Chapter 11

Idon’t have any weapons. I’m tired, my back aches from where I fell on the stupid couch, and my dress is covered in alien blood. And my own, apparently.

Then there’s this collar around my neck, which is my second least favorite new development.

My absolute least favorite new development is that it’s looking like Lyko and I are about to be thrown into a gladiator ring.

“I blame this on your goddess, by the way,” I tell him sullenly.

“What?”

“Yeah.”

He stares at me, probably taken aback by my attitude. I guess old Piper would be crying in a clump on the floor or something. I don’t have time for that shit now.

“What do you mean?” he asks.

“Your goddess?” I point to my ankle. “The one who marked me. She spoke to me, too. Said if I was worthy, I’d live.”

His eyes seem to get even darker, and his jaw clenches.

“Yep. Right before these blue lion fuckers came and snatched us up.”

“Lyin?”

“Li-on,” I correct. “They look a little like lions we have on Earth. Animals. Funnily enough, humans used to throw lions into arenas like this. A long time ago.”

“That does not seem funny to me,” he says.

“It’s not.” I shrug my shoulder, then immediately regret it.

“Did you hit your head?” he asks me, stepping closer and holding my chin as he stares into my eyes.

“Probably,” I say sweetly.

“You are acting very strangely.”

I roll my eyes and blow out a breath, shaking off his grip. “No, I’m not.”

“I assure you, you are.”

“No, I’m not.”

“You should let me check your head for injury.”

“Why? Do you have magic healing powers I don’t know about?” I ask sarcastically. Sure, it’s a dick move to be mad at him for how this is all going down, but it turns out dick moves are my forte at the moment.

“Because I want to help you,” he says patiently, which sets my teeth on edge even more.

“You don’t even know me.”

He doesn’t explode at me like I expect him to. Instead, he studies me as though he’s fascinated by this new side of me.

Well, new to him.

I’vealways known I was a raging bitch, after all.

“So, what’s the plan?” I ask, an unsteady feeling settling over me. Not just because we’ve been quite literally tossed into a death trap, but because of his interested perusal.

It feels like the only real thing in the cell with us.

Certainly more real than our impending doom.

“We survive.” His attention turns back to the arena in front of us.

“And then?” I press.

“Then we escape.”

I sigh, leaning against the cool wall. The arena is chaos, and the fact that I can’t hear the screams of the alien impaled on something that looks like a trident makes it even more surreal. “Feels like we’re missing a few steps.”

“I don’t have answers for you.” He grits the words out, like admitting it pains him. “Do you want to recommend a course of action, my queen?”

I don’t have an answer to that either.

So we watch the battle on the other side of the clear wall unfold in tense, weighted silence.

Hours slide by, but whatever passes for this planet’s sun still hangs high in the sky. The later the day slips, though, the more feverish the cheering of the crowd becomes. The vicious energy is palpable, and it sets me on edge every time I chance a glance back at it.

I don’t want to watch. There is so much blood in the arena, so many different colors. It makes my stomach hurt.

So I don’t. Instead, I stare out the other way, watching the few blue lion-maned aliens who wander past our cell, pointing at us and talking.

“There must have been some kind of worm hole that brought us here,” Lyko says for the third time, pacing the length of the cell. “I can’t understand what happened?—”

“Or where we are.” I finish his thought for him, because he’s said it so many times now I might as well. “The days are longer here. Much longer.”

“I noticed that,” he says.

My fingers find the strange collar around my neck again, and bile rises in my stomach as I skim from my skin to the hard surface of it.

“What is this made of?” I ask him. “Have you ever seen this before?”

“No.”

Of course not. I don’t say it out loud, because being a raging bitch isn’t going to help our situation, and I don’t think it would make me feel any better about it either.

“I meant our vows.”

“What?” I ask, confused at the non sequitur. He’s paused his pacing, staring down at where I’m tucked into myself on the cold floor. A muscle ticks in his temple, his dark eyes as serious as ever.

“It has occurred to me that… you married me for protection. For yourself, for humans. I don’t know.” His dark hair shimmers in the alien sunlight as he shakes his head.

