Page 77 of Alien Prince’s Fake Bride (The Tentacle Throne #1)

- Mareliux -

“Making sure we’ll behave by reminding us that he can disavow his marriage to our mother and thus throw us out of the palace completely anytime he wants,” I agree, not feeling as good about this audience as I was hoping. “And that’s not even the worst idea he had.”

“That Regent’s Council is going to end in disaster,” Nerox agrees as the door closes behind Craxallo and we start to walk out, too. “He made sure to include members who will cause permanent imbalance. That Preniat is nothing but trouble. I suppose he should be let out of his cell.”

“There’s no rush about that,” Mareliux snaps. “Keep him under lock and key for as long as possible. Only let him out right before the Council meeting.”

“So there’ll be a huge wedding after all,” Umbra says quietly. “What do you think about that? Now that nobody’s forcing you to get married?”

I stop halfway to the exit, keeping my grip on her hand. I nod to Nerox and the others. “Go on ahead to the Knife’s Edge. You know where that is, Nerox. We will meet you all there. There is more to talk about. You too, Caret’ax. We’ll be safe here.”

I wait until the double doors close behind our friends.

Then I gaze back at the Tentacle Throne.

Normally there would be Calanians standing by the wall in silent guard of the Throne, but now it’s strangely alone.

It slowly moves its tentacles like a tree would wave its twigs in a mild breeze, the flickering light from the torches making it look almost like a fire.

I look down at Umbra’s dark eyes and take both her hands into mine.

“In the beginning I thought that a fake marriage would solve all my problems. Then I fake married you, and it became much more real than I ever dreamed. It’s been a while since I cared about having to get married in order to inherit the throne.

It became unimportant. The necessity is gone now.

We could both go our separate ways. The Emperor would be puzzled, but not displeased.

Because you are still an alien. If you want that, then I will honor our deal and send you all you need to jumpstart the space age on Earth.

Ten ships. Five hundred engineers. A thousand AIs.

No, don’t say anything yet. First, I will say what I want.

I want you to be my wife. Not because of necessity.

Not because of politics. Not because the people of Khav love you dearly.

Not even because we’re so clearly Soulbound.

But because I love the woman that you are, Umbra.

I love your resilience, your softness, your sweetness, everything that you are.

I want to live with you for the rest of my life.

It’s the one thing in the universe that I’ve ever truly wanted. ”

“I feel the same way,” Umbra says and pulls at my hands. “Now kiss me.”

We kiss for a good while as I finally enjoy that the dangers are over and that I can keep Umbra safe for the rest of our lives.

“Mareliux,” Umbra finally says and places a final kiss on my lips, eyes glittering. “There’s nobody in here.”

Heat immediately goes to my midsection, starting the familiar hardness. “I do believe you’re right. It would doubtless be the first time anyone did that here. But it’s all stone. The only place with some padding is…” I glance over at the Tentacle Throne.

“Umm,” Umbra says. “That’s not really what I meant. I mean, I want that. Very much. When we get back to a decent room with a bed and such. But I also just thought… that Throne. Aren’t you curious?”

I frown. The hundreds of Tentacles keep moving, as if calmly beckoning me over.

Is that what it’s really doing? Does it want me to sit on it?

“Of course I am. But only the Emperor may sit on that Throne. Anyone else discovered sitting on it can be killed on sight. If the Throne doesn’t do that itself. ”

Umbra taps her lower lip. “I don’t mean sit on it. But you do feel this, right?”

“It’s calling to us through the Syntrix,” I confirm. “And our rings show it, too.” They both pulsate slowly, in time with the Throne movements.

We walk closer to it.

Umbra squeezes my hand. “You don’t think it was damaged by the Phrexz, do you? I mean, poisoned or something?”

“Or maybe it is a Phrexz shapeshifter having taken its place?” I suggest. “No, I don’t think any of those things. Feel the Syntrix. The Phrexz felt so different, so wrong! This feels… right.”

“It does,” Umbra agrees as we stop at the foot of the podium.

“I suppose we shouldn’t be the only ones in the family who haven’t sat on that thing,” I ponder, having already made the decision.

