13 Cylene

On Day Three, I decide I'm ready to find Vitus for breakfast. Maybe it's that I'm coming to my senses because my reality has finally sunk in, or maybe it's the dreams that have been filled with his tongue lapping up my juices and the protective yet brooding way he always seems to have his eyes on me. It's comforting to know that he doesn't expect anything of me.

But as I enter the buffet hall and see him sitting by himself at a table along the window, messaging on his wristband, I see what I didn't clearly before. It's in the way he moves, glances warily at others, and sighs.

Vitus doesn't think he belongs here.

He serves others, leads, protects

I doubt he does anything for himself.

But before I can join Vitus, Jalut stops me.

I jump back. "You snuck up on me!"

He dips his head in apology. "I didn't mean to startle you."

My heart beats fast. "That's okay. It's just usually me who does that to others. Perhaps you can teach me your techniques?"

He seems to figure out I'm not offended and cracks a smile. "General Vitus's Acting Second sent this on behalf of Rhynin, who's healing."

Jalut hands me a wristband. "Females' are smaller than ours." He taps his own larger band. "But this way, you can connect to us or to Vitus if you need anything. It allows us to track you too, to be fully transparent."

I don't like the sound of that. "It reminds me of my collar. Does it shock me?"

"No. It can assess your health with a blood sample."

I turn the device over in my hands.

Jalut shows me how to unlatch it and to put it on. "You don't have to wear it. Rhynin just wanted to offer you something as a gift. He had bought that for his future mate but didn't get it to Vitus before we left to come here. It was delivered by one of our security team members last night."

He motions me into the middle of the hallway, then taps a button on his. A blue shield surrounds him. "Might be helpful."

Jalut's actions make Vitus look up.

I put the bracelet on with a shaking hand. It feels wrong like I'm shackling myself to Vitus, but the idea of a shield to ward off unwanted attention is nice. "If we don't work out—"

"Keep it." Jalut switches his shield off and backs out of Vitus's way. "We may still need to keep in contact due to intergalactic relations."

"Lovely."

Vitus joins us in the hallway. He scans between Jalut and me, then notices the wristband I fiddle with. He glowers at Jalut.

"I didn't know it would make her uncomfortable," Jalut admits. "It's a gift from Rhynin."

Vitus' jaw muscles dance. He offers me a protein bar and a bottle of water. "They are beginning the knowledge game soon. We must go."

He leads me back into the buffet hall and apologizes. "You do not have to wear that."

I touch the metal band and eye the blue shield button.

"Don't tap that unless you have to," Vitus warns. "We are not supposed to carry weapons or shields while we are here."

I read it in the contract but didn't think much of it because I didn't have any.

"To do so would show others we're disobedient or imply that we are distrusting of others. To earn trust we must first give it." Vitus gently rests a hand to my low back when we enter the game auditorium. He glares at everyone who dares look at us. "But I am glad you have it."

The announcer climbs up to the central podium and instructs women to one side and men to the other.

"I feel bad taking this from Rhynin when it was meant for his mate," I admit as we leave.

Vitus glances back at me as he follows the other males. "He is an honorable Second but a far better friend. If you were mine, you would get my mother's band. I still have it."

He slowly joins the other males, glancing back at me like he regrets telling me.

I take a seat among the other women, a large button in front of me and a screen with the Alien Bride Race logo bouncing around the frame. When we are all in place, Vitus across the room from me, the announcer tells us we will switch between a question for the males, then one for us women. The fastest to tap their button and correctly answer the question will get a point. The winner of the males and the females will get a special bonus at the end of the games, culminating on Day Seven.

I'm ready to play, but I know next to nothing as the game begins. The announcer asks what the national song is of a planet I've never heard of. A woman two rows below me answers correctly. The males get a question about Earth's continents.

Vitus, to my surprise, answers. "There are seven; three are inhabitable by humans, one too cold, and the other three have been irradiated beyond healthy limits."

"Correct."

The announcer turns to us. "Ladies, what is the name for the pointed scales on creatures that do not grow with age?"

Finally, something I know. I tap the button.

My screen lights up with a blinking marker.

"Placoid."

"Correct." The announcer turns to the males.

Vitus's gaze burns into me from across the room, and I realize I have some relevant knowledge of his kind. We aren't so different. But I've earned myself the attention of other scaled aliens, including those covered in scutes.

"Ladies, what is the fastest way to calm a mutant Squamatans?"

I grin and tap the button again. No one else on my side even tries. "Rub the mating glands behind the ears or auricular pits. Just don't confuse them with the projection markings on the lower back, or you'll end up with acid burns, quills in your face, or any number of other less-than-ideal consequences."

The announcer laughs lightly. "Nice detail. That is correct."

When she turns to ask the males a question, a woman next to me swats me. "Shut up! You're making the rest of us look bad."

I stare at her flawless face, flat-ironed hair, and glittering gold eye shadow, and I'm pretty sure that's impossible. She looks like the type of flawless model I often saw in one of Tathe's dirty magazines he left open on the kitchen table.

Several questions pass that I have no answer for.

Vitus responds correctly to another one about the gravitational pull of a nebula far out in space, something about dark matter and time warping that I don't understand. He looks almost bored.

We get more questions about planets and politics of the nations, a few about space travel. I can't answer most. A few I have ideas on, but I never get them out in time.

Vitus is one of the top five, but it doesn't look like he's trying very hard. In fact, I think, by the way he hovers his hand over the button but doesn't tap it that he's holding back.

He doesn't want to be in the spotlight.

