Cruel Union (Brutal Universe #1)

2. Aurora

2

AURORA

PRINCESS OF L’CRIST

“ R oderick , I must talk to you,” I murmured to my brother as he settled himself on the throne. It was a wide, golden chair that looked grand but was actually nothing but wood covered in metallic paint. Large jewels sparkled along its top—obviously fake to any but the most inexperienced eye.

Gaudy though it was, I had loved the look of the throne when my father sat on it. Good King Gerund , as he had been called by our people, had always ruled with wisdom and compassion and had done his best to make certain everyone who came to him got justice.

My younger brother, however, wasn’t doing quite such a good job.

“ What do you want now?” he demanded, glaring up at me. He was too young to reign—at least in my opinion. But we had all thought that my father had years more on the throne—he’d only been sixty when he died in a fiery shuttle crash last summer.

I still mourned my father—who I had been close to all my life. And I was pretty sure our whole kingdom felt the same way. Unfortunately , while everyone had been in mourning, my brother, Roderick , had been doing some extremely unsavory things.

“ What I want to know is what happened to all the tribute money collected from the people that Father had stored in the treasury,” I muttered, bending down so the lone guard who stood at the far end of the ragged crimson carpet couldn’t hear. “ The Lord Chancellor let me in to get my favorite tiara today—the one Mother left me—and it’s gone. All gone.”

Roderick jutted his chin at me defiantly.

“ What makes you think it’s gone? Maybe I just had it moved somewhere.”

I pursed my lips— I feared that I knew where he’d had it moved. His private hover-coach driver had let it slip to my maid that my brother had been spending his nights on Rigelis Nine .

Rigelis Nine was a vast world in our sector—hundreds of times bigger than the tiny planetoid our own Kingdom of L’Crist occupied. It was known as “ The Sinner’s Paradise ” or sometimes just “ Sin World ” by most of the people I knew. That was because the entire world of Rigelis Nine was one big city made up of brothels, casinos, clone cafes, and massage parlors that offered much more than just massages. Or so I had heard— I had never seen the place myself.

It was also almost entirely owned by our enemies—the Brutes .

The Brutal Crime Organization , which offered “protection” to our planetoid as well as many others in this sector of the galaxy, was made up of four main families— Clan Cruel , Clan Vicious , Clan Savage and Clan Ruthless —all of them Impure . Which is to say, they’d allowed their DNA to mix with that of non-humans.

I didn’t care about the DNA mixing—it was the older generation that hated that. But the Clans that made up the Brutal Crime Organization were frightening—all of them were huge, hulking males with curving horns, gray skin, and glowing eyes. I had never seen one that was under seven feet tall and all of them had muscles bulging beneath their expensive, well-tailored suits. You never wanted to get on the wrong side of a Brutal Clansman .

There were stories about them too—rumors I’d heard whispered among the palace maids. It was said their male equipment resembled that of an animal’s—that their shafts were twisted and huge with an immense knot at the base.

I had listened with horror when my own maid, Pansy , told the story she’d heard from a friend of a friend who had visited Sin World and seen a Brute without his clothing.

“ Long as your forearm it was—big enough to split a human girl in two!” she’d said, her eyes wide as she relayed the salacious gossip. “ And they say, my Lady , that if you let them stick it in you, the knot swells inside you and ties you to them. Once that happens, you’re Soul - Bound to them for life and you can never be free!”

Just the thought of such a fate made me shiver whenever I saw one of the Brutes , which thankfully, wasn’t often. Of the four Brutal families, it was Clan Cruel that ruled over us with an iron fist. But to be fair, they weren’t micromanagers. They mostly left us alone and only came twice a year to collect their tribute.

I had heard horror stories from other enclaves of Untainted , telling what happened when they didn’t pay their tribute money on time. Some said the Clan carried away women and children to work as slaves in the quadrach mines. Others claimed they brought flesh shears and took a finger from every Untainted human they found attractive for use in the clone brothels.

I couldn’t imagine the horror. Just the thought of having a mindless copy of me, kept in slavery somewhere and being subjected to the animal lusts of males like the Brutes made me sick. I didn’t want to find out if those rumors were true— I was afraid I might, though, if my younger brother really had used up all the tribute money gambling and visiting brothels on Sin World .

I didn’t want to believe that.

“ Please , Roderick ,” I said, trying to keep my voice soft and coaxing so he would answer instead of just dismissing me. “ Tell me where the money went? The representative of Clan Cruel is coming today—we need to have it ready!”

