Page 2 of Gemini
He pulled my head closer to his face with a snarl and I winced, eyes shutting close, anticipating a blow. But it didn’t come. “Who did you sell your cunt to, huh? Some rich old dude who’ll pass you to his other rich friends? Like the good little slut that you are?”
I didn’t answer. Telling him that I was traveling to the Zodiac System to be married and bred by an Alien for free seemed like it would only anger him more.
Did we even reach the System? The crew had said we were just over an hour away from the station before wewere attacked.
“Where is the crew?” I asked through the pain.
He pulled harder on my hair. “Dead. We scattered their guts around camp to keep the potential predators off our backs.”
Predators? “What—what planet did we crash on?” He ripped his hand away, pulling the hair brooch with him to inspect it. The brooch my sister had given me before she left. My heart broke in my chest. “Give it back—”
“I haven’t seen any humans to rescue you,” he sneered, ignoring me and sliding the precious item in his pocket. “We’re on Gemini. And in two days, your buyer will be here to make me a really rich and happy man.”
Gemini…So I did make it to my destination…
But the chances that my husband found me before my “buyer” were slim. And whoever that man was? I wasn’t sure I wanted to meet him, high libido be damned. Because if he was allowed to, he would have tried to get one of us directly where we came from. Which could only mean he was on my colony’s black list, and not someone I would enjoy my time with.
2
Please, do not go all ruthless killer.
Nitochi
My blood boiled in my veins as I gazed over the dark forest below, legs dangling from the side of our elevated cave, ignoring the grunts of disapproval coming from Ulughan living in the cavern under ours. Baelor was pacing behind me, restless since he came back from the station just an hour ago.
“I did not see or hear any human flying box crashing,” I said. “Did not see anything amiss on my flights the last few days.”
Baelor stopped and the sound of his wings rustling echoed in the unfamiliar home we had moved into in preparation of our human bride’s arrival.
I had spent the week hunting and gathering materials to build our new, bigger nest. It was ready. The moss bed was thicker and more padded than any I had ever built for myself or Baelor in the past. The few humans I had seen before being banished from their station had thin skin, and I was worried our female would not feel comfortable if the fluffy moss collapsed with use. The new hive we moved into also had running water flowing from the top, just a few levels above andcreated hundreds of little pools for our people living inside to use; a luxury we did not care about before, happy to just fly to the nearest rivers and springs. I had filled our ice columns with the meat of freshly hunted beasts and made covers with their hide.
We were ready. Our new home was ready.
And our bride was not here, lost somewhere on our planet.
“The coordinates say that it did not crash too far from our childhood hive,” Baelor said, reading the human words on the thin white square—paper, he had called it. “I just—I cannot really pinpoint it.”
I gritted my teeth, eyes narrowing as I scanned the forest for unusual signs again. “I thought you learned how to read the human language.”
“I did,” he snapped. “Coordinates are just…another, more complicated thing. From the map they gave me, I could only narrow it down to anarea. Not a precise—”
“Then what are we waiting for?” I asked, turning around to stare at my brother. The other half of my soul, the one that spoke instead ofacting. He froze, eyes darting away. “She could be in danger. She could bedead.”
“Iknowthat! But I—You know my senses are dulled at night. I cannot go now, I will only slow us down and…” He stopped and released a charged breath.
“And you do not trust me to go alone,” I finished for him.
At least, helooked sorry about it. “You do not have the best track records with humans,” Baelor muttered.
“It is different, and you know it.”
“How is it different?” he challenged.
My jaw clenched.Hard. “She is our female. I am not going tohurther.”
“What if she looks at you like all the other humans we have met so far? What if sherejectsus because she finds us terrifying? Will you accept it and let her change her mind?”
“I am not amonster.”
