Chapter 23
Chapter
Twenty-Three
REM’EB
I wake up in a strangely chilly environment, with my cock aching and hard, and my khui’s song booming in my chest. My frill is engorged and ready to splay open. A warm body is next to mine, the curve of it sweet, and I have my face buried in a coiling mass of mane.
Tia.
My mate. My resonance.
The one I do not get to keep.
I bite back a groan, sliding my arms around her and pulling her tighter to me, even as I know I should not. I should get up from this soft pile of fur blankets and prepare to return to my people now that Tia is safe. We will finish resonance soon enough, and the moment it is done, I must return. I cannot afford to laze about.
Even as I chide myself, I pull her tighter against me, pull her backside to my front, nestling my cock against her. She makes a soft sound in her sleep, her hips rocking against mine, and it takes everything I have not to push her thighs open and sink into her. We are both bare from the waist below, and it would be such a simple thing…and I would betray her. Because Tia has to look me in the eye and say yes. She has to tell me that she wants me. I cannot just take .
So I roll onto my back and take deep, steady breaths. The stahrs are gone from the smoke hole and so is the blackness. There is a murky gray overhead instead, and that looks far more familiar. The doubts I was filled with last night abate, just a little.
Tia yawns, stretching one arm over her head, and turns to look at me, a sleepy smile on her face. “ Gmornin .”
Her coiling mane is in her face, and she looks delightfully tousled. I smile and brush it away from her brow. “You are beyond lovely every time I see you.”
“ Fr dat choogetta mornin handee ,” she says to me, a playful look on her face. Her hand goes to my cock and I suck in a breath as she smiles.
“Tia.”
“ Yer harrd ,” she murmurs, leaning over me to kiss me even as her fingers dance over my cock. “ Noffor long tho .”
This time I do not put up much of a fight. Before I am even fully awake, she has her fist around the head of my cock, and my frill splays out, cupping her hand and sucking on it as she milks my release. She murmurs more nonsense words at me, then kisses me. When my frill releases her hand, she gets up and fills a bowl with slushy water, cleaning her skin.
I reach for her, intent upon giving her the same pleasure, but she only shakes her head and gives me a teasing smile. She will withhold herself from me this morning, then. Perhaps that is her game—to withhold herself until I swear to be hers.
It is an excellent ploy. I wish I could give her what she wants. I am obligated to return, though. As chief’s son, I have no choice. My people need me to lead them. I need to guide my father before he destroys those of us that are left entirely. “I am sorry, Tia. I cannot give you what you want.”
Her face falls and for a moment she looks so sad and hurt that it wounds me. But then she shakes her head and puts another smile on her face, pulling on fresh clothing. She tosses furs at me, indicating I should dress, too. All the while, she tries to teach me words. The shirt I put on is a too-nik . The fur-covered leggings, panntz . Chews go on my feet and a clowk over my shoulders. Once we are bundled up, we go outside of the hut and into the bracing cold air. It should not surprise me each time we emerge. I have been in the occasional above cave and I know that the world outside of the safety of the tunnels is a chilly one.
Yet each time I emerge, the air feels like a strike to my face. There is a low, constant roar in the air that I cannot mark, and a thick, strange fog hangs around us, as if we are in a smoky cavern…yet I know we are not. There is no ceiling here, which makes it all the more bewildering.
Tia notices my reaction and chuckles, pulling me close. She tugs a strange pouch of fabric out of the back of my clowk and pulls it down over my head as far as she can, tsking when my horns get in the way. “ Gonna haftew makeyew a hatt ,” she tells me, tucking the furs around my neck to keep it warm. “ Anna skarff .”
“Does this cold not bother you?” I ask. “Do your people truly frolic in this air as if it is nothing?”
She giggles at my words and shakes her head, indicating her own heavy furs. Then she points at a male walking past with his female. He is one of the four-armed strangers with blue skin and very small horns. He wears nothing but a vest and leggings, whereas the female at his side is heavily bundled like Tia.
Then she points down the way, where the golden-skinned male stands and stretches, completely naked. The male yawns and scratches his gut, then his backside, before wandering away.
I look over at Tia, who rolls her eyes in the amused way that others do when one of the old uncles does something foolish.
“It is different for all, then?” I ask.
She thinks for a moment and then nods. Then she takes my hand and gestures back at the cliffs behind us, and I let her lead me away. Tia brings me to a group of people seated near a large fire with a pot over it. There is not enough warmth coming off of the fire to ease the cold, but it is clear from the cluster of people chatting and eating that this is not the purpose. This is a cooking spot, a gathering place much like the one in our village. It makes sense, as many mouths can be fed with less work and less meat. I am given a bowl with a hot, warm stew of fish and strange roots, and a hot tea to drink. We sit together on a large flat stone near the fire, but Tia does not engage the others in conversation. She is friendly enough, but it is clear she is here for food alone.
I watch the others as I eat, noting the many children—both male and female—that race around the gathering. I watch them for sickness, too, but everyone seems to be healthy, their cheeks flushed with vigor. The tribe seems to be made of many that look different. Some are of the same people as Tia, whereas others are the blue strangers I have been warned of in the past. Then there is the gold one, who has something to do with the great golden beast we saw before. And there is a green one with scales.
I do not know what kind of people he is, nor the big gray male that they call “Gren.” He is like nothing I have seen before. In some ways he is similar to my people and yet very, very different.
I wonder also at how many they have here, but it will probably seem troubling to ask. Better to ask Tia in a quiet moment.
We finish our food and rinse our bowls and cups, and Tia takes a moment to thank the male and female who cooked it, and then she grabs me by the hand again and takes me back to her hut. She pulls out a short, fat bone with a pointed end and hands one to me, then takes one for herself.
