by Juno Wells
Braxan was the largest of them, and he was the one everyone's eyes sought. There was just something about the way he carried himself and his deeply confident manner that made him the center of attention. Especially among the female colonists, Amelia noticed. They all looked like they wanted to jump him. Amelia didn't blame them. She had felt the same way when she met him. She had even acted on it.
Commander Hanson officiated, and he used the standard ceremony that was common for Outward Expansion and tailor made to work for any religion or worldview. They both said “I do”, Braxan kissed Amelia for just a little too long, and then they were married.
- - -
“So do Ultracos get married like this at home, too?” Daria took a sip of her drink.
“Not like this,” Amelia said and tasted the green juice in her own glass. It was the juice of the lemongrass-like herb mixed with water, and it somehow managed to be both sweet and fresh all on its own. “Braxan says we will have an Ultraco ceremony whenever we go to his planet, but as far as he's concerned, we're married now.”
Daria nodded. “I can't even imagine what a dragon wedding must be like. A royal dragon wedding, too. Am I invited?”
“Absolutely. Everyone is invited. Um ... you may have to find your own transportation. I don't know if Marqatzo is willing to act as a space limo slash nature reserve slash luxury resort for us that much longer.”
“Let's ask. Hey, Marqatzo!” Daria yelled into the air.
“I'm usually around,” the spaceship said through his hidden loudspeakers. “But I don't always bother listening. Bring me up to speed?”
“Will you act as a space limo slash nature reserve slash luxury resort for us much longer?”
“I'm enjoying travelling through space, if that's what you mean,” the ship said. “I was stuck on that dreadful planet for a little too long. I suppose I owe you something for shaking me out of my stagnancy.”
“I think he means 'yes',” Daria whispered very loudly. “Let's ask him for more stuff! He's in a good mood.”
“I don't really have 'moods' as such,” she ship said. “I am just an artificial intelligence. I'm not alive per se. The thing about artificial intelligences is that they are at their best when they have living beings to care for. It's stimulating in all its weirdness and irrationality. I liked the Byt. They were intelligent. I find that you people are much the same. Except perhaps less so.”
“And now I think he's insulting us,” Daria said. “Okay, great. Amelia, I'm going to pretend that this clearly non-alcoholic drink is getting me drunk and then I'm going to talk to a dragon. Not yours! One of the others. That super handsome one with the shy smile.”
Daria winked and sauntered off with her exaggerated hip movements, clearly in the direction of the Ultraco called Evec.
A shadow fell on Amelia, and suddenly she was looking up at Dacron's face. She couldn't help taking a step back. Even though she knew him, an Ultraco prince standing close by was so intimidating her survival instincts kicked in.
He gazed down at her with an expressionless face. “It seems you have taken our captain from us.” His voice was not as deep as Braxan's, but it was strong and smooth. He sounded dangerous.
Amelia's eyes darted to her husband. Was he close enough to come to her aid if this broody Ultraco prince decided to get angry? “Hey, he started it.”
The big Ultraco held her gaze for three heartbeats, then smirked. “He did indeed. Don't get me wrong. I am happy for him. And a little envious. We all long to find our Mate. May I ask how you cured him?”
Amelia got her father's bravery medal out of a pocket in her shirt, relieved that Dacron wasn't there to pick a fight. “This seemed like a logical choice. A golden medal for a golden dragon.”
He held out his hand, and she placed the medal in his calloused palm.
“You were willing to sacrifice this for him?”
She shrugged. “Not much of a loss under the circumstances. I would have lost both that and my life if it didn't work. He was our last hope.”
Dacron studied the medal. “Interesting. The workmanship is exquisite. It's not entirely pure gold, but close enough to be very attractive to us. Yes, this would heal him. About ninety-eight and two sevenths percent pure, I estimate.”
Amelia frowned. “You can tell just by looking at it?”
“Looking at it and feeling it. Any Ultraco will be able to tell. We live only for gold, after all. And we live for a very long time.”
“I don't get the impression that Braxan lives for gold. As far as I can tell, he doesn't care much about it one way or the other.”
Dacron smirked. “Perhaps he has changed. He is known as the Golden Ultraco. That's not just because of his appearance. Gold used to be the meaning of life for him. His hoard was immense. Then he sacrificed it for his new one. It is not as big. But it seems he values it more than the old. It is the strangest thing I have seen. I want you do understand this fully, in all its implications: the hoard is the meaning of life for any Ultraco.”
“What happened?”
