Chapter 4
Chapter Four
Maelic
The snow was endless. Truly endless.
Maelic growled as he trudged through it, wings tucked tight against the wind. He should have taken that coat his little human had offered—
His little human?
He shoved the thought aside, following Delaney’s scent. Except there was no trace of her warmth in this whiteout. Only the acrid copper of blood she’d left behind. The scent hit the back of his throat, wrong on every biological level. This was a female he never wanted to see hurt.
He should be freezing. Instead, his body burned, fever-hot beneath his skin despite the storm clawing at him. His wings shifted as he knelt, digging through the snow until his fingers closed around fabric.
The glove had been crafted with care—worn soft from use but still sturdy. It was important enough for her to risk her life out here… Why was she out here alone with no one to help her?
He glanced up. The storm swallowed everything. His transponder band could locate the pod. He could leave right now, reach out to his oldest compatriot, request extraction, and disappear before this got more complicated—
No.
He’d freeze before he made it halfway. Even with whatever was happening to his temperature regulation. He’d handled cold before, but never a storm like this.
Was this normal? Did Artaisan bodies react to snow this way?
Maelic stood, and his body locked up.
Something was very wrong.
Unfamiliar wildness surged up his throat. His lumin glands throbbed, pheromones building at a rate that made his neck and chest ache. Sweat froze against his skin in crystalline tracks despite the fire raging under his skin.
No.
Heat cycles came every few years back home.
Females’ wings lighting up, bioluminescence triggering rut in any male close enough to catch their scent.
There was a whole season for it. Young adults pairing off and locking themselves away to work it out of their systems. He’d refused to participate, of course.
Had chosen to be off-world, training with Katan instead, learning to be an Axiom.
No time for attachments. No room for the kind of loss that came with caring.
But temporary; few actually formed the bond of luminance from those encounters.
He’d heard the stories. His own parents had been true mated—Luminance was rare now, but it happened. Just never with another species. Never like this.
His body pulsed with demand. The fever climbed.
He clenched his fist around the glove. Ridiculous. This had to be atmospheric. Altitude or air pressure or something that made sense.
Not mate fever. That was impossible.
He turned back toward the house. Each step took more effort than the last, his body swaying as dizziness crept in. The wind tore at him. Snow blinded him. But he pushed forward, drawn by something he refused to name.
When he finally reached the door, he hit it with his shoulder, barely staying upright.
It opened. Her scent wrapped around him—delicious and warm like that drink she’d made. He groaned, stumbling inside.
Small hands steadied him. Her face swam in his vision.
“Maelic?” Her voice pitched high with worry.
“Glove.” He thrust the damp fabric at her.
“Oh my god! Are you okay? Get in here.”
She ignored the glove entirely, maneuvering him deeper inside instead. He leaned against the wall, fighting to keep his weight off her. He’d already pinned her once. Crushed her against the barn in his feral state.
Enough shame for one rotation.
“Thank you.” Her voice softened. Those pale brown eyes searched his face, wide with concern he recognized even through the haze.
He grunted, swallowing hard against the nausea churning in his gut.
He barely registered being led up the stairs. Tried not to lean on her, but his body had other ideas. Her warmth pressed against his side, and he clamped his free hand over his neck, fighting to keep his lumin glands from releasing.
This wasn’t good.
She was taking him to her nest.
The realization hit as she opened a door to a small room. The bed dominated the space, covered in a chaotic spread of blankets and pillows. But goddess, the scent—
His cock went rigid. His coremata pulsed, seed threatening to spill right there. He groaned.
Delaney patted his arm, oblivious. “It’s okay, it’s probably just a fever? You were out there a while, and with no coat… I can’t believe you went out there to get that glove. I can’t believe I even let you.”
She helped him down to the bed. He clenched his fists to keep from reaching for her curves.
“Think nothing of it,” he grumbled as she pushed him back into the mattress. He pulled his wings tight—flexible enough to tuck beneath him, unlike many other winged species. As long as they weren’t restrained at odd angles, he could rest like this comfortably.
He looked ridiculous sprawled across the small square of mattress. Humans had odd tastes.
That scorching heat flamed in his gut at the thought of tastes and humans. She’d worried he wanted to eat her, hadn’t she? Now that the image was in his mind, he considered it… just not the way she had implied.
He took a breath to steady himself. Mistake. All he did was inhale more of her scent. He wasn’t even sure if humans possessed pheromones, but whatever it was ignited something primal in him.
He’d never gone into rut. Not once. Stars, he’d never even taken a female to bed.
His brow furrowed. Mate fever wasn’t supposed to be this intense, was it?
But he’d missed the years when he should have been learning these things—had been off-world with Katan instead. How would he know what was normal?
Delaney was speaking. He blinked, shook his head.
“Apologies.” His antennae flicked in appeasement.
“I said, let me make you some food. It should be okay… I don’t know what aliens like to eat. But a broth made from meat and bones would be fine, yeah?”
He could barely focus on her words. Only on those pink, plump lips forming them. How would they taste under his tongue? He licked his own lips, swallowed hard, and nodded.
She gave him an odd look, said something else, and left.
He sank back into the bed. Tight fit for his frame, but soft. Like the enticing little human might be.
He growled at the shell-like garment covering them.
He shook off the fever-riddled thought as he closed his eyes.
“Here we go, fresh made soup. From the can. But still, I freshly made it from the can.”
He jerked awake. When had he—
The fire in his body was all consuming now. His cock felt ready to rupture. He sat up weakly.
Delaney frowned, leaning closer. Her scent hit him sharper, more concentrated. His eyes flared. He locked every muscle in place to keep from lunging.
“Here, let me help you. It’s really the least I can do.”
