Gladiator: A Scifi Alien Romance (Galactic Gladiators Book 1) Page 4

Another Thraxian guard pushed forward, murmuring to Scar Face. Then Harper was shoved back in line.

  They were arranged in a straight row and Harper glanced around, trying to take in more details. It appeared Kor Magna was a strange mix of old and new technology. The walls around them were made from an ancient stone, and sand crunched under her sandals on the stone floor. The small crowd wore a mix of clothes—robes, leathers, jumpsuits. But then she also saw tech she couldn’t identify hanging off people’s belts—weapons, advanced tablets, and other strange devices.

  As her gaze ran over the small crowd, she noted people who looked humanoid, some vaguely reptilian, and one that had two long antennae on his head and multifaceted eyes, which reminded her of an insect.

  Then her gaze moved on to two men at the end who looked almost human. They were both big though. Over six and a half feet tall. One looked a little older, with a scarred face, black eye patch, and a dash of silver at his temples. His body was hard and muscled, though, with strong legs covered by dark, leather trousers. He wore a leather top that covered one arm and left the other arm bare, and a black cloak. His cool ice-blue gaze watched the line without a hint of emotion.

  Then she looked at the man next to him and everything inside her went still.

  He looked like a tattoo-covered, badass god.

  He was an inch taller than his friend, wearing the same black leather pants, but his chest was bare except for leather straps that crossed over his skin topped by a burnished gold medallion. The straps held the blood-red cloak that hung down his back. Power radiated off him. She noted the people nearby were watching him with wide, deferential gazes.

  Harper’s chest tightened a little. There wasn’t an ounce of fat on him, and all his muscles and tattoos—and there were a lot of them—were on display. He was made up of defined ridges and hard ropes of muscle, and every inch of them was covered in amazing markings.

  The tattoos had all been done in black ink, no color to be seen. His left arm and shoulder were covered in tribal-looking marks and swirls, his right arm was covered in a beautiful script she couldn’t read, and down his hard sides, she saw fascinating images. Something in Harper wished she could read the words and images, understand whatever amazing story they told.

  Her gaze drifted up his body, and when she reached his rugged face, she stiffened. He was looking at her.

  His eyes were deep green in a face that was too hard to be called handsome, but it was commanding. Harper lifted her chin and held his gaze. She was a long way from home, and for the moment a slave, but she wasn’t going to act like one.

  The winged alien in front of her started to make a low keening sound. Scar Face moved forward and slammed his baton into the slim alien’s back. With a cry, the alien fell to one knee. The baton had torn part of the alien’s delicate wing.

  As Scar Face lifted his baton again, Harper stepped forward and blocked the hit with her tied hands.

  “Enough.” She pushed the baton away. “Leave him alone.”

  Scar Face spun to look at her, his lips pulling back over his tusks. The Thraxians had black teeth, which just added to their scary looks. Harper swallowed. She knew standing up for the alien was going to get her a beating, but at this point, she didn’t care. Watching Scar Face, she realized he’d attacked the other man to provoke her.

  You want a fight, you bastard? All her emotions bubbled to life inside her. The fear, the loneliness, the pain, the sadness and the anger. It coalesced into one hot ball in her gut. You got one. Harper fell into a fighting stance and raised her arms.

  Scar Face raised his baton and Harper moved.

  She went in low, jamming her elbow into a pressure point on his knee. Over the weeks and months, she’d tested every point on the Thraxian’s bodies. She knew there were certain points on their bodies that were hypersensitive. She assumed that nerves were bundled together at these points, and a well-placed blow caused intense pain.

  The guard roared and as his knee gave out, Harper slammed her joined hands up, thrusting into his chin. Then she stabbed her fingers at his eyes. He dropped the baton and she caught it before it hit the floor. Straightening, she whirled around and smashed it into his lower back.

  Scar Face went down, making a horrible moaning noise. Harper rested the end of the baton at the base of his head—another vulnerable point. He went still, spitting orange blood out of his mouth.