“The Emperor stated that if Braxan disobeyed him, he would forfeit his hoard and the Emperor would seize it. The threat of that would have kept any other Ultraco in line. Especially Braxan, I would have thought. But then it turned out to have the opposite effect. Did he not tell you?”
Amelia looked over at her husband. He was surrounded by colonists, including kids. Finally people had come over their fear and realized that he wasn't going to hurt them. “He did not. Was it because he rescued me?”
Dacron gave the medal back. “It was. Doing so, he knowingly disobeyed his Emperor. He exchanged one hoard for another, smaller one. How monumental a sacrifice that was, only another Ultraco can understand.”
Amelia looked at the medal. For Bravery. “He exchanged it for this?”
The huge Ultraco in human form gazed at her levelly. “No. Not for that.”
Amelia stared down on the medal in her hand, thinking hard. Did he mean ...
She looked back at her new husband. He was lifting a little girl with pigtails, tossing her ten feet into the air and catching her again as softly as if she had landed in a heap of eiderdown. The child laughed and squealed in exhilaration. Then he looked straight at Amelia and sent her a warm little smile, just checking on her in a room full of people. As usual, her heart skipped a beat and for a split second, only they two existed in the universe.
“Of course,” she said, and her voice cracked. “He has a new hoard now. Excuse me.”
She went over to Braxan, and he gave her a happy smile and took her hand. She looked up at him. “I'm ready to go.”
He nodded. “I was starting to fear you'd stay here forever. I understand the ship has prepared something for us.”
He led her into an elevator, and before she knew it, they were inside a cabin that she hadn't seen before, but must have belonged to an important person among the Byt. There was even a real bed, wide and long, with what looked a lot like fresh linen on it. “Nice,” she said.
“I know you prefer to sleep under the stars in that clearing,” Marqatzo said from the wall. “But I was informed that perhaps this particular night you'd prefer a different environment. I looked through all my storage units, and I came across a collection of items that I was told was suitable. I had some help from your friends in arranging it.”
“Thank you,” Amelia said. It looked a lot like a nice hotel room with a big bunch of alien flowers on the table. She detected Daria's touch in making this happen. And probably Jean's. “This is great.”
“My pleasure,” the ship said. “I will now give you complete privacy. I was told it was essential. If you want me, you'll have to go outside in the corridor.”
Amelia reached up and hugged her half dragon husband. “I'm not going outside for a good while, I'm thinking. How about you?”
“My home is where my wife is,” he said simply and bent down to brush his lips against hers.
Again she was so moved she welled
up. He meant it. She laughed in pure happiness. “Dragons are smooth talkers, they say. But I've had enough talk for one day. Now I want some action.”
She pulled off her shirt and the white skirt, then got up on the bed on all fours and lowered her head and chest to the linen, presenting herself for her husband.
She needed no time to get ready for him. She was always ready. “I want you to enjoy me,” she said with a mouth that was dry with arousal. “After all, I am your hoard.”
The room was silent for three heartbeats.
“So you know?”
“I do.”
“I was not going to tell you. But yes, indeed you are my hoard. And at the same time, you're so much more than that.”
The mattress shook as he positioned himself behind her. She felt him place the tip of his remarkable cock at her entrance, and a surge of excitement send a hot wave to her sex. She knew she had to be dripping wet.
He placed the tip of his remarkable cock at her entrance. “In fact ...”
She arched her back to give him total access, and he put his hands on her naked hips in preparation for the thrust.
“... you're my Mate.”
- - -
Make sure to catch the Epilogue at the end of the book!
- - -
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Epilogue
- Amelia -
“So this is your home now?” Daria looked around the garden. The lawn was the size of a football field and had tasteful arrangements of bushes and flowers and trees, with streams and waterfalls and ponds spread out over the area. It might look natural, but it was really the result of the giant spaceship Marqatzo carefully arranging part of his jungle over several weeks.
The grass was soft against Amelia's feet. “I think so. Marqatzo isn't owned by anyone but himself, but he says that he's willing to take us wherever we want to go. This way, we need no external supplies and Braxan can fly in space whenever he wants. And there's room for a lot of people here.”
Daria gazed up at the blue disk that was the Earth, hanging innocently in the sky. The Sun was up and bathed the alien jungle in a warm light. “Millions, probably. Aren't you afraid of the wildlife here? From what you've told me, some parts of the jungle are just trying their damndest to kill you.”
“There are some places we don't go. But the forest is big enough for everything that lives here. How's the family?”
The immense alien spaceship Marqatzo with an entire jungle nestled on top of his hull had taken the colonists to Earth in a week, much faster than the evacuation ships that Outward Expansion had sent could ever hope to travel. Now they were all back home on Earth, while Amelia and Braxan had taken up residence in and on the ship.
