by Bailey Dark
We touched down inside the giant, open air circle and the crowd roared. There was a suspended platform for Kajo to make his speech from. He left me with a slight nod and I followed Delicha to a place for nearby seating. Strange eight-legged horse-like animals with cat heads lined the coliseum floor, pulling wagons decorated in all colors. Curan and Bordash in splendid costumes were ready to ride in the carriages for the parade. Kajo stood up on the suspended platform, thirty feet in the air, and he began to speak, his voice amplified.
“My dear Farian brethren!” Cheers drowned out his opening. “Welcome to the Day of Joy!” Plummeting projectiles, clashing weapons, and angry cries drowned out his next words.
I spun around to look up at the coliseum walls. The Bordash soldiers from the nearby city-state were attacking!
Bodyguards had immediately floated up to Kajo, prepared to forcibly remove him from his station, but he was flinging back attackers, raining rocks and weapons, and suspending attacks as swift as they happened. He spun from side to side, a whirl of telekinetic power, never letting a weapon strike him, preventing many from striking others, holding a vast attention on where I was sitting, throwing aside any rock or weapon that rained down in my direction. I couldn’t believe his skill. He was so strong, composed, striking down the onslaught, showing no fear, just steady control. His hands were whipping every which way, and then I heard his voice, as clear as if it were my own thoughts: “Hide under the hovercraft, Daphne. Now!”
He had used telepathy to communicate with me and it was dizzying how clear his words were. He hadn’t tried that with me yet. My brain felt rocked, as if someone had reached in and squeezed out some of its wrinkles.
Delicha and I moved quickly to the underside of the hovercraft we had landed in. I hoped no one knew we were there, as it made quite the target for massive disruption. Every now and then, there was the thunk of something that had fallen down onto it, but it held steady over us.
Spectators were screaming, coliseum walls were collapsing as telekinetic warriors used pieces of the siding as weapons. I peered out from under the hovercraft and saw a figure that sent the same cold feeling up my spine that I felt every week handing in progress reports on my team: Rhone. Rhone was there, armed with his glowing sword, and he was fanned by dozens of other Bordash and they were all armed with guns.
“Guns!” Delicha gasped out the word beside me and I looked at her. “It is illegal to bring in guns from an outside world. We all use telekinetic power. There’s hardly anything stronger. But guns fire so quickly and repeatedly, that they give an unfair advantage. It’s a matter of honor.”
“Rhone has no honor!” I hissed back and Delicha nodded. We stayed hidden, but I peeked out enough to see five of the Bordash soldiers aiming their guns up at where Kajo was on the platform.
Just as the soldiers began to fire, other soldiers, on Kajo’s side, began to teleport in. Flashes of brilliant green and blue lit the arena, obscuring everyone’s sight for a matter of seconds. Then the hand-to-hand exploded. Rhone’s soldiers, all Bordash, fired guns while Kajo’s allies, made up of both Curan and Bordash, swept aside every bullet with either a glowing sword or a telekinetic motion.
Then, Kajo’s soldiers began to fall. The barrage of automatic gunfire was too much. They could only sweep aside so many bullets at a time, they could only anticipate the trajectory of so many at once. Now, Rhone’s soldiers were on all sides.
I dared to look out, trying to see Kajo, but his platform was empty. Had he fallen?
Right before I pulled back under the hovercraft, my heart beating fiercely, Rhone’s eyes scanned the battling field and, somehow beyond somehow, he caught my eye. I scrambled back beneath the shade of the hovercraft, but not before I heard him barking orders and ten sets of boots stopped right outside the hovercraft.
Delicha had a knife out in an instant and was preparing to impale feet with it when there was a heavy thump on the hovercraft.
“Beast King,” Rhone said. “Will you give me your kingdom?”
“Never.”
“Then, you shall die.”
