Excerpt: The Alien Bride by Brie McGill

It
was a tortuous hike through three frosty sectors of the building
before Aleister’s RCU indicated close range with the target. They
passed hallway after hallway, door after door, everything locked and
stamped with the bident emblem of death.

Aleister
thumbed through his RCU. “I should have the access codes here.”
He lifted a hand, prepared to input the code.

With
a metal groan, the doors rolled open before he inputted anything.

Ninkasi
shivered, peering inside: against the far wall sat an empty hospital
bed with rumpled, contusion-purple sheets, connected to a complex
bank of computer screens. Swabs, syringes, and glass jars packed with
gauze cluttered a grey marbled sink. Scab-purple curtains dangled
from the ceiling and fluttered in the cold draft slicing through the
room.

A
young woman appeared in the corner of the room, clutching Orion’s
scarlet patchwork knapsack. Flowing robes of black silk dangled
around her wraithlike frame, rippling with her contained,
premeditated movements. Her stomach stretched with a pregnancy in the
third trimester.

Ninkasi
opened her mouth to speak, but no words came out.

Aleister
and Nero were equally dumbfounded.

The
door slammed shut behind them.

The
girl approached slowly, taking one tiny, purposeful, powerful step at
a time. “You’ve come to help.” She stared at them with green
eyes flickering with the light of St. Elmo’s fire.

Ninkasi
felt a twisting, foreboding knot in her stomach, something about the
girl that told her to run, run far away, as fast as she could.

The
girl lifted the bag, her dainty fingers, white like bone, digging
into the fabric. “You’ve come to help. . . haven’t you?”

“Come
to help with what?” Aleister stepped in front of Ninkasi. “What
are you, child?”

Ninkasi
shot a glance at Aleister. Could he feel it, too, the enormous stormy
gravity of her fragile presence?

The
girl approached him languidly, each step a thunderous black demand
and a desperate plea. “They’ve taken him to the basement.”

“The
basement?” Aleister raised a bushy eyebrow. “Who?”

She
presented him the bag. “We must hurry.” Her voice was mousy,
vacant, each word ringing as if her statements were incomplete.

Aleister
tentatively accepted the sack, glancing from the bag to the girl.
“This is. . . my
bag. . .”

Ninkasi
noticed skin discolorations on the girl’s neck, her arms, bruises
as if someone had struck her. “You mean, you know where Orion is?”

“They
took him to the basement.” The girl approached the door, moving
with a ghoulish air. “Come.”

“You
can take us to Orion?” Ninkasi scrambled after her.

The
girl placed her hand inside the black biometrics box, opening the
doors. “I cannot free him myself.” She exited.

“Where
is he? What’s happening?” Ninkasi shadowed her, despite the
repelling aura, despite the ominous twitch in her gut that told her
NO.
“What are we doing?”

The
girl placed a frigid hand on her shoulder. “Come.”

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Learn more about the author in this interview, and get your copy of The Alien Bride on Amazon. But first, visit Brie’s blog for a dramatic video reading of the first chapter by the author herself!