Table of Contents

NOTICES

ALIEN STORM

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

CONTENT WARNINGS

CHAPTER ONE | Stephanie

CHAPTER TWO | Errok

CHAPTER THREE | Stephanie

CHAPTER FOUR | Errok

CHAPTER FIVE | Stephanie

CHAPTER SIX | Errok

CHAPTER SEVEN | Stephanie

CHAPTER EIGHT | Errok

CHAPTER NINE | Stephanie

CHAPTER TEN | Errok

CHAPTER ELEVEN | Stephanie

CHAPTER TWELVE | Stephanie

CHAPTER THIRTEEN | Errok

CHAPTER FOURTEEN | Errok

CHAPTER FIFTEEN | Stephanie

CHAPTER SIXTEEN | Stephanie

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN | Errok

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN | Stephanie

CHAPTER NINETEEN | Errok

CHAPTER TWENTY | Stephanie

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE | Stephanie

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO | Errok

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE | Stephanie

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR | Stephanie

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE | Errok

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX | Stephanie

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN | Errok

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT | Stephanie

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE | Stephanie

CHAPTER THIRTY | Errok

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE | Stephanie

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO | Errok

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE | Stephanie

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR | Errok

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE | Stephanie

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX | Errok

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN | Stephanie

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT | Errok

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE | Stephanie

CHAPTER FORTY | Stephanie

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE | Errok

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO | Stephanie

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE | Stephanie

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR | Errok

NOTICES

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be copied, used, transmitted, or shared via any means without express authorization from the author, except for small passages and quotations used for review and marketing purposes.

This is a work of fiction. All characters, events, and incidents in this novel are fictitious and not to be construed as reality or fact.

Alien Storm Copyright © 2023 Veronica Doran

ALIEN STORM

Fated Mates of the Sea Sand Warlords

Book Thirteen

By Ursa Dax

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Thank you, as always, to all my readers and new friends on this journey. You are the reason I keep writing these stories!

Thank you to my partner and parents for their unending support. It means the entire universe to me.

CONTENT WARNINGS

Parental abandonment (specifically the heroine’s father leaving) and resulting childhood trauma; deaths of parents; illness; BDSM themes with slight (shallow and non-lethal) self-harm, blood, submission, and binding with rope during sexual scenes between a non-human alien hero and a human heroine; injuries, gore, and graphic violence; natural disasters such as storms and rockslides.

CHAPTER ONE

Stephanie

The ship’s screens swirled in front of me, bands of colour lighting up the dark landscapes. Neither this ship nor Valeria’s was connected to the orbiting research vessel’s scanners and systems anymore, but Zoey and Tilly had re-jigged some of the drones for me. Those drones had scattered across the Sea Sands and fed me meteorological data that I analyzed here.

There wasn’t much to look at today. The weather out here had been pretty calm, other than the one sandstorm at the settlement that had happened months ago. The real data that needed analyzing was further out, past the Death Plains, where storms raged often. But I didn’t trust that a drone would make it that far on its own without getting chomped by some alien monster first.

We’d all hoped that the group who’d journeyed out past the Death Plains would return soon with new allies and new info, and that maybe on another trip they could take a drone or other weather monitoring equipment.

But we all fucking knew how that had ended. Gahn Razek and Jocelyn had been the only ones to return two days ago. Varrow’d almost gotten himself killed and was recovering in the Death Plains with Camille and Kohka. Meanwhile, nobody knew what had happened to Priya. Valeria’s shuttle had departed almost immediately afterwards to track down Priya and the four men who’d gone after her. My stomach twisted at the possibilities of what they might find.

Please, please let her be OK.

Praying had never done much for me back on Earth. But it was a habit I couldn’t seem to break.

I sighed harshly, pushing back against the desk in front of me. My wheelie office chair rolled backwards over the shining metal floor. I almost wanted to laugh at the mundaneness of that fact. The boring Earth reality of a boring chair in a boring office.

Except we weren’t on Earth. We were on an alien planet. And this wasn’t a normal office, but one of many, many rooms in the spaceship that had brought us here.

“Is all well?”

I jumped out of my chair, heart hammering at the sudden deep voice that boomed in the metal room. One of the alien warriors who’d escorted me out here, a man named Malachor, leaned into the room from the spot where he’d stationed himself in the hallway.

“Is all well?” he repeated.

No.

“Yes.”

“Alright. I heard a strange sound.”

I turned to the chair and kicked it as hard as I could, working out some of the frustration mounting in my body. Annoyingly, it didn’t fall over like I’d expected it to, instead careening noisily on its wheels until it hit the desk.

“That sound?” I asked, turning back to him.

“Yes,” he confirmed, his copper-coloured sight stars pulsing in large, dark eyes. Suddenly, his thick brows lowered, his high, dark ears twitching from where they poked out from between locks of long black hair. I’d heard some of the other girls say the Sea Sand men’s ears reminded them of cropped Doberman ears. I could see that. But they also reminded me of a horse’s ears.

He tightened his grip on his spear, turning to face whatever sound he’d heard in the hallway outside. I hurried up to the doorway, trying to see around his bulk.

Zoey was jogging down the hallway, huffing and puffing. Her giant blue lizardman mate, Kor, easily kept pace at her side, towering over her. Malachor lowered his spear at the sight of them.

“Let me carry you, mate,” Kor growled, his brilliant blue sight stars focused entirely on Zoey as he walked.

“No!” Zoey panted. “I need to exercise. My mom had gestational diabetes and I-” She stopped speaking to breathe heavily, her pace slowing somewhat. “I – putain – I need to keep in shape.”

Kor, bless the giant lizard monster, looked utterly bewildered at the tiny, beloved woman beside him.

Might as well shorten the distance a little.

Their conversation had carried easily through the long, tube-like tunnel of the hallway. But they were still a good ways away. She was probably hauling her newly pregnant self down the hallway to talk to me about something, so I started walking briskly to meet her.

“Steph!” she called, or rather wheezed, picking up speed when she saw me approaching.

“Do not push yourself,” Kor murmured with concern, his huge scaly hand coming down to rest on Zoey’s lower back as she finally stopped.

She bent over, placing her hands on her knees to catch her breath for a moment. I watched Kor’s hand stroke gently up and down her back, being careful that his claws didn’t come anywhere close to snagging the fabric of her grey tank top.

“Is everything OK?” I asked, feeling worry knit my brows together.

Zoey nodded, her long braids bouncing as she straightened. I couldn’t help but let my gaze dip to the small swell of her abdomen. She pushed her glasses up her nose, fixing me with her deep brown eyes.

“Just saw it on the scanner. The shuttle’s coming back.”

“Holy shit,” I breathed. My heart galloped in my chest. Burning pins rushed into my fingers, making them numb with anxiety. I flexed and relaxed my hands, fighting to keep my stress levels in check.

“Do you think… Is that a good thing?” I asked. The two of us started walking quickly down the hall together, followed closely by Kor and Malachor.

“Don’t know,” Zoey said.

The shuttle had only just left the settlement recently.

Which meant they’d found something quickly.

Something good…

Or something very, very bad.

Zoey and I didn’t need to speak to confirm where we were going – we both walked with purpose towards the cargo bay, the closest exit onto the sands. We picked through the shelves and boxes of the cargo bay until our boots hit the sand. She shrugged into the jacket that had up until a moment ago been tied by its sleeves around her hips.

“If we hurry, we should meet them at the settlement when they land. They’re still way out,” Zoey said, putting on her jacket. I nodded quickly, doing up my own jacket’s zipper.

“Please tell me you do not plan to run the entire distance across the open sands, too,” Kor said, helpless worry choking his growling voice.

“No way,” Zoey said, grinning up at the underside of Kor’s scaly snout. “That’s what I have you for, isn’t it? I did my cardio and now I am done.”

“Malachor?” I asked, spinning to find the warrior.  Unlike Zoey, I didn’t have a nine-foot-tall lizardman to mount. I had to ride back on an irkdu with Malachor.

Luckily, Malachor was on the ball. He turned to the open sands, calling out a high, loud yipping sound. A few moments later, his irkdu crashed into view, circling around the silvery dome of our desert-bound ship.

The irkdu were massive creatures with dusty greyish purple hide, long reptilian snouts, and too many eyes to count. Too many legs, too, the various skittering appendages turning the whale-sized creature into something very centipede-like. A lot of the girls were more than a little freaked out by the things.

Not me.

My heart fluttered as it got closer, the setting sun gleaming on the soft leather of the saddle upon its back. It wasn’t as pretty or as elegant as a horse. But it was the closest thing I had.

Malachor had learned on our ride out here not to bother offering to help me up into the saddle. The irkdu may have been bigger than a horse back home, but my muscle memory and my own strength were more than enough to get me up on its back. Plus, I’d fashioned stirrups for the saddle I used. My boot slipped into the stirrup and I pushed upwards. For the briefest moment, I could imagine I was home. Well, not exactly my home, but the closest thing to home I had – the ranch I’d worked at back in Alberta. My eyes closed as I executed the mounting movement I’d done so many times before, my chest calming, my breathing steady as I got up onto the back of Daisy or Rocket or Coal.

But it wasn’t Daisy’s dappled coat or Coal’s shining black back that met my eyes when I finally opened them.

It was the dry, dusty purple of the irkdu.

I gritted my jaw against a wave of grief. None of us human girls had people to miss – at least, not living ones – on Earth. But I’d had the horses. And they’d been just as important to me as any human member of my family could be.

Swallowing against a thick, sore throat, I patted the irkdu’s back, just in front of my saddle. It snuffled, casting its many eyes back to look at me.

It wasn’t the same.

But it helped.

Once Malachor was up on the irkdu and Zoey was safe and secure on Kor’s back, we took off. The sun sank lower and lower. The stars and asteroids fought against the stain of the night, splashing down silver over the darkening sands as we raced back to the settlement. It wasn’t long until the deep whirring of Valeria’s shuttle could be heard above and behind us. As the settlement came into view, the sound of the shuttle’s engines overtook us, flying over and past us, though we couldn’t see it with its cloaking tech. Luckily, Valeria and Zoey had reprogrammed the big ship’s scanners to see the shuttle even when cloaked. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have known it was coming back until we heard the engines overhead.

The shuttle decloaked, shimmering into view ahead of us, blotting out the stars and asteroids. It didn’t land on the sands, instead heading up to a large stone ledge in the Cliffs of Uruzai. The shuttle was small enough that when it landed it didn’t usually create enough of a shock to call zeelk up out of the sands. But this close to the settlement, every precaution was taken to avoid a zeelk attack. The shuttle disappeared from view as it descended somewhere in the dark mass of cliffs ahead of us.

In front of the cliffs, on the sand, was a band of tents, bending outward from a carved-out, sheltered part of the cliffs that comprised the settlement. The human women and families stayed closer to the shelter of the cliffs. These tents out here belonged to unmated warriors, many of whom were now leaving their tents and sprinting for the evening fire at the settlement. I knew it wasn’t the usual draw of dinner at the fire calling them with such haste, but the return of the ship.

We felt that haste, too. We sped forward until we’d passed the outer tents and had entered into the broad, stony arms of the cliffs. I dismounted the second Malachor commanded the irkdu to stop. Zoey was a little slower, but even so, the two of us, followed by Kor and Malachor, reached the evening fire just as the group from the shuttle approached from a crack in the cliffs.

I crowded into a bubble of human women.

“Anyone know what’s happening?” I asked.

Fiona, who stood beside me, shook her head vigorously, her long brown hair swirling around her shoulders and brushing the tattooed lengths of her arms.

“Not a clue,” she muttered in English, her Irish accent coming through much more obviously than it did when she spoke the language of the Sea Sands.

Please let it be good news, I thought silently as the shuttle group came to a stop at the fire. My eyes searched their faces frantically, skimming over Chapman, Gahn Fallo, Gahn Taliok, Grim, Valeria, Tok, and three of the warriors from the original Death Plains mission.

But Oxriel was missing…

And so, I realized with a hard lurch in my guts, was Priya.

CHAPTER TWO

Errok

“What in the cursed peaks is that?”

I stood, frowning into the fire-spattered darkness of foreign peaks. Togo and I had crossed the swallowing sands of what I now knew to be called the Death Plains. We’d stopped to rest and eat in the mountain range that separated the Death Plains from the Sea Sands. Though, in my opinion, these peaks were pathetic excuses for mountains. They paled, both in colour and grandeur, compared to the great clawing peaks of the Deep Sky.

But it was not the puny fangs of rock around me that had caught my attention. But rather movement among them.

Togo, my braxilk, who up until that moment had been resting beside our fire, now rose up onto his many legs, tossing his head uneasily.

We had built our fire against a small, stony sheltered area. Its light licked up the stone - normally white and grey under the sun, now shades of black, silver, and orange in the night. The firelight flickered, brightening our area and deepening the shadows that surrounded us.

Whatever was moving was getting closer. I could see the shifting of greyish limbs in the darkness where the firelight did not reach.

“Whatever it is, it is no match for a Deep Sky Gahn and his mount,” I said with easy confidence. I slipped my bow off of my chest, up over my head, and nocked an arrow, aiming it at the shifting mass in the distance. Tension rammed through my body, my arm bulging.

I let the arrow fly.

A shockingly quick tendril snapped out of the darkness, catching the arrow and snapping it.

Suddenly, more tendrils of flesh spilled from the shadowy area of the valley, coming straight for us.

Hmm… Maybe not.

“Let’s go!” I roared at Togo, leaping up onto his back.

Maybe I was not a match for this thing on the ground.

But from the air?

No matter where I was – the lands of my birth or among the rock of these putrid Death Plains – the air was my domain.

Togo took off as soon as my legs tightened across his back. With a caw, his mighty wings beat, propelling him upward alongside the strength of his leaping legs. I twisted upon him as we ascended, aiming another arrow downward.

For a breathless moment, perhaps the first moment of my life, I had no idea where to aim my arrow. The thing below us was a mass of writhing, whirling muscle and flesh. Too many tendrils to count both seemed to circle inwards and also reach upwards for us. And the entire wriggly ball was moving. Scaling the peak nearest to us, several long tendrils snapping into the air to reach for us. I snarled when the tip of one came close to latching onto Togo’s foot.

Quick as the wind, we dipped and whirled. Togo’s wings sliced through the night air, his feathers shining like blades under the stars and moons. I decided that exact aim was less important than actually hitting this thing, and I loosed arrow after arrow downwards. More than one was snapped in the many arms of the beast, but I called out in triumph when it shrieked. Some of the arms or legs or tails or whatever they were shuddered, revealing the thing’s main component. The head. Or the body? It seemed to be all one big ugly piece, flat and grey, surrounded by the wriggly bits.

With that bit of its centre exposed, Togo and I swooped down. We flew directly over it but moved too quickly to be caught. Two arrows, one after the other, sank dead-centre in the thing’s flat body. A third arrow entered one of its many eyes. But still, the thing moved. Still, it climbed. Still, it reached for us.

“Don’t beasts out here know when to die?’ I snapped, irritation building. I was not annoyed to fight with this thing.

I was annoyed because it was slowing us down.

We’d been nearly finished with our meal and our rest. Nearly ready to continue on this most important journey of my entire life.

The journey to retrieve my mate.

Even now, the thought of her among other lands, other tribes, other men, filled me with a possessive rage the likes of which I’d never known.

“I will kill you twice for keeping me from her,” I barked down at the creature. Or rather, across, as it had scaled nearly to the top of the spiked peak of stone. I ducked, and Togo lurched out of the way of a wildly swinging tendril. Hissing, I dragged a blade from my back with my free hand, lopping off the end of that tendril. The creature shrieked again, its injured arm scuttling back in towards its body. But another one replaced it.

So, I cut that one off, too.

But there were so many cursed arms on the thing. I could be here all night playing this ridiculous game. And I couldn’t just flee. For one thing, even injured as it was, I had no guarantee the thing would not just hunt us and catch up with us as we slept in some other place.

And for another thing?

I did not flee.

Ever.

Besides, it had angered me too much. How dare this ugly thing think it could come for a Deep Sky Gahn and live?

It has even less sense and manners than Lerokan. And that is saying something.

“Let’s end this,” I muttered to Togo, putting my bow across my chest and holding my blade with both hands. He squawked his reply, and we arrowed forward together. We dove right towards the centre of the creature. Its tendrils unwound from its body and curled around us in a cage of flesh. Loop after loop caught at my ankles, my tail, my arms, and Togo’s wings.

But it had been weakened by my previous blows. And trying to catch us in its tendrils left its head exposed once more.

Tugging violently against a particularly nasty tendril wrapped around my bicep, I plunged my long blade deep into its head.

Immediately, all movement ceased. The many grips on us slackened as the thing slid down the stone peak it had climbed. Togo beat his wings furiously, trying to break free of the entanglement. The dead weight of the beast was pulling us down with it.

I hacked at the tendrils holding us like mountain vines until, suddenly, we careened up into the air once more. The creature rolled down the stone incline faster and faster until it landed on top of our fire. Its weight killed the flames immediately.

“These lands are foul,” I hissed to Togo. His wings, luckily uninjured, kept us above the ground easily as we both stared down at the beast we’d vanquished.

“Let us hope,” I said, sighing and cracking my neck, “that our welcome at the Cliffs of Uruzai will not be quite so abominably rude.”

In all honesty, it did not matter how I would be greeted at those cliffs. Even if I was met with a shower of arrows, I would fight my way through. I’d watched my own little brother scale the cliffs of our homeland for his mate, despite a deep wound that should have laid him low, and he hadn’t even had the Vrika’s mate bond, yet.

Anything Lerokan could do, I could do better. With twice the power. Especially with the ardent, obsessive pulse of the mate bond inside me.

I knew without the barest brush of doubt that I could take twenty arrows in my guts to get to her. And that, even on the brink of death, I’d still be shooting my own right back, still fighting to find her.

Speaking of which…

With a click of my tongues, I directed Togo downward to the corpse. We landed beside it and I dismounted. I removed two arrows that had not been broken from the thing’s head, frowning with disgust at the blood coating their shafts. I wiped them with a spare bit of hide from among my things before returning them to my quiver. I wiped at my hands, too, but did not feel sufficiently clean as I tossed the rag down.

Curse these bone-dry mountains.

Unlike the lush Deep Sky peaks, there was little water to be had out here. No sudsy moss for cleaning myself, either. I’d been using other plants – long skinny ones that did not grow in my mountains – for that. But it did not compare to the cold and hot springs of my homeland.

“I cannot wait to get out of here,” I growled, rubbing my hands viciously up and down my thighs, trying to eliminate the feeling of stickiness. Togo fixed me with his six eyes and then brayed in agreement.

I patted the feathery fluff of his neck, smiling at my loyal mount.

“Soon. Soon, I will have her. And I will bring her back to our mountains and treat her to the sort of life a Gahnala of the Deep Sky deserves. One with actual water.”

Skies above, that thought was a luscious one. Now that the beating of blood from the battle was easing, it moved downwards, settling heavily between my thighs. I’d only seen a glimpse of her face in the Vrika’s egg, but my mind ran rampant, imagining more of her. The way her brown hair would look drenched in heated water, steam billowing around her. Her smooth white skin laid bare on the brolka hides of my cave. Her thighs spread…

My cock thickened, and my stomach clenched. There were too many mysteries in that image. Too many parts of her I had no context for. I’d been with several Deep Sky women in the early days of my adulthood, but I could not use my experience of their anatomy to picture her. I’d only seen the face and the general shape of Lerokan’s mate under her odd clothing, so that did not help, either.

My tongues lashed my fangs, my throat tightening as I tried to put the puzzle of her together in my mind. What did the silken petals of her cunt look like? How tight would she be around me as I claimed her?

What would she look like, sound like, with my cock buried deep inside her?

The cock in question jerked. I raked my claws through my hair. It’s been far too long since I’ve had a woman. Yes, I had been with others, but I had ended all casual dalliances when I’d taken the title of Gahn. As Gahn, I wanted no other woman but the one who would serve at my side as my true, fated mate.

I’d been Gahn for nearly twelve ages, now. More than a thousand days of cold hides and an even colder cock. I’d ground my fangs, fisted my own shaft, and waited and hoped and begged for the Vrika to come to me. I’d begged, even though such a thing was not befitting a mighty Gahn. I’d begged for my mate, my Gahnala. Begged for the sort of love my parents had had before me. The kind of love that carved a man’s life with the glorious blade of purpose.

I’d begged for peace. Even begged for agony.

The agony of love was better than the agony of loneliness.

But no more.

There would be no more waiting. No more shameful begging. No more wondering if I’d gone half-mad with longing for something that seemed ever out of reach.

She was within my reach, now.

At least, she would be very soon.

I leaped up onto Togo once more.

My mate was waiting for me beyond this hideous rock. Somewhere out there in all that shifting sand, she now ached the way I had ached for so long.

I will not let her ache. I will not let her feel even one claw’s tip of the pain I have endured without her.

I commanded Togo into the fastest flight of his life.

For I had no more time to lose.

CHAPTER THREE

Stephanie

Istared at the swirling meteorological data on the ship’s scanners, my shoulders relaxed and a smile on my face. A smile because of the news Chapman had given us a few nights ago: Priya was fine. So was Oxriel, who’d stayed behind in the mountains. Apparently, she’d found her mate out there. I was a bit surprised by that – Priya, like me, had been on the quieter side, absorbed more with her work than social stuff. She definitely hadn’t seemed like she’d cared about the whole mates thing. But I supposed that didn’t matter much if you found the right person.

A frown took over my smile as I mulled over how I would respond to having a mate. The concept was so foreign to me. I mean, that makes sense. It’s an alien planet after all… But even so, the idea that some mystical dragon creature could just make a man fall in love? It was weird to me.

If an outside force like the Lavrika makes it happen, how do you even know it’s real?

Not like I was the one with answers to questions like that. I couldn’t even say for sure if I’d ever been in love in my 23 years. I’d dated a few guys back on Earth, but they’d always gotten fed up with how much time I spent at the ranch. I may have been a bit of a horse girl cliché, but I’d always cared more about the horses than I did about guys.

Well, human guys, at least.

Would things be different if some alien giant came up to me here and told me I was the one for him?

I sighed. Somehow, I doubted it. The idea didn’t give me any spark of excitement. It just exhausted me.

I’m exhausted and it hasn’t even happened yet!

Yet… But it had to eventually, right? The math told us there were only so many women left for the many, many single dudes on this planet.

I was saved from my circling thoughts by the squeak of boots on the metal floor behind me. I spun my chair around to see Chapman striding into the room.

“Do you have a few minutes to chat?” she asked. Like usual, her ginger hair was pulled neatly back into a classic military bun. Her smattering of freckles gave a cute, carefree edge to a face that was otherwise firm and serious.

“For sure. Everything OK?” I replied.

I gestured to a spare office chair which she grabbed and dragged closer. She spun it so the back of the chair faced me, then straddled the seat, resting her forearms and elbows on the back of the chair.

“For the moment, yes. I came to talk to you about the new settlement we’ll be starting out in the Deep Sky mountains.”

Ah. Right. They’d mentioned that at the fire when they’d come back. But I hadn’t caught all the details. After the news of Priya and her mate, our little human group had erupted into titters and gasps that had drowned out the following announcements.

“We’ll be using Valeria’s ship as a sort of home base tech hub out there. We’re going to park it in neutral territory near their Lavrika’s – the Vrika’s – mountain.”

“Vrika?”

That explained how Priya had ended up with a mountain mate, then, considering no one from way out there had come to visit our Lavrika’s caves. Just how many magic love juice gods exist on this planet?

For the briefest flicker, before Chapman’s next words dragged me back to the present, I wondered not only about this planet, but beyond it. What else was out there? I knew more human missions like ours had been flung out among the stars. What bizarre worlds had they found?

“Yes. The Vrika. It also healed Varrow when their group was first attacked, so thankfully it seems to be at least somewhat on our side. Anyway, I came here to ask if you’d be willing to join the mission as one of the humans stationed at this new settlement.”

My eyebrows rose. I hadn’t expected that.

“Shouldn’t that be, like, you? Or Valeria or something? Someone with some military or leadership experience?”

Chapman nodded.

“Oh, yes. Valeria and Grim will be heading up the operation. Taylor and Tok have also agreed to go. I plan to ask Fiona and some others, too. Along with at least one warrior from each Sea Sands tribe. I want you there to help measure and predict the storms out there. They are absolutely brutal, and the more data we collect, the better we can protect ourselves and plan.”

I leaned back in my chair, rubbing my chin thoughtfully. I didn’t love the idea of gallivanting off into unknown territory. But I did relish the idea of a more challenging workload. Being able to use my skills somewhere the weather actually did stuff on a regular basis instead of just blasting us with hot dry sun day in, day out. And it sounded like Fiona, one of my closest friends, would hopefully be along for the ride, too.

I sat up straighter, about to tell Chapman I’d do it.

But for some reason, she lifted an arm from the back of the chair and held up a hand.

“Hold on. I haven’t told you everything. I want you to be fully informed.”

My stomach dropped. Uh oh. What insanity is she going to tell me about now? Are there pits of acid that look like water out there? Even bigger zeelk? More quicksand like in the Death Plains?

“What is it?” I asked, keeping my voice steady even as dread drenched my spine with icy water.

“It’s the Gahn. One of them, at least. Priya’s mate Lerokan’s older brother. Gahn Errok.”

“Oh,” I said, relaxing somewhat. Don’t get me wrong, I knew from observing Chapman’s own mate Gahn Fallo that a Gahn could be like an armed explosive. One wrong move and he’d blow up. But after being around the territorial Gahns at this settlement for so long, and seeing how they’d bent to our human whims, I didn’t understand the note of foreboding in her voice.

“So, what is it?” I probed. Chapman had stopped speaking, her grey eyes narrowed as they scanned my face.

She sighed, then took in a large breath. “It’s very possible that you’re his mate.”

The air got thin. And the air on this planet was already fucking thin.

“What?” I asked, mind whirling. “How… How do you know?”

“I don’t. Not for sure,” Chapman said. “He got his mate vision from the Vrika. He described a white woman with brown hair and brown eyes. That could be a few different people. Fiona, for example, but he didn’t mention the tattoos. Anyway, you are one of the women who fit the description. So, I wanted to warn you, give you the full picture, before you agreed to come back to the settlement so close to his tribe’s territory.”

“He didn’t say anything else about what she looked like?” I pressed, heart hammering. “Like, no other defining characteristics?”

Chapman chuckled wearily. “Nope. He was too busy saying that his mate was above all others and we should know who she was by that fact alone. Then he demanded I drag all the brown-haired, brown-eyed humans before him so he could pick his mate out of the line-up.”

My nose wrinkled. Jesus. Sounds like a real prize.

Chapman caught my expression and continued. “You know the rules. No woman has to be with a man she doesn’t want to be with, even if he’s supposed to be her mate. Those same rules would apply at the new settlement, too. And…”

She paused again, and yet more dread tugged at my belly.

“What now?” I asked, voice low.

“It’s just that, you’ll probably find out if it’s you or not before we even leave for the mountains, anyway.”

I cocked my head in confusion. “How?”

Chapman’s eyes bored into mine. Her words punched into me even harder than her gaze.

“Because he’s on his way here right now.”

CHAPTER FOUR

Errok

Night drenched the sands the way the mate bond drenched me. Made me dark and heated. A deeper, truer version of myself than I had ever known. Harder and stronger and pulled to a taut and vicious point.

The Cliffs of Uruzai were visible ahead, just as Priya’s maps had indicated. A vast, sprawling shape of reddish stone, painted by the darkness until the stone looked like dried blood. I didn’t need to speak to Togo to command him to go faster. He felt it in the straining forward of my body. The never-shifting angle of my head.

As we got closer, I located the settlement area with ease. It was easily recognizable by the tents that littered the sand. The tents bloomed outward from a sheltered dip in the cliff wall, and became more concentrated within the cliff area.

This is how she has been living? I thought darkly. In a puny little tent? No cave walls to protect her?

That would not stand.

We got closer and closer, the air whipping my hair back from my face and making my skin thrum with tingling tension. Soon, more than tents were visible. Men, guarding the settlement. Men like the ones I’d seen in Gahn Thaleo’s mountains. Sea Sand and Bitter Sea men.

I almost wanted to dare one of them to try to stop me, to attack me, as I landed among the outer tents and dismounted to face the row of seven guards.

None did.

Instead, one of the Sea Sand men turned away, jogging into the more sheltered area of the settlement.

The other guards – four Sea Sand men and two Bitter Sea monsters – regarded me. Still but wary.

They do not even raise their tails.

I could not wait to get my mate out of these barbarian lands. Away from men who did not even have the smallest inkling of the grace and courtesy owed to a mighty Gahn.

But perhaps they did have an inkling. Because when five men approached from the settlement, the Sea Sand guards turned and raised their tails for them. Anger flared beneath my skin. Anger at being treated as less than these other Gahns. I recognized two of the men who came to a stop before me. Gahn Fallo and Gahn Taliok. The other three I had not yet met.

“You and your men do not raise your tails for your new ally and fellow Gahn?” I said smoothly, masking my irritation. I lifted my chin and regarded the men before me critically. It annoyed me to see how many features they shared with my people. With me. Apart from our colouring and slight individual differences in size and proportion, we all shared characteristics. The same shape, the same sight stars. It bothered me that I was closer to these men in appearance than I was to my own mate.

“And yet you have not raised yours,” growled the man who stood at the very centre of the five Gahns. He was nearly as tall as me, second in height only to Gahn Fallo. One long, dark braid hung behind his shoulders and a black axe glinted at his hip.

“I will raise my tail to no one here. No one but my own mate.” My voice lowered, turned dangerous. “Where is she?”

Tension and growls rippled through the Gahns at my response. I narrowed my eyes, preparing to snatch my bow from my chest and fire an arrow through each and every one of them if needed. If they try to keep me from her…

The Gahn in the centre heaved a huge breath and swished his tail in a placating gesture to calm the other Gahns.

“I am Gahn Buroudei,” he said, his sight stars taking in my face. They flicked momentarily to Togo, then back to me. “These two men beside me are the Gahns Razek and Baldor. You have already met Gahns Fallo and Taliok.”

I cared little for meeting these other Gahns. Cared little for this alliance at all. The only reason I’d succumbed to this ridiculous arrangement was to have access to my own mate.

I was starting to regret it.

I should have just attacked them after all…

“Yes, yes. Very good,” I snapped. “Thank you for telling me your names so that I may promptly forget them. The only name I wish to learn is hers.”

Gahn Fallo’s massive tail thrashed in fury, sending grains of sand exploding behind him. He stalked forward, pressing his snarling face towards mine until our noses nearly touched.

“You’re a fool if you think you can come here and insult us,” he barked.

“You’re a fool if you think you can keep me from her,” I said, meeting his gaze stonily. Then, my eyebrow twitched in amusement. “Though, perhaps that would not be much of a departure from your usual state of intelligence.”

Gahn Fallo and I were about the same size. But I was quicker. I dodged the swift darting of his claws as they sought my throat. In an instant, I’d nocked an arrow, the fatal point a mere breath from Fallo’s chest.

“Do it,” he said, grinning madly, leaning forward until the point of my arrow scratched his hide. “Send your arrow right through me, you putrid purple Gahn. Go ahead. You will not pierce my heart. It was wrenched from my chest long ago by a little human hand.”

“Apparently, so was your brain,” said Buroudei with a sigh. Then, more quietly, “Perhaps the mate bond makes fools of us all.”

“Speak for yourself,” I muttered. I did not feel like a fool under the sway of the mate bond. I felt strong and proud and purposeful.

I felt chosen.

“When any one of us speaks,” said Buroudei from behind Fallo’s bulk, “it is with the weight of all five armies behind us. We speak for ourselves. For this settlement. And the new women.” Careful control crackled in his voice. “Now put down your weapon.”

“Yes,” breathed Fallo, his fangs glinting. “Lower your tiny little spear and see what happens.”

“It’s an arrow,” I scoffed, wrinkling my nose at Fallo’s ignorance. “And I will lower it. Not because you’ve told me to. But because I refuse to waste a decent arrow on this foul excuse for a Gahn.”

Fallo snapped his jaws, but a warning grunt from Buroudei and the watchful eyes of the other three kept him in check as I lowered my arrow.

“Enough of this,” I said, my tail twitching as Fallo stepped reluctantly away from me, rolling his broad shoulders.

“Despite the fact that I expect all five of you to be braxilk talons in my sides, we are now allied,” I continued. “This has been decided. We do not need to like each other. We do not need to spend time building up false pleasantries between us. Just lead me to my mate so I may collect her and leave this place.”

Even the sand under my feet was beginning to grate on me. All shifting and grainy and leaving me feeling like I needed to rinse my skin and claws. I replaced my arrow in my quiver and slung my bow over my head once more as the other Gahns regarded me. Buroudei looked sorely tempted by my words, as if he could not wait to be rid of me.

“You need not stay here any longer than you wish,” he said evenly. “But your mate will accompany you only if she agrees to go.”

I balked.

“Why in the piercing peaks would she refuse to come with me?” I was her mate, not to mention a Gahn. I was Gahn Errok. Fastest flyer and fiercest fighter of the Deep Sky. No woman could look upon me and find me wanting. Especially not under the spell of the mate bond.

“Oh, Gahn of the Deep Sky,” said a man who had not yet spoken. Gahn Baldor. Glinting silver sight stars met mine. “You have much to learn.”

“I do not see what you lot could hope to teach me,” I growled in response. They don’t even know what arrows are called…

“But each of us has claimed our mates,” said the scarred Gahn, Taliok.

“So?” I huffed. “That is no great feat. Men of the Deep Sky claim their women, too.”

“But not new women.” That remark came from Razek.

I sighed. “That does not matter. She cannot be so different from a woman of the Deep Sky. She is my mate. Do not claim to know more of her than I do.”

“Stop trying to help him. Let him face her. I wish to watch him flail. And fall,” Fallo muttered, his words dripping with hateful longing.

“You will be waiting a long time for such a thing,” I retorted. “Gahns of the Deep Sky do not flail. And we never fall.”

“Fine,” Buroudei said, looking at me intently.

“Fine?” I asked, my sight stars zinging to him.

“Yes, fine. We will escort you to her, now. All the new women are at the evening fire.”

My heart surged, and I looked behind him, searching for the light of a blaze. I almost missed Gahn Buroudei’s next words, spoken quietly to Gahn Taliok.

“He may be the most hopeless of us all.”

CHAPTER FIVE

Stephanie

“Well, they look like they’re off somewhere important, don’t they?”

At Fiona’s words, I stopped trying to tear a tough chunk of dakrival meat off the bone. She and I were sitting at the evening fire, along with Tilly and Nasrin. The four of us were all on the list to head up the new mountain settlement, and we’d been inseparable ever since Chapman had announced it – talking about what we’d do in the mountains. What we’d find. How we’d help.

Other human women were also seated, eating and chatting, in little groups among the Sea Sand people circling the fire. A few Bitter Sea men were present – like Tok, who hadn’t left Taylor’s side since he’d returned from the Deep Sky mission. He hulked beside his mate like some kind of golden gargoyle, his sharp eyes never straying from her smiling face.

“Who?” I asked, wiping the back of my hand over my mouth. I turned to follow Fiona’s gaze, as did Tilly and Nasrin.

It took me a moment to figure out what she meant. But once my eyes registered it, there was no way I could be mistaken about what she’d commented on.

The Sea Sand Gahns, all five of them, were striding purposefully away from the settlement, towards the open sands. Once they passed beyond the main grouping of tents, I lost sight of them.

The Sea Sand people had evidently noticed the Gahns’ movements, too. The warriors who’d been seated at the fire stood, and the women called their children back to their sides with clicking tongues.

A frisson of dark fear ran under my skin.

The Gahns were spotted together fairly regularly as they strategized. But seeing them all walking swiftly away from the camp felt like cause for alarm.

“They haven’t given any orders. The warriors are all jumping up but they’ve not been told to prepare for anything,” Nasrin noted, a note of concern lacing her Australian accent.

Fiona turned to me, her expression grim.

“Do you think…?”

“Does she think what?” cut in Tilly, leaning forward. Her German accent was a contrast to Nasrin’s words a moment ago. The firelight licked up one side of her face, making her deep brown skin gleam. That same light glimmered in coils along the tightly-wound spirals of curly hair tied in a puff on the top of her head.

Fiona and I glanced at each other. As two of the women who matched the description given by Chapman, we’d been warned.

Warned that we could be his mate.

“One of the mountain Gahns has a human mate and he’s coming here to find her,” Fiona supplied with a sigh. I was glad she’d filled the silence. For some reason, I was finding it difficult to speak. My throat was dry and tight. I placed the meat I’d been eating onto a nearby bone plate, no longer hungry.

“A pale brunette with brown eyes,” Fiona continued. “Chapman warned Stephanie and me because we match the description. I think she warned Abigail, too.”

Nasrin’s elegant dark eyebrows rose. She had olive-toned skin and brown hair – the deepest brown you could get before black. But her eyes were an exquisite jade green, not brown.

