by Maia Starr
"No, it is not like that, Terik. Please, you must believe me. I beg you to hear me out. The way it happened is not the way you think. I did not use you and manipulate you. I know it looks that way but…"
I cut her off. I was pissed. I was outraged. But most of all, I was hurt and my heart was broken. She had used me and I fell for it. I even put my life at risk for her, and she was playing me all along. But I had no time to deal with this when I had to stop the theft from happening. "Get out of my way. I have work to do," I said as I pushed her away. She fell to her knees and cried.
"Guards! Guard this woman and do not let her out of your sight until I return!" I shouted to the guards outside my living quarters as I left. It was unbelievable. How could I have been so blind? Now, looking back, it was obvious. She was so interested in taking samples when she could. It was a classic maneuver of a plundering scheme, but because it came wrapped in a beauty that captivated me, I did not see it. If it had been a male asking me to show him these areas and take samples I would've seen right through it, as scouting for a bigger robbery. But I was blinded by her scent. "Shit!" I shouted at myself. How could I have been so stupid?
When I arrived at the ravine the cargo ship was lowered to the ravine floor and the Drackon warriors had the crew at gunpoint.
"Who are you? Who sent to you?" I asked as I approached. I was boiling over with anger and I needed to take it out on someone.
No one answered my questions. I punched the first human male right across the face.
"Tell me who you are? Why are you here?" I shouted again.
"Sentinel! The navigation reads coordinates for Earth. It seems to be an earthship but it is crewed by outlaws from Riolb." A warrior said as he came out of the plundering cargo ship.
"I should have known. Take them all prisoner. Examine the cargo hold for how much damage they have done to the ravine. Report back to me," I said angrily. I was furious. How could she do this to me? How could she do this to my planet?
It was unforgivable. The wedding was off. She would be a prisoner.
Chapter 12
DR. ADRIANA ADAMS
I stood there in chains in front of King Jarith Rykor and Queen Marissa. I did not protest my guilt, but I hoped for mercy and understanding.
"What do you have to say for yourself Dr. Adams?" The king said.
"I apologize. I was wrong. The circumstances are not what you think. I wish to plead my case in private to Queen Marissa, if she will hear it."
Everyone was silent and shocked by what I said. It was an unusual request but I knew it was the only way.
"Your request is granted," Queen Marissa said. She stood up and motioned for me to follow her into a private chamber.
"Tell me what happened," she said.
So I began to tell her how it all started. I told her about the dig in Montana and about Richard and Xander Black, who was now in custody of the Drackon. I told her about how the mission to search for the flagion was one I thought meant everything to my career. But when I met Terik, I truly fell in love with him. But by that time it was too late, because I had already given the information about the location of the flagion to Richard since I thought I was being sent back to Earth. I told her every single detail. She listened. At the end of it she finally said, "You remind me of myself from many years ago."
"I do?" I said surprised by her response.
"Yes, I was in a similar situation. I did it for my career as well. But I was fortunate enough to have the heart of the King, who forgave me. He trusted me and believed me. Of course, he didn't until after he cooled off. The Drackon temper is a notorious one and it takes time. I believe you, Adriana. I shall plead to my husband to pardon you. But I cannot force Sentinel Vuna to forgive you. That is altogether a personal matter and it is possible that you will be banished back to Earth." Queen Marissa said.
I broke into tears, "I do love him, Queen Marissa. I love him with all my heart. I never thought I could love someone so greatly. But there is more to it. You see we did not wait to be wed before coupling, and I am… I am…"
"You are pregnant with his offspring?" She said to me lifting her eyebrow.
"Yes, I am. He does not know it. I do not know what to do. He will not want the offspring anyway. He hates me.”
"I do not think he hates you. You must tell him about the babe. Whatever happens after that, at least you know that he knows the truth. You would not want him to find out later and for him to think you are withholding information from him when he already does not trust you," Queen Marissa said to me. It was a wise statement and something I did not think of before.
"You must tell him now," she said as she walked towards the door. "I will summon him in here."
She left the room and I began to panic. Terik had not spoken a word to me since the day that he saw me as a traitor when the ravine was almost plundered. I was nervous. What if I said the wrong thing again?
"The Queen is forcing me to be in here with you but I do not have to speak with you,” He said as he walked in. There was fire and anger in his eyes.
"I am pregnant," I said to him quickly. It was like ripping off a Band-Aid, you just had to do it very fast.
He was shocked. I thought I saw a smile come across his face but then it quickly vanished as he said, "How do I know it is not Mordikye’s? You are a deceitful human female. How do I know you did not couple with Mordikye and that it is his offspring you carry?"
"I know you do not trust me. On Earth there are tests to prove paternity. I assume there is the same here. A test to prove that the offspring is yours."