“Oh, fine. I told them all about you and Braxan and the dragons and everything. Seems the story is the talk of the town. Or the whole Earth, pretty much.”
Amelia squinted up at her home planet in the black sky. Her mother had come to visit, and was at that moment exploring another and safe part of the jungle by herself. “Uh-huh. A lot of reporters tried to get in touch. We'll probably grant some interviews before we take off.”
“Uh-huh. I guess Braxan is eager to have the dragon wedding ceremony on his planet. Am I invited?”
“Of course. I was hoping you might be maid of honor.”
Daria brightened. “Oh, I'd love to! Um ... do they have those at Ultraco weddings?”
Amelia shrugged. “If they didn't, then they do now. Braxan is not much of a traditionalist. Whatever works, he says.”
“Too bad his friends had to leave. I'd wouldn't have minded getting to know them better.”
“Yeah ... I guess they had things to take care of. They have their own lives. Only Braxan got seriously ousted from the gang and lost his hoard. He was the captain of their group, so he was seen as responsible for the whole disobedience thing. The other three have to continue their lives. I get the feeling no one likes their emperor that much.”
Daria laid down on her back on the soft grass. “Well, maybe they'll come back at some time. You never know.”
Amelia chuckled. “You really don't. Those Ultracos are pretty unpredictable.”
Daria squinted at the Sun. “So what are your plans? You want to have kids, right? Little princes and princesses that can change into dragons when their nanny is being too stingy with the candy?”
“Yeah, I'm not even sure how that works with him. Apparently his mom was human. Or close to it. And the father is an Ultraco. So I guess it's possible that we can have kids.”
Daria scratched her chin. “Maybe you have to lay eggs. Or something. Doesn't he know how he was born?”
“Oh, he was born the normal way, he says. But kids are called 'hatchlings' in their culture, and I don't think that's just for fun. So I don't know. But I tell you, if I have to lay eggs and, like, sit on them until they hatch, then I'm going to suggest maybe a surrogate mother or something like that. I'm not a chicken.”
“Right. So undignified for a princess to have to build a nest and sit on a huge dragon's egg in a huge royal coop or something. You are a princess, right?”
“That's what Braxan says. But I never planned on becoming one, so I'm not going to force anyone to call me that. It would weird me the hell out.”
“Princess Amelia,” Daria said pensively. “It has a nice ring to it, absolutely. Speaking of rings, I guess wedding bands aren't huge in
Ultraco culture?”
Amelia flexed her unadorned fingers. “Oh, they like their gold. As in, really like. But yeah, we don't have those yet.” She took hold of the medal that was now a pendant and hung around her neck on a solid titanium chain that Marqatzo had scrounged up somewhere. “The only gold we have is this medal, and Braxan has forbidden me from melting it down and making rings of. He says it goes well with me, whatever he means. And we have a lot of history with it.”
“And you totally deserve it just as a medal,” Daria stated. “You are the bravest person I've met. And then some. You totally saved our asses. Did we ever find out where they came from, those Pirgks?”
The sunshine and the pleasant warmth and the slight breeze blowing across her face made Amelia drowsy. She had gotten used to sleeping on the grass, even if they had a large cabin inside the ship, too. “I guess space contains all kinds of weird stuff. Braxan says that sometimes a semi-advanced species will dabble in genetic engineering and create organic robots, and then the robots take over and kill their creators and go out into space on some kind of killing spree. He thinks maybe that's what happened. Because the Pirgks just seemed artificial. It goes with their urge to rape and breed, too. They probably can't procreate by themselves and need females. Belzon Base had three hundred of us.”
Daria stretched luxuriously. “'Braxan says'. ' Braxan thinks'. 'Braxan feels that'. And whenever I talk to him, it's all 'Amelia says' and 'Amelia wants' and 'Amelia told me'. In my expert opinion, you two are seriously in love.”
“See, that's what I thought,” Amelia said. “But it's nice to have it confirmed by an expert. Because you know, all the kissing and sex and staring into each other's eyes and not being able to keep our hands off each other is not conclusive evidence at all.”
“Whatever would you do without me? Okay, I'm about to fall asleep.” Daria slowly sat up. “And I guess this lawn is kind of your bridal suite. So rude of me to take a nap in what is probably your marital bed where all kinds of things might have happened.”
“Things do happen,” Amelia agreed. “And with an Ultraco, they happen a lot. And speak of the dragon ...”