I craned my neck, looking for Abigail. I spotted her sitting across the fire with Melanie.

“I don’t think it’s her,” I said quietly.

“Why not?” Fiona asked, cocking her head.

“She has a pixie cut,” I replied. “If the mountain people are anything like the Sea Sand ones, short hair is unusual for a woman. So, I feel like the Gahn would have used that as a defining feature to identify her when describing her to Chapman and the others.” Chapman said he also didn’t mention the tattoos, I thought silently as I stared at the dark line art inking down Fiona’s arms and swirling along her collarbones.

“Hmm. Yeah. Could be.” Fiona said, scratching her jaw thoughtfully as she stared at the fire. The movement made a long row of black flowers flex along her forearm. She stopped, her gaze finding my face again. “It’s probably you then, eh?”

I didn’t bother refuting her statement. The more I’d thought about what Chapman had told me, the more likely it seemed that I had to be the otherwise non-descript white brunette the Deep Sky Gahn had seen in his mate vision. I had no short haircut, no tattoos. Not even a unique mole or freckles or anything. I’d never minded blending in. Never wanted to be the centre of attention. And God knew the horses didn’t care what I looked like.

But now…

Now, a new Gahn was on his way, probably for me.

He might even be here now…

I stood. For a moment, I wasn’t even sure why I’d gotten to my feet. Didn’t know where I meant to go. Part of me wanted to run and hide in the tent I shared with the other single girls. Another part of me wanted to march after the Gahns and go see if there was some newly arrived man out there.

That second part won out. If he was here, I had to know.

I have to know if it’s me.

I turned, preparing to walk to the edge of the settlement – at least, as far as the guards would let me – to see what was going on.

But a brilliant, opalescent set of sight stars stopped me in my tracks.

My stomach swooped. My breath caught in my throat like a trapped bird. My heart rammed.

Those sight stars, those eyes. They sliced right into me, sharp and bright.

If that gaze had been a blade, it would have left the deepest, cleanest cut. The kind of cut so quick and deft that you don’t even know you’re bleeding.

The eyes, of course, were in a face. A fucking gorgeous face. A face I didn’t recognize. Broad and strong-jawed and framed by long, flowing, inky hair. A huge, elegant bow was slung over his chest, along with weapons straps and blades. He walked with long, powerful strides, closing the distance between us with relentless focus.

It’s him. The Gahn from the mountains. Gahn Errok. It had to be.

He stopped before me.

I gulped.

If there was any doubt about whom this guy had come for, who his mate was, that was long gone. He appeared to have absolutely no interest in anything else going on around him, around us. Five Sea Sand Gahns, looking rather peeved, flanked him. Other human women jumped to their feet, pressing forward to get a look at the stranger. Warriors twitched their tails and eyed their Gahns with apprehension, as if waiting for this new Gahn to make one wrong move.

He didn’t look at any of them.

But he did make a move.

I gasped as two giant, muscled arms enveloped me. I lurched forward against a wide chest.

Fuck, those arms were like iron bars at my back. One huge, trembling hand stroked down my hair and a single word was spoken reverently against the top of my head.

“Finally.”

I blinked, unable to even process what was happening as the grip on me suddenly disappeared, replaced by night air that suddenly felt much colder. Fiona and Nasrin clutched at me, dragging me backwards so quickly I almost stumbled and fell. Tilly caught me about the waist before I did, steadying me.

A ring of warriors encircled the four of us, hissing and drawing their weapons. Before they closed in too tightly and blocked my view, I glimpsed Gahn Errok thrashing, snarling viciously, as Gahn Buroudei and Gahn Fallo locked their bulging arms around him.

“Well, that was quite the greeting. I guess that settles that, then,” Fiona whispered beside me, still holding my arm. “He came for you.”

“Are you OK?” Nasrin murmured. Her green gaze was narrowed as she tried to see past the warriors who had created a wall of muscle in front of us.

“Yeah. I think so. It was just a hug,” I said, fighting to keep my voice even. I was shaken, but not badly so. I wasn’t hurt. Just… Surprised.

“He is not happy,” Tilly said.

Since I couldn’t see what was happening anymore, I steadied my breathing and focused on trying to listen to what was going on.

“I have enough arrows to kill all five of you putrid Gahns!” Gahn Errok hissed. His words had a different cadence than I was used to. A different accent, lilting from his mountains.

“They are no use to you without your arms,” Gahn Buroudei grunted in return.

“Yes,” seethed someone else – sounded like Fallo. “Maybe we should just rip them off. Let us see how you fire your little spears then.”

“You have no right to keep a man, a Gahn, from his mate,” Gahn Errok snapped.

God, that word. Mate. Said with such force, such possessive rage, I felt it like a fist in my chest.

“She has not accepted you,” Buroudei said, his voice thick with exertion at trying to keep Gahn Errok under control. “You cannot behave this way – grabbing her without so much as a word!”

“I did say one word!” Gahn Errok retorted.

“Did he?” asked Nasrin, turning to me.

I nodded. “He said, ‘Finally.’”

“Bit rich of Buroudei to be saying shit like that,” Fiona noted, her grip finally easing on my arm. “The way Cece tells the story, he licked the blood off of her fucking neck the second he had her alone. And they couldn’t even speak the same language back then!”

“But that was before,” Tilly replied. “Before they knew we didn’t feel the mate bond.”

“Does… Do you think he knows that? Gahn Errok?” I asked.

Oh my God. What if no one had told him? What if he’d come all this way, expecting me to be as obsessively in love with him as he was…

With me.

He loved me. This strange, snarling, vicious man loved me.

He doesn’t even know me.

My friends didn’t answer me.

But they didn’t need to.

The answer became clear just a moment later. Fallo’s deep voice cut through the scrabbling and noise.

“There is no automatic mate bond for the new women. She feels nothing for you.”

All the commotion beyond the warriors in front of us ceased.

The silence pulsed around us before it was cut with a vicious statement.

“I do not believe you.”

A command was grunted, and suddenly, the warriors in front of us parted. Fiona and Nasrin grabbed my arms again, as if worried they’d once again have to haul me away from an overly eager Gahn.

Gahn Errok had been forced to his knees, with Gahn Fallo and Gahn Buroudei both holding him in place.

They probably didn’t need to hold him, now. He was still as stone, still as death as he stared at me.

“Tell them,” he growled, his sight stars searching my face desperately. “Tell them you are mine. Tell them what you feel.”

I couldn’t tell if he was commanding or begging.

“I…”

At the sound of my voice, his sight stars exploded, his nostrils flaring. He jerked, leaning forward, as if he were dying of thirst and I was a pool of clear water, just out of reach.

“I’m sorry,” I said, shaking my head. “They’re telling the truth. I don’t… I don’t feel it.”

I was dealing with a whole lot of very big feelings at that moment. It would take me all night to untangle them. But I was absolutely certain of one thing – there was no mate bond. No intense rush of all-consuming love. Gahn Errok was a stranger to me.

“You…” Gahn Errok murmured, his expression faltering, turning confused. Then, he hardened his features. “You do not speak the truth. Why? Do you fear the reaction of these men?” He jerked his head as if to indicate the other Gahns and warriors. “You need not,” he continued, lifting his chin and somehow looking down his nose imperiously despite the fact that he was on his knees. “You need not fear anything. I have come to claim you and take you back to the mountains. I will take you away from all this filth and these unworthy fools.”

“Excuse me?” The words were loud and harsh, and I almost didn’t realize I’d been the one who’d said them. But I had said them, and it was as if the words had punched through some kind of stopper inside me. More words flowed, hot and fast and furious. “No fucking way. You do not get to come here and insult my friends and the home we’ve built here.” Sure, the place was dusty and sandy and hot. But filthy? No. Everyone worked hard to keep the place efficient, clean, and safe. And the Sea Sand people had been good to us. Not just the men who had or who wanted mates. The women and the children, too. They’d welcomed us, healed us, fed us. Given us a place. Protection.

They’d become the family that all of us human girls had lost back home.

“They’re not unworthy,” I said, defiant anger bubbling up in my chest. “You are.”

With that, I wiggled out of my friends’ grips, turned, and walked away. Humans and aliens alike parted silently for me as I stormed through the crowd towards the human tent.

I didn’t feel shaky, now. Didn’t feel anxious or concerned or confused.

I was mad as hell

And it was all because of him.

CHAPTER SIX

Errok

“What… What just happened?”

Evidently, in my horrified shock, I’d said the words out loud without realizing it. Because Gahn Fallo’s obnoxious reply rang in my ears.

“You flailed and you fell,” he said. I jerked my head, looking up at him from my knees. I sneered at his look of vicious glee.

“You Gahns have somehow poisoned her mind against me!” I grunted, pulling once again against their hands.

“They haven’t.”

I stopped fighting, surprised to hear a high, clear voice now instead of the deep growls of the Gahns. Three small, strange women stood before me. They’d been with her – my mate – a moment ago. But I’d been so focused on my mate’s face that I hadn’t really taken notice of them.

The one speaking had hair similar in colour to my mate’s. She also had strange markings on her skin. Perhaps scars?

“No one poisoned her mind. It’s true. We don’t feel the mate bond.”

My lungs heaved with harsh breaths. My brains churned in my skull. My heart contracted in my chest, as if dealt a death blow.

Fallo’s words from a moment ago echoed.

She feels nothing for you.

I thought I knew agony before.

But that was nothing. Nothing to the complete collapse of my entire world.

I waited for her for so long… I want her more than I want my next breath.

Yet she does not want me?

“I do not envy you, Gahn Errok,” said Razek.

I wanted to fire back at him, at all of them. Tell them that they were weak fools and that I could never envy any of them.

But… I did.

Curse me, I did. I envied these irritating desert Gahns. They’d claimed their mates.

And so had Lerokan. My little brother.

The shame was almost as bad as the hurt of it all.

Almost.

I’d always been the strongest among my tribe. The biggest and the fastest. Fearless and regal and powerful. That power had never once failed me.

Until now.

What did it mean, if nothing she saw in me, nothing I had to offer, was enough?

That thought blackened my insides, turned to poison in my guts.

“We will let go of you-”

“We will?” Fallo cut in, interrupting Buroudei.

“We will let go of you,” Buroudei continued, “if you promise not to chase after her. She has made her choice, at least for tonight. There are guards outside the new women’s tent, not to mention all the warriors here at the fire. Even with your mount, and your spears – arrows – you will never get through us all.”

“Plus, you’d have to go through us,” said another new woman, this one crossing her brown arms and glaring at me.

“Oh, please, spare me the gibbering warnings,” I snapped, fury and humiliation curdling. I hated this. All of this. These men and this place and the sudden new tempest inside me. A storm with battering winds that echoed with the sweetest voice I’d ever heard uttering three terrible words. You are unworthy.

Slowly, cautiously, Buroudei and Fallo took their idiotic hands off of me. I rose instantly, my lips curling away from my fangs. But I made no other move. I would give them no reason to put their claws on me again this night.

“Though you have insulted us at every turn, technically you are still our ally. We offer our meat and fire to you tonight,” Gahn Buroudei said. I scoffed at him, wanting nothing more than to punch the look of beleaguered, noble forbearance right off of his face.

“I need nothing from you,” I growled.

The only thing I needed was not theirs to give.

It was hers.

I turned from them, from all of them, and stalked through the settlement until I’d reached the open sands.

Togo trotted over to me from where I’d left him. He blinked his six eyes at me and cawed in confusion. He knew why we’d been coming here. He knew that my mate should have been with me now.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I snapped. I began to pace, my feet shifting in the sand. I was vaguely aware of the guards at the edge of the tents watching me warily, and it took everything in my power not to make them scatter with a volley of well-aimed arrows.

That would just make the obnoxious Gahns come back and grab me again. I shook my hands vigorously, skin crawling at the thought of those other men holding me back, holding me down. They have no right!

My mind turned from them quickly, settling into much darker territory. Her perfect face loomed in my thoughts, her little pink mouth turned downwards in unhappiness. Perhaps even in disdain.

“How do I move on from this?” I blurted, stopping my pacing and staring at Togo.

He opened and shut his beak and then tossed his head.

I sighed grimly. “Why am I asking you? All you had to do to win your mate was bring her a shiny rock.”

Togo reared back and looked rather offended. I jerked my tail placatingly.

“Yes, I know. It was a very nice shiny rock.”

Maybe I needed to give her something? I’d travelled light and had nothing impressive with me now, save for my weapons. If she would only come back with me, I could provide her with every gift and luxury the Deep Sky mountains have to offer…

But she had already walked away from me once. The chances that she’d agree to come back to my mountains seemed to dwindle every moment. For some blasted, unknown reason, she liked it here.

I seethed, realizing that I probably needed… Advice. I did not usually take advice. Not willingly at least. At times, I would listen to my right-hand man, Zakkar, because he was quiet yet wise. Doubly wise because he never dispensed advice when he could tell I did not wish to hear it. I could not say the same for my Aunt Tilka who commanded me as if I were her own cub and not the Gahn of our tribe. Even before I’d left on the journey here, she’d ordered me to drop some of my ego, my pride, on the flight.

Of course, I had done no such thing.

But obviously, everything I’d done had not worked. And the only men I knew who’d claimed their strange new mates were the insufferable men at this settlement.

Or my equally insufferable little brother.

The thought of asking any of the Gahns here, or trudging back to my smug, mated brother for help, made me want to rip out my hair with my own claws.

I will not do it.

I was strong. I was clever.

I could figure out the enigma of my torturously beautiful mate on my own.

Even if it killed me.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Stephanie

Iwasn’t in the tent alone long before Nasrin, Fiona, and Tilly came stomping in after me.

“That fucking guy,” Fiona said as she whipped the tent flap back into place after all three of them had entered.

“You’re telling me,” I hissed, crossing my arms.

“I swear,” Fiona said, candlelight licking across her angry features, “I felt the soul of my mammy invade my body at that moment. I could practically feel a wooden spoon forming out of thin air in my hand so I could whack him on the back of his smug head!”

I snorted, some of my anger abating at that image. But the anger came roaring back when I remembered what had just happened. His sneering disgust for the settlement. His claims that he’d take me away from all the filth.

“What happened after I left?” I asked.

Nasrin folded her long legs under her, sitting on top of her bedding hides. Tilly followed suit. I was too worked up to sit down yet. Apparently, so was Fiona. She started bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet, shaking out her hands as if preparing for a boxing match.

“He left,” Nasrin said.

I blinked, my arms falling to my sides.

“He left?” I hadn’t expected that. I’d almost wondered if he’d come storming after me and I’d have to shut him down all over again.

“The Gahns made it clear he wouldn’t get anywhere with you so long as you’d rejected him. Shockingly, he actually listened,” Tilly explained.

“Well, good. I do not want to deal with him again tonight.” Or ever.

“Will you still go to the mountains? To help with the new settlement?” Nasrin asked. “None of us would judge you if you wanted to stay behind to avoid him now.”

“I…” I hadn’t even thought about that.

The answer formed instantly.

“I’m still going,” I said, my voice hardening. “I’m not going to let him dictate my choices.” I’d been excited about going to the mountains. I’d actually get to use my meteorological expertise and I was interested in seeing new landscapes. Plus, they would need me out there. I wouldn’t let some cocky alien asshole ruin this opportunity.

“The new settlement will be in neutral territory, anyway,” Tilly said, nodding her head at my words. “And I told him if he wants to get to you, he has to go through us.”

I felt my face melt into a smile.

“Stand up you two, would you? And come over here, Fiona.”

Once everyone was within arm’s reach, I dragged them into a big group hug.

“Thank you,” I said, holding back a sudden tightness in my throat. “I’m seriously glad I have friends to help me deal with this.”

Nasrin laughed, deep and melodic. Fiona made a pleased-yet-embarrassed scoffing sound. Tilly, despite being the shortest, hugged back the hardest.

“I wonder what he’ll do now,” Fiona said as we pulled apart. “I couldn’t tell if he was leaving to go back to his territory, or to just blow off some steam.”

I shrugged. “Not my problem whatever he does,” I said. “He can hang around or go back. Whatever.”

“We’ll be leaving soon for the new settlement anyway,” Nasrin said. “Day after tomorrow.”

I pushed aside thoughts of Gahn Errok to let in a little excitement about that fact. New places, new work to explore, my friends with me…

I tried to picture the vast blue mountainscape ahead of us.

But instead, Gahn Errok’s sneer filled my mind. It was even more annoying that the expression of judgmental disgust was on such a handsome face.

Well, that face won’t get him any points with me. Outer beauty did literally nothing to impress me. Other things – kindness, authenticity, and generosity of spirit – were far more important. And something told me Gahn Errok didn’t have much of those things to spare.

“I’m gonna hit the hay,” I said with a sigh, suddenly exhausted.

The other girls said their goodnights as I took off my boots, socks, and pants and wiggled into my bedding hides.

Over the next hour or so, other women filtered into the tent. I’d thought I would fall asleep right away, but I didn’t. I lay there with my eyes closed, listening to the titters and snatches of conversation around me. Most of that conversation was centered on one thing: Gahn Errok’s arrival and the subsequent scene that had unfolded at the fire.

The conversations invaded my ears as I finally did drift off, tainting my subconscious.

Because when I eventually fell into a deep enough sleep to dream, I dreamed of flashing fangs in a disdainful face. A haughtily raised chin. And piercing sight stars.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Errok

After hunting a desert rakdo for an evening meal (reddish-coloured, like the sand, instead of the blue of our mountains) Togo and I begrudgingly found a place to sleep. We slept upon a ledge up among the cliffs. One that offered a view down into the settlement, with the new women’s tent at its heart.

I knew this was the tent for the unmated new women because I’d watched them enter it. Which meant that was where my own mate was.

I laid flat on my stomach, my arms crossed ahead of me, my forearms at the very edge of the stone ledge. I rested my chin moodily upon my crossed wrists, glaring down at the tent.

I should be sharing that tent with her. Right now.

I sighed, imagining how things should have gone. She should have been overtaken by the mate bond as I was. She should have accepted me immediately. She should have taken my desperate cock and…

I grunted as my cock thickened, pressing into the hard stone of the ledge. My tail thwapped in annoyance, making Togo stir where he was asleep nearby.

I kept staring at the tent as night trudged on around us. The moons rose higher and higher, trekking across the sky.

Still, she did not emerge.

Part of me had hoped that the mate bond was just… Late. That it would explode inside her without warning and she’d come running out searching for me that way I had journeyed over the sands to search for her.

It never happened.

I suppose I must admit that, somehow, for the first time in my life, I have been found lacking. A few days ago, such an idea would have been unthinkable. I perked up a little. Perhaps she rejects me because I am too perfect.

But no. I was a clever Gahn. None who knew me could call me a fool. Which meant I would not soothe myself with excuses like that. Besides, I could not make myself less perfect if I tried.

Hmm… Perhaps I can make myself more perfect. Even stronger, even more impressive for her.

I was not exactly sure how such a specimen as myself could possibly improve much. But if anyone could build strength upon strength, it would be me.

I leaped up, inspired by my new plan.

And got to work.

I started training with my blades, swinging the weapons through the air over and over and over. Honing every pose, every strike, into something even deadlier than before.

Then, I created a target out of desert valok, firing arrow after arrow into its perfect centre no matter how far back I moved.

At one point, Togo cracked open three of his six eyes, watching me.

“You could train, too,” I panted, firing four arrows in rapid succession. “I cannot appear to have a weak and lazy mount.”

Togo squawked indignantly at me, rustling his massive feathered wings.

“Fine,” I ground out, jogging to retrieve my arrows from the target. “You sleep, then. I suppose I don’t want you stealing my mate’s attention anyway.”

Togo made another offended sort of sound before closing his eyes and ducking his head back down against his body to sleep.

I did not sleep. I kept going.

I trained with such vigour and focus that I did not notice dawn split the sky. I only saw the change in light when I hoisted a boulder atop my shoulders and noticed the shadows cast down onto the dusty red ledge.

Gritting my fangs, I moved closer to the edge of the ledge, the massive boulder on my back.

I squatted, then straightened, heaving under the weight of the boulder.

This weight is nothing, I told myself as the muscles in my leg contracted into another squat. This is nothing for a Deep Sky Gahn.

As the sun climbed higher and illuminated the settlement, people began to emerge from their tents. The Sea Sand people, those who looked up and noticed me, paid me little mind, as if I were some odd feature of the landscape that required no further thought.

The new women, though, were another story.

As they came out, one by one, they gathered in a little group, staring up at me through dark eye-shells. They spoke to each other. Of course, I could not hear them from this height. But I imagined they spoke with reverent awe at finally seeing the strength of a Deep Sky Gahn.

Unfortunately, I could tell my mate was not among them.

Pity. All this training was to impress her, after all. I should time this better next time. Maybe train right outside the opening of her tent, so my thick, strong thighs and heaving chest are the first thing she sees when she emerges in the morning…

One of the new women from the group hurried back into the tent.

I ignored her movements. The only new woman I cared about keeping track of was my mate. And so far, she had not left that blasted tent.

My tail thrashed as I fought to keep the boulder steady, lowering myself and straightening again and again and again. The burning in my muscles turned to impatience, then irritation.

Why has she not yet emerged?

I would keep this boulder on my back until she did. Or until it crushed me.

Which it wouldn’t.

Because I was made of stronger stuff than that.

But not strong enough to keep your heart in one piece under the pummeling force of her tiny fist.

I grunted, pushing myself even harder.

Maybe my heart was weak. Soft and far too vulnerable.

But I could make the rest of myself strong.

I will not be unworthy.

CHAPTER NINE

Stephanie

“Get up! You have got to see this!”

I groaned, rolling over in my bedding hides. Saying I hadn’t slept well was an understatement.

But somebody with an Irish accent and way too much fucking energy didn’t seem to care one bit about that. A hard finger prodded my shoulder.

“What?” I moaned, yanking the hides up over my head.

The hides were quickly peeled away.

“Get up! Get up right now! Because something absolutely ridiculous is happening out there!”

I sat up, head spinning, suddenly worried that something was wrong. But when I saw Fiona’s broad grin, I knew things couldn’t be too bad out there.

“What is happening that is so important I have to go out there right now?” I grumbled. Despite my protestations, I wiggled into my pants and shoved my feet into my boots. Fiona jumped up from where she’d been crouched beside me.

“Sweet Jesus, would you hurry? He can’t keep this up for long and you’ve got to see it.”

I pulled on my jacket, zipping it up as her words absorbed into my groggy morning brain.

Him…

“Who? Is it Gahn Errok?”

My friend’s grin got even bigger.

“Yup. He’s a total gym bro, apparently. He’s up there on a fucking ledge like it’s some kind of pedestal, doing squats with a giant-ass boulder on his back. I don’t know if it’s his usual morning workout routine or he’s trying to put on a good show or what, but it’s bloody hilarious.”

“And why, exactly, do I need to come out and see this?” I said flatly.

“Because it… It’s just wild! I can’t even explain it. Just come on.”

I didn’t bother fighting Fiona as she grabbed my wrist and pulled. I knew better. She could be as stubborn as a Mustang when she wanted to be. Which was… A lot of the time.

So, I let her lead me out, just managing to yank up my hood and slap my sunglasses onto my face as the hot morning sun drenched us.

“Alright. So where is he?” I asked, resigned.

I needn’t have asked. Just outside the tent, a group of human women had gathered. And they were all staring upward at the same thing.

I followed their gazes.

And gasped.

OK. Fiona was not kidding. This is pretty wild.

About 15 metres off the ground, Gahn Errok stood on a flat ledge of stone. Actually, at that moment, he wasn’t standing, but squatting. He straightened his legs with visible effort before immediately dropping back into a squat again. I stared up at him, speechless at… Whatever this was. Training session? Performance? Who the fuck knew?

In the sunlight, some of the differences between him and the Sea Sand people became more pronounced. He had the same jacked-up bodybuilder physique, of course. The same kangaroo-like ankles, feet, and tail. The same high, pointed, horse-like ears. But his skin was a different colour. A stony violet shade tinged with blue that swirled and shifted into indigo down his legs, at his hands, and at the tip of his tail. His hair hung forward in two rivers down his chest, displaced by the boulder and forced forward by his squatting motions. The strands were thick, straight, and inky blue, gleaming with electric aqua everywhere the sun touched.

It was hard to tell from so far away, but his eyes appeared to be closed. Which, frankly, was a bit of a relief. I didn’t need those sight stars trying to get any deeper inside me the way they had last night.

“He’s been at it all morning,” said Tilly when she noticed us.

My eyebrows rose. Tilly was an early riser, often waking up at dawn, or just before.

Which meant he’d been out here for…

“Hours,” Tilly confirmed.

Fiona’s words from the tent echoed. He can’t keep this up for long.

“What is the point of this? What is he even trying to accomplish?” I asked, frowning up at him. He hadn’t stopped the entire time I’d been out here and his movements seemed strained.

“I told you. He’s like a gym bro. This is the alien equivalent of ‘welcome to the gun show, want me to bench press you, love?’” Fiona snickered.

“Yeah, well, I don’t care about stuff like that. He should just stop,” I muttered.

“I don’t think he will,” Nasrin said slowly from nearby. “I think you might have to tell him to stop.”

“What?!” I cried. “Why do I have to? Just let him tire himself out and he’ll give up.”

“He already looks tired,” Nasrin countered.

I glanced from her face upwards again, just in time to see the boulder wobble on Gahn Errok’s back. A collection of gasps and cries ran through the group of women. My hand flew to my mouth, my eyes widening as I fully expected the boulder to roll off his back and seriously injure him.

But it didn’t. With what appeared to be a ferocious channelling of willpower, he steadied the boulder on his back.

“OK. He’ll definitely stop now,” I said breathlessly, heart hammering at the near miss we’d just witnessed.

But nope.

He did another squat.

“What are you doing?!” The words left my mouth before I even had time to consider them. My body moved of its own accord, pushing through the group until I was at the front. I planted my hands on my hips and craned my neck, staring up at Gahn Errok.

At the sound of my voice, his eyes flew open. Even from this distance, I could feel the probing white pricks of them on my skin.

He stared down at me, holding my gaze fiercely, almost mulishly, as he did yet another squat, this one even slower and lower than the previous ones.

Show off.

“I am training,” he snarled down.

“For what?” I called back up, exasperated. This guy may have been the most obnoxious alien, perhaps the most obnoxious man, I’d ever met. But I didn’t want to see him crushed like a pancake under that boulder. I eyed it uneasily as he answered.

“Training for-” His words faltered, turning into a grunt of exertion as he did yet another squat. “Training for you.”

“I never asked you to do that,” I cried, shaking my head at him. “But I am asking you to stop before somebody gets hurt.” That somebody being you.

Gahn Errok straightened out of his squat, and for once, he didn’t immediately descend into another one. Instead, with great effort, he worked the boulder off of his back and held it in front of him. Then, in a quick, jerky movement, he swung it up and over his head. He stood, arms straight up above his head, holding the boulder up the way an Olympic weightlifter would hold a barbell. His broad chest heaved, every muscle straining under his purple hide as he fought to maintain his position.

“Oh my God, just put it down already!” I called.

“I cannot,” he forced out between clenched fangs.

“And why exactly not?” I countered.

“You must… Must see,” he panted, tendons bulging in his thick neck.

“See what?!”

“Me.”

Fiona was right. This was some kind of show he was putting on. Trying to prove something to me.

“Well, all I see is an idiot who’s about to smash his own skull trying to prove… What? That you’re strong? Obviously, you’re strong. That’s not up for debate!” I cried.

His arms trembled violently enough that I could see the tremors from here.

“Just put that down and come down here and we can talk,” I said, grasping at anything that would get him to stop. I was getting more and more concerned that he actually was going to seriously hurt himself up there.

Apparently, saying we could talk was a secret fucking password to make him act like a normal person. He immediately tossed the boulder heavily down.

Something else moved up there with him – some kind of animal. My mouth fell open in shock as he mounted it and took off right into the air.

I’d heard about the flying alien creatures the Deep Sky warriors rode from Chapman and the others. But their descriptions didn’t live up to the reality before me. Or rather, above me.

The creature was massive, with an elegant, feathered wingspan that gleamed in shades of dove grey, cobalt blue, lavender, and violet. Its many long legs tucked under its body as it flew, its majestic head angling downward on a long, heron-like neck. Gahn Errok commanded the creature with ease, with subtle adjustments to his positioning. He had no need for reins or anything like that – every movement and hitch of his body commanded his mount seamlessly.

Something lurched inside me. A nostalgia made sharp by both grief and longing. The desire was so thick it made my throat go dry. I want to ride like that.

This creature was nothing like a huge, lumbering irkdu. It had grace and intelligence and rugged nobility in the raw power of its wings. Its feathers were so dazzling they almost looked like they were made of metal, dozens of daggers flashing in the light. It soared downwards and landed lightly, its many spindly legs cushioning the blow of gravity.

Gahn Errok sat tall upon his mount’s back – perfect riding posture. As much as I hated to admit it, he looked good up there. Like it was exactly where he belonged.

My breath hitched. I used to belong somewhere like that, too.

I walked forward as if drawn by an invisible force, coming to a stop before Gahn Errok and his mount. I tipped my chin up to meet the mountain warlord’s gaze.

“Alright,” I said. “Let’s talk.” Clearly, me ignoring him or just walking away the way I had last night wasn’t going to achieve anything. We needed to talk this out. So that he understood that I wasn’t interested in him.

Gahn Errok swung his leg over and then jumped down onto the sand. Fuck me, he was huge. I had to keep my chin tipped back just to look at him. I squinted behind my sunglasses, letting my gaze roam his face. His face was broad but not quite as rugged as some of the other Sea Sand men’s. There was a masculine sort of refinement to it. High cheekbones to balance out the strong jaw. A full mouth and dark blue brows above his large, relentless eyes. Like some kind of dark alien angel.

“Must we speak here?” he asked, his bright white sight stars shifting behind me to the crowd of human women watching. Now that he had descended, some of the Sea Sand guards had taken notice of the situation, too, their eyes never leaving us.

“Alright. Hold on.”

I turned to everyone watching.

“I am going with Gahn Errok to speak in private. In…” I glanced around. “In there.” I pointed to a crack that led into the cliffs and would afford us a little privacy.

“I don’t think you should go anywhere with him alone,” Tilly called over uneasily.

I heard a hiss building in Gahn Errok’s throat, but I spoke before he could say something colossally stupid and offensive.

“If I need any help I’ll just scream or something. But I need to deal with this.”

Fiona and Tilly looked at each other, and the Sea Sand guards didn’t exactly look happy about it. But ultimately, this guy was supposed to be my mate. Which meant they couldn’t stop us from from going somewhere together if I agreed to it.

“Come on,” I said, walking away from him. He caught up quickly, and even through the fabric of my hood I could feel the penetrating blade of his gaze.

We entered into the crack, walking through a shadowy tunnel of stone into a small, sunlit clearing. I leaned against a wall of red rock, shaded enough in my spot that I could take off my hood and sunglasses.

Gahn Errok stood in the centre of the clearing area. The sun poured down his body as if the very light worshipped him. I wonder if he’s ever had somebody say no to him before.

“So. That… Um… Display,” I started. I wasn’t exactly sure how to ask what I wanted to. It was something along the lines of, “What the actual fuck were you thinking?”

But that wouldn’t translate easily.

“Were you suitably impressed?” he asked, watching me closely. His face was unreadable. Closed off and cold, his eyes narrowed calculatingly.

“Uh… I guess? Like, yay you, you’re strong? But so is every other guy on this planet. It doesn’t mean anything.”

His lip twitched, his jaw tightening. “What does one derive meaning from, if not strength? If not prowess? If not the glory of a lone man with a boulder on his back fighting until there’s no fight left?”

“Oh, please. You weren’t fighting. You were showing off.”

His brows rose, his mouth falling open to reveal pointed fangs. “You make me sound like a boy playing at being someone he is not.”

I quirked a brow, silently confirming what he’d said.

“You…. This is not fair!” He closed the distance between us in two large steps. I gasped at his sudden proximity.

“This is not fair,” he said again, his voice lower and huskier than before.

I was about to roll my eyes and snap that life wasn’t fair, and hadn’t anyone ever told him that? But he spoke before I could get it out.

“You’ve got my heart. You can do whatever you wish with it, and clearly what you wish to do is crush it. I cannot stop you. Will not even fight you. But it’s only fair that you give me your own heart in return.”

His gaze turned stormy, sight stars buzzing as they stroked down my face, settling on my mouth.

“Oh, and what would you do with my heart, then?” I sputtered. His words had thrown me off balance.

He swallowed, his thick throat visibly bobbing before he whispered, “Cherish it.”

I gawked at him. Before I could fully recover from that statement, he swept my hands into his own. Shocked at the unexpected contact, I stared down at my hands, looking so small and pale in his huge clawed ones.

“Come with me,” he said, his voice so harsh it almost sounded like a groan. “Come with me, back to my mountains.” His words came faster and faster, spilling out of his mouth in a fervent tumble. “Let me lavish every luxury upon you. Let me make you my Gahnala. Let me show you everything the Deep Sky has to offer. That I have to offer.”

His words came to a halt, his breath shuddering out of him as the rough, warm pad of his thumb brushed the sensitive skin of my inner wrist.

Despite the heat, I shivered as electric sensation ran under my skin. My pulse leaped against his touch.

I snatched my hands away. I crossed my arms and stuffed my hands under my armpits, keeping them out of sight and out of reach. For the briefest moment, his skin on mine had felt… Well, not nice, exactly, but…

Stimulating.

And I did not want to repeat the experience. It made things too confusing.

“And what exactly is that, then?” I said. “What do you have to offer?”

Confusion wracked his handsome features. If he weren’t so obnoxious, it would have been cute.

“I… I have already shown you my strength. You saw me with that boulder, did you not?”

“I did,” I said, nodding once, my tone clipped.

His confused frown deepened.

“So… Strength?” He sounded unsure, now. I had a feeling he wasn’t used to that. Being unsure of himself.

“Plus, I am Gahn! Ruler of my tribe. Frankly, I am the best out of both Gahns of the Deep Sky. Which means I am the best Gahn out of all of them.”

Oh boy. Here we go again with the ego.

“Literally none of that stuff matters to me,” I said. “You can’t just swagger in here, say you’re better than everyone, and act like that fact should sweep me off my feet!”

“I don’t know what your feet have to do with anything,” he hissed, his sight stars two vibrating pulses of intensity, “but I do know that I am better than any other man I have ever met.”

I gave a bitter laugh at that.

“Not from where I stand,” I shot back.

He moved to stand at my side, his back to the stone wall like mine. His huge arm brushed the sleeve of my jacket. Even with the fabric separating us, another annoying jolt of sensation flew down my arm.

“No,” he said after a moment. “It is still the same from over here, where you stand. I remain the best.”

Jesus fucking Christ.

He glanced down sideways at me. When he saw that his arguments weren’t getting him anywhere, his confusion turned to exasperation. He stepped back into his previous place, standing in front of me, sunlight rippling down every hard line of muscle. “Any woman would rejoice at the chance to be my mate!” he cried, slamming a huge fist into his own chest.

“Yeah, well, I’m not any woman,” I said, unconvinced that what he’d said was even true.

He let his hand fall back to his side as he regarded me critically, his jaw working.

“Clearly,” he said after a long tense silence.

We stared each other down, tension crackling between us.

Finally, Gahn Errok broke the strained silence.

“What is your name?”

I blinked in surprise. I hadn’t even realized that with all the commotion we hadn’t had any sort of normal introduction.

“It’s Stephanie,” I said.

“Zzzzteph… Zuht… Zuh-Tephanie.” He grunted, his tail jerking on the sand behind him, a curving, muscled line of indigo contrasting with the shimmering copper sand. “Your name is as impossible as you are.”

“I’m being impossible?” I said, rage turning my voice to a low murmur. Gahn Errok must have recognized just how pissed I was, because his sight stars pulsed, his brows rising at my tone.

I jabbed a finger at him. Anger never made me shaky and flustered. If anything, it was the opposite. Made me smoother, harder, more competent. Some people got all stopped up when they were angry. Couldn’t get the words out, couldn’t say what they meant and then agonized in the shower later about how the conversation could have gone. Not me. Anxiety could shut me down and take my voice, sure. But I didn’t feel even a whiff of anxiety now. Just the sluice of cold fury in my veins.

“I will tell you this once and I expect you to listen because I have no intention of repeating myself,” I said, my voice venomous. Gahn Errok’s eyes grew wider and wider, his sight stars misting across his gaze as he stared at me.

“I had little interest in being someone’s mate before this and I have absolutely no interest now,” I continued. “I already had my doubts about love being true and lasting on Earth, and now I can see that the so-called mate bond is just as flimsy and unreliable since it’s bonded you to the last person who would want you. I don’t feel it and I will never feel it. Not for you. You have proven to me, without a shadow of a doubt, that I will never, could never, love you.”

Gahn Errok reared back as if I’d swung my fist at his nose. Not that my human fist would do anything to him. But clearly, my words had.

