Here’s the link to the Weekend Writing Warriors central page, so you can visit all the participants sharing excerpts today…a fun way to sample new books and find new authors! (Also welcome to the Sunday Snippet visitors!)

Sharing from my second scifi romance gladiator novel RENNYR.

If you want the full story of what they go through and how they battle to survive and protect each other, and their romance, with all the nuances and details, the book is available wide. 

The excerpt, switching to Jaine’s POV as she waits to enter the arena:

The wall in front of her was gone and Jaine felt pressure at her back as the crowd of prisoners was forced onto the waiting sands. A pile of shields, swords and other gear waited in the center of the arena as promised so she broke into a sprint. She was barely conscious of the screaming of a crowd in the seats above the fighting field. Her only goal was to grab a weapon and then find the safest space she could and make a stand.

Jaine circled  the disorderly pile of gear, dismayed by the selection. The shields were two feet by four feet and thick, impossibly heavy and although she’d love to have one, she doubted she could lift it. She barely gave the swords and spears a glance but when she saw a spiked ball at the end of a chain lying in the sand, she pounced. Yanking her find free from the items piled haphazardly on top, she discovered she had a short handled mace with three chains fastened to the end. Even better, each of the chains had a spiked metal ball at the tip. Taking an experimental swing, she was sure she could manage to defend herself with this, if all her opponents had were swords and spears. Of course if the men after her had shields, all she could do would be to batter at them ineffectually.

Swipe at the legs, she thought.

VS: Next week I’ll switch back to Rennyr’s POV as he attempts to join Jaine in the arena to defend her.

RENNYR (BADARI GLADIATORS SERIES BOOK 2) by Veronica Scott

Rennyr was a genetically engineered senior soldier in his Badari Warrior pack until one day he woke up on a strange planet naked, disoriented and about to be sold into the gladiator arena for the rest of his life. Unscrupulous guards faked his death in the lab where he was created and sold him into slavery in the galaxy’s hinterlands. Kill or be killed is the rule in his new life and a Badari never gives up. He’ll fight to stay alive until the Badari goddess sees fit to decree his death and release him from the wretched existence.

Jaine Mitchel of the Sectors was on her way to an exciting research internship until pirates seized the spaceship on which she was a passenger and took her to feature in a gladiator ‘death match’ in the galactic hinterlands. She has no hope of surviving in the arena until a man she only glimpsed in passing breaks out of his cell and saves her life, declaring her to be his fated mate. Given to Rennyr as his reward for winning the death match, Jaine must share a cell and a bed with the handsome, not human, gladiator and together they have to find a way to survive in this merciless world of violence and death. Their mutual attraction is off the charts. Falling in love is the easy part, finding a way to escape or even to remain together is the challenge. At any time their mutual owner could decide thumbs up or thumbs down on one or both of them, or sell them separately.

Their only hope is a mysterious gladiator master from offworld who may be coming to buy Rennyr. Will he take Jaine as well? Could Rennyr win freedom for them both if he does well enough in the arena? Badari Warriors claim their mates for life and Rennyr has no intention of losing Jaine…RENNYR is an 80K word novel and can be read as a standalone. KYDEN is the first book in the series.

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