by Bailey Dark
Except for that scar over his eye…But, it did fit the animalistic aura that wafted off him, as if he were trying to decide whether to throw me to Rhone without mercy, or to just throw me.
He set me back on the ground, surprisingly gentle.
“The woman comes with me.”
“Wh…what…?” I managed to stutter out the singular word.
Rhone barked a laugh. “Why? What do you want with this mere Earthling woman?”
“That is my concern. A life for a life. You killed Fyland, I take this woman. Would you prefer I take your life, instead? Or, perhaps, the life of Siteer?” Kajo gestured to the man who was still twirling his daggers back and forth.
Rhone put his hands on his hips. The four other minions who had arrived took two steps forward, waiting for the order from their boss—my boss—to pounce. I guess they had done the magic trick teleportation thing, too? That had to of been a trick of the eye. There was no way I had seen people teleporting.
“Will you be taking her away from Earth?” Rhone asked.
“Wait—hold on—what?” The men were all still ignoring me.
“She will join me on my ship. She will never be able to alert Earth authorities that you killed a man in your office.” Kajo’s grip on my wrist tightened a little and he looked at me again. “This isn’t a negotiation, Rhone. I am taking her. The next time I hear you have corrupted one of my legions, I will not be so friendly with you.” He flicked his other hand toward the four men standing behind Rhone and they went flying backwards, their bodies thudding loud against the walls, ribs surely breaking, then they crumpled to the ground.
He had just thrown them…by magic!
“It’s not magic,” Kajo said as he turned to me. “It’s a skill. It’s telekinesis.”
That’s fucking magic.
“It is not fucking magic,” Kajo said. My mouth dropped open and the glimmer of a smile graced his deep blue, threatening eyes. “I can also hear your thoughts. So, be careful what you think of me…”
I twisted my wrist in his grip. Was that a joke he was making? I honestly couldn’t tell. His face looked so severe as he said it.
Rhone’s men were gathering themselves as Rhone held his hand up to Siteer, making sure his daggerman didn’t lunge at the Beast King.
“Let us go.”
“Whoa, hold on, I’m not going—” Before I could finish the sentence, Kajo had pulled me into his arms, pressed hard into his body, and light was glimmering all around us. He held me tight, my head buried in his leather chest plate, his bare arms wrapping about me. The light grew, sparking blue and green. A tingly sensation filled every cell of my blood, bone, and sinew.
“Stop struggling!” Kajo growled into my ear, his fingers pressing so hard into my arms that I was sure they would leave bruises. He pinned me against him so tight I struggled to breathe. He wrapped one leg about my legs and pulled them in closer to him so I couldn’t even kick out against him. My mind raged, overcome by panic at the restraint, at the tingling sensation that was starting to turn into a needle prick against every surface of my skin, and at the awe-inspiring reality of what was happening to me: what did it mean that he was taking me away from Earth? A ship? A spaceship? This was unbelievable.
My fingertips had started to tingle and I knew it was hypoxia, my breath so choked out, coming hard and fast, unable to catch it, Kajo’s arms crushing my skeleton into his muscular frame. My vision blurred – no, wait, the world around us was blurring. It was as if we were spinning, or the world was spinning. Then the lobby of the building blinked out of sight and I was wrapped in the sucking gel of a teleport, fire branching through my arteries, my insides feeling like they would be ripped out through every orifice. Dark space flashed, glimpses of bright lights spinning by outside the blur now and then, and suddenly we reappeared, with a sucking flash of light, on a metal platform.
Kajo released me, pushed me away from him, and I dropped to the ground, vomiting immediately onto a metal floor engraved with geometric patterns. I dry heaved and then rocked back to my knees. I watched Kajo walk away from me in a blur, headed down a hallway lit by blinking lights. Two women in bright green uniforms approached me and I slid backwards from them, swiping my hoodie sleeve across my mouth to clear the vomit.
The Beast King paused in the hallway and looked back at me. “Take her to my secondary quarters. Get her into something nicer looking.” Then he spun away.
I wanted to hit him. I wanted to spit at him, wanted to demand where he had taken me, wanted to clobber him until he was as dizzy as me.
Which was righteously so, I realized again as the two women technicians hauled me to my feet. I couldn’t fend them off, I was so weak. I was still catching my breath and the sensation of fire and needles was slowly retreating.
The women half-carried, half-dragged me, laughing and gossiping in a language I didn’t understand and was certain was not of Earth, down the corridor. Doors slid open for us to pass through, one after the other, high pitched beeping and occasional lights blinking.
One of the women placed her palm on the outside of a door. It sucked aside and they heaved me onto a chaise in a luxurious looking suite. There were flowers I had never seen before sprawling all over the cabin. Copper, brass, and glass glittered around the room. One of the women put a bottle of water on a table next to me. Then they bowed slightly, and left back through the door. It snapped shut and turned red. Locked, I presumed.
Not that I would understand at all how to open such a door.
