Page 1 of Pleasured By the Panther
1
MIRANDA
“Hanna Slocum—you have been selected. Please come forward to be matched to your Monstrum,” the voice rang out through the large auditorium.
Beside Miranda, her daughter stiffened, her eyes going wide.
“Oh no!” she gasped, her hands tightening on her purse. “Oh my God, Mom—what am I going to do?”
Miranda took a deep breath and put a hand on her daughter’s arm.
“We knew this might happen—just relax, honey. I’ll handle it.”
“I…I should speak up for myself.” But Hanna looked horribly unhappy about it. She had always been shy—an introvert’s introvert who shied away from crowds—she hadn’t even wanted to go to Disney World when she was little because it was too crowded. She hated being the center of attention, which was one reason Miranda had come with her.
As a high school English teacher, Miranda was used to public speaking—and she wasn’t afraid of crowds. She’d been preparing for this moment ever since her daughter had received a draft summons in the mail informing Hanna that she had been chosen for a “General Drafting Call” to go aboard the Monstrum Kindred Mother Ship.
It was supposed to be a time for unmarried human women to meet and spend time with Monstrum Kindred warriors and see if they might be compatible with the one who called them. But everyone knew once a woman went up to the Kindred Mother Ship, she rarely came back down.
When Hanna had gotten the summons in the mail, she’d gone as white as a sheet.
“Oh no!” she’d breathed, her voice filled with horror. “Oh no, I can’t believe I forgot!”
“Forgot what?” Miranda had been making spaghetti in the kitchen, but her daughter’s horrified words had brought her quickly to Hanna’s side, still clutching the wooden spoon dripping red sauce.
“The Draft—the Kindred Bride Draft!” Hanna had moaned. “I forgot to withdraw my name after Bradley asked me to marry him! And that was months ago—the wedding’s this weekend!”
Miranda frowned.
“Now, honey—I’m sure they’ll understand. We’ll just call the Human/ Kindred Relations building and explain that you’re engaged and about to be married. They won’t make you bond with a Kindred Warrior when you’re promised to someone else.”
“Not just any Kindred warrior—a Monstrum.” Hanna’s eyes had filled with fear. “They’re so big, Mom! And they all look like animals!”
Miranda had to acknowledge that the Monstrum were rather frightening. They and the regular Kindred were all over seven feet tall. They were aliens who had come from another planet. After saving the Earth from invasion, the World Council had decreed that the huge, muscular warriors had the right to call human women as Brides.
The regular Kindred looked more or less human—except for their size, of course. But the Monstrum really did have an animalistic look to them. They were covered in fur and had large, golden eyes. Miranda thought the Felinus Monstrum—who looked like lions and tigers and panthers—were possibly the most fearsome. They had long fangs and some even had tails.
But despite all that, Miranda didn’t believe in giving in to fear or hysteria.
“We’ll call the HKR building,” she told her daughter firmly. “I’m sure they’ll understand when we tell them you’re engaged.”
But when she made the call, the woman on the other end of the phone wasn’t very helpful at all.
“I’m sorry, but if you’ve been called to a General Draft by the Monstrum, then you’ll have to explain to them why you didn’t remove your name from the Draft after becoming engaged,” she said brusquely. “Please be sure to appear at the downtown Hilton, where the Draft is being held in their main ballroom. You can explain there why you shouldn’t be chosen to go to the Monstrum Mother Ship if your name gets called.”
Hanna had been so upset she’d started crying, but Miranda stayed calm.
“Honey, it’s going to be okay,” she reassured her, hugging her daughter. “We’ll just go down there and tell them the truth. They can’t make you marry someone you don’t want to marry—you have a right to refuse them.”
“But what if they make me go up to that ship for a month?” Hanna wailed. A month was the usual time for what the Kindred called “The Claiming Period.” During that time, the Kindred—or Monstrum—had certain rights and privileges that allowed them to be more and more intimate with the brides they had called. If a girl could resist, she could come back to her old life on Earth. But almost no one managed to resist—they all stayed aboard the Mother Ship with their new alien husbands.
“Look, I’m sure they won’t—” Miranda began.
“The wedding is this weekend!” Hanna exclaimed, running a hand through her dark brown hair. “If they make me go up there, I’ll miss my own wedding! We’ve been planning it for months.”
“I know, honey—I helped you plan it,” Miranda said dryly.
“The wedding is on Saturday!” Hanna was getting more and more upset.
