Abducted Read online

  “So you’ll go?” he asked, sounding surprised. “You’re done complaining?”

  “Oh, I’m not done complaining—not by a long shot,” I said dryly. “By making me wear this dress, you just gave me a free pass to complain as much as I want. But yes, I guess we’d better go. Just tell me what to do.”

  “Simple—when we get to the mechanic, just treat me the same way you see every other female treating their male. That should do the trick.” Sarden said, though he didn’t sound very happy about it.

  He held out an arm to me and I looked at it, surprised at the courtly gesture. Apparently the male escorting a female on his arm wasn’t just an Earth custom.

  “Well?” he asked. “Are you ready to go?”

  I took a deep breath and smoothed down my transparent dress. My women’s study professor back at USF would either be extremely proud or totally horrified by this outfit. I decided to go with proud—I wasn’t objectifying myself or letting anyone else objectify me, I told myself. I was owning my curves and revealing my inner beauty—projecting positive body image all over the damn place.

  I hoped.

  I took Sarden’s arm and looked up at him.

  “Let’s go get ‘em tiger,” I told him. “Go big or go home.”

  Or in this case, go naked but I was trying really hard not to think about that.

  Sarden

  I couldn’t help feeling both proud and possessive as I squired Zoe into the spaceport proper through the entrance designated only for males accompanied by their females. Or goddesses, if you believed the way the Majorans did. I didn’t but I had to admit, my little Earth female was looking particularly divine in the Majoran garb. Her beautiful curves and lovely freckled skin were fully exposed in the thin, silky dress and her wild, curly auburn hair floated around her shoulders like a burning corona.

  Gods, she was fucking gorgeous. The whole world was more vivid now that she was mine. And she was still mine—at least for a little while longer. I wouldn’t have to give her up to Tazaxx until we reached Giedi Prime. I pushed away the emotions that tried to rise at that thought and concentrated on the business at hand.

  I had left Al back with the ship to get the Scoop ready for repairs. I missed having him at my back but I wanted everything in readiness as soon as I lined up a mechanic. I just hoped the one Doloroso had recommended was good.

  The entrance to the spaceport was a big place—a high dome with duty-free shops and merchants of all kinds lining its wall. It was packed with people from every known species in the galaxy going here and there. Yet even in that busy crowd, Zoe stood out as I had known she would.

  All around us, I saw the other Majoran females catching glimpses of the little Pure One and talking among themselves, buzzing like a hive of Rigelian bees. Some of them even changed their skin color to match hers on the spot, though none of them managed to copy her charming pattern of her freckles with any kind of accuracy.

  Zoe caught sight of what they were doing and gasped. She looked up at me and jerked her head at a Majoran female with the traditional long, blue hair who had just turned from deep lavender to Zoe’s own creamy pale shade.

  “How did she do that?” she asked, under her breath. “How are any of them doing that?”

  “Majorans are chromatacromes,” I explained. “Able to change their skin color at will. Some can also change hair and eye color but that’s much more challenging.”

  “So they just go all day changing all the time? Like chameleons blending in with their environment?” she wanted to know.

  I barked a short laugh.

  “Hardly. If anything, the Majoran females want to stand out. That’s why they’re copying you—see?” I nodded at a female who must have been especially skilled in the ways of her people. She had managed to copy not only Zoe’s skin color, but also the warm, changeable ruby-auburn of her hair and the blue of her eyes.

  “Hey! That’s creepy,” Zoe protested, moving closer to me uneasily.

  “No, it’s a compliment,” I corrected her. “They recognize your beauty. I knew they would.”

  “Well…thanks, Sarden.” Her skin grew pink and I realized she was blushing, as she did so often when she was embarrassed. It struck me again that she didn’t understand how lovely she was, though it was hard to comprehend how she couldn’t. She was the most stunning female I had ever seen. It amazed me that she couldn’t see her own beauty.

  “Ambergeis for sale here. Buy your goddess that which compliments her beauty,” a voice shouted, almost in my ear.

  “Ooo, what’s that?” Zoe slowed to stare at what the merchant—a swarthy Fenigan with a mustache above his first mouth and a beard below his second—was selling.

  “Ambergeis, lovely goddess,” the Fenigan merchant said, holding out a small silver pot with a yellowish paste inside. “Made from the purified nectar of the ish’tha flower.”

  “What does it do?” Zoe wanted to know.

  “Ah, it is truly wondrous,” the merchant said, both mouths speaking as one. “You put just a tiny dab behind each ear and a dab on your wrists and soon your scent is irresistible.”

  “Is it some kind of perfume, then?” she asked.

  “It enhances your own natural scent,” a new voice answered her.

  It was one of the Majoran females who had copied Zoe’s skin color, though at least her hair was still blue. Behind her was a Majoran male. His skin was a warm, neutral brownish-tan at the moment, though I knew that could change according to mood or whim…not his, of course. Though the female’s skin color would be dictated by what she thought fashionable, the male’s color would be dependant on the mood of his female. At the moment the soft, neutral color was an indication that she must be feeling well.

  “How does the, uh, Ambergeis enhance your scent?” Zoe asked, turning to her.

  “By bringing out your natural musk, my goddess,” the merchant assured her.

  “Your musk?” Zoe wrinkled her pert nose. “Um, sorry but I don’t want to smell musky.”

  “He doesn’t mean it will make your skin smell unpleasant, only that it will intensify the natural scent of your skin,” the Majoran female explained.

  “Yes, for it takes on the scent of your skin and magnifies it.” The merchant nodded. “It can also be put on articles of clothing if you wish. In this way if you have to leave your mate for a time, he is able to keep a little of your scent to comfort him during the loss of his goddess.”

  “Leave my mate? Goddess of Love prevent it!” The Majoran female sounded shocked and her male, who had been silently watching, came forward to comfort her. His skin was as blue as his hair now—the color of sadness, which she was obviously feeling at the idea of the two of them being parted.

  “Come, Leelah,” he murmured softly. “Don’t fret. You know I’ll not leave you.”

  He put an arm around her shoulders and she leaned against him, obviously drawing strength from his embrace. For a moment I wondered what it would be like to have Zoe trust me enough to lean on me that way, to seek me out when she needed to be held and touched—then I pushed the idea away.

  “I did not mean that you would leave him forever,” the Fenigan merchant said smoothly. “Perish the thought! But any absence, no matter how brief, may be traumatic. Think how he must feel when you go to spend time with your friends and he is left without you. The scent of your skin on a scarf or other such object would comfort him greatly.”

  “Sheesh,” Zoe muttered to me. “He’s acting like her guy is some kind of sick puppy who can’t stand to be without her for an hour or two while she has a girl’s night out. That’s ridiculous.”

  “Not at all,” the Majoran female, who had unfortunately overheard, gave Zoe a very cool look. Her skin remained pale and creamy, like Zoe’s, but her mate’s skin suddenly went a deep maroon indicating anger and offense.

  “Oh, uh…” Zoe seemed taken aback. “I…I didn’t mean…”

  “Prether is very a