And then she directs me onto the sands and towards the waters that roar and roar. For the first time since emerging from her hut, I get a good look at them. The waters back home in the underground lake are calm and still. They move up and down throughout the day, like a pot being filled, but they do not tumble in constantly like this water. It rushes toward the sands repeatedly, only to taper off and retreat, and then repeats the exact same motions again. It is the source of the constant roar I hear.
Just like the cold, the sight of the water is overwhelming. It stretches for as far as I can see on both sides of the horizon, and when I peer out, I cannot see the other side. “How far does this go?” I ask Tia, stunned. “I cannot see the other side.”
“ Verrafar ,” she tells me, gesturing and indicating that it keeps going and going, well beyond our sight. I have never seen so much water in all my life, and yet I have grown up fishing the underground lake. Yet this…this is completely different.
Once again, the world above shocks me with how strange it is.
I must wear my shock on my face, as Tia takes my hand and gives it a squeeze. While holding the stick, she tries to mime the tap on her chin. “ S’okay .”
I nod. She is here with me, and I am reassured. This is not something to be feared, if their people live this close to the wild, constantly moving waters. It must be a source of food for them. Are the waters sweet, then, I wonder. They churn like a sludgy porridge, large chunks of white and a strange pale grit covering them. More frozen water that falls from the sky, I realize. A massive piece the size of a mountain drifts by far off in the distance, floating atop the waters, and I stare at it in fascination.
“ Issa ise-berg ,” she says. “Big ice.”
Ice is the water that falls from the sky, and I realize what she is saying. My eyes go wide and I stare at her incredulously. “ That fell from the sky?”
Her lips twitch and she fights a giggle. “No, no. Watch.” She crouches on the sands and I crouch next to her, paying close attention. Tia picks up a handful of sand and lets it drift down to the ground. “Ice, yes?”
“That is sand.”
She makes a face at me. “Ice.” She flicks it out, mimicking that it falls on the ground once more. “Ice.” Then she picks up another handful and pours it over one spot. “Ice.” Another handful, over the same spot. “Ice.” When she repeats this with two more handfuls, she has a little pile in front of her.
She points at it. “Big ice.” Then she points at the floating one. “Big ice.”
Aaaah. “So it did not fall from the sky. It is made up of a pile of the smaller bits?” When she nods excitedly, I shake my head. “That is quite a pile.”
The expression of agreement she makes is adorable.
I lean in toward her. “We do not have ice, big or small.”
Tia clutches her heart, staggering, and it takes me a moment to realize she is teasing me. She is feigning shock at the very obvious thing I have just told her.
I mock-scowl, though I like her playfulness. It reminds me not to be so serious. “Can we look around? I wish to see more of the ice and your great water.”
She holds the sharpened bone tool up and gives me a sly look. “ Weer gonnagit lunsh .”
I hold my stick up in agreement, though I do not know what exactly I am agreeing to.
“ Comon ,” Tia tells me with a laugh, and drags me down the beach.
We explore. We walk up and down the long length of beach, and when we are at the far end, where the tall cliffs block us off, we turn and look at their village. It is sheltered here, with the mountains and cliffs cupping it like a pair of hands, and the sea on the other side. From this view, it seems almost…cozy.
It also makes me wonder just how big the world is above. It is not something I ever considered before, but the vastness of it seems alarming now. Perhaps I am not as brave as I imagine myself, because right now, I feel like one of those grains of sand. Unimportant and lost in a vast sea of chaos.
But Tia stays by my side, pointing out things she thinks I will appreciate. We pick up things called shells which are hard and delicate, and wash up from the rolling waters. Many of them are broken, and some have beautiful, iridescent insides. When we find a particularly large one, Tia takes it and stuffs it into her bag.
She shows me that the water is not drinkable. Instead of sweet, clean water, it tastes of salt and more salt. I make a face and spit it out, much to Tia’s amusement. “ Fishpiss ,” she agrees. “ Sohmuch fishpiss .”
How strange to have such a big water surrounding your encampment and not being able to drink any of it. I point this out to her and she shrugs.
Then, she shows me things that the vast waters do have. We find hard little creatures called “ krahbs” that scuttle around on the sands, in and out of the waves. We find a smaller pool with fish trapped in it, and a cluster of dark shells she calls “ muss-el” that she uses her bone to pry off, and puts them in the bag. Then she shows me spots to dig in the sands. Wherever there is a tiny hole amidst the smooth sands, she uses her bone to dig and up comes a larger shell, whole and with a strange, jelly-like occupant inside.
“ Lunsh ,” she tells me again happily.
“So you stay here because the food is abundant,” I muse, and it makes sense. When the warmth leaves a garden cavern, all of the plants inside die off. I cannot imagine that they can grow the mushrooms and mosses that our people are dependent upon. Her people eat the things from the strange, salty waters.
And the cave full of fruit…that my people cleaned out. I am uneasy about that realization. We were selfish, all because Kin’far spoke his poison to my father and said the fruits should be ours.
We dig up more of the lunsh from beneath the sands as we walk, and I forget that it is so bitter cold after a while. Sunlight pushes through the clouds, blindingly bright, and then the water glitters and it is a beautiful sight. I pause to look at it and a winged creature soars far overhead, dipping down to the waters to skim its beak against the surface. I point it out to Tia.
She nods. “ Ee eets fish .” And she makes a back and forth motion with her arm.
“Fish?” I grow excited. “You can fish in these waters?”
Tia smiles widely, amused by my enthusiasm. “We fish. Come.”
We return to her hut and stomp the sands off of our boots just outside. Then she ducks in and puts the clams and mussels into a container full of water and grabs a net and what looks like line attached to a long, bendy thing that looks like bone but is not.
“ Fishinpole ,” she says, offering it to me. “ Lessgo fish.”