by Maya Carnage
His Chosen Mate
(The Ghegion Tribes, #2)
Maya Carnage
Dedication
To all those who have been a blessing during the writing process, thank you.
Acknowledgements
You would think it gets easier the more you write, but it doesn't. I had a rough time with His Chosen Mate, and I wouldn't have been able to get through it without the support and love of my friends and family. Y'all are amazing! I also wanted to say a huge thank you to my readers, with you this wouldn't be possible. Your time and support are so appreciated.
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Disclaimer
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
COPYRIGHT by Maya Carnage
Cover Art by: Kasmit Covers/ www.kasmitcovers.com
Prologue
"Yeah! I'll be right there!" I yelled over my shoulder. My mom stands in the kitchen a few feet away in our tiny trailer. Outside you can hear Becky Tarris's three boys playing in the new kiddie pool that their mom's new boyfriend, Martin, bought them for the summer. The faded towel I was folding, I toss onto the seat next to me on our old beige couch.
Sighing, I get up from my seat, to see what Mom wants.
The trailer I live in with my mom and younger brother is old and depleted, and tinier than a can of sardines. So it only takes me a few steps to reach our bright yellow kitchen. When we moved in a few years ago, Mom hung up white curtains with tomatoes on them in the one window in the kitchen facing out into the front yard.
"Yeah?" I slouch against the door jamb. My mom stood at the sink hands submerged in sudsy water.
Taking her hands from the water, she shakes them off before drying them on the towel hanging on the stove. "I didn't know if you could go over to your Gran's to drop off her medicine?" She wipes the water droplets from the counter. "I already picked them up last night, but I had to go and get Tommy and so I never made it to Gran's."
I nod. Gran is one of my favorite people in the world, probably even above Mom, so I don't mind driving the forty minutes to her house out in the country. "Sure, is she home?"
"Yes, I already called her this morning before you got up. The meds are in the glove compartment." Mom goes back to washing the dishes.
Going to my bedroom at the end of the trailer, I grab my purse from off my dresser. Stopping at the end table Mom keeps by the front door, I reach in the blue porcelain bowl for the keys to Mom's old Honda. "I'll be back before dinner!" I hollered over my shoulder as I walked out of the door.
Becky's two boys, who are seven and nine roughhouse in the pool, splashing water all around. I look around for their mom, who isn't much older than my twenty-six years. But I don't see Becky anywhere; she must be inside with Martin. I wave at the boys, before opening the car's door.
It takes a moment for the engine to turn over, but once it does I quickly pull out of our drive, leaving the trailer park.
I drive the highway most of the way to Gran's, but when I turn off at the exit taking me to her place, I rummage through my bag for my phone, but I don't find it. "Dammit!" I sigh. "I'll just call Tommy from Gran's."
Yesterday on my way to work I had to drop off our cat Binks at the vet to be neutered and since I have to go all the way to Gran's and the vet's office is on the other side of town, I was going to ask Tommy to pick him up. Hopefully, I can reach him before he leaves his girlfriend's house, that way he won't have to turn around.
After about fifteen minutes of driving down an old country road, with no other cars around me, not even passing by, I pull into Gran's long driveway. Gran lives on her Papi's old farm. Fifty acres of land and most of it used to be for an orchard but now Gran just grows a small garden, and she has a greenhouse behind her kitchen.
When I park in front of her house, I see her sitting out on her porch, rocking in her antiqued rocking chair. I stepped out of the car, "Hey, Gran!" I shouted. She smiles when she notices me, "Come on up here, Tracy. I made a fresh pitcher of sweet tea with lemon and lots of sugar, just the way you like it." I plop down on the bench next to her against the porch's railing. Next to her is a small table, placed on it is a silver serving tray with the tea and several glasses. I pour myself a tall glass before relaxing in my seat. "Mom couldn't make it she has to watch the neighbor's boys tonight." I hand her the paper bag that holds her medication.
"I told her that was fine, that there wasn't any reason to rush." She drops the bag on the table before sipping from her glass. "When is that brother of yours going to stop by to see me? It has been so long that I don't quite recall his face." She said with a chuckle.
"He has a new girlfriend in town and has been spending most of his time with her he hasn't even been home all that often."
She nods staring off in the direction of her garden. "Tracy, would you mind staying the night? George is supposed to be by tomorrow evening, and I would sure love to have an extra set of hands picking the vegetables in the morning."
"Of course, I just have to let Mom know." I get up, going into the house. Hanging up on the wall in the back of the house in Gran's kitchen is her phone, which is the same one she had when my mom was a kid. I dial the trailer. Mom picks up after the second ring. "Yeah?"
"Hey, it's me I just wanted to let you know I am staying at Gran's tonight. She needs some help with her garden."
"Alright, I called your brother and told him to pick up Binks."
"I was about to call him to ask him to do that, let me know how he is when he gets home, okay?" Tommy bought me Binks a year ago after Sheldon- the cat I had since I was four- died.