She leaned forward with the bowl and tilted it to his lips. The broth might as well have been tasteless for how overloaded his senses were. All he registered was her proximity. Her warmth. Her scent wrapping around him.
He took slow sips until the liquid was gone. She set the bowl on the end table.
She didn’t move away. Her hand lifted, resting on his forehead. His heart thundered.
“You’re still really warm.” She frowned, then stiffened. “You know… you smell good. Like, really good.” She leaned closer, pupils dilating.
He froze. He’d thought he was controlling his pheromones, but without his damper mask, in this state, he was failing spectacularly.
“Female—no, Del—you should go. Now.” The words rasped out as his mind hazed thicker. He swallowed hard.
She leaned even closer, her hand trailing down from his forehead along one of the sensitive lumin glands on his cheek. He shuddered, pleasure ripping through him.
Something snapped.
He lunged, flipping her onto her back and burying his face in her neck. A rumble tore from his chest.
I need her. Nothing has ever tempted me like this.
He fought his body to hold still, her heartbeat thundering against his jaw.
“W-wait,” Delaney panted.
He pressed the lumin glands along his jaw against her throat, marking her. But didn’t move beyond that.
The scent of her arousal hit him. He stiffened, his body reacting before he could stop it. His incisor fangs ached in a way they never had before, but he was too far gone to focus on the strangeness.
“Let me bring you pleasure. Let me taste you.” He held himself rigidly still, every instinct screaming to ravage and claim. But he wasn’t completely lost. No, he would never hurt her. He’d rather freeze to death in that goddess-awful snow.
After a beat, his female nodded.
“Say it, little human. I won’t touch you unless you say it.” He licked a line up her neck.
“Please!”
“Please what?”
“Please… I want you to taste me.”
And just like that, he was lost.
Even burning with fever, Maelic lifted his hand to his mouth and snapped off the sharp points of his claws.
Her skin was delicate, and he barely trusted himself to touch her as it was.
He wouldn’t risk spilling her blood. Not even slightly.
Seeing that horrific bright red once today had been enough to last a lifetime.
He leaned down, his large hand skimming her thigh. Frowned.
“Clothes need to come off. Now.”
She made a sound low in her throat that went straight to his cock. He wanted to be pressed against her, burrow into her warmth. He resisted the urge to rip the fabric away and gently pulled her shirt off first.
His eyes went wide. So much exposed skin—the gentle column of her throat, the lack of fur disarming but quickly forgotten when his attention locked on those soft breasts. He growled at the shell-like garment covering them.
Delaney gave a low, throaty laugh. “Here.” She reached behind herself, and the thing fell away.
He rumbled his approval.
Couldn’t resist leaning down to give each nipple a slow lick, nipping gently. The slight salt of her skin was delicious.
His cock pulsed with need, that heat riding him demanding more.
Her scent thickened. True arousal. He groaned and stripped her pants away, nearly whining at the pain surging through his cock from how vreking strong she smelled even with that last scrap of fabric between him and the one place he wanted to be most.
His patience gave out. He ripped the delicate fabric away from her cunt, his body winning the war with his mind.
The color of her sex was a beautiful, flushed pink, slick and glistening with arousal that made his head spin. Delaney rolled her hips in a slow, needy circle, silently begging.
Maelic didn’t make his pretty human wait. He buried his face between her thighs and groaned at the first taste of her. His cock twitched painfully.
One broad hand slid up to cup her breast, rolling the tight peak between his fingers while the other parted her folds. Two thick digits pressed inside as his tongue swept upward in a long, deliberate lick. When he reached a swollen little bead of flesh, he circled it, slow and worshipful.
“Oh, fuck—” The broken cry tore from her throat.
He paused, a wicked gleam igniting behind his eyes. There. That was the spot. He sealed his lips around her clit and sucked, gentle at first, then harder when her hips jerked off the bed. Fresh wetness coated his fingers, dripping down his wrist. His pheromones preparing her, in full effect.
Delaney’s hands flew to his hair, nails scraping his scalp, and the sting shot straight to his cock.
He growled against her, the vibration making her sob.
He worked her in earnest now—tongue lashing that sensitive bud, fingers curling and stroking the ridged walls inside her until her thighs trembled on either side of his head.
I’m going to come like this, untouched. The thought flashed, hot and humiliating. No. No male of worth spilled before his female, rather he was buried in her body or giving her pleasure.
He doubled down, relentless. His tongue flicked faster, his fingers drove deeper, thumb replacing his mouth for a heartbeat so he could watch her face. Her back arched like a bow drawn taut.
“Maelic—Maelic—”
“Yes, astara,” he rasped, voice thick with the rumbling vibration from his chest. “Come for me. Let me feel it.”
She shattered. Her cunt clamped down on his fingers so hard his vision whited out for a second. A broken scream ripped from her as she came, pulsing around him, flooding his tongue with the sweet proof of her pleasure.
He couldn’t hold back. The taste of her release snapped the last thread of his control. His cock jerked violently in his trousers, spilling in thick ropes while he kept licking her through it, gentler now, drawing out every aftershock until she sagged, boneless and panting.
Only then did he feel it—the sharp, burning swell behind his fangs.
He pulled back, chest heaving, eyes locked on her flushed, satisfied face.
Luminance.
The chemical that bloomed only once, for one mate, for life.
His fangs throbbed in time with his racing heart, already aching to claim what was his.
She was dozing off already, clearly exhausted from his pheromones and the exertion. She looked so vulnerable in the aftermath.
So perfectly his.
He knew he shouldn’t have done this, that it was going to cost him. But despite himself, he couldn’t stop the urge to cradle her to his chest, wrapping his wings around them both in a protective cocoon.
For the first time since he was a child, he drifted off peacefully to sleep.