Chapter 31
Morning came much too swiftly, and it brought reluctance for Telok—reluctance to move, to breathe, to make even the smallest sound that might disturb Lacey as she slept atop him.
He wanted this moment, with the two of them reclining in peace and quiet, wrapped in each other’s embraces and sharing each other’s warmth, to last on and on.
Here and now, the world couldn’t harm them. They were free from worry, unburdened, existing in harmony as one.
He would’ve preferred to spend their first morning as bonded mates in languid contentment, with no need to leave their bed as the sunlight slowly trekked across the room. Talking, touching, sharing, learning.
But the coming suncrest also brought duties to fulfill, words to keep, dangers to face…together.
Telok woke Lacey with a slow stroke of his hand along her back. She moaned and stretched, her movements sparking tingles across his hide. The air was redolent of his new favorite scent—the scent of their mating.
Loath as he was to trade that fragrance for the cloying odors of the jungle, he had no choice. The winddancers were depending upon Telok and his companions.
With no small amount of hesitation, Telok disentangled himself from both the bedding and his mate. Yawning, she wrapped a blanket around her torso, tucking a corner to keep it in place, and stood, only to stop short and press a hand to her lower belly with a loud groan.
“I can’t believe you shoot so much cum…” Lacey muttered as she stuffed some of the blanket between her legs.
Telok chittered. “As much as I give, your body demands more.”
Shaking her head, she gathered her belongings. “Not like I have much choice when we’re stuck together.”
“And would you choose for it to stop?”
“Hmm…” A smirk curled her lips as she glanced at him and tapped her chin. “Nah.”
“Good little female.” With his mandibles raised in a smile, he grabbed his things and followed his mate out.
Tovuunshai was quiet as Telok and Lacey strode to the shower. It was the sort of peacefulness that rarely settled over such places, at once contrasting and complementing last night’s liveliness and music. This was simply another part of life—rest, recovery, a sort of renewal.
The shower was thankfully empty. This time, Lacey didn’t ask Telok to leave—not that he would have regardless.
After she relieved herself, they tended to one another, washing with gentle touches.
Aches lingered in his body, though they were distant, and the way she moved suggested that her soreness extended beyond the scratches and bruises visible on her skin.
Confirmation came when he brushed his fingers between her thighs to clean her and she flinched with a hiss.
Telok stilled. “You are hurt here?”
She guided his hand away and smiled, patting his chest. “It’s a good hurt, but my pussy is gonna need a break.”
Though he let out a disappointed grunt, he did not argue with his mate. Much more than her pussy was likely in need of a break, but he knew she would not agree to stay behind and rest. Not as long as their friends were delving into danger.
Once they were dry and Lacey had dressed, she checked his wounds.
All but a few had healed enough to no longer require sticky silk to seal them.
He also gently tipped her chin aside to inspect her bitemark and ensure it was healing well.
The scabbing looked healthy, and soon enough it would scar, leaving a permanent mark upon her.
His mandibles drooped, and he lightly ran a finger over one of the scabs. Pride and sorrow still warred within him over what he’d done.
Lacey took hold of his wrist. “Better not be having regrets.”
“Only that I caused you pain.”
“I guess I’ll have to bite you harder next time to leave my own mark on you. Then we’ll be even.”
Telok trilled. The memory of her biting him that day at the waterfall was emblazoned in his hearts.
He wanted to feel her teeth sink into his hide again, wanted to relive that shock of pleasure-pain that had swept through him and stoked his need, wanted Lacey to leave her mark on him so all would know he belonged to her.
Taking up their packs and spears, they headed to the common area at Tovuunshai’s center to meet the others and eat a light meal. The hunters departed just ahead of suncrest, carried by an unspoken but palpable sense of hope.
Lacey offered no complaints as they strode through the jungle. Whenever Telok glanced back and caught her gaze, her lips curled up in a smile that made her eyes shine and his heartsthread thrum with joy.
Without needing to painstakingly follow a barely perceptible trail, the group soon reached the site of yesterday’s kurghest attack. Telok’s hearts sped and his blood heated as vivid memories assailed him, rousing equal passion and fury. He squeezed his spear in hand and clenched his jaw.
Should not have brought her back to this place.
But Lacey showed no signs of fear or discomfort apart from her flushed, sweat-dampened skin.
Thornskulls and winddancers formed a defensive ring as Tas, Garahk, and Telok, with Lacey beside him, examined the area.
Telok pointed the signs out to his mate and explained what they meant. Nothing seemed amiss as they searched. The Tangle, ever indifferent, had already forgotten the ferocious battle that had so recently occurred here.
The sun had reached its peak by the time they finally unraveled the scant, confusing signs far enough to discover the point at which the kurghests’ individual tracks joined together. The hunters set out along the new trail with Telok in the lead.
Telok and his companions navigated thickets, gnarled roots, and fallen branches, crossed a shallow stream and several wide depressions, trudged up hills and over boulders.
Telok’s fine hairs stood throughout, and his gaze roved ceaselessly. Kurghests could be prowling anywhere. Only good fortune had seen Lacey through the attack unscathed. He would not be caught off guard again, would not rely on blind luck to shield her.
But apart from a few birds and other small animals that fled into the denser jungle to hide, the group encountered nothing. That did not ease Telok.
Finally, Tas, who’d been eyeing the sun’s path all day with increasingly apparent concern, suggested they return to Tovuunshai. Telok glanced at Garahk.
The white thornskull folded his lower arms, mandibles twitching. “The trail is a day old already. It will only fade more.”