“ What ?” My younger brother looked up at me, his mouth agape. “ You’re lying,” he said flatly. “ The tribute’s not due until next month. I have plenty of time to get the money back.”

“ What do you mean you have time to get it back?” I asked ominously. “ Where did it all go? That was thousands of credits, Roderick ! Where is it?”

“ I lost it, all right?” he snarled, glaring at me. “ But it’s not my fault—the games at those casinos are all rigged. I was going to go win it all back before the representative came, though— I swear I was!”

“ Goddess of Mercy !” I closed my eyes and pressed my fingers to my temples, rubbing to try and force back the headache that was starting. This was my greatest fear come true—my brother had actually taken all the tribute money my father had collected from our people and gambled it away! What were we going to do?

I couldn’t help thinking that this wouldn’t have happened if Father had left me in charge in his will. Or if I had been allowed to marry, I might have been gone by the time it did. But that was never going to happen for me—not now and not ever.

All my life, I had been forbidden to wed—my fate had been sealed the moment my mother bore a son. By the laws of our tiny kingdom, there could be no direct descendants of a sibling to the Royal Heir . This was to keep the peace, as my father had often explained to me when I asked for the thousandth time why my younger brother was free to wed if he chose, while I was relegated to spinsterhood.

“ We cannot have any challenges to the throne, child,” he said to me when I complained. “ Your brother is the Royal Heir . Which means any male children of yours would be a rival to him. Especially if you had a son. That would be bad—very bad.”

I wanted to ask why my brother was the Heir and not me— I had, after all, been born eight years before him and was notably better at my studies. But I already knew the answer to that.

My brother, Prince Roderick , was a male and in our small kingdom of L’Crist , males ruled everything. No one would even consider the idea that a female might make a good ruler—or that she would be equal to the task of ruling in the first place. Though if you asked me, I would have done a much better job than my younger brother currently was. For one thing, I wouldn’t have gambled the tribute money away.

“ What are we going to do?” I demanded, opening my eyes to look at him. “ The Enforcer from Clan Cruel is on his way here right now!”

“ Put him off somehow!” Roderick exclaimed. “ I just need some time—one more night at the tables and I can win it all back— I know I can!”

“ You’re fooling yourself,” I said curtly. “ You have gambling fever—you’ll never win the tribute back. We must find some other way to pay. What about the crown jewels? We can offer them as collateral until we can pay the actual tribute.”

I touched the tiara I wore on my head. It wasn’t very big, but the diamonds were real. And we still had the big ruby in my father’s State Crown . Roderick had only worn it once, during his coronation. I knew it was still in the Royal Treasury because I had seen it there just that morning.

But when I looked at my brother, there was an expression that was half defiance/half shame on his face.

“ What ?” I demanded. “ Why are you looking like that?”

“ Your tiara…the crown…the other jewels…” He cleared his throat. “ I had them replicated.”

“ You what?” I stared at him, open-mouthed with horror. The Crown Jewels were sacred to our family— I never would have suggested using them as collateral if I hadn’t believed we could eventually pay off our debts and get them back.

“ I needed more money—more credits!” Roderick snarled defensively. “ I was trying to win back the tribute money. So I had the jewels replicated and sold the real ones. I figured no one would ever know—the tiara fooled you , didn’t it?”

I tore the dainty diamond and white gold tiara off my head, (mussing my long, honey-brown hair in the process, though I didn’t care about that,) and stared at it.

I had to admit the replication was excellent. Whoever Roderick had hired, they had done quite a good job. Probably the diamonds were nothing but clear zircons and the white gold was trash metal dipped in silver, but it wasn’t immediately apparent.

“ It looks real,” I admitted, twisting the tiara every which way so that the light from the floating chandelier hovering overhead shone on it from every angle.

“ Maybe we could offer the Crown Jewels after all,” Roderick said hopefully. “ If you can’t tell the difference, I’m sure the Enforcer from Clan Cruel won’t be able to either.”

“ I don’t know…” I didn’t like the idea of trying to fool the Enforcer . He was a big, silent male with curling golden horns and piercing gold eyes to match. He never said much to me but those golden eyes followed me whenever we were in the same room together and I felt somehow that I ought to know him as more than just a passing acquaintance.

That made no sense, of course. The Enforcer —whose name was Slade —came to the palace only twice a year. He never raised his voice or asked any questions—he just accepted the tribute and left. But I always felt a sense of relief when I saw the back of him—his broad shoulders under their expensive tailored suit jacket retreating through the palace’s main entrance.