I buried my head in my hands and force myself to take three, practiced, deep breaths. “I can do this. I don’t know where I am. But, I can handle it. I can do this.” I rubbed my temples and squeezed my eyes tight against tears that were threatening to overwhelm me. “Goodness, I hope this is a dream…”
I opened my eyes and looked around the room. The flowers made a beautiful garden along the wall. They were multi-colored, striated with lines and swirls, purple stems and green leaves. They curled around the countertops and their scent wafted clean, fresh, and a little like honey-dew melon.
There was an enormous bed in an alcove, a tiny kitchen that had a few cooking implements I didn’t quite recognize, an ornate wooden rolltop desk that looked quite old, and a small bathroom. I patted water on my face and stared at myself in the mirror. I looked a bit haggard…the lack of sleep of the last few weeks had certainly painted dark circles into my sunken eyesockets and now my hair was a wreck, limp and tangled. I pulled it back in a ponytail and pinched my cheeks a little.
One of the women came back through the sliding door and laid a clothing bag on the chaise. She smiled at me, but it seemed like there was a glow of anger in her eyes. Then she left, the door blinking red again.
Curious, I slipped open the zipper. A blue and black cape was wrapped around a blue crop top and tight leather pants. They seemed to be exactly my size. The crop top had long sleeves, with golden embroidery curling up and down the fabric, wrapping around the breasts. The top had a low, square neckline. I glared at the outfit a moment. While it was something I might dare to wear sometime, I was certainly not going to put it on at the command of my kidnapper.
Holy shit…Kidnapped. I was kidnapped. I hadn’t quite framed it that way yet. The word loomed and I ran to the door. I pressed my hands into its metal smoothness and tried to find a button, a depression, a signal that would let me open it and…and what? I wondered. And run from this place? I couldn’t possibly be on a spaceship, right?
There were curtains across one wall that had a track of shades shielding what I assumed to be windows. I jogged over to the wall and found a panel button. I couldn’t read the symbols next to the panel, but I just started flicking switches.
With a grinding whir, the shade shields slid up and away from the window.
I gasped.
The Earth was outside my window.
White clouds swirled over green and brown landmasses. We were over northern North America. The Arctic floated, glaci
al and cool, just beneath the ship. The image of the Earth took up almost the entire window. The shadow of night was falling across the Atlantic and city lights rippled in the refraction of the atmosphere.
My head swooned and I grasped the small ledge of the window. I leaned forward, surprised by the coolness of the window against my forehead.
I was in space, a captive of the Beast King from some other planet…
How the Hell was I supposed to get home?
Four
Kajo
I paused outside my secondary quarters. I focused on the Earthling’s thoughts. Our telepathic connection was surprisingly strong; I had never before felt that with someone from her planet. They were such an inferior people…
Yet, I had invited one onto my ship.
There was just something about her…
Her thoughts were scattered, frantic, helpless. She was looking at her planet through the window. She was likely overwhelmed, stunned by the beauty of being in space. I could rationally understand that she was going to be frightened by this but couldn’t empathize. I had been born on a spaceship, had always loved traveling through the galaxies, and now ruled a kingdom skilled in telepathy and telekinesis. It was a world so far from her own. So much better than what she had ever known.
She should be grateful to me. I was going to unleash an entire new world for her.
I placed my hand on the panel and the door slid open.
The woman spun around, tears in her eyes, fists clenched, and her first movement was to pick up a base of sprigalin flowers and throw them at my face.
I ducked the wild throw easily. The vase shattered as it hit the floor.
“What right do you have?” Her face was turning red with the intensity of her yelling. “What right?” She scooped up a glass star figurine and lanced that at my head next. I caught it deftly in the air with my telekinesis, and then threw it back toward her. Not aiming for her but aiming so that it shattered into the wall just above her head.
“You Beast!” Her eyes went wide, shocked by my throw. “You are a beast! Truly! How could you take me from my home?”
Her blonde curls were messy, thrown back in a ponytail. A few had escaped and were making gentle swirls on her tear and sweat soaked cheeks. Though she was wearing sweat pants and a hoodie, the clothes could not hide a slender, athletic figure and the type of ass I liked: one I could dig my teeth into.
I shook away the thought sharply. I didn’t know why I had brought her here, but it couldn’t possibly be just for that. Though, she was attractive…brown eyes sharp and intelligent with a tiny ski-slope nose and the slightest number of freckles dotting her cheeks, likely usually hidden by make-up.
It was more than admiring her as a thing of beauty; I was pulled to her. I was compelled to want to be near her. Something had sparked when she had run into me and grown stronger the longer I held her in front of Rhone. There was something visceral about my drive to have her near…
I was only five feet away from her now and she was brandishing a lamp in front of her like a sword. I narrowed my eyes at her. Why must she resist?
She swung the lamp at me and I dodged away from it. She swung again, and this time I caught it in my hand. Her eyes widened, she bit down on her lip, and tried to jerk it out of my hand with both of hers. The tug hardly made me move. We Curan were so much stronger than humans. Even the Bordash, like Rhone, had insurmountable strength when compared to human beings.
“There’s no point in fighting. You belong to me now. I am your King. Look.” I waved my hand at the window where the Earth loomed, gorgeous and coated in pollution. “I have opened your eyes and already given you more than you would ever have had in your pitiful Earth life.”
