Chapter 8
Jasmine
I couldn’t stop touching the scales along his chest, my fingers trembling as I stroked them.
They were firm, warm, and surprisingly smooth and soft.
Ekkire’s heart was pounding beneath my fingertips, but that was no wonder.
I’d never seen any of the naga Hunters at Haven move as fast as he had.
Moving at least three dozen feet in the blink of an eye, he’d been there between me and the spear as it came toward me.
A spear… I shifted, suddenly deeply concerned that this spear had actually struck him.
My hands clawed at his shoulders as I tried to lift myself high enough to look.
Gold glowed from beneath the edge of his pauldron, and it trailed down that chest I’d been patting, too.
His wide back was darker than his front, and it appeared completely unharmed.
I breathed a sigh of relief, which quickly morphed into a groan of pain.
Ah fuck, with the adrenaline wearing off, my leg hurt. Really badly.
Ekkire was like a rock, holding me to his chest, head lowered, eyes glowing.
He wasn’t moving. My heart kicked in my chest, was the fight not over?
I craned my head around and searched the clearing.
A body lay nearby, azure coils all crooked and lax in a way that only came with death.
I checked his shoulder and saw the tip of the arrow I’d shot him with still sticking out of the bloody hole.
Other than the body, there was no one else in the clearing with us.
Ekkire had me in his arms, my body cradled by the coils of his tail, which actually kept my broken leg immobilized right now.
He was glowing not just on his chest, but along his serpentine tail.
A golden explosion of light and savage grace.
My belly clenched, tightening into a ball as the sight of it sank in.
But I had one more matter that was even more important: “Where is Dove? Did they kill her? Did you see her, Ekkire?”
He shook his head like he was coming out of a trance, the deep, mossy green strands of his long hair tangling with mine.
“I… I haven’t seen her, Jasmine.” Then he craned his head to gaze around us like I had, his emerald eyes narrowing and the impressive ridges of his brows lowering.
“She distracted one of your attackers very bravely,” he murmured, “then I lost sight of anything but you. I think she’s…
yes, there!” He flicked the tip of his tail out and plucked something from the dry, gray-purple grass behind the body.
It glittered white with the shimmer of a pearl.
Dove lifted her head, wings fluttering, and her tail began sweeping back and forth, much like the wagging tail of a dog.
“Chirp kee kee!” she cried, wriggling in Ekkire’s grip.
I breathed a sigh of relief; she was all right!
Perhaps she’d been dazed for a moment, but as Ekkire released her, she leaped effortlessly through the air toward me.
She landed with a thud against my chest, nearly toppling me backward if not for the solid grip of Ekkire’s arms. Pain shot through me, sharp and immediate, and I blinked back tears, biting down on my lip to keep from crying out.
To make matters worse, Ekkire began withdrawing as soon as I had hold of Dove.
His arms released my waist, his tail unwound from around me.
He was retreating, moving away, and it jostled the break in my leg.
I saw stars, and this time I definitely couldn’t hold back the sound of pain.
He froze again, his green eyes growing so wide he looked like a deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming vehicle.
His nostrils flared as he inhaled deeply, and his freaky split tongue flicked out, tasting the air, tasting me.
“I know,” I snarled through gritted teeth. With one hand, I grabbed hold of his bicep and held on tight. If he abandoned me now, I’d be so freaking pissed, and to hell with him calling me short-tempered. I’d have every fucking right. “I know! Deal with it!”
Dove poked her head up from where she huddled against my chest, sharp claws digging into my coat.
Then she nipped him on the chin, hard. He reeled back, growling furiously at the tiny sleara, but she did not back down.
Her wings fluttered, slapping me in the face, and she leaped, claws first, and struck him on the side of his head.
I thought she’d picked up on my anger and pain and simply lost it. I was wrong.
She was shoving him, shoving him back toward me.
I nearly fell out of his lap as he tried once more to shift away.
That time, I screamed as the pain that shot through my leg felt like lightning sizzling through my veins.
“Ah, by the sacred streams…” he groaned, his arms coming back around me in a rush, tail coiling to support my broken leg again. “I am sorry, Jasmine.”
“Sorry?” I gritted out. “I’m the one with the broken leg, and you’re having a meltdown because you just found out I’m your mate?
Priorities, dude! And newsflash: I don’t want to be your mate any more than you want to be mine!
We’ll deal with it later!” Figures, I’d find the one freaking male on this planet who didn’t want to get shackled to a human.
I was going to pretend that didn’t hurt, didn’t sting even a little.
That was exactly what I wanted anyway, wasn’t it?
I didn’t need a guy, definitely not one of those ultra-possessive, ultra-doting scaly fellows.
I’d never see another hunt again. Screw that.
His expression went from worried to something so furious I nearly flinched back. See, I wasn’t the only one with a short fuse around here. Though I had to admit, even through the pain in my leg and the hurt burning in my chest, that he looked a little silly with Dove clinging to his head.
She had her claws in his long hair, her tail coiled around a braid, and her wings outstretched for balance.
Like she was the oddest living hat. More importantly, even when looking absolutely enraged, Ekkire did not try to dislodge her.