"I will tell Gran I said hi and that I love her, I'll see you when you get home, love you baby." Mom hangs up. I wait a second before placing the phone back on the hook.
Why did my heart clench when she said bye?
I shake my head, ridding myself of my depressing thoughts.
I turn from the kitchen, going out the side door leading to the greenhouse. Gran had this built a few years ago, it isn't anything fancy just something that she can use to grow vegetables, flowers, herbs, fruit during the colder months, but since we live in the mountains of Tennessee the winters can get freezing. Smoothing my hand down the smoky glass door, when I reach the handle I twist, letting the door swing open.
The overwhelming scent of lavender flies out smacking into my face, they say that it is supposed to calm people, but I have only ever found the flower obnoxious.
There are three rows of above ground gardens the one directly across from me is the one Gran uses to house her flowers. Large, towering bushes of lavender take up most of the space. But if I were to walk toward the back of the building, I would see a patch of yellow daffodils growing at the end of the row.
Gran has been growing my favorite flower since before I could remember. She always cuts them for me to take home.
Exhaling, I close the door without going in. I walk around the side of the house toward the front porch where I left Gran.
"You staying the night, then?" She hollered.
"Yeah."
∞∞∞
Later that day, after Gran had gone off to bed I decided to do the same, that way I wouldn't be tired when Gran wakes me up before dawn to help out in the garden
. I have always been somewhat of an insomniac, unable to fall asleep and that night at Gran's I felt restless, and my mind wouldn't quiet down. Still awake after an hour of tossing and turning, I prop myself up in bed giving up on finding sleep anytime soon. With nothing much to do, my mind drifts off, thinking about my life.
When my dad was alive, Tommy was still in high school, and I had just graduated from college with a degree in botany. I was working at the place where I had interned at my senior year, the pay was low, but I was doing something I loved. But then Daddy got caught selling meth and refused to go to prison he pulled out a gun on the arresting officers, they shot him once in the chest. Mom couldn't afford to keep our house, not since they re-mortgage it the summer before so Dad could buy a boat. She ended up moving to the trailer we live in now, but since she only worked part-time because of her bad knee, I had to come home and help her while Tommy was still in school.
I started work at the local hardware store owned by an old friend of Gran's. It doesn't pay much but the hours are flexible, so that's fortunate. It sucked that I had to give up my life and come back home, but I couldn't abandon my mom and little brother. But now that Tommy is holding a steady job and helping out with the bills, I am thinking about moving out and looking for work as a botanist again. I have secretly filled out several job applications in the cities near us.
From outside, a bright green light shines through the room's window, but before I even get a chance to think whether I imagined it, it is gone.
I jump out of bed, rushing over to the window and pulling aside the lace curtains. I scan the yard but don't see anything that could have been the source of the strange light. I let go of the curtain.
Turning my head, I look at the bed, messy from my sudden exit from it.
Shutting the door behind me, softly so I won't wake Gran, I creep down the porch steps, my hand heavy with the weight of the baseball bat. Gran keeps it next to the front door in case of an emergency. Seeing nothing in the front yard, I make my way around the side of the house toward my room's window.
I use the bat to dig around in the bushes making sure no perverts are skulking around in them. Finding nothing I look out at the woods.
"I really don't want to go over there." I murmured, voice strained with fear. Swallowing, I push my shoulders back taking purposeful strides toward the dark woods.
"Hey! If you think you can go peeping on an old lady, and her granddaughter you better think twice. I have a bat and I ain't afraid to use it either!" I shouted mock aggression in my voice.
Something breaks a twig to the side of me. I whirl around ready to face the danger. Panting from fear my hands shake slightly causing the bat to tremble in my hands and I tighten my grip on it.
A rabbit scurries out from under a bush, pausing when it sees me before hopping away. Sighing with relief, I let the bat fall from my grasp.
I chuckle nervously.
I lean over picking the bat up, heading back toward the house. "I probably just imagined the green light," I said before my whole body seized. I couldn't move, not even to blink.
The lungs squeeze tightly around the breath of air they are holding, my heart thunders, beating against my ribs. Suddenly everything goes black, and a fiery electrical current runs across my body.
I wake up laying face down on a cold steel floor, the side of my face pressed against the floor leaving indentions on my cheek. Rubbing at the redness, I sit up noticing that I am not alone. Across the room leaning against the wall is a black woman wearing her pajamas, a pair of grey sleeping shorts with a red tank top. Her hair is shaved on the sides, leaving a short length of hair in the middle to hang over the side. "Hey." She said when she realized I was awake.
"Hey?" I said confused. "Where are we?" I rub my arms, trying to ward off the chill.
"In a spaceship, we were abducted." She tells me nonchalantly.
My mouth dropped open staring at her with horror. She can't be serious! Right?
