Claimed by the Alien: A Scifi Alien Romance (Fated Mates of the Titan Empire Book 6)

by Tammy Walsh

  The Changelings had just committed suicide.

  It didn’t make any sense.

  My eyelids fluttered and I could barely keep them open. My head flopped over into semi-unconsciousness.

  Titans didn’t fear death. I didn’t fear it even now. What I feared was what would happen to my people after I passed.

  The Changelings never did anything without careful consideration. They had a plan and it would not bode well for us once it came to fruition.

  I should have seen this coming.

  Something in the reports I received each day must have contained little hints and clues that this was going to happen.

  But there hadn’t been. Nothing indicated the Changelings were on the warpath.

  Neither had we attacked them. There had been no provocation, no aggression.

  As far as I knew, our two races were at total peace.

  My thoughts were interrupted by the soft thudding noise of padded feet. I recognized it immediately.

  An arlath was headed this way. Wild arlath creatures didn’t exist on this planet. If it was passing by on a nearby road, someone had to be riding it.

  Could I get the rider’s attention?

  I had one chance. My life depended on it.

  I wriggled like a worm in the mud, inching up the riverbank.

  I got halfway before I slipped back the distance. I turned ridged to prevent myself from rolling any further down.

  I angled my head to get a better understanding of how far the road was.

  The soft thumping footsteps grew louder.

  Closer.

  If I could just reach the top…

  I cupped my hands. I might not be capable of making delicate movements but I could make big broad ones. I shoved them in the mud and used what little strength I had remaining to pull myself up the incline.

  The mud acted as a lubricant, helping me slide upward.

  The clip-clopping reached its pinnacle as the creature passed by.

  I glanced up and caught sight of the rider on the creature’s back. He had white hair and dragged a cart behind him.

  And I’d missed him.

  How long would it be before another rider came along?

  An hour? A day? A week?

  Any one of those was too long for me to wait.

  “Wait!” I shouted.

  The word didn’t come out the way I intended. It was more of a groan, my tongue struggling to form the words.

  The clip-clopping grew fainter.

  No! He’s leaving!

  It didn’t matter what noise I made. It only mattered that he heard me.

  I yelled again. It was a fuzzy groan at the back of my throat.

  The arlath came to a stop.

  I couldn’t make out the rider from this angle but I imagined him turning in his saddle to identify the sound’s origin.

  I curled my body up and made the noise again.

  The rider might have thought he was mistaken with the first sound I made. With the second, he must realize it was genuine?

  But it was just as possible he thought it was some form of creature native to the forest or river. There were many dangerous creatures in this part of the world.

  Stars danced before my eyes and darkness turned my vision fuzzy around the edges.

  Not now. Please! Not now.

  If I didn’t get his attention, I was doomed.

  I heard the rider’s boots on the hard dirt-packed road as he climbed down from his saddle. He approached the top of the incline and peered down it.

  I smiled, relieved he had found me. At least now I had a chance to survive.

  But the rider kept on looking. Worse, his eyes passed right over me as he scanned the rest of the muddy embankment.

  Couldn’t he see me? Was he blind?

  No, he’s not blind, I thought. I’m caked in mud and there’s nothing to distinguish me from the dirt.

  I groaned again. This time, I wasn’t trying to get his attention with noise. It was with movement. I couldn’t do it without a high-pitched growl escaping my lips.

  I paid for the movement with a lance of pain up my back.

  That darkness squeezed my vision, turning it to the size of a pinhead.

  “Now, where did you come from?” the rider said.

  He’d seen me. He’d finally seen me.

  Would he help me? Would he get me somewhere safe?

  I didn’t know. And I was unlikely to find out.

  My eyelids were already drifting shut.

  And I was gone.

  My dreams were nightmarish and infected with fever.

  The cart ride was rough and comfortable. It jostled me awake several times, but I was glad of it. Anything to escape the memories of fireballs being hurled toward my face and boulders of rock cracking beneath my feet.

  When I opened my eyes, the sun glared at me, accentuating the headache blossoming at my temples.

  Then I would fade unconscious and awaken again sometime later.

  I choked.

  I gasped and bolted upright—I was only capable of a few inches—and spat out the liquid in my mouth. I rolled over onto one shoulder.

  “Easy there,” a man’s voice said.

  It was the arlath rider from the riverbank. I guess he must have helped me after all.

  He patted me on the back before raising the plastic container in front of my eyes.

  “What… What is it?” I said, my voice an ugly rasp.

  “Only water,” the rider said. “I would feed you soup but you can’t keep it down.”

  The man could easily overpower me if he wanted. I doubted he wanted to poison me.

  I let him give me the water. It tasted refreshing as it spilled down my throat. Some leaked out of the hole in my cheek and ran down my neck.

  “I’m headed to a town called Urcim,” the man said. “It’s home to the Urcim tribe. I’ll drop you off at their medical center. If they have one.”

  “What happened?” I said, struggling to mouth the words. “Changelings.”

