The Alpha King (4 page)

Tal nodded and smiled, but he determined he'd never find his mate. He loved his family, but nothing lasted forever. People died, and people left. They especially left him, so it would do no good for him to have a mate he wouldn't want to live without, knowing one day that mate would do the same and leave him behind.

He also had that whole men getting pregnant thing. He couldn't wrap his mind around it and utterly refused to do so. It might work for some other people, but at the age of fourteen, the thought of carrying a child scared the ever-loving shit out of him and he would not consider the possibility.

From that day onward, Tal refused to get emotionally entangled with anyone. He might be Vermithian, but he didn't have to let fate decide his destiny.

CHAPTER TWO

It might be years later, but Tal still shuddered at the thought of carrying a child so he required every boyfriend, every meaningless fuck, every one-night stand or bathroom hookup to wear a condom… even if a mutual jerkoff or blowjob might be the only thing they did. He'd gotten a reputation for being overly protective and safe when it came to sex, even though most of the STDs from centuries past were completely eradicated. People still used contraceptives to prevent pregnancy and while Tal hadn't met anyone he felt inexplicably drawn to, he wouldn't be taking any chances.

Of course, Josie, being a nosey older sister, refused to let his behavior go without remarking on it. His online friend, 'Mail S' did the same, the two oftentimes ganging up on Tal over the years telling him to stop being so fearful. But he ignored them. He had his reasons and they didn't understand.

He should have known Josie wouldn't give up so easily. The day they loaded their shuttle for their most recent expedition and delivery, she decided to speak to him about the direction his life had taken.

"You know what? I think you never look for anything serious and are so cautious about the whole condom thing because you're actually afraid of any type of committed emotion," Josie stated when she stored her case, filled with clothing, toiletries, electronic books and music in her private cabin before turning to face him.

Her thick black hair swung back behind her shoulders, the tight curls never losing their spring.

"What the hell are you blathering on about?" Tal murmured and sauntered away, putting an exaggerated swing in his hips, smiling when Josie giggled.

He didn't need much room to slide past her in the narrow hallway, his height and weight almost matching Josie's small but curvy frame. He walked towards his own quarters on the rather luxurious shuttle and put away his travel items. He loved traveling with his sister, he really did, but she'd become horribly focused on him finding his mate and having a bunch of 'little Tals' running around. Josie more than likely tried to live vicariously through him. It had been a year since she'd broken up with her last boyfriend, a disgusting blue bird shifter named Oponkian, from the planet of Bolauntiq. Josie had met Oponkian when she'd gone with Tal to make a delivery of Vamprician Flow to the planet's kingdom. Tal had never regretted a delivery so much before.

Josie followed him to the shuttle's flight deck and sat in her chair next to his. "I'm talking about you, Tally. You and your fear of your mate, whomever he is, and your fear of having children of your own." With a final wave to their parents through the forward viewing window, she helped him prepare for liftoff.

"Josie, where the hell are these children supposed to come from if my mate is a man and I get pregnant? I sure as hell won't be shooting them out of my ass, my mouth, or any other small hole on me," Tal growled his usual, rather silly defense, hoping she would be put off while he focused on inputting their destination's coordinates into the shuttle's computer navigational system.

"Mom already told you when it was time for you to give birth a line would appear on your stomach and open so the doctor would be able to deliver the baby. That's not an excuse anymore," Josie pointed out.

Tal shot her a glare and turned his head back to focus on flying. He set the coordinates for Strawxig and turned his mind to the delivery they were making to Leader Torqran of the GPA. He had no idea why he had specifically been asked for, but he wouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth. He'd to make enough money with this one delivery to get his own place so he wouldn't have to keep sharing an apartment with his sister. Hell, he'd be making enough money to move to the affluent planet of Printakium, even if the planet had been overrun with vampires. He'd gotten to the point where he'd rather live in an area surrounded by rich, undead snobs than to listen to his family drone on and on about his lack of goals, ambitions, dreams, and how he needed to look for his mate.

