Never Submit! The Swarii Brides, Book One (5 page)

“Sorry,” Ellie said, heaving a sigh. “I was…” She cleared her throat. “
Plugged
.”

Mary gasped in horrified shock, “
No!
Are you serious?”

Ellie blushed and nodded. “By Jazeel,” she added, since Peyton occasionally plugged a girl or two that was flirting with human men through the peep-hole near the kitchens, where the supplies were delivered. As Peyton would be blamed for the loss of any of the girls’ virginities, he didn’t allow any non-eunuchs anywhere on the premises, and so the small face-wide opening in the door there was the only place where girls could see any new men. Ellie would tease Peyton about it and call him a
bouncer
, but she still never considered even looking outside the peephole after seeing the consequences.

Ellie jutted her bottom lip sadly out. “It’s put me in a
mood
.”

“What could you possibly have done?” Mary asked, still shaking her head incredulously. She never would have thought Ellie could do anything to earn Jazeel’s displeasure—Ellie was always put up on a pedestal as an example of how to serve him!

“He was about to shoot this Swarii in the face.” Ellie shrugged. “And I sort of… hampered him. Look,” she said, changing the subject. “Have you ever seen a Swarii, Mary?”

Mary nodded. “Yes, my old master had captured a couple of them once and tortured them to death.”

Ellie, now knowing what they looked like, seemed disturbed by that forward explanation. “They look like… humans,” she noted, confused as to how Mary didn’t seem to notice. 

“But they’re not,” Mary was quick to correct, her voice almost stern.

“But they
look
like…” Ellie continued.

“They’re not human, Ellie,” Mary told her, cutting her hand through the air. “Don’t let yourself become confused by the coincidence that they, in some way, look like us. They’re far more advanced than us. They’re also, like… I don’t know, eight feet tall, some of them.”

“I didn’t see one of them that was eight feet—at least not most of them,” Ellie argued. “Seven feet, maybe, but… Peyton’s like… six and a half, about. That’s not too weird.
You
obviously like tall men…”

“So, is that why you saved them? Because you thought they were
human
?” Mary raised an eyebrow, looking like Ellie had just said that grass was purple and that up was down.

Ellie shrugged. “Well…”

“Look, Ellie,” Mary sighed. “We have enough of a time protecting our own skin. The last thing we need is to lay ourselves down for a whole other species.”

Peyton walked back into the kitchen, his eyes quickly focusing on the two girls. Mary’s expression was far darker than it normally was, and Ellie looked like she was facing turmoil by the way her expression seemed twisted. “What are you both talking about?”

“Nothing,” Ellie said, her head snapping in his direction.

Peyton squinted at her as if she had to be up to mischief. “Are you
lying
to me, now?” Peyton asked, marching dangerously close to her.

Mary put a calming hand on Peyton’s chest. “You need to chill out, Sugar,” she told him. “We were just talking—woman issues. Besides, you need to give her a break. She didn’t anger Jazeel on purpose. Believe me. And she’s entitled to screw up every now and then. She’s only human!”

He grunted, but seemed to calm. “You need to get back to work, Ellie.” He watched her mouth open in protest, but he put a finger on her lips, which silenced her. “I don’t care how sore you are. There’re lots of jobs that need doin’—Mary’s sewin’ machine needs to be fixed, the oven’s having troubles, the air conditioner on level two is off…” She sighed as he continued the list.

What she would do for a car to repair! Just a
car
! She missed being up to her elbows in grease, listening to her uncle and her father’s cursing or her cousin’s tools blare and shrill from across the room… With the duties Peyton liked to give her, she might as well have been just an electrician.

“Are you listening?” Peyton snapped.

Nope, she wasn’t. Her eyes climbed to his face so she could stare wearily at him.

“First thing I want you to do, Little Girl, is go downstairs and fix the damn locking mechanism in the prison cell.”

Her eyes popped wide with interest. “I thought that there’re Swarii down there?” she replied.

“The guards will let you in there. They know it needs fixin,’” Peyton shrugged. “Just told me this mornin’ about it. Though, if you’re
nervous
, go ahead and wait. The Swarii are gonna be executed on Wednesday, anyway.”