I tense, my pulse picking up speed.

“I meant every word, Piper. I meant every kiss in that ceremony, every stroke of my cock inside you.”

Heat rises in my chest, my cheeks, both at the memory and his blunt words. My hands fall away from my neck, and I clasp them together, as if holding my own palms tightly will stop me from giving away my sudden fear at what he’s deduced.

“I am not stupid.”

“I didn’t say you were.”

He cuts me a jagged look, one black eyebrow raised in amusement and disbelief. “You didn’t have to.”

“I—”

He holds up a hand, cutting off whatever bullshit platitude I was about to spout.

“I have misjudged you. But that does not mean I regret marrying you. No, indeed, now that we find ourselves here?—”

A body slams against the clear wall separating our cell from the arena, and I flinch. Lyko simply blinks, then draws himself up even taller. More imposing.

God, he really is nice to look at. I clear my throat, studying my filthy hands. Purple blood’s still there, staining like some kind of dye.

“I misjudged you, too,” I finally admit, doing my best to ignore the bloody chaos unfolding outside our tiny holding area. It’s difficult when it’s literally splashed up against the wall, but I swallow hard and do my best to look at the Roth king in front of me. “I did what I felt was best.”

He tilts his head.

A dry, humorless chuckle leaves my lips. “Not that it got me where I wanted.”

“We will get out of this,” he growls. “One way or another. But I meant my vows, and you are my wife, regardless of why you entered our marriage.”

My stomach does a little squirm, and I don’t know whether it’s hunger or discomfort or something else entirely. “I wanted a say in my future.”

Slowly, he crouches, lowering himself until we’re eye to eye. “Explain.”

“The Roth took my plans and crushed them underfoot. They took my world and tried to bleed it dry, and for what? So I joined the Federation.” I don’t care that telling him was never part of the plan. It doesn’t matter anymore anyway. We’re going to die on this planet, just like all those bodies littering the arena. Might as well come clean. “I joined the Federation to fight back, to reclaim what should have always been my future. And then my team was abducted by the Roth again. All the men killed, the women imprisoned and kept like lab rats. Experimented on.”

His face tightens, his lips drawn down in displeasure. Not at me, though.

At his own people.

“They wanted to see what it was the Suevans saw in us. See if we could be bred.” I don’t take my eyes from his, lifting my chin in challenge. “They wanted to see if they should go back to Earth and abduct all of us. To ensure the survival of your species. Not ours. Never ours.” A brittle laugh breaks from my mouth. “My mission was always to do anything I could to influence the Roth to keep Earth safe, by any means necessary. When Leigh proved she was no longer an asset I could use to achieve that goal, I stepped up. To use you.”

I don’t blink, daring him to say something, to erupt. To be angry.

Instead, he just raises his eyebrows. “And you think I would have invaded Earth again?”

I shrug a shoulder, and it sends a jolt of pain through my collared neck. “I think the reality of another invasion will always be in the back of the Roth mind.”

“The Suevans gave humans their interplanetary defense system.”

“And I wanted to be the first to know if you found a way around it.”

“You assume I would tell you?”

“You assume I wouldn’t find the means to discover it?” I shoot back.

He chuckles, finally sitting on his haunches and folding his long, strong legs under him. “I have decided I can’t assume anything about you.” He opens his mouth to say something else, then closes it again with a shake of his head, like he’s thought better of it.

“What?”

A sigh. Another brow raise. “I just wondered if any of it was real.”

“What?” I ask, confused.

“In the ceremony.” That orange flame sparks deep in his eyes. “Was it all fake? Pretend? When you came for me?”

I can feel the blush heat my cheeks this time, and I nearly shrug again before I remember how badly it hurt. “No. It wasn’t fake.”

A smile splits his serious expression, and pleasure coils in my stomach. No, there’s no denying the chemistry between us, even here, in this clusterfuck of a situation.

“Good.”

“Why good?” I motion to the gore just steps away from us. “We’re fucked.”

“Because now I have even more to fight for.”

I don’t know what the hell to say to that.