  As the other guards rushed toward her, she dropped the baton and held her hands up. It wouldn’t stop the beating, but if she fought a group of them, she’d just encourage their anger, and she’d probably end up dead.

  She braced herself for the first blow.

  “Leave her.”

  The deep voice made her head snap around. It was the tattooed gladiator.

  He was staring at her, like he could see right inside her. Then he glanced at the man with the eye-patch beside him and they shared a nod.

  Green eyes came back to her, the intensity of them searing her. “I’ll take her.”

  ***

  It had been hours since Harper had been shuffled into a bare cell, deep in the bowels of the arena. Or at least she guessed it was the arena. She’d had a bag dropped over her head and had been unceremoniously dragged down here. No one had said a word to her.

  The floor was stone and the bars were made of metal. She wrapped her hands around the cool bars. Above, she could hear the distant roar of a cheering crowd.

  It was clear that there was a fight going on in the arena. She wondered how long it would be before she was tossed in the ring and had to fight for her life. Her stomach grumbled, and she leaned her head against the bars.

  “I’m so afraid.”

  The quiet whisper made her turn her head. In the next cell was a man who looked humanoid, except for some ridges running down the side of his neck. He was huge, towering over her. But despite his size, the giant was terrified.

  “I can’t fight,” he said. “I don’t know how. I’ll die as soon as I step foot in the arena.”

  “We don’t know what’s going to happen yet,” Harper said.

  “We fight for our lives,” another rasping voice said. “Or we die.”

  There was another man in the giant’s cell. She remembered him from the lineup. He had the tall, muscled body of a swimmer, and gray skin.

  Harper didn’t respond to that. Again, she thought of Rome, and fights to the death in front of barbaric emperors.

  So many of the scientists on Fortuna had been excited by the prospect of making contact with alien life. To discover all the new technology and wonders in the galaxy.

  This was not so wondrous.

  Her hands tightened on the bars. Just take each minute at a time. She just needed to survive. Then she’d find a way home…somehow.

  She looked at the back of the cell. Her winged friend was huddled in a ball, terrified. The tattooed gladiator and his friend had selected several people from the lineup but Harper couldn’t work out their strategy. Some of the men were clearly fighters but—her gaze fell on the winged alien again—some clearly weren’t.

  “What’s your name?” she asked the big alien.

  “Ram. And this is Artus.” He nodded at the gray-skinned man.

  She saw the winged man alien was looking at her.

  “I’m Pax,” he said in a gentle voice.

  “And I’m Harper. All we have to do is take each day at a time.” She saw them all watching her, hope in their eyes. “Be smart, watch and learn, and eventually, we’ll get a chance to escape.”

  More wild cheering from the crowds echoed through the cells, and then it slowly died down. She tilted her head, wondering who had died and who had won, simply for the enjoyment of the teeming masses.

  Minutes later, heavy footsteps echoed outside the cells, and the gladiator with the eye patch appeared. His other eye looked like a chip of ice, and something told her that despite only one eye, this man didn’t miss anything.

  “I’m sorry to keep you waiting,” he sa
id. “I want to welcome you to the House of Galen.”

  “Who are you?” Harper asked.

  The man’s icy gaze moved to her. “I am Galen. I am imperator of this house, and your new owner.”

  “So, you’re a slaver and we’re slaves.”

  The man ignored her and moved along the cells, looking at all the occupants. Then he waved to another guard he had standing nearby. “This is simply a holding cell. We will now take you to your permanent residence. Your new home.” He shot them one more hard stare. “The more you embrace your fate and follow my rules, the easier things will be.”

  When her cell door was opened, Harper stepped out into the corridor. “I am not a slave. I was abducted. I am not going to ‘embrace my fate.’”

  Galen moved closer, holding something in his hand. Before she knew what he had planned, he slipped a bracelet on her wrist and snapped it shut.

  “What the hell?” She lifted her arm, studying the slim black band. It was made from some sort of molded plastic. She saw the guard fitting the other prisoners with the same devices.

  “Insurance,” Galen said. “It’s embedded with a small explosive. If any of you leave the outer boundary of the arena, it will detonate.”

