Drav
Ileft at dawn.
I could sense Hallie still sleeping—exhausted from yesterday's breeding, her body working overtime to develop the eggs. Good. She needed rest, and I needed to know what we were facing.
The territory boundaries were quiet in ways that made my spine prickle.
Too quiet. Kethar's scouts had pulled back after Hallie spotted them, which meant they were regrouping somewhere out of sight.
Planning. Getting ready for a coordinated assault that would come when we were least prepared for it.
I flew the perimeter slowly, looking for signs they'd left behind. Tracks in the sand. Fresh claw marks on the rocks. Anything that would tell me how many males I was dealing with and what they were planning.
I found the first camp at the southern boundary.
Two males. Barely out of adolescence. Desperate enough that they'd left supplies behind: dried meat, water stored in bladders made from some creature's stomach, weapons carved from obsidian. Planning to stay for days, which meant they thought they had time to wear us down before attacking.
Their wing membranes were starting to thin—unbonded sickness in early stages. Not immediate threat level, but close enough that they'd be getting reckless soon.
The eastern camp had three males. Older. More experienced. More dangerous because they'd fought before and knew what they were doing.
I counted six total not including Kethar. Six desperate, dying males who saw Hallie as their last chance at survival and didn't care what they had to destroy to claim her.
Her consciousness brushed mine. Felt her immediate awareness of me even from miles away, this connection that meant we were never truly separate anymore.
I sensed her contentment, her satisfaction, the slight soreness from yesterday's breeding that she didn't mind because her body had already adapted to constant use.
Mine. Pregnant with my young. Safe in my territory.
I should go back. Should stay close in case they attacked while I was gone.
But I needed to know what they were planning, and that meant going further than I wanted to while leaving her undefended.
I flew higher, using thermal currents to gain altitude without expending energy. From up here I could see the entire territory spread below me, could see the boundaries they were circling like scavengers around a kill. Could see—
Movement.
Massive. Wrong silhouette. Not winged—something else entirely.
I dove.
The cliff wyrm was maybe three hundred feet from our main cave system, its massive serpentine body easily sixty feet long and thick as a transport vehicle. It moved along the cliff face using thousands of tiny legs, flowing over the vertical surface like water over stone.
Drawn by Hallie's scent. Had to be. Cliff wyrms hunted by smell and pregnant females gave off pheromones that attracted predators from miles away.
I had to kill it now, before it reached her.
I dove faster, building speed. The wyrm's head lifted as I approached—sensory organs detecting my presence. Its mouth opened showing rows of teeth designed to grip stone, to burrow through rock to reach prey hidden in caves where they thought they were safe.
I hit it at full speed.
My claws sank into its thick hide behind the head. The impact drove us both against the obsidian wall, shaking dust loose from the ledges. The wyrm screamed—a high-pitched sound that echoed across the canyons and probably alerted every predator within miles.
It thrashed, trying to throw me off. I held on, wings spread for balance, and tore at anything I could reach.
My claws weren't designed for this kind of combat. Cliff wyrms had armor-plated skin that deflected most attacks, scales that overlapped like shields. But I found the gaps between plates and ripped with everything I had.
Black blood sprayed across my chest and arms.
The wyrm coiled, trying to wrap around me, to crush me the way it crushed prey before swallowing them whole. I launched into the air before it could complete the movement. Circled. Dove again.
This time I aimed for the eyes—four of them, glowing green, arranged around its head in a pattern that gave it nearly complete vision. I destroyed two before it could react, claws raking across delicate tissue.
Blind on one side, it pulled back from the cliff. Tried to retreat into a crack system where I couldn't follow. I couldn't let it escape. If it healed, it would come back stronger and angrier, and next time Hallie might be alone when it attacked.
I drove it toward open air, forcing it off the cliff face entirely. Without surface contact, the wyrm couldn't use its legs for purchase. It fell.
I dove after it.
Caught it mid-fall, all four hands gripping its body. My wings strained against the weight—too heavy to fly properly, both of us dropping now toward the sand sea below.
At the last second, I threw it.
Released my grip and let the wyrm continue falling while I opened my wings fully, catching air, pulling up with every muscle screaming. The wyrm hit the sand sea below with enough force to crater, black blood spreading in patterns that would attract scavengers for days.
I circled once to confirm the kill. It wasn't moving, body broken from the impact.
Dead.
Through the bond: Hallie's alarm. She'd felt my fear during the fight, felt the danger even though she couldn't see what I was facing.
I flew back to the caves as fast as my damaged wings would carry me.
She was waiting at the entrance.
"You're hurt."