The truth hurts, bud. I didn’t want to be an asshole or anything, but I had to get it through Gahn Errok’s thick skull. I had to be clear with him. Set this boundary now so that he didn’t keep peacocking around, expecting me to melt into his big muscly arms.

Gahn Errok took a heaving breath, his chest inflating. His abdominal muscles tightened, crunching inward as he let the breath out in a harsh growl.

“Despite the assurance of your speech, you have gotten two things wrong,” Gahn Errok muttered darkly. The shock from my words was gone from his face, replaced by a stormy rage that mirrored mine.

“Oh, really?” I rolled my eyes and crossed my arms. “Enlighten me.”

His lip twitched at the same time his tail did, his entire body thrumming with barely controlled tension.

“Firstly,” he hissed, “the mate bond is not flimsy. To say so would imply that I am weak for succumbing to it. Which I am not. It is sacred and strong and impossible to shake.” His voice turned flat. “Though I am now questioning the Vrika’s judgment in bonding me to you.”

My mouth fell open, but he continued before I could come up with a reply.

“This leads me to your second error.” He raised his chin, looking down at me with imperious confidence.

“Which is?” I sighed.

“That you will never love me.”

“Are you serious?” I said, balking. Had this guy disregarded everything I’d just said? “What, just because you always get what you want, you think that’s going to be the case now?”

“Precisely.”

“I really don’t like you,” I muttered.

“And I love you with everything I have, to my own heart’s detriment” he shot back. “And I vow, my stubborn little Zuh-Tephanie, that one day very soon, you will feel the same.”

I snorted.

“Wanna bet?”

His brow furrowed.

“What is bet?”

“It’s like a deal. If I win, you give me something I want. And if you win, I give you something you want.”

His gaze grew heated. “There is only one thing I want.”

I cleared my throat and flapped my hand at him dismissively.

“Yeah, yeah. That’s what I’m saying. If you can make me feel anything close to affection for you, then I’ll stop rejecting you and give this a chance. How’s that?”

He stiffened, his tail jerking.

“And if you can’t,” I continued, “which I already know you won’t be able to, you give me something I want.”

“And what is that, exactly?” he said.

I pursed my lips, the image of him on his mount flashing in my mind. It melted away, swirling until I was the one seated on the flying creature.

“I want to learn to ride the animal you came here on,” I whispered. I hoped that the intensity of my longing wasn’t too evident. I didn’t want to give him anything he could somehow use against me. Letting him know how much I wanted it made me feel too vulnerable.

But his next words shocked me.

“My braxilk, Togo? You do not need some twisted deal for that,” he said, cocking his head. “I would teach you to ride anytime.” The heat returned to his gaze. “I do not think you understand how fully I wish to fulfill your every desire.”

My stomach swooped at his words, and I broke eye contact.

“OK, well, thank you. I would like to learn.”

“Then you will have to come back to my mountains,” he countered instantly.

“Ah, there it is,” I said, my gaze returning to his face. For a moment, I’d thought he was actually being generous. But there it was. The other shoe. To get what I wanted, I’d have to go back with him.

“There is what?” he asked.

“The catch,” I said. “Using something I want to get your way. To force me to go with you.”

He inhaled sharply, his sight stars storming.

“You assume far worse of me than I deserve,” he uttered vehemently. “I am not doing this to force your hand. You may have forgotten, but I am a Gahn. I am the leader of my tribe. My people need me, especially during such turbulent times as these. I cannot remain in foreign territory any longer than is necessary. Besides, I do not know these lands well. If I were to take you flying, to teach you, I would only do so in the familiar peaks of my homeland where I know every valley, every shadow, every monster.”

I stared at him, trying to figure out how sincere his words were. Maybe I had been a bit hasty in my accusation.

“OK then. Maybe I was wrong about that,” I said, my voice softening slightly. “It doesn’t even matter anyway. I already agreed to go to the mountains.”

When his sight stars pulsed, I quickly added, “With my people. I’ll be at the new settlement.”

“When?”

“We leave tomorrow.”

He made a thoughtful rumbling sound, deep in his chest. Then frowned.

“And I suppose you will travel with your people, too?” he asked.

“Yeah. The shuttle.”

“Fine,” he snapped. “But once you are in the Deep Sky, you will only fly on my mount. Not some bizarre wingless corpse from another world.”

I wanted to bite back at him with a scathing retort, but that would have been pointless. I did want to ride a braxilk. I did want to learn how, to see what it was like, to find out if it would be anything close to the freedom and contentment I’d felt when riding back home.

“Fine,” I repeated after him.

“For once, then, we agree,” he muttered, his gaze narrowed as if he didn’t trust this new turn of events.

“Well, for once, you’re being agreeable.”

Kind of.

The silence stretched between us.

“I guess there’s nothing left to discuss right now,” I said. I pulled up my hood and put on my sunglasses.

Gahn Errok didn’t answer. Instead, he watched me with the dark intensity of a panther.

I pushed off from the stone wall and started to walk through the clearing, back towards the stone tunnel we’d come through. I’d almost expected him to just stay where he was, staring at my back moodily as I left.

But he didn’t.

Goosebumps prickled along my skin as he fell into step directly behind me, looming over me like some kind of grumpy shadow.

“Thought you were just going to stay back there,” I said.

“Please. You cannot think so little of me as that. No worthy Gahn would let his mate be alone out where it is dangerous,” he grumbled.

“I can take care of myself,” I stated flatly.

His next words were a clawed caress down my spine.

“Not as well as I can.”

Thankfully, the next few steps brought us out into the open air, letting the hot sunlight burn away the oddly cooling shiver of his words.

The group of human women who’d been watching Gahn Errok’s single-competitor strongman competition had mostly dispersed. My closest friends, Nasrin, Tilly, and Fiona had remained nearby, along with several warriors. Clearly, they’d been waiting to make sure I didn’t start screaming something like, “Help, I’m suffocating under the weight of this alien’s astronomical ego!”

I nodded at them to let them know everything was OK, then turned around to face Gahn Errok.

“You’ll be heading back now,” I said, the words more a statement than a question.

But he sliced his hand through the air.

“No. I will remain until your departure.”

Great. So, this guy is going to be strutting around here annoying everyone for the rest of the day and tonight?

“Won’t that mean we get to the mountains before you do? The shuttle has to be faster than riding a braxilk back,” I asked.

“Yes. That is what will happen.”

His sight stars flashed, his jaw working obstinately.

Oh my God. He wants to make sure I actually follow through and go.

“I am going,” I said, annoyed by his doubt. “I said I would, and I am. I already decided I would.”

“Every expectation and belief I held about our first meeting has been utterly dashed. Forgive me for wanting to confirm this one simple thing with my own sight stars,” he growled. There was a sarcastic bite to his words.

Forgive me. Yeah right. He didn’t seem the type to ask either for permission or forgiveness.

“Alright. Whatever.” It would only be for another 24 hours, tops. Probably not even that long. We’d be leaving early tomorrow morning. Then, I’d be able to focus on getting the new settlement set up instead of the ferocious drag of opalescent sigh stars along my skin.

I hurried over to the group of my waiting friends. Together, we walked away from the brooding mountain Gahn.

But even as my feet took me further and further from him, the distance seemed only to diminish.

Moment by moment, his sight stars grew stronger and harder at my back. More demanding, more desperate. I could physically feel them, hooking into me like talons.

Threatening to drag me back.

CHAPTER TEN

Errok

Ispent the rest of the day with Togo as my only companion. We hunted desert rakdo for our meals and watched the settlement with brooding eyes. I did not bother engaging in any more feats of strength. My earlier display with the boulder had not had the desired outcome, and my muscles needed some time to recover. By nightfall, I was in a foul mood indeed. Togo and I remained up on our chosen ledge, staring down at the evening fire.

My mate was there, along with some of the other new women. I felt sick with longing. Longing to go to her, to touch her. To have her look at me with something other than disdain.

And when I saw the pregnant new women, smiling beside their mates, that longing grew even sharper claws.

Cursed skies, I wanted that. Needed that. Needed my mate content at my side, her middle heavy with my cub.

It will happen.

I’d vowed both to her and to myself that she would one day love me.

I just had to figure out how to make it happen.

It was very difficult not to fly home at top speed and hold Lerokan over the edge of a cliff by his hair until he told me how he’d won Priya. My hands curled into seething fists as I thought of my little brother so perfectly, hideously happy at home with his own willing mate.

I got little sleep that night. The fits of slumber were punctuated by the stiffness of my muscles on the hard rock ledge. I was struck by the battling sensations of wanting desperately to return to my own comfortable bed, and knowing that all the comfort of said bed would be worthless if Zuh-Tephanie was not in it.

Having slept so uncomfortably, it was not difficult to force myself to rise at dawn. Zuh-Tephanie was due to leave today. From the ledge, Togo and I observed a small group forming among the tents of the settlement, lit by the slowly rising sun. The group was comprised of Sea Sand men and two Bitter Sea warriors Grim and Tok, whom I recognized from the mountains, as well as new women.

When my mate emerged from the new women’s tent, heading for that group, my sore muscles tensed.

It was not so bright yet as to require the use of her eye shells or hood. The rising sun painted her lovingly in shades of milky pink and golden red. Her shoulder-length brown hair shone. Her oddly pale skin glowed, luminescent and clear.

In that moment, I hated the sun. Hated it for touching her, for warming her perfect skin, when I could not.

I glared at the rising orb, wondering if I could try to shoot it down. My aim was certainly good enough. The only question was the distance…

That question would have to wait.

“Come, Togo,” I commanded. He rose from where he’d been sitting, and I leaped up onto his back. Together we dove off the ledge.

The members of the group that had gathered all turned to look at us as we descended. Well, all of them but one. Zuh-Tephanie made a show of not turning to look at me, ignoring me and fiddling with her cloak.

So, you will not even look at me, mate?

I did not say the question out loud.

It felt too pathetic.

And I refused to be pathetic.

I landed near the group and dismounted, striding over. Zuh-Tephanie kept her eyes fastidiously elsewhere. Three new women, the ones who often spent time with her, closed ranks around her.

I stopped in front of them.

“Oh, there is no need for that,” I growled, jerking my chin at the little wall of new women that had been erected in front of my mate. “I do not plan to snatch her from among your ranks.” I decided not to add that I would happily snatch her from them if it would not make her even more hateful towards me than before. Frankly, my claws ached to do it. But my mate’s reactions confounded every instinct I had. So, I fought the urge.

“Then what do you want?” This question came from a new woman I recognized. Valeria. She’d been in the mountains before.

“I merely want to wish my mate a safe journey,” I retorted. Then, my voice turned hard and cold as high mountain ice. “And to warn you all that if anything happens to her, you won’t even have time to blink before the arrow of my punishment is upon you.”

Tok, the golden giant, snapped his mighty jaws, stepping in front of a wide-eyed new woman with spirals of brown hair.

“I would like to see you try to harm us, little mountain Gahn,” Tok growled. The spikes along his arms twitched, threatening to emerge.

I met his gaze unflinchingly, though the use of “little” sent rage pounding through my veins.

I should know how irritating that is considering I call my brother Little Lerokan just to incense him…

“Enough of this,” barked Valeria. “Gahn Errok, you are welcome to do whatever you wish, whether that be to remain at the settlement in our absence or to follow us back into Deep Sky territory. What you will not do, however, is disrupt my mission. We are leaving momentarily, and you will not get in the way.”

“No, I will not get in your way,” I said smoothly, keeping the irritation out of my voice. “But I will see you soon.”

Those last words were meant solely for Zuh-Tephanie, who finally looked up from the front of her cloak. My jaw clenched, my fangs clanging off of each other when her eyes met mine. Curse me, those defiant eyes could burn a man from the inside out.

They were burning me from the inside out.

That gaze scorched me. Branded me.

I was hated and I was hers.

And there was nothing I could do about it.

At least…

Not yet.

I watched my mate go with the others into the cliffs to find the wingless thing. Even though I was secure in the knowledge that she would soon be in the Deep Sky, just as I’d wanted, I felt further from her than ever.

I watched her the entire time before she disappeared from view.

Not once did she look back.

“Come, Togo,” I said, returning to my mount’s side as the sun rose higher. It glanced off the smooth blades of his feathers. “It’s time for us to go.”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Stephanie

We stretched the available space of Valeria’s shuttle to its limits. It was a decently large vessel, about the size of a school bus, but unlike a bus the interior wasn’t just devoted to seating. There was storage for food, weapons, and other supplies, beds that folded into the walls, and a small bathroom towards the back. A lot of the space had been loaded with equipment we’d taken from the big desert ship – equipment we needed to set up the new settlement and do our work. The front of the shuttle had the cockpit area with two large seats, Valeria, being the pilot, sat in one of those seats, strapped in. Taylor sat in the other cockpit seat, also strapped in. Their Bitter Sea mates, Grim and Tok, each stood behind their seats.

There were four other seats that unfolded from the walls with seatbelts, and Nasrin, Tilly, Fiona, and I occupied those. Four Sea Sand warriors found seats on the floor between boxes of bedding and drones and guns. There would be one Sea Sand warrior from each Sea Sand tribe at the new mountain settlement. One of them, Oxriel from Gahn Taliok’s tribe, was already in the mountains. Dalk, from Gahn Fallo’s tribe; Vaxilkai, from Gahn Buroudei’s tribe; and Bariok, from Gahn Baldor’s tribe were on the shuttle now. They’d been on the original mission beyond the Death Plains, so they were already familiar with the territory. Zoren, from Gahn Razek’s tribe, was also joining us, traveling out there for the first time.

“Normally, I wouldn’t fly with so many bums out of seats,” Valeria had said when we’d all piled in. “But, unfortunately, there’s no way around it this time. We have to fly out there with all this equipment and we might as well just get this all done in one trip.”

“Will anyone else be joining us at the settlement?” I’d asked her. She’d craned around in her seat, her deep brown eyes meeting mine from around the hulking red shadow of her mate.

“Not sure. Each of the Deep Sky Gahns may send a few delegates. Also, I’m pretty sure that Hakah Gog said Kohka will be joining us once he’s done escorting Varrow and Camille back to the Sea Sand settlement. He’ll join us on foot. There’s not much out there that can kill him, so he’ll be fine journeying on foot alone.”

I nodded. That made sense. We already had precedent for that – Zoey’s mate, Kor, had wandered around hostile territory for ages all on his own and he’d been fine. And he wasn’t even quite as big as a pure-blooded Bitter Sea warrior.

Once all the fragile-boned humans had gotten settled and adequately strapped in, we’d taken off.

From my seat, I couldn’t see much out the viewscreen without leaning forward and craning my neck. After a while, I gave up, since we’d gotten high enough that all I could see from this angle was bright, cloudless sky.

Luckily, the fact that half our group wasn’t strapped in didn’t become a problem. Valeria was a skilled, confident pilot, and she flew our invisible-to-the-naked-eye shuttle with practised ease. With the vessel’s powerful engines, the trip to the mountains that would have taken two weeks or more on foot took one full day.

I wonder how long it will take Gahn Errok to get here, I thought as Valeria announced our arrival in the Deep Sky territory. He’d arrived at the Sea Sand settlement a few days after the shuttle group, so it would maybe take him two or three days to fly back here.

Well, he can take his freaking time. I was not looking forward to whenever he was going to show up. I could only imagine that his ego would be even bigger in his own territory where everybody worshipped his every move and jumped to obey his commands.

My brooding thoughts about the cocky Gahn were disrupted by excited chatter and the intake of breaths all around me. I blinked, leaning forward as far as my straps would let me, angling my head to try to see out the viewscreen.

We’d descended since I’d last tried to look out. Or, maybe it was because the very ground had risen up all around us in steep peaks. There was no longer empty clear sky out there.

There were mountains.

Breathtaking mountains.

The setting sun shattered, exploding into millions of crystalline shards against the gorgeous peaks of high, sharp stone. Where the light hit the stone brightest, I could see that the mountains were mostly blue in colour, and would likely appear blue during daylight. But the warm, deep sunset turned many cracks and crags into other colours – shades of glimmering copper, indigo-spattered gold, silver-shadowed pink.

The sight wasn’t just beautiful. It was nostalgic in a deeply painful way.

I didn’t realize how much I missed these, I thought, sucking in a sharp breath and holding it, my eyes burning. Growing up in Alberta had meant many weekend and summer trips into the mountains with my mom, especially after my dad left when I was six. We’d used those trips as an escape. It was us against the world, and the mountains had been like our fortress.

We’d stopped going out there when I was in high school and she got too sick.

And then she’d died.

And I never went back.

I slammed my back against the seat, not willing to deal with the onslaught of emotion.

“Alright?” Fiona asked from her seat directly across from mine, her brows furrowed in concern under her short, blunt bangs.

I nodded firmly, clearing my throat. “Yeah.”

“Alright everybody, we’re landing,” Valeria called from the front end of the shuttle.

I gripped the edges of my seat as we descended, but there was no real reason to be nervous. The descent was smooth and steady, and the landing only a slight jostle.

“Alright, everyone. Here’s the deal,” Valeria said, rising from her seat and striding into the main area where the rest of us sat. “Grim and Tok will go out first just to make sure nothing iffy is going on out there. Both mountain Gahns have agreed to us being here, but you never know, and I don’t want somebody getting skewered by an arrow the second we step out of here.”

The other girls and I cast grim looks at each other. The Sea Sand warriors stood, preparing for their instructions.

“Once Grim and Tok make sure the area is clear, the Sea Sand men will go out next. We’re in a large valley, and we’ll be setting up camp in the caves at the base of the Vrika’s mountain which I’ve landed next to. So, the warriors will go scope out the caves, make sure there’s nothing nasty waiting for us, while I hang back with you guys. Then, only once everything looks safe, we’ll all go out together.”

We all nodded our understanding. At least, us human girls did. The aliens made various grunts and tail twitches of agreement with the plan.

Valeria opened the shuttle’s door and Grim and Tok lugged their huge bodies out. Tok could barely get his shoulders through the doorway, but somehow he managed it. I unbuckled myself from my seat, standing and shaking out my stiff legs. My friends did the same. Taylor jumped out of her seat and hustled over to our area to stand with us four. Even once she was with us, though, she kept her eyes glued to the dark rectangle of the open door, no doubt wanting to make sure her mate was alright.

Valeria kept her eyes trained out there, too, a pistol ready in her hand that I hadn’t noticed her draw. But it seemed she wouldn’t need to use it. Grim leaned into the doorway, bumping his snout affectionately to her temple.

“All is clear,” he growled.

“Alright, you guys next,” Valeria said, nodding at the Sea Sand warriors. They leapt into action, as if sitting for as long as they had had been some kind of torture.

This time things took a little longer, presumably since the group was now exploring a cave system instead of just securing the main open area of the valley. But about 15 minutes later, Ghan Fallo’s man Dalk returned to let us know that everything looked good out there.

We all trundled into a line behind Valeria and then followed her out of the shuttle.

While the men had searched the area, the sun had almost entirely set. The mountains were no longer reflective and brightly glittering but shadow-stained, nearly black.

Our little human group dispersed tentatively, each of us taking a few steps and looking around in awe as the warriors continued to prowl the edges, looking for danger. My boots scuffed on the ground as I walked, and I looked down to see that the ground wasn’t just plain dirt or rock, but some kind of uniform stone that seemed smoother and more translucent, like thick, night-blackened ice.

We stood in a large valley, like Valeria had said. The flat area between the sloped sides of the mountains all around us was pretty large – large enough for our shuttle to land and have lots of room left over to spare.

“There’s the Vrika’s mountain and the caves we’ll be using,” Valeria called over. I glanced her way to find her gesturing into the dark entrance to an exceptionally tall mountain peak.

The Vrika’s mountain…

I tilted my head back, craning my neck to try to see all the way up to the top. But I couldn’t. I wonder if it’s up there, watching us right now…

I almost wanted to call up to it. To tell it that it had made a mistake with this whole mates thing. There was no way Gahn Errok and I could ever mesh well as a couple, and even outside of that, I still wasn’t sold that the mate bond was a real, reliable thing. It certainly seemed real enough in the other couples I’d observed so far…

But how could it ever feel real for me?

I’d already watched one marriage crumble before my eyes. My own father had left my mother, had left us. If I couldn’t even rely on the love of a parent to be steady, how could I ever rely on the arrogant proclamations of some alien mountain king?

Whatever. He’s not here right now. Don’t let him take over your thoughts.

I sighed. For someone who’d vowed not to care about Gahn Errok, I certainly seemed to be spending a lot of my precious time and energy thinking about him.

That ends now. We have work to do.

I walked over to Valeria, 100% committed to doing my part to get our new settlement ready.

“Fuck me, it’s gone bitterly cold out, eh?” Fiona said as she jogged over. She stopped next to Valeria and me, rubbing her hands up and down the sleeves of her jacket viciously.

She was right. It got fairly cold at night in the Sea Sands. But it was definitely colder here at night than it was back there. I made a mental note of that, already internalizing the climate and weather differences between the two regions.

Nasrin and Tilly drifted over to us, too, followed by Taylor and Tok. Grim came to stand beside his mate.

“It’s been a long day of travel. We can just get set up to sleep for tonight if you guys want,” Valeria said. She leaned gratefully into Grim’s side and he wrapped a huge red arm around her.

Fiona gave a moan of complaint. “Ugh, I don’t know why but I was picturing the most beautiful hot springs would be right here, ready and waiting for us. I feel like that’s the only way I’ll be able to get warm right now.”

“There are hot springs in my mountains.”

We all jumped, turning to find the source of the new voice in our midst. The Sea Sand men drew weapons. Grim and Tok stepped protectively in front of their mates.

What the hell? Who is here?

The mountain accent had been the same as Gahn Errok’s, but the voice itself was entirely different. When I saw all the warriors looking upward, I looked up, too.

About six metres off the ground, a smooth ledge jutted out from a nearby peak. On that ledge, something huge stepped out from the shadows and into the silvered light of the asteroids and stars.

It was a braxilk.

And a rider.

“Ah. Gahn Thaleo,” Valeria said. She relaxed slightly and stepped out from behind Grim, but kept her expression guarded. “We didn’t notice your arrival.”

“I do not make excessive noise a habit,” he replied simply.

I felt my brows rise at that. The Sea Sand and Bitter Sea men basically had super-powered hearing. The fact none of them had heard this huge Gahn land on the ledge was pretty shocking. That wasn’t a case of not making excessive noise. That was a whole other level. That was near-perfect silence of movement.

And now, it was near-perfect stillness.

Gahn Thaleo sat atop his braxilk like he’d been carved from stone, like he’d been there for a hundred years and would remain there for hundreds more. I shivered, and it wasn’t just from the cold. It was knowing that his impossibly still, searching gaze was on us.

I gasped as that stillness broke. I didn’t see or hear any sort of command from Gahn Thaleo, but the braxilk leaped, its huge, heavy body carving a graceful line through the air as it descended. Its wings carried it easily down to the ground where it landed. Much like when I’d seen Gahn Errok on his mount, I was overwhelmed with the urge to leap up onto the creature’s back and ride it myself.

Gahn Errok’s words echoed in my mind. Once you are in the Deep Sky, you will ride no other mount but mine.

Why was he in my thoughts yet again?! I thought I said I was going to keep him out of there!

I forced my attention back to the scene at hand. Gahn Thaleo dismounted smoothly, landing on the ground in a soft crouch before rising and striding over.

I didn’t need Gahn Errok here beside Thaleo to know that the two mountain Gahns would be an epic study in contrasts. Where Gahn Errok was quick and loud-mouthed and haughty, Gahn Thaleo was… Exactly none of those things. Every slow but powerful step he took was an art of quiet, calculated precision. There was no lifted chin, no imperious gaze sweeping over us with disdain.

If Gahn Errok was a tempest, a swirling storm of rage and desire and pride, Gahn Thaleo was a deeply rooted immovable mountain.

As if to further exemplify the metaphor, Gahn Thaleo settled into that stony stillness once again, standing before our group. The silver light licked down his hide, letting us get a good look at him for the first time.

Even his face was the opposite of Gahn Errok’s. Where Errok’s was rather refined, almost annoyingly angelic with high cheekbones and full lips, Gahn Thaleo’s was broader, tougher, more serious and more mature. A harsh scar lanced down one side of his face, through his eyebrow, eye area, and into his cheek. One shockingly bright silver streak of hair fell along the side of his face, sprouting from the place his scar began at the edge of his scalp. Unlike Gahn Errok, or any of the other warriors with us now, he wore no blades. His only weapon was a massive bow strung across his chest, and the strap that likely led to a quiver on his back.

The only movement coming from this mountain Gahn was that of his sight stars. The movement was slightly asymmetrical, I realized, the sparking sight stars of his scarred eye moving slightly slower than the other eye. But that didn’t stop his gaze from penetrating us with deeply intelligent judgment. What that judgment was, it was impossible to say. His face was entirely unreadable. The only thing that seemed to give anything away was when his gaze suddenly snagged on someone in our group, staying there for a beat longer than was natural.

I subtly glanced to the side to see who’d caught his attention.

Nasrin.

His gaze didn’t stay there much longer, because Valeria spoke.

“It’s good to see you, Gahn Thaleo. I hope you and your people are doing well.”

She gave a little nod that was almost like a small bow.

Right. This guy is basically royalty out here. This wasn’t like dealing with the same old Sea Sand Gahns I’d gotten used to for months, and it wasn’t the same as Gahn Errok whom I now felt completely comfortable insulting. This was a whole new political entity to deal with.

Following Valeria’s lead, I did a small bow, too. Tilly and Taylor followed suit, and Fiona did a weirdly awkward curtsy. The only human who didn’t make a show of respect was Nasrin, who regarded the Gahn coolly. If he noticed her lack of special greeting, he didn’t remark on it.

“I will not raise my tail to him,” came a hissing voice from our group.

I turned to find Dalk scowling fiercely at Gahn Thaleo.

That’s right. Dalk, Vaxilkai, Oxriel, and Bariok had all been held captive by Gahn Thaleo for a few days.

“Good,” came Gahn Thaleo’s reply. “I am not interested in false displays of respect. Give me something real, or give me nothing.”

“Oh, I can give you something real,” Dalk muttered, reaching for a blade. But Tok’s huge, golden hand clamped down on his wrist, stopping him.

“Enough, Dalk,” snapped Valeria. “We’re allies now. Yes, you guys were held captive here. But Gahn Thaleo also made sure your wounds were healed and that you were taken care of, correct?”

Dalk ripped his hand out of Tok’s grip, his expression murderous. When he didn’t reply, Bariok did.

“Yes. That is true.”

“Don’t make me regret bringing you out here,” Valeria said, fixing Dalk with a hard stare. Grim loomed beside her, a silent reminder that every word she uttered would be backed up with his own claws.

Dalk grunted and appeared to calm down slightly. Valeria watched him menacingly for another long moment before she turned to Gahn Thaleo once more.

“Sorry about that. It’s been a long day,” she muttered.

Gahn Thaleo’s tail twitched to acknowledge her words. Even that gesture was perfectly restrained. Usually, the movement was a lot more obvious.

“This is why I have come,” he said. “To greet your party and to invite you to recuperate for the night in my mountain. Take your evening meal with us,” he said. His eyes flicked to Fiona for a moment, his next words echoing her sad moan from a few minutes ago. “And make use of the hot springs.”

“I don’t know,” Valeria said, chewing her lip. “We have a lot to do here.”

“It’s not all going to get done in one night, is it? Wouldn’t it be better to have some hot food and a soak and a decent kip and then get started when it’s light out?” Fiona cried. She lurched forward and grabbed onto Valeria’s arm. “Please, oh fearless leader. I beg you.”

I snorted, shaking my head at my friend’s dramatic begging. But honestly, her arguments made sense. We weren’t going to get much done tonight, anyway. We were already tired and hungry and cold. Plus, we’d need to get to know our allies better and explore their territory, anyway.

There was another reason I wanted to go, too.

That reason being that Gahn Errok would probably be super pissed off. If he didn’t want me riding any other mount than his out here, something told me that going to another Gahn’s mountain was ten times worse.

Well, good. He doesn’t control me.

“I vote we go,” I said firmly, decision made.

“Me too,” Tilly and Taylor replied in unison.

Valeria cast a questioning look at Nasrin, who shrugged.

“Fine by me,” she said.

“Alright, then,” Valeria said. “We’ll go. With a few conditions.”

Fiona groaned, but Valeria held up a hand to get her to stop.

“Name them,” Gahn Thaleo said.

“We’ll take our ship and bring our weapons,” Valeria said. “I don’t want us relying solely on your men and your…”

“Braxilk,” I whispered to her.

“Braxilk, to get in and out of your territory. Plus, Grim and Tok are probably too heavy to ride on one with one of your warriors, anyway, and I’d want to bring them for our own protection.”

Gahn Thaleo remained silent for a long moment. Finally, his tail did that small, subtle twitch again.

“I agree to your terms.”

“Alright, then,” Valeria said. She swirled her index finger in a tight circle in the air beside her head, then pointed at the shuttle. “Everybody back on the ship!”

CHAPTER TWELVE

Stephanie

In the end, it was decided that Dalk would stay behind to keep the caves and valley clear of any predators or other danger while we were gone. He was still pissed about being held captive and had no interest in going to Gahn Thaleo’s mountain. Bariok and Vaxilkai were only marginally less angry about going back to that mountain, but they kept their emotions on a tighter leash. “I’d let you two stay behind, too,” Valeria had told them, “but then we’d only have Grim, Tok, and Zoren. That’s only three warriors to six human women. Gahn Thaleo is our ally, but still, that’s a risk. Not one I’m willing to take.” Vaxilkai and Bariok had grunted their agreement, and so we all trundled back into the shuttle. Well, all of us but Dalk.

By the time we’d all gotten into our seats on the shuttle, Gahn Thaleo was long gone. He’d taken off immediately after the decision about us going to his mountain had been made.

“I don’t trust that guy,” Nasrin said as we buckled in.

“Why? Because he looked like he was trying to see straight inside your brain there for a minute?” Fiona said. She’d clearly noticed what I had – the snag of Gahn Thaleo’s attention on Nasrin’s face.

“Exactly,” she said.

“Do you think he’s your…” Tilly asked. She didn’t need to finish the sentence for us to know what she meant.

I frowned.

“I don’t know,” I said. “Have you guys ever known a Gahn, or any warrior, who didn’t try to instantly find and claim his mate the second he got his mate vision? Buroudei, Taliok, Baldor, Kor, even those two,” I said glancing over at Grim and Tok. “Hell, Grim literally kidnapped Valeria.”

“That was a misunderstanding,” Valeria piped up from the cockpit as we ascended.

“OK, but still. Kor searched the desert endlessly for Zoey, desperate to find her. Baldor literally launched a huge attack on our settlement, ready to go to war to get Theresa.”

“Yeah, I see your point. That’s different from just waiting for us to show up here and then being all like, ‘Fancy a bite and a bath at my place?’ kinda thing,” Fiona replied. Her brown eyes narrowed, a wicked grin splitting her face. “I see you left our least favourite alien gym bro off your list of guys who went batty trying to claim their mates.”

“Ugh. Don’t remind me,” I groaned.

Fiona chuckled, then turned her attention back to Nasrin.

“You’re probably safe, love,” she said, nodding sagely. “Like, if he doesn’t nearly break his back doing a billion weighted squats to impress you, can he really be your mate?”

We all burst into laughter at that. Damn, it felt so good to laugh. Especially about a situation that had been a huge pain in the ass so far. That situation being a broad-shouldered, mouthy, sinfully handsome idiot of an alien king.

“What are you gonna do when he gets back here?” Fiona asked me once our laughter died down.

I slumped in my seat and tipped my head back to stare at the shuttle’s metal ceiling.

“No clue. Just… Ignore him? I don’t know.”

Fiona snorted.

“Don’t think he’ll be easy to ignore. Lad’s gonna be looking for a new boulder out here. An even bigger one.” Her tone grew more serious. “But you do know we’re with you no matter what, right? If you don’t want him near you, he’s not coming near you.”

I brought my chin down to look at my friends, finding them all nodding in agreement.

“Thank you, guys. Luckily, even though he’s extremely stubborn, he hasn’t pushed me too far or anything. I mean, he told me that I’m wrong about my own feelings and that I’m apparently going to fall in love with him somehow. But he hasn’t done anything like… Icky. I don’t think I’ll need any actual protection from him.” I smirked. “Maybe just some earplugs for when he starts droning on about what a catch he is and how any other woman would ‘rejoice at the chance to be his mate.’”

“He did not say that!” Fiona gasped.

“Oh, he one thousand percent did,” I confirmed, aware of just how cringey it sounded.

“Cheeky bastard,” she said, shaking her head.

“Delusional bastard, more like,” I said with a laugh.

The conversation died down for the moment, and I tipped my head back against the seat once more, closing my eyes.

Could there be anyone else less suited to me? I wondered. Probably not.

Although…

An image of stony Gahn Thaleo flashed through my mind. I hated to admit it, but he was probably someone I’d want as a mate even less than Gahn Errok. Gahn Errok was his own spectacular brand of obnoxious, but somehow it felt more manageable and was now more familiar, than Gahn Thaleo’s eerily quiet power. Every once in a while during our conversations, Gahn Errok’s face would go flat and unreadable, but for the most part I could tell exactly how he was feeling as the emotions played out wildly on his features. I would take the dramatic, pouty sincerity of those expressions over the cold stare of Gahn Thaleo any day.

Not that I’ll take Gahn Errok, of course! I’m just saying that he’s maybe not the absolute last guy I could stomach being with.

But he’s still low on the freaking list.

Hell, there wasn’t even a list at all! I didn’t need or even want some big alien boyfriend. I hadn’t had crushes or close connections with any of the men here. I’d barely put any effort into dating on Earth, and there’d been absolutely no reason to put more effort into it on a literal alien planet where every other day presented some catastrophic problem we’d had to solve.

“Alright, we’re here,” Valeria called back to us. My eyes snapped open.

“That was fast,” Nasrin muttered, leaning forward in her seat to see out the cockpit viewscreen. I did the same, but I couldn’t make much out.

The landing was similarly smooth to our earlier one, and soon enough we were all getting off the shuttle – first the Bitter Sea guys, then the Sea Sand warriors, then us humans.

My boots hit hard, smooth stone. I looked down to see more of the translucent, ice-like stone from the other valley beneath our feet. But unlike the long, splitting valley we’d come from, this stony clearing area was a nearly perfect circle. Mountain peaks ringed the clearing, pointing upward like spikes on a bear trap.

Directly ahead of us stood a small group of warriors. Five of them, all with bows strung across their chests and various blades strapped to their torsos. The one in the centre stepped forward.

“I am Warrek, Gahn Thaleo’s commander,” said the warrior. His long, inky hair was tied back in a tight, neat braid. “We’ve been commanded to show you into the hall upon your arrival.”

“Should we wait for Gahn Thaleo?” I whispered to Valeria. It felt a bit weird to go into his mountain after beating him back here.

She pursed her lips, thinking about it, then shrugged.

“I don’t think so. Clearly, the other guys knew we were coming so we’re not surprising them or anything. And the Gahn must have known we’d beat him back here even though he left before us.”

“Fair enough,” I replied.

“Oh, thank fuck, because I’m absolutely starved,” Fiona said.

“Thank you, Warrek. We never directly spoke, but I remember you from when I was last here,” Valeria called over. “I’m sure you remember my mate, Grim, as well as Tok. This is Taylor, Tok’s mate. And you probably remember Vaxilkai and Bariok, too.”

Warrek stiffened slightly at the mention of those last two. Tension crackled in the air between the two men who’d been held prisoner here last time and the men who’d held them.

But Valeria forged forward, ignoring Bariok and Vaxilkai seething behind her.

“This is Zoren, whom none of you have met. He’s from the neighbouring Death Plains. And then there are…”

She stepped aside and gestured to us.

“Fiona. Nasrin. Tilly. Stephanie,” she rattled off, efficient and business-like.

Warrek strode towards us. He kept his hands loose at his sides, which was probably the only thing that kept the men from getting all antsy about his approach.

Scratch that, they were definitely itching to grab their own weapons, especially Bariok and Vaxilkai who hissed beside us.

“Which one of these women is mated to Gahn Errok?” asked Warrek as he came to a stop in front of our group.

My cheeks heated. What the hell? Why did he care about that?

None of us answered, and Valeria’s eyes narrowed suspiciously.

“Why do you need to know that?”

Warrek didn’t react to Valeria’s challenging tone.

“It is simply good sense to know whom we welcome here. There is some risk in inviting the Gahnala of a Gahn as… spirited… as Gahn Errok without his permission. We merely wish to know whom we are dealing with.”

“I am not a Gahnala, and I do not need his permission to be here,” I responded fiercely.

Warrek’s eyes flashed to me. So did Valeria’s a moment later.

I shrugged at her pointed glance.

“They were going to find out soon anyway. Might as well just get it out in the open now,” I said with a sigh.