  Dammit. Harper swallowed her curse. She saw Galen watching her, and refused to give him a reaction. “You are slaver scum.”

  Galen spun and the guard nudged them all to follow. With the other prisoners, she followed the man down a tunnel. They moved through various tunnels, before Galen approached a large, arched doorway with huge, beaten-metal doors. Branded on the doors was the profile of a gladiator with an ornate helmet.

  The doors opened and they stepped inside.

  There was a large, open space. The stone floor was swept clean, and there was no furniture, except for red-and-gray wall hangings with the same gladiator head motif as on the door. One side of the room was lined with doors, and the other with cells.

  A sense of helplessness washed over Harper. God, she wished she was back on Fortuna, sparring with Rory in the gym, or beating Regan at cards.

  The guard opened the first cell, ushering two prisoners inside. At least the cells were furnished, with narrow bunks with folded blankets on them, and a table and chairs. There was a small door at the back of each cell she guessed led to a bathroom.

  The cell door was slammed shut, the metallic sound echoing in Harper’s ears. The next cell was opened, and Ram and Artus were urged inside.

  Harper was led down to another cell, and the guard fitted a key into the lock. The key looked old-fashioned to her, but then she heard something beep, and knew that the locks themselves were high-tech.

  “These are also temporary cells,” Galen said. His gaze moved over them all. “Tomorrow, you will face your initiation fight for us to gauge your potential.”

  Pax whimpered from the neighboring cell.

  Galen’s face stayed impassive. “Get some rest.”

  Yeah, right. Harper fiddled with the band on her wrist.

  Suddenly, she heard the echo of male voices. They sounded happy, cheering and calling out to each other.

  Harper turned, and her eyes widened. Three huge gladiators stepped into the room. Their bare chests were covered in smears of blood.

  A huge mountain of an alien was on the left, cheering as he held an enormous axe clutched in an equally huge fist in the air. His dark hair was cut very short, and as he moved, she thought she saw the glimmer of scales on his shoulders. She blinked and then they were gone.

  The gladiator on the right was all bronze skin, with an exquisitely crafted leather guard covering his right shoulder and arm. He had a handsome face and thick brown hair, and was smiling at the bigger man.

  The titter of feminine laughter brought her gaze straight to the gladiator in the middle. It was the tattooed man from the lineup. His tattoos gleamed from a sheen of perspiration—at least, the ones that weren’t covered in blood. His red cape contrasted with his gleaming skin, and two scantily-clad women were under his arms, clinging to him. They were looking up at him adoringly. One was giggling while the other was shooting him a sultry look. They were both beautiful with long, curved bodies.

  “My champions are back,” Galen said. “Time to celebrate.” He gestured for Harper to enter the cell.

  She moved inside and looked back through the bars. She saw one of the women sliding her body against the tattooed gladiator, while the other woman was kissing the side of his neck.

  She looked at his face and his gaze locked with hers. Even across the space, she felt the power of it.

  Giggling broke the spell, and, drawing in a deep breath, Harper pulled herself back into the shadows of her cell and watched the gladiators disappear through a doorway.

  She eyed the narrow bunks on the other side of the cell, and noted that one was occupied.

  But it didn’t matter. Harper had never felt so alone in her entire life.

  Soon, silence fell around them. There was a faint glow of light from outside the cell but mostly it was all shadows. Harper sat down and tested the explosive band. It was made from a tough substance she couldn’t break. With a huff, she sat back. Maybe it wasn’t really explosive. Maybe it was just a bluff to keep them in line.

  Either way, Harper decided she wasn’t staying. She was going to get back to the spaceport and find a way back to Earth.

  She moved to the lock, running her fingers over it.

  “What are you doing?”

  She lifted her head. Pax was watching her through the bars, his undamaged wing fluttering nervously. “I’m not staying.” She was pretty sure she could pick this lock if she could find something long and thin. She eyed the bunk and the metal wire holding it together, then looked back at the man. “I’m going to escape.”