His family had hit on his last nerve and he was on the verge of a freakout. Or a major mental breakdown. Whichever happened first.

"Doesn't matter anyway, with all the men and women I've met and been with, none of them were my mate. Not one. So, I'm thinking my mate died before I had a chance to meet them, and since I have no desire to settle down and have a bunch of little Tals running around, I figure it's all for the best," Tal stated emphatically.

"Bullshit," Josie scoffed, raising her eyebrow when he shot her an incredulous look. "You want all of that, the husband, the kids, you want to have someone to cook for and take care of. You're wired that way. When we played as kids, you always wanted to be the mom or the wife or the nurse."

Tal flipped her off and Josie laughed.

"Face it, Tal, the only reason you say you're so opposed to the idea is because you don't have it right now and you don't think you'll ever have it, but if you were faced with the reality of your mate and a lifetime of love, happiness, and children, you'd jump at the chance."

Tal swallowed deeply and closed his eyes at the brief flash of a life with his mate and their children before he mentally shook the image away—an image of a large muscled man with black hair and blue eyes fading from his mind. He'd been dreaming about the man every, single night for the past three years, and found it a bit unnerving.

"Not even a little," Tal lied, smoothing his hands over his thick, long brown hair, making sure he wasn't sitting on it, and turned his mind back to the task at hand.

They talked about all manner of things as they flew farther away from their home planet and closer to their destination. Tal laughed when Josie described the Doralian she'd met online and slept with. Josie had a soft spot for large men—they shared that turn-on—and she couldn't get much larger than a bear shifter. Everything on target as they flew towards Strawxig to deliver their goods and engage in a little exchanging for their family, Tal figured they'd never had such an easy delivery before.

The notion got cut short, when without warning, a massive space storm arose and he and Josie found themselves thrown 25,000 light-years off course and came out of warp headed to a totally different planet.

"What the hell?" Josie yelled, clutching at the arms of her chair, her hair flying around her face, her eyes wide.

Tal would have laughed at how frightened she looked had he not been trying to keep the shuttle in line, and had he not been scared shitless himself.

"I don't know! That storm came out of nowhere; we've been rerouted to Tumaro by the shipboard computer." Tal felt both frustration and a little fear as the shuttle sputtered and whirled around, his systems shutting down one by one.

His hands moved frantically over the board, Josie's fingers moving in rhythm with his as the two of them did the best they could to keep from crashing.

"Isn't that where all of those fucking dog shape-shifters live?" Josie asked, anxiety creeping into her voice.

"Not all of them, but yes, it's like the wolf shifter planet and they don't have a democracy like we do, they have a monarchy," Tal explained before angrily pounding his systems board when the shuttle's brakes cut off. "Shit, we're going to have a crash landing… a hard crash landing," he warned when they passed through the atmosphere of the planet Tumaro. "Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fucking shit balls!" He swore loud and long when the shuttle's shields crashed completely.

Tal lifted his hands to his head momentarily and grabbed his hair before thumping the useless brakes again in the hopes they would reboot. What the fuck? How had this happened? Things had been going so well. How had it gotten this bad? He returned his hands back to the shuttle's control board trying to bring the systems back up.

He yelled out to his sister. "Josie, I hope you weren't being an idiotic bitch and unhooked your safety belt, because when we crash, anything not strapped down is going to go sailing through the front viewing window and Mom and Dad would kill me if you died!" he shouted over the sounds of the shuttle hurtling through the air towards the ground.

"Well let's hope that when we land the shape-shifters will be in human form and not puppy form or whatever they are," Josie joked, "so they can use their hands, and not their paws, to help us."

Tal and laughed at her attempt at humor. Josie joked when she got scared, but he'd never been so thankful for her absurdity at that moment. He reached out a hand and clutched hers tightly, only then noticing her unbuckled safety belt.

