worlds now! It was incredible, truly.” King Brixta laughed. “With the help of the humans, it was not even hard.”
“You rule the galaxies with Earth as well, now?” I had to say it out loud, just to ensure that it was real.
“I do,” King Brixta boasted. “And Lunaria grows rich from it. Do not think that I would rob my subjects of the joy of femaleness completely, Ronan. Jeorkanians, Rutharians—even humans who are unable to breed—they all work in pleasure houses here on Lunaria now. On a worker’s salary, the average Lunarian male can enjoy the company of a warm female body every night, if he so desires!”
“And the females are…agreeable to this?” I had to ask, though I felt I already knew the answer.
“What does it matter, Ronan? As I told you. The Slave Trade Commission is no more. We are no longer bound by the chains they placed on us. Speaking of—” King Brixta nodded at the House Halat soldier at my side.
He moved to me, unclasping my wrists one by one.
“There. That is better, is it not?” King Brixta hummed to himself, pleased. “Truly, Ronan, I am gladdened by your return. I have heard such great things of your loyalty to Lunaria—and when I was made aware that you had come home to us, my heart leapt with joy!”
“Did it now?” I could not imagine why.
“Of course! You, one of the few remaining of the old guard of Lunarians from before my reign… You have returned to serve me, Ronan. Even when your companions fled the reach of my grace.”
I gritted my teeth. King Brixta was obviously deluded. I had sacrificed myself so that Gallix and the others could flee—not returned here to serve.
But given the blasters of the other Lunarians at my side, while I remained unarmed, I could not tell him that.
“Now, I have two true allies here from the old days. It is cause for celebration!”
“Two?” I asked, cocking my head to the side.
“Leonix!” King Brixta called to the curtains behind his throne. “Bring the wine and come greet our returned ally!”
Slowly, the curtains shifted, and Leonix—my comrade and former commander—emerged. Her steely gray hair was braided with flowers and jewels. As she brought forward a jug of wine, she did not raise her eyes from the floor. She held the jug with one hand only. Her other, tucked away in the folds of her skirts, was missing at the wrist. A scar was slashed from her temple to the curve of her jaw.
That was not the most terrifying thing about seeing Leonix once more, though.
No, the fact that her belly was swollen, round with a child she had been waiting her whole life to bear, that was what made my heart pang, made my blood run hot and my eyes flush red.
“Drink, brave warrior,” Leonix said in a dull, haunted tone. She offered me the jug of wine and raised her eyes only for a moment. Her gaze said, Control your temper, Ronan. Or else.
I took the jug from her and drank, then passed it back to her.
There was no other choice.
“Brilliant! I knew your intentions to returning to Lunaria were true, Ronan.” King Brixta waved his sausage-shaped fingers to Leonix, bidding her to come to him. When she placed herself on his knee, her face was pale as King Brixta took the wine from her as well.
The wine dribbled down his chin, then down his neck, as he drank from it as well. It stained his shirt in rivers and splotches. Like a dark mark of battle. Like blood.
“Leonix is your…queen, then,” I guessed. As much as my heart ached for Leonix, I knew of King Brixta’s lust for her. He had offered her the queenship once before, and she had denied him. In my absence, it seemed as though she had taken it—or been forced to. “A fair choice…my king.”
Calling King Brixta by his title left a bad taste in my mouth, but I fought through it. Leonix’s look of warning had been enough to balance my temper.
I could not lash out at this baz-terd. Not now. But if I played my true intentions close to my chest…
Someday. Somehow.
I could strike his fat head from his bulbous neck for good.
“Queen? Moons, no!” King Brixta laughed, as though I had just told him a particularly funny joke. “Leonix is merely part of my harem. When she went into heat—finally—well, I simply could not let her say no.”
Leonix shifted her stump into the folds of her skirts once more. I had a strong sense of exactly what had happened between King Brixta and my former commander—and I deeply doubted that any reluctance on Leonix’s part had been heartily ignored.
“No, my true queen must be human. It is high time we solidified the bond between Earth and Lunaria—for good.” King Brixta placed a hand on Leonix’s swollen belly and rubbed it fondly—though, his fondness seemed reserved for the cub within it, not for Leonix herself. “My bride will be a human, Ronan—and you, as part of the forces who secured me this position when you killed my terrible sister and set all of this into motion, will bring her to me.” King Brixta turned his head to the side. “Would you like to see her?”
With a wave, King Brixta summoned another teary-eyed harem member forward. She held a communicator screen the size of a large, dark mirror between her trembling hands. As she stood before me, the screen came to light—and my heart stopped.
The face I saw glowing before me had high, noble cheekbones. A heart-shaped face. Heart-shaped lips, soft and deep pink. Her eyes, black as a specter’s, stared out at me as though even in image alone, she could see straight through my chest into my soul. Her red hair, so much brighter than Eve’s, burned around her face like the hottest parts of a flame.
I knew this face and knew it well.
It was the face of the female I had crowned in my dreams.
Regnava! Regnava!
Queen. My queen.
“She is the daughter of some Earthan leader. A bit boring for my tastes—but pretty, no?”
“She is fair, yes,” I said through gritted teeth. Boring was not a word I would use for this female. Regal, yes. Heart-spinning, yes. Boring?
No. Not in a lifetime, no.
“You will bring her to me, then? Protect her. Deliver her to me, safe and unharmed?” King Brixta shoved Leonix from his lap and, with great difficulty, unwedged himself from his throne. He lumbered down the steps toward me and, after a moment of uncertainty, chose two of my four hands to clasp in his own. “Please, Ronan. This planet is full of snakes, and after your service to Lunaria, you are the only warrior I can trust.”
“I will protect her, yes,” I swore in an instant.
But I swore nothing more.
King Brixta was a false king. Now I knew that I was Lunaria’s true ruler. My dreams were sent from our holy moons themselves—and no matter what King Brixta intended for this human female, I knew that she was the one who was destined to rule by my side.
King Brixta had claimed much from Lunaria—from my people. My planet. From our world.
But no matter what he asked of me, he would not claim my queen as well.
Not while my heart was still beating. Not while blood still flowed through my veins.
This female was mine—and mine alone.
Get ready for book 7 in the Lunarian Warriors Series, Her Fated King
Available Now!
Her Fated King
Get ready for book 7 in the Lunarian Warriors Series, Her Fated King
Available Now!
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Her Fearless Warrior
Lunarian Warriors: Book 6
Roxie Ray
© 2020
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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and events are all fictitious for the reader’s pleasure. Any similarities to real people, places, events, living or dead are all coincidental.
This book contains sexually explicit content that is intended for ADULTS ONLY (+18).