Aedian: Alien Warrior: A Sci-Fi Alien Invasion Paranormal Romance (3 page)

And they expected her to marry one of them?

Roxanne barely paid attention as the fight started, the sound of metal on metal ringing out in the arena. As they always seemed to be, the Calphesians were shirtless, no armor protecting them from the blows of swords and axes.

She didn’t know if they were using dulled weapons or what, but the blows that landed seemed to roll right off of them.

Beside her, Samantha was nearly falling out of her seat with how far she was leaning forward, clearly eager to watch every strike. Under the roar of the crowd, Roxy could hear Samantha’s excited breathing, and it made her a little sick.

Honestly, she didn’t care which of them won, and she closed her eyes, focusing on her breathing and not thinking about what was happening in the arena or what had happened before.

It felt like it dragged on for hours, but soon enough the horn was being blown, startling Roxanne into opening her eyes. In the middle of the arena, three Calphesians stood tall and proud. They were bruised and a little bloody, but there were grins on their faces.

“The champions!” called the Calphesian who was acting as the master of ceremonies. He explained what it meant that they had won, and Roxanne found it hard to breathe.

It was over. One of those creatures down there was going to choose her to be his wife, and there was nothing she could do about it.

She felt the need to run, to get up and get out of there, and she jumped when someone touched her shoulder. Roxanne turned her head to see Samantha looking at her with a sympathetic expression. “They just said that you’re supposed to stand up,” she said.

When Roxanne looked, there were two other women in the crowd on their feet, a pretty blonde woman and a brunette, and Roxy swallowed hard and then rose to her feet.

“And the prizes!” the Calphesian called, gesturing to the three of them. “If you ladies would make your way to the back someone will see to you.”

The other two turned to do as they were told, but Roxy felt rooted to the spot. She couldn’t breathe, and her hands were shaking.

“Hey,” Samantha said. “It’ll be okay. You’ll be fine.”

She’d told her parents not to come, but now she sort of wished they would have anyway. At least they knew that this wasn’t something to be proud of or happy about. They would have mourned with her.

Roxanne just nodded to Sam’s attempt to reassure her and turned to head to the back where there was another female Calphesian waiting. “Your name?” she asked, looking down at the tablet in her hands.

“Roxanne Weaver,” Roxy said, voice trembling.

She held out her hand for Roxy’s and pressed it to the tablet. There was a rush of warmth and then a trilling sound that clearly indicated she’d passed whatever fingerprint test she’d just been put through.

“This way,” the female said, motioning for Roxy to follow her. “My name is Llya. I will be attending to you.”

“Nice to meet you,” Roxanne lied.

The female Calphesians were somewhat less scary than their male counterparts. They weren’t as tall, and their horns were smaller, and they wore more clothes, draped in silky fabrics that were nearly sheer, leaving very little to the imagination. Even as she followed her, Roxanne could see the swell of Llya’s hips and the curves of her breasts when they turned down a corridor. She blushed lightly and averted her eyes.

Llya led her to a room that turned out to be a bathroom. A very large bathroom.

The Calphesian compound was the strangest mixture of old and advanced, as evidenced by the tablets and sensors in the walls and doors and the large, sunken basin that served as a bathtub in the center of the room.

It was more like a small pool than a tub, and she watched as Llya and another woman filled it with warm, scented water. It smelled sweet and slightly herby, and Roxanne was nervous about what they might have put in it.

There was a rack of clothing against one wall, and a mirror set into the wall opposite, but the room was bare other than those things and a few small tables which held various bottles and containers.

“Undress,” said Llya, and Roxy’s blush returned. She’d been naked in front of other women before in locker rooms and dressing rooms, but this was something completely different. These women weren’t even the same species as her, and they were
staring.

“Do I have to?” she asked, taking a step back.

The two women exchanged a look and Llya stepped forward. “We will not hurt you,” she said. “You must be made ready.”

Seeing that she really had no other choice in the matter, Roxanne sighed. Carefully she undid the buttons of her shirt and took it off, letting it drop to the floor. She toed off her shoes and socks and then wiggled out of her jeans, standing there in her underwear for a moment before she worked up the nerve to take those off as well.

The other female said something in the Calphesian’s harsh sounding language to Llya who nodded and smiled. “She is saying your skin is very dark. Beautiful,” Llya translated.

“Oh,” Roxy said, blinking. “Thank you.”

Since all the Calphesians were so pale, she supposed dark skin like hers was something of a novelty. She was lighter than her mother, her skin a rich, chestnut brown.

Llya took her hand carefully and led her over to the sunken tub, helping her in.

The water was hot and slightly oily, and Roxanne quickly began to wash herself before one of them could decide that they needed to help her. She didn’t need them to tell her to be thorough, since she was going to be presented like the “prize” she was supposed to be.

The soap smelled like vanilla and lavender and she worked it over her skin, and then sank down in the water, rinsing and enjoying the way the soothing bath worked to calm her nerves.

Once she was deemed clean enough, she was helped out of the bath and dried off and more oils were applied to her skin, which shimmered under the lights. The two women looked at her face for a moment and conversed in low tones before Llya went to get a pot of something that turned out to be gold pigment.

She dipped a finger into it and used it to add a dab of gold to the corner of both of Roxy’s eyes and then to draw curving lines over her collarbones and leading down to her breasts.

When Llya stepped back, the other one came forward, holding a bundle of cloth in the same light material that their clothes were made from. She helped Roxanne step into it, adjusting things here and there before tying it with the sash.