“True. We are allies after all,” Valeria said with a tight nod. She turned back to Warrek. “But I expect Stephanie will be given the same courtesies and protection as any other person here.”

“She will be, of course,” Warrek said, silvery sight stars buzzing as they tracked down my face. “The fact that she clearly has not accepted Gahn Errok speaks to her wisdom – a good ally indeed.”

Fiona snorted loudly and then clapped a hand over her mouth. I pursed my lips, not sure if I should laugh or groan at Warrek’s comment. Obviously, I wasn’t the only one unimpressed by Gahn Errok’s… Errokness.

“Let us not count dust out here. Come inside and feast with us. With our expanded territory, hunting has been bountiful,” Warrek said. He gestured with his tail towards a dark crack in the large mountain straight ahead of us, across the round clearing.

I shivered. That entrance looked so ominously dark I almost wanted to stumble back to the shuttle. But I sucked it up. We were here for this alliance. We’ll have to go in there sometime. And I’m not alone. I have my friends with me, and the other warriors.

Valeria nodded in agreement. The four warriors ahead of us fanned out to watch us enter while Warrek led our group. The Bitter Sea men followed Warrek directly, and the three Sea Sand men hemmed us humans in at the back and sides so we were protected in a little muscly alien bubble.

We crossed the stone clearing quickly, our party’s boots and claws scuffing and clacking on the glassy ground. Still following Warrek, we pressed into the darkness of the crack.

But after one swift turn, the darkness dissipated, melted by flickering light.

“Holy smokes,” I whispered. We stood in a cavernous, glittering space. The mountain’s insides were just as gem-like and blue as the outside, making light glance off of every wall in an effusive clatter. To the right was a tunnel that appeared to go up on an incline, snaking up into the height of the mountains. That tunnel, too, was lit.

All the light in the space was shocking and exquisite. I turned slowly, taking in the unexpected sources.

Much of the stone inside the mountain was completely opaque, but there were small pockets and natural shelves of translucent crystal that had what looked to be lit torches of some kind burning inside.

“Those are new,” Valeria said, indicating the dozens of crystal lanterns.

“We do not forget the needs of our allies,” Warrek said firmly. “Our Gahn remembered how your kind struggled to see in the darker parts of our mountain. He commissioned the installation of the light sources immediately after your departure.”

“OK, that Gahn looks like he would kill a man in cold blood without a second thought, but he gets some points for that,” Tilly whispered. Fiona and I nodded in agreement – it was decent of him to have anticipated this need. Nasrin didn’t say anything as her gaze swept over the space.

“Ooh, something smells great,” Fiona piped up, her nose scrunching up as she sniffed the air.

“Yes, that is our evening fire. Our kills are roasting. Come. I will show you,” Warrek said.

My gaze caught on something on the other side of the largely empty space we stood in – a flat stone slab on the floor that appeared to be hooked up to some sort of pulley system. An alien elevator?

“We do not need to use that,” Warrek said, seeing where I’d been looking. “The Sky Hall is not so high up.”

With that, he turned towards the tunnel on our right. We followed him, having to adjust the big circle of our group to walk more easily in the narrower space. The right wall of the tunnel was clearly the outer wall of the mountain, because large natural windows of translucent stone punctuated the wall and let in arching asteroid light and the slivers of stars. That, coupled with the lanterns, meant the tunnel was well-lit and not nearly as spooky as it otherwise would have been. As we walked, the scent Fiona had remarked on grew thicker in the air. Smoke and the smell of roasting meat. My stomach grumbled. I could definitely go for a hot meal right about now. I wonder if the food here is very different from the Sea Sands… I’d gotten used to the dakrival, rakdo, and valok menu at the settlement, but I was more than ready to try something else.

Soon, it wasn’t just the scent in the air that caught my attention, but sounds, too. Conversation, laughter, and the crackle of a fire.

The tunnel widened into a natural stone landing. Ahead, the tunnel continued onward and upwards, making me wonder if its spiral went all the way to the mountain’s peak. To our right, that landing extended outwards, a shelf jutting out from the mountainside. It wasn’t an exposed shelf, though, but rather a large natural cave seated on the flat jut of stone. The cave wasn’t dark – its rounded wall bubbled out from the mountain and was made of yet more translucent, crystal-like material, letting in the silvery evening light. A fire crackled at the far side of the cave, directly beneath a small break at the top of the see-through stone – a natural skylight and chimney for the smoke. The result was a firelit hall seeming to be suspended in the air, encased entirely by windows instead of walls. From my place in the group, I could see some of the Deep Sky people who lived here – a smattering of men, women, and children.

“Strange that we didn’t see the fire from outside. Have we already gone around the mountain to the back?” I asked, confused. I could tell that the tunnel curved upward around the shape of the mountain, but we hadn’t been walking for that long.

A voice from behind our group made me jump, echoing in the tunnel.

“It is the nature of aguir stone. We can see out. But you cannot see in.”

Gahn Thaleo stood behind us in the tunnel. Goosebumps broke out under my jacket. Weirdly, and rather ominously, his words seemed to be more about himself than the stone. I got the impression that his gaze captured absolutely everything.

But gave away nothing.

“If that’s so, how do the lanterns work? How does light pass in and out?” Nasrin asked, raising a brow skeptically. I would have said Gahn Thaleo’s sight stars snapped to her face… Except they’d already been glued to her face.

“The lanterns use a different variety of stone, called kaktuir. Kaktuir allows unhindered sight from both sides. Aguir does not.”

Nasrin gave one short nod, then turned away to look into the hall again.

Warrek raised his tail.

“Welcome back, Gahn.”

He grunted at his warrior.

“Please, enter the hall.”

Our group spread out as we filtered from the tunnel area into the great hall. The Deep Sky people fell silent at the fire, staring over at us. Our group was equally quiet, taking everything in. The new alien allies. And the exquisite spread of stars practically encasing this entire space.

“So. What do you think of my mountain?” came Gahn Thaleo’s quiet rumble.

He didn’t seem to have addressed the question to anyone in particular, but when I turned towards him, I found him directly behind Nasrin, staring intently at the back of her head.

She didn’t answer him. Though she had to have noticed his proximity and his gaze. That intensity must have felt like a finger of ice down the back of her neck.

“You and your people have a very impressive home, Gahn Thaleo,” I piped up, hoping to avoid any awkwardness as Nasrin continued walking forward and away from him.

I wonder if somewhere out there, Errok just snapped to annoyed attention, sensing I’ve just given another Gahn a compliment…

“Yes. Thank you for the invitation,” Valeria added. Tilly and Fiona nodded eagerly, their eyes wandering to the fire where the food cooked.

“Seat yourselves,” the Gahn said, gesturing with his tail towards the fire.

The Deep Sky people’s sight stars buzzed silently as we got nearer.

“Do you think this is all of them?” Fiona whispered to me. The tribe gathered was small. Much smaller than the numbers we had at the settlement. There were about twenty men including Warrek and Thaleo, and far fewer women and children. They all had skin in varying shades of greyish violet and blue, their hair gleaming with inky indigo. Several of the women had their hair bound into tightly braided updos, something I wasn’t used to seeing in the Sea Sands. Usually, the braids were worn loose down one’s back in the desert

“I would assume so,” I muttered, glancing around. I didn’t see the four warriors who’d greeted us with Warrek outside, but otherwise, I didn’t see much evidence that there were significant numbers of people elsewhere. We hadn’t passed anyone in the main entrance hall or seen anyone else in the tunnels on the way here.

Gahn Thaleo must have heard Fiona’s question. That, or he was a mind reader.

“Apart from four men on guard duty, all my people are here.”

One by one, he introduced every member of the tribe, his tail gesturing to each person with precise care. A couple of the children haltingly raised their tails to us while others stared with suspicious confusion. More than one person, not just the children, let their gazes swing wildly over the members of our group.

Can’t really blame them. I wonder who looks more weird to them – the humans or the Bitter Sea men?

The Sea Sand men may have had different colouring, but they were otherwise anatomically the same as the Deep Sky people from what I could see.

But us girls, plus Grim and Tok? We probably looked like… Well… Aliens.

When Gahn Thaleo was finished, Valeria did the same for our group, rattling off our names and jabbing her finger at each of us as she did so.

After the introductions were done, Gahn Thaleo urged us to sit once more. We did so, sitting down on the stone. Perhaps expectedly, there was a very clear divide in the group – the Deep Sky people sat on one side of the fire, us on the other.

Gahn Thaleo sat between the two groups, at the head of the fiery table, so to speak. The fire wasn’t a large circle, but rather burned in a long, rectangular pit. Blocks of stone along each side held skewers up, balancing meat over the fire. I inhaled deeply, the scent of the pale roasting meat seeming familiar.

When I got handed a chunk of it, I realized why. It tasted like smoked chicken.

“It’s called felkora,” Gahn Thaleo told us, watching us chow down on the alien chicken barbecue. “We eat the eggs as well.”

The eggs, cooked in their shells, were equally pleasant, as were the delicate little pink mountain fish we were given. I didn’t know if I’d ever get to eat fish again, I thought to myself, smiling as I ate. There were oceans on this planet – the Bitter Sea Grim and Tok had come from for example. But I had no idea if I’d get the chance to go there anytime soon.

The group was mostly quiet, our arrival silencing the chatter and laughter from before. I felt a bit bad about that – like we’d intruded on the Deep Sky people’s peace for the evening. But we had been invited. And we were allies, and hopefully would be friends eventually.

As we ate, I let my gaze skim over the Deep Sky people seated across the fire. Yep – they definitely had the lack of ladies issue that plagued the Sea Sand men. And, at least from what I could see based on where everyone sat, it looked like all the adult women had mates already. Every adult woman sat with a man, some of them with children. There were no little groups of apparently single alien ladies the way Nasrin, Tilly, Fiona, and I sat together. Which meant that a good number of the small group of warriors here not only had no mates but no hope of one, either.

At least, that would have been the case before. Before we showed up. Which probably explained why more than one silent warrior’s sight stars crawled back and forth over our faces with unusual intensity.

As if sensing the direction of my thoughts, or maybe the thoughts of his men, Gahn Thaleo spoke up. His deep, regal voice boomed in the cave.

“I am glad to welcome our new allies to our mountain. I hope all of you, but especially the new women, find it hospitable.” His sight stars dragged over our group, snagging on Nasrin, before he continued. “It is my expectation, and my hope, that some of you will end up staying here permanently. As mates to my men.”

Nasrin choked on a piece of meat, and I leaned over to thump her on the back. Gahn Thaleo was on his feet in an instant, but I waved him off.

“She’s fine,” I told him.

He watched us intently.

Nasrin wheezed, then took a big swig of her mountain valok plant, a sweeter version of the desert ones we were used to.

“She’s fine,” Valeria reiterated, echoing my words. “No doubt just… Reacting to your statement,” she continued, choosing her words with slow and diplomatic care. She met Gahn Thaleo’s gaze sternly. “Gahn Thaleo, we thank you for your hospitality. But I’m sure we discussed this during our initial negotiations – no human woman goes anywhere she does not want to, mated or not.”

“Evidently,” Gahn Thaleo said, his narrowed eyes lingering on me meaningfully. My face heated, but I wasn’t sure why. I had no reason to be embarrassed or to feel bad that I hadn’t followed Gahn Errok blindly back to his mountain as his obedient little wife! But there was something in Gahn Thaleo’s response, in his tone, that made me uncomfortable. Not exactly that he was judging me, but that the idea of the human women having that much freedom grated on him. If he was anything like the other Gahns, he was likely desperate to secure mates for his men and didn’t want anything getting in his way.

Fiona seemed to get the same impression.

“Mister Big Strong King over there doesn’t exactly sound happy about that, does he?” she whispered into my ear, muffling the words behind her hand as if Gahn Thaleo would be able to see the words in the air.

“It’s better we set these expectations now,” I whispered back. “No sense in disappointing anyone when we don’t go falling over ourselves from the mate bond that we don’t even feel.”

Gahn Errok’s face once again flashed in my mind. His confused look of disbelieving horror when I’d confirmed what the other Gahns had told him. That I felt no mate bond for him.

“I agree,” Fiona said, still whispering behind the shield of her hand. “But it doesn’t mean that our mountain man over there is gonna like it.”

Gahn Thaleo’s eyebrows were drawn downward, the scarred one slightly lower than the other. His jaw was stonily set, but otherwise, his face was largely unreadable. One thing was clear, though – he definitely wasn’t happy about any hurdles he or his men would face in getting a human mate.

He inhaled quietly, then turned to Valeria once more. “I have not forgotten your terms.”

We all waited, expecting him to say something else. When he didn’t, Valeria stood. Grim quickly followed, rising to his huge, scaly feet. The Deep Sky people gawked, as if they’d forgotten how huge he was while he’d been seated.

“Well, thank you so much for this meal,” Valeria said stiffly. “We’d better be-”

“You did not get to experience our heated pools.” Gahn Thaleo’s words sliced through Valeria’s. She pursed her lips, casting her eyes down at those of us still sitting. When her eyes met mine, I shrugged. Yeah, the previous conversation had been a little awkward, but I wasn’t itching to get out of here yet if we didn’t have to.

“Please, pleeease, let us stay and see the pools,” Fiona begged, clutching her hands together in a dramatic, prayer-like position. “I am so not ready to go back out into that chilly night.”

Tilly nodded in agreement, and Nasrin, like me, just shrugged. Taylor also piped up that she wanted to see the heated pools, and Tok growled that he’d go wherever his mate wanted to be.

Valeria was clearly mulling over the options. But she obviously knew what we all did. We may have been in Gahn Thaleo’s mountain, but with our Sea Sand guards, her guns, and especially the Bitter Sea men escorting us, we wouldn’t be in any real danger. It wasn’t like Gahn Thaleo was going to be able to hold us hostage until we all agreed to be mated to his men or something. Besides, even a Gahn couldn’t decide who should be someone’s mate. Only the Kell, the Lavrika, or the Vrika out here, could do that. Although, the Vrika doesn’t exactly seem to have the best track record for this stuff, I thought sourly, remembering whom it had apparently chosen for me. Is there, like, a Vrika supervisor I can speak to? A 1-800-my-mate’s-kind-of-a-dick hotline to call? Who do I complain to about this?

“Alright. Thank you. We’ll use the heated pools. And then-”

“And then you’ll stay the night,” Gahn Thaleo finished for her. Valeria’s mouth dropped open, but she closed it, recovering quickly.”

“I don’t know about that,” she said, frowning.

“You propose that your party undresses, bathes in the warm water, gets comfortable here, only to go back out into the cold night, heading for a settlement that as of yet, does not even really exist?”

“When you put it like that,” I murmured.

Fiona nodded eagerly beside me.

“I vote for the alien sleepover,” she said in English. Valeria sighed, casting her eyes over our group, once again taking a quick tally. Nobody had any strong objections about staying the night here. We’d have our alien guards, Valeria’s weapons, and the shuttle just outside if needed. And honestly, the idea of getting warm and snugly in a bed of some kind sounded fantastic right now. Gahn Thaleo was absolutely right – getting all lovely and warm in the pools only to trudge back to the cold dark caves sounded awful.

“It might be worth staying here a few days,” I said suddenly. Valeria looked at me, surprised. I explained. “It would be worth collecting data about the environment and weather systems here to compare to other areas. The storms have been worse on this side of the mountains lately, right?”

“Correct,” Gahn Thaleo answered.

“We have all the equipment in the shuttle. We can do some work out here, get acquainted with the mountains, then set up the settlement and continue our work there,” I said. And the fact that the longer I’m over here in Gahn Thaleo’s mountains means the longer I can avoid Gahn Errok is just the cherry on top, I thought to myself. Gahn Errok had said himself he needed to get back to his own tribe and territory. If I stayed out here for a while, maybe I could avoid dealing with him for a little longer.

“Let’s just take this one step at a time,” Valeria said. “For now, yes, we will stay one night. We can reassess in the morning.”

She turned to the Sea Sand warriors who were now standing.

“Vaxilkai, you and Bariok run down to the shuttle and get our packs from the shuttle, would you?”

The two of them grunted before striding away. Gahn Thaleo flashed a silent look to Warrek, who trotted after the other two, escorting them back down the tunnel.

A little niggle of worry started to poke at me as the minutes ticked by without Vaxilkai and Bariok. I started to get paranoid that maybe this was some kind of trap after all. But my suspicions were dashed a few moments later when the two warriors returned, carrying all our backpacks as well as some extra bedding hides. Warrek brought up the rear, and Gahn Thaleo turned to us.

“You have your things. Now follow me.”

His commanding voice made me shiver. Even though we were his guests, his words felt less like an invitation and more like a command.

But then again, who really cared? He was taking us to a heated spring after a long day of travel. No commands were necessary.

We all followed Gahn Thaleo back out into the tunnel we’d come from. I cast a glance backward as we left, finding all the Deep Sky people’s sight stars trained on us as we departed their hall. I smiled backwards, mouthing a quiet “Thank you,” at them, hoping we hadn’t made their dinner too weird. I didn’t have much hope for a response, but just before I turned forward once more, a young Deep Sky woman caught my gaze and smiled hesitantly, but warmly, back at me.

That soft smile quelled my nerves even more. Yes, we may have been in an alien world, but there were always connections to be made. Always relationships to forge, things in common to find.

Even with Errok?

Ugh. Not thinking about him right now.

The tunnel continued upwards, spiralling around the mountain. In several places, it split off into other tunnels that dug deep into the stone. I wondered where they all led. What else this mountain held that we couldn’t see.

Eventually, Gahn Thaleo turned and took us down one of those branched-off tunnels. Unlike the main tunnel, this one had no lanterns and, because it plunged into the mountain, it had no natural windows to let in bright asteroid light from the outside. Valeria swore under her breath and a sudden beam of light appeared in her hand. Gahn Thaleo jerked his head back, shocked by the flashlight. If he had questions about it, he didn’t ask them.

The flashlight felt minuscule in the velvet darkness of the tunnel. That darkness didn’t last too long, though. The tunnel twisted and turned until we ended up back at an outside wall of the mountain. We stepped into a small cave with a large clear stone window, as well as a fire already crackling in a small hearth.

He was ready for this. He was expecting us to stay the night the entire time…

I still believed we were safe here in our group. But I couldn’t help but feel there was something calculating to everything Gahn Thaleo did. This may not have been a trap, but it did feel as if we were following along each step of a carefully outlined plan. A plan no one understood but the stony mountain Gahn.

“These are the guest quarters that will suit your party best,” Gahn Thaleo said, stopping in the space. “The Sea Sand warriors can sleep here and act as guards. A larger cave with a heated pool for the new women lies beyond, and smaller caves branch off from that for the mated pairs.”

“Is this the only entrance to the guest caves beyond?” Valeria asked, jutting her chin back at the way we’d just entered.

Gahn Thaleo jerked his tail in confirmation.

“Alright, then. That works,” Valeria said. I nodded, also satisfied by that answer. If that was the only way in, no one would be able to get to us without going through the Sea Sand warriors first.

“Thank you for the meal,” I said to Gahn Thaleo. “And for the bath.”

“Of course,” he said. “We are allies now. Everything in this mountain is yours.”

Once again, I got the unshakeable feeling that he was speaking solely to Nasrin. His sight stars pulsed noticeably when he looked at her before he circled around our group, heading back for the tunnel we’d come from.

“There is always at least one warrior stationed in the Sky Hall,” Gahn Thaleo said from the darkness of the tunnel, just beyond the cave. The shadows there swallowed him. Even with the fire in the cave behind us, he was invisible. A deep and disembodied voice in the gloom. “Make your way back there at any time should you need anything. As I said before, everything in this mountain is at your disposal. I bid you good evening.”

His mention of good evening, followed by silence, was the only indication that the Gahn had left us. There wasn’t a single rustle of fabric or clicking of claws to let us know he’d gone.

“Like a fucking ghost, that bloke,” Fiona said, wiggling her shoulders as if to disperse a foreboding sensation. “Whatever. Let’s go check out the heated pool!”

Now that Gahn Thaleo had left (confirmed by a surreptitious sweep of Valeria’s flashlight beam into the tunnel – obviously she was disconcerted by his utterly silent departure, too) we could relax a bit. I was even getting excited – this felt a lot like going to a hotel when you were a kid.

And despite the rustic nature, there was definitely something resort-like about Gahn Thaleo’s mountain. Even this small, simple cave for the warriors was elegant and clean, free of dust or gravel in the corners. The fire burned brightly, licking up glittering blue walls, and the spray of stars beyond the natural window made everything stunningly romantic.

Zoren, Vaxilkai, and Bariok unrolled their bedding hides in this first cave. I caught quiet snippets of conversation between Vaxilkai and Bariok, commenting on how it would be better here tonight, now that they were not bound as they’d been last time. Last time they’d been here, they’d been prisoners. It must be a stark contrast.

“Are you guys alright? We don’t actually have to stay here,” I said to them. I’d been so concerned about avoiding Gahn Errok, getting some data on the weather systems out here, and checking out the hot springs, that I hadn’t put enough thought into how Vaxilkai and Bariok would feel staying here.

The two of them straightened and looked at me, seeming surprised I’d spoken to them.

“We are at the service of our Gahns and, by proxy here, the new women,” Bariok said, his serious voice quiet thunder in the cave. “We have no qualms with our orders.”

“But how do you feel? Is this… Is this OK? Last time you were here, you were bound and imprisoned!”

“And this time, we are not,” Vaxilkai replied with a swish of his tail. “We have already gotten used to the peace at the Cliffs of Uruzai settlement, living among men who were once our blood enemies. We will get used to this, too.”

Right. I tended to think of us all as one solid unit. We were the group from the Sea Sand settlement. But really, it was less than a year ago that these three men before us – all from different tribes – would have killed each other just as soon as looked at each other.

I nodded, accepting their answer and not wanting to push further.

Us humans collected our packs that the Sea Sand guys had brought in from the shuttle. I was glad Valeria had thought of that. It would be annoying to soak in a hot spring only to have to put on the same clothes we’d already worn all day.

At the far end of this cave, there was a curving crack that led into a narrow, shadowy tunnel. Grim went first, followed by Valeria, then the rest of us humans. Tok brought up the rear, keeping close to Taylor. Behind us in the first cave, the Sea Sand guys discussed sleeping in shifts to be on guard throughout the night.

The Sea Sand voices fell away as we walked through the narrow stone passage, lit only by Valeria’s flashlight. But soon, up ahead, more light glowed. Another fire.

Grim grunted back at us that the cave ahead was empty and looked safe, which made us move faster.

We dispersed into this new cave, spreading out to take it all in.

If that first cave was nice, this one was breathtaking.

Like the sky hall, one entire side was glassy, translucent stone. Directly in front of that transparent wall was a massive heated spring. Its smooth, glistening edge went right to the see-through window, which made it look like an infinity pool. Clouds of steam billowed up from the surface, creating rolling beads of condensation on the clear stone wall.

Above us, the cave arched upward into a natural cathedral of stone, sapphire-like rock shattering the firelight. The fire was larger in this cave, which made sense – there was more space to heat. The fire stood opposite from the heated pool, crackling in a carved pit. Its smoke vented upward into a crack in a sparkling stone overhang. I couldn’t tell if that chimney was natural, or if it had been created. A little way out from the wall, on either side of the fire, were two huge carved rectangles, piled high with neatly folded fuzzy hides. Each rectangle was at least the size of a California king bed from Earth. Even with four of us sharing those two beds, the amount of room we’d have was glorious.

Like some other areas of the mountain, lanterns had been created in pockets of that clear crystal stone – kaktuir. They looked like magic gems that glowed from the inside – little diamonds of light studding the walls.

“Fuck me, this is brill,” Fiona said, her brown eyes wide. “Hell, I don’t care if Mister Moody Gahn wants to marry me off anymore. As long as I get a room like this!”

I snorted, shaking my head at her as she hurried to the side of the heated pool. Nasrin and Tilly followed while Grim, Valeria, Taylor, and Tok headed for another dark crack at the far end of this big cave. A few moments later, those four came back, saying they’d found their guest quarters for the evening in a pair of smaller caves beyond.

“I wanted to check out the heated pool tonight, but I’m knackered,” Taylor said. Tok’s giant golden arm hooked around her waist, drawing her into his side. “I’m just going to go relax I think.”

“Grim and I are going to go to our cave for the night, too.” Valeria slipped her hand into Grim’s clawed one. “The Sea Sand guys will be sleeping in shifts, so just shout if you need anything. Plus, Grim and Tok only sleep a few hours a night, so if anything happens, one of them will probably be awake, too.”

Nasrin, Tilly, Fiona, and I said our goodnights to them. They disappeared from view, heading for their own beds for the night.

“OK. But do you guys get the sense Gahn Thaleo is pulling out all the stops here?” Tilly said as she took in the gorgeous room that would be ours for the night. “I mean, maybe they always set up their caves this nicely… But the lanterns, the fire, the bedding hides all clean and folded for us… It’s like a hotel.”

“That’s what I was thinking!” I cried. “It totally feels like one of those luxury rustic retreats that seem simple but actually cost like five grand per night.”

Tilly nodded.

“Exactly.”

“Well, we are allies now,” Nasrin said slowly, her green eyes flitting from the heated pool to the beds. “It makes sense that he’d want to keep us happy.”

“Or maybe he’s trying to woo somebody,” Fiona said, wiggling her eyebrows at Nasrin.

Nasrin frowned. “I’ll admit he’s looking at me a fair bit, yes. But he would have had to have gotten all this ready before he came to find us tonight. Before he saw us. And we’ve already established that we don’t think he has a mate among our group, right?”

“True,” Fiona replied. “But maybe he’s just trying to woo us in a more general way. Like, ‘look, tiny humans! We can take care of you here! Accept my warriors’ big alien dicks with open arms! Or, er, legs!’”

Tilly and I descended into a fit of giggles at that. Even Nasrin cracked a smile and shook her head.

“Yeah, that could be,” Nasrin said.

“Let’s not read any nefarious purposes into it just yet,” I said, slipping out of my jacket. “I think Fiona’s right. He probably just wants to show us what a good ally he is and how nice his mountain is, just in case some of his men end up with human mates. Let’s just accept the gift and take advantage. I, for one, am dying to get in that hot spring.” Unlike Gahn Errok, Gahn Thaleo had given us no obvious strings attached to this invitation besides trying to prove what a nice home he had. There were no brash declarations that I would fall in love with him someday. No demands that I give him my heart in return. Like someone else I could name…

With that, we all undressed and splashed into the water. It was the perfect temperature, and it glided silkily over our skin. There was a slight mineral tang to the fragrance, making it feel like some kind of fancy spa treatment rather than a simple hot bath.

At its deepest, the water came up just about to our chins. Fiona half-waded, half-swam over to the clear wall of the cave. She rapped a wet knuckle against its crystalline surface.

“What do you guys think? Is this the totally see-through stuff or the half-see-through stuff?” She pressed her nose to the foggy window.

“Any warriors flying by, trying to catch a peek?” Tilly asked, chuckling.

“Can’t tell,” Fiona replied. “Too foggy. So, I guess either way, they wouldn’t be able to see in.”

“It’s aguir,” Nasrin said.

“Someone paid attention to Gahn Grumpy’s geology lesson,” Fiona said with a grin.

“‘Gahn Grumpy?’ How many nicknames do you have for him already?” I laughed, splashing water her way. She splashed back at me, shrieking.

“Don’t worry. I’ve got a bunch more for Gahn Gym Bro, too, so don’t feel left out.”

“Oh, God,” I groaned. “Forget I said anything!”

We enjoyed our soak for a while longer after that. Eventually, the laughter and conversation died down, and we all stared silently out at the harsh, stunning sky above the condensation on the window. It really is beautiful here, I thought.

The beds turned out to be as nice as the pool. Each carved bed rectangle was lined with layers of springy, woolly fabric that created a cushiony cocoon of a mattress. Combined with the rest of the clean, fuzzy hides for blankets, the beds were shockingly comfy.

It didn’t take long for us to snuggle down and fall asleep.

WE DID END UP STAYING with Gahn Thaleo’s tribe for a couple of days after all. We were all happy to enjoy the luxuries of his mountain, and I was able to start collecting meteorological data to analyze.

I was glad to start my work. I was even more glad that, since this was another Gahn’s territory, the longer I stayed here, the longer I avoided Gahn Errok.

At least… That’s what I’d thought.

But, as it was so often the case when it came to the loud and stormy Gahn who’d set his sights on me, my assumptions turned out to be absolutely, positively, flat-out wrong.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Errok

Togo pushed himself hard for me, but even my loyal braxilk could not match the speed of the new women’s vessel. I flew behind them, tracking them, for as long as I could see them. But they disappeared more swiftly than I would have thought possible. At that speed, they’d reach their destination in a day or less.

As for Togo and I, it took three days of flying to return to the Deep Sky.

But return, we did. To the land of my people.

To the place my mate had gone.

I’d thought being without her before had been torturous. Now, it was madness. Now that I’d seen her before me as more than just a mate vision, now that I’d heard her voice and touched the incredible skin of her hands, she tormented me more viciously than I would have believed anyone capable of. Her face drove me onward, her strange eyes burning and taunting. Her voice claimed my dreams and haunted my days. A voice that was so achingly, painfully soft against all the harsh and hateful words she had for me.

I thought I would be relieved to follow her, to get near her again. I needed to do it – could not resist it. Could not be anywhere but where she was. But there was no relief as I passed over the blue plains and dark peaks of the Deep Sky.

There would be no relief for me until she stopped her useless fight against me.

No relief until I claimed her as my own.

For now, there was only the grinding of fangs. The throb of my cock. The howling of the unrequited mate bond inside me, twisting my insides until I hardly recognized them. Hardly recognized myself.

I was losing control. Of this situation. Of myself. Of everything.

I wanted to say this was the first time, but it was not.

I could not control fate when my parents died.

I could not control my brother Lerokan when he ignored both the Vrika’s call and my orders.

And now I could not control the heart of my maddening foreign mate.

What sort of Gahn have I become?

That question plagued me as dusk turned the Deep Sky mountains into blood-stained teeth.

Well, at least I could control one thing. When I found Zuh-Tephanie tonight at her new settlement, I would at least be clean and presentable.

In neutral territory, near the Vrika’s mountain where the new women were to set up their settlement, I directed Togo to land in a shadowy valley. In that valley, a clear mountain stream led into a shallow pool, the water winking under the stars and moons.

Togo drank from the water as I undressed. I tossed my bow and arrows down on the pool’s bank then removed my cock cloth. My blades, I kept strapped to my body. I’d avoided any more run-ins with the many-limbed beast of the Death Plains mountains. But these mountains had monsters of their own. I would not be unprepared.

The cold water lapped at my skin as I strode through it. It was not deep – it barely reached mid-thigh. I crouched down to get more of the water on my hide, then dove forward, arrowing through the cold liquid. Coming up for air, I scraped some stone moss off a nearby rock, sudsing the stuff up between my claws. I washed my body while sitting in the pool, passing over my half-stiff cock quickly so as not to harden it further.

I’d been in a dulled state of arousal ever since my mate vision. It had sharpened, brutally so, after seeing Zuh-Tephanie in person for the first time.

Even just the thought of her had me hardening further. Despite the cold temperature, the water turned delicious as it swirled over my rising organ.

“Cursed skies,” I choked out, chest heaving. I glanced around. Togo had trotted off to hunt some mountain creature for his evening meal.

There was no one here but me. Me, and the dashed dreams of a mate who did not want me.

But what if she did want me?

My heart stuttered as I let the fantasy unfurl. The fantasy of a Zuh-Tephanie warm and wanting and waiting for me with a desperation which matched my own.

My tail jerked, and my eyes half-closed. Through the hazy curtain of my vision, I conjured her before me, small and naked and glistening.

Gahn Errok, my unreal mate whispered, her eyes wide and gleaming, her mouth soft and open, I have waited for you.

She slid forward on her knees in the water, the shining liquid obscuring her body from her breasts downward. She came to a stop between my spread thighs.

You’re the perfect Gahn, she murmured. The perfect mate. And now, I want your perfect cock.

They were the exact sort of words I thought I wanted to hear from her mouth.

But I knew they were not the words she’d say. This was nothing like my actual mate.

And therefore, the fantasy lost its lustre.

Curse me, she has even ruined self-pleasure. I can’t even stroke myself to her false image.

No, those were not my mate’s words. I did not want some fake version of her.

What would she say, if she were here?

The Zuh-Tephanie of my fantasy shifted, her brows drawing downward, her face pulling into a sneer. Ah, yes. There she is.

You are unworthy, she hissed.

I sank my fangs into my lower lip. My cock jerked so hard it made the water swish.

I will never love you, she continued.

My hips began to rock, gaining speed. They canted up and down, my cock sawing through the water. I have been twisted and ruined. Kind words do nothing for me now. But her hate…

Her hate was going to make me spill my seed.

You are strong, she seethed, but it is not enough.

My mouth fell open in a harsh moan. My claws sank deep into the muck of the pool as my hips bucked helplessly. Every muscle tightened and trembled, my entire body a taut bowstring of feral need.

Her voice fell lower. A hot breath I could practically feel as I imagined it.

You are not enough.

I arched, my hips rising right out of the water as blinding pleasure gripped my pelvis. My cock exploded, completely untouched, a hot, jerking shaft spewing rope after rope of seed into the dark night air. Unable to help myself, I lowered my hips and started jerking myself with my fist, a brutal growl building in my chest as I squeezed yet another climax from my feverish, needy organ.

I panted harshly, staring blindly into the water as my cock softened. The vision of Zuh-Tephanie was gone. All that was left was the same question that had clawed at me the entire way back here.

What sort of Gahn have I become?

I did not have long to ponder the gnawing question. Because a voice from above distracted me, drawing my gaze upward.

“Gahn Errok!”

It was my right-hand man, Zakkar, flying overhead on his mount. He urged his mount, a strong female braxilk named Talga, downward. He leaped down from Talga’s back before her claws even hit the ground, sprinting to me.

I rose swiftly, snatching my cock cloth and dressing before grabbing my bow and quiver. Zakkar was a clever, thoughtful warrior. He was not the sort of man to do things wildly and without judgment. Which made his speed of approach concerning.

“What is it, Zakkar?”

He raised his tail and then let it fall quickly.

“I thought I would have to come in search of you beyond the plains soon,” he growled.

“Why?” I snapped, urgency sharpening my tongues. “What is wrong?”

“It’s the party from the Sea Sands,” he said. “They… Your mate…”

“Do not let words fail you now, Zakkar,” I hissed, my voice dripping with warning. “What has happened to my mate and their new settlement?”

“That’s just it. There is no new settlement.”

Everything stilled. Got darker.

“What?”

“They have not set it up. One of our scouting parties saw them land. But nearly as soon as they arrived, they departed again.”

“Where?” The word was a roar on the air, cracking thunder through the valley.

Zakkar’s jaw hardened.

“They went with Gahn Thaleo,” he said grimly. “And they have not returned.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Errok

Iclicked my tongues, urging Talga into faster flight. Zakkar had lent me his mount in place of Togo. After three days of hard travel, my braxilk needed rest. But Talga was fresh and ready for this flight.

The mountains sped below us in a raging, spiked wave as we hurled towards Gahn Thaleo’s mountain. Gahn Thaleo knew what an insult this would be. Taking new allies into his territory was one thing.

Taking another man’s, another Gahn’s mate, was entirely another.

My mind whirled darkly over the possibilities. Gahn Thaleo may have entered into this new alliance, but he was still my oldest and most dangerous enemy. Would he take out our years of bloodshed on my mate?

I hoped that he would have more honour than that.

He will die. If there is so much as a scratch anywhere on her tiny body, I will tear him apart.

I realized during the flight that I was only one man against Gahn Thaleo’s two dozen healthy warriors.

But it would not matter. Not where my mate was concerned. The mountains themselves could not hold me back from her, let alone the puny arrows of Gahn Thaleo’s army.

Talga was quick and responsive to my commands, and we made good progress over the night-drenched landscape. But still, it was not fast enough. Every beat of her wings was slow agony and every beat of my heart made me fear I was too late.

But finally, finally, we entered into Gahn Thaleo’s territory.

No guards or scouts spotted us. Not until we landed in the aguir circle before the main entrance to Gahn Thaleo’s mountain.

Warrek, Gahn Thaleo’s closest commander, along with three other men, charged out of hidden shadows, arrows nocked. I left my own bow strung across my chest, choosing instead to draw two long blades from my back. I slashed them savagely through the air.

“Where is she?” I snarled. My tail thwapped against the stone, the sound echoing across the open space.

It was not one of the four men circling me now who answered. But the putrid Gahn Thaleo himself.

“I assume you ask after your mate, Gahn Errok. She is safe and well taken care of.”

Gahn Thaleo’s sight stars flashed as he stepped out of the gloom and into the light of the bright stars and many moons.

“You have done wrong by me, and done wrong by the alliance,” I hissed.

“Have I?” Gahn Thaleo asked coolly. His hands remained folded behind his back, but I was not lulled into a false sense of security. He could shoot faster than any other man in his tribe. And we both knew it.