I look around at the room, finding that the entire thing is made up of the steel flooring beneath us. I don't see a door or a window so I don't know how we got in here, or how we could escape if we wanted to. Closing my eyes, I let my head fall back, banging into the hard wall. The sound of my head meeting the metal echoes throughout the room. I gulp down the rising panic. I try to remain calm.
I have thought of a lot of terrible things that might happen to me. Getting caught up in the drug trade, being mugged or shot or raped, but not once did I think that there was a possibility of aliens abducting me.
I look over at my roommate. At least I'm not alone, and that is probably wrong of me to think. "What is your name?" I asked.
"Kate, well actually, Kathleen but I don't go by that."
"Tracy, I'm from the Appalachian mountains."
The ship vibrates beneath us. I look at Kate with concern. "What's happening?"
"We've landed." She said before slumping over.
I follow suit quickly after not getting the chance to react to her news.
Chapter One
Lorth
I wish that I was out in the garden with Tracy instead of with my father and brother in our family's blacksmithing shed. The sound of my father's hammer beating down on the metal reverberates around the tiny shack, but it is not loud enough to drown out my brother's incessant talking.
"She is still ignoring me, even though I gave in and allowed her to have one of those nuances as a pet like the human Sheila's. I don't know what else to do I don't like her silencing me out." My brother Exxil whines to our father about his teenage daughter's moodiness.
Without looking up from his work, "Don't worry about it, son," our father murmurs to him. Even though he is approaching his ninetieth year, there are only a few strands of white running through his black hair, and there are barely any lines on his face.
Our mother, Farris, died when we were very young, leaving our grieving father to raise us by himself. My brother's mate died giving birth to their son Rexxil. It was a painful time for us all, especially Exxil. He had a babe, and two older children to look after, it was a lot for him to undertake. We tried to help him as much as possible.
Exxil takes care of his three children by himself, but my father, brother, and I help him out as much as we can. But it is hard for them not having a mother around.
"I can't help but do so. Rex and Ferle run around wreaking havoc on the tribe, they are a merry bunch, but Hexxil is somber like her mother. So I worry," said Exxil.
"Well, stop," Pops grumbled.
I chuckle at my father's annoyance, but when I see the frown on my brother's face, I quickly stop. I clap him on the back, causing him to rock forward in his seat. He has lost weight. "It will all be all right, Exxil. How about I take Hexxil with me to help out in the garden tomorrow morning?" I offered. The garden always manages to cheer me up, so perhaps it will do the same for my niece?
Sighing, "You don't mind? Hexxil can be troublesome at times, Lorth." he straightens up, his hopeful words belie the meaning of his words.
"Not at all, I enjoy spending time with the kids. I think it will do Hexxil good to be out under the sun."
"That is great!" He rises from his seat. "I need to get home to make dinner for the kids. I'll let Hexxil know she'll be helping you out in the morning." He slaps Pops on the back before leaving the shop.
Pops shakes his head, looking out after his oldest son, pausing from his work. "I told him he should ask one of the humans to come and live with him, that way he will have help looking after the kids. But he refused."
"Maybe he didn't feel comfortable asking them for such a thing, Pops."
Leaving the sword down on the bricks, he walks over to his shelf my younger brother Havrick made for him on his birthday, taking a rag in his hand, he wipes down the hammer. "It wouldn't hurt to ask, though, now would it?" He raises a brow.
"He could, but it still might make them uncomfortable." I sit down on Exxil's abandoned chair.
"It isn't
easy taking care of three kids, Lorth. Even with my help, it tired your mother out on most days." He hangs his hammer up on the wall, going back over to the now cooled sword, he wipes it down with the rag before setting it on the shelf. Next to his other finished pieces. "Are you going to sell this one?"
For the last several months Father has been creating stunning weapons but refuses to sell them, he has only been doing commissioned pieces.
"No, why did you want it? Because if you do, you can have it." He cleans up the workstation, putting the rest of his tools away. He tosses a bucket of water onto the hot coals, and steam rises from them making it hard to see.
I shake my head when the steam clears, and he can see me again. "I was just wondering when you were going to start selling them again."
Pondering over the idea, he doesn't answer me for a while. When he does, he says, "I don't think I am. At least not anytime soon." I walk with him to his house, he asks if I want to have dinner with him and Havrick, but I tell him I promised to meet with Tracy after she finished out in the garden today.
He winks at me before shutting the door behind him, I turn around, walking toward the garden where Tracy is.
∞∞∞
I lean against the tree and watch my mate- even if she does not realize it at the moment, that is what she is- while she digs through the dirt, weeding the plants that are now growing. She is beautiful. Her long brown hair blows in the wind, and I can't help but crave to run my fingers through her locks. The spots on her face appear lighter from where I am standing, but I know that once I stand next to her, looking down at her face, they will be a burnt red color on her fair skin. They are strange, yet fascinating, to look at. I have never seen anything like them before on another, except for one of the other humans.
Tracy tosses her hair over her shoulder and finds me gawking at her, she waves.