Chapter 6 #2
She slapped away my hand with a mutinous glare.
“Easy there, friend. I don’t even know your name yet.
I’m definitely not getting undressed unless you look away.
” Not undressed? Why? At least she did not seem to protest the prospect of doing so, just my permission to see her body without her coverings.
She had also called me “friend,” but the way she said it made me think she was considering me anything but.
“You need to warm up in the warm water,” I hissed at her in warning, pointing at the steaming pool with a claw.
“And my name is Khawla. I am the Master Scout of the Thunder Rock Naga.” I hadn’t even realized I hadn’t told her this.
She had distracted me with her pretty mouth and sapphire eyes.
I tucked my claw into the neckline of her drab gray shirt and yanked, and the fabric split open right down the middle.
To my disappointment, she was not bare beneath the shirt.
I had not expected the odd scraps that covered her breasts, but they were enticing and delicate.
She was also far curvier than I had expected beneath the shapeless clothing.
Her breasts spilled from the fabric that concealed them, her hips widening in an enticing manner.
Everything about her body appeared soft, even her scaleless skin.
“Hey! I’m not your mate, remember?” she snapped at me, her arms crossing over her chest as if that could hide the abundant spill of her breasts.
My mouth watered, and my tongue flicked out to catch her scent.
She was too pretty; she made me ache. My cock was growing so firm inside my pouch that I struggled to keep it from extruding.
Her words did not even dampen my arousal, though they lodged like arrows in my chest. How long was she going to hold that over me?
Did that mean she knew it was a lie, or did she believe those words were true?
“I’m also not getting into water that hot; I’d go into shock.
We need to raise my core temperature a little more slowly.
” Her words were landing in my brain as if everything were covered by a haze—the haze of mating lust. I should get out of this room, leave her to it, so I wouldn’t tempt myself even further.
There was not a force on Serant that could make me move, though.
Unless it was toward her, into her embrace.
The spell she’d cast on me was simply too strong.
“There are other pools,” I said vaguely, and I gestured with a hand.
Some of them had steam curling in white tendrils from their surface, but others did not.
She looked where I pointed, her expression growing tight.
Then she hobbled out from under the coil of my tail toward the next one in awkward steps.
I did not like that. Not only was it the first time since we’d met that she had stopped touching me, but it was obvious she was in pain.
My sigils had only just begun to die out when I lunged forward and snatched her back into my arms. She yelped, her breasts jiggled, and spilled more from the pale pastel fabric that held them.
She glared at me again, but she said nothing as I carried her from pool to pool and let her test the temperature until she found the right one.
Only then did I put her down, and, with a loop of my tail around her middle, held her upright.
At her insistence, I begrudgingly turned around while she took off her ‘pants’ and waded into the water.
I did not see why that would matter, as I was going to follow her in anyway—something she realized when I took off my pack, laid down my spear, and shrugged out of my tunic.
“No,” she said. “Geez, Khawla, you’ve got no chill, do you?
Kissing on the first meeting, leaping into a bath with a girl minutes after.
Is that’s normal for you guys? Do you bathe with all the Naga girls?
” I still had my back to her, but I could easily picture the frown and the sharpness in her gaze.
It made me smile, which was a surprise. I couldn’t recall the last time I’d smiled so freely.
Not since Kusha’s death, but probably much longer before that. There hadn’t been much to smile about.
There was splashing and a sharp inhale, my tail hit the warm water where I still held her around the middle.
I refused to let go, and thankfully, she did not protest that part.
I waited until I was certain she had submerged herself to her neck before I turned to look, shocked by how desperate I was to see her pale skin, wet and bare.
Pressing a fist to the slit for my cock, I urged the unruly member to stay hidden, and then I slid into the pool with her.
She had already accused me of bathing with her; I might as well make that the truth.
“Am I your captive? Or are we friends? Do you know a Naga with white scales? He rescued my friend Nala.” Jolene’s voice was much calmer now that she was in the warm water, floating in its gentle heat.
I slipped closer to her, watching her face as she tilted her head back and let herself drift.
She had her eyes closed, and that told me that she already knew—deep down—that she could trust me.
“Allies, friends,” I said, not once forgetting that she’d already used her sharp tongue to call me “friend” when she didn’t mean it.
“You can trust me.” That was, of course, exactly what someone untrustworthy would also say, so I held my breath and waited to see if she’d make a comment, fighting with my impulses not to seek out more of her body beneath the water.
My tail around her waist was already such a temptation.
Just a little slide, and I could touch the tempting curves of her breasts, or I could go low and seek out the heat between her thighs.
She was quiet, though, and I checked her face again to make sure she was all right.
Had she fallen asleep or gone into shock like she’d warned about if the water was too hot?
I reached out and found her wrist with my fingers, curling my thumb over the pulse there.
It was steady, calm—though much faster than my own—but that was no surprise.
She was, after all, much smaller than I was. She was prey, while I was all predator.
Her lashes fluttered, then lifted to look at me, a soft smile gracing her mouth—wholly unlike a Naga female.
Her lips were pink again, and I wondered if their color was an indication of her inner temperature.
She remained silent, but there was none of that sass or sharpness to her expression. She looked… happy.
I wanted to keep her that way. The urge to please her was a powerful one, so I found myself gruffly explaining more.
“Yes, Artek is our shaman, he is the white Naga you saw rescue Nala. Nala lives with him and gave birth to her daughter, Erin. Then there are the humans at Haven, who came with the dragon before the winter started to try and rescue you. They only managed to free a few.”
This news seemed to interest her greatly.
She jerked upright, eyes huge in her face, and demanded to know more.
Too bad for her, my mind was occupied with other things.
She’d risen above the water level, and her breasts emerged from her strange chest-covering.
The thin fabric had gone completely translucent, and I was utterly transfixed by the sight of her dark nipples poking through.
There was no holding back my eager cock then, it slipped from its pouch, spilling into the water.
The scent of my arousal rose thickly in the air between us.
I knew then that there was no fighting this. I had to have her, keep her, pleasure her. There was simply no other option.