“You know you have,” I called across the aguir circle to him. “No worthy Gahn would let another care for his mate in his own place!”

“I agree,” came Gahn Thaleo’s icy reply.

My nostrils flared, my knuckles cracking as I gripped my weapons harder.

He heaps insult upon insult.

I would not suffer through this insolence. Not from him. Not from anyone.

Anyone but her.

“Gahn Thaleo,” I said, fighting to keep my voice steady through my rage, “you have insulted me at every turn. You hoard my mate and her friends in your mountain. I will not stand for this.”

Gahn Thaleo’s eyes narrowed as his men grew tenser, ready to send their arrows right through me the moment I made the wrong move.

I made no move with my body.

But one with words.

And it was a move far deadlier than the slash of my blade or the twang of an arrow.

“Gahn Thaleo,” I said, my words bouncing off the stone peaks and raining down upon us over and over again. “I challenge you to a taklok.”

Gahn Thaleo rarely showed expressions of surprise on his face. Whether this was because he’d schooled his face into an impenetrable mask, or because he was so viciously clever that little surprised him, I was not sure. I saw no surprise now, either, at my words.

He knew I’d come for her and challenge him.

“Gahn Errok,” he replied, his voice smooth and dark. “I accept.”

“Good,” I snarled. I tossed my blades down and ripped my bow over my head. In an instant, I’d nocked my first arrow, its deadly point vibrating with the intention to bury itself deep in Thaleo’s flesh.

Gahn Thaleo’s mouth twitched. The tiniest hint of a smile tugged at his lips. He slipped his own bow off of his chest. He, too, nocked an arrow, his sight stars locked on my face, his weapon aimed at my chest.

“Let us begin,” he roared.

I let my arrow fly.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Stephanie

“Man, I am so full,” I groaned, patting my stomach. Tilly and Nasrin nodded in agreement, breathing out heavily.

Fiona rolled her eyes. “You guys are wimps. You can’t be giving up now! They just brought out more moonbark!”

Moonbark was our new favourite thing. Some of the Deep Sky women had brought it out on our second night here, and when Gahn Thaleo had seen how we’d inhaled the sweet stuff, he’d commanded more to be made. Much more. More than we could ever hope to eat.

I eyed the platter of dessert that had just been brought into the Sky Hall and placed in front of us.

“Thank you,” I said to the Deep Sky woman who’d brought it over. She was a young, pretty woman named Zaria. She’d been the last single woman recently paired off by the Vrika. “It’s so good,” I told her, “but I truly cannot eat anymore.”

“I’ll have hers!” Fiona said, practically falling over my lap to snatch one of the bars of moonbark from the platter. The moonbark bars were soft, fudgy white rectangles made from the sweet mountain valok plants, called valikir, mixed with brolka milk. I hadn’t seen a brolka yet, but from what I understood, they were something like a mountain goat. The fuzzy grey hides in our beds were made from brolka wool.

“Be my guest,” I said with a laugh as Fiona chomped into a fresh bar. Zaria smiled, too, before hurrying back to her place beside her mate. Some of the awkwardness of our first evening meal here had faded as the Deep Sky people had gotten used to us, and us them.

At least, I’d thought it had…

But a sudden tension descended. The chattering ceased, and, apart from Fiona and her beloved moonbark bar, everyone stopped eating. I swivelled my head, frowning, trying to find the source of the weird atmosphere.

Warrek had just entered the Sky Hall, his expression furious.

“Every warrior must report to the aguir circle!”

Valeria jumped up, as did all the warriors in the hall - both our warriors and the Deep Sky ones.

“What’s happening?” Valeria asked, fighting through the suddenly chaotic crowd to Warrek’s side. All around us, Deep Sky warriors sprinted out of the hall and down the tunnel.

I jumped to my feet and started to run, too.

But I didn’t run to the tunnel. I ran to the clear wall. Panting, I slammed my palms to its cool surface and stared down. If Warrek needed all the warriors down in the aguir circle at the base of the mountain, there had to be something happening down there.

And there was.

It took me a long moment to make sense of what I was seeing.

A few warriors were spread out in a circle, all of them with arrows aimed inward. As the warriors from the hall streamed outside, they joined the circle, caging in a pair of figures in the centre.

And those two figures were shooting at each other.

“Holy shit,” Fiona said around her last mouthful of moonbark as she reached me. “Is that Gahn Thaleo?”

“It is,” Nasrin said, following close behind with Tilly.

And the one shooting at him…

“Gahn Errok,” I breathed.

“What’s going on?” I asked, my question echoing Valeria’s. I spun around, searching for Warrek. But I only caught his broad back as he charged out of the hall, following the other warriors outside.

“He said Gahn Errok initiated something called a taklok,” Valeria said, jogging over to us. “No fucking idea what that means.”

Many of the Deep Sky women had disappeared from the Sky Hall, taking their children deeper into the safety of the mountain. But a few, including Zaria, remained.

“A taklok is a mighty duel,” she said, her dark blue eyes wide. She reached up and smoothed her elaborately braided updo nervously. “Two warriors shoot arrows at each other as quickly as they can. They are not allowed to dodge their opponent’s arrows. They may knock the opponent’s arrows away, though that slows them down and means they cannot shoot back.”

“So… Wait… Who wins, then?” I asked.

She looked at me with something that almost seemed like pity. Pity for my human ignorance.

“Whoever does not die,” she answered softly.

“What the hell!” I said in English, shaking my head fiercely. “We’re in an alliance! Why would Gahn Errok come here and start shit like this?”

“I’ll give you three guesses,” Valeria said flatly.

I didn’t need three guesses.

I only needed one.

Because of me.

For fuck’s sake.

“Well, we can’t let this happen,” I sputtered at Valeria. I was worried she’d tell me no, that we weren’t going to insert ourselves into this situation. But thankfully, she agreed.

“You’re right. Both the Gahns seem to have forgotten that peace between the tribes is a fundamental part of this treaty. They can’t be entering into fucking death duels like this. At least, not if they want to remain allied with us and have any sort of access to human women.”

With that, she called Grim to her side, drew her pistol, and stormed out of the Sky Hall.

Of course, we all followed her.

We moved through the tunnel quickly, our boots scuffing along the stone incline as we ran. It didn’t take us long before we were tumbling out into the open air of the cold night.

The circle of warriors parted slightly, allowing us to see what was happening.

My eyes went wide, my mouth falling open.

Only the sound of twanging strings and whizzing arrows, coupled with Zaria’s explanation of the taklok helped me to figure out what was happening. Because based on sight alone, it was nearly impossible. The two Gahns moved so quickly their arms became blurs. Shooting and blocking and shooting again, the two huge men warred under the bite of starlight.

“They can’t keep that up for long,” I said fretfully, not realizing I was wringing my hands. I stopped the motion, shaking my fingers viciously at my sides.

“I think that’s kind of the point,” Fiona said grimly, all traces of her usual humour gone. “Whoever gets tired first gets shot.”

I shook my head, biting down hard on my lips. I was so fucking pissed at Gahn Errok I could barely breathe.

And even more than that, I was scared. Scared I’d see a man die in front of us. Gahn Thaleo, though not a warm person by any means, had still been hospitable to us. He’d fed us, taken note of what we liked and needed, and had been more than generous so far. I didn’t want to see him get hurt or die, especially when this was feeling more and more like my fault. Which was dumb, because it obviously wasn’t my fault. But it still felt that way.

And as for Gahn Errok…

As much as I absolutely hated what he was doing right now, and as much as he drove me up the alien fucking wall, I didn’t want to see him get hurt, either.

I walked forward. I would have walked all the way into the circle if the nearest warrior’s tail hadn’t shot out to block my path.

“Stay back during the taklok,” he ordered, his arms bulging with tension as he held his bow and arrow trained on Gahn Errok.

I swallowed and nodded, knowing I wouldn’t get any further into the circle right now even if I tried.

I returned my gaze to the two men at the centre of the circle.

Gahn Errok seemed to have gained the upper hand. Or, rather, he’d just given up on blocking altogether. His arm flew, arrow after arrow pounding through the air and forcing Gahn Thaleo into a pattern of defensive blocking. One of Gahn Thaleo’s men hurried forward and refilled Gahn Errok’s quiver, and another man did the same for Gahn Thaleo on the other side before either of them could run out of projectiles.

One of Errok’s arrows found its mark. It zoomed by Gahn Thaleo’s head, slicing his ear badly. The wound bled profusely, coating his scars in a fresh river of black blood.

Gahn Thaleo didn’t seem to register the injury at all – didn’t even flinch. But I still couldn’t control my shocked cry of horror. I wasn’t going to stand here and watch Gahn Thaleo get killed over me.

“Gahn Errok! Stop!” I yelled.

The merciless rhythm of Errok’s arms faltered. His head snapped to the side. His sight stars found my eyes instantly, and I gasped. Those sight stars blistered. Got inside me like lightning. Hot and electric and –

And… Gone.

Errok’s gaze went dark as an arrow slammed through his chest.

He fell to his knees, then collapsed.

A scream split the air as I started to run.

It wasn’t until I reached Gahn Errok’s lifeless form on the ground that I realized the scream was mine.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Stephanie

Ishould have known Gahn Errok was too stubborn to die that easily. His form wasn’t so lifeless after all. I fell to my knees beside him, terrified, only for him to take a deep, wheezing breath and rise unsteadily to his knees. I fell backward onto my ass in shock, staring at him open-mouthed as he placed his right palm flush to the end of the arrow poking out from his chest. His face contorted into a mask of fury and pain as he shoved his palm inward, painstakingly pushing the arrow further into his chest.

Scrambling to my hands and knees, I leaned around to see the arrow’s point sliding out of Gahn Errok’s back.

“What are you doing?!” I exclaimed, crawling back around to his front once more. “You need to lie back down!”

“If I get this out,” he rasped, “I can still shoot.”

“If you take that out, you could bleed to death!”

He ignored my very logical and practical statement.

His gaze was hazy, but he forced it into focus. I turned to see what he was looking at. Gahn Thaleo stood, still and silent, watching with piercing eyes.

“Oh, definitely not,” I told him. “We are completely done with this macho competition nonsense.”

Errok’s gaze slid to mine.

“It is not nonsense,” he hissed. “This is our way.”

I sighed. I didn’t want to be the ignorant human who clomped in here and stomped all over another people’s culture. But at the same time, I didn’t want to watch two men kill each other over me.

“This may be a tradition for your tribes,” said a voice from above us. Valeria stood with her gun in her hand. “But don’t forget that the terms of our treaty require peace from all parties. Violence between the tribes means you lose access to human resources… And human women.”

Gahn Errok looked so pissed that I was sure he would have jumped up in protest if not for his injury. I’d stopped him from pushing the arrow all the way out of his chest. My eyes fell to the bloodied staff poking out his front.

“Violence? You have left me with no choice but violence,” Errok panted. His breath caught, and he groaned, slumping forward until his hands were planted on the ground.

“You’re not thinking straight right now,” I said, panic starting to set in once more. Based on the fact that he was conscious and breathing, I didn’t think the arrow had pierced his heart or a lung. But an arrow through the chest was no mild injury. Who knows how much he’s bleeding internally right now…

“Gahn Thaleo!” I cried, twisting to look at him. “We need a healer!”

Gahn Thaleo didn’t move.

“Please!” I said, rising to my feet. Gahn Errok was phenomenally lucky that he hadn’t just died. I didn’t want to lose that luck now.

“That is not the way of the taklok,” Thaleo said, his gaze cold. “Gahn Errok came here and challenged me. He knew the risks.”

“But that’s not fair!” I said, feeling tears bite at the back of my throat. “The only reason you hit him is because I distracted him! If I hadn’t called out to him, he probably would have won. And you know it!”

Not that I had wanted that to be the outcome, either. I hadn’t wanted to see Gahn Thaleo hurt. But my words were true, and he knew it. The scarred side of his face twitched.

“Gahn Errok has caused much havoc for our people,” Thaleo growled. “I will not subject one of my healers to caring for such an unworthy warrior. I will grant you access to our stores of Vrika’s blood. But that is all.” His voice got lower, harder, if that were even possible. “I am committed to the alliance with you. But if you want him healed, you’ll do it yourself.”

I pursed my lips, then finally nodded. I didn’t love that we were now responsible for what could be an extremely complicated injury, but it was better than nothing. I knew Gahn Thaleo was already forgoing tradition and his own hatred to allow us that much. I wouldn’t get anywhere pushing that proud mountain Gahn further than he’d already bent.

“We have to get him inside,” I said hurriedly to Valeria. I crouched down, slinging one of Gahn Errok’s heavy arms around my shoulders.

“That won’t work. He’s too big. Grim, get over here to carry him!” Valeria called. Grim was at her side in an instant, his claws reaching for Gahn Errok’s slumped form.

“I am not a cub, nor a sick old man. I can walk with my own power,” Gahn Errok snapped, fangs flashing.

Valeria rolled her eyes.

“Just be ready to catch him when he falls over,” she said quietly to her mate.

Gahn Errok slid his arm off of me. I stood, planting my hands on my hips, wanting to grab him by the shoulders and shake him as hard as I could. He was wasting precious time and energy with this stupid display of pride!

“You may not be a cub or an old man, but you are seriously injured!” I reminded him as he got, very slowly and laboriously, to his feet.

Remarkably, he was able to stand on his own, just as he’d claimed. His bow was still held fast in his hand despite his fall. He slung it across his body and then he pressed his fingers to the bloody flesh around the arrow’s shaft.

“This is not the worst injury I have suffered in recent days,” he grunted.

Why do I feel like that remark was specifically aimed at me?

“Ah, yes,” I said with a roll of my eyes, “because romantic rejection is definitely as bad as dying of blood loss from an arrow wound. Christ, you’re so dramatic! Can we just get inside and get you healed already?!”

He didn’t move. His sight stars pulsed weakly as his expression turned from one of ferocious determination to one of grimly restrained rage.

“If you believe that this injury is worse than the loss of your love,” he rasped slowly, every clipped word precisely chosen and aimed, like a weapon, “then you know nothing of the mate bond. You know nothing of need.” He straightened to his full height, despite the obvious pain it caused, and added with damning finality, “And you know nothing of me.”

With that, he began to walk, slowly but determinedly, across the stone circle and into the mountain of his oldest enemy.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Errok

That did not go as planned.

The plan had been to best Gahn Thaleo and pry my mate from his claws. The plan had been to stand proud and victorious at the end. Not bloodied and saved from death by the begging of my woman.

The fact I am using Gahn Thaleo’s Vrika’s blood at all is shameful beyond measure.

The sense that I was losing control grew stronger with every step I took through the aguir circle. I never normally would have lost that taklok. Never, ever, would have gotten distracted before.

But things had changed. It seemed more and more as if there were two vastly different portions of my life now. Before my mate.

And after.

And no matter how I tried to reconcile those pieces, no matter how I tried to get their frayed edges to fit…

They didn’t.

Clearly, Gahn Thaleo had sent Warrek ahead. He was ready with a jar of Vrika’s blood when I entered into the broad entrance hall of the mountain. I stopped before I reached him.

I blinked.

It was bright in here. Much brighter than it should have been.

I took note, with mounting rage, of the firelight glinting from behind kaktuir pockets in the walls. We did not need such light to see.

This is for the new women.

My chest tightened, making me hiss with pain. That tightening wasn’t from the injury. It was from my fury. Fury for what Gahn Thaleo was up to. To the new women, his efforts likely seemed to be simple hospitality. But I knew better. Gahn Thaleo was a ruthlessly calculating Gahn and he never did anything lightly.

I had no doubt that his changes to the mountain, as well as his inviting the new women here so soon after their arrival, was all about positioning himself as the better Deep Sky ally. About making himself out to be the more agreeable Deep Sky Gahn. So that in case of conflict, the new women would side with him instead of me.

Both Lerokan and I had mates from among the new women. He did not. So, he needed some other connection. Some other way to ingratiate himself among the new women. And by specifically taking my mate into his mountain, he knew that I would be forced to come for her. He knew our culture dictated a taklok in such a situation. He’d orchestrated things perfectly so that he appeared to be the more responsible Gahn. The better Gahn.

My fury deepened and twisted when I realized that my charging in here so violently would have done nothing to dispel the image Gahn Thaleo had created in the new women’s eyes.

To a Deep Sky warrior, to any person of our culture, my actions would be understood. Everyone at that taklok knew I was justified. It’s why Gahn Thaleo’s warriors didn’t kill me on sight when I challenged him. They all knew that Gahn Thaleo should not have been taking care of my mate in my absence. No warrior would ever respect a Gahn who let his woman disappear into the mountain of another.

But the new women would not understand this. To the new women, and to my exacting mate, I’d only proven myself unpredictable and unreliable. A hazard of a Gahn who did not respect their treaty.

Every instinct I have leads me astray. Nothing I do, nothing I understand, will ever be right in her eyes.

I eyed the closest kaktuir lantern, barely resisting the urge to drive my fist through it.

Who cares if Gahn Thaleo made a few lanterns? I will make a hundred. A thousand. I’ll make so many that the stars will turn their faces away in shame, outdone by the gleaming beacon of my mountain.

I would set every valley ablaze with light for her.

“Your Vrika’s blood, Gahn Errok,” Warrek said, watching me through a narrowed gaze.

Either he was confused about why I’d stood glaring at the lanterns for so long…

Or he was watching me closely for any sign that I was about to keel over and thus spare them from wasting any Vrika’s blood on me.

Curse you, Warrek, for thinking a single arrow could take me down.

I reached for the jar.

“Thank you!”

A tiny white hand reached past me, taking the jar of Vrika’s blood from Warrek before I could grab it.

I turned (slowly and stiffly as I was unable to twist my torso) to find Zuh-Tephanie at my side.

I’d been so preoccupied with my own inner turmoil and the cursed glittering lights that I hadn’t even noticed she’d followed me in here.

Foolish, foolish Gahn. You should always know where she is.

I am doing many things wrong tonight.

“Hand it over so I may get this finished in peace,” I said to her, holding out my claws for the jar. A sudden wash of weakening pain made me squeeze my eyes shut briefly. When I opened them, I found Zuh-Tephanie’s gorgeous, strange eyes burning a hole through my head.

“Yeah, right. How do I know you’re not just going to pass out and die in some dark corner before you even get to use any of this stuff?”

“I doubt you’d care if I did,” I snapped.

Her slim brows flew upward.

“Wow. You really think I’m that heartless?”

“Oh, no,” I growled, stepping closer. Her scent wafted over me, making me even weaker than the pain did. “You are not heartless. I can see your dizzying pulse at your throat. It calls to me and mocks me, all at once. That heart is in there, alright. You just refuse to let me have it.”

She inhaled sharply through her nose, rolling her eyes up towards the entrance hall’s ceiling.

Why is she looking up like that? Do not tell me there is some even more impressive light display up there.

“I’m going to ignore how difficult you’re being because I know you’ve got to be in a buttload of pain,” she said. She dragged her eyes back down from the ceiling to my face.

“What is a buttload?” I grunted.

“It means, like, a load. A lot.”

“Hmmph. What is butt?”

Her cheeks inexplicably darkened to a luscious pink.

“Do you really need to know that right now?!”

“Yes.”

Let no man ever say I do not try to understand my precious mate.

She sighed forcefully and spun, transferring the jar into one arm against her side. With her free hand she gestured at… Her backside?

“You think I have a backside of pain?” I said, frowning, as she turned to face me once more.

Maybe I should let her think my backside is in pain. Maybe she would deign to rub it…

“It’s just a saying! God, we are not going to do this right now!”

She kept the jar of Vrika’s blood pinned to her side with her left arm, then snatched at my hand with her right.

Then she pulled. With much more force than I would have thought her capable of.

Maybe it was the sweet oblivion of her voluntarily holding my hand for the first time.

Maybe it was the blood loss.

Maybe it was the kaktuir-clear fact that, for this day and all my days to come, I was utterly helpless against her.

Whatever it was, I followed her. Followed her deeper into the mountain of the man I hated most.

And I knew I would do it a thousand more times. Pierced by a thousand more arrows.

She could lead me off the edge of a cliff if she wanted.

I would not give a peep of opposition.

As long as she held my hand.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Stephanie

“Are you going to make it?’ I asked, suddenly worried that we should have taken the alien elevator. Had the tunnel always been this fucking long?

“Kindly stop doubting my strength,” Errok muttered. “Otherwise, I will have to find another boulder for my back to prove myself to you. Again.”

Despite the insane situation, or maybe because of it, I snorted, laughter overtaking me.

“Fiona totally said you would do that!” I wheezed, struggling to breathe. I adjusted my hold on the jar of Vrika’s blood against my side, worried I’d drop it now that I was literally shaking from laughing so hard.

“I am glad my shows of mighty strength are so amusing to you, mate,” Errok said testily, sarcasm saturating his words.

That just made me laugh even harder.

But my laughter died in my throat at a sudden change in his voice. It grew raw and wanting and wistful. Maybe even sad.

“I love your laugh.”

My fingers jerked involuntarily, tightening my hold on his huge hand. Electric heat buzzed under my skin everywhere his hand touched mine.

“How about we just stop talking for now,” I murmured, feeling flushed and weird and freaking awkward. I would have added something about him needing to conserve his strength, but obviously, he wasn’t going to take a comment like that well. Hell, he’d probably start trying to work out with the arrow still jutting out of his chest just to prove me wrong.

I glanced uneasily at his chest from the side, cringing at the blood-soaked shaft I saw there.

Errok was so blasé about what had happened that it was easy to forget just how serious his injury was. And just how lucky he’d been. One slightly different angle and the arrow would have gone right through his heart or a lung. And for all his brash bravado, I knew even he wouldn’t survive something like that, even with a trained healer. That kind of wound had almost killed Camille’s mate, Varrow. It was only the divine intervention of the Vrika itself that had saved Varrow.

“Just for the record, I am glad you didn’t die,” I said softly, squeezing his hand slightly.

His breath hitched.

“I thought you said we should stop talking?” he said, speaking even more quietly than I had. As if, if he spoke quietly enough, I’d forget that I’d said we should stop talking.

Which, in all fairness, I literally had already forgotten.

“Oh, yeah. Right,” I said. I cleared my throat.

We’d made it to the guest quarters we’d been sleeping in, and I was glad to have the change of scenery. The narrow confines of the tunnel had grown oddly intimate. Too intimate.

I tugged him through the first cave that Zoren, Vaxilkai, and Bariok had been sleeping in and into the large room that us girls had been sharing. We were alone – everyone else was apparently still downstairs.

Can you call it downstairs if it’s at the base of a mountain with a tunnel instead of stairs?

Whatever. Focus!

“Try not to bleed on the bed too much,” I muttered as I tugged him over to my side of the bed I’d been sharing with Fiona. At least the bed was so big that, even if he did bleed all over it, it wouldn’t reach Fiona’s side. Something went all wiggly and weird inside me at the thought of sleeping in blankets stained by this massive alien’s blood.

“I may be the mightiest Gahn of the Deep Sky,” Errok growled, “but even I cannot command my blood thus.”

“Mightiest Gahn of the Deep Sky who almost got himself killed tonight,” I shot back. “Now sit down!”

Gahn Errok looked like he wanted to argue, but mercifully, for once, he knew when to shut up. He plopped down onto the hides in the bed.

“Not as good as the mattresses in my mountain,” he grumbled, shifting from side to side.

Well, there goes the whole knowing when to shut up thing.

“You have an arrow sticking out of your chest and you’re commenting on how uncomfortable the bed you’re sitting on is?!” I asked in disbelief.

His sight stars snapped viciously to my face.

“Maybe it’s the butt pain,” he snarled.

I blinked.

Then burst into laughter once again.

“At this rate, you’re never going to get healed. I’ll be laughing my head off while you’re bleeding to death over here,” I said shakily, forcing myself to breathe. I knelt down on the stone floor beside the bed, directly in front of him. Gahn Errok eyed my throat with sudden unease.

“Can… Can that happen?” he asked, leaning closer and peering at my neck as if it were about to snap in two before his eyes.

“Oh, yes,” I said with mock seriousness. “Human women’s heads can pop off for any number of reasons. The number one reason being overbearing men annoying us.”

He looked stricken for a moment before my face broke into a grin, giving away the joke.

He scowled. “Then it is a good thing for that little neck that I am neither overbearing nor annoying.”

“Guess that depends on who you ask,” I teased, still grinning.

“Ask anyone in the Deep Sky for confirmation,” he scoffed.

“OK. I’ll ask Gahn Thaleo.”

He paused, grinding his fangs together before grunting, “Anyone but him.”

“Hmm. OK. I’ll ask your little brother, then.”

“No. Do not ask him either. Ask… Anyone except for those two.”

I shook my head, chuckling softly.

Then I froze.

Hold on… Am I fucking flirting with Gahn Errok?

And am I flirting with him while he bleeds all over my goddamn sheets because I’m not healing him?!

“Stop distracting me,” I said brusquely. I took a deep breath, my stomach twisting when I looked at the arrow shaft in his chest.

“So… I guess we need to take that out first,” I said, suddenly feeling entirely unprepared for this.

But clearly, Gahn Errok wasn’t feeling that way. Just like he’d done outside, he placed his palm on the butt-end of the arrow at his chest and began to shove.

“Wait!” I cried, stumbling forward on my knees to grab his wrist. “I’m not ready yet!”

“You do not need to be ready. Because I am. I’m always ready,” he said.

“Smooth,” I said, rolling my eyes.

Was there ever a moment in conversation with this guy that didn’t serve as a chance for him to try to show off?

“But I’m serious,” I continued. “We need to take off all these straps and your bow and stuff so that I can see what’s happening and have more clearance for the Vrika’s blood.” I didn’t want to waste even a moment fiddling with a weapons strap that might get in the way. The millisecond that arrow was out, I had to be ready with the Vrika’s blood.

Gahn Errok grunted, gingerly taking his bow off over his head. Then, he slipped his quiver off of his back. The straps turned out to be trickier. They were a lot tighter and closer to his body, and some of them needed to be reached from the back to undo the knots in the leather-like straps.

When Gahn Errok reached back to start on the first weapons strap, his breath lurched out in a painful sound.

“OK, stop right there,” I tsked at him. I scooched around on my knees, shuffling onto the bed beside him. I kept moving until I was behind him.

“Just hold still,” I muttered, sweeping my eyes over the work ahead.

His hair was in the way. Even though it was tangled from his flight and fighting, the strands looked incredibly silky and perfectly straight. The firelight gleamed on it, turning it into an inky river with blue highlights that shifted bronze in the warm light in the cave. I needed to get all that hair out of the way. I shook myself, despite how weird and intimate it felt to be touching him like this. We need to get a move on and get him healed.

I gathered his hair in my fists. I was right - it was silky. And thick. My two hands barely circled the entire gathered clump of his long hair.

Working quickly, I gently brushed off his hair to one side, slipping it forward over his right shoulder. As I settled his hair there, out of the way, my knuckles skimmed across the back of his neck.

He let out a twanging huff of a breath, a slight tremor going through his muscles.

“Sorry. Did that hurt?” I said, yanking my hands back.

“It did. But not in the way you think,” he groaned. A raw, aching edge had crept into his voice.

I cleared my throat, my face heating and focused on the task at hand once more.

Without the dark curtain of his hair blocking my view, I could see more of the damage. I grimaced at the brutal, bloody tip of the arrow jutting out of his back. The river of his hair had been moved, only to be replaced with a slender river of black blood that pulsed from the wound and trickled down the natural valleys created between his muscles.

And holy shit, speaking of muscles…

Muscles upon muscles upon muscles.

No wonder he was able to keep that boulder up there for so long.

But that wasn’t important right now. I got to work undoing all the straps that lined his back, taking care to remove the heavy blades without cutting either of us in the process.

I laid all the weapons down on the stone floor beside his bow and quiver of arrows.

“Hold on. Just one more thing,” I said, quickly rising and jogging over to my pack. There was some first-aid stuff in there. I was hoping the Vrika’s blood would be sufficient to stop the bleeding quickly, but there was both an exit wound and an entry wound. I’d need to quickly slosh the Vrika’s blood on his back wound, then scramble around to the front without him losing too much blood. While I was getting around to his front, I could reach around and apply pressure to his chest with some gauze.

Oh, even better, I thought, is I could soak the gauze with Vrika’s blood first…

Gahn Errok watched me with the wild wariness of a trapped animal as I returned with the first aid kit. Like he didn’t know if I were going to set him free…

Or tighten the bonds that had snared him.

“Don’t give me that suspicious look. You know I’m here to help you,” I said, uncorking the jar of Vrika’s blood. Inside, the fantastical liquid swirled and glowed, thick and milky.

He snorted mirthlessly.

“I am beyond help,” he muttered sullenly.

I smiled despite myself.

“You’re telling me,” I joked. “But not where this injury is concerned, at least. Come on. Let’s get this done.”

I got on my knees once more, shimmying behind him on the bed. I got the gauze ready, soaking its centre with Vrika’s blood. Clutching the soaked gauze in my left hand, I reached around, my hand hovering over the butt of the arrow, ready to slam against his chest wound. My other hand clutched the jar, ready to pour it directly onto his back.

“OK. Ready,” I said. My stomach clenched, my heart hammering against my chest as Gahn Errok started to push the arrow out from the front once more.

It was a horrible, sickening sight. The arrow slowly working its way out of his back. But I didn’t let myself look away. As much trouble as this guy had caused me, I wouldn’t let him face this alone.

“Jesus! Why do you have to make your arrows so big and long,” I lamented. The stupid arrow staff never seemed to end! It was easily as long as my entire arm. I even had to move to the side at one point to keep the tip of the arrow from hitting me as it slowly, painstakingly ejected.

“I am sure they seem large to you,” Gahn Errok panted, his voice gravelly with pain and effort. I sensed a slight smirk in his voice, then, when he said, “But as this is Gahn Thaleo’s arrow, it is nowhere near as large as one of mine.”

“Whatever you say,” I replied. I didn’t bother telling him I could see his quiver of arrows right beside us, and I could tell that they were generally the same size and design as the one nudging slowly out of his body now.

“This is as far as I can push,” Gahn Errok said suddenly, the arrow’s movement halting. “You will have to pull from the back.”

“Oh, hell no!” I cried in English. “I agreed to help heal you. I didn’t know I was on arrow-pulling duty, too!”

But there was no way around it. Unless he was going to shove his fist into his own chest to keep pushing. And we’d already established that the wound made it nearly impossible for him to reach around from behind to pull it from the back himself.

“Alright,” I said in the Sea Sand language this time. I put down my gauze and jar of Vrika’s blood on the bed beside me. I didn’t like that I had to let go of them. It meant that I’d have to move even faster once the arrow was out to stop the bleeding.

Swallowing against nausea rising in my throat, I tentatively reached forward and grasped the arrow shaft with both hands. I wasn’t a particularly squeamish person, but I’d also never had to pull a weapon out of somebody’s chest with meticulous precision. The shaft of the arrow was smoothly polished bone, perfectly straight and slick with Gahn Errok’s hot black blood. Swearing, I let go of the shaft to wipe some of the blood off with spare gauze before returning my grip. I had much better purchase, now. Now that the blood wasn’t slick and wet on the shaft, it turned sticky between my palms and the bone, practically gluing my hands there.

“I’m going to start,” I breathed. I gave an experimental, gentle tug.

It didn’t budge.

OK. I’m going to have to pull harder than I’d thought…

Work on the ranch with the horses back home had kept me in pretty good shape. My upper body strength was solid.

“I can do this,” I whispered to myself.

“Yes. You can,” came Gahn Errok’s surprising reply. Surprising because I hadn’t really realized I’d said my previous sentence out loud.

And surprising because of the sincere belief in his words.

He sounded… Encouraging. Maybe even kind.

Gahn Errok believing in the abilities of someone other than himself? Must be the blood loss turning his brain into mush. I better get this done fast.

Without another word, I gritted my teeth, widened the stance of my knees on the bed, and started to pull. A sharply physical memory of playing tug o’war as a kid resurfaced in my body. Only this time, I wasn’t playing an innocent game with friends. I was fighting for this man’s life.

The arrow began to move. So fucking slowly, it slid back through Gahn Errok’s body. Sweat beaded on my brow as I pulled.

Gahn Errok hissed, his tail jerking weakly on the bed between us. His claws sank into the hides as he attempted to lean forward to hurry up the process.

There was a ragged grunt of pain, and his movements ceased.

Instinctively, I started talking to him, without even thinking about it, the way I’d talk to a frightened or injured horse.

Obviously, he wasn’t a damn horse. He was more than seven feet of lethal, arrogant alien muscle. A man with more power than almost anyone else I’d ever encountered, and the ego to match.

But pain could make even the strongest of us into something other than ourselves. And there was something to be said for the instinct and nostalgia of muscle memory. The comfort of words from home suddenly finding their way to my lips, even if they were translated into another language.

“That’s it, there you go. You’ll be alright, sweet thing,” I crooned between pants of exertion. “Steady, steady there. It won’t be much longer.”

I wasn’t sure if I was talking to Gahn Errok now, or myself. Maybe both of us.

“Not much longer now,” I repeated. “Almost there, sweetheart.”

The arrow surged out of him in a torrent of blood.

I gasped, dropping it in shock.

Shit! Get the stuff!

I twisted to the side, snatching up the Vrika’s blood. Thankfully, even in his state, Gahn Errok was faster than me. He pressed the soaked gauze to his chest, slumping forward, while I sloshed Vrika’s blood onto the wound at his back.

For a long, agonizing moment, I couldn’t see what was happening. The white Vrika’s blood mixed with his dark blood, creating a pulsing, greyish ooze that flowed down his back.

I added some more Vrika’s blood, thankful that Warrek had given us such a big jar. I still needed some for his front, too. That little bit on the gauze wouldn’t be enough.

Yes!

The new Vrika’s blood had rinsed some of the bloodied stuff away. Already, I could see that the flow of blood had been vastly reduced. I patted his back dry with clean gauze, then added another slosh of Vrika’s blood for good measure.

It’s working.

Satisfied that the bleeding from his back was taken care of, I hurried around to his front, still moving on my knees.

Once again, all his hair was in the way. I tossed it behind his shoulder.

“Move your hand,” I whispered.

I needn’t have said it. Gahn Errok’s eyes squeezed shut, and his hand slid down his body, leaving a trail of blood in its wake.

He slumped further forward, colliding with me, his forehead on my shoulder.

“Sit up!” I cried, pushing at him. “I can’t get at the entry wound like this!”

My words did nothing. And me shoving against him did even less. He was losing consciousness, his frame of packed muscle turning heavy as stone against me.

“Oh, no you don’t!” I snapped. How dare he try to die on me! “I am not done with you yet!”

Angry, panicking, and unsure what else to do, I grabbed a fistful of his hair, near the scalp, and pulled as hard as I could.

Gahn Errok’s head snapped up, a weak snarl forming on his lips.

I moved around to his side, still pulling his hair.

“Come on, come on, this way!” I commanded, his hair in one fist, the jar of Vrika’s blood clutched in the other.

The pain of the hair-pulling had woken him up just enough for him to lean back once more. With a heavy thump, he collapsed onto his back in the bed, the mattress bouncing with his immense weight.

“Just stay like that,” I said urgently, moving quickly. Before I knew it, I was straddling him, my thighs spread across his waist, just above his pelvis.

“Sight stars on me,” I ordered him, maintaining fierce eye contact with his hazy gaze as I leaned forward and sloshed Vrika’s blood onto his chest wound.

His chest rose and fell weakly, but he managed a strangled reply.

“My mate,” he choked out. “I… obey.”

And he did.

His sight stars pulsed and pulled slowly inwards, focusing on my face through his dizziness.

“Keep your eyes open. Keep looking at me,” I said as I broke eye contact to look at his wound. Relief coursed through me, tightening my throat and chest as I watched the Vrika’s blood slow, and eventually stop, his bleeding. I poured more into the wound, wanting as much of it as possible to get inside his chest before the surface wound closed up. It wouldn’t help to simply seal off the outside if he was still bleeding internally. But it seemed to be working – the Vrika’s blood surged down into the cavernous wound of his chest, stopping the bleeding from the inside out. Lying on his back like this was good – gravity was helping get the Vrika’s blood deeper inside.

Breathing out heavily, I leaned back, sitting upright on top of him.

Is he still conscious?

He was. His eyes were heavy-lidded. Nearly closed.

But in the hazy crack of his weakly glittering gaze, his sight stars remained steadfast.

Trained on me.

Always, always, on me.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Errok

I’d been holding up well enough with the arrow in my chest. But once the arrow had come out, the blood had poured with intense vigour. Which was perhaps not surprising. Every action of my body was vigorous at all times. Even that of my blood spewing out.

The result of that spewing blood, however, was a sudden lack of vigour that displeased me greatly.

I did not want to be weak in front of my mate.

But I had to admit, in this moment, it had its advantages. Namely the fact she was seated upon me, sweet thighs spread across my frame.

Sight stars on me.

Cursed skies, even with the blood loss, I felt the stir of my cock at the echo of those words.