In all the years he had been visiting us, I had only had one personal interaction with him and it had been both strange and embarrassing…

It happened not long after my maid had been whispering in my ear about how all the Brutal Clansmen had shafts that would “split a girl in two” with huge knots at the base. Slade had come to collect the tribute as always and he was standing across the throne room from me, speaking to my father.

Since the big Brute seemed distracted, I felt free to study the front of his trousers to see if what my maid had said was true. I knew it wasn’t very ladylike, but I couldn’t help myself— I was consumed by curiosity. I think I was fascinated because I knew I would never actually see a male shaft in person, owing to the fact that I was forbidden to wed.

So I took my time, eyeing the definite bulge I could see in the tailored light gray suit trousers he was wearing. Slade’s suits always fit him like a glove, molding to his muscular body in a way that was extremely distracting.

It wasn’t that I found him attractive, I told myself. It was just that I was curious about what he looked like under his clothes. I knew it was scandalous but I couldn’t help wishing that just once I might get to look at a naked male and see for myself what all the married ladies at Court whispered and giggled about.

I don’t know how long I stood there, staring at his crotch from across the room—much longer than was in any way proper, I’m sure. But when I finally looked up, I saw that Slade was staring right back at me.

His golden eyes met mine and I bit back a gasp. Then his gaze dipped to his crotch and came back up as he arched an eyebrow. His message couldn’t have been clearer— Like what you see?

I felt my cheeks going hot with a blush but somehow I felt powerless to stop looking at him. Then Slade let his own eyes wander— I could feel that glowing, golden gaze traveling down the bodice of my dress, lingering on my breasts, and then dipping lower to where my skirt mercifully hid the tender V between my legs.

When his eyes came back up again, they were burning—filled with a dark lust that made my heart bang against my ribs and my breath come short. Oh Goddess , was he thinking what I thought he was thinking? It seemed likely because he held my gaze brazenly with his own.

He didn’t lick his lips or blow me a kiss or make any kind of lewd or rude gesture, but he didn’t have to. That burning, half-lidded gaze said it all. It said he desired me—that he was dreaming of what he would do to my body if he ever got the chance.

At last, my father—who was still speaking to both Slade and an advisor—said something that distracted the big Brute . He ended our staring contest to turn his attention back to the conversation and I was finally free.

My heart racing in my chest, I hurried from the Throne Room . I was mortified that the huge Brute had caught me staring at his male-hood. And yet, I couldn’t stop thinking of the way he had looked at me. That heated, half-lidded gaze…the way his glowing, golden eyes seemed to burn into my very flesh.

For months afterwards Slade’s face with that hot, lustful expression kept popping up in my mind’s eye at the most inconvenient times. For instance, when I was washing myself in the shower. Or when I was touching my secret place beneath the covers at night.

I knew it was wrong to do so, but I couldn’t help myself—there was something inside me that begged for pleasure. So when Slade’s darkly handsome face and golden eyes appeared as I was stroking my little pleasure button, I felt doubly guilty for the impropriety I was committing.

I felt so guilty, in fact, that for the next few tribute days, I attempted to avoid him and made sure to stay far from the Throne Room when I knew he would be there.

But eventually, my curiosity drew me back. There was something about the huge, alien Enforcer that tugged at me. I felt like a moth drawn to a dangerous flame. Though we never spoke outside of a few stilted pleasantries when my father drew me into the conversation, I felt that Slade knew me somehow…that he saw me in a way no one else in my life cared to or dared to.

Which again, made no sense because I had never even had a real conversation with him…

A trumpet blast interrupted my train of thought and a courier entered the Throne Room .

“ Announcing Lord Slade , Clan Cruel Enforcer here to visit King Roderick ,” he called out after lowering his trumpet.

“ He’s here!” Roderick exclaimed, suddenly going extremely pale. “ Oh Goddess of Mercy —what are we going to do?”

“ Just what we said.” I straightened my spine and fingered the fake tiara in my hands. “ We’ll offer him the Crown Jewels and promise to pay the tribute soon. Hopefully we can get them back before he has them appraised.”

“ All right, fine.” Roderick sat up taller on the throne, though I could still see the panic in his eyes.

I started to leave the Throne Room , but he reached out a hand to grab my wrist.

“ Wait —don’t go! I need you here— I’ve never done a tribute day by myself before.”

“ Neither have I ,” I pointed out.

But I stayed just the same. I had a feeling that my spineless little brother would need someone to back him up and since my father was gone, I was the only one he had. I just hoped we could convince the Enforcer to take the fake jewels and give us more time to raise the money.

I had no idea how badly our little plot was going to go.