I looked down at myself. Multiple gashes across my chest and arms where the wyrm's thrashing had caught me. Wing membrane torn in two places—not bad enough to ground me but would take days to heal properly.
"Cliff wyrm," I said. "Killed it."
"You're bleeding." She moved toward me, hands already reaching to examine the wounds. "Come inside. Let me—"
"I'm fine."
"You're not fine." She pulled me into the cave despite my size advantage, surprisingly strong when she decided to be stubborn. "Sit. Let me look at these."
I sat because arguing with a pregnant mate seemed like a bad idea. She worked efficiently—cleaning the wounds with water, applying the healing paste I'd used on her earlier, wrapping the worst gashes with strips of fabric torn from something I didn't recognize.
Her hands were gentle but confident, and I sensed her concern mixed with determination to take care of me the way I'd taken care of her.
"The wyrm would have reached our caves by tonight," I said while she worked. "It was tracking your scent. Pregnant females attract predators from miles away. Their pheromones trigger hunting instincts in anything large enough to consider you prey."
"So this is going to keep happening?"
"Yes." I caught her hand, making her look at me. "Until the eggs are laid. Your body gives off pheromones I can't mask. Every predator within miles knows you're here."
She processed that information the way she processed everything—practically, without panic. "And Kethar's males?"
"Six of them. Camped at our boundaries. Waiting for the right moment to attack."
"So we're being hunted by Kethar and by the local wildlife." She finished wrapping my arm with more force than strictly necessary. "Great."
Her determination solidified. Not fear. Not panic. Just practical assessment of threats and immediate planning for how to handle multiple attack vectors.
Strong female. Perfect mate.
"Drav." Her hand on my face made me focus. "You need to heal. How long?"
"Three days for the wing membrane to repair completely. The rest will close by tomorrow."
"And you need breeding to heal faster?"
I blinked, surprised she'd figured that out. "How did you—"
"The bond." She moved to straddle my lap, careful of my injuries but determined in ways that made my cocks respond immediately. "You heal faster with breeding. The bonding hormones accelerate tissue repair. So let me take care of you."
She was already opening her suit seals, already positioning herself over my breeding cock which had hardened the moment she'd touched me.
"You're injured—"
"I'm pregnant and sore and I don't care." She sank down onto me in one smooth motion that made us both groan. "You heal faster this way. So we're doing this."
The bond flared white-hot, erasing the boundary between us.
Her determination, her satisfaction, her pleasure at being the one giving instead of receiving.
Felt the role reversal—usually I was the one initiating, the one demanding.
Now she was claiming me and it felt right in ways I hadn't expected.
She rode me slowly at first, mindful of my wounds but insistent. Her hands found safe places on my shoulders, using them for leverage.
"Through the bond," she said, moving faster now. "Can feel that you're in pain. Can feel that this helps."
I gripped her hips carefully, letting her set the pace. The knot was already swelling—my body desperate to lock with hers, to take comfort from the breeding and the bonding hormones flooding my system.
"You're mine too," she said, leaning down to speak against my throat. "Not just me belonging to you. You belong to me. My mate. My male. And I take care of what's mine."
"From now on, I’m keeping you full,” I growled. “Morning, noon, and night."
The possessive words from her mouth triggered my orgasm.
The anchor took hold, anchoring us inseparably, and I flooded her with seed while my whole body shuddered. Through the bond I felt her satisfaction—not just physical pleasure but emotional. She'd taken care of me. Provided what I needed.
We stayed locked for maybe thirty minutes. When she pulled off carefully, I was already healing faster. The bond hormones working through my system, accelerating tissue repair in ways that would have my wounds closed by tomorrow.
"Better?" she asked.
"Better."
She curled against my uninjured side, fitting herself against me. "So. Six males plus Kethar. Cliff wyrms. Whatever else is out there hunting us. And I'm pregnant which makes me a beacon for every predator in a ten-mile radius."
"Yes."
"We need a better plan than just waiting for them to attack."
She was already strategizing, planning defenses. My human female wasn't panicking—she was strategizing.
"Tomorrow," I said. "Tomorrow we start planning. But today—rest. Let me heal. Let the eggs develop."
She nodded against my chest. "Tomorrow."
But I could feel through the bond: she was already planning. Already thinking about how to defend our territory against multiple threats simultaneously. Already preparing for war in that human way of turning fear into action.
Perfect female. Strong mate. Mine.
I wrapped my wings around her carefully and let myself rest, feeling her heartbeat against my chest and the eggs growing in her belly.
Tomorrow we'd plan.
Tonight, for a few hours, we could just be mates instead of warriors preparing for battle.