We get one last question each. "What are the ideal environmental conditions for a Talhusk?"

I think back to climbing the ravine to the nest with only a rope tied to the dead tree at the top. No other female taps their button, so I tap mine and get the blinking cursor. "Hot, dry, but preferably windy and in a rocky cave or cliff crack. It has to lead to a large cavern because of their wings."

"Correct."

"Bonus question, ladies. What is their bedding made of?"

I tap my button again.

"Gravel." As I say it, I regret it. A large male with bound wings leans forward across the room as I elaborate. "Because it holds the heat of the day at night. And since they usually live in deserts, that means cold nights."

"Correct."

I don't hear the last question the males get. A slender violet alien answers. The scores are tallied, and he and one of the other women win.

On our way to another field opposite the complex from the initial race grounds, we're handed a bottle of water and a cookie. I search for Vitus but am pushed around by the cluster of women into a staging area.

I eat quickly as I try to see where the males have gone.

"They're getting the play nice speech," Ohni remarks. She hands me a face mask. "To protect your eyes."

"From what?"

She waggles her head. "Candy-flavored dye pellets, powdered sugar grenades, sprinkle bombs, you know."

"No, I don't."

Ohni grins. "You're going to have fun. That's all that matters. Enjoy it while you can. And PS, they award points based on teamwork, not battle tactics. I know you're independent, but if you want to win the all-expenses paid honeymoon, you want to win this one."

Ohni gives me a finger wave and hustles off to help the other women gear up.

I grab a dye gun and a belt loaded with grenades and the much larger sprinkle bombs.

"To survive, you must pair up with a male, figure out the puzzle on the wall, and find the golden egg in the maze," the announcer says.

"Why the weapons then?" another woman asks.

I have the same question.

"To deter and disrupt the other teams," the announcer replies.

The doors open us to a field filled with partial walls, large wooden crates and a handful of trees on our way to a wall of puzzle doors along the edge of a hedge maze. Women race out and find their partners or snag whoever has their hand raised for a match.

I stagger through the group, darting around others, trying to find Vitus. A blast goes off nearby, showering sprinkles in the air. I duck. A warm hand grabs me.

Vitus helps me straighten then plinks dye shots at other males with one hand while he guides me to a door. "Toss out a sugar grenade. Twist and throw." He points to a gaggle of couples running toward a door.

I do as he says, and they topple in a tangle of arms and legs, laughing.

We skirt around a couple that doesn't make it to the door. They're covered in dye and sprinkles. She licks the side of his face, making his eyes roll back and his body fall limp.

"What the heck is going on?" I ask.

Vitus stops before a door. "Watch my back while I solve this?"

I lift my dye gun and fire clumsily at everyone who so much as looks at us. My shots are wild, but so is the dye spray.

The door swishes, and Vitus leads me inside by the wrist. A male greets us with a pair of dye shots as the door closes us in. A sprinkle bomb goes off just outside, showering us over the top of the hedge.

A sweet, delicious heat spreads through me. Vitus, backlit by some freakish light, comes closer.

"Cylene." Purple dye shimmers on his face. He closes his eyes and clutches me against him. My hearing warps, and everything slows.

His hands grip me with desire, and his lips find my ear. "I think they put hormone enhancers in the dye."

I breathe through the intoxicating desire his touch evokes, suddenly wanting more, wishing we weren't covered in so much fabric or that we were so out in the open, in public, with camera drones hovering overhead.

"Must be. I want to—"

His lips graze my ear with a heavy breath. Vitus' fingers dig into my back and my thigh. His voice rumbles. "I know. But we have to keep going."

My pussy slicks with aching need, and my legs struggle to keep me upright. But I let him take my hand and lead me on through the maze.

"Why do you want to win?" I ask him in a daze. Does he want the honeymoon trip?

Vitus leads me around a bend. Another couple passes in a nearby junction. "It's not about winning."

"Then what?"

He sniffs the air and looks down at me with radiant eyes. "It's about protecting you from others, from losing more than you already have, but mostly keeping you safe from what I want."

Vitus stalks out into an opening. He fires his gun with one hand, leads me with the other, and ducks around me as a sugar bomb fills the air.

My mask is coated in dye and sweet powder. I can't see out of it anymore and toss it aside.

Vitus leans away from a dye blast, returns fire with anger in his eyes, and then scoops me up with one arm, guiding me into a protected corner of the maze.

He touches me gently with trembling hands, and I see he's taken another dye blast, this one in glittering pink. What should be a fun experience for him, seems to have only made his life hell.

Vitus won't look at me. And he won't calm down.

It the first time I really want to kiss him, to let myself fall for a male that wants me, not just anyone, but me. And yet, he's trying so hard to fight it, that I don't want his effort to be for nothing.

"How about we split up? You take one way, I'll take the other. We'll meet up here if they're both dead ends. If not, we can backtrack and go the other way."

He shakes his head as explosions fill the air with sugary scents and colors. A group of males get lost in a nearby tiff over someone stealing someone else's mate.

Shots pelt the area in their scuffle. Sugar grenades and sprinkle bombs fill the space, making Vitus and I stumble back.

The repeated shots disorient me, and I crawl away on instinct.

A hand picks me up by the back of my suit and drags me off. I try to call for Vitus, but a bumpy texture of scutes covers my mouth.

I struggle to breathe beneath their grip. The light of the lunar surface blurs. I fight to be free and nearly pry his grip free of me, but he adjusts his hand and wraps a rough arm around my throat. "You and I need to talk."