by Renee Rose
Gunt gripped her elbow. “Let’s go, slave.”
Barr frowned. “The prince said to call her Lamira. That she serves him like we do.”
Gunt shrugged. “Let’s go, Lamira.”
She flashed Barr a grateful smile over her shoulder. At least there was one being in this pod who liked her.
Once in the hallway, Gunt stopped. “Do you want a tour? Of the whole pod?”
It was too good an offer to turn down, even if she disliked Gunt. “Yes, please.”
He led her down the hall in the opposite direction from Zander’s chamber. Like her first day, she noticed how beautiful even the corridors were. The walls were plastered in beautiful hues and natural light— she stopped and looked up. How did they get so much natural light in there? Ocretia’s atmosphere was covered in smog. Normally, the three suns did not offer so much light.
A giant crystal was embedded in a skylight in the ceiling above. Its crystalline structure magnified the light coming in. Was this what he meant when he spoke of light baths?
“Whoa.”
“The crystals are all from Zandia. They provide our species with energy. They’re also used in laser weaponry, which is why the Finn invaded our planet—to control the supply.”
Gunt pilfered crystals from Zander and sold them on the black market.
The knowing dropped into her head from nowhere. Things she shouldn’t know arrived in her head without any deductive reasoning. Without being told.
She hadn’t liked the male, but she couldn’t tell Zander. Not without revealing the trait that would equate to certain death. Humans with gifts like hers were executed. Zander would be required to turn her over to the Ocretion law for disposal.
He opened a door into a huge open room with vaulted ceilings and even more light. The longest table she’d ever seen took up much of the floor. Embedded like skylights glittered five giant crystals—each twice the size of her head. The light pouring in wasn’t only magnified sunrays—the crystals cast rainbows around the room. She gasped.
She could grow things in here. Wonderful food and flowers.
“The formal dining room.” He pulled her back and shut the door, continuing down the corridor. “The great hall.” Another enormous room, with a domed ceiling and a giant crystal beaming light down. A large, stone chair sat upon a dais. “This is where Prince Zander hears the complaints, requests, and cases of our species.”
“How many Zandians are there?” From what she’d heard, the majority had been wiped out by the Finns when they invaded the planet.
“Very few. Two hundred. Maybe three. They’re scattered about, but many come to visit this pod for the crystal light baths. They are open to any Zandian, one planet rotation a week. The same day Prince Zander hears cases and pleas from our species.”
He tugged her elbow, pulling her from the beautiful room, and led her down a narrow hall with lower ceilings. “This is the staff quarters.” Even though they were not as magnificent as the rest of the pod, they were still beautiful to her.
“This is my chamber.” He stopped and opened the door, pushing her forward, as if to guide her in.
She froze, catching his intent. “I should get back to Prince Zander.”
He swiveled his dark-violet gaze to her. “You’re the only female we’ve had around here in a long time. We’ve never had one live here.”
She tried to back up. “Well, I’m just a human—hardly pleasing to your species, if Lord Zander can be believed.”
Gunt’s eyes glittered. “Oh, I think every male in the pod finds you pleasing.” He pushed her against the doorframe, pressing his large body against her, mashing her back into the hard wood frame.
She threw her hands up to push him back, but he was too solid.
“I could help you around here. Protect you from the rest of them.” He leaned forward, his horns pulsing, his breath foul in her face. “Maybe even help you escape.”
“Oh sure. And all I have to do is what? Suck your cock?”
Zandians didn’t understand sarcasm. Gunt’s eyes turned dark-purple. “Not all. But, yes. That’s a start.”
She turned her cheek away from him. “No thanks.”
Gunt’s expression changed in slow motion, developing from lust to rage. His hand shot out and closed around her throat. “What?”
She gurgled, trying to suck air through her closed windpipe.
“You think you’re too good for me, vecking human?”
She shook her head, and he dropped her. A door whisked open down the hall. Before he had the opportunity to do or say anything more, she took off running. The expensive rugs slipped under her bare feet. She didn’t hear Gunt’s footsteps behind her. Chancing a look back, she saw him walking purposefully but not running. Perfecting his cover, she supposed, in case anyone saw them.
She slowed her steps as well. No reason she should act guilty either. By the time she reached Zander’s door, she’d caught her breath and held her head high. She didn’t know how to open it, though. She stared at the door, waiting for Gunt.
He arrived behind her. “Let me know when you change your mind,” he said as he reached past her, pressed his palm to the security screen, and opened the door. “If you tell the prince, I’ll say you offered yourself to me. He won’t believe a human over his own species.”
Chapter 4
“She’ll be back from her feeding soon,” Zander told Daneth, who had arrived full of information on human reproduction. “You can take her for the implants then.”
Daneth believed a “natural conception” was important for Zander’s child. He said they would only resort to harvesting her eggs and breeding offspring in the lab if natural conception failed after 200 planet rotations. Zander had grumbled about having to breed the human for two hundred days and nights. If things went as badly as they had the night before, he would insist on a lab breeding by the third moon passing.