She was a vision, more perfect than anything I could have dreamed, even with her hair all askew and her hands coated with my blood. Or perhaps because of those things. Her slight weight sagged against my pelvis as she breathed out heavily.

“How do you feel?” she croaked. She sounded exhausted. Like I’d put her through some great trial. And maybe I had. She was not a healer as far as I knew.

And yet… She’d healed me.

“Strong as ever,” I breathed, the words barely above a whisper. Her brows rose at that, and she did that odd back and forth movement of her head.

“Obviously,” she retorted. She sighed, looking down at the black palms of her hands, stained by my blood. “I’d better go get cleaned up.”

“No,” I said, the word slipping out before I could stop it. I liked seeing her with my blood on her skin. I liked seeing that I’d marked her in some way. That, for the briefest of moments, she was mine.

But she ignored me, sliding off of me and standing up. I watched her. I may have been practically immobilized, but my sight stars tracked her every movement.

“I don’t want to go too far while you’re in this state,” she said, seemingly more to herself than to me.

“What state?” I attempted to scoff, but it came out sounding weak and reedy.

“The half-dead on my bed state,” she replied flatly, pinning me with an unimpressed look. “I’ll just clean up in the heated pool right here. I don’t want to risk going around the corner to the other area where I can’t see you.”

I hadn’t been this deep into Gahn Thaleo’s mountain before, so I couldn’t say for sure. But if it was anything like mine, the other area she spoke of likely had clear, running mountain water and basins both for relieving one’s bodily functions and washing one’s hands.

But she was not going there. She was staying here. With me.

Getting in the heated pools.

Naked.

I attempted to sit up, but a bout of dizziness forced me back down.

I will never forgive Gahn Thaleo for making me weak the first moment my mate undresses in front of me.

Then again, the fact he’d sent an arrow through my chest was also the only reason I was here in this cave with her now in the first place.

I chewed on that annoying fact, trying to decide whether to be angry or grudgingly grateful to the obnoxious, scarred Gahn.

But all thoughts – thoughts of anger, thoughts of Gahn Thaleo – thoughts of anything but her in my head ceased when she stepped up to the steaming edge of the water.

She started with the shells she wore on her feet. Using the encased toe of one foot, she hooked it against the heel of the other and slid her left foot out. She did the same on the other side until both feet were freed. They still had thin fabric coverings, which she peeled off quickly. I stared in entranced fascination. I’d never seen her feet without their protective outer layers before. They were small and pale, like the rest of her, so oddly clawless with many tiny toes. I could not for the life of me understand how her ankles worked. They were so low to the ground! Her feet were flat, jutting out from her ankles along the ground. It was a miracle she could walk at all with anatomy like that. A mysterious miracle. For it truly made no sense to me.

The only thing that did make sense was her utter perfection. In all her strangeness, all her awkward angles of bone, all her parts so different from my own, she was as flawless as a cool flight through the sky of early dawn.

The next part to be removed was her stiff human cloak. It crinkled even more than usual, not because of the nature of the fabric, but because of the dried layer of my blood cracking along its surface. She held the garment in her hands, wrinkling her high, bony nose at the sight. The greyish material was entirely black at its front.

She crouched, scooping water onto the jacket’s surface. Rather surprisingly, the blood came clean off and left no stain. That annoyed me. The marks my blood had left on her skin would no doubt be washed away. Why could the mark on her cloak not remain?

Evidently satisfied with her work, Zuh-Tephanie set her cloak aside.

Then, my near-bloodless heart stopped.

Because she was pulling at the leg coverings she wore, wriggling them over her narrow hips and down her legs. She was seated on the stone with her back to me, so I could not see her legs, nor what was between them. She appeared to wear some kind of tight loincloth beneath her leg coverings that further obscured my view of her.

And yet, even that glimpse was entirely overwhelming. I let out a broken moan.

Her head snapped back to me.

“Stop looking over here. Just focus on getting some rest,” she said, eyes flashing.

“You are the one who commanded my sight stars remain on you,” I shot back. “As far as I know, I have not yet been released from that command.”

“Oh.” The irritation in her expression softened. Somehow, that softness was even harder than the arrow she’d pulled out of me. “Ok then. I release you now. I’m not even getting fully undressed, so don’t get too excited over there. That probably wouldn’t be good for your recovery.”

“How do you know?” I asked testily. “Perhaps seeing something exciting is exactly what I need to recover. A man needs something to live for, you know.”

Her mouth opened and laughter spilled out, the sounds both bright and rough, like unpolished gems tumbling to the floor.

I had already said it once tonight.

I could not help but say it again.

“I love your laugh.”

Her laughter quieted, and she fixed me with a thoughtful stare.

“I didn’t expect to be laughing so much. You’re actually pretty funny, Gahn Errok.”

I certainly liked hearing her laugh and seeing her happy, but I had never really thought of myself as funny before. I was brutally strong, headstrong, and hard-fisted. Relentless and determined and deadly.

But this little creature thinks that I, greatest Gahn of the Deep Sky, am funny.

I was not entirely sure that was a good thing.

So, I asked.

“Is that a good thing?”

The pale pink, lash-lined lids of her eyes drew back, widening her gaze slightly.

I found I could not stand her hesitation. I pressed her harder.

“Being funny. Is that an attractive trait? Do you like that in a man, in a mate?”

Is that the sort of thing that could make you love me?

She flattened her mouth, pressing her lips together. This made her lips oddly white, while her cheeks flushed dark pink.

She uttered a single word before shunting her hips forward and plunging into the heated water. And with that single word, I felt a whole new world of hope open up before me.

“Yes.”

CHAPTER TWENTY

Stephanie

Heat flamed under my skin, and it wasn’t because of the hot water that now enveloped my body. It was because of the massive, annoying alien lying in my bed. Only, in this moment, he wasn’t annoying me. Not at all.

It was slightly alarming how fast my dislike for him had faded.

It’s just because he almost died in front of you, I reasoned, frowning while I scrubbed at the bloodstains on my palms. It’s not because you might actually be starting to like him.

I glanced up, peering through the steam at the bed to find his glazed eyes still on me. I crouched lower, deeper into the water, even though I was still wearing my tank top, bra, and panties. I was even more covered up than I would be in a bikini at the beach, and I still felt the need to hunch down and hide from his gaze.

The fact I was trying to stay out of his gaze wasn’t all that weird.

It was the reason for my hiding that was knocking me off my axis. If I’d merely hated him, I wouldn’t really care if he saw me in what essentially equated to a bathing suit.

But my feelings, apparently, had suddenly grown a lot more complicated.

That moment on the bed, pulling the arrow out so painfully slowly, had been undeniably intimate. But it wasn’t the simple closeness of the fact I’d had his blood pour all over me, the fact I’d spread my legs over his body while I’d literally held his life in my hands.

No, it wasn’t just that.

It was the other things – the ways he’d surprised me tonight – that were making things so suddenly new and complicated. For example, the way he’d made me laugh. Apart from choice conversations with Fiona, I didn’t think I’d laughed this much the entire time I’d been on this planet. And then there were the slices of authentic vulnerability he’d shown me tonight.

And the way he’d obeyed.

The throb of heat inside me grew more intense, moving deeper. I never would have expected this arrogant Gahn of the Deep Sky to look at me like I ruled his entire world and utter the words, “I obey.”

Our eyes met through the steam. Despite the fact that I’d released him from the sight stars on me command, he clearly had no interest in looking anywhere else. An odd wave of self-consciousness broke over me, different from the one I’d had a moment before about being too exposed in front of him. I mean, right now all he could see was my head above the water.

And even that felt like too much.

I wonder what he sees when he looks at me…

Right now, it probably wasn’t a pretty picture. I could tell my hair was a mess, falling out of my ponytail and turning all weird and wavy from the steam. I hadn’t washed my face yet, so it probably shone with oil and sweat and the occasional streak of Gahn Errok’s blood. It was late at night, now, so I assumed I must have looked pretty exhausted, too.

Why do I care what he sees when he looks at me? I’m not here to be pretty for him. I don’t even like him!

But more and more, this night was turning that last statement into a lie. I didn’t love him or anything. Obviously not! But there was an annoying and undeniable surge of attraction for him that had deepened with the new glimpses I’d seen of his personality tonight.

Honestly, it scared me.

“Has anyone ever fallen out of love here? Like, can the mate bond ever… Stop working?”

I cringed, hardly believing I’d said the words out loud.

Gahn Errok’s healing chest rose with a deep breath.

“No,” he said, the word as decisive and cutting as the deadly blow of a blade. “Some people – usually women – in generations past ignored the mate bond and chose other partners. Usually, because they wanted sons that their mates could not give them. But that bond, those feelings, they never disappear. The sacred mate bond grabs hold of you like the long, squeezing body of a pattarak – it winds around you until you cannot breathe. And it never lets you go.”

I nodded wordlessly, my chin sloshing in the hot water. His answer made me feel… Weird. All prickly and somehow heavy and floaty at the same time. I hated that I’d even had to ask the question. Hated that my father and what he’d done made me weak enough to, even now, even in an entirely different world, need that kind of reassurance.

I was mulling over what he’d said when he lobbed a question back at me, distracting me from my thoughts.

“I assumed that the human mate bond, this falling in love, was just slower to establish in the new women, but that it was just as permanent and strong as our mate bond once it eventually appeared. Is this not the case?”

I laughed bitterly. “Nope. Sorry. Love is fickle. Some people fall in and out of love like the changes in the weather. Some people fake it the entire time.”

I was never entirely sure which of those options had described my father. Whether he’d actually loved my mom and me or not. He’d certainly left us far too easily for any of his feelings, if they’d ever been real, to have been permanent. My fists clenched beneath the water, thinking of the way my mom had tried so hard not to fall apart when he’d left. The way she’d doubled down on her own love for me, doing everything she could to make me feel worthy and enough. Like I wasn’t a kid who somehow deserved to be abandoned.

But in the end, even she had left me too soon, too. Not that dying had been her fault – of course not. But to an anxious and angry teenager trying to make sense of the world, I was ashamed to say it had felt like a sort of betrayal. My grandma, who took over my guardianship while I was still in high school, hadn’t had the money for therapy. But she had a friend at a ranch just outside Calgary who would let me come help out with the horses.

And that pretty much saved my life.

“You sound upset,” Gahn Errok said.

“Just bad memories,” I muttered tensely, swishing my hands through the water. “I don’t really like to talk about it.”

I expected him to press me further, or to at least ask, “Why?”

But he didn’t. Instead, he surprised me by saying, “I understand.”

His sight stars glittered, piercing through the steam despite his loss of strength.

“You do?” I asked.

“Yes. We are more alike than you realize, Zuh-Tephanie.”

“We are?” I asked, not sure if I should be shocked or offended or what. How was I similar to this cocky, possessive alien king? This man who’d barged into my life, insulted pretty much everyone I knew, and had challenged our host to a freaking death match tonight?

But when he answered me next, I felt like I was the one who’d been shot through with an arrow. This hulking alien from across the universe had seen right through me, peeled back the layers and punched right through to my core with his words.

“Neither one of us,” he said softly, “wants to be weak. Especially in front of others.”

When the hell did he get a psychology degree?!

It was confusing and infuriating and terrifying that he was so fucking right.

I didn’t want to be weak. I didn’t want to be vulnerable. I didn’t want to be the woman with my world turned upside-down like my mom had been. I never again wanted to be the confused and crying child I once had been.

I didn’t want to fall in love because that meant that shit could fall apart. And I wasn’t convinced I’d be able to put the pieces back together again.

I’d already had to do that on Earth. And there were still pieces missing. Little jagged holes left behind.

My jaw worked as I tried to figure out what to say next. My instinct was to deny everything, to push back against Gahn Errok. Distance myself – protect myself – from his words. From him.

But I was stopped, maybe saved, from doing any of that by the sudden cacophony of voices and footsteps coming into the cave.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Stephanie

Our entire party entered the cave, shattering the weird intimacy that had expanded between Gahn Errok and me.

“Oh! Fuck me, did you have to let him bleed all over our bed?” Fiona moaned when her eyes landed on Gahn Errok. I straightened in the water, looking over at the bed and seeing the scene through her eyes. In my hurry to clean myself up and let Errok get some rest over there, I hadn’t cleaned up anything else. Though he wasn’t actively bleeding now, his skin was coated with a dried grey mixture of his own blood and Vrika’s blood. Yet more blood darkened the hides on the bed beneath him and around him.

“At least he’s on my side of the bed,” I said, feeling oddly defensive of Gahn Errok in that moment. Yes, he’d kind of brought this injury on himself by challenging Gahn Thaleo to the taklok. But it was also because I’d distracted him in the heat of the moment that he’d been shot. And even though I’d literally told him something similar – I’d told him not to bleed all over the bed – I felt strangely protective of him when Fiona complained about it.

“It doesn’t even matter,” Valeria said. “Gahn Thaleo has offered us alternative arrangements for tonight so that Gahn Errok doesn’t need to be moved.”

“I am not used to being spoken of as if I am not here,” came a reprimanding growl from the bed.

Fiona, who was closest to the bed, nearly jumped out of her skin at the sound.

“Christ almighty! I thought you were asleep or something. How are you still conscious?!” she said, her eyes huge beneath the blunt edge of her bangs.

“Unwavering will,” he hissed.

“And Vrika’s blood,” I reminded him sardonically. I decided, however, not to remind him about the fact he very nearly did lose consciousness. At least, not in front of the others. Apparently, my sudden, new protective urge also included not wanting to disparage him in front of my friends. His words from before came back to me so forcefully I practically heard them in the steamy air. Neither one of us wants to be weak in front of others. Maybe I wanted to protect that part of him because I understood it. Because, like he’d said, we were more alike than I’d realized.

Truly, I was glad he was still awake and that he hadn’t passed out. Now that the Vrika’s blood had gone to work inside him and he was lying down, he definitely seemed better than before, as evidenced by all the arguing. Undoubtedly, he’d still need recovery time, though.

“We brought some food and more Vrika’s blood for him… For you,” Tilly said, first to me then to Gahn Errok.

“Thanks,” I replied for the both of us, trying to cut Gahn Errok off before he said something typically ungrateful that offended everyone in the room.

I crouched back down in the water, dunking my face and head under the surface to fully rinse this night from my body. When I emerged again, I found Gahn Errok’s sight stars searching for me, his head straining off of the bed. As if my disappearing beneath the water even for a second had sent him into a panic.

“Grim is going to stay here tonight and the rest of us will be moving to another set of guest caves,” Valeria said. “Since Grim doesn’t sleep much, he’d be the best candidate besides Tok to keep an eye on you, Gahn Errok.”

“Oh,” I said, scraping soaking hair back from my face. For some reason, that bothered me.

Is it because I don’t want to burden anyone else with looking after Gahn Errok?

Or because I specifically want to do it myself?

Gahn Errok seemed just as displeased by Valeria’s proclamation.

“I will not have another male watch over me in my sleep,” he spat savagely. “That is an insult of the highest order.”

“It’s not an insult,” Valeria said, pinching the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger. “It’s a necessity. Gahn Thaleo won’t let his healers tend to you and we need somebody to make sure you last the night.”

“I refuse to die tonight,” Errok told Valeria as simply and surely as if he told her he planned to have a bath before bed. “And even death would not dare defy me.”

I held back a shaking laugh while Valeria cast her eyes upwards as if begging some unseen force for patience.

“I’ll stay with him.”

The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them. That seems to be happening a lot tonight.

All eyes, human and alien, swivelled to me.

I got out of the heated spring, water dripping down my body. Gahn Errok’s gaze dragged so feverishly from my face to my feet that I had to remind myself I was feeling the hot water droplets coursing downward over my skin, not literally feeling his sight stars touch me. Despite how warm I was, my nipples hardened beneath my wet clothing.

I cleared my throat and reached down for my backpack, picking it up.

“I’m going to get dressed and then we can finalize all the plans for what’s happening next. I’ll be right back,” I said.

I turned and hurried away from the group, desperately aware of the way my soaked panties were clinging to my ass. Not that anyone was likely looking there besides Gahn Errok.

But it was precisely Gahn Errok’s gaze that made anxious heat hurry my steps.

I moved into a little stone alcove area that functioned as a bathroom and dropped my pack. The bathroom had two basins – one built into the wall, and one down on the floor. The floor-level one was an ingenious sort of toilet. Cool mountain water ran through this room from a crack high above in the wall. It collected in the higher hand-washing basin before spilling down the wall and into the other basin. The result was that the toilet basin was continually being rinsed out, the contents disappearing down into a small hole in the rock. There was sudsy moss that acted as soap, too, to wash your hands in the higher basin.

This spot wasn’t exactly like a room in that it had no door. The rock wall curved almost all the way around the little toilet area, but not completely, leaving a gap.

It was through that gap that Fiona slid, uninvited, just as I was peeling my soaked tank top from my body.

I gasped, my exhausted heart slamming in my chest.

“You scared the shit out of me!” I said, tossing my heavy tank top down on the floor, being careful not to drop it in the toilet basin.

“Who’d you think I was?” she asked. She raised an eyebrow. “Gahn Errok?”

“What? No! What are you talking about?” I stammered. I grabbed a small cloth from my pack and started scrubbing my damp skin to dry it.

“I don’t know. I sensed a… A vibe, if you will,” she said, leaning against the curved rock wall and crossing her arms over her chest.

“And just what kind of vibe are you talking about?” I grumbled, even though I knew exactly what she meant. I’d felt it myself. The intimacy.

She could probably tell I was being obtuse on purpose. But she answered me anyway.

“A vibe characterized by you being all half-naked and wet in the pools and staring at Mister Fallen Angel of the Arrows. And it was a vibe that only got stronger when you, the person I thought disliked Gahn Errok most, volunteered to stay by his poor, muscly side all night like some kind of sexy nurse.”

“Fallen angel? Really?” I sighed. I guess I’m not the only one who noticed his darkly angelic looks.  “OK, first of all, I was covered in his blood. I had to get in the pool to clean up,” I said tensely, stripping out of my wet bra and underwear and dragging fresh clothes onto my body. “Second of all, you saw how he reacted to the idea of Grim looking after him. He won’t accept it!”

“Since when do you care what he will or won’t accept?” All hints of suggestive teasing had disappeared. Her question confronted me in the small room, stark and unavoidable.

“I feel weirdly responsible for him. When I called out to him during the taklok, that’s when he got hit by the arrow.”

“Yeah, but you calling out also saved Gahn Thaleo’s life, and probably helped avoid an all-out war between the tribes that would have caused way more bloodshed,” Fiona pointed out.

“OK. Maybe,” I conceded. “But still. I feel like I should look after him. I don’t want to burden Grim or anybody else with it.”

“How is it a burden? Valeria said herself her big red lug only needs a fraction of the sleep we do. The only burden for him would be listening to Gahn Errok complain all night.”

Now that I was fully dressed in fresh undies, pants, and a new tank top, I had nothing else to distract my gaze or my hands. I faced Fiona, feeling like she was staring right into my soul.

“This is what I’m talking about. The vibe,” she said, nodding sagely as if she’d just confirmed some scientific hypothesis.

“Can you please stop using that word?” I groaned.

“No. It fits too perfectly. Because there is a vibe, now. It wasn’t there before. And that vibe is telling me that you want to stay with him all night because you want to be close to him.”

I paused, chewing on the inside of my cheek, unwilling to admit that she was pretty much 100% correct. Instead, I settled on sourly muttering, “I am feeling extremely attacked right now.”

Fiona’s gaze softened. She pushed off from the wall and wrapped me up in a hug.

“I might think he’s a massive prick, but you’re clever as fuck and have one of the best heads on your shoulders I’ve ever had the pleasure of encountering. I have immense respect for you and your awesome brain, so I respect your decisions and your feelings, too, whatever they may be.”

I returned the hug, relaxing into the embrace. I hadn’t realized how much I’d needed to hear those words until right now. To hear that I wasn’t an idiot for starting to grow closer to the last man on this planet I thought I’d ever want to. My own brain was already telling me I was an idiot. So, it was nice to have my best friend refute that. Even if it did end up being true.

“Just no funny business tonight,” she said as she withdrew. She wagged a finger at me. “That bloke barely has enough blood in his brain at the best of times, even when he’s not injured. Best not to send the last dregs of it to his dick.”

I slapped a hand over my mouth to keep from gasping or laughing loudly. I wasn’t sure which.

“I am not going to do that!” I whispered forcefully, suddenly concerned about Gahn Errok’s excellent alien hearing. “That would be insane! Besides, I barely even know how I feel about him!”

“I’m just saying. You’re going to be playing the sexy nurse for the injured warrior. It’s got that whole romantic hurt comfort vibe.”

“Again with the freaking vibes!”

She grinned. “You know I’m right.”

She reached down and grabbed my wet things from the floor, dumping them into my arms.

“Come on. We’d better get back out there before Gahn Errok kills himself trying to get out of bed to drag you back.”

I wanted to tell her, no way, he wouldn’t do that. It would be too colossally stupid when he needed rest.

But I didn’t.

Because, just as she’d said…

She was right.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Errok

If my mate had taken any longer returning to my side, I would have gotten up and dragged her back myself, no matter my cursed weakened state. But just as I was readying myself to dredge up every last morsel of fortitude left in my body so that I could stand up and find her, she appeared.

The other new woman, the one who’d complained about me being in the bed, was with her. My mate was dressed once more in dry clothing. I lamented the loss of the sight of her wet and exposed even more than I lamented the loss of half my body’s blood. The blood I would get back.

I might not get to see her undressed again…

No. I will.

I had vowed that one day, she would love me as I loved her. And I did not intend to break that vow.

Zuh-Tephanie stopped beside me, facing away from me. My sight stars licked desperately at the backs of her legs as she spoke.

“I’m all good to stay here tonight,” she said to Valeria and the others.

“Are you sure?” Valeria asked.

“Of course, she is sure. Do not question my mate,” I snapped. Zuh-Tephanie shot me a withering glance, then turned back to Valeria.

“Yes. I’m sure.”

“Alright, then. Zoren, Vaxilkai, and Bariok will still be at their posts in the adjacent cave if you need anything.”

As if sensing I was about to object to this, Valeria leaned around my mate and spoke directly to me.

“That part is non-negotiable,” she said, her voice so firm it was like the smack of my aunt Tilka’s hand on the back of my head.

“Fine,” I gritted out. Never before would I have capitulated to such demands.

But it would be worth it to spend the night with her.

It was not long after that that the rest of the group dispersed. The sky had already swallowed more than half the night, and everyone was weary. Not me, though. Some of my strength had returned thanks to the Vrika’s blood and the short rest, and my body thrummed with aching energy at the thought of having Zuh-Tephanie with me all night long. Even if all she did was stare hatefully at me from across the cave, I would take it. I would do anything just to breathe in the air she exhaled.

Zuh-Tephanie walked with the others to the cave’s exit and bid them goodnight. When they’d all left – apart from the three Sea Sand men who were annoyingly stationed in the next cave – she walked back to my side. She planted her hands upon her hips in an odd stance, frowning down at me.

Perhaps I was right. Perhaps she does just mean to glare at me all night…

“You’re a mess,” she said.

Now I was the one frowning.

“I’ll have you know that I usually take much greater care with my appearance.” This was true. Good hygiene and presentation had always been important to me. Doubly so, now that I had a mate to woo.

“Oh, I know,” she said.

Ah. So, she has noticed my efforts, then? She’s been impressed with my meticulously-maintained appearance?

Apparently not. Her next words obliterated any hope of that idea.

“Vanity is pointless. Everyone’s looks fade eventually.” She crouched down beside me, casting an appraising gaze down my body. “But even so, we definitely need to get you cleaned up for the night.”

I glowered at her as she rifled through her pack to find a spare scrap of clean hide.

“So, what then? Strength means nothing to you, apparently, and neither does the upkeep of my appearance. What do you actually look for in a male? Besides being funny, that is.”

Being funny was not enough. It wasn’t as if I could make her laugh so hard that she lost all strength and fell helplessly upon my cock.

She didn’t answer me for a long moment, instead taking her time to stride over to the heated pool. She dunked the clean hide into the water, then walked back with the sopping thing in her hands.

She knelt beside me and began to dab gently at the dried fluids on my chest and abdomen.

I almost wondered if she’d forgotten my question. I opened my mouth to ask it again because, cursed peaks of the Deep Sky, I would go out of my already half-crazed mind if she didn’t just tell me what to do to make her love me.

“Generosity,” she said suddenly. “Kindness. I guess, someone who makes me feel safe.”

“You will always be safe with me,” I said fiercely.

Her hand halted, but she recovered quickly and began her movements once again. The hot wet cloth was a tantalizing drag across my hide.

“But will you be generous?” she asked. “Will you be kind?”

“To you? Of course.”

“But what about to others? People from the other tribes? The other Gahns?”

“I hope you are not telling me that the only way to win your love is to be kind to Gahn Thaleo,” I said flatly. “You can’t have already forgotten the arrow he sunk into my chest. You pulled it out yourself.”

Her brows drew inward and she let out an irritated sigh. “That’s because you barged in here and caused chaos! Things were going perfectly fine around here before you came in here guns, er, arrows blazing!”

Grunting, I forced myself up into a seated position. I needed to clear this up for my mate, and make it clear now.

“What are you doing? Lie back down!” Zuh-Tephanie smacked the wet cloth against my chest, trying to push me back down. But I remained firm. My head swam for a moment. I swallowed hard, and things settled enough for me to say my piece.

“You speak as if I have done some great wrong,” I snapped. “As if I have done great harm to the alliance for no reason. But this is because you do not understand our kind. You do not understand me, nor the ways of the Deep Sky. If you did, if you had bothered to ask me anything about what had happened with a willingness to listen to what I had to say, you would know that Gahn Thaleo committed the first wrong. Gahn Thaleo shamed me greatly by bringing you here. In accordance with our culture’s oldest and most sacred laws, I was well within my right to call the taklok. In fact, our ways demanded that I do it. Gahn Thaleo knew exactly what he was doing when he brought you here without me. He knew exactly what the outcome would be because there could have been no other outcome but a taklok.”

Zuh-Tephanie stared at me, her eyes wide and her lips parted with shock.

Fine. Let me continue to shock her, then.

I placed my own hand atop her small one, pressing it harder to my wounded chest.

“The moment Gahn Thaleo invited you into his mountain, he knew that I would come for you. He knew that our ways would demand a taklok for the insult he’d heaped upon me. In fact, I now think it likely he brought you here not only to lure your party closer to his tribe for his own benefit, but also to force me into the taklok in the hopes that he would win. So that he could finally end me.”

Zuh-Tephanie’s lower lip trembled slightly. I gnashed my fangs, longing to slide my tongues along its softness.

She clamped down on that quivering lip with her teeth. Her gaze fell to where I held my hand against her chest.

“Well, I suppose that gives a little more context to the situation.”

Her gaze met mine again. Concerned and questioning.

“Are you telling me the truth?” she asked. “Do you really think Gahn Thaleo invited us, me, here to manipulate you into the taklok?”

“I believe that was a large part of his motivation, yes. And look how well it worked out for him,” I said bitterly. “In your eyes, he is the gracious host, innocently defending himself against my jealous violence. The Deep Sky people know that what I did was justified by all laws and measures. But you new women do not. And thus, I become the monster. Well, if I am the monster in this situation, it is because he has made me so. And at the same time, he made himself out to be the kind one. The generous one.”

Those last words were poison on my tongues. Gahn Thaleo had painted himself with the exact things Zuh-Tephanie looked for in a male. And in doing so, had made me the unreliable one. The unsafe one.

She said she wanted someone who always made her feel safe…

I will be that man. Whether she recognizes it or not.

I swear that I will be that man.

“I’m sorry.”

Maybe I should lie back down. I’m hearing things…

But she said it again. And I saw her lips move with the words.

“I’m sorry.”

“Sorry for what?” I asked tensely, every word placed as carefully as claws upon thin ice. Sorry for rejecting me? Sorry for not loving me? Sorry for making me wait this cursedly long?

I barely breathed.

“I’m sorry for judging you so harshly about the taklok. Like you said, we obviously didn’t understand the cultural implications of everything that’s happened here so far. I didn’t know what Gahn Thaleo’s invitation would mean. I honestly thought you were just being way over the top.”

Her hand curled into a fist under my palm. Her tiny blunt claws scraped my flesh, sending a throb down my spine.

“And I’m sorry for not anticipating this,” she continued. “I should have understood your motivations better than I did. I mean, these things happened in the Sea Sands, too. Gahn Baldor literally launched a full-scale attack on our settlement to get to Theresa. So, I’m starting to understand the culture around this stuff a little better.” Her eyes flashed. “But even so, you need to understand our culture, too! For us, challenging a man to a death match is not an appropriate response for simply inviting a woman and her friends over to his place. Even if she’s supposed to be your mate. There has to be peace here.”

I breathed out heavily, finally allowing her to guide me down onto my back.

“No warrior would have respected me if I had let Gahn Thaleo keep you here without challenging him,” I muttered up at her.

Her response was whispered. Barely audible.

“But I would have.”

Oh, little creature. I do not think you know just how you wound me.

“Well, if Gahn Thaleo wanted you dead-”

“Oh, he does,” I cut in tersely.

“Then why give you any Vrika’s blood and let you stay here to get well again? I know he said he wouldn’t get his healers to tend to you, but why help you at all now?”

“Do you think you and your friends would have reacted kindly to that outcome?” I asked. “If he had refused all your demands and let me bleed out on the stone? No. He is more clever than he is proud. In that instance, he would rather have let me live than risk losing the alliance with you. He had likely hoped to kill me swiftly before any of you even knew about the taklok taking place below. Once I was dead, he would have claimed it was all in simple self-defence, since I had been the one to come here and challenge him. But when you and the other new women came down and tried to stop everything, he knew he’d lost his chance to kill me without human witnesses and repercussions. And he knew he’d potentially lose his place in this alliance if he let me die there. Once I’d been shot, he could no longer claim that my death was mere self-defence, because I’d already been largely incapacitated.”

My abdominal muscles clenched as she skimmed the damp cloth across my waist. Her hand was so slight, and the damp cloth had cooled. So how did that little touch send every nerve aflame?

“Well, we will need to have a talk with Gahn Thaleo,” she said, frowning down at her hide cloth swirling over my bloodied skin.

“If by talk, you mean I need to send an arrow through the centre of his skull, then yes.”

She snapped the cloth away from my stomach, clenching it in a furious fist. She pointed a single, tiny, and oddly intimidating finger at my face.

“No. That is not happening. I told you, there has to be peace. Promise me, Errok. Promise me you won’t retaliate.”

I was fairly certain that this was the first time she’d called me Errok without the title of Gahn attached. It made me feel very odd indeed. I wanted to be recognized as Gahn – recognized for the very thing that should have made me more than worthy of her.

But nothing I valued about myself seemed worthy in the eyes of my mate. Being Gahn meant nothing to her.

But maybe Errok, the man behind it all, could mean something.

What that could mean, I had no idea. Who was that man, the one behind the title and the strength? Who was I, if not the greatest Gahn of the Deep Sky?

Who was I, if I did not avenge myself against Gahn Thaleo?

“You take too eager an interest in protecting him,” I seethed.

“I’m taking too eager an interest in protecting you!” she exclaimed. “I can’t…” Her voice cracked. “I refuse to go through this again!” She waved the hide cloth in a vague gesture over my chest, no doubt referring to the injury I’d suffered.

She’d said she was glad I hadn’t died. It had shocked me. I knew I had not won her heart yet, and up until tonight, I was reasonably certain that if she ever saw me hanging by my claws from the edge of the cliff, she would walk away and thank fate for ridding the world of me. Perhaps after giving fate some help by stomping on my fingers.

“Did it hurt you? To watch me suffer?” I said carefully, trying to keep the ragged, bleeding edge of hope out of my voice.

“Yes,” she said bluntly. “But that’s because I’m a normal, compassionate person. It would have hurt me to see Gahn Thaleo suffer too, just so you know!”

Curses.

“Then you must be hurting deeply, now,” I told her bitterly, “because your words are making me suffer.”

She resumed stroking the cloth against my skin. I nearly lost myself to the cooling, flaming rapture of her touch.

But I was not so lost that I missed the confusion on her face.

“What do you mean? Are you jealous of Gahn Thaleo?”

I forced out a bark of a laugh that I immediately regretted. My ribs screamed, and I gritted my fangs against the pain.

“What would I have to be jealous of?” I hissed between my clenched fangs. “I am Gahn Thaleo’s superior in every way.”

“I mean, because I just said it would hurt me to see him suffer,” she clarified. She needn’t have done so. I knew exactly what she was asking me. And, blast it all into the cursed sky, she was right.

I remained sullenly silent. I expected the silence to stretch between us, but Zuh-Tephanie spoke again, surprising me. She studiously avoided my gaze, speaking somewhat haltingly.

“You have no reason to be jealous of him. For a time, I’d thought you were the last man on this planet I could ever want to be with.”

Her words were like blows.

“Are you trying to heal me,” I interrupted crossly, “or to kill me for good this time?”

She smirked, still avoiding my gaze.

“Let me finish. After spending some time around Gahn Thaleo, I realized I was wrong. I realized pretty quickly that he was actually the last man on this planet I’d ever want to be with.”

My breath stilled. But I could not stop the surge of the next question.

“Why?”

I needed to hear all the ways Gahn Thaleo had failed to impress her. One, so that I could feel secure once again in my superiority over him. And two, so that I did not lose that sense of superiority by making whatever mistakes he had made and thus forfeit what little ground I’d gained with my mate.

“He’s… I’m not sure. Too reserved. Cold. Or maybe just excellent at hiding his emotions.”

“And I am not?” I pressed, hating how much I loved this. How much it soothed something deep inside me, to hear her tell me how I was different from him.

“You, cold?! Or good at hiding your emotions?” She snorted. “You are the exact opposite of that.”

Her eyes finally found their way back to mine.

“If Gahn Thaleo’s a mountain, then you’re a storm.” She suddenly stopped, chewing on her lip, looking unhappy.

“What is it?”

“I’ve always loved storms.”

My heart did not seem to be working properly. I’d thought her words from before might kill me, but I felt entirely more sure that she was actually killing me with hope, instead. She said I was like a storm and that she loves storms. I will become the stormiest storm that ever stormed over these mountains.

I just needed to know how.

“And how, precisely, am I like a storm?”

She paused, looking thoughtful for a moment.

“You’re chaotic,” she began. “Astonishing. Swirling in and out of my life with the kind of drama only gale-force winds could come up with. You sweep everything around you up into the centre of your force. The eye of the storm.”

I frowned, suddenly unhappy with the comparison.

“A mountain will always withstand a storm,” I pointed out. Why does Gahn Thaleo get to be the mountain in this analogy? But she did that head shaking thing that often seemed to mean “no.”

“Only temporarily. But there’s erosion. Even mountains will be ground down by the wind and the rain eventually.”

“I don’t like waiting for eventualities,” I muttered. I wanted to watch Gahn Thaleo ground down to dust now.

“You don’t say,” she murmured, smiling and raising a brow at me. “Alright. I’m done with your front.”

I pressed my chin down to my chest, seeing that my skin had been wiped entirely clean. The wound was healing, but it was still a deep divot in my flesh. Zuh-Tephanie’s eyes lingered on the wound, too.

“As long as you don’t move too much I don’t think you’ll need stitches. The worst damage is probably inside where I couldn’t stitch you up, anyway. Not without some kind of surgery.” She stood, hustling over to the heated pool to rinse the rag, then came back. Kneeling once more, she asked, “Can you roll onto your side? I want to clean your back, too.”

With a suppressed grunt of searing pain, I did so. My breath came quick and shallow, my skin tingling as I awaited her touch. I was facing away from her, so I could no longer see her. Only sense her.

My skin sparked when her hand came back to it. The cloth was once again warm from the water. It contrasted with her other cool hand that rested lightly upon my upper arm, steadying her as she worked.

Her touch was too much. More than I could bear.

And nowhere near enough.

It made me want to howl. Howl, like the tempest she’d said I was. Howl and beat down upon the world until there was nothing left but her and that terrible, torturous, not-enough-and-altogether-too-much touch.

“Are you alright?” she asked, the cloth stilling. “Your breathing’s changed.”

“Yes, I’m fine.” I mangled the words. Do not worry, mate. I am merely falling apart, that is all.

No, I was not falling apart. I was being torn apart. The tearing blast of the arrow was nothing compared to my mate’s achingly soft hands upon me.

And yet, despite the tearing, despite the torture, despite the sweet dismemberment that seemed to hang suspended in the air above me like the promise of a beautiful knife, I knew that I could never ask her to stop.

I’d take whatever she had to give me.

Even if I shattered in the process.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Stephanie

I’d taken my sweet time cleaning Gahn Errok’s back, trying to procrastinate on what I knew had to come next. But there was no way around it, now.

His loincloth had to come off.

His skin was clean, but the fabric around his hips – the only thing left on his body now that his straps and weapons were removed – was soaked with his blood. He was still lying on his right side with me kneeling behind him.