“But the Throne is deadly. It has killed dozens of people who came too near, strangled them or done even worse things. That’s not just myths.

Their deaths are well recorded. The last one happened when I was two. ”

“If Nerox can do it and not suffer any ill effects, you probably can too,” Umbra says, an extra bit of rasp on her voice.

Her eyes are glassy as she stares at the hypnotic moves of the Tentacle Throne, her full lips parted.

“You have much more of a right to it. If Craxallo were a responsible emperor, he’d step away and let you take over the Empire. You saved it, he didn’t.”

“ We saved it,” I remind her. “Helped by our friends.” But her words strike something in me that I’ve felt for a while.

Craxallo should step down. He may have recovered from the poisons the Phrexz gave him, but he’s still too old and weak to bring the Empire back to where it needs to be after years of decline.

Gently letting go of Umbra’s hand, I step up on the podium and stroke the armrest. It’s a forbidden thing I’m contemplating now. And deadly.

I look up. One tentacle is slowly descending above me, its tip a warm copper color. I carefully reach up until my hand is a thumb’s width away. I will meet it halfway. But I am the Crown Prince of the Khavgren Empire, and the Throne has to come to me .

It does, gently touching the palm of my hand. I gently curl my fingers around it and give it a little squeeze.

It’s as if the Throne relaxes. The Syntrix becomes louder, clearer. My ring glows brighter.

The tentacle gently pulls out of my grip. Choosing to take it as a ‘yes’, I slowly sit down on the seat and lean back until my own tendrils are touching the thick, living base of the Throne.

Umbra stares at me, eyes still glassy. “That’s where you should be, my love.” Her voice is hoarse. “That Throne is yours.”

I relax and enjoy the warmth of the Tentacle Throne. She’s right. This is my place.

While I’m here, this is a good time to send some good Syntric strength to our forces. I concentrate, and our rings glow even brighter, outshining the feeble torches and casting long, dark shadows.

I imagine the Twenty-Ninth Legion on Grefve and focus the Syntrix to feel strong and confident, spreading it among those thousands of legionnaires that I vaguely sense out there on the alien moon.

I move to the Second Heavy Armor, always the first into the battles.

Then the Hundred-and-Third Assault Legion, the furthest away from the Empire. I go on for a while, focusing hard.

There are no active battles right now — the Vyrpy seem to have withdrawn the moment the Phrexz died...

My thoughts are gently guided away and I see and understand things I never knew.

Ah! There’s an alliance - Phrexz and Vyrpy. The impostor Empress was using the Throne to talk to them, and to her own species. They were defeated by us, but they haven’t given up. They will still be coming for us. Both Phrexz and Vyrpy. And there’s an even bigger danger...

The blood freezes in my veins. The Throne doesn’t show me the details, but there’s a terrible darkness coming through space-

“What?” I’m suddenly aware that Umbra is speaking.

She looks up at me, eyes clear and her ring shining so bright it nearly blinds me.

“ Behold, the great serpents of shadow and flame, born of utter darkness. They shall eclipse the very heavens and sup upon the light of a thousand burning suns, turning mountains to weeping stone with their greed and fire.”

I stare at her. What the hell is going on? She’s using an archaic form of Khavgrese that I can only barely understand. And she’s saying some strange things. “What’s happening, Umbra?”

“ She’s being held in place,” Bellatriz pipes up. “ I would recommend getting away from this thing right away.”

I want to bounce out of the Throne, but many tentacles shoot down from the Throne and whip around my arms, my legs, and my chest, holding me firmly. And sure enough, one tentacle has snaked around Umbra’s waist while another lies along her neck and chin as if ready to strangle her.

“ But forsooth,” she goes on with a clear, calm voice, “ the truest peril is harbored from within. The root of thy blessed tree shall blacken with a fell plague, and the hand that offers thee a token of peace shall clench a blade in its unseen grip. The foe ye seek shall be found within thy very gates.”

“Aaargh!” I use all my strength to writhe out of the Throne’s grip, but it holds me firmly. Two more tentacles come snaking around my chest. “Bellatriz! Do something!”