  The man took a seat on the cart’s edge. His legs dangled over the side.

  “They came out of nowhere,” he said, “and attacked every colony at once.”

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Every Titan colony? There were hundreds of them. Surely, they couldn’t strike them all at the same time? Reports suggested they didn’t have the military for such a big operation.

  I thought they’d only attempted to kill me. After all, remove the emperor, and you had an empire without a head.

  But the Changelings were far more ambitious than that.

  “Do you know… anything else?” I said. “More news?”

  “I’ve been on the road since the attack happened,” the rider said. “The last thing I heard was…”

  He glanced at me and shook his head.

  “No,” he said. “You don’t need to hear that yet. It’s better you focus on getting stronger. This news can only weaken you.”

  “What is it?” I said.

  The rider wet his lips and let out a sigh.

  “The worst thing imaginable,” he said. “The emperor may be dead.”

  He had genuine hurt in his eyes. The emperor had a special place in every Titan’s heart. He was supposed to represent everything good and true about Titan culture. He was what everyone was meant to look up to, what they were meant to emulate.

  A good thing they didn’t know the real me.

  “Rest,” the rider said. “With any luck, we’ll be at Urcim by nightfall.”

  I fell in and out of consciousness after that, resuming my usual routine.

  I could move my arms now and my legs were no longer unresponsive. I was consumed by a terrible itching pain across my entire body. I wondered if I would ever fully heal and become the Titan I had been before.

  The Changelings.

  They did this to me.

  I ground my teeth and swore to the thousand suns and the Creator himself that I would have bloody vengeance
.

  One day.

  I thought I was getting stronger each day that passed but as we approached the entrance to Urcim, I was suddenly overcome with an unbearable weakness. Then my body began to shake. It was uncontrollable. My head banged against the cart floor.

  The rider pulled to a stop and immediately leaped into the cart bed with me.

  “Help!” he yelled. “I need help here!”

  The local Titans lifted me off the cart and carried me into a building with paint peeling from the walls.

  “We have a live one here!” someone shouted.

  “Place him on the bed over here.”

  The speaker’s voice was female. She was direct and firm.

  I felt the bed’s soft mattress as they put me down. Then the helpers backed away and let the little woman through. She wore a nurse uniform that looked a little baggy on her small frame.

  Her skin was the color of fresh cream and she wore an apron splattered with blood.

  “Give me your coat,” she said, reaching across to one of the Titans that’d carried me in.

  He immediately shrugged it off and handed it to her.

  The nurse rolled it into a pillow and placed it under my head.

  “Everybody stand back,” she said, “and get out if you don’t need to be here.”

  Most of them filed out. Immediately on their heels, another body was carried in. He was placed on the bed beside mine. With my body shaking and my eyes opening and shutting sporadically, I couldn’t get a good look at him.

  The nurse picked up a syringe from a side table, flicked it, and squeezed the plunger. She approached me and prepared to insert it into me.

  “Hazel,” one of the other nurses said. “This Titan isn’t going to survive. We only have one shot of adrenaline left. Maybe it’s best to give it to the other patient. He’s more likely to survive.”

  She was referring to the second patient that’d just been brought in.

  The nurse called Hazel looked between me and the other patient. She considered her next course of action. Finally, she shook her head.

  “No one will die today,” she said.

  She bent down to inject me in the arm.

  I raised a hand to stop her. I opened my mouth to speak but the words were clipped by my snapping jaw. I wanted to tell her to give the adrenaline shot to the other patient. He was in better condition than me. He could still survive. I was more likely to die and it wasn’t worth wasting the medicine.

  Hazel met my eyes. I turned my head to peer over at the other patient.

  Give it to him, I was telling her.

  She understood and stepped back.

  “Prepare this patient for surgery,” she said.

  Surgery?

  Hazel slipped the needle into the other patient’s arm and administered the adrenaline.

  The patient’s entire body tensed up, every muscle and fiber reacting to the sudden boost in activity. Then his body relaxed as the initial kick passed.

  The one called Hazel dropped the syringe. She grabbed my bed and pulled on it, leading me down the corridor and into another room. This one smelled of death.

  They knocked me out as the surgeon bent over me.

  I might be doomed to die, but even a dead man can feel fear.

  Nurse Hazel flashed a light in my eyes.

  I waved my arms to push her away but I was too weak to even do that.

  “Back in the land of the living, I see,” she said with a smile.

  “What… What happened to me?” I said.

  “You suffered a fit,” Hazel said. “Have you had them before?”

  “Never.”

  I blinked my eyes. Purple strobe lights followed wherever I looked, thanks to her flashing that light in my eyes.

  “With any luck, you shouldn’t suffer from another fit in the future,” Hazel said.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  “Don’t thank me. Thank the surgeon.”

  “Thank you anyway, Hazel.”

  She smiled and cocked her head to one side.

  “You have me at a disadvantage,” she said. “You know my name but I don’t know yours.”

  “My name is—”

  How should I respond? With one of my many titles? With my actual name?