Her lower lip trembled a little and I had to resist the urge to bite it…but, then, I wondered why I was resisting? What was it about her?
“You stole me. You kidnapped me.”
“Rhone was going to kill you. I saved you.”
She looked taken aback by that, as if she hadn’t considered that component yet. She thrust the lamp away from her with a sigh. I set it back on the countertop.
“Still. You took me from my planet—”
“Prepare for departure. T-Minus 5 minutes. Warp drive initiated.” The voice of my XO that echoed in the room made the woman jump. I gestured to the nearby couch and chaise.
“Departure will be rough for a few minutes. I suggest we sit down. Anchor ourselves. Then, you can ask me all the questions you need to.”
“Will you answer them honestly?”
I actually smiled at that. “I am never dishonest. I also, though, never obey someone else’s commands.”
She sighed and put her hands on her hips. “Fine, then I will not command you.”
Yes…but you just might have the ability to, someday…
I scowled at my thought. How could I be giving her so much credit?
The woman carefully sat on the chaise next to the outfit I had had prepared for her. I sat on the far side of the couch from her and tried to look pleasant. I wondered if my smile was crooked, or intimidating, or more of a sneer. I rarely cared if someone thought I was nice, but this woman was just…different.
“What is your name?”
She pursed her lips and I thought for a moment she wasn’t going to respond.
“Listen, you big Beast, I don’t have to tell you anything. Take me home!” I read her mind and could hear her lashing out, but aloud, she said: “Daphne. My name is Daphne.”
“Daphne, I am King Kajo Wilos of the Curan Empire. Welcome to my spaceship, the Unortho.”
“What are you going to do with me?”
“You will come with me to Farian.” I couldn’t answer with more than that, because I wasn’t sure what I was going to do with her either. But, I did know I needed her near me. I needed to figure out why I was so drawn to her.
“Where is Farian?”
“75 lightyears from Earth. We will be there in a few days.”
“That’s your home planet?”
“Yes.”
She nodded and looked around the room. She was sitting straight up on the chaise, stiff, uncomfortable around me.
“You don’t like the outfit I sent you?”
“I don’t dress for any man.”
“I’m not just any man.” I didn’t mean for it to sound like a growl, but it did. How dare she thwart my wishes?
“Yes, I know. You’re the Beast King. Why do they call you that? Because you’re king over Beasts? Or because you’re beastly?”
I lashed the two vases in front of me into the wall with my powers. They smashed and rained pottery shards onto her cheeks. “It’s because I am as wild and fierce as any animal! You would do well to remember that!”
She quaked away from me and then picked up the outfit. “Fine. I will change into it.” She looked around. I hid a smile. There were no doors for her to hide behind. “Turn around and don’t watch.”
“That sounds like a command.”
She glared at me. “Please, don’t watch.”
“I shall not.”
I should have been enraged that she was telling me what to do, but the smile on my lips betrayed me. I wiped it away quickly, grumbling to myself. Why did I allow her to rebel against me? This Earthling was bewitching…I slipped a surreptitious glance to the panel photo on the wall. Her reflection was vivid in its shine as she slipped out of her hoodie, revealing a simple calm underneath. She took a deep breath, her breasts rising and falling as she stretched to slip out of the cami as well. In just her pink lace bralette, she shimmied out of her sweat pants. Her silhouette was highlighted in the sheen of the panel. Her fair skin glistened and I was overwhelmed with the urge to dot kisses over every inch of it. As she bent down to pick up the outfit I had chosen, her shapely ass curved into sharp detail—
I shook myself and looked away sharply. I willed the engorged shape in my trousers to minimize its presence, hoping she took long enough that there was time for
me to relax my arousal. I focused on the thoughts of Jorsin, my Second-in-Command. He was unfortunately asleep and there was no entryway through that curtain of unconsciousness. However, trying to break that barrier distracted me enough that my swollen dick calmed and the impression it had been making in my pants relaxed.
“Fine. I’m ready.”
I turned at her words and my mouth dropped. She was beautiful in traditional Curan clothing. The little black and blue cape fit across her shoulders perfectly, her exposed midriff was creamy and beckoned my eyes to memorize every line, every curve.
“What do you think? Is this satisfactory, your Highness? Am I fit for your desire?” Her voice oozed sarcasm and my lips curled upward in an unbidden snarl.
“You will learn to value your place here,” I said.
“Why did you bring me here? What reason do you have to have saved me from Rhone? If you’re a King, surely you can have anyone in your world that you want. Am I going to be part of a freakshow? The weakling human who has no magical skills? Brought forward to be laughed at and part of your court jesters?”
I looked at her, brow furrowed, genuinely perplexed. Is that what she thought of me? That I could be so callous? I had saved her life, hadn’t I? I needed to know what Rhone wanted of her; was it merely that she had seen him kill Fyland? Or was there something more? Not to mention the fact that I was irresistibly drawn to her…
“You will be kept safe,” I said. “No one will harm or hurt you. You have my word as King.”
She nodded and gestured to my sword at my waist. “Rhone killed that man, your minion, with a similar sword. What’s so special about it? Why does it glow?”