Lamira burst into his chamber, a spot of high color on her cheeks. Red blotches marred the slender column of her neck, too. It must be from the wet collar.
Humans and their weak constitution.
“What took you so long?”
She lifted a shaky hand to her hair and smoothed it away from her face. “Oh...um, Gunt gave me a tour of the pod.” She pulled her shoulders back and drew a breath. “My lord, the crystals provide excellent light here. I could grow plants for the pod—food you could eat, or flowers.”
“I have no need for—”
Daneth lifted a finger. “My lord, this could be useful knowledge for rebuilding an over-mined planet.”
He was right. But surely that wasn’t the only reason this human had been selected as his best mate. Knowledge of agriculture could be found or bought. “All right,” he grumbled. “You may grow things, Lamira. Later, you can tell me what supplies you’ll need.”
Her face lit up so bright, it almost made the hassle worth it. Almost.
“You may take her now.”
Daneth planned to insert sensors in her female canal and womb which would send constant feedback of her physical state directly to Zander’s armband.
Lamira’s eyes went wide, the beautiful green of her irises growing as her pupils shrank. He didn’t have to be an expert on humans to recognize fear. Veck, he could smell it on her. Why was she so afraid of Daneth?
Before he could explain what would happen to her, Daneth had touched his wand to the back of her neck, and she crumpled. His physician swung her up over his shoulder.
“Not like that,” he snapped.
Daneth put her down, supporting her upright, and stared at him.
“Don’t carry her like that. It’s disrespectful to the mother of my future children.”
Daneth bowed. “Yes, of course, my lord. You’re quite right.” He picked her up in two arms, cradled like a baby, instead.
Zander scowled, not liking the intimacy of it. “I will carry her.” He waved an impatient hand to dismantle the hologram he’d been working on and surged to his f
eet, snatching his bride—no. Not his bride—his slave—from Daneth’s grasp. “Let’s go,” he growled.
“The procedure will only take a few moments, my lord. It would be useful if you stayed, and I could show you what I learned about her anatomy and arousal.”
His guard Gunt followed them with an overly-interested gaze. Zander turned back to give a disapproving glare.
To Daneth, he said, “If you insist.”
“I would not presume to do so, my lord.”
That wasn’t true. Daneth presumed to insist on a great many things, but he let it go.
In the lab, he laid Lamira on Daneth’s table and helped the physician strip off her clothing. Daneth attached new ankle and wrist cuffs to her. He clipped her two wrists together over her head and attached her ankles to a pair of stirrups that lifted and spread her knees wide. With an imagescope, he implanted several miniscule sensors inside her vaginal and uterine walls.
He requested Zander’s armband and programmed the sensors to transmit directly to it.
“Now, my lord, let me show you what I learned. The human female’s climax is important for breeding. The contraction of her vaginal and uterine muscles help propel your seed up into her cervix. Deep penetration would be important if she were breeding with another human, but, considering your size, it should not be an issue.”
His little human stirred, the effects of the stunning wearing off.
“Ah, good timing. As soon as all her faculties return, we can test it out. In the meantime, let’s examine her anatomy.” He peeled back Lamira’s labia, exposing the heart of her vagina. With one thumb, he lifted a hood of flesh, revealing a delicate pink button.
Zander gritted his teeth, not liking Daneth touching her.
“This is called the clitoris. Touching it gives her pleasure. See?”
The little nub had thickened as Daneth brushed his thumb over it.
It took all his control not to shove the male aside. “I’ll do it,” he clipped.
“Of course, my lord.”
Lamira’s lids fluttered open and she stared at him with those spectacular green eyes. Green with gold starbursts.
He took Daneth’s place between her legs, fumbling to find the secret nubbin.
Lamira cried out when he touched it, yanking against her cuffs and giving him an accusatory look—half panicked, half something else.
He hesitated. Had he been too rough?
“She likes it. Look at her responses.” Daneth kept his voice low, as if Lamira might not hear him. He wasn’t sure what responses the male meant until Daneth pointed at the projection from his wristband.
Thirty percent aroused.
Interesting. So that was what aroused looked like. Angry and panicked.
He slid his thumb over the nubbin in a slow circle.
Her face flushed and her breath shortened. She swallowed. Her inner thighs began to quiver.
“Now, inside her channel is another cluster of nerve endings that give her pleasure. It can be found with your finger on the front wall if you reach in and make this motion.” Daneth curled two fingers as if beckoning someone. “You will find a place where the tissue tightens when touched, the same way her nipples do.” Daneth reached out to tweak one of her nipples but stopped shy of it, probably catching Zander’s murderous glare.
Lamira thrashed against the bonds holding her wrists, trying to move away from the physician.
“Ahem.” Daneth cleared his throat and took a step back. “Why don’t you attempt to inseminate her now, my lord, and we can monitor her arousal rate?”
His cock had no arguments with that plan, already straining against his pants, painfully thick. Zandian moons, he’d been ready to mount her again since the moment he woke up that morning.
He released his cock.
“No.” Lamira thrashed her head from side to side. “No, you are not going to breed me here like this.”
