Untamed Alien - Luna Kingsley

Chapter 1

Marion

We land on Xavren in the middle of the afternoon. The sun is shining brightly enough to match my mood, reflecting off the gold-dipped peaks of the castle towers. Snow covers every inch of the ground but it isn’t as bad as they warned us it could be this time of year.

“Do you think this is it?” Lana, my younger sister, asks. She leans over me to get a look out the window of our ship. A massive structure occupies the majority of land in the center of the walled area where we’re landing—like a castle keep surrounded by towers and turrets. I never imagined anything so grand when I worked so hard to get us three spots aboard the first flight to Xavren. I only thought of our freedom and a fresh start.

“It must be, right?” I take her hand in mine and give it a reassuring squeeze. She’s not a child, already twenty years old to my twenty-two, but we’ve lived such a sheltered life. My protective instincts swell from the look of hope and excitement on her face. I fight the desire to tuck a loose strand of her wild black hair behind her ear. She’s already chastised me for treating her like a child in the past but it has always been my duty to remind her not to get her hopes too high.

“The human settlement is made of gold?” Now Diana pushes her way through for a better look. Unlike Lana and me, she’s not related by blood, but we all consider ourselves to be sisters, nonetheless. She’s the youngest of us both at nineteen, but no one would ever know based on her looks and personality. She’s a firecracker and has been since she was a little girl. It’s one of the many reasons we couldn’t leave her behind when we made the decision to leave.

“It does look fancy,” I say, taking the opportunity during the slow descent to take it all in. The main structure is so massive it draws the eye, but there is so much more to see. What I initially thought to be the ground is in fact snow-covered roofs. Occupants of the city move about the streets, and for the first time my nerves make themselves known. Absentmindedly, my fingers brush the language transmitter behind my ear that we were all fitted with before our journey. It’ll be helpful but it isn’t just about the difference in language, it’s the cultural differences too.

This is the first time I’ve left the colony where we lived. Not only do I need to figure out how to survive but it’s on me to make sure Lana and Diana have what they need as well. The Intergalactic Colonist Association assured us all of our needs would be taken care of but until I see it with my own eyes, I won’t be able to relax.

“Is everything okay? All of a sudden you look like you’ve swallowed a bug,” Lana says.

“Nerves.” I plaster a smile on my face and prepare myself for the landing.

“This is the right decision for all of us,” Lana says, surprising me. “We couldn’t stay there any longer.”

“I know. The fact we made it out at all and we’re finally here…well, it’s all contributing to my nerves. It’ll be fine once we’re settled.” Flashbacks of sneaking out through the fence of the compound in the middle of the night are a stark reminder of what it took for us to get here. We ran through the cornfields with nothing but the clothes on our bodies and the packs on our backs. But we made it and we’re finally landing.

We’re free.

When we land we shuffle down the ramp with all of our bags along with the other three hundred humans who signed on to be a part of the first human settlement on Xavren. We stand around for a few minutes before a large snow transport vehicle pulls up and the native Dhivu species we were informed about climb out. Just like the descriptions we were given, they stand not much taller than typical human males, but their skin is a shade of green that reminds me of evergreen trees back home. Their eyes are the same shade of green, and it’s quite unsettling at first because they don’t have the whites in their eyes like humans do. Their hair looks to be a dark shade of brown, but it’s cut short to their scalp and right now they wear warm