Page 60 of Alien's Eternal Mate

I opened my mouth, but Zey unexpectedly pushed forward to the center of the ring.

“You can tell Jank that Chief Zey accepts his challenge,” the frail old Masari said with surprising strength.

The envoy’s grin of spiteful pleasure made me want to run him through, handicap or no handicap.

“Then I will bring the news back to his eminence. Jank will return at Sundown. Make peace with the Architects. You will be with them soon.”

He launched himself into the air with a sudden burst of speed that had half the gathered warriors on the verge of attacking. I supposed he didn’t have to conserve his innate power for combat.

I turned to Zey and spread my hands out wide.

“Chief Zey, why did you accept his challenge?”

“Because, I am the Peace Chief, and I had to accept.” He shrugged, not seeming the least bit concerned. “It is the way of things.”

I hated that phrase, which was often justified--according to Masari logic--something that should have been unjustifiable.

“Forgive me, Chief Zey,” I said, striving to keep my voice as diplomatic as possible “but I believe that you might struggle to achieve victory over Jank.”

“Struggle to achieve victory?” Zey chuckled. “I believe that I would struggle to last more than a few seconds against as skilled a warrior as Jank.”

I wanted to scream in frustration, but I held myself in check.

“If that’s the case, don’t you think that you should, ah, be more worried?”

“Why should I be worried? I’m not going to face Jank.”

I tilted my head to the side.

“You’re not? But, you accepted his challenge.”

“Indeed,” Zey said with a smile.

“And you just admitted that you can’t defeat him.”

“That is a fact,” Zey replied with a nod.

“Then why are you acting so calm?”

“Because, the challenge was to the Peace Chief of the Starlost tribe. Whoever that may be.”

I glanced around, because the gathered villagers had hemmed in much closer to us. All of them, from the eldest to the youngest, held a gleam in their eyes I could not comprehend.

“What’s going on?”

Chief Zey drew a knife and I took a reflexive step back.

“What are you doing? Stop it,” I cried as he lifted the knife toward his own throat. I feared he would commit suicide in order to stop a duel he could not hope to win.

“I’m only doing what I must.”

The knife flashed. The villagers gasped. I looked on in puzzlement as Zey’s topknot flopped to the ground at his feet.

Why did he give himself a haircut?

Zey extracted a metal band from the shortened strands of his new hairdo. He approached me, holding it with both hands.

“Turn around, Gro.”

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