ALIEN ABDUCTION (Captured by Aliens) (6 page)

“Oh, it’s
moonlight,” she whispered.  “The moon is up!”  Ebony turned back to Fallon and
could not help smiling.  “I haven’t seen the moon--or the stars--since I’ve
been here.  There are no windows in the harem and they never let us go out into
the gardens at night.  The gardens are the only place where we ever see the
sky.”

Fallon
paused, and stared at her thoughtfully; and then, after a moment, he took her
by one elbow and led her a short distance off the main path.  Before Ebony could
protest, he turned her around to face the way they had come.

“Look,”
he said.  “See for yourself.”

Ebony
looked up through an open space in the trees.  There, shining down on her face
like spotlights, was not one--not two--but three different moons.  One was
large and yellow, one was rather small and pale sandy brown, and the third was
very small and bright white and seemed to be slowly tumbling end over end even
as she looked at it. 

And all
around the three strange moons were stars unlike any she had seen before.  A
few were silvery white, but many others glowed fiercely blue or a garish deep
red--and they were so thickly clustered together that there would be no true
night in this place even without the moons.

“Oh!” she
said, and suddenly buried her face in her hands. 
“Oh...”
 She began to
cry in a way that she had never cried since coming here.

Fallon
stepped over to her, and put his finger beneath her chin to force her to look
up.  “Why are you weeping?” he asked, and she could hear the genuine puzzlement
in his voice. 

“You
wished to see the moonlight.  I have allowed you to do so, even though I should
have made you keep walking.  Why are you weeping?”

She
pulled her face away from his iron finger and struggled to get her emotions
under control.  “Seeing three moons in the sky, along with those crazy big red
and blue stars, reminds me so much of how I’m not on Earth any more, and that
I’ll never see it again,” she said, her voice shaking.  “You wouldn’t
understand.  But I miss my home.  Go ahead and laugh if you want.  You can do
it behind my back while I walk like a slave back to the other captives.”

“I do not
laugh at you, Ebony,” Fallon said quietly.  “But perhaps I should tell you that
Chalcydon actually has five moons.  Only three of them are visible from here on
this night.”

Ebony
closed her eyes briefly, and then raised her chin and went striding away.  Soon
she had caught up with the group.  She made a point of not looking up to the
sky again.

It wasn’t
until the outline of a building appeared before them in the dimness that Ebony
stopped dwelling on her frustration and fatigue and sadness, and began to hope
that relief was within her reach. 

But that
hope faded as soon as they got close to the building.  She could see that the
place had been built for the heat and the rain, not for cooler temperatures.  It
looked much like the Cherokee summer house where she had gone family camping
one year as a child.

The back
wall, the roof, and the main support were constructed of pine logs taken from
the surrounding woods.  The remaining three sides were wide open to the air.  Beneath
the thatched roof, the floor of the hut had been scraped down to bare dirt.  There
was a crude stone hearth and chimney built into the back wall, but Ebony could
see, by the blackened stains in the fireplace and the dry pine needles blown
inside it by the winds, that it had been a very long time since a fire had been
built there.

Ebony
couldn’t help the disgusted look that crossed her face.  She saw it on the faces
of Cassie and the other women, too.  “You brought us to a
roof?
 With
one
wall?” she said.  “You’ve got to be kidding.  We need a building.  A safe place
to sleep.  That’s nothin’ but a
roof!
 Are you
serious?
”

“We’ll
rest for the night here and continue on at daybreak,” Fallon said, and nodded
to his men.  Two of them walked under the roof and began cleaning the pine
cones and twigs and other debris from the covered area, and carried away a few
stray stones.  Soon the floor was smooth, even if it was just bare earth.  “There,”
Fallon said.  “Now you’ve got a clean place to sleep.”

Before
Ebony could answer, the men caught the women by the arms and walked them firmly
into the shelter.  She suddenly realized that each of the seven other women had
one of Fallon’s men assigned to guard her at all times, for the same woman was
always closely watched and accompanied by the same man. 

Again she
could feel the tension within these men, just as she had with the guards who
accompanied her to King Kore’s apartments--especially after the king had forced
those men to watch what he did to her.  Fallon’s men also went about as though
in the grip of iron control, but they eyed Cassie and Suzanne and Rebecca and
all the other women the way a wolf looked at a lamb.  The women only gathered
together and tried to stay as far away from the men who guarded them as
possible, but should the men choose to make any moves on them there would be
nothing Ebony or any of them could do.

Fallon
also walked Ebony to one corner of the shelter, and let her go only when she
stood very close to the other women.  She’d never known that one man could have
so much strength in his hands.  Damon stood close by, too, and she suddenly
realized that Damon was the odd man out.  He was the only one with no woman
assigned to him to guard.  Yet he studied Ebony just as closely as Fallon did--just
the way the other men studied their women.

She
wondered what kind of night they could expect.

CHAPTER SIX

Cold,
hungry, tired, and miserable, Ebony walked to the back wall of the structure--the
only wall it had.  She looked around in the dimness to make sure there were no
lurking bugs, and then lowered herself onto the newly swept dirt floor.  Sitting
cross-legged, she propped her elbows on one knee and settled her face in the
cradle of her bound hands.

Fallon
eyed her for a moment.  When he saw that everyone had settled into a spot, he
sat down on one side of her and then Damon sat down on the other.

Ebony
looked first left and then right at the two men flanking her.  “What’s this
about? Does it take two of you big oafs to guard someone as little as me?  One
ain’t enough?”

Damon’s
cheeks stained red as he flashed Fallon a look.  It didn’t take much smarts to
know that Fallon was the ruler of this group.  All the men looked to him for
everything.

Finally
Ebony turned and looked at Fallon.  “When I was in the harem, there wasn’t much
to do except listen to gossip.  There was a lot of whispering about some ‘rebel
faction,’ but I didn’t know who they were or if it was even real--until now.”

She
watched the two of them, but they merely stared back at her.  “And I still
can’t figure out how these ‘rebels” could get into and out of Auresial Palace
without being seen, and why they wanted the king’s harem.  Were y’all just that
horny?”

The men
seemed not to have heard.  Fallon returned Damon’s look and then rummaged
around in a pack hanging from his belt.  He pulled out a brown, wrinkled strip
of something and handed it to Ebony.  “Here.  Eat this.  We’re still too close
to the city to risk lighting a fire or hunting.”

Ebony’s
nostrils flared and her lip curled in one corner.  She took the brown thing in
her fingertips and held it out at arm’s length to look at it.  When she got up
the nerve to give it a cautious sniff, she found that it looked and smelled
like meat jerky.

“I don’t
want to know what kind of meat this is,” she said, “because right now I’m too
hungry to care.” After a moment, with her tummy grumbling, she stuck a corner
of the leathery strip in her mouth and ripped off a corner with her teeth.

She
nodded.  “Pretty good.  Or maybe that’s just the starvation talking.” And then
kept chewing and chewing until at last she could swallow the first bite. 

“So,”
Ebony continued, looking over at Fallon, “how about this rope on my hands?  I’m
going to have a hard time sleeping like this.  It was hell trying to relieve
myself and then get my skirt and panties back up.”

“No.  The
restraints stay on,” Fallon said, chewing on his own piece of jerky.  “We’re all
tired and we’re not going to worry about you running away while we rest.”

She
sighed.  “Well, then, how about you tell us why we’ve been taken?  Maybe we’ll
cooperate better if you explain it to us,” she said, catching the eye of Cassie
and the others.  The women nodded.

“You will
continue to cooperate, regardless of the circumstance.  But since you asked--you
and the others are to be ransomed.  That is all I am willing to say.” The set
of Fallon’s jaw brooked no argument.

Ebony had
never been one to take a hint, even if it hit her in the face.  “Ransom? You
really think the king wants us enough to
pay
to get us back?”

A muscle
ticked in his jaw.  Damon walked up behind her and grabbed her shoulders.  “Do
you want me to gag her?” he said.

Fallon swore
under his breath.  “Much as I would love to have you shut her up--no.  Do not
gag her.” Damon let go of her shoulders, and then stepped away with a little
snort of frustration. 

“Finish
eating and go to sleep, Ebony,” Fallon said quietly, for her ears alone.  “Don’t
make me change my mind.” His voice was soft but the menace in it was mildly
alarming.  If Ebony had not been certain that their captors did indeed need her
and the other women alive and unharmed, she would be scared.

She
sighed again.  She was getting pretty tired of his Big Daddy attitude, but
decided it was still better to play along and nodded slightly.  “Can I join the
others?  They don’t know much, but they’re more fun to talk to than you are.”

Fallon
gave her a cold stare.  “Go.  And tell them all to sleep.  We march again at
dawn.”

Ebony
smiled briefly at him and then got up and walked to the far side of the shelter
where the other seven women were huddled together. 

“Listen
to me,” Ebony said, sitting down beside Cassie.  “By the looks of the men,
they’re about as tired as we are.  I imagine it was a pretty tough journey for
them just to make it to the city, and it’s obviously taken a toll on them.  Look.”

Even as
the women watched, all nine of the men sat down and began dozing off.  Their
shoulders and heads drooped with weariness, and one man simply allowed himself
to fall onto his side on the earthen floor of the shelter.  “Wow--they’re
asleep already,” marveled Cassie.

“Now,
look at what I’ve got here.” Moving her hands together, Ebony reached down
inside her panties and drew out the piece of seashell.  “I’m pretty sure the
sharp edge on this will cut through the ropes on our wrists--and then, with
this place being open on three sides, escaping would be a breeze.”

“Escaping!”
said Cassie.  Suzanne and Pamela came over to huddle near her.  “What do you
mean?”

Ebony
tried to summon up the patience to explain it to them.  “If we’re close enough
to the city that Fallon’s afraid to light a cook fire, then we’re close enough
to find a rescue party...if that pig everybody calls the king cares enough
about his harem to send somebody out to look for us.”

“But we
can’t escape!” said Pamela.

“They’ll
kill us!” moaned Suzanne, and all of them collapsed together and sat huddled
and crying on the cold earth floor.

“Hey--
hey!
”
whispered Ebony, as loudly as she dared.  “Listen to me: Are any of you
pregnant?”

They
women all looked up.  The sobbing gave way to sniffling.  “What?”

“I
said
--are
any of you
pregnant?
”

Slowly
the women looked at each other, and then began shaking their heads.

“No,”
said Famke, the tall, reticent, Scandinavian beauty, and Jane, the ill-tempered
dark blonde.

“I’m
not,” said Pamela, a redhead and the plainest of the group.

“Not me,”
added Michelle, a pretty but fearful redhead, and Rebecca, with dark red hair
and a nerdy, problem-solving temperament.

“You told
us not to let it happen!” cried Cassie and Suzanne, the two sweet-tempered pale
blondes.

Ebony
sighed again.  “Yeah, I guess I did.  But now that we’re kidnapped, I’d hoped
that King Kore might be worried enough about some of us carrying his unborn
children to try to bring us back.”  Her eyes flicked across their faces in the
dim moonlight of the shelter, but all she saw there was pleading and fear.  “I
guess we’ve all been a little too successful at diverting his attempts.”

The other
women looked away, or at each other, but kept silent.  Ebony shook her head.  “With
none of us pregnant, I don’t see that there’s much to inspire the king to
rescue us.”

“Speak
for yourself,” said Jane.  “All the king wants is sex, morning, noon, and night. 
He needs all the women he can get.”

“But--there
are no native women at all to be found on Chalcydon,” said Rebecca.  “You heard
what they said when we got here.  They said that all the women died in some
kind of plague.”

“Yeah,
but the Grays land practically every month with a fresh supply, just like they
did with us,” Ebony said.  “There’s not exactly a shortage anymore.”

The women
began quietly weeping again.  “But maybe the king won’t think of that,” Ebony
added quickly.  “He’s not exactly the smartest man I ever saw.”

“Or he
could just use the opportunity to replace us all with a fresh new harem!” cried
Cassie.

“Yes--one
that might have better luck in getting him an heir,” said Jane, hissing through
her teeth.

“Oh, we
should have thought of that!” wept Michelle, and all of them collapsed together
again.

“Shhh. 
Shhh!
”
Ebony told them.  “The what-ifs will keep us all up all night if we let them.  Tonight
we’ve got to rest and save our energy.  Then we’ll figure out what to do.  All
right?”

The women
all quieted at that, and nodded silently.  To Ebony’s relief, they began to
settle down together and prepare to rest.  And then, later on tonight, once
both the men and the women were asleep, she’d get away on her own. 

If she
was lucky, she could make it back to the city and send help this way for the
other women.  She could find Adrienne and her husband, Captain Dezec Zeta, and
they would help her.  Dezec could enlist others to come and rescue them all.  He
was smart.  He would find a way and he would find them.  Adrienne would
certainly encourage him to go and free a group of women captives--women that
she knew herself.

And if
she wasn’t so lucky--well, she could only hope that Fallon and his rebel men
weren’t as horrible as the stories said they were.  She replaced the broken
seashell within her ragged clothes once more, lay her head down, and tried to
sleep.

***

Sleeping
came easy.  Waking up was a different matter altogether.

It was
the cacophony of snoring from the men that finally awakened Ebony.  She wasn’t
sure who was the loudest, or if they were having a pissing contest in their
subconscious, or what, but luckily the dregs of her exhaustion had worn off
enough that she could rouse herself from slumber.

On one
side of her, Damon lay on his back.  To her right lay Fallon.  Both seemed
deeply asleep, if the roaring and snuffling out of their mouths was any
indication.

Ebony
popped her head up.  A quick glance around the camp by the faint light of the
three moons showed her that everyone else was asleep, too, and no guard had
been set. 

She
almost laughed.  The men must have assumed they would not be discovered out
here if they were all willing to sleep at the same time.  And, even better,
they must have been equally confident that the women could not get loose--or
would be too frightened to run if they did get loose--or perhaps they thought
the women did not have any desire to escape in the first place.

That was
good enough for her.  Feeling confident, Ebony carefully stood up--not easy
with one’s wrists tied together--and tiptoed over to the far end of the
shelter, on the other side of the sleeping women. 

She
slipped the seashell out of her underwear and went to work on the ropes that
bound her.  It took her a while, but she kept patiently whittling with the thin
piece of shell--and finally she tore through the rope enough that she could
snap the binding with brute strength.

Finally
free at last, she rubbed the raw skin circling her wrists.  She was tempted to
go back and just smother Fallon and Damon in their sleep, but she was pretty
sure they’d wake up and snuff her lights out.  Ebony crept surreptitiously from
the shelter and stepped into the darkness of the woods. 

She
hadn’t made it twenty feet from the camp when she heard a snap of underbrush.

Whipping
her head toward the sound, her eyes widened and her mouth gaped to see Fallon
standing in the dark, stalking her with a furious expression on his face.

The urge
to shriek strangled in her throat when he launched himself at her.  Ebony tried
to leap backward, but she stumbled over a fallen log and landed on the ground
flat on her back.