Royal Recruit - Susan Grant Page 0,24

of the lushly flowing skirt sweeping the floor. She was the perfect goddess-queen bride.

“It is time,” Tibor said. His eyes were deep and dark as he nodded at her. Uncharacteristic emotion tugged at his features. Her father was long dead. If he had been here, he’d have looked a lot like Tibor. To her guard’s right stood Fair Cirrus, Zaafran and Vemekk. Remember, the woman’s eyes said, I can help you escape him.

Keira knew something the minister didn’t—after the first-mating night and the games she had in store for the Terran prince, perhaps it would be he who would want to escape her.

Somberly, Keira lowered a drape of black, semitransparent fabric over her face. With eunuchs and assorted palace staff trailing her, she glided into the chamber where she would bind herself to the Terran prince for a lifetime.

There, Rissallen addressed a man and woman displayed on a huge screen. The prince! Keira halted, her breath catching. Dressed in royal ceremonial regalia, the Terran prince looked as handsome as he did confident: a completely self-assured male in the prime of life. In control. This man will share your bed. He will share your body. Her simmering fear began to bubble.

You are strong. A warrior.

Rissallen saw her standing in the doorway and beckoned her forward. She hesitated. Maybe Vemekk’s fears were justified. Perhaps this was a Drakken trick, and the Terran prince was loyal to the Drakken warlord. After he came to live in the palace, he’d lock her away to impregnate her with half-barbarian heirs.

Keira scowled. I refuse. The only half-barbarian babies she’d be birthing would be the Terran’s.

Grasping the fabric of her skirt, she fought to keep her hands from trembling as she walked forward, step by reluctant step. Rissallen extended his hand to help her up to the dais. As required by tradition, the origin of which was lost in the mists of time, seven warrior-priestesses wearing pale pearlescent-gray robes formed a half circle around the platform. Incense floated into the air as the soft chanting began. “We come from the light, we will return to the light,” the holy ones whispered, over and over.

Keira’s rapid breathing made the diaphanous black fabric in front of her face flutter. Why was she so nervous? This ceremony wasn’t supposed to matter. She wasn’t supposed to feel the gravity of this day, its importance in her life. It was just a treaty. Just a marriage. A formality, really. Yet her heart slammed and her palms sweat. Why did the prince affect her so? Was it because he was an unknown quantity, a man from so very far away? Was it because he wasn’t afraid of her the way everyone else was?

Or is it because when he looks at you, he seems to actually see you?

Goddess help her. Eyes downcast and scared to the bottom of her soul, she waited for the ceremony to begin that would bind her to a man located light-years away.

Chapter Eight

Jared attempted to reconcile the stiff, silent, black-draped woman with the fiery beauty he’d met online only days earlier. “Couldn’t she have chosen a better color?” he muttered to Jana. “It looks like she’s on the way to a funeral.”

“Protocol,” Cavin whispered from offscreen. His voice came over a tiny speaker in Jared’s right ear. “It’s the color worn to a royal betrothal ceremony.”

“Great.” Black. What a cheerful tradition.

“Keira, Her Majesty the Queen of Sakka,” the prime minister intoned from on-screen.

After the appropriate amount of time passed, Jana announced, “Jared Jasper, Prince of Earth.”

As the formal exchanges back and forth droned on, Jared reviewed his part of the routine. A dull headache didn’t help his concentration. Some prince he was. Where was his staff? His servants? All he’d had to eat since yesterday was a doughnut and coffee. Jana owed him big-time for this. In fact, Earth did. The Japanese emperor was probably here. Surely he could arrange for some sushi and ice-cold Japanese beer to be flown in to ease the craving from last night that had never gotten satisfied.

His stomach growled, and he cut off that train of thought. No use letting food distract him from saving the world.

As the pleasantries dragged on, Cavin paced out of the line of sight of the screen. And if that wasn’t enough pressure on Jared, the president of the United States, the prime minister of the U.K., the Russian president and the Chinese premier sat rigidly in a row, listening intently.

Finally, it was time for Jared to address