Page 5 of The Royal’s Bumblebee (Operation Colonise #2)

“PUT ME DOWN”

Izule.

That sweet smell was much stronger now.

My yellow eyes watched a particular scene in the middle of the crowd.

One of the humans was actively cowering.

She was so afraid she was being walked like a child through the room.

Her eyes were shut and she looked on the verge of tears.

I looked to the human she clung to and wondered why she wasn’t calming her down. At least the male on her other side was posturing defensively. He smiled, but his stance was clear. He was guarding the smaller alien.

Dalahan, an emerald Ucfeni from the merchant’s guild with green eyes and a grin, coiled his tail around the human male’s waist and extracted him from his sentry duty.

In the process, the human resisted and leaned back, bumping and startling the small human with brown fur on her head.

She squealed and my yellow eyes widened.

I watched her whimper and look around the room at last with horror.

The sweet smell in the air became so intense it made me dizzy.

It’s her.

She is the one giving off the sweet smell.

“Billie wait!”

I blink my yellow eyes and track someone coming right at me. The little human has pushed her way through the rest of the colonists and is crying.

I watch her run below me and collide with her right shoulder against the back corner beneath the resting branches. Her reaction and fleeing has alarmed many in the room. I smell it in the air. Many turn to look towards her, as do I.

She is sat in the corner of the hall in a ball. She is holding her legs, her head behind her knees, and shaking.

That must be what humans do instead of tangling into a protective ball within a tail. She is beneath me now and her terror coats my tongue.

My yellow eyes notice another human female trying to get closer but unable to break through the line of Ucfeni coming over to investigate.

Leading the party is Ambassador Rerasha. He looks up at me, wary of approaching a Royal without permission, and comes no closer.

“Excuse me? My name is Ambassador Rerasha. I was at your welcoming after you arrived on Thelia. Are you injured?”

She doesn’t answer him. “May I please approach?”

He asks me. I wonder why at first, but then I realise it’s because he will have to enter striking distance to get to her. The makes her feelings clear by whining and rocking back and forth.

“No.”

I slide down from the resting branch until my entire form towers over the lesser Ucfeni. They lower their heads and slither away the second I widen my cowl.

The human that once held the crying one behind me screams. I ignore her and roll my shoulders to adopt a warning stance.

My cowl is wide and the brown eye markings on either side of my neck make my presence intimidating. “None may approach until she is calm.”

I decree, and I rightly expect that to be the end of it.

“Yes, your highness.”

Rerasha shows his submission and ushers the other curious Ucfeni to return to the middle of the hall. I notice the same human that screamed at my presence tries to get to me.

“You will not approach me.”

I order her, but she does so anyway. I lift up on my tail and adopt a striking position.

“P-please?”

She shook like a leaf and she held both hands up. Her long black hair and messy fringe were dishevelled from her ordeal jumping and rolling over the tails of many Ucfeni to get to me. I am impressed with her determination, even if she is stupid. I don’t look away from her, though I notice Rerasha slithering at speed to get to her. She will be extracted soon. “Billie is my sister and she has shut down. She needs—”

“You need to back off, right now.”

Rerasha tried to take hold of this female who dared to look me right in the eyes. She seethed and slapped Rerasha’s hand away! The level of disrespect! I started to hiss and leaned forward. “HEY! Will you ALL just calm THE FUCK down?!!”

She screamed and there was a fire in her dark brown eyes. She no longer shook and she bore her teeth at me.

“Billie Blac is my sister, and she has been treated SO BADLY since we arrived here on Thulia, and now she is COWERING in the back of your hall! I am her sister, the ONLY person who understands her, and you are stopping me from taking care of my AUTISTIC SISTER!”

The humans residing in the hall all gasped and looked horrified. Not afraid, but disgusted. I have no idea why.

“Billie Blac? Oh no.”

Rerasha’s neck scales paled. “The technical genius? The one Alaric says is very important?”

My curiosity is peaked. A technical genius? It was hard to imagine something so small as being a genius.

“Yes she’s all that, sure, but that’s not what I care about right now. I care about the fact that she is so upset and so scared she has shut down, and you are stopping me from getting to her. Let me pass.”

She tried to go around me. I would not allow it. I swayed and hissed angrily, making her take a step back. “Why? Why won’t you—”

Rerasha took hold of the back of her head and forced her to bow forward.

“You stupid girl! Show respect. This is Prince Izule. When he gives an order it must be followed.”

“Rerasha! Unhand her this instant!”

The Human leader ran forward with a scuffle of shoes on the stone floor. He skidded to a stop beside her and took hold of Rerasha’s orange wrist, trying to make him release her. I look over their heads and notice that the hall is being cleared. “Hannah I’m here!”

“Thank God! Get him off me!”

“This is a huge misunderstanding, I’m sure.”

Alaric aims up at both of us. “But it’s not okay to take hold of one of my people, Ambassador. Release Hannah right now.”

“She will be fine. I act to protect her, that is all.”

Rerasaha was insulted and deeply hurt by the mistrust of his partner. His other arm wraps around the woman called Hannah and she is lifted clear off her feet.

“PUT ME DOWN!”

“Rerasha!”

Alaric is beside himself, but I don’t care. As the Ambassador carries the thrashing woman back from my presence, I lower my stance and retract my fangs.

Only when they huddle angrily together at the other side of the room do I turn and look behind me.

Eyes like liquid gold look at me. They peer out from behind her knees and beneath the round circles she wears on her face.

I scent her with my tongue and her sweetness is still in the air. Her fear has lessened. This makes me more confident that I have done the right thing in guarding her.