Chapter 20 #2
She gets louder. I wonder briefly if all human females make this much noise during mating, or if mine is uniquely vocal.
I decide it does not matter. I want to hear every sound she makes for the rest of my existence.
I want to memorize them. I want to learn which angle produces the sharp, bitten-off gasp versus the long, shuddering moan that vibrates through the mindspace and makes my vision go dark.
She breaks first. Her body locks rigid around me, and the clenching wave of pressure drags my own release straight out of my spine. I bury myself deep, shuddering, the secondary shaft swelling and locking tight along with the first.
The mindspace goes white.
I collapse onto my forearms. We are both shaking. She has rendered me incapable of standing up.
She traces a trembling finger along the ridge of my jaw.
“Okay,” she whispers, her voice destroyed. “Now I feel like I got hit by a truck.”
The mindspace flashes me an image from her thoughts: a rectangular beast on round black legs, roaring down a flat gray path at terrifying speed. A tuh-ruk. I file the word away. If this tuh-ruk is the standard by which she measures impact, I am satisfied with my performance.
I press my forehead against hers, my breath still ragged. I do not want to move. I want to remain buried deep inside her heat until the next dark cycle.
But the silence does not last. The tight mental shields I held during the mating begin to slip. The low buzz of the clan crashes against my consciousness.
The clan is bleeding. They are waiting for their dra-dam.
“I know, my mate,” I project before she can even speak the thought aloud.
I force myself to slowly push up on my forearms. The physical separation is agonizing. I withdraw from her body by fractions of an inch, my ridges dragging against her swollen, sensitized flesh. She winces, her thighs trembling as the shafts slowly slide free.
A thick strand of our mingled slick stretches between us as I pull back. The sight of the sheer mess of my release coating the delicate junction of her thighs makes the feral beast in my chest roar with satisfaction.
I reach down, my claws scooping a thick smear of my own fluid from the furs between her legs.
Her breath hitches as I drag my palm slowly up the inside of her thigh, rubbing the thick, glistening spill directly into her skin.
I coat the soft curve of her hip. I spread the potent scent of my claim across her lower stomach.
I want every warrior in this cavern to smell exactly who she belongs to.
A continuous, possessive rumble vibrates deep in my chest.
I lower my head, pressing my face directly to the soft, marked skin of her stomach. I drag in a deep breath, filling my lungs with the scent of my fluid mixed with her heat.
The mindspace trembles with her lingering arousal. She lifts a shaking hand, her fingers tangling weakly in the dense strands of my mane.
“Rest,” I project, my mental voice a dark, soothing vibration. “I will return as soon as the boundaries are secured.”
I turn my head, dragging my open mouth over the soft swell of her hip before pulling myself up to press a single, lingering kiss directly over her racing dra-kir.
Only then do I finally force myself to pull away. I swing my long legs over the side of the stone shelf, preparing to stand up and walk out into the cavern.
“Whoa, whoa, wait. Halt.”
Eh-ree-kah sits bolt upright, grabbing my arm with both hands. Her spoken voice is suddenly sharp.
I pause, looking back at her. “What is wrong? Are you hurting?”
“No,” she says, her eyes wide as she stares pointedly at my lap. “You... you can’t just walk out there like that!”
I follow her gaze down to my own groin.
The dual shafts rest heavily against my thighs.
I look back up at her.
“Why not?” I project. “The clan knows we are mated. They felt it in the mindspace. I have completed the transformation. My body is proof of my strength and my right to lead.”
“Because you’re...hanging out!” she gestures at my crotch, her face flushing bright red.
“The whole package! You can’t just stroll into the clan with your.
..” She trails off, waving both hands at my groin in a frantic circular motion.
“Your two whole dicks, Kol! Just out! In the wind! Tina will die. She will literally drop dead.”
I blink, the images coming through the mindspace at me transferring her meaning.
She wants me to hide my strength?
“I am the dra-dam,” I tell her gently. “Why would I hide it? It proves I am strong.”
Eh-ree-kah buries her face in her hands, groaning.
“Kol,” she projects. “Human women do not want to see your... your parts while we are trying to plan a rescue mission. It’s...distracting.”
My brow furrows. If a male hides his strength, another male will challenge him.
But the distress radiating from her is real. She is genuinely upset.
“For you, my mate,” I project, sighing heavily. “If my body is too terrifying for the other females, I will sit down during the council so it is less obvious.”