“And if we lose it, the delay may lead others to harm,” Telok said, his own words weighing heavily upon his hearts.
“These beasts are hard to spot by day,” Tas replied. “By night, they will be as shadows in the darkness.”
Garahk grunted and waved at Telok. “Good then that we have one who stalks shadows.”
Telok turned his head to look at the others. As always, the thornskulls seemed ready for a fight, but the winddancers’ eyes held the same worry as Tas’s. Telok’s attention halted on the humans. On Lacey.
Her skin glistened with sweat, and she was leaning on her spear a bit more than she had been earlier. He knew she was tired, and likely even sorer than she’d been this morning, yet he also knew she would stride onward if he decided to continue.
After sunfall, the hunters would be at a disadvantage. Like all shadowstalkers, Telok’s eyesight was strong in the dark, but the thornskulls and winddancers would not see as keenly without light. Worse, the humans would be effectively blind and alarmingly vulnerable. Unnecessarily so.
They were out here to locate the kurghests’ den, scout the area around it, and make a plan to effectively destroy the pack. Stumbling onward through the dark of night was far more likely to lead them to their deaths than to achieve their aim.
“Best we turn back,” Telok said.
The winddancers relaxed at that. They carved crude symbols into a few trees to mark their place, and everyone returned to the village.
They arrived shortly before sunfall. After washing and eating, Telok and Lacey went to their den, where she collapsed facedown atop the pallet with an exaggerated sigh of relief.
Chittering, Telok lay down beside her.
He meant to take Lacey in his arms, hold her close, and sink together into a serene, much needed slumber as the dark and quiet cocooned them. But the instant his hands were upon her, they started moving of their own accord.
It began with Telok’s palms smoothing over her soft skin, exploring her body in slow, soothing strokes. But as his hands discovered more and more tension in her muscles, their motions became firmer and more deliberate, kneading away the tightness.
With a moan of satisfaction, Lacey melted into his touch.
Mindful of her cuts and bruises, Telok massaged her shoulders and neck, her arms and back, her feet—which her sighs suggested she particularly appreciated—and up along her calves, around her knees, and over her thighs.
Only the press of his claspers kept his stem contained. He thrummed with yearning, tantalized by her every sound, her every reaction. That a hint of her arousal now fragranced the air made it no easier to deny his urges.
Before he realized what he was doing, he’d slipped his hand beneath her and cupped her pussy. She whimpered and gyrated her hips to press into his palm, tickling him with those short, curly hairs, teasing him with her heat, beckoning him with her already accumulating dew.
Gathering her in his arms, Telok drew Lacey’s back against his chest. He covered her breast with one hand, kneading her nipple, and gently stroked her slick slit with another.
She lay an arm over his, clutching his hand as his fingers circled and brushed her clit. “A little slower…” Lacey tipped her head back against his shoulder and closed her eyes with a moan. “Mmm, yes, just like that.”
The ache deep within Telok intensified as Lacey rocked to the rhythm of his ministrations, her breaths growing short and erratic spasms wracking her body.
She came undone with a rush of hot essence, shuddering in his arms until he finally stilled his fingers.
Lacey tried to turn and face him, but he held her fast. With a grumble, she reached back to slip her hand between their bodies at his slit, but he prevented her from doing so by tugging her firmly against him.
“I want to touch you,” she said, wiggling her round ass. “Telok, I want you inside me.”
Desire roared within him, shaking him to his bones. The press of his throbbing cock against the inside of his slit was the purest agony. He could bury himself in his mate with a single stroke, could claim her anew…
Protector, shield me from myself.
Lacey was still sore and healing from their spirited rutting yesterday. If he succumbed to instinct and yearning now, if he rutted her again like he craved, he would hurt her. Those bruises would never fade, and fresh scratches would always mark her skin. She needed to recover.
Because the hunt would only grow more dangerous in the coming days, and he could not bear to be the reason she was not at her best. Satisfying as it was to see his mate well-rutted, prolonged soreness would hinder her out in the Tangle, where life and death was determined in a time shorter than a single heartbeat.
“Be still, my nyleea. Rest now.”
“But what about you? I want to give you pleasure too.”
“Your pleasure is my pleasure.”
“Telok, you—”
He quieted her by setting his fingers back into motion. Her thighs squeezed around them, but they could not stop his gentle caressing of her sensual little bud.
“Oh fuck, this is so not fair,” she said between quivering breaths.
Telok purred. “Whatever it takes to subdue my prey.”
He took his time in building her toward another peak, teasing her, drawing her to the edge and back repeatedly. She rasped his name, begged him for more, harder, faster, but he would not fully obey.
“This is fucking torture,” she breathed as her body went rigid.
More than you can know, little thorn…
She came with such force that it stole the sound from her scream. She clawed at Telok with her blunt nails, scraped her feet across the bedding in search of purchase, and writhed against him.
Had anything ever been as maddeningly arousing as this? As knowing that he could, with a simple touch of his fingers, give his mate overwhelming bliss?
Finally, she sagged, chest heaving with her ragged breaths. “God, Telok… That was…so mean.”
He nuzzled her hair with his face. “Then I must be mean to you more often. You like it.”
She snickered and rubbed his hand with her thumb. “Maybe.”
Gradually, her breathing eased, evening out when her body fully relaxed. Only after she’d been asleep for a while did he dare move, lifting his hand from her pussy and bringing it to his mouth.
As though he hadn’t tormented himself enough, he licked her essence from his fingers, shuddering at the delectable taste.
And it is mine, for me. She is mine.
Despite his cock throbbing mercilessly against the walls of its cage, Telok eventually followed his mate into slumber.