He was silent for a long time and then said, "Yes, there is a test. But that does not change what you did. I do not understand why you did it."
"I don’t expect you to understand because you haven’t let me explain. If you would just listen… I spoke to Queen Marissa and gave her the entire story, and she believes me, and is going to ask the king to pardon me. If your queen believes me, maybe you can too."
He looked at me and took a deep breath and then sat down and said, "I'm listening."
So I began to tell him the same story I told Queen Marissa, starting with the Montana dig. I told him everything. He listened to the entire thing. After I was done I looked at him. He seemed very sad and confused. I walked over to him, and dropped to my knees in front of the chair. I grabbed his hands in mine and said, "Please, Terik ,give me another chance--if not for me, than for our offspring. Do not let him suffer for my mistakes. It is unfair. He will need you. He cannot be raised on Earth without his own Drackon, without his father. Can you not forgive me? Do you not love me?"
"I do love you. That is why you hurt me so much. Your betrayal is beyond anything I have ever experienced."
"I know. I will try to make it up to you and regain your trust with everything that I can do, but what about now? What is to be done with me?"
"I guess if the queen forgives you and believes you, so can I. You are my everything Adriana, from the moment I saw your photo. I knew. I do believe you. Perhaps if I were sent to another planet, I too would become obsessed with a land resource of that planet and be blinded by its beauty and power as well. I do share that obsession of elements with you. I may have done the same thing."
"So you forgive me?"
"I forgive you, if you will forgive me for being so cold and for arresting you? It was not what I should've done. Will you still consider being my human female wife?"
"Yes, without a doubt. I will be your wife and give birth to our son."
He pulled me onto his lap and curled his body around mine. I felt sheltered. I felt safe. He moved his lips over mine and kissed me deeply. I felt sweet relief wash over me. I did not deserve his forgiveness for what I had done, but this love we shared was greater than both of us. We could not be parted.
Months later I was the wife of the Drackon Land Sentinel Terik Vuna. I had been given a full pardon by the King and Queen and accepted back into their company. The Queen had finally told me her story,
and I understood why she was so helpful to me. But the greatest joy of all was the birth of our Drackon high-bred son, Vikka Vuna. He was a tricolored Drackon weredragon and he brought Terik and I closer together. I never thought that my geologist life would lead me to being a geologist on another alien planet, with an alien weredragon for a husband, and a son that I adored. It was an overwhelming adventure that felt like it had only just begun. There was much more to come in this new chapter of my alien life. I was ready for it.
THE END
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BONUS BOOK : Duron-Corillion Mates
(Corillion Mates)
By Maia Starr
Chapter 1
SHIA HETON
"We are under attack!” I shouted into the intercom of the research space station that I had lived on for over a year. “I repeat, we are under attack!”
Boom! I was thrown across the experiment station room as the space station violently shook. I didn't know if this was because it had been bombed or had been rammed, but either one was very terrifying.
Sirens blared into the air and red and blue lights flashed off and on in the chaos. I could only think of one thing. “They found us” I said out loud to myself.
By they, I meant the alien warrior race known as the Corillion. Earth had been at war with this warrior race for the last ten years, and yet we knew nothing about them other than the fact that they were physically dominant to the human male species. They were taller, at almost 8 feet tall, stronger, had blue scales on various parts of their body, and they were ruthless, brutal fighters.
Male humans did not stand a chance against them in hand to hand combat, and our technology was not as advanced as theirs, but this didn't stop us from trying to figure out a way to stop them from what they had been doing: abducting human females.
"To the escape pods! Now!” the captain of the space station shouted over the intercom. My eyes grew wide as I realized just how far away I was from the escape pods. I was on the complete opposite side of the space station. I would never make it.
"I'm on my way!” I shouted as I grabbed onto the counter to press the intercom. A few other voices of the crew joined in confirming they were headed to the escape pods. There were only fifteen other people on the space station, including myself in that number. I and one other woman were the only females. The rest of the crew was men. The space station was still violently shaking, and I had to hold on from one counter to a table and onto the walls in order to stand up and try to make my way out of the experiment room and into the hallway.
Boom! I was knocked off my feet again. It seemed all but impossible to make it to the escape pods. I cursed that I had fallen asleep during my experiment. If I had not, I would have been in my sleep bunk, which was located very close to the escape pods. If that had been the case, then my entire life would have turned out differently, but I couldn’t have known it then.
"They have locked onto us!” I heard Lieutenant Marksman shout over the intercom.