“ I’m a sword, not a robot,” she tells me calmly. “ There’s nothing I can do here. Use your Syntrix, maybe?”

Umbra looks me right in the eyes. “ Yet from a rift hidden from all, a new star shall arise. A strong hand shall reach through the chasm, and by a tongue ye comprehend not shall ye be saved.”

I get ready to mobilize all my strength again, for one last try to get off the Throne. But before I can unleash my furious might, the tentacles loosen and allow me to stand up. The ones around Umbra also withdraw quickly.

In two steps I’m next to her, holding her, my heart beating fast. “Are you all right, my love?”

She looks up at me, eyes widening. “Mareliux. I’m fine. Why?”

“You just… do you remember what just happened?”

She blinks once. “You sat on the throne.”

“And then?”

She frowns. “And then you got up.”

“And what happened while I was sitting there?”

She shrugs. “Um… nothing. Did something happen? Did you feel something?”

I take her hand and lead her fast towards the door. “Something did happen. I’ll tell you later.”

At the double doors, I look back at the Throne. It moves in its mesmerizing way, looking innocent. But I should never forget the reputation it has for its strange and sometimes deadly actions.

The doors close behind us. This is a smaller anteroom where supplicants and visitors wait before they’re admitted to the Throne room. Now it’s also empty of people, and it’s much brighter than the gloomy Throne room.

I sit us down on the lowest couch in the room, which is still so high that Umbra dangles her legs.

“Bellatriz, can you repeat to Umbra what happened in the Throne room?”

“ Of course,” the sword says and goes on to recount the strange occurrence, playing Umbra’s words for us.

Umbra gasps and grabs my arm, squeezing it in alarm. “I don’t remember that! I don’t even know most of those words! What happened to me in there?!”

I lift her onto my lap and pull her close. “You’re safe now, my love. We won’t go in there again. Bellatriz, has the Throne done anything like this before?”

“ Not that I know of.”

“How do you interpret it?”

“ It appears that the Tentacle Throne took hold of Umbra’s body somehow and had her say things that it can’t say itself.

I assume this happened through some Syntric connection.

There were three distinct statements in the general form of prophecies or an oracle’s predictions, The language was an archaic form of pre-Imperial Khavgrese.

It appears the first statement was a prediction or prophesy of alien enemies coming to Khav.

There’s mention of serpents, fire, and darkness.

These were common terms for describing aliens in the old days, when alien species were held to be dangerous. ”

“Could it mean the Phrexz?” Umbra asks. “Their army, maybe?”

“ That’s definitely one possibility. The second statement appears to concern an enemy that’s closer to you, perhaps even inside the palace. The words, like plague, blacken and so on, are typical of such descriptions in the ancient histories and records.”

“‘A foe found within the very gates’,” I ponder. “Can’t this describe the Phrexz that took the place of my mother?”

“ It could,” Bellatriz says cheerfully. “ The grammar and the words are consistent with a prediction of something that is to happen in the future. But it could be that this is the Throne’s way of making sense of recent events and not a prediction at all.”

“The Throne may have been badly traumatized by the Phrexz sitting on it and sending destructive Syntrix to the legions,” Umbra suggests. “It may just have needed to vent in the only way it knew how.”

“That sounds possible,” I reluctantly agree.

The visions the Throne showed me were definitely not things that have happened.

“The first enemy mentioned could be the Vyrpy. The second could be the Phrexz. And the third statement is clearly about a friend coming to the rescue. Surely that means you, Umbra. ‘A rift hidden from all’ could be Earth, stuck behind that Syntric Veil. ‘A strong hand’ could be your talent for using the Syntrix.”

“‘ A tongue you comprehend not’ may well be an old-fashioned description of you and your Earth language, Umbra, ” Bellatriz adds.

“ Yes, that could well be the explanation. But I maintain that it was meant as a prophecy or prediction. Perhaps the Throne is not quite updated on what’s happened.

Or maybe this was something so alien that I can’t even guess at it. The Throne is a mysterious lifeform.”

I nuzzle Umbra’s hair. “How do you feel?”