He didn’t even respond when she bent her head down and nipped his eyebrow with a tiny growl.
Sighing, because anger was hard to hold onto when you were in this much pain, I reached for her.
“Come on, Dove. You’ve done enough, sweetie.
” She came at my croon, sliding down his hair, claws scraping scales as she dropped from his shoulder into my arms once again.
She purred and chirped, nuzzling my chin and nestling against my chest with a whole lot of rubbing.
Like a kitten settling onto a pillow for a good nap, but even more affectionate.
“Let me see it,” Ekkire said, the growl still clinging to the edges of his voice.
Finally, he moved to get a look at my injury, but there wasn’t much to see through the fabric of my pants.
He seemed dubious there was even anything there.
His gaze lifted back to my face, as if he was checking whether I was truly hurt, but he didn’t ask. He knew I hadn’t faked that scream.
I had all the required first aid training.
I’d needed those certificates to be allowed to take anyone untrained into the wilds.
I knew what to do. So I began listing instructions, asking him to find me the items I needed to make a solid splint to secure my leg.
It was nearly impossible, now that I’d convinced him to prioritize my injury, to get him to release me.
Eventually, he went to get his backpack with supplies and cut fresh branches and bark to make the splint.
Waiting in that clearing, right next to a dead Thunder Rock corpse, was pretty terrifying.
For several minutes, I wondered what I’d do if he never came back.
If he left me here, how was I going to survive?
I had food and water, and a buttload of arrows to go with my bow, but I wouldn’t be able to walk back to the crashed ship.
Not in this terrain, I’d have to crawl and risk running into more of those Thunder Rock warriors.
Ekkire was so quiet when he returned that I didn’t hear him until he was almost right next to me. It made goosebumps break out along my spine. That was close, and if he could do that, perhaps an enemy naga could, too. I hated being that vulnerable.
Hovering at my side, he hesitated for a moment, and then, finally, he reached out to touch my shoulder with one hand.
Instantly, the sigils along his chest and the front of his tail lit up again with a golden glow.
Both of us stared. It was real. This was happening.
He really was my mate, and I had no doubt that this was as unexpected to him as it was to me.
He didn’t want this, but his sigils lit, he had no choice in the matter.
“We’re gonna cut open my pants first to see how bad the break is.
We might have to set it. Have you ever done that before?
” I said, distracting myself from the thorny mating issue to focus on the painful now.
I’d used my lecturing tone, the one I reserved for those smug, extra-obnoxious clients I’d taken on hikes in the past. It made something curl briefly at the corner of Ekkire’s mouth, and that, in turn, made something twist in my stomach.
“I have set broken arms before for fellow hunters. I believe I know what to do,” he said.
He sounded calm, which I found a little reassuring.
His hand dropped from my shoulder, but the glow of his sigils did not fade.
He’d sneakily begun wrapping his tail around my waist, still coiling more and more of it around me.
He took my weight that way, propping me up, but also immobilizing me.
Then, with a grimace he failed to hide, he bent over my leg and got to work.
I really tried not to scream as he moved me, or when he assessed the break and pushed it back into alignment with firm hands.
It was impossible; the pain was so intense I nearly blacked out.
I was grateful his restraining tail meant I couldn’t move, couldn’t try to stop him or get away.
I hated him for it at the same time. It wasn’t over until he’d secured a splint of wood and bark around my shin, but by then I hung limply in his grip, exhausted, still aching.
I felt wrung out, and my heart was still pounding wildly in my chest, my breathing too fast.
“Here, chew on this. It will help with the pain,” he said, and his hand came up to my face, holding out something dark and fuzzy. Moss? Bark? I wasn’t quite sure, but I was so out of it that I opened my mouth and let him put it on my tongue before I could think it through.
“Now you tell me? Couldn’t we have done that before you set the break?
” I grumped, a bitter taste coating my tongue, but a numbness spread through me that was pleasant and warm.
It definitely helped, the pain fading to the back of my mind and my heart rate beginning to slow.
I became more aware of things around me again, like Dove huddled beneath my chin, cooing and crooning as if she were trying to comfort me.
Or Ekkire’s warmth and solid grip around my body with his tail, not restraining, but protective, sheltering. I wasn’t used to such a feeling.
“Would you have taken it?” he said, with a wryness to his tone that made me smile despite myself.
Ah, damn it, he was right, I probably wouldn’t have.
I’d have been too suspicious of what it was, and whether it was safe for human consumption.
Still a risk, but after that agony, I was definitely relieved not to have to feel it anymore.
I knew it wouldn’t settle and ease for days, that pain, not unless I got to a healer.
Like Corin, who had a device that could restore the break in a matter of hours, or, if it was bad, days.
“Points for that,” I muttered, my thoughts beginning to blur a little.
“But that doesn’t mean you know me…” He said nothing to that, but I was vaguely aware of him moving around.
My leg still throbbed, now confined in the tight splint so the swelling tissue had nowhere to go.
It was the deep, burning kind of ache that, while not sharp and acute, would still be impossible to ignore if not for these primitive painkillers.
Now I just had to figure out how to get back to the crashed ship and Corin’s magic healing device from here...