“Met the Supervisor again, huh?” Harper said. “Tell me something. Are you and him…?”
She wiggled her eyebrows.
“What?” I said. “Get serious. He’s an old man!”
“He’s not that old.”
“The answer is no. And don’t start a rumor. I know what you’re like.”
Harper raised her hands as if she would never do such a thing.
“Moi? Besides, you want to be careful. He’s a—”
“Sh!” Lily said.
Harper clamped her mouth shut and we focused on the figure walking up behind the guards.
He was big and muscular, but that hardly nailed it down. All the dudes in this place were huge.
The guards peeled to one side, revealing the fighter behind them.
My smile faded. It wasn’t Kren.
It was someone else. He was bigger and taller than Kren with tusks that poked out from his upper lip. His teeth were small and brown. Probably rotten. He had a small tuft of hair on his head and blood across his armor that clanked and rattled as he crossed the space separating him from us.
Lily approached him and opened her mouth but he waved a hand dismissively.
“Dreth doesn’t want to hear your sales patter, slut,” he said. “Leave Dreth to choose. A victor chooses whatever he wishes.”
The other girls lowered their eyes as he approached—nothing like how they looked when the other victors came by.
I followed suit and stared at the floor.
I let my mind wander and thought about the problem I had with Kren. Thinking about him brought a smile to my lips. I pictured us together last night, our bodies entwined and hot and sweaty.
He rocked me to my core. I still ached when I walked and felt him with me.
“Meager scraps,” Dreth said. “Why do you dishonor me with the ugliest girls?”
“They’re all fine women,” Lily said. “I can assure you, every fighter has been pleasured by them many times—”
Dreth waved a hand for her to be quiet.
“Silence or I’ll choose you!”
I had never seen Lily look afraid before. But there was no denying the fear in her eyes.
It was then I recalled some of the stories Harper told me when I first arrived in this place. Most of the fighters weren’t aggressive. Sure, they were rough in bed just as they were rough in the ring, but they always treated the girls right. That was why the girls hadn’t committed suicide already.
But there were some who were not good, and all the girls could do was hope those fighters didn’t win, and when they did, pray they wouldn’t be chosen.
Some of the stories were… pretty gruesome. The girls left and when they came back, they were never the same. Sometimes it was physical abuse, other times mental.
Alien creatures mated differently to what the girls were used to. Some liked to draw blood. It excited them. There had been more than a few incidents with overly aggressive victors in the past.
Dreth moved along the line and inspected the girls. He grabbed a girl at the front and squeezed her breast. She whined with pain.
“Good tits. But ugly face. Who wishes to look upon something so hideous?”
He’s one to talk.
He moved along the line. He stopped in front of Harper. She was smaller than the others and usually up for anything.
But not this time. Not with this fighter.
Dreth raised her chin and grunted with satisfaction.
“Pretty. But do you have the goods, my girl?”
He pinched her small but firm breasts and her nipples turned bright red from where he’d pinched so hard. Then he reached under her dress and slipped a finger inside her. He rummaged around like he’d left his car keys inside.
Harper grunted with pain and discomfort.
“Stop that!” Dreth said. “You’ll be getting a lot worse than that if I give you the honor of pleasuring me! Is that what you want? To pleasure me?”
“Stop it!” I blurted, the words out of my mouth before I even processed them.
Shit!
Why did I have to say anything? Well, it was too late now. I raised my chin and glared at him.
“Such insolence!” Dreth said, glaring at me with his tiny piggy eyes.
In them, I saw a glimmer of brutal amusement.
“Please, forgive her,” Lily said. “She’s new here. She doesn’t know what she’s doing—”
Dreth backhanded her across the face. She didn’t lose her feet but she should have.
“What did I tell you about shutting up, slut?” Dreth said.
He turned back to me and reached for my nipple but I slapped his hand away. Maybe if I was “insolent” enough, he wouldn’t want me.
Dreth growled and drew his hand back to slap me.
I ducked, avoiding the blow.
Blood flared in his cheeks and he brought the same hand back across, this time catching me across the cheek and knocking me to the ground.
“Sir, please,” Lily said. “These girls need to be in good condition for all fighters. You shouldn’t hit—”
“This one,” Dreth said, referring to me. “I want this one.”
Lily had never refused a fighter before but she looked on the verge of doing it this time.
“Sir, this girl…”
“Today, this girl is mine!” Dreth said.
“This girl was chosen by Kren.”
That gave the fighter pause for thought. He tried to conceal his fear but failed.
I’d already seen it. So had the other girls.
“He doesn’t own this girl or any of the others,” Dreth said.
“No, sir,” Lily said. “But he chooses her every day. And if she’s not here when he returns…”
He’ll beat your ass.
“You think I’m afraid of him?” Dreth said. “I’m afraid of no one! A fighter may choose any Prize he wishes. Those are the rules! And I intend on taking my Prize!”
He grabbed me by the arm and dragged me to my feet. He twisted my arm so hard I thought it might snap.
Lily followed us but there was nothing she could do.
Tonight, I was his.
Time to panic.
Kren
Ice struck the floor hard. I knew the moment my fist connected with his jaw he would be down for the count.
I calmly kicked his sword from his outstretched hand and