“Jazeel’s getting married on Wednesday,” Ellie replied flatly. “Right?”

“I know. He’s a real romantic,” he snorted sarcastically. “Thinks a Swarii execution will be a real nice weddin’ gift. Besides, the crowd will already be in town for it, and he wants the event to have an audience. Jazeel just told me about it.” He pointed his thumb in the direction of Jazeel’s chamber.

Ellie began to laugh. “This reminds me of Robin Hood. You know, with Kevin Costner? Where the bad guy…”

Peyton raised his hand to silence her. “We’re not having a movie night right now. Did you want to get that job done, or should I call down to the guards and tell them to suck it until the cell’s clean?”

“I’ll go,” Ellie said lightly, wanting, on second thought, to get another good look at the creatures. They were doomed to die, but she knew she’d be up all night if she didn’t have another look at them, to see if she could spot something that made them indisputably alien. “Electrical work is loads of fun,” she lied.

“Thank you,” Peyton grunted. He gave her a much more playful swat than earlier. Ellie feared it was his way of apologizing for his earlier terseness. “Get on with it, now.” He looked over longingly at Mary, who blushed knowingly at the look. “I need to talk to Mary about a thing or two—real fast. In her
empty workshop
…” He took Mary’s hand and pulled her playfully out to the hallway while Ellie groaned and rolled her eyes. 

“Yeah. I
bet
.” She stuck a finger down her throat to illustrate a gag before the door shut the couple out of her sight.

Suddenly, the thought of her and the commander doing exactly what she’d seen Peyton and Mary doing that morning (and probably what they were doing right now) slammed into her head, jarring her. “Whoa, Ellie,” she warned herself, walking from the room to get her tools and to change into her working clothes. “Don’t start fantasying about a dead man. There’s nothing good at the end of
that
tunnel!”

Chapter Three

By the time Ellie made it down to the prison (which was really a ‘dungeon’ as it was on the lowest floor, was cold and not very well lit, and had absolutely no comforts for the prisoners), she looked very different than she had earlier that morning. She was constantly changing clothes when it didn’t look like she would have to be in Jazeel’s company for a couple of hours. She wore panties, a bra, and work pants comparable to what she used to wear at her family’s garage back home.

Ellie, simply put, looked far more comfortable than she really was. She actually had to walk down some stairs to get to the cell, and during that process she thought she was going to die.

“You guys need something fixed?” she said brightly to the guards posted outside, who sat all day in something that looked to her like comfortable La-Z-Boy recliners.  They looked at her with disdain, checking out her utility belt.

One of the guards finally began to speak in what she could only guess was an attempt at English. It was horrible, but she did make out a couple of words and choice phrases like, ‘you stupid human cunt’ and ‘don’t know what a full day of work is’… She hoped he was talking mainly to himself. Finally, he stretched, got himself out of his chair, and walked to the door to open it for her. The door only opened halfway, and the lock took at least seven tries before it worked at all.

She walked in and turned around, watching the same guard attempting to close the door. “You’re… not coming in here with me?” she asked, confused. She quickly looked at the Swarii, who were on the far side of the cell, huddled together, and glaring suspiciously at her.

“No. Go fuck yourself. Pound on the door for a while and we
might
let you out,” is what she believed he grumbled before he slammed the door in her face.

“Dick,” she muttered before she slowly turned around and looked back in the Swarii’s direction. She expected them to be where they had been the first time she had looked, but now they were much closer; they had very quietly snuck up on her. “Hi,” she greeted, trying her best not to gulp and give her nervousness away. She cleared her throat and focused back on her work.

She pulled out a key from her belt loop that helped her uncap the locking panel, which was close enough to the floor that she had to get down on her knees to work on it.

Her ears were open, hoping she would hear them use shal’ta. Instead, she heard whispers made in a completely different language which sounded, to her untrained ears, pretty akin to Gaelic. This was surprising… She had always figured that speakers of shal’ta—like the Frians—would never have felt the need to develop their own
spoken
language.