It was like a dress, though the splits on either side of it went all the way up her thighs to her hips, showing her legs and leaving little to the imagination. To Roxanne’s relief, the material was less sheer than what Llya and her companion were wearing, though it still clung and bunched in all the right places to show her...assets.

One shoulder was left completely bare, and it reminded Roxy of the clothes that women wore back in Ancient Greece, draped and flowing and tied with a sash.

The color was a dusky rose that worked well with her skin tone, and her masses of dark curls fell over her shoulders, adding to the effect. When she looked at herself in the mirror that was provided, she felt like being sick all over again because she looked beautiful and every inch like some trophy to be passed off to a champion.

The two females stood back and admired their work on her, nodding to each other. Llya stepped forward once again, eyes cautious.

“You know what will happen?” she asked.

Roxy gave her a puzzled look. “I go out there and one of them picks me to be his wife?” she returned, voice dry.

Llya nodded and then hesitated. “Are you…” she gestured to Roxanne’s lower half. “Have you?”

For a moment Roxy was confused, unsure if there was some sort of language barrier here or if Llya was just too awkward to ask her question in plain language. “Have I what?”

The two Calphesians conferred in their language again and the other said something, which made Llya blush. “Are you untouched?” she asked finally, and then it was Roxy’s turn to blush, even though she usually wasn’t shy about things like that. Still, there was something about being asked if she was a virgin or not by an alien woman that was just so surreal.

“
No
,” Roxanne replied stridently. “Is that going to be a problem?”

They both shook their heads. “No, no. They like...they prefer to not have to...to wait,” Llya explained, and it honestly wasn’t a surprise to hear that.

“Wonderful,” Roxanne deadpanned, dislike and unhappiness twisting and growing until it was like a lead weight in her stomach.

From somewhere else in the compound another horn was blown, and the two women stopped their hovering and adjusting and ushered her out the door.

Everything was happening so fast.

One minute she was being dressed up and the next she was being led back out into the arena. The crowds were still there, but now there were three throne like chairs in the middle of the arena and all the weapons and stones had been cleared away.

The thrones were high backed and tall, draped with crimson fabrics, and seated on them were the three champions.

They looked much alike, all with dark hair and pale skin, and Roxy wasn’t close enough to see what color their eyes were. One of them was clearly older if his horn size was to be believed, and they sat on their thrones like reigning kings, looking down on the women with interest.

The other two women had been done up in much the same fashion as Roxy, draped in their dresses (blue for the blonde and gold for the brunette), though she noticed that both of them were more heavily made up than she was. She wondered what that was about.

Both of them looked nervous, but excited, and Roxanne knew that she was probably the only one who saw this as a sort of death sentence, but that was fine. She hadn’t expected to end up friends with them anyway.

The three Calphesians looked down at them, two of them looked interested, and one looked like he was bored and couldn’t be bothered, and Roxanne disliked him immediately. For a moment no one moved, and then the one who was in charge of the ceremony rushed forward.

“Three champions, three prizes!” he cried, and Roxanne wondered if he was the most excitable Calphesian on the planet. None of the others she’d ever seen had ever spoken with that much enthusiasm in their voices, and the others seemed to be pained by him, even though they didn’t have much of a choice but to put up with it. “Three for three in the way of the treaty,” he continued. “May there always be peace between our kind and yours.”

There was a moment of silence, seemingly to honor what had been said, and Roxanne barely resisted rolling her eyes. It was hard to see the benefit of this when she was the one who was giving up her life for it.

“Now,” the master of ceremonies said, “as our first champion, Shiia, you have first choice.”

The Calphesian sitting in the furthest to the left rose in one fluid motion, and Roxanne was momentarily struck by how graceful he was to be so big. He was bulkier than the other two, and his markings were the most vivid, a deep red instead of the usual brown color. It looked like blood, and she swallowed hard and glanced away, hoping he wouldn’t pick her.

Shiia walked forward towards them, ducking his head to peer at each of them in turn. Now the brunette woman looked a bit cowed, stepping back instinctively, and Roxanne did roll her eyes then. Finally she got with the program.

But the blonde didn’t look afraid at all. Instead she held out a hand to Shiia when he was in front of her, a smile on her face.

Shiia smiled back and inclined his head, reaching for her head. “You,” he said. “I choose.”

Her smile grew, and she dipped an honest to god curtsey. “I’m honored.”

Shiia led her back to his throne, and then helped her up so she could sit in his lap. She looked perfectly happy to be there, too, and Roxanne ground her teeth together to keep from saying something she shouldn’t. She was aware that this was some kind of ceremony, but honestly it just made her angry.

There was a roar of applause from the assembled crowd in the stands, and Roxanne jumped, having been so wrapped up in being angry that she’d forgotten there was an audience present.

“Demos!” cried the Calphesian with the mic. “As the second champion, you get the right of second choice.”

The one in the middle rose then, and Roxanne could see that he was the older one. He was no less well built, despite his apparent age difference, and he held his horned head high as he moved over to them.

Roxy kept her back straight, hands clenched into fists by her side, hidden by the draped folds of her garment. The brunette next to her was breathing quickly, fear apparent in every line of her body, and it was in front of her that Demos stopped.

He looked at her calmly and then held his hand out, making the first move. “I will not hurt you,” he said in a low voice. “Will you allow me to choose you?”

Everyone seemed taken aback by the fact that he’d
asked
rather than making demands, but it had the desired effect. The brunette stopped trembling and managed a shaky smile, putting her hand in Demos’ and nodding.

“I would be honored,” she said softly, and allowed him to lead her back to his throne.