Choosing Theo: The Clecanian Series Book 1 Victoria Aveline (the giving tree read aloud TXT) 📖

Jade scoffed. “That’s ridiculous! What if two women or two men want to be together? You’re telling me they’d leave their partners and sleep with someone of the opposite sex just to become pregnant?”

Zikas looked at her sadly. “At one point that wasn’t the case, but you have to understand that in a way, we’ve devolved. The threat of extinction has caused our priorities to change. Females, males, and those who identify as neither are free to be with whomever they want, but most of our citizens understand that continuing our species is our top priority. I know of many Clecanian females who choose to be in marriages in order to procreate but return home to their female partners after their marriage is complete.”

Jade stood and started to pace. She was beginning to feel a tug of compassion. Housing, safety, and food in return for a wife. Forced prostitution! That was what he was offering. She needed to remember that and not be suckered in by the sweet old man trying to pull on her heart strings.

“Infertility isn’t our biggest problem, though.”

“How can that not be the biggest problem?” Jade said with thinned lips.

“When females do become pregnant and give birth, eighty of the children born are males,” Zikas said with a look of desperation. “Finding another species that’s compatible with us would be an invaluable discovery. One we’ve been searching for, for hundreds of years. One that might save our people from extinction.” With that, he gazed earnestly into Jade’s eyes.

Jade’s eyes widened as she realized what this guy ultimately wanted from her. “Oh, no! I see what you’re getting at, and I’m truly sorry for you and your people but I’m not going to have alien babies! If the sci-fi movies taught me anything, it’s not to get pregnant with an alien. It claws its way out—”

“Jade.”

“—and then it looks like a cockroach or an octopus beetle—”

“Jade.”

“—and if you’re lucky, it’ll leave you alone and not eat you after it’s born! But most of—”

“Jade!”

“What?” Rage boiled in her gut. So much had happened to her in the last week. In all her life, she’d never felt the pull to have a child. They seemed fine but not something that interested her very much. Now on this alien planet, she was being asked—no, not asked—told. She was being told to pick a guy to marry and then have his alien baby.

“I don’t understand what you’re talking about. Please let me finish. No one will force you to have a child.”

Narrowing her eyes at Zikas, she gestured impatiently for him to explain.

“You have to understand, females are the most precious thing on this planet. Females are treasured, worshipped even. They can create life! More than once!” Zikas added, looking exasperated, “On Earth, marriage means you stay with that person forever, correct?”

“It’s supposed to,” Jade said. “Doesn’t mean anybody follows through with that though.”

“Well, here, a marriage only has to last three months. Matehood is forever, but marriage is more of a…” Zikas scanned the ceiling, trying to find the right words, “a trial.”

“What?” Confusion now warred with her anger. Jade glared at him suspiciously. “How long in Earth days is three months?” For all Jade knew, three months could really be thirty years on this planet.

Zikas tapped his ear. “The translator uses the amount of time I intended to mean and translates it based on information from your planet. The amount of time you need to be married for is equivalent to three months in Earth time.”

“Why three months?” Jade asked placing her hands on her hips.

“Clecanian females decided that three months would be a long enough amount of time to assess whether the male they’ve chosen is worthy of raising a child.” Zikas stepped closer. “I’m not trying to deceive you, Jade. You have to understand, females on this planet can do whatever they want. Choose to marry whomever they want. They also choose whether they want to have sex with their husband during their marriage or not. When a female chooses a male to marry, she’s gifting that male an opportunity, not a right. He’ll do whatever he can to make his wife happy. It’s a Clecanian husband’s job to satisfy his wife in every way. If he does this, then she may choose to have sex with him. If she wants more time with the male, she can choose to extend her marriage or she can go live somewhere else. Often, females choose to live in The Pearl Temple with other unwed females.”

Jade stared open-mouthed at Zikas.

Zikas continued, “If a male ever did anything to hurt a female in any way, the female has the right to mete out his punishment.”

“So—”

“And the reason we have a law that requires Class 4 planet females to marry,” Zikas quickly added, “is because we want all females who may have been brought here under very unpleasant circumstances to understand our customs and give them a chance. We want to show them, and you, how treasured you’d be here. The creators of that law believed, as I do, that if you experience how good life can be on Clecania, that you, and females like you, will decide not to leave after a year.”

Zikas moved to stand across from Jade as she considered everything he’d told her. Finally, she looked at him and asked, “So I pick any of those guys to marry.”

“As long as someone else hasn’t picked them first. In which case, the male will choose who his bride will be,” Zikas answered happily, sensing Jade was softening to the idea.

“Uh-huh. And whoever I do marry,” she said, raising her eyebrows, “is not allowed to rape me, beat me, lock me up, etcetera?”

“Any of those behaviors will most likely result in the male’s death,” Zikas said, almost bouncing in his chair with joy.

“And he’ll do anything I want? Happily? And get nothing in return?”

“Well, you’d live in his house in return,” Zikas said, confusion etched across his face.