She looked into the panel and immediately cursed her rotten luck. The panel was, as Peyton would have put it, ‘fucked up.’ It needed to be completely rewired, completely reprogrammed. It was going to take her
hours
.

She sighed in sympathy for her throbbing rectum which, even though science probably would have assured her differently, was not feeling like it would ever get accustomed to having the plug in it.

Suddenly, there was English being spoken above her head. “Are you okay?”

Startled, she looked up—way up— and saw the Commander himself, leaning up against the wall above her, his arms crossed, looking nearly like he was trying to be cool on purpose.

He spoke
English
? How…? She found herself getting excited; she loved listening to her own language when it wasn’t insulting her, or ordering her, or cooing at her to stay still while her nipples or bottom were played with.

She wanted to lament about the butt plug, and she wanted to further lament how much trouble she’d be in if she took it out, she wanted so much to get some sympathy about it—but she didn’t mention it. It was, after all, mortifying. So, instead, she simply pointed to the wall and said, “Yeah, this is just gonna take me
forever
.”

“No, I mean… You’re not too bruised, I hope?” he asked, his tone actually sounded soft and concerned. “You look like you’re still in pain.”

“I don’t normally talk about my bottom with strangers,” she replied coyly, blushing as she took her electrical gloves out of a pocket in her utility belt. “You’re not going to… kill me, or rape me, or anything I should be worried about, right?”

He looked surprised for a moment, but then he gave a singular, quiet laugh. “No. Not you. Not at all. I owe you, actually—you know… For making Jazeel miss his mark…”

“You don’t owe me,” she informed frankly, shaking her head as she pulled out the electrical pliers. “I probably just gave you three extra days, tops. Jazeel plans to kill you at his wedding ceremony.”

She looked up at him to see his reaction. It certainly wasn’t one of surprise; it was much more like amusement. He slid down the wall and sat down next to her. With her kneeling, and him sitting, he was still easily taller than her. “You don’t say? I thought he wanted to tempt us into a deal…”

She shrugged. “I wouldn’t trust my master as far as I could toss him.” She looked at him, her eyebrows raised. “Why? Were you
hoping
for a deal?”

He shook his head. “No, but normally pretending like we
are
buys us about three days more to get out of these situations.” He motioned to the room around them. “The
game
is to avoid torture during these little visits. But, if we have three more days, anyway, we won’t bother. They normally like to have their victims in non-tortured wellness before they cut their heads off. They’re odd that way.”

She snorted with disbelief. “Don’t even
pretend
you’ve been captured before.”

“This will be our seventh time,” he admitted with a sincere nod of his head.

“If it was, you wouldn’t be telling
me
,” she said, cutting a couple of wires with a small pair of scissors then ripping out the whole line with a firm tug. “You don’t know me,” she reminded. “I could turn around and just tell my master that you’re apt escape artists. Have him kill you in
five minutes
rather than three days. See how you get out of
that
. Lots of humans will do that, you know—sell you out for the clothes on your dead body.” And that much was true. She had seen one servant girl sell out another girl into a whipping to get a second cookie after dinner.

“I don’t think you will,” he replied, shrugging carelessly.

“What makes you say that?”

“Because you hate your master and because you’re not really human.” He said this so sing-songishly, that the wording didn’t actually settle into her mind for a couple of seconds.

Not really human.
As if
. Ridiculous! Still, it was unnerving that she had so easily given away her true feelings for Jazeel. She had not acted well enough—what had she given away? “Why do you say that?” she asked, trying to be as calm as possible.

“I can give you two reasons. One—your eyes are far too pretty to be a human’s,” he told her. “I’ve met a lot of human servants while in dungeons. Enough to learn your most common language,” he explained. “And you don’t look like any of them.”

“We’re all as unique as snowflakes,” she educated, continuing to cut and pull out wires until they were massing into a giant pile next to her. “
Of course
you haven’t seen one like
me
.”

“Or one that smelled so sweet.” He smiled a smile that could have knocked her socks off—it was dazzling.