“No,” she says, dropping her hands from her face. She looks around the alcove with alarming determination. “I have a better idea.”
She scrambles off the sleeping shelf, standing bare in the center of the alcove. My eyes immediately drop to the flare of her hips, the soft curve of her rear, the dark mane between her thighs. The beast in my blood roars, demanding that I throw her over my shoulder and take her back to the furs.
But she is digging through the small pile of her discarded coverings.
She pulls out the thick leg coverings she had been wearing last sol. They are covered in dust and stained with lifeblood.
Then, she grabs my spare bone-knife from the rock shelf.
I stiffen. “Eh-ree-kah. That edge is incredibly sharp. Be careful.”
She ignores me. She lays the fabric flat on the stone floor, grips the knife tightly, and begins hacking violently at it.
I stare at her in absolute disbelief.
She is destroying her own hide coverings. It is one of her few possessions. The only layer protecting her skin from the harsh elements.
“What are you doing?” I watch her saw through the fabric at the knees.
“I’m solving a problem,” she mutters. The bone-knife slips, cleanly slicing through the thick seam. “There. Honestly, I’ve been dying to make these into shorts anyway. It’s way too hot for full pants.”
She drops the knife. She picks up the top half of the...pants and pulls them on over her bare hips. They sit low on her waist, exposing the long, pale length of her legs.
It is an incredible visual. I swallow heavily.
But she is not done. She retrieves the bone-knife, picks up the two discarded tubes of fabric, slices them open along the seam, and lays them flat. Now it is two wide panels of hide.
She walks over to me, holding the panels in her hands, her face serious.
“Stand up,” she commands.
I narrow my eyes. “I will not.”
“Kol. Stand up.” The mental spike of her stubbornness hits me like a rock. “Please.”
I let out a low, rumbling growl of extreme displeasure, but I obey. I push myself off the shelf, towering over her.
Eh-ree-kah steps directly into my space. She drops to her knees.
My heart stops.
She is kneeling directly in front of my “double dicks”. Her face is inches from my heavy, twitching shafts. They immediately swell, ready once more.
If she touches me with her mouth right now, the council will wait three more solmarks.
But she does not touch me with her mouth.
Instead, she grabs the leather harness of my hunting knife sheath from the rock shelf and threads one of the flat fabric panels through it, looping the material over the leather strap.
She wraps the harness low around my hips, settling it below my waist, and pulls the fabric panel down over my groin.
A flap of hide, hanging from my weapon strap.
“What are you doing?” The projection is strangled as her soft knuckles brush against the sensitive ridge of the primary shaft.
“I’m making you a loincloth,” she says, buckling the harness tight against my hip. “The leather holds it in place. Just... tuck everything behind the fabric.”
I stare down at her.
Rok wears one. Tharn wears one. Sarven, because Mih-kay-lah insisted. The unmated warriors stare at the hide coverings with naked envy, because a loincloth fashioned by a female’s hands is a visible mark of being claimed.
I did not expect to be wearing one this soon.
“There,” she says, sitting back on her heels and admiring her work. “It’s not exactly high fashion, but it covers the essentials. Tina’s retinas are safe.”
I look down at the covering. I look back up at her.
I reach down, unbuckle the harness with one hand, and pull the flat covering off the leather strap, dropping the hide onto the stone floor. I toss the empty harness onto the rock shelf.
“Hey!” she shouts, leaping to her feet. “I just made that!”
“I am not wearing a hide flap,” I project firmly. “It restricts my movement. I am a warlord, not a timid prey-beast hiding in the dust.”
She crosses her arms over her chest, glaring up at me. “Kol. You cannot go out there naked. You just can’t. It’s a cultural boundary for us. Please.”
I stare down at her flushed, deeply frustrated face.
She is so tiny. I will not get over it. Her size is ridiculous. And she possesses no survival instincts and demands that I follow the illogical rules of her terrible water-world.
But she is mine.
And underneath the frustration, radiating clearly through the mindspace, is the quiet fact that she spent time making this garment specifically for me. She worked her soft hands with a sharp blade just to create something she thought would protect me in front of her friends.
She made something for me. With her own hands. A blade she could barely grip and hide-coverings she could not spare. That is how a mate tends a warrior on any world.
The beast in my chest goes helplessly soft.
I let out a long sigh that shakes my broad shoulders.