forward.
“I’m being sold?” she whispered in disbelief.
When she didn’t move immediately, the man gripped her shoulders and pushed her again. Her feet stumbled clumsily. Her mine whirled, not wanting to grasp the reality of her situation. The voices from the crowd reached a feverish pitch.
This was some sort of alien sex slave ring. The gathered crowd shouting took on new meaning. They...they were here to buy her.
After turning her in a full circle, the man stepped away and started yelling numbers. Trembles started at her knees, working their way up to her shoulders. Sold. She was being sold at an auction.
Nausea swirled and her stomach lurched. All of the faces below the stage blurred. Darcy pressed a hand to her midsection. She wanted to scream, but her throat locked. Heat rose in her face then cooled and a dry sweat broke out on her skin.
I’m going to be an alien’s sex slave.
Darcy swayed, then caught herself. Now wasn’t the time to faint. She needed to be awake to see what her future held. Her lips firmed. She didn’t plan for things to go like this but she damn well wouldn’t be passed out on the floor while her future was being decided.
“Fifty thousand open credits. Paid in full. Today.”
Silence swept through the audience, followed by groans. The man on stage with her paled, the bulge in his throat popped and there was no missing the sweat dabbing his bald head. “Fifty thousand?”
Darcy stretched her neck and tried to see beyond the blinding spotlight to the voice but the alien who’d called out was too far away.
“Yes.”
Boots thumped down the center aisle. The previously bold aliens all jumped out of the way of the newcomer. Darcy waited, her world suspended for this moment in time. Her buyer had a darkly tanned face with a hint of red on the skin, thick thighs and a muscled body capable of crushing any of them present. His appearance was the epitome of threatening but what held Darcy memorized were the twin horns at the sides of his head.
Horns!
“Done.”
The man on stage gripped Darcy’s hand and led her to a set of stairs at the side of the platform. Voice low, he murmured, “I will send blessings that you die a quick death.”
The words were the last blow and Darcy shuddered at what was to be her fate.
***
Nikol burst through the door open to Lothar’s office. “What do you think you’re doing?”
Seated behind his large desk, Lothar lifted his head and his mouth twisted in a cruel snarl. “Watch how you speak with me.”
His anger too great to heed the warning, Nikol marched toward the desk, pounded both fists on the surface and gritted out between clenched teeth, “I said: What. Do. You. Think. You. Are. Doing?”
The only response was the narrowing of the black eyes staring back at him. Aggression vibrated on the air between them. Nikol refused to stand down. Lothar did things to enrage him all the time but he’d gone too far this time.
Lothar sighed and tapped a finger on the top of the desk then without a semblance of guilt on his face, he rocked back in his seat. “Someone told you about the shipment of bliss, I gather.”
A sustained usage of bliss resulted in its users going crazy and committing murder while under the influence. Those who retained their sanity often died a painful and immediate death from the attack on their nervous system. After complaints had reached the Majad, Lothar had been ordered to withdraw from manufacturing or selling the drug.
“I gave the Majad my word we would stop selling it. If he finds out about this, I’ll look like a liar,” Nikol spat.
Lothar had directed him to pick up and deliver an extremely large shipment, claiming it was high-level trade merch. One of the crates had dropped and broken open to reveal the thick packs of bliss inside. Otherwise, he’d never have known.
Nikol hated that he’d had any part in putting more of the dangerous product out. Year by year, his very sanity was challenged by the things he did on behalf of Lothar. This latest was shoving him closer to an edge he wasn’t sure wouldn’t break him.
“My brother will not punish you. It’s obvious he’s favored you since your youth. Even my useless daughters seem to be under his protective eyes.” Lothar said the last on a sneer.
Probably because only one of his younger daughters had been placed in a kitse. Hauka also happened to