  Chapter Five

  Raiden swirled the ice and Canellian whisky around his glass. He listened to the husky laughter from the two women he’d passed off onto Thorin. His friend had been happy to oblige. They were sprawled with Thorin on a large couch in the living area reserved for the House of Galen’s highest ranking gladiators.

  The rest of the gladiators Raiden called friends were dotted around the room. Kace was talking with his fight partner, the tall, lean, and lethal Saff, with her dark, gleaming skin.

  The other fighting pair in the room appeared mismatched at first, but were deadly on the sand. Tall and damn-near elegant Lore was a showman at heart. He had long, tawny hair that brushed his shoulders and a long-boned face. His eyes were a shifting silver-gray. Lore came from a world where illusion was prized and he mixed his tricks with his skill in the arena. His fight partner, Nero, was as big as Thorin, had tattoos to rival Raiden’s, a face no one would accuse of being handsome, and only spoke when it suited him.

  Female laughter drew his gaze back to Thorin and the flutterers. Often, Raiden liked to burn off the residual high of a fight with a woman. He liked their softness to his hardness. The little sighs and moans they made. He loved to plow himself between their velvety thighs. He wasn’t averse to bringing a woman back to his room when it suited him. Thorin, on the other hand, liked a strong woman and a hard fuck, sometimes against the wall of the tunnels as soon as the fight finished. He never turned down sex.

  But tonight, Raiden felt restless.

  Thorin was giving a play-by-play account of their fight. “And when Raiden slammed that new guy from the House of Thrax headfirst into the sand—” Thorin clapped his big hands together “—that was the best bit of the night. That, and the look on the Thraxian imperator’s face.”

  Raiden grunted. He wasn’t really listening, and couldn’t care less about the Imperator of the House of Thrax. Hatred burned inside him. There was one Thraxian he hated more than all of them, although in all his years on Carthago, the man had rarely stepped foot here.

  “No,” Kace said from nearby. “The best bit was when Raiden ran his sword through the shoulder of the Thraxian champion.”

  Thorin wasn’t finished. “Or maybe the best bi
t was when I put on a dress and paraded around the arena.”

  Raiden swirled his drink again. “What color was the dress?”

  “So you are listening to me.” Thorin stroked a large hand down one of the women’s arms. “What’s with you? You won tonight, but you were…distracted. And then you handed these two delectable beauties off to me for the evening.” Thorin grinned at the ladies. “Your loss, my friend.”

  Raiden moved over to the window. Beyond, he saw the bright lights of the District. If he wanted, he knew he could head into the city to play a high-stakes game of Jaack or a back-street fighting match. Or he could visit Lady Charliza’s House of Pleasure—the most exclusive collection of pleasure workers in the system.

  Instead, he thought of steady blue eyes looking at him from between cell bars.

  “Well done this evening.” Galen moved up beside him. “The House of Thrax is not pleased by their loss.”

  Raiden lifted his glass. Making the Thraxians mad was definitely something to drink to.

  Galen studied him before lifting a bottle of whisky and topping up Raiden’s glass. Here, in the inner circle of the House of Galen, they could all be themselves. Outside, Galen was the imperator and they were all his gladiators. Back here, away from prying eyes, they were friends, with a long, dark history.

  Nothing was ever what it seemed in the Kor Magna Arena. That was the first lesson Raiden had learned as a broken-hearted, seventeen-year-old boy stepping foot on the sand for his first fight.

  He pressed his glass to his lips and tossed the last of the fiery whisky back.

  “The House of Thrax wants a rematch fight. The day after tomorrow. They’re looking for a little payback.”

  Raiden nodded. They could try.

  “They’ve scheduled a beast fight.”

  Beast fights always drew the biggest crowds, and the sponsors with the deepest pockets. But every new beast that was tossed in the ring increased the risk of harm to the gladiators. The main types of predators Raiden knew, he understood how they hunted and how to beat them. But the Thraxians loved to find something new and dangerous. Odds were they had some fresh, frightening beasts to let loose in the arena.