“Alright,” I said, trying to sound professional and efficient and not as flailingly awkward as I felt. “You need to take that off.”

“Take what off?” came his reply. He’s really going to make me spell it out for him, isn’t he? I wanted to be annoyed with him but found that I couldn’t be. His voice sounded thick. Almost dazed. I’d been cleaning him in silence for a long time. Maybe he’d drifted off to sleep for a bit.

“The only thing left on your body, obviously,” I said. I poked at his hip. “Your loincloth.”

“You mean my cock cloth?”

“Potato, potato. Yes.”

“What’s a pahtaytoe pahtawtoe?”

“It’s a root vegetable. Nevermind. Would you just take this off?”

I poked his hip again, a little harder this time, but wrenched my hand away when his tail jerked in response.

“Why must I remove it? Though I would gladly accept your healing below my waist, I feel it is only fair to remind you that I have no injury there.”

“Your loincloth is filthy. Completely soaked with blood,” I told him, rolling my eyes.

His tail twitched. Then, without warning, his left arm snapped down to the hip I’d poked a moment before. Within seconds, before I could get my bearings enough to look away, he’d unloosed the garment from his body, letting it fall until it was trapped beneath him.

I suppose I need to look to make sure he doesn’t need to be cleaned down there…

But he didn’t. The loincloth had soaked up his spilled blood and the Vrika’s blood, leaving his skin clean.

I ascertained that immediately. Which meant I should have been looking away right about now.

But I wasn’t.

My eyes were glued to his fucking ass. Even relaxed on his side like this, his glutes were hard, round, and strong, perched above violet-tinged tree-trunk thighs. His tail swept downward and to the side, a muscled line resting on the mattress and giving me far more of a view than I would have had if he’d been standing up with his tail falling straight down behind him. My face burned. My throat went dry.

Thank God I wasn’t on the other side of him when he undressed, I thought. If his ass is turning me into such a fucking idiot, I don’t even want to know what seeing his cock would do.

With great effort, I forced my gaze away. And with even greater effort, I yanked the loincloth out from under his significant bulk.

My heartbeat bludgeoning the inside of my head, I hurried away from him, washing the garment in the heated pools then laying it on the stone near the fire to dry.

But now I was faced with a whole new conundrum.

Because there would be no way to avoid seeing his cock, now. When I turned around, I’d be walking back towards his front.

I am not some cock-obsessed idiot. I can do this! Just pretend he’s got nothing down there at all. Or picture something else between his legs. Something nice and calming. Like… A sunset. Or a kitten. Or a beach. A kitten on a beach during a sunset.

Because of our earlier conversation, though, all I could picture was a fucking potato. And not just any potato. One of those insanely long, tapered-but-girthy sweet potatoes that made you do a double take in the grocery store.

Oh my fucking God. Someone put me out of my misery.

Huffing out a heated breath, I hurled my body around to face him, keeping my gaze fastened on the ceiling as I stomped back.

“What are you looking at up there?” Gahn Errok asked.

“It’s what I’m not looking at,” I groaned. “Ah, shoot. We still need to get you into the clean bed.”

I didn’t like the idea of him walking anywhere, but I didn’t want him sleeping on these blood-soaked hides. Maybe I could drag him somehow…

But he saved me from having to do that by rolling over again, then once more, until he’d rolled out of the bed and onto the stone. This way, I could strip the bed and he wouldn’t have to move to the other.

“Thanks” I muttered. I squatted, yanking all the sticky, blackened hides away and dumping them in a pile. Luckily, just as his loincloth had protected his skin from the blood, the hides had also protected the mattress. I swapped the dirtied ones out with the clean ones from the other bed. Gahn Errok rolled onto the freshly-made bed, sprawling on his back. It took damn near everything I had not to submit to the magnetic pull his lazily spread thighs exerted on my gaze.

I’d expected him to look happy, or at least relaxed, now that everything was nice and clean. But he scowled, his nostrils flaring.

“These hides smell like the other new women. I preferred the bloody ones. Beneath the stench of blood, I could still smell you.”

“Yeah, these are from Tilly and Nasrin’s bed,” I said with a shrug. “It can’t be helped. You can’t sleep on those bloodied things. Besides, these hides will smell like me again soon enough.”

His sight stars pulsed with surprise.

“Don’t look at me like that,” I said, crossing my arms. “Just because you’re the Gahn doesn’t mean you get to kick me out of my own bed and make me sleep on the hard floor. I’m dead on my feet over here. There’s no way I’ll be able to sit up all night to watch you. Which means I need to be right beside you in bed so that hopefully part of me will notice and wake up if you do something stupid. Like stop breathing.”

I wasn’t actually concerned about that possibility. If I truly thought he might run into trouble during the night, there was no way I’d stay here on my own with him. Because what I’d said was true – I was brutally exhausted. My eyelids felt like they weighed about a thousand pounds as they hovered over dry, gummy eyes. It wasn’t just my eyelids. My whole body felt heavier.

“Move over,” I muttered. Kind of a pointless phrase. The bed was huge. He didn’t actually need to move over.

But, surprisingly, he did, scooching on his back further to one side. Something bounced between his legs. Shit. I scrunched my eyes shut and tumbled into the bed beside him.

Well, I’ll give him one thing. This guy certainly knows how to surprise me. Never before would I have imagined I’d be willingly sharing a bed with Gahn Errok tonight. But, strangely, once the shock of it wore off, it didn’t feel so bad. In fact, it felt kind of nice.

“Want some?” I asked, holding up the hides and offering to toss them over him. Please, please say yes so that you’re not just sprawling out like that in the open all night…

“No,” he grunted. “With the fire nearby, I am more than warm enough.”

“Suit yourself.” I’d noticed this about the Sea Sand men, too. When it got cold at night, they seemed relatively unbothered, while us humans would add layers and try to get cozy.

I pulled the hides up over myself, wiggling until I had burrowed happily beneath them.

Sighing contentedly at the sheer bliss of the physical comfort of a bed after a long day, I was about to drop off when a growly voice broke into my consciousness.

“Wait. I changed my mind.”

I cracked open one eye to find Gahn Errok on his side staring at me.

“What do you mean? I thought you said you were warm enough!”

“I am. But if you are under there then I want to be under there, too.”

I chuckled.

“You are like a child sometimes, you know that? It’s like I have a cool fort and suddenly you’re pouting that you can’t come in.”

His gaze narrowed fiercely.

“I promise you, vexing little creature, that I am no child.”

There was a heated promise in his words that made my insides curl in an alarming way.

“Besides,” he lamented, “I have lost half my body’s blood tonight. In fact, I think I feel a bit of a chill coming on. Yes, indeed I do. Surely you will take pity on me. I am the invalid here, after all.”

I gawked at him.

“What? This entire time you’ve been blowing off how serious your wounds are. Talking about how strong you are and how death would never defy you. Since when are you an invalid?”

A wicked gleam entered his gaze.

“Since it suits my purposes.” He scrunched up his face, drawing his arms about himself. “Show some compassion, Zuh-Tephanie. I fear that I may catch my death of cold out here…”

“Catch your death, my ass. And I’ve already been more than compassionate tonight, thank you very much. Fine. Here.” I loosened the hides and then chucked one edge unceremoniously on top of him.

“How’s that?” I asked.

“Not good,” he answered gravely. “I fear the only thing that can save me now from this chill is sharing body heat.”

“Sharing… Are you serious? You are naked right now!”

His gaze dipped to my chest before rising to my face again.

“The sharing of body heat would be much more efficient if you were naked, too.”

I burst out laughing. This guy was such a freaking ham. And in this moment, I kind of adored him for it. It felt so good to laugh after the fear and the stress and the blood.

“I don’t think you could handle that right now,” I said, wiping away tears of laughter. “It would overwhelm your delicate systems. Your heart would probably give out.”

“It wouldn’t,” he said adamantly. “My heart is very strong. As is the rest of me.”

“What happened to being an invalid?”

He frowned, knowing I’d cornered him.

“Ah. Right. Well, I am both, of course. I’m a very complicated male, as you will learn.”

I quirked a brow at him. “What if I don’t want to deal with ‘complicated?’”

He didn’t even bat an eye.

“I’m a very uncomplicated male, as you will learn.”

Somehow, over the course of our conversation, we’d inched closer to each other. I didn’t even realize it had happened until a deep inhale between bouts of laughter made my nipples zing with contact against Errok’s chest. And, what the hell, when had my head ended up on his outstretched right arm? And why was it so comfortable?

At some point, Errok’s left arm had curled around me. I now felt his hand, hot and possessive, splayed across my upper back. One of his rough fingertips skimmed gently across my shoulder blade, dipping beneath my tank top’s strap. That tiny sensation turned my spine electric, sparks of vivid heat moving downward into my pelvis. Without meaning to, I licked my lips. Errok’s brilliant white sight stars misted and pulsed, stroking over my face before falling to linger on my mouth.

A skull-splitting alarm bleated in my head. Panic at the proximity.

Panic at my own desires.

I can’t do this.

I rolled away from him.

But his huge fucking arm never moved. With impossible quickness, it hardened as I rolled onto my other side, caging me before I could scramble all the way away from him.

I panted. Earlier, I’d thought the injured Gahn had looked like an animal in a trap.

Now I was the one who felt trapped. And not by the iron bar of his arm holding me in place, but by the confusing, treacherous quagmire of my own feelings.

I am not supposed to like this! I am not supposed to like him!

The quagmire only deepened, threatening to drown me, when Errok spoke from behind me.

“Don’t run away, Zuh-Tephanie. Not from me. Not now.”

“I’m not running,” I muttered. “I’m rolling. There’s a difference.”

He didn’t try to drag me back. Just kept me from moving any further away as he replied.

“But the result is the same,” he whispered thickly. “Once again, I lose you. And once again, my heart is broken.”

For once, there were no eye-rolling dramatics behind his words. No theatrics, no irritation, no whining. It didn’t even sound like he was complaining about having a broken heart. He was simply stating a fact. A brutal, miserable fact.

Now my heart felt like it was the one breaking.

I remained tense on my side, my mouth hard and my eyes burning. I both hated and was grateful for the distance I’d put between us. It saved me as much as it slayed me.

It kept me lonely.

And it kept me safe.

But Errok told me earlier… He told me I’d always be safe with him.

I stifled a sob as Errok’s arm tightened where he held me. When he spoke again, it was a raw scrape in the fire-touched darkness. Like a broken claw on stone.

“I will ask nothing of you tonight. I swear to you that all we will do is sleep. Just don’t…” He inhaled shakily, his breath shattering as if he couldn’t get it around the jagged pieces of his heart. “Please don’t turn away from me.”

I don’t think I’ve ever heard him say, “please,” before. And it wasn’t just the word that was new, but the tone. His usual cocky air of command had cracked. And through those cracks, I could hear the fear.

Maybe I’m not the only one panicking.

I moved slowly, subtly, almost as if I somehow wouldn’t notice my own actions. If I thought too much about this, if I stopped to really take stock of what was happening, I’d only try to run away again. I still wanted to. Still wanted to run, as fast and as far as I could go. But even more than that, I wanted to shift and slide, one silent centimetre at a time, until I was touching him again.  Until I could feel him, solid and safe at my back. The fear in his voice had gotten inside me. Turned me breathless with something unbearably painful. Something I wanted to turn away from but couldn’t.

Not pity.

Recognition.

Tension rammed through him when our bodies finally connected again, my back tentatively touching his front. Then came the sag of his relief. His arm grew heavier as it relaxed around me, and he breathed out in a long, groaning sigh.

“What are you afraid of?” I whispered.

His head nuzzled down, his breath stirring my damp hair as he answered.

“I am not afraid of anything.”

I rolled my eyes before I closed them for the final time that night.

“Of course, you’re not.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Stephanie

Aman who wasn’t afraid of anything wouldn’t have nightmares like that.

I sat up like a shot, heart racing, immediately sensing that something was wrong. I turned my head this way and that, trying to get my bearings. The fire had almost completely died down. Apart from the slanting silver light from the stars and asteroids coming in through the natural cave window, the space was thick with darkness.

My frantic eyes landed on Errok beside me. The splashes of starlight turned his hide to shifting metal. He glistened as if he’d been painted with mercury. His angelically handsome face was twisted into a furious dark mask. Shadows pulled and streaked over him, deepening in the hard lines between clenched muscles.

He was on his back, his huge hands curled into hammer-like fists at his sides. I barely managed to dodge one of those fists when it went roaring through the air. I clambered away from him, panting, and stopped at the edge of the bed.

His fists loosened just enough for him to dig his claws into the hides, shredding them. His tail twisted on the mattress, like a python in pain. A feral growl built deep in his chest, and he arched right off the mattress.

Oh my God. He’s going to hurt himself, I realized, near-blind with panic. If he keeps this up, he’ll re-open his wounds!

I could call one of the Sea Sand men from next door…

But I rejected that thought almost as soon as it came to me. They might see him as a threat like this. If he didn’t wake up easily and kept acting aggressively in his sleep, they might be the ones to hurt him instead of him hurting himself. And even more than that, I didn’t want anyone else to see him like this. Because I wouldn’t want to be seen like this, either.

It’s up to me, then.

“Errok!” I whisper-shouted at him. I tried to keep my voice calm but firm.

He didn’t register what I’d said at all. Another growl tore out of him, turning into a ragged barking sound. His feet scrabbled on the hides as if he were trying to run. The hides that had covered us both when we’d fallen asleep had been entirely kicked aside by now, a sad, crumpled pile his sleeping body had beaten to a pulp.

“Errok!” I said, more loudly this time. It was harder to keep my voice steady. Thoughts of him bleeding internally, bleeding so deep I couldn’t stop it, made my hands shake and my head pound.

I crawled towards him, being careful of every twisting, trembling limb.

His snarls and grunts had changed, turned to a keening whimper. And somehow that was even more terrifying.

I came to a stop beside him, then, acting on pure instinct, I straddled him the way I had when I was healing him earlier. I wanted to grab his wrists and hold them in place on the bed with my weight, but I wasn’t tall or strong enough to do that.

Errok must have sensed me on him. He strained his hips upward as if trying to dislodge me, baring his fangs, his eyes screwed shut.

But I refused to let him go.

I tightened my thighs, clamping onto his waist as my hands moved over him.

I skimmed nervous fingers across his chest wound, glad to know that, at least for now, he wasn’t bleeding on the surface. I kept sliding my hands up. Up over the thick column of his throat to his jaw. His hips slammed back down to the mattress when my hands came to rest on either cheek. I shifted further up on him, making sure not to get so high that I put any pressure on his wound. But even with that in mind, and the size difference between us, I was still able to lean forward enough so that my face was directly above his.

“Errok,” I whispered. I was so close that my lips brushed his as I spoke. “I’m here. You’re safe.”

Errok’s whirling tempest of a body turned to stone beneath me.

Except for his eyes.

They flew open, his sight stars reflecting the silver light.

“Errok! Are you awake? Can you hear me?”

He remained frozen. And I noticed there was a lack of clarity in his wide gaze. His sight stars spun, frantic and fevered. I couldn’t tell if he was looking at me or looking right through me.

But he must have been able to see me, at least in some capacity.

Because one feral heartbeat later, his hands crashed to my jaw and he dragged my mouth down to his.

I gasped against him, my lips parting to make a shocked sound. That turned out to be a big fucking mistake. His tongues, all three searching, searing tendrils, plunged into my mouth.

This barely qualified as a kiss, at least compared to the kisses I’d had before. This was… Desperation. Grief and longing and fear made physical by a searching mouth and gripping hands and penetrating tongues. There was a question in that blistering, claiming kiss – an unconscious question, I was certain. But a question all the same.

Are you here? that brutal kiss asked me. Were you ever even here at all?

I could do nothing but answer.

I slid my hands down and back, wrapping my arms around his neck, opening my mouth to give him better access.

I’m here.

This was insane. I knew it was. But I couldn’t stop it. Couldn’t fight it. Couldn’t do anything in that moment but open myself to him and let him know that he didn’t need to be afraid. It’s only because he’s scared, I told myself. It’s only because it’s dark and I’m sure he feels alone…

I tried to tell myself that if it were light, if it were daytime, free from nightmares and shadows and pain, I never would have allowed him to do this.

But after everything we’d gone through tonight – all the laughter and blood and the terrifying bloom of new feelings – that began to feel like a lie.

The kiss may not have felt necessarily sexual from Errok’s side – his movements were too anguished – but as my breasts were crushed to his chest, my legs spread wide, it certainly became sexual for me. Heat catapulted into my core, and I stifled a moan.

My jaw ached.

So did my clit.

Everything whirled around me. My breath heaved from my chest as I was suddenly flipped onto my back. I stared, wide-eyed, up at Errok. He loomed over me on his hands and knees. The silvery light coming into the cave was blocked out by his broad back, turning him into a velvety silhouette of black above me. I jolted, my back arching, when his left knee slid upwards, the front of his thigh bumping the agonized place between my legs.

With the darkness clinging to him like a hooded cloak, I couldn’t make out his expression. His hair hung down on either side of his face, further shielding him from the light. All I glimpsed was a flash of sight stars and a gleam of fangs before his mouth claimed mine once more.

The anguish was still there. The howling need of the kiss. But the need was shifting, too. Changing to match my own. Turning to heat and aching emptiness. Turning carnal.

I didn’t know when I’d wrapped my arms around his neck once more. Or maybe I’d never even let go of him. I clung to him, my eyes rolling back in my head when his hand drove under my tank top, finding my breast and making the nipple grow taut and needy beneath his calloused palm. His leg shifted slightly, applying gloriously painful pressure to my clit.

He had to be awake, conscious of what was happening, because he was talking, I realized dizzily. Between fevered kisses against my lips, my jaw, my scalp, he spoke, his words roughened by longing.

“I am lost, beloved. I am lost and I wish that you would find me.” His thumb stroked roughly over my nipple, and we groaned in unison. “I waited and hungered for the mate bond. I thought it would… I thought it would make me. But it has only made me come undone.”

His hand slid inward, settling in the pounding valley between my breasts. “My love for you feels like a wound. One I know not how to heal from.”

The unmistakable, heavy drag of his erection against my belly had my eyes flying open.

“Perfect creature of pain, wound me again. Hurt me with everything you have. Just don’t-” His mouth dragged against my pulsing throat as if trying to whimper right into my bloodstream. “Just don’t leave me behind.”

His mention of wounds, the unescapable swell of his shaft against me, and the disturbingly haggard straining of his breath sent reality crashing down around me. It felt as if I were the one who’d become half-delirious from a dream instead of him.

But it was time to wake up.

He’s injured. This stops now!

I yanked my hands down from where I’d been clutching at the back of his neck and shoved his shoulders as hard as I could. Even in his weakened state, my pushing him wouldn’t have been enough to make him move. But he reared back as if scalded. He snatched his hand out of my tank top, away from where it had laid over my racing heart. As I watched him stare at his own hand as if he didn’t even recognize it, I tried to ignore the way my skin now felt far too cold without his touch.

He moved back, then slumped into a seated position between my ankles. I scrambled to sit up, smashing my legs closed and drawing my knees towards my chest.

He’s not looking at me. The thought was oddly painful. He always looked at me. So much so that it seemed excessive.

But not now.

No, now he was staring woodenly at the hides between us.

“Are you alright?” I asked, hating how shaky and weak my voice sounded.

He must have heard that weakness, too. Heard the trembling. His eyes squeezed shut, his brow creasing, his jaw hardening. He hunched forward, his hands balling into fists against the bed, looking every bit the picture of wretched despair.

Like a man who hated himself and hated what he’d just done.

I am lost, beloved.

“I should be asking you that,” he forced out. “I did not mean to… I cannot even say I was asleep, for I was not. But all the same, I would not have… That dream made me so desperate with fear, and when I woke and saw you still here with me I…”

His words ground to a halt. His eyes were open again now but still fastened upon the bed.

“I am sorry,” he finally whispered down at his hands.

Two in one night. First time I’ve heard him say please, and the first time I’ve ever heard him apologize.

He thinks he pushed me too far.

Little did he know there was no need for his apology. I’d held onto him. I’d felt the rush of heat. I’d only shoved him away because I’d remembered what a state he was in.

He thought my voice had trembled because I was terrified. I mean, I was. But not of him.

I was terrified of my reaction to him. The way I’d clung to him. The way I’d let him smash through every barrier, every wall. The way I’d wanted him. Needed him.

If he weren’t injured, just how far would we have gone?

“Errok,” I said softly. I moved to my hands and knees, crawling forwards. I came to a stop between his splayed thighs, right in front of his fists. “Would you please look at me?”

His throat worked. He let out a strangled gasp.

“It hurts.”

He looked younger like this, unhappy in the darkness without his customary sneer. It made me want to soothe him. To wrap my arms around him.

So, I did.

I kept my arms light and gentle as I circled them around his shoulders, leaning forward on my knees. I rested my cheek against the place where his shoulder met his neck, my nose brushing the side of his throat. He smelled of leather and blood and harsh mountain air.

“You didn’t push me too far,” I told him.

Shock at my words made his shoulders clench under my arms.

“I could have stopped you sooner. I should have stopped you sooner. I didn’t push you away because I…”

I didn’t push you away because I wanted you to stop.

But I couldn’t say it. Instead, I changed course. “I’m worried about your wounds. You really should lie back down.”

He didn’t fight me. Without argument, he laid his huge body back in its place. I knelt beside him, placing a tender palm over the wound on his chest. I was no longer worried that he’d done any extra damage to his wound. He was alert and didn’t seem to be in any worse physical pain than before, but I still wanted to make sure he was alright.

“How do you feel?” I asked. I shivered when one of his hands came up to cover mine.

“Like I have spilled far too much of myself tonight.”

I knew he didn’t mean his blood. He meant his words. The terrible, vulnerable ones he hadn’t been able to hold back.

I am lost and I wish that you would find me.

Don’t leave me behind.

“What were you dreaming about?” I kept my hand where it was and wriggled down until I was lying on my side facing him. He remained on his back, staring grimly up at the cave’s ceiling.

For a moment, I thought he wouldn’t tell me. Just when I assumed he’d shut down entirely, he answered.

“I dreamed of the taklok. Only when you called out to stop it, Thaleo shot you instead of me.”

I stilled against his side.

“You are so small,” he said gutturally, as if that fact physically pained him. “The arrow was so big. It tore right through you. Destroyed you. You were bleeding out on the stone and no one stopped to help you. I ran towards you as fast as I could, but the distance between us widened with every step I took.”

I remembered his feet moving in his sleep. I’d wondered if he’d been running away from something in his dream.

But it was towards something. Towards me.

“I knew that you were dying,” he continued. “I was losing you. And I cannot… I cannot even begin to explain that fear. And then when I awoke and saw you above me, strong and beautiful and alive, I… I was overcome by relief. Relief so blindly overwhelming I could barely tell it apart from despair.”

I knew that. I’d felt it in his kiss.

“I thought you said you weren’t afraid of anything,” I whispered.

His fingers twitched, then curled around mine.

“I lied.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Errok

Icould not make myself look at Zuh-Tephanie. Could not even enjoy the balm of her touch on my skin. I was too wrapped up in how hatefully weak I’d become.

No wonder she does not want you.

The first time our mouths had met, it was not because she’d given me leave to claim her. It was not because she wanted me. It was because she’d seen me trembling and terrified like a child. She was too good, too generous, and she’d let me touch her out of pity.

Pity.

The word hissed in my brain like scorching metal plunged into cold water. It made my insides curdle.

I would take her insults and her judgments and her pain. Her hate. Her claims that she would never love me. I would take it all.

But I would never accept her pity.

Soon, Zuh-Tephanie’s breathing changed. Growing rhythmic and deep. She’d fallen asleep once more. I knew I needed sleep, too. I needed to recover, and quickly.

I needed to gain back my strength, come into my full power once more.

So that I could be worthy of her love.

I wanted her love. Was desperate for it.

But even I would not accept scraps of love that were not really love at all but rather condolent charity.

I refuse to be pathetic. I refuse to be pitied.

I am Gahn Errok. I will remind my mate of my power and prowess, over and over again, until the pity is ripped away and she is helpless to do anything but love me.

Or, at the very least, I vowed to continue in my attempts until the day I died.

Whichever comes first.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Stephanie

Perhaps expectedly, Gahn Errok became the most obnoxious patient anyone could ever have imagined after that night. I hoped it was a good sign, that it meant he was gaining strength and energy back. Because, Jesus Christ, you needed a lot of energy to bark and snarl and complain as much as he did.

What was unexpected, however, was the way he now began to push me away. All the humour, the softness, the vulnerability we’d experienced together that night seemed as if it had never even happened at all. Errok made no mention of the kiss, and, confused and feeling weirdly rejected, I didn’t either. Instead, I dutifully brought him food (which he complained about endlessly – too burnt, too dry, too little, too much) while I seethed internally. In the span of a few hours of sleep after his nightmare, he’d somehow gone back to the first Gahn Errok I’d met. Maybe even a worse version of him.

I knew that part of it had to be the fact that he was in pain and hated being cooped up in Thaleo’s mountain. It was obviously making him miserable. Gahn Errok was the kind of guy who squatted with a boulder on his back all night and carved his way through the cold, clear sky all day. I could tell that lying in bed, especially a bed belonging to his enemy, was driving him out of his mind.

But that didn’t explain why he didn’t want me near him. Shockingly, he even suggested that I no longer sleep in the cave with him after that first night. Even though I agreed with him that he appeared to be out of the woods, I took issue with the way he said he “no longer needed me hovering about like some typically over-worried female.”

I more than took issue with it. I was furious.

“If I’m worried,” I’d snapped, “it’s because I’m worried that I’m going to end up killing you myself!”

Then I’d stormed out of the cave.

And hadn’t gone back for four days.

I spent those four days busying myself with work. That’s what I’d actually come here for, after all. To work. To help track and predict the weather in the mountains. I didn’t come here to get distracted by a gorgeous injured Gahn who was giving me a serious case of emotional whiplash. I made use of the equipment we’d brought, and I sent out drones that would be able to send data back to Valeria’s ship and its portable data tablets. Of course, monitoring the weather patterns would have been much easier with access to the orbiting research vessel’s scanners. But considering the people on that vessel might have been planning an attack on us at this very moment, it wasn’t like we could ask them to share it. So, drones and short-range scanners it was.

The work was a welcome distraction. Even if I did it all with a black cloud of rage swirling in my chest.

And the rage just got worse, turned murderous, when I thought about the reason I was so freaking upset with Gahn Errok.

I wasn’t angry at him for being his usual arrogant idiot self. I was angry because it seemed like we’d gotten somewhere. Like I’d glimpsed something more than that inside him.

But now it was gone. He’d pushed me away

And I didn’t know why.

It doesn’t matter why. I never wanted to be with him, anyway. I should be glad that he’s not being so pushy and clingy with his caveman “you’re mine” bullshit anymore.

I should have been happy.

Should have been.

Wasn’t.

Shit.

And that just made me even angrier. Nothing about this – about his reactions, or mine – made any goddamn sense.

I threw myself into work with such intensity, and was so distracted by my extremely annoying feelings, that I’d forgotten about the reason for the taklok. I’d forgotten all about Gahn Thaleo’s underhanded methods of trapping Errok.

Gahn Thaleo didn’t always share the evening meal in his Sky Hall. He was often out assisting his hunters or patrolling parties, or hosting meetings with his closest warriors deep in the mountain. But when he strode into the Sky Hall on the evening of the fourth day after I’d left Errok’s bedside, it all came crashing back. This was the first time I’d seen him since the taklok. Since he’d sent his arrow through Errok’s chest.

“Gahn Thaleo,” I said, jumping to my feet when he entered the Sky Hall. “I have a bone to pick with you.”

Thaleo stopped his precise march into the hall, watching me with expressionless eyes. I could hear Fiona whisper, “Girl, what the fuck?” from the floor where she was seated beside me. Valeria stood, too, obviously uneasy with my proclamation. Grim and Tok both got to their feet as well. Zaria tried to catch my gaze from across the fire, throwing me a very clear stop right now you dumbass human look which I ignored.

“Oh?”

That was all he said. He wasn’t telling me to sit down or denying me the chance to speak, I had to give him that. But the simple, almost careless, “Oh?” sent me into a blinding rage.

“What do you mean, ‘Oh?’ You know exactly what I’m talking about!”

Valeria was at my side in an instant.

“What the hell is going on?” she asked, her gaze swinging anxiously between Gahn Thaleo and the group of warriors who now stood around him.

“Ask him,” I said, my hands balling into fists. “He knows exactly what he did.”

“I know everything I have ever done, this is true,” the Gahn said. “But you’ll have to enlighten me about the precise action you speak of.”

“The taklok!” I cried.

Fiona, once again, was asking me, “What the fuck?” from below. Valeria was also looking at me like I’d gone more than a little crazy.

“Errok is the one who started that. He called the taklok,” Valeria said slowly, as if I was fucking stupid.

“Tell them,” I said to Thaleo. “Tell them that you knew this would all happen from the beginning.”

Thaleo’s chin lifted slightly.

“I have no reason to hide this. I knew that by inviting your party here, which included his mate, that he would come and call a taklok.”

“Well, maybe we should have predicted that, too,” Valeria said. “Gahn Errok does seem to be a bit of a loose cannon.”

“No!” I said, whirling on her. Errok had been right. Gahn Thaleo’s plan had worked out perfectly. Thaleo came out looking stoic and noble while Errok came out looking like the insane, violent one who couldn’t be trusted. The loose cannon. Which he kind of was, to be honest, but not in this specific instance.

“That’s not true, is it, Gahn Thaleo?” I looked at him once more. “Tell them that this had nothing to do with Errok’s personality and everything to do with your culture and ways. Tell them that he had no other choice but to call a taklok to preserve his honour. Your men know it’s true, but my people don’t. So, tell them how you used me to lure Errok here so that you could have the chance to kill him in the taklok without making it look like you’d done something wrong in the eyes of the alliance.”

Valeria stiffened beside me. “Is this true, Gahn Thaleo? That by bringing us, her, here you forced Errok’s hand?”

“Yes.”

I blinked, shocked he hadn’t even tried to deny it.

But he kept going, which shocked me even more. I wasn’t sure I’d ever heard him put this many words together at one time.

“I knew Errok would call a taklok the moment you entered these mountains, yes. Our ways demand such a response. No man, especially a Gahn, would allow his enemy to take care of his mate like I had done. However, I did not simply bring you here to lure Gahn Errok.” He passed his eyes over our group, his gaze lingering on Nasrin as he continued. “Enraging Gahn Errok was not the only, or the most specific, reason I brought you here. I truly wanted to show you my mountain. Wanted to foster trust and peace between us. Wanted to offer hospitality and care. The fact that I might have gotten the chance to finally shoot Gahn Errok was rather a bonus of it all, but it was not the main origin of my motivations.”

Valeria let out an annoyed breath. My heart pounded furiously at the way he’d so easily admitted he’d wanted to kill Errok. There was a small amount of comfort knowing that he hadn’t specifically invited us here just to instigate the violence, that we weren’t entirely pawns in his twisted game. But it wasn’t enough to cool my anger and the sense of betrayal.

“You said you wanted us to trust you. How can we trust you after this?”

The question came from Nasrin, making me swivel to her, surprised.

Gahn Thaleo’s reply was controlled thunder in the space.

“You cannot understand. You are not of our world and do not know our ways. And you were not at the negotiations. But she was.” He gestured his tail towards Valeria. “You ask me to tell them all the truth? Valeria, you must do the same. Tell them how, when Errok learned that the storms had battered my people and decimated our hunting grounds, he still refused to allow us to hunt in neutral territory. He would have let us starve before he’d bend to help us.”

My blood ran cold.

No, he wouldn’t… Would he?

Gahn Thaleo kept on going, every word like an arrow in my chest.

“You think I used you?” he asked, speaking to me this time. “Perhaps your own leaders should tell you how they dangled you in front of Gahn Errok’s nose in order to get him to submit to the terms of the alliance.”

“Now, hold on!” Valeria snapped. “That is not a fair characterization of what happened.” She turned to me. “We told Errok the same thing every Sea Sand Gahn’s been told. That he’d never see his mate if he didn’t uphold the peaceful terms of the treaty. We never used you as bait. There was no guarantee he’d ever get to be with you. Just see you. That’s it. It was the only way we could get him to agree to let Gahn Thaleo expand his territory to hunt and keep his people alive long-term.”

I took a shaky breath, nodding. I knew my people wouldn’t sell me out. Chapman, Valeria, and all the others had always been adamant about the fact that no woman would ever have to be with a man she didn’t want to be, mate or not. But even so, the idea that I was part of the negotiations without even knowing it, that I was the only thing that made Errok bend his iron will to keep Gahn Thaleo’s people from starving, felt prickly and ugly in my guts.

It got even pricklier when it made me understand Gahn Thaleo’s actions just that little bit more. How could he not want to kill the man who would have turned his back while his people starved?

“I have to go,” I said. Fiona tried to grab for me, and Valeria called out to me, but I ignored them. I stumbled into the tunnel, turned my feet towards Errok’s cave, and ran.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Errok

On the evening of the fourth day of healing, I began to fear that I might have made a mistake. A rare occurrence for me, to be sure. But every day that went by that my mate did not return to the cave sent dread’s claws slicing through my guts. I’d sent her away myself. Told her she need no longer sleep here. Not because I didn’t want her, but because I’d not been able to stomach the idea of her seeing me afraid and vulnerable again. The thought of having another nightmare in front of her, skies forbid, made me want to drive my head against a wall until consciousness fled. I’d had to send her away.

But I did not think I would make her so angry that she would refuse to see me at all. A Sea Sand warrior had been bringing me my food. And I’d been sleeping so hatefully, terribly, safely alone.

I missed her. More than I would have thought a man could miss anything. More than food, more than air, I needed her.

And yet, my pride kept me from going to her. Not because I was too proud to beg for her forgiveness – I’d discovered about three heartbeats after she’d left that I was not. As soon as she’d disappeared from sight, my insides had crashed in fear and my throat went tight, swallowing the sound of me calling out her name. No, I was simply too proud to go to her before I was entirely healed. If I went to seek her out, it would be with my full power. And she would agree to come to me because she saw my strength and wanted me. Not because she pitied me.

But it turned out I need not have gone to her at all. I heard a slight commotion in the next cave where the Sea Sand men always kept at least one guard stationed.

And then, a moment later, like a flurry of sun cutting through clouds, she burst into my line of sight, my cave, my world.

Her cheeks were flushed, her hair loose and brushing her shoulders. Her eyes were bright with some intense emotion. Passionate longing, I hoped, a throb going through me as I got quickly to my feet.

“You can stand,” she said breathlessly, chest heaving as if she’d run here. “Good. You’re strong enough now that I won’t have to feel bad about punching you.”

My brain felt slow as sludge.

She crackled with what I now realized was fury, crossing the distance in quick little steps. Contrary to what she’d told me, she did not actually try to punch me. Doing so would have been futile, anyway. I’d grown too strong in my recovery for her soft hands to have any effect on me.

Any effect besides cracking my chest right open and making my heart howl, that is.

“You didn’t tell me everything.”

Her voice was low. I sensed something in it. Some warning. Tread with careful claws, it told me.

“What are you talking about?” I muttered. I’d hoped our reunion would be marked by soft sighs and her arms around me. Not her hands curling into absurdly tiny fists at her sides.

“About Gahn Thaleo. You didn’t tell me that the storms had affected his lands so badly that his people could barely hunt for enough food.”

Oh. That?

“You did not know about this? I thought one of the main reasons your party was coming out here was to track the storm activity.”

“It’s not about the storms!” she cried. “It’s about the fact that you would have let those people starve for your own stupid pride! Just because you didn’t want to let Thaleo hunt beyond his own territory! I just got informed that the only reason you deigned to let him hunt in neutral territory and save his people was so that you weren’t cut off from access to me. No wonder he wanted to force you into the taklok and kill you.”

“Well, that is both true and not true,” I said, my fury churning to match her own. Leave it to Gahn Thaleo to once again make my mate hate me.

“In the heat of negotiations with your people,” I continued, “when I first realized that the storms had affected Gahn Thaleo so much, yes, my instinct was to tell him, and your people, that I would never let him expand his territory.”

My mate opened her gorgeous mouth and sucked in a huge breath, no doubt about to hurl fist-like words at my head. Whip-quick, my hand cupped the side of her face, my thumb pressing against her lips until her mouth closed to prevent my thumb sliding inside.

“Let me finish,” I snarled quietly, stepping close enough that her chest brushed mine on her next raging inhale. My cock thickened, but I did my best to ignore it.

“That was what I told them, yes. I told them Gahn Thaleo could go ahead and starve for all I cared because I would never let his warriors have access to neutral territory. But I will remind you that, mere days before that, my brother was nearly killed and your own friend Priya was kidnapped by Gahn Thaleo’s men precisely because they were hunting and fighting in neutral territory where they should not have been. It was the same thing for your Sea Sand man. What is his name? Barrow?”