"No,” I said out loud to myself. I felt so alone and so terrified of being in this part of the space station all by myself. We were doomed. Once an enemy ship locked on to a vessel, there was no escape. The ship that locked on had complete control with manual override of the space station. They would lock onto the airlock and board us easily. It was all over. We were in no shape to defend ourselves. The space station was a research vessel, not a military one. We were not equipped to fight for ourselves, and we were very, very, far from Earth. No one would be coming to our aid. Even if they were warned, they would never get here in time.
"Dr. Elmore launching escape pod number three!” I heard Dr. Elmore's voice say over the intercom. He had made it to an escape pod. I wondered how many more had made it there. Would I be the only one left on the space station? I hated the thought of it. I looked around the room for a weapon of any kind, but I knew that it would be no match against Corillion weapons. I stood up and tried once more to run down the hallway, but just when I got some traction, the ship would jolt again, knocking me off of my feet. My best bet would be to hide somewhere, and hope that they did not find me before finally leaving. I crawled into a cabinet and awaited my fate.
I knew taking this assignment aboard the space station was a risky move. But I never thought that we would be attacked in such a way. I never thought that I would find myself in such a terrifying moment waiting for the dominant alien male warriors to take me into deep space, never to see Earth again. But how could I have known that when I first started on this mission?
It all started when I, Dr. Shia Heton, joined the space station mission in order to conduct my sound experiments. I studied deep space sound. I recorded all kinds of activity that traveled across deep space. This space station was going into incredible depths of deep space in order to gather information that could help Earth understand and find out more information about the Corillion race. My studies fit with that agenda because I would be able to pick up any transmissions that the Corillion aliens would be making that crossed our path. Therefore I was granted permission to participate in the research mission.
Joining us were one other female scientist studying astronomical gases, Alexis Scott, and Andrew Diaz, who was studying space biology. There were two more general scientists on board, and the rest of the crew were astronauts that managed the day-to-day needs of the space station. A few of them also had their own science experiments, but they were astronauts first and scientist second. Together, we had set off from Earth a year before and were taken to the space station just outside the solar system. Then once aboard, the space station was set into a spin motion to spin into the far reaches of space toward the asteroid belts.
It was an unknown area that was rarely studied. That was until the Corillions appeared in our lives. It had been complete chaos since they did. At first, it was a peaceful interaction, but once Earth refused to share human females with them willingly, the Corillions became hostile. That was when a war eventually broke out. It inspired many people to suddenly become interested in the sciences. It was as though science was now a military defense against the alien warrior race.
No one knew where the Corillion came from. They just appeared out of nowhere. It was said that they had spawned from an asteroid in deep space, but those were just rumors. That seemed highly unlikely to me, but they were a very mysterious race of males. All kinds of rumors surrounded the alien warrior race about their powers and incredible fighting skills. They were beyond mysterious, and I found myself drawn to their mystery.
I had seen a Corillion warrior before, but only once many years before. But that one time was enough to have his image burned into my memory forever. I remembered seeing the warrior with blue scales on half of his body. I remembered the long, dark hair, dark eyes, and extremely tall, muscular physique. I had never seen a male like it before. It stunned me. It intrigued me. That was how I became fascinated with these creatures from deep space. It was after I saw one that I wanted to know as much as possible about them. But I wanted to do it from afar, not to have any immediate interaction with them. I wanted to study them from a distance and not interact or be in their world. So I applied for and was accepted to conduct my studies on the space station mission.
“Dr. Shia Heton, your field of studying sound in space is very intriguing to us. Only a few scientists are doing what you are doing. We think you might be the perfect candidate for the space station missions,” the Earth Science Council said to me as I stood in front of them with my red hair pulled into a bun and a black pantsuit covering my petite body.
“Thank you. I am grateful to be considered for the opportunity,” I said while smiling at the fact that out of five thousand scientists, I
had made the final rounds.
“The next round is not academic in nature; it is physical training. You and your competitors will go through two months of training to see if your body can withstand the rigors of space.”
“I am excited to be able to do the training,” I said, knowing that the other scientist studying sound that I was up against at this stage were almost ten to fifteen years older than me. After being turned down so many times by the academic world because so many others had more experience simply because they were older, it was refreshing that my young age finally gave me the advantage.
So when I passed the training and others and others did not, I was delighted to join the mission.
That is how I found myself on this space station in the far reaches of space, past our solar system, searching for signs of the Corillion warriors in order to gather data and study them. It was a mission that would allow us to understand why they had suddenly appeared in our solar system and taken a liking in human females. It was not just a simple liking: they were abducting them from Earth. It had grown completely out of control, reaching almost two hundred women at this point. No one understood what was going on. Why only the females and not males? We theorized it had something to do with mating, but we could not be sure. Through the Corillion peace years, in the beginning, the Corillions were very tight-lipped about what they were, what they wanted, and what the future held for them. So we knew very littlele