"Josie, your bel—"

Tal's words were abruptly cut off as the shuttle crashed violently to the ground and the shuttle ripped apart as they bounced, rolled, and spun to a halt. His head snapped forward and back, his body shook with the ship and his hands flew forward towards the front of the shuttle as his life flashed before his eyes. He thought about his parents and the day he'd come out to them. He turned to check on Josie, noticing her empty seat just as unconsciousness claimed him.

* * * *

The horrific shuttle crash didn't change history. But people remarked upon, debated, and mentioned the damage to the small shuttle for decades after the fateful event. Not even the cargo the shuttle carried, over sixteen zillion malui worth of gems and natural stones altered the course of destiny. The two passengers who flew in the shuttle weren't found among the gems, stones, money, clothing, and the broken and shattered remains of the space vessel. Instead they were found several feet away from the broken vessel, among the foliage, inside the walls of the Tumaron palace and their identities were remarked upon for centuries after the One called them home. A stranger—a humanoid, not a Tumaron werewolf shape shifter—lay injured, brutally so, in a location far from his original course.

That one man changed the history of Planet Tumaro. He so completely altered an entire planet, her people, and their ruler. Though Tumaro had not been his original destination, fate had brought him almost 50,000 light years away from of his original destination of Strawxig. The crash would have killed a lesser being, and maybe he would have accepted the option over fate stepping in and taking over. His destiny awaited him on the planet of Tumaro and the big payoff he'd expected from his delivery to Strawxig… would have led straight to his death.

The man found didn't happen to be just any humanoid, either, but a Vermithian. One with a price on his head and a prophecy to fulfill.

CHAPTER THREE

Alpha King Blazell Roughshire waved goodbye to his cousins, Anglania and Freud Lang, and breathed a sigh of relief. He hated it when Anglania and Freud came to visit. He couldn't put his finger on it, but something about them always smelled… off. Anglania hoped he would eventually give up on his quest to find his mate and if she knew how close he'd come to giving in to her not quite so subtle hints and attempts at flattery—in her journey to becoming the Alpha Queen—she'd be relentless. Blaze counted himself lucky she didn't know.

Walking into his sitting room, he closed the door after sending away the guards who had stepped inside with him. He needed some time alone. He didn't want to wear the constricting mantle of Alpha King at that moment.

With a sigh, he pulled off his crown and robe and placed both items on the coffee table in the middle of the room. Walking over to the electronic bar, he pressed the button for a glass of Vamprincian Flow. Once it had been poured, he picked up the glass and took a deep gulp of the intoxicating liquid. Smacking his lips, he savored the aftertaste on his tongue and massaged the back of his neck. Walking back over to the large sofa facing the vid screen, he sat down heavily upon the cushions and put his feet up on the coffee table, the glass of Vamprincian Flow hanging from the grasp of his right hand. He lifted his right foot and pushed off the black boot on his left foot before repeating the action with his left foot and right boot. He grunted when the boots hit the ground.

He groaned and leaned his head back, closing his eyes as he inhaled deeply. Bone tired. He really needed a vacation. Having been in the role of Alpha King for over ten years, he'd grown tired of the bickering of his people, tired of the women who threw themselves at him—whether they were mated or not—and tired most of all of having to hide the fact that he preferred the company of the male Tumarons to the females. With another groan he sat up and leaned forward, reaching for the remote that lay on the edge of the table and pushed the gold button in the center to turn on the screen and play the vid he'd watched every day since his parents had both passed away.

His heart clenched in pain when his father's face appeared on the screen. His father had been a man larger than life. One of the strongest Tumarons in history, he'd ruled the planet and his kingdom with dignity, respect, strength, and justice. He'd instilled that same sense of duty and leadership in both of his sons. Blazell snorted when he thought of his brother, Buckington. He didn't know what his younger brother had going on, but he had been suspiciously absent for weeks on end, and he and Blaze's assistant, Percy, seemed to be more and more at odds with each other. Blazell had some suspicions about those two, about the true nature of their relationship, but he wouldn't butt in. Besides, Buck never stayed in one area long enough for Blazell to talk to him.