The soldiers seemed to forget us and began to fire at Kajo. There was running, jumping, clunking, gunfire, and cursing, but I could see none of it. I could only imagine Kajo floating, vaulting, spinning, and fighting against Rhone and his soldiers. I wished I could see it; I knew he would be mesmerizing. But, all I could see was the dust of the coliseum floor. Rhone’s soldiers were falling at Kajo’s hands and soon that dust was saturated with blood.
A cry split my head and I realized it was Kajo calling out in pain. I ducked out from underneath the hovercraft in time to see the third bullet rip through his side. He collapsed to one knee on the hovercraft. Rhone floated up above him with three of his remaining minions. Kajo tried to lash his hand at them, but all he managed to do was rip the three guns from the soldiers’ hands. Rhone laughed, holding his sword out in front of him.
“You can’t win, Kajo.”
Then there was a giant cracking sound and more teleporting bubbles grew. Rhone cursed and looked from his sword to Kajo.
“You will die by this blade!”
“You better leave now, Rhone!” I screamed at him, clambering up the edge of the hovercraft to hold Kajo by his shoulders, keeping him from falling all the way to the floor. I pressed one of my hands into the wound on his side. The other two bullets had ripped through his shoulder and thigh.
“Shut up, your Earthling inferior,” Rhone snarled. Telekinetic warriors from other alliances were raising their hands at Rhone and he grimaced. “Next time!” He roared and then he vanished in a teleport, with his few remaining soldiers following.
Kajo sank to both knees, forehead braced against the ground.
“Kajo…Help! Help! We need a doctor here!” I yelled and the translator spit out some other sentence. One of Kajo’s bodyguards climbed into the driver’s seat. Another was soon there, helping me roll Kajo over on his back, and then we were racing off to the nearest hospital. I held Kajo’s hand, willing for the spark between us to serve as a lifeboat, as a surge of strength and power to live by.
The doctors worked quickly to get Kajo’s wounds pressured and the bullets removed. I waited by his bedside, frightened by every sound in the hall, worried it was Rhone returning to finish off what was left of the Beast King.
“We need your blood.”
I looked blankly at the doctor. I had heard him through the rasp of the translator, but then, I hadn’t heard him, either. I stared. “What?”
“You’re his Destin, right?”
“That’s what he said.”
“He is going to die without your blood. Only your blood can revive him at this point.”
“That doesn’t make any sense—” I began to protest.
“Are you the doctor here on Farian?”
“No, of course not.”
“Then, I suggest you trust one who is. I am trying to save the King. He says he will not force you to give him your blood. You must choose to do so. You must choose to save him. If you do not, he will die.”
I nodded and stood up, squeezing Kajo’s hand. “Tell me what to do.”
Soon, I was lounging on a bed not dissimilar from Kajo’s and they were sticking a huge needle into my right forearm. I waited anxiously as my blood pumped out. Kajo’s blood was pumping out, too, but in a much heavier flow and I was then trying to put in my uncontaminated, fairly healthy, bloodline.
“The bullets were tainted,” the doctor said. I looked at him, not understanding. “There was an ink on it, an ink that tainted the bullets.”
“Poisoned!” I understand the shitty translation and looked sadly at Kajo beside me. That was why they were doing a transfusion. He would soon have more human blood than Curan. Just as I thought that, one of his bodyguards laid down on a bed on the other side of him.
“We will resupply your blood now and get more Curan blood back into the King,” the doctor explained. So, they switched around the pumps and my blood, havi
ng flowed through Kajo’s system, returned to me, with a bit of him, I am sure. His bodyguard resupplied the King with what was thought to be purer Farian blood. I wondered if any of the poison would impact me, but I was assured it wouldn’t hurt an Earthling.
I rested in the bed beside him all through the night. I kept the translator close and heard the bodyguards talking. Thousands had been killed. Rhone and his soldiers had been nondiscriminating about the Curan. To the Bordash, they had offered one chance: kill the Curan next to you, or be killed. Thankfully, the Bordash who were there to celebrate the Day of Joy did not stoop to the level that Rhone wanted them to. Many of them had died because of it, but they had not taken lives themselves.
Rhone’s soldiers had led attacks all around the capital city, not just at the coliseum. It had been a massacre. He had made a deal with one of the Bordash empires that Kajo had thought to be allies, and they had been the ones entrusted to guard the coliseum uprights, as a sign of trust between Curan and Bordash. This had been the downfall of the entire security detail. However, more of the true allies had teleported in as soon as word of the battle spread. Most of Rhone’s soldiers had been wiped out. But, the key was getting Rhone.
That, and the survival of King Kajo. It was hours before he was breathing normally. The doctors came in to check on him often, as did Delicha. The bodyguard eventually left, replaced by another, just in case Kajo needed more blood.
Finally, right before dawn, Kajo stirred beside me. His eyes opened and he blinked a few times, getting his bearings.
“Daphne!” He cried and tried to sit up in the bed. My heart ached to hear him call for me.
“Shh, it’s okay, Kajo. I am right here.”
He settled back down as soon as he was able to verify it was me. He reached a hand out to me and I squeezed it. The spark between us felt more like a slow burn, as though it knew he couldn’t handle much of a jolt.
“You saved me.” He smiled, his eyes closing again, seeming satisfied that I was alive and well. He licked his lips and I held a straw to his lips for him to suck on. He seemed so small, so childlike, so vulnerable and open.
“You saved me first.” I smiled back, even though his eyes were closing again. “In fact, I think this counts as you saving me twice.”
He tried to open his eyes, but the pain medicine was too strong. He was slipping back unconscious. “Well…then…you owe me...”
“How do I make it up to you?”
There was a long silence and I was sure he had gone back to sleep. Then he opened his eyes and looked right at me, with a sleepy smile.
“Be my Queen.”
My heart beat so rapidly I was afraid it would leave my chest. Before I could reply, he was back asleep and I was left to stare, stunned, up at the ceiling.
I could be a Queen.
Eleven
Daphne
Our hands were still clasped together when I awoke that morning. I looked over at Kajo, the soft rays of sun breaking across his face, highlighting his scar, but somehow making it seem gentler. I squeezed his hand and his eyes fluttered open. The bandage on his bare shoulder had bled a little in the night and there was a red mark against his flesh toned sealant.
“Let me redress your wound.”
“That’s what the doctors are for, Daphne.”
“I know, I know. But I like taking care of you…”
“One week and you haven’t let me get out of your bed. You are ravenous,” he joked. I stuck my tongue out at him.
“You would be so lucky.”
“Will I?”
I didn’t look at him but felt my face flushing. I kept fiddling with the bandage-laying tools. It was a kind of suction spray that I had never seen on Earth.
“Will you what?”
“Will I get lucky one of these nights?” Kajo reached over and grabbed my wrist. The spark we still were getting used to coursed through us, igniting that fire, and stripping away my breath.
“You were hurt only a week ago, Kajo. I don’t want to hurt you…”
He laughed and it was a genuine laugh. One I never would have thought to hear from him when I had met him as a fierce, intimidating Beast King who abducted me, while also saving me.
“Daphne…” I refused to look at him. Somehow, I couldn’t get my fingers to work. Kajo pulled on my wrist, then moved aside the bandaging material. “Daphne…put that down. We will likely need it again in a moment.”
I looked at his hands as they guided my hands to his bare chest. We had been sleeping next to each other for the last few nights, since his release from the hospital, and I had hardly left his side. Even though he was a King and had dozens of servants to wait on him, and an entire planet sending him prayers and adoration, I was the one that he let change his bandages, who was able to bring him his meals, who read to him, who laughed and joked and playfully touched him, just to feel that electric shock.
Now, he set my hands on his pecs and brought one of my legs around, so I was straddling his waist. Why do I feel so bashful?