Veck. Her resistance again. It took some of the eagerness right out of his spear. But the breeding had to be done. The sooner she conceived, the sooner he could stop torturing the poor girl. Although that plan didn’t ring true on several levels.
The table was the wrong height for him to enter her. Plus, he preferred the sight of her ass, so lush, soft and feminine. He unbuckled one of her ankles from the stirrup. The moment her foot came free, she kicked him in the nose, hard.
“Ack!” Stars flashed before his eyes. “Enough, human,” he roared. “I am tired of your resistance.”
When his vision cleared, he found her cowering, as best as someone with three limbs cuffed can cower. Her one free leg was tucked up and she’d twisted in a protective manner. Mostly it was the terror on her face that inspired his sympathy and calmed his ire.
~.~
She hadn’t meant to kick him in the face. She’d only wanted to get free of the bonds. The last thing she wanted was to have sex with Zander while his scientist or physician or whatever Daneth was watched.
But she’d hit Zander square in the nose, and a trickle of red-violet blood ran from his nostril n.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”
Zander swiped at the blood with the back of his hand. With verbal command, he released the cuff on her other ankle and both wrists.
She tried to draw up into a ball, but he grabbed both ankles and pulled her off the table.
He flipped her around and shoved her upper body over the examination table, pulling her wrists behind her back and clipping them together.
She tensed, knowing what was sure to come next.
“I’m sorry,” she moaned, knowing it wouldn’t do any good.
“I believe you’re sorry.” To her surprise, it sounded like Zander had recovered his temper. It didn’t stop him from clapping his huge hand down across her buttocks.
She lurched forward, as if she might somehow get away, but he continued to spank her, his large, paddle-like hand crashing down on her upturned buttocks again and again.
“Ow, please,” she moaned. She’d given up on defiance, at least for the moment. A little sympathy wouldn’t hurt right now.
Zander continued to light a fire on her behind, his huge hand clapping down on one cheek then the other then right in the middle.
“Look at her arousal rate,” Daneth murmured.
Arousal rate?
She must’ve heard wrong. Her ass was on fire. She was completely humiliated, being punished in front of Daneth and now—
Zander ran a finger across her already engorged clit. It pulsed and her pussy clenched.
Okay, her pussy might be a little wet. Actually, dripping wet. But that didn’t mean she was aroused, did it? Aroused by the spanking? Or what had happened before?
It didn’t matter because Zander’s malehood prodded her entrance and, for some reason, she pushed back at him, as if she wanted his entry.
The head of his cock stretched her wide, and he eased into her.
She caught her breath, but it didn’t hurt this time. Not at all. In fact, it felt…
Delicious.
A wanton sort of sound escaped her lips.
Zander gripped her elbows, using the bound circle of her arms to brace her each time he shoved deep inside.
“Zander,” she gasped.
A growling sound came from his throat.
She arched back for him, spread her legs wider as he stroked in and out, his giant cock filling her with each plunge.
“Zander,” she cried again, sounding a bit more desperate.
“Nearing orgasm,” Daneth’s cool manicured voice didn’t take her out of the moment. She heard it, as if in the distance, far away from the only beings that mattered—Zander and her.
Zander released her arms and gripped her pelvis with one hand, reaching around the front of it with the other. He rubbed his finger over her clitoris, and she shrieked.
“Oh please, oh—”
“Zandian moons, yes.” Zander shoved deep inside her, his hot seed filling her.
Flick
ering lights danced before her eyes, and she let go. Her muscles spasmed around his cock, squeezing around his thick girth. They continued clenching, ripples of release that went on and on, even after Zander started to pull out.
“Wait—do you feel how her orgasm milks your seed up higher in her channel?”
Zander pushed back inside her.
“It serves an important purpose for conception.”
She shivered. Hearing her physical processes discussed made them all the more intense. Her internal muscles continued contracting strongly around his cock.
“Now, we want to invert her so she doesn’t lose any of your seed.”
Zander flipped her up into his arms, cradled like a baby, but with her ass-end slightly higher than her head.
She ducked her face into his shoulder, not wanting to show it after—well, after any of it.
“She should rest like that for at least a half hour. I can chain her up here or—”
“No.”
She was relieved at how quickly Zander cut in.
“I’ll take her back to my chamber. Give me something with which to cover her.”
Daneth produced a thin blanket, which Zander wrapped around her.
She felt oddly like a baby. It wasn’t an unpleasant sensation.
Zander carried her out of the examination room and back to his chamber.
Gunt, the odious guard, watched with his lip curled as they passed him at the door. It made her stomach tighten. She wondered if she ought to tell Zander—not about what Gunt had done to her, but about the crystals he was stealing. No—what was she thinking? She couldn’t. How would she explain her knowledge?
Zander carried her into his chamber. She expected him to lay her on the bed, perhaps with orders to keep her butt in the air, but instead he sat upon his sleep disk and continued to hold her, cradled in his arms. He tossed the blanket off and studied her, his violet eyes sweeping the length of her body, lingering on her breasts then her face.
She gazed up at him. Like with the bite mark, his nose had already healed. “I truly didn’t mean to kick you in the face.”