  Every Titan would recognize it immediately. And I couldn’t face them right now. Not with how weak and frail I was.

  “Fiath,” I said. “My name is Fiath.”

  Fiath was the nickname I had as a child. It meant, “Curious One” in the Titan language. Few people knew I had that name. Certainly nobody here.

  “Well, Fiath, you had a lucky escape,” Hazel said, jotting my name on a document. “If you took just a little longer to reach us, I’m not sure you would still be alive.”

  Join the club. Nobody thinks I’m alive. Everyone believes the emperor is dead.

  “Your name is Hazel?” I said.

  “It is.”

  It was as beautiful as she was.

  “Where are you from?” I said.

  “A little out of the way planet called Earth,” she said.

  Earth. The name rang a bell but I couldn’t place it. Must have been one of the outer quadrant planets.

  “How is the patient in the next bed?” I said.

  “Better,” Hazel said. “Thanks to you. Without that adrenaline shot, he would probably still be unconscious.”

  “I didn’t do anything. You saved him.”

  “It was your sacrifice that saved him.”

  It was the first time I’d ever done something good for a Titan citizen. Oh, I’d signed decrees and made laws, helped them live a little easier, but I’d never helped a Titan directly like that before.

  It felt good.

  That familiar streak of pain bolted up my back.

  “Will I ever fully recover?” I said.

  Hazel looked uncomfortable and clutched her clipboard close to her chest. She looked me over head to foot. What surprised me was she didn’t flinch. I was not a pretty picture.

  “Back on my home planet?” she said. “I would have said no. Even with all the surgeries in the world, you would never look the same again. But we’re not on my home planet. And you’re not human. You’re a Titan. You have an ability to heal that I’ve never seen before. So, can you return to the way you once were? It’s possible. But could you also be left with scars? Yes. That’s also possible. I’ve sent for some special ointment Titans use that will be applied to your wounds frequently. It should help with healing.”

  What she was referring to was a common herb called Healer’s Touch. It was as old as Titans themselves.

  “Is there any news about the Changelings?” I said.

  My throat had turned hoarse and dry.

  Hazel handed me a glass of water.

  “Yes, some,” she said. “According to the news, they attacked without mercy and have successfully taken over much of the empire. Still, some Titans are fighting back. I guess it’s in your nature.”

  She had a warm smile. I couldn’t think of a better face to welcome me each time I awoke in this place.

  “And… I have some bad news for you,” she said. “There are reports the emperor has died. There’s no sign of his body, so many are praying he’s still alive somewhere.”

  “What do you think?” I said. “Is he still alive?”

  “I think it’s good that they have hope,” she said. “Titans put a lot of faith in him. It would destroy them to think he’s been stripped from them.”

  Perhaps one day, I thought idly, if I could make a full recovery, I could lead the Titans in a revolt against the evil Changelings. It was hard to imagine who they might rally around if it wasn’t the emperor.

  I eased back down, suddenly feeling very lethargic. My body shuddered with the pain and it took hold.

  Hazel took my hand. The warmth of her skin beat the agony to a dim murmur.

  She placed her other hand on my forehead where sweat was already beginning to blossom in tiny bea
ds. She didn’t shudder when she looked at me. And she didn’t recoil at the touch of my coarse and angry skin.

  Her touch was more powerful than all the Healer’s Touch ointment in the world combined.

  Then she began to sing. It was a song of hope and longing. A song from her homeworld, no doubt.

  I relaxed even further, my muscles pressing into the soft bedding as this angel watched over me.

  The valiant defender at war with the angel of death at my other hand.

  Hazel

  He fell asleep.

  I placed his hand down on the bedspread and backed away silently. In all my years of nursing, I’d never seen anything like this.

  On Earth, I was a nurse. I’d seen gunshot wounds, stabbings, beatings, all manner of injuries. It took some time for the patients to recover but there was always an understanding that, if the injuries weren’t too severe, there was no reason they couldn’t make a full recovery.

  There was no doubt in my mind no human could have survived what this poor Titan had gone through.

  A large part of his flesh had melted away like chocolate on a hot stove. I could smell his charred flesh before I saw him. My mouth actually salivated before I laid eyes on him.

  Even peering down at him now, it was touch and go as to whether or not he would survive. He’d pulled through the worst of it. We’d put an end to the fit he had.

  But would he make a full recovery?

  I had no idea.

  Titans could heal from broken bones in hours, not weeks.

  So, how long would it take for them to recover from grade three burns?

  But no matter how good their healing ability, the pain was always the same. I dreaded to think how much pain he’d been through. When I offered him the adrenaline, he’d flat out refused it.

  Despite the agony he must have endured, he still preferred for another patient to receive the best medicine we had available.

  He was a hero. I’d never seen anything so selfless.

  I picked up my clipboard and left Fiath to rest. I moved through the space, checking on some of the other patients.

  Funny to think that just a couple of weeks ago, I’d been working quite happily in a modern American hospital.

  At least, it’d been a couple of weeks in my time.