“Varrow,” she murmured against my thumb. The crush of her lips and the drag of her teeth, skies help me, lit my cock on fire.

“Yes. Exactly. They attacked your group and would have killed Varrow if the Vrika had not been chasing my idiot brother to the ends of the Deep Sky and hadn’t just happened to be flying overhead at that moment. These are precisely the sort of things that are not supposed to happen. Gahn Thaleo knew that. He knew he had no right to use neutral territory for his own purposes and to attack others there. Yet his men did it anyway.”

“You can move your hand,” she said. My thumb grew damp when her tongue accidentally swiped it as she spoke. “I’ll listen to what you have to say.”

I did move my hand, but I found I could not let go of her. I slid it down and backwards, cupping the back of her fragile skull and burying my fingers in the soft warmth of her hair.

“So, yes, after being hot with rage at Gahn Thaleo’s brazenness, his men attacking my brother and kidnapping his mate in what should have been neutral territory, my first response was to refuse his request. But had I been given some time to actually think-”

My hard cock nudged Zuh-Tephanie’s hip and her eyes went huge.

“-my response may have been entirely different.”

With neither of us noticing, my other hand had drifted to Zuh-Tephanie’s waist.

“Thaleo could have come to me,” I said. “He could have told me of the situation affecting his people. Despite what you may think of me, I am not so vicious as to let women and children starve.”

“What about the male warriors? About the Gahn himself? Would you have let him starve?”

Why is she so cursedly concerned with that foul Gahn?

“The man put an arrow through me just a few days ago,” I said flatly. “I did not know I should reward him for such things with fresh meat and sweet moonbark from my own mountains.”

She raised a brow at me, not willing to let the question go.

“I do not know,” I replied honestly. “I never got the chance to see what I would have done because Gahn Thaleo never gave me a chance. All I got was my enemy’s arrows striking men down in neutral territory and the abduction of my brother’s mate. And then, to top all of it off, I was told I’d never get to see my own mate, I’d never get to see you, if I didn’t let Thaleo officially take the neutral territory he’d already claimed with his lawless arrows.”

Zuh-Tephanie sighed.

“So, neither of you are really victims, then. You’re both right and you’re both wrong. Why do you guys have to make everything so complicated?”

“I refuse to believe that your kind is less complicated than mine,” I said with a humourless laugh. “You are the most infuriatingly complex creature I’ve ever tried and failed to understand.”

“Alright, well, like I said before about the taklok, this definitely provides some more context,” she said slowly.

I could tell her anger had abated somewhat.

But not entirely.

“Good,” I said. “I am sick to death of spending all my time with you talking about Gahn Thaleo. Tomorrow, I will be healed enough for the flight. We will leave this place. And I will show you my mountains.”

I had hoped she would have shown some excitement, or at least interest, at the prospect of seeing my mountains.

But I should have known better by now.

“Oh, really?” She jerked her head away from my grasp, then stepped out of my reach. “Just like that? You’re feeling better and you just make the decision for both of us? Suddenly I’m back in your good graces enough to be allowed near you?” She searched my face with guarded eyes, then whispered, “What happened to, ‘Please don’t leave me’?”

I stiffened, my spine going ramrod straight. My wound ached.

Curse me, I’d hoped she had forgotten all my blubbering.

But my mate was too insufferably clever, it seemed, to forget a single thing I said. I had a feeling that this skill of hers would likely be turned against me many times over the course of my life.

“I was not myself when I said that,” I grunted.

It was true. If I had been at my full strength and not half out of my mind with the lingering grief from my nightmare, I never would have allowed myself to become so weak in front of her.

And at the same time, the words weren’t true at all.

Because it had been me – the deepest, ugliest, and most pathetic part of me – who’d asked her not to leave me. Who’d made her pity me enough to want to stay.

She rolled her lips into a thin line, regarding me coolly.

“I see,” she finally said.

“Well… Good,” I said, though I could tell that things were far from good. Unease nipped at the base of my tail, making it twitch. She no longer seemed angry. She seemed… Cold. Expressionless. Impossible to read, and she wasn’t easy to read at the best of times. Her eyes were hard in her little pale face as she spoke, the words even and measured.

“I’m very glad to see that you’re recovering well. I hope it continues.”

Why did her words make me feel like a dozen arrows had just been aimed straight at me? Like I needed to shield myself, or else nock my own angry arrow in return? At their core, the words were kind. They should have been comforting, but instead, they filled me with dread.

My claws itched, longing to reach for her. I teetered on the brink of turning back into that panicked, gibbering man I’d been four nights ago in the post-dream darkness.

I am lost, beloved.

I am lost and I wish that you would find me.

Hold me. Touch me. Train me. Tame me.

Make me into something worthy, or unmake me.

Just please…

Please don’t leave me behind.

I clamped my fangs down against each other so hard my jaw cracked.

I said nothing at all.

She turned and walked away.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Stephanie

Ileft Errok’s cave and passed blindly through the next one, ignoring Zoren’s questioning look. I couldn’t talk to anyone – not now. I was trying too hard not to puke. My stomach had been turned upside down and I was struggling to make it go back to normal.

And it was all his fault. Him, the gorgeous, snarky, impatient, maddening Gahn. I’d told him I was glad he was recovering – and I was. I never wanted to see him that badly hurt again. But if I were being totally honest with myself, the fact that the Vrika’s blood had worked so well as to not even leave a scar behind made me feel like I had lost something. Like the night we’d shared had never even happened.

I wasn’t myself when I said that.

I swallowed hard at the memory of his words.

If that wasn’t you, then who the hell was it?

Who was the man who’d bared himself – his heart, his twisting soul – to me? Who was the man who’d let me see his fear and begged me not to run? Who was the man who made me feel like I’d maybe even begun to care, no, more than care, to –

“Oh!”

I fell hard on my ass. A strong set of hands hauled me upright.

Human hands. It was Valeria.

“You alright? I was just coming to check on you,” she said.

“Thanks. Yeah. I’m OK. Sorry for nearly knocking you over,” I said, rubbing at my sore tailbone and wincing.

“It’s all good. This guy kept me upright and broke my fall. Though I’m pretty sure he’s harder than the ground.”

Only then did I notice Grim behind her. And realize I’d made it all the way out into the tunnel.

“How’s our least favourite Deep Sky Gahn?” Valeria asked. “Although, Gahn Thaleo’s kind of on my shit list now, too. So, I guess they’re even.”

“He’s fine. Annoyingly fine, if you ask me,” I answered, crossing my arms as we began to walk back to the new guest caves we’d been assigned.

“That’s good to hear. I want to leave tomorrow, but I don’t want to leave him here alone if he’s not well enough to travel back to his territory.”

“We’re leaving? Tomorrow?” I stopped walking, staring at her. She stopped, too, as did Grim.

“Yeah. We had a long talk with Gahn Thaleo while you were gone. Made our expectations clearer for him. It was a tense conversation, to say the least, but he’s agreed to everything. Namely, he’s agreed not to cause situations that could get someone killed without at least informing us first. Anyway, I think we’d all do well with a break from each other.”

“Gahn Errok’s gonna love that,” I said rolling my eyes. “He just told me he wants to take me back to his territory tomorrow.” I almost wanted to stay here in Gahn Thaleo’s mountain just to spite him. But I agreed with Valeria. It would be good to have some space from Gahn Thaleo right now.

“Shit, probably should have expected that,” Valeria said with a sigh. “I’m sure if we refuse to go to his mountains now after visiting his enemy’s, it’s going to be an insult so deep even his ancestors will feel it. At least, that’s probably what he’ll tell us.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle. She was dead on. That was exactly the sort of thing Gahn Errok would say.

“I leave it totally up to you,” Valeria said. “If you say no, then we don’t go with him. Ultimately, we will have to go there sometime to set up some equipment and get the lay of the land and everything. Plus, I know we’d all like to see Priya. But it doesn’t have to be tomorrow. And, no matter what Gahn Errok says, you don’t have to come if you don’t want to when we eventually do go.”

“Can you ask me again tomorrow?” I said weakly, closing my eyes and rubbing my temples. I was starting to get a wicked headache.

“Of course,” she said, laying a hand on my shoulder and squeezing gently. “For now, let’s just get some rest.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Stephanie

Tomorrow came, and I was no closer to an answer about what I wanted to do. We ate a quick morning meal in the Sky Hall with Gahn Thaleo’s people. We were already all packed to go, and after saying goodbye to the people we’d met, Gahn Thaleo saw us to our ship. The only question now was, where would that ship take us? To the settlement area under the Vrika’s peak? Or to Gahn Errok’s territory?

As if my question had conjured him, I heard his voice, an echoing boom across the aguir circle.

“Kindly step away from my mate, Thaleo.”

The fact Errok had left off the title “Gahn” when addressing Thaleo was so obvious an insult that the missing word felt even louder than his spoken ones. A muscle in Gahn Thaleo’s scarred cheek twitched. If he wanted to do anything about Errok, he decided against it, instead wishing us a safe flight before moving out of the way for Errok.

My breath caught when I saw him. Fuck him for being so good-looking. I wasn’t a shallow person. I didn’t care how someone looked. But when you got smacked in the face with beauty like that, it became harder and harder not to notice.

Even though he was in enemy territory, Errok swaggered across the aquamarine stone as if he owned the place. His weapons straps, bow, and quiver had all returned to his bulky torso, cutting hard lines over his smoky violet and blue flesh. His hair looked freshly combed, a long silken tumble of blue-black down his strong back. It seemed impossible that only a few days ago I’d seen him fall on this very stone. Seen him nearly die.

His moonlit sight stars found my gaze, lasering a white-hot path right through my sunglasses and into my brain. Screw you, Errok. Get your laser beam eyes out of my head.

“Why are you getting in this vessel?” he asked, frowning, as he reached me.

“Good morning to you too,” I said, rolling my eyes.

He ignored my sarcastic greeting.

“I thought I told you that once we were in the Deep Sky, you would only ride with me.”

“And I thought I told you that you don’t get to decide anything for me!” I snapped.

“Is there a problem here?” Valeria had been getting the others settled in the ship, but she poked her head out the open shuttle door to see what was going on.

“No problem,” I assured her. “I’ll be there in a minute.”

“Oh, there most certainly is a problem, or there very soon will be, if you think you are getting on that shuttle instead of riding back with me,” Errok snarled.

“What do you mean, riding back?” I asked. “I haven’t even decided if I’m coming to your territory yet!”

Errok’s mouth fell open in affronted rage. He cast a hateful glance at Thaleo who was still standing nearby and who’d obviously heard everything. I could practically see Errok’s thoughts steaming angrily out of his ears, like a cartoon character’s. He was likely thinking something along the lines of, why the hell will my mate accept Thaleo’s invitation into his territory but not mine?

Finally, his flashing eyes returned to me.

“This is an insult so great that-”

“That even your ancestors will feel it?” I finished for him. “Yeah, I had a feeling. But you insult people all the time, so maybe you should be used to that kind of thing.”

My eyes lowered, lingering on the place he’d been torn open. The place that had bled under my frantic hands.

Then, I turned and stepped through the shuttle’s door.

“Have a safe flight home, Gahn Errok.”

The shuttle door closed with a click of finality.

I tried not to think about what Errok was doing out there – if he was standing there, frozen in place and offended, or if he was trying to claw that door right open – and found my seat beside Fiona.

“Alright, love?” she asked, reaching over and giving my hand a squeeze after I’d strapped in.

“I am. I will be. It’s fine,” I said.

As Valeria started pushing buttons to get everything booted up for the flight, I pulled forward against my seat’s straps.

I hated that I did it, but I couldn’t help myself.

I leaned forward to look out the ship’s front viewscreen. So that I could see Errok.

I caught a glimpse of him just as he was mounting his braxilk. He leapt up with easy, impressive power. But then, he faltered. When he landed on the braxilk’s back, just for the briefest slice of a moment, he hunched forward, his hand flying to his chest.

I undid my straps and jumped up before I even realized I’d moved.

“Hold on. Stop. Can you please let me off?”

Valeria’s head snapped back to me, her dark eyes wide with surprise over the back of her pilot’s seat.

“Why? Is everything alright?”

“Yes. No. Honestly, I have no idea.” I grabbed my pack and then walked to the front of the shuttle. I jerked my chin towards Gahn Errok’s figure outside on the sunlit stone. “Someone needs to make sure that idiot doesn’t die on his flight back.”

“But that doesn’t have to be you,” Valeria pointed out. “We can send a Sea Sand man to accompany him. From what I understand, a braxilk can carry two adult alien riders. Probably not a Bitter Sea warrior, but a Sea Sand guy should be fine.”

I snorted mirthlessly.

“Yeah, right. How do you think that would realistically go?” Errok would probably try to drop an assigned male chaperone into some spiky death valley the first chance that he got.

Valeria watched me carefully for a long moment before speaking. “You’re not responsible for him, you know. He’s a big boy. He can sort himself out. And if something actually went wrong while you were flying with him, do you really think you’d be able to help him alone out there in the mountains?”

Even though she was absolutely right, her comment stung a little. The idea that I’d be useless to him if he ran into trouble kind of hurt.

But it didn’t change my mind.

“Yeah, well, I’m also a big girl,” I said. “This is what I’ve decided.”

An odd expression tightened Valeria’s mouth. I couldn’t tell if it was an anxious grimace…

Or she was trying to hide a smile.

“Alright, then. I won’t stop you. He’s your-”

I knew that she had been about to say, “He’s your mate,” before tactfully stopping herself.

“He’s your… Patient,” she course-corrected. “And, from what I’ve seen, he seems strong enough for the journey back. I know Priya’s ridden with Lerokan on his braxilk quite a bit and it seems safe enough. And Oxriel is in Errok’s territory, too, so that will be another familiar face for you when you get there.”

Priya. Excitement warmed me when I realized I’d be seeing her sooner rather than later, now that I’d decided to go back to Errok’s territory. She was currently living there with Errok’s brother, her mate Lerokan. It would be nice to see Oxriel, too.

“Alright. We’re going to stop at the settlement site to set a few things up,” Valeria said. “But we’ll join you in Errok’s mountains soon after that. A few days at most.”

“That’s fine,” I said. I gave her a quick goodbye hug, then hugged Taylor, Nasrin, Tilly, and Fiona. Both Nasrin and Tilly tried to talk me out of going, but Fiona started droning on, yet again, about the vibe, and she distracted everyone enough with her nonsense for me to slip back out the shuttle door unnoticed.

Well, mostly unnoticed.

One person definitely noticed me.

Errok.

CHAPTER THIRTY

Errok

The new women’s bizarre vessel finally ascended.

But my mate was not on it.

No, Zuh-Tephanie was walking towards me with purposeful strides, her clothing buffeted by the winds of the vessel’s motionless wings.

I could not tell if this was good or bad. If I should be gratefully relieved…

Or terrified.

To my great shame, I was leaning awfully close to the latter option when she arrived, smile-less and silent, beside me.

She looked even smaller from where I sat up here on Talga’s back. It made me want to scoop her up into my arms, clutch her close, keep her warm and safe and –

“That’s not your braxilk.”

Her words cut into my thoughts, surprising me.

“Correct. She is Zakkar’s mount. My braxilk, Togo, required rest after the journey back from the Sea Sands. Zakkar lent me Talga to fly here.” Frankly, I hadn’t expected her to notice. Yes, Talga was a female braxilk, so she was slightly smaller than Togo. But her colouring was quite similar to Togo’s. For someone who had only ever seen one braxilk before, and hadn’t grown up noting the differences between specific beasts, I was surprised she’d recognised it so quickly.

Zuh-Tephanie was not looking at me, but rather at Talga. She spoke in soft tones that made my chest ache.

“Hey, girl. Easy there. I’m Stephanie. Wish I had an app-uhl for you, you lovely thing. Have you ever had an app-uhl? Probably not, eh? I bet you’d love them.”

When Talga decided that she liked Zuh-Tephanie (clever creature – Talga had excellent taste) she closed her six eyes and bumped her head affectionately against Zuh-Tephanie’s hood. Talga and I were rewarded with a bright bolt of laughter. Zuh-Tephanie’s smile as she patted Talga’s neck was so pretty it was like a punch to the gut. And that fist only went deeper and twisted when I remembered that her smile was not meant for me.

Stop charming my mate, Talga, I ordered silently.

Talga was certainly a clever braxilk. Unfortunately, not clever enough to read minds.

Ah, well. There’s no way to stop Talga from pleasing Zuh-Tephanie. At least my vexing little mate is happy about something.

“I can help you mount-”

My words choked to a halt, strangled by the sudden image of Zuh-Tephanie mounting something, alright. That something being my cock.

“I don’t think I’ll need help,” she said, oblivious to my aroused turmoil. “If you can get her a little lower to the ground, that is. Her legs are so long, and there are no stuhr-ups.”

I had not the faintest idea what a stuhr-up was, but I commanded Talga to bend her many legs anyway.

I was about to reach my hand for my mate when I drew back, grunting softly in surprise. In a smooth, practiced movement, Zuh-Tephanie mounted Talga. Her tiny rump settled between my thighs. She slipped off her pack, and I fastened it to Talga’s side.

“Do you have braxilk in your world?” I asked. I knew my mate was an enormously competent woman, but the way she’d pulled herself up here with such confidence had shocked me.

“No,” she said, wiggling slightly as she settled herself. “But I used to ride hore-sez. They’re kind of like braxilk without wings. Well, not really. They only have four legs and two eyes. But it’s close enough.” She wiggled again, drawing dangerously close to my neglected cock, then sighed happily. “This feels so good already. It feels like…”

“Like what?” I pressed, needing to know what she’d been about to say when she’d hesitated.

Her answer was quiet. Nearly lost on the morning air.

“Feels a little bit like home.”

My wounding little creature, this is only the beginning. You may have left your world behind, but I will be your home.

I didn’t say it out loud. I couldn’t. I was too afraid that, if I had said it, she would argue with me. Deny me. Dash my words, my hopes, upon Gahn Thaleo’s aguir stone.

My body had almost entirely recovered. But I somehow felt even weaker than before. Too afraid of hurt, of rejection.

I cannot be afraid. I refuse it.

This was no way for a Gahn to feel.

“We will fly back to my territory, now. You will stay there with me,” I said, infusing my voice with authority. I certainly sounded like my old, commanding self.

But I didn’t feel like him.

Never before would I have waited with bated breath to see if someone pushed back upon one of my orders. If a man had so much as hesitated to act on one of my orders, he would have found himself very quickly in a world of pain.

But Zuh-Tephanie wasn’t a man. She was my impossible, perfect mate. The vicious captor of my heart. Soft and weaponless and yet somehow armed to the teeth against me.

“Yeah, yeah,” she muttered at me. “Why do you think I came back out here? Obviously, I’m going back with you. You don’t need to make it sound like you’re ordering me to. I decided on my own.”

“Why did you decide to?” I asked. She’d seemed like she’d been about to crawl up the side of Gahn Thaleo’s mountain just to get away from me this morning. I wanted to tell myself she had come back for me because she must have seen sense and she suddenly loved me now. But I was not that much of a fool. At least, not anymore.

She hesitated, staring straight ahead, before answering.

“I… I saw you flinch. When you mounted Talga. You were in pain.”

My blood froze in my veins. My head pounded. My fangs ground against each other.

I’d nearly recovered all my strength, but it clearly meant nothing. One breath of pitiful pain, and she’d seen it. She’d come to me this morning for the same reason she’d let me touch her after the nightmare.

Pathetic.

“Save your pity for someone who deserves it,” I seethed.

“Pity? Wait, what?”

If she had more to say – which, no doubt, she did – she did not get the chance. A click of my tongues and we shot up into the air, leaving Gahn Thaleo’s putrid mountain behind.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Stephanie

My breath lurched out of me as the ground was sucked away beneath us. Instinctively, I reached for reins. There were none, of course. My fingers buried in Talga’s feathers, my hold tight and my eyes wide.

But, despite the shock of our sudden ascension, I wasn’t afraid.

I was exhilarated.

I’d never had much of a fear of heights, and as Talga’s wings beat, drawing us ever upwards, I could almost imagine the motion was the rhythmic beat of hooves beneath me.

Sometimes, when I’d ridden at home, I had felt like I was flying.

Now I really was.

Even the possessive bar of Errok’s grip around my waist couldn’t dampen the explosive feeling of freedom. I gasped, then whooped, my voice shattering into a breathless laugh as the wind whipped around us. My hood flew back, and I thanked past me for putting on lots of sunscreen this morning, because there was no way I’d be able to fasten my hood so that it would stay up properly now.

I smiled so hard it made my face hurt. I was kind of glad that Errok was behind me. I didn’t want him to see that something he’d done, something he’d provided, was making me this happy. No doubt he’d find some way to lord it over me. But then again, back in the Sea Sands, he said he’d teach me to ride, to fly, no strings attached…

Fuck it. This flight had already put me in too good of a mood to stay pissed at Errok. At least for right now.

Grinning widely, I twisted my head back as I said, “This is-”

I stopped short, his expression stealing my words.

Like me, Errok was smiling. A broad, beautiful cut of joy across the lower half of his face. The wind whipped at his long hair, sending it snapping in dark tendrils behind him. His sight stars, ones I’d seen hazy with feverish pain too many times, were now brighter than the blinding sky and fierce with exultant power. He wasn’t looking at me, but rather ahead, extraordinary happiness pouring out of him and raining down on the mountains that flashed like pointed sapphires beneath us.

He felt what I felt. The freedom.

He called out light-hearted commands to Talga, and she obeyed instantly. I had to admit I liked how he spoke to Talga. He was firm, of course, but there was an undeniable kindness and respect in his voice when he spoke to her. He’s nicer to her than he is to most people.

As someone who had been frequently accused of the same thing, usually by my own boyfriends, I… I kind of liked that. I could never be with someone who didn’t respect and care for his mount.

If he’d wanted to impress me, he should have just shown me this from the beginning, I thought, in awe of him for the very first time. I was in awe because this was no calculated display of strength. This wasn’t something designed to make me swoon. This was sincere, inimitable power. True mastery. And his joy in it, the love in it, could not be faked. This is his domain. As obnoxious as he’d been, I felt a stab of sympathy for him being stuck in Thaleo’s mountain for the past few days. A creature like Errok wasn’t meant to be lying in bed. He was meant to be doing this.

And I was irritatingly grateful that I got to do it beside him.

I felt more at home in that moment than I had since I’d been on Earth.

Yes. I felt more at home, carving through an alien sky on Talga’s back with Gahn Errok, than I had at the settlement. Than I had with the other human women, even.

It scared me.

Don’t ruin this.

I pushed aside the uncertainty, the fear, and just let myself enjoy the moment. I closed my eyes, muscle memory taking over as I settled comfortably into a position I’d taken countless times on horses’ backs. It wasn’t exactly the same, of course. But it was more than close enough.

This sky, this flight, Talga… Errok.

All of them were putting something back together inside me. Something I’d thought was lost forever.

I was glad my eyes were closed when the tears came. I kept them scrunched, not wanting Errok to see that I was crying.

But I didn’t keep them closed for long. I wrenched them open, feeling moisture seep into my lashes and across my cheeks.

This was the kind of moment that could define a person’s life.

And I refused to miss even one more second of it because I’d closed my eyes.

WE FLEW FOR THE ENTIRE day, passing over the shuttle where it had landed in neutral territory before continuing on towards Errok’s territory. We stopped a couple of times to eat and pee. I couldn’t help but dawdle during those stops, wanting to draw out this day. Wanting to draw out the ease, the joy, that had tentatively grown between Errok and me during the flight. But the closer we got to Errok’s mountain, the more impatient he became. So, I hurried up my peeing and my snacks on our breaks, remembering that he had a whole tribe waiting for him. He hadn’t seen them in days, and I had to remind myself that he actually was an important leader out here and that not everything was about me. Plus, I was excited about seeing Priya. I’m sure I’ll get to fly again soon… At least, I hope so.

The sun had long since set by the time we reached Errok’s mountain. I knew it had to be his – it was the biggest, baddest, pointiest-looking mountain in this area. The stars and asteroids painted its shining crags with luminescence. The sky was like a clear dark pool we dove into as we soared.

It was fucking cold, but flying at night was just as good, if not better, than the day. The darkness, the stars, the shadows – all of it turned the flight into something deeply poetic. I used to get up early and ride before dawn back on the ranch, and this reminded me of those times. The calm, poignant beauty of moving swiftly through a world breathless with quiet dark.

I wondered where we’d land, eyeing the ink-black of the valley below with unease. But instead of descending, we just kept going higher. I soon saw why. Firelight above indicated an entrance into the mountain.

We flew up to what I now saw was a huge cave, completely open to the air. There was no natural stone window, there wasn’t even a guardrail or anything. We flew right into the space and landed.

“Oh my God, Stephanie?!”

I twisted on Talga’s back, searching for the source of that London accent. I grinned, dismounting as Priya sprinted towards me.

“Cor, you did well with that,” she said, looking surprised at how easily I’d gotten down off of Talga. “I pretty much fall flat on my arse every time I try to get off Breena’s back.”

Damn, it was good to see her, alive and in person. Without saying anything, I wrapped my arms around her in a crushing hug. I remembered how worried I’d been when we didn’t know what had happened to her out here.

“You scared the shit out of us, you know,” I said, laughing so that I wouldn’t start crying for the second time today.

She laughed, too, and I could hear the tight teariness in the sound. She pulled out of the hug, swiping at her eyes.

“Well, you can thank this guy for freaking you all out. He’s the one who snatched me.”

I looked at the man who had stepped up to her side and was now draping a lanky arm around her shoulders. My mouth fell open as I did a double take.

He looked so much like Errok that it disoriented me for a moment. There were differences, of course, but the resemblance was jarring. He looked like a younger, leaner, slightly shorter Errok.

I smiled at him, recovering from my surprise. “You must be-”

“Lerokan.” Errok’s voice seethed from above and behind me. At some point during this encounter, he’d dismounted and had decided to loom directly behind me like some kind of glaring gargoyle. I raised a brow at him, then turned forward once more, crossing my arms.

“Welcome back, brother. And Zuh-Tephanie! It is very good to meet you.” Lerokan said, returning my earlier smile. Ah, there was another difference between them. Lerokan had a dimple on one side when he smiled. If he sensed Errok’s near-malevolent mood darkening the atmosphere, he ignored it. As if he’d had lots of practice.

I glanced behind Lerokan and Priya, taking note of the cave we were standing in. This had to be Errok’s version of Thaleo’s Sky Hall. The main social area of the mountain where people cooked and ate together. I noticed a large group of male Deep Sky warriors raising their tails at our arrival, as well as a fire that crackled, sending light skittering up the gleaming blue walls.

Errok spoke loudly, addressing the group of warriors.

“I have returned, and I have brought with me my mate, Zuh-Tephanie. Every respect you show me is to be multiplied tenfold where your new Gahnala is concerned.”

“Your new… Hold on. What?” I said, staring fiercely at Errok. I had not accepted him as a mate, let alone agreed to be the new queen around here! I turned to the warriors, who were all once again raising their tails… To me.

“No, please don’t do that. I am not the Gahnala!” I cried, waving my hands frantically in front of me.

Silence thundered, broken only by the slow swish of confused tails falling through the air and Priya’s breathy whisper of, “Oh, shit.”

The next sound came from Lerokan. And it was laughter.

“Oh, this is too good. So, she has not accepted you, then, brother?” Lerokan’s sight stars – the same bright white colour as Errok’s – slid from his brother to me. “Zuh-Tephanie, you have brought me much joy this day. The Vrika has done very well to join you to my brother. Please, I beg that you continue to deny him. Someone must drive through his thick skull the fact that he is not-”

His words were literally crushed out of him. Errok’s huge fingers closed around Lerokan’s throat. Lerokan was clearly a strong guy, but he was definitely smaller than Errok. Errok infused his grip with furious strength, driving Lerokan backwards until the younger brother collided with a nearby wall.

“Oh my God, Errok, stop!” This felt like the taklok all over again. Me begging Errok to stop shooting. Or, in this case, stop squeezing.

“Erm, why don’t I take you on a tour of the mountain?”

I couldn’t believe what Priya just said.

“Are you insane? He’s about to kill your mate right in front of us!”

I moved to run towards them, but Priya grabbed my arm with surprising quickness and drew me back. She glanced over at the brothers, her gaze appraising, then she shook her head.

“No, he won’t. Lerokan can wiggle his way out of just about any situation. Besides, even though they can both be complete fucking knobs around each other, they do actually care. At least a little bit.”

It was hard to believe her considering Errok was fucking vibrating with fury and was currently taking that fury out on Lerokan’s windpipe. But… Lerokan was somehow grinning? So maybe she was right.

“They’ll sort themselves out. I’m serious. Let’s give them some space.”

“Fine,” I muttered, letting her lead me gently out of the hall. I was tired of trying to control Errok. Tired of feeling responsible for him. Let them duke it out. And if Lerokan ends up shooting him, he can find somebody else to heal him, thank you very much.

But despite those thoughts, despite my attempt at indifference…

I twisted to watch them even as we walked away.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Errok

“Everyone else out!”

My warriors dispersed with obedient quickness. It felt good to finally have people acknowledge my authority again. After days with Gahn Thaleo’s men and Zuh-Tephanie fighting me, and now Lerokan’s mouthiness, I’d felt as if I were no longer Gahn at all.

“Don’t want witnesses when I best you, older brother?” Lerokan choked out. My lips twitched, and I tightened my grip, wanting to strangle that hideous smile right out of him.

“Tell me,” I hissed, getting so close that our noses nearly touched. “Tell me how you won your mate.”

Lerokan’s sight stars pulsed, and then, somehow, despite the force I applied to his stupid neck, he laughed. Clearly, I needed to squeeze a little harder.

But I didn’t. Because I wanted, needed, him to speak and answer my question. My foolish younger brother was the only man in the Deep Sky who had won his human mate. I hated that fact with every taut fibre of my being. Hated him for besting me in this.

“Ah, I see,” he grunted. “You sent the men away because you did not want to admit she has not accepted you and beg for my help in front of them. It is-” He stopped to cough, his throat convulsing under my fingers. “It is a little late, brother. She already said it in front of everyone. She is not your Gahnala.”

My breath heaved. For a moment, I worried I’d lose control and that I really would snap his neck. I did not need to be reminded of what had just happened. Her words had been harder than Thaleo’s arrow. Even worse was the shame that had coursed through me afterwards. She had not only rejected me yet again, but this time in front of my men. I was supposed to be the strongest, the cleverest, the king.

And I could not even control one tiny female.

“Answer my question,” I hissed savagely, “before I toss you out of my hall with nothing to catch you but the sharp fangs of the rocks below.”

Lerokan tsked. “I do not think killing me will help your sorry cause.” His eyes narrowed, his smile disappearing. “You did not see your mate’s look of hateful disapproval when you grabbed me by the throat. But I did.”

As if burned, I snatched my hand away, stumbling backwards. I whirled desperately, searching for Zuh-Tephanie. Look, see? I let him go. But she was not there.

No one was.

No one but my brother, rubbing at his throat.

“Cursed skies, Errok. You nearly tore my head off, there. I do not know how I will manage to fight through the pain you’ve caused to pleasure my pretty mate tonight.”

“It is not my fault your neck is so weak,” I snapped. I knew that he was goading me, and I knew that I was weak for falling into it, but I could not help it. I was half-crazed with need for a mate who did not want me and Lerokan reminding me of that fact every other moment made me feel like my skull was about to explode.

“You still have not answered me. Tell me how you won your mate,” I growled.

Lerokan stopped rubbing his neck and gave me an odd look.

I knew exactly what the look meant.

He was shocked, maybe even disturbed, by the reedy, panicked note of weakness that had wormed its hateful way into my words. I was no longer commanding him.

I was begging him.

Skies alive, if I have to endure Little Lerokan’s pity on top of my mate’s then I will hurl myself off this ledge myself.

To my immense relief, a look of pity never came to his face. Instead, he gave me one of his characteristic cavalier expressions.

“I have no answer for you, brother. I did not even have the Vrika’s mate bond upon me when I began to feel love for Priya. It was the same for her, of course, since the new women do not feel the Vrika’s bond.”

“But clearly, she feels a love bond for you now,” I said. Priya smiled at him. She let him touch her. And, bizarrely, she seemed to care not a whit about all his absurdness and shortcomings.

“Yes,” he said simply, his voice hard. Hard as a claim. “She does.”

“So, in short, you are telling me that you have no idea how you won her?” I muttered, staring into the fire.

“Please. Clearly, she could not resist my numerous charms. Charms I am afraid that you do not possess.”

I wish I’d ripped his head off after all.

I was getting nowhere with Lerokan. Nowhere apart from the sprawling lands of insanity, that is. I should have known talking to him would be useless.

Without another word to the loathsome man who somehow shared my blood, I grabbed Zuh-Tephanie’s pack and then stalked from the hall. There was only one person I wanted to be around, even if she was the origin of every one of my misfortunes.

My mate was somewhere in this mountain without me.

It was time for me to find her.

Find her.

And finally make her love me.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Stephanie

“Are you sure they’re going to be OK?” I asked as Priya led me by the hand through tunnels she’d obviously memorized during her time here.

“They’ll be fine. Honestly, what you just saw was pretty typical for their interactions. Did you know Errok exiled Lerokan for months, just because he wouldn’t answer the Vrika’s call?” Her voice softened. “But like I said, they do care about each other. I don’t know if you know this, but they were called to the Vrika’s peak at the same time when I was with Gahn Thaleo. They were climbing together and Lerokan slipped. He would have fallen to his death, but Errok grabbed him. He saved him. So, no, after all that, I don’t think he’s going to turn around and strangle my mate. Besides, if he has any sense at all, he’ll know that if he does something that stupid, he’ll have both of us angry human ladies to deal with.”

It was hard for me to imagine Errok saving anybody except for maybe himself. Or me. But then again, I clearly didn’t know everything about the confusing, maddening Gahn.

Priya dragged me around the massive mountain, knowing her way despite the darkness. I made a mental note that we’d have to install lanterns like Gahn Thaleo had done. She showed me the beautiful cave she shared with Lerokan, and I told her honestly how lovely I thought the space was.

“Apparently Errok’s cave is even nicer,” Priya said.

I rolled my eyes.

“Of course, it is.”

“I could show it to you.”

Priya and I both jumped at the sound of a new voice in the mix. At the entrance to the cave, someone stood watching us.

“Hi, Tilka!” Priya said, jogging over. “Here, come meet Stephanie.”

Priya led someone – a woman – towards me. The Deep Sky woman looked slightly familiar, even though I knew I’d never seen her before. I definitely would have remembered seeing a Deep Sky woman with a shaved head like she had.

“I am Tilka. Lerokan and Errok’s aunt.”

That was why she looked familiar. Family resemblance. She had the same white burst of sight stars in her dark gaze, and a cocky mischief in her smile that matched Lerokan’s.

“Come,” she said. “I will show you the Gahn’s quarters.”

“Oh, no, that’s OK. I don’t want you to get in trouble.” Something told me that going to Errok’s room without him had to be considered a no-no.

Her sight stars pulsed, then she threw her head back and laughed.

“There will be no trouble. Errok may be Gahn, but even he knows better than that.”

I decided instantly that I liked this woman.

“I mean, it’s not like I’ll be sleeping there or anything,” I told her. “So, I don’t need to see it.”

Tilka stopped laughing, looking surprised.

“Yeah, I know,” I muttered, annoyed by how the hurt of Errok’s rejection still poked at me. “But he wouldn’t even let me sleep in his cave when he was injured, so I don’t see why that would be changing now.”

Tilka’s gaze sliced through the dim, firelit darkness.

“That does not make sense,” she said. “Errok has gone near out of his mind waiting for a mate. You cannot tell me that once he found her, found you, that he did not do everything in his power to keep you by his side.”

“Yeah, well, he didn’t,” I said, crossing my arms and hunching down into myself, feeling oddly defensive. As if I somehow weren’t good enough to make him want me. Which was absolutely stupid.

But my feelings didn’t care about how stupid I thought they were.

“Priya,” Tilka said with the decisive force of a soldier commanding an army, “I am taking Zuh-Tephanie into my care now.” She grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the cave just as Priya had done earlier. “You will explain this to me,” she said, as if stating a simple fact. “And together, we will figure all of this out.”

I laughed, though none of this was funny. “Well, you’re going to have to be the one doing the explaining. That Gahn is a total mystery to me.”

“I have known him since birth,” Tilka said. “He may like to think he is unknowable to a mere aunt such as myself. But he is no mystery to me.”

I squeezed her hand involuntarily. There was something so comforting about her words, and about the way she seemed to be taking charge of the situation. Maybe she can actually tell me what the fuck is going on.

I filled her in on pretty much everything that had happened between Errok and me. I told her about our fights, about the taklok and his injuries. I told her about his nightmare, though I left out the details of the kiss afterwards.

“A nightmare?” she asked sharply, her steps faltering for a moment.

I nodded, