Alien Prince: (Bride of Qetesh) An Alien SciFi Romance (11 page)

Vanixa disappeared first into the Spire, and Waelden and Calder headed off in one direction and pointed me in another. I was informed a coterie of women would be along shortly to prepare me for the evening’s festivities.

“And do not worry,” Calder said, low so only I could hear, “we shall do nothing you do not wish to do, regardless of whether or not it legitimizes the marriage.”

I tried to smile, but I think it just turned my lips into a thin line, but I felt bolstered. Calder was a gentleman. A gruff, obstinate, horned gentleman. And actually, I fancied myself pretty lucky. What if I had been rescued by a brute? Or someone who would rather give me back to the slavers? No, I knew then as I made my way toward the door they’d indicated that I was very lucky indeed.

The five Europax women who gathered around me were very warm and bubbly, and I appreciated that after spending a couple of days in Vanixa’s cold company. They fawned over me, grateful, I would imagine, to have something to fuss over. Their lives had been a failed experiment for the last several years. They had all taken Qeteshi husbands, and none of those unions had born fruit.

So they focused their attention on me, their erstwhile human Queen. They bathed me and washed my hair before styling it in a neat collection of curls atop my head, with a few loose tendrils left to frame my face. They applied rouge to my lips and cheeks and lined my eyes with kohl. They put jewels in my ears and draped gold around my neck and wrists. Then they put me in my gown, a stunningly beautiful number with an empire waist and cap sleeves. The fabric was light and gossamer as a butterfly wing in shades of white and gold, and there was intricate beadwork along the bustline that, I noticed, looked rather like the tattoos the men wore. I wondered if their women had been similarly marked; I wondered if I would stay and mark myself.

“Here,” one of the girls said in broken English as she pressed a cup of wine into my hand, “drink this. You are nervous, yes? Drink, less nervous.” I did as she bid me, drinking down the sharp, dry red wine as though it were the last thing I would ever taste. The Europax tending me, bless her heart, immediately refilled my cup. “You drink more,” she said, and smiled. “You calm nerves.”

She smiled sweetly at me, this tall, willowy blonde who had become my helpmate. “Here is what you must know,” she said. “They are much bigger than a human male or a Europax male. You must make ready, yes?”

And when I blinked owlishly at her, she heaved a sigh and rolled her pretty brown eyes. “You stand up, I make you ready.”

I wasn’t entirely sure what she meant. Wasn’t I ready? I was dressed. I looked…rather lovely, actually. I looked the part of a princess, with the assistance of my Europax ladies in waiting. I was an alien in this land, and they made me look like its mistress. I finished off the second cup of wine and stood as she bid me. She pressed a strong hand on my back, forcing me to bend over the vanity, and I did so with a little grunt of protestation. “You stay there,” she said, and darted off. “I help you!”

I remained awkwardly in this position, my elbows on the vanity, until she came back. Then, she lifted up my skirt. “Hey!” I began to protest, but she put a hand on my back to shove me down again.

“Trust me,” she said, gathering up my skirts and letting them rest atop my back, “I help you. Now you spread your legs for me.”

“What?”

“Just do!” I grumbled something utterly un-Queen-like under my breath, and spread my legs as she bid me. Because I was wearing no undergarments, this gave her full access to my nethers. I heard a sound rather like someone scooping gel out of a small tub, before I felt her fingers, greased with something cool and sweet-smelling, as they invaded my personal space. She was applying lubrication, working it around my labia, and just inside of me as well. She was quick and perfunctory, and she used the gel liberally. I had seen Calder naked by the pool of still water we’d bathed in together. And while I remember him being a sizable man, it didn’t look like something I couldn’t handle. Still, she had bedded a Qeteshi man, and I had not. So I kept my mouth shut.

When she was done, she patted me on the bottom and helped me to stand upright so that my skirts fell once more to the floor.

“There,” she said, smiling as she wiped her hand on a rag, “now you are ready. You need more wine?”

I shook my head. I was already feeling the effects of the last two glasses. I thought that if I had much more, I might black out in the middle of the proceedings and the thought of losing my faculties entirely was not at all appealing. “Good, then I take you to your King.”

My King. Good God. I spared myself another glance in the mirror, and couldn’t help but smile a little. My life was many things, but “ordinary” was not one of them. Following the blond Europax — whose name I really thought I should learn given where she’d just had her fingers — I could feel my heart beating out of my chest.

The Spire was beautiful, not at all like the cold spaceship I had imagined. There were tapestries draped everywhere, and the lighting was warm and indirect. When the Europax led me into the audience chamber, Calder was already laying down atop a bed of velveteen pillows. He was naked, save for the crown he wore on his head. When he caught sight of me, his entire face lit up, and as I drew nearer, I understood why the lubrication had been so necessary. At its full turgidity, Calder was easily three times the size of any other man I’d seen. I approached him tentatively, trembling with nerves, and the blond Europax took her place around the outskirts of the bed. Once I was in place, they drew a set of gossamer curtains around us to give us the semblance of privacy.

“You are stunning,” he said to me, holding out his hand. I took it, and he drew me close to him.

“You are looking rather fine yourself,” I said, pointing to the crown. It was a weave of silver and gold, with broad, black stones at its center. It was a beautiful, masculine thing, and it rested easily between his horns.

“Is the crown absurd?” he asked. “The crown is absurd.”

“No,” I said, smiling. “It looks fantastic.”

“I feel like an imposter,” he confided. “Like I have betrayed the memory of Ramari Ro’quare.”

“Your mother.”

He nodded, but he would not say the word. “Perhaps I…I never should have left.” He averted his gaze, and I caught his chin with my fingertip. He’d shaved. His skin was smooth and much softer than I thought it would be.

“If you hadn’t,” I said, “you never would have found me.”

Calder swallowed hard as he trailed his fingers up my bare arms, sending a little shiver through me. “We do not have to do this,” he murmured. “I will not ask you to.”

“I want to,” I said, before I even realized it was true. I did want to. Call it the wine, the stress, the desperation of the situation, whatever it was, I wanted this. I wanted this marriage to be legal, I wanted the aid of these people, but more than any of that, I wanted him. Calder. Not the king, not the man who would assist me, just…Calder. I bent forward and caught his mouth in a kiss, and he kissed me back with such fervor as I had never felt before. It made my heart rise up into my throat.

“I do not know if I can be gentle,” he said, his voice a low growl.

“Then don’t be,” I said in English, but he took my meaning well enough when he gripped me by the hips and rolled me onto my back. With one hand he tugged at my skirts so that they came up to my waist, and the other he used to tug my breast free of the confines of my gown. I scooted over a little and spread my legs for him, startled that we had gotten so quickly to the main event, and yet craving the sensation of him filling me up all the same. He lifted himself over me, careful not to crush me beneath him, and he took his cock in his fist and directed it to my wet and sensitive opening.

I cried out when he thrust himself home, sliding easily into me with the aid of the lubrication and my own natural wanting. He gripped me by the hips and leaned forward to take my nipple into his mouth, fucking me with abandon. I was lost in his hard and steady rhythm, oblivious to the fact that dozens of eyes were on us as he plowed into me. I dug my nails into the flesh of his back, and he grunted as he bucked his hips back and forth before he pressed his lips to mine in a hungry kiss. After a moment, he pulled out and turned me over, hoisting me up so that I was on my hands and knees in front of him. Then he slipped his quivering cock back into me, sinking his fingers into the flesh of my backside as he pressed his hips forward. I cried out and pressed back against him, rocking back and forth so that our bodies slammed together with each thrust.

He reached around and pressed one of his fingers against the rigid pith of my sex, and I felt my orgasm begin to grow deep from within me. I came fast and fiercely, calling out his name as my inner walls contracted with the force of my orgasm. With one final thrust and a great bellow, Calder reached his own zenith, and released his seed deep within me. We collapsed together, spent and breathless, but when the group of people around us began to applaud, we could do nothing but laugh.

We laid together for a long moment on a scattering of velveteen pillows, obscured only slightly by the gossamer curtains that separated us from the crowd filing out of our chamber. We shifted in our shared afterglow until we were side by side, our limbs all tangled, our breathing falling into the same steady rhythm.

I heard the door shut as the last of the guests left us on our own, and I rolled over until my left leg draped over his right, and my arm rested, bent at the elbow, on the vast expanse of his chest. I propped my head up on the heel of my hand and peered down at him: his eyes were closed, the hint of a smile gracing his lips, and I thought to myself, How strange. And I thought to myself, How wonderful.

“What happens now?” I murmured, loathe to break our companionable silence.

“Now,” came his gentle reply, “the guests will file into the banquet hall, whereupon they will begin the feast.” It wasn’t until he said the word “feast” that I realized I was starving. My desires sated, it was time for me to take care of other more basic biological needs.

“But what do we do?” I pressed, trailing my fingertip along the lines of one of his spiraling tribal tattoos. It came down in a thick column over his left shoulder, curving beneath his breastbone until it splayed its spiral across the left side of his rib cage.

“We sleep?” he said, but it wasn’t a statement. It sounded more like a plea.

“Is that really what we do now?” I asked. “Here? In this bizarre sort of…viewing chamber?”

Calder heaved a sigh, though his smile never faded, and opened his eyes before turning his head to look at me. “I suppose I shouldn’t have expected a nap, but you cannot blame me for wanting one.” Certainly not, not after the workout we’d given each other. I laid my head down on his arm and looked at him, really looked at him. He had dozens of rings in his elfin ears, countless designs in ink across his flesh, a fine aquiline nose, and skin sunkissed and rich.

And horns. He had horns. But even those were starting to seem less strange.

He lifted his right hand and swept a few errant locks of hair out of my eyes, locking his limpid blue eyes on my face. “And how are you feeling?” he asked, his tone low and sonorous.

“I’m…” I paused, canting my head to the side as I checked in with myself. I blinked. “I’m fine, actually,” came my surprised reply. “I thought I would feel… I don’t know. Strange? Or violated somehow, doing…what we did…in front of all those people. But…”

“But you were lost in the moment,” he said, and I felt the rose of a blush warm the apples of my cheeks. I nodded, abashed. “So was I.”

“I hardly even noticed that they were there, to be honest,” I continued, and rolled onto my back, staring up at where the lacy curtains were attached to golden curtain rods mounted to the ceiling. A small crystal chandelier hung above us, sending dancing prisms onto our bodies.

“I noticed them at first,” he admitted. “I was keenly aware of them before you arrived.”

I laughed. “Undoubtedly.”

“But then…” I felt his shoulder rise to his ears in a shrug. “I saw you, and I forgot about them entirely.”

I smiled, allowing my eyes to come to a close and losing myself in my other senses: The air was warm, and scented sweetly of smoke and lavender, beneath which was the musk of sweat and sex; my fingertips felt the warmth of Calder’s skin on one side, and the soft, cool velvet of a pillow on the other; I could taste the tang of red wine on my tongue; I could hear harp music drifting in from another room. And then I heard him chuckle, breathy and low, and I opened one eye to peer at him.

“What?” I urged.

“This is not how I pictured my wedding night,” he said by way of explanation.

“Is that so?” I asked, a smile in my tone. “And how did you picture it?”

“Honestly?” he began, pushing himself up to sitting. “I did not think I should ever take a mate. But I thought, if I were to take one, that we would marry in private, on our secluded homestead.” His smile faded, urging me to sit up as well. I brought my knees up and hugged them to my chest.

“What is it?”

“I just…” he gave a slow shake of his head, purposefully averting his gaze. “I never expected to come back here, after Ramari. After… my…” He cleared his throat. “After she passed, I never thought I would be back here. I certainly did not expect to take up the mantle of my people. I thought that once I had given up my position as their spiritual leader, they would not want me back. As the months passed, and the years, I thought I would have to win them over. And yet, here I am.” He lifted his eyes to look at me, and they were blue and watery as two still ponds. “They have welcomed me back with open arms.”

“They are lucky to have you,” I said, reaching out and placing a hand on his arm. “And so am I.”

He scoffed, self-consciously running his hands over his hair, mussed as it was from our activities. “I’m serious,” I continued. “No one else would have done something like this for me.”

“What do you mean?”

“Agreed to marry me, to keep me safe,” I went on. “You’ve saved me. And with your help, we can save others.”