“It’s because you want this as much as I do…and that’s okay…”
I still hadn’t adjusted to the fact that he could read my mind. He had promised to keep it to a minimum, but I also knew it was a skill he couldn’t easily turn off. He explained that, since I was human, I kept my thoughts on the shallowest levels. It was like all my thoughts were magazine covers; they were meant to catch the mind’s eye.
He left my hands on his chest and rubbed his hands down my thighs. He squeezed them in tighter around his sides. He brushed his fingers up my back, sending a trill of desire through my body, all the way up to my throat and stealing away my breath. He found the little blue ribbon on my neck and back that held my top on and he slowly, ever so slowly, pulled at it.
The thin fabric fell away, leaving a wispy pile on his stomach. My breasts were revealed for him to admire. And he did. He stared at them, a smile parting his lips. My cheeks flushed even further. He reached up and touched my red cheeks and I couldn’t help but nuzzle into his hand. His other hand cupped first one breast, then the other. He tweaked the nipples in a moment of play and I yelped a sweet gasp and smacked his hand away.
“You don’t like that?”
My mind was a blur, I had to get myself under control. I was giddy, silly, feeling like I was being touched for the first time.
So, I moved his hands to my waist, then leaned forward over him, so my nipples dragged up his chest. Then I hovered them over his face.
“I would prefer if you do that with your mouth.”
He grinned at me, then squeezed them both with his hands, taking one into his mouth, sucking in, flicking it with his tongue. He bit down on the nipple, teasing it, twisting sideways gently. Then he moved to the next and did the same, sucking, flicking, biting, nibbling…All the while kneading my breasts.
I squeezed his waist tight with my knees, when he released my breasts and then shimmied back, so I was straddling him. He was wearing tight little boxer briefs and I still had my panties and shorts on.
I stood up over him on the bed, looking down at him with a commanding, flirtatious smile, letting him admire the curves of my body. I admired the hard angles of his. Even the three places where the wound bandages were, couldn’t cover up the definition of a well-tooled soldier.
“Take off your underwear.”
“That sounds like a command.”
“It is.”
He obliged, slipping out of them quickly. When he laid back down, I let him watch as I slipped out of mine, bending purposefully so he could check out my ass while it was slowly revealed from under the lace panties. I tossed them to the side, then sat back down on him.
I hadn’t yet looked at his dick. I was afraid…I had sensed the size. I had sensed the way his desire grew when he pushed into me. I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to handle it. At the same time, I knew I wanted it more than anything.
So, I sat in a way that the shaft was lined up with my clit and the tip would be
aligned up toward his belly button. Then I leaned forward and rained kisses up his bare chest.
If touching fingertips ignited an electric shock, the sensation of my lips on his skin was like a lightning bolt shooting through our bodies. I could even hear the thunder in the rasps of our breath.
I laced my tongue up his chest, grabbed a kiss on his neck, then swooped in, as if to kiss his mouth, but swiftly turned his chin aside so that I could devour his ear instead.
He moaned, his hands grabbing my ass as soon as I wished that he would. He squeezed down tight. One hand quickly went to my hair, reading my mind and responding before I even knew I had asked him to. He pulled back on my hair, to grab his own kisses on my neck. I shook away from his grip and sat back on top of him. Slowly, slowly, I looked down at his dick.
The size did not disappoint. I gulped and he noticed. He laughed.
“You can handle it,” he said. “I trust you entirely. And, I will only go in until you say—or even if you think—stop.”
I licked my lips. “Let’s find out.”
I shimmied down from him so that I could have his shaft in my hand and then I gently, so gently, moved the tip into my mouth. I moved it around with my tongue, sucking hard in as I slowly, so slowly, took it all the way down my throat, rubbing the shaft down at the same time.
His moan was even deeper this time.
I sucked in hard, deep throat, and then moved up and out slowly, a couple inches at a time, tongue swirling on the shaft, a ring with my fingers, my other hand cupping his balls. I spit on the shaft, then quickly moved to squat over him, maneuvering his dick into position, gently easing down, seeing if I could take him all.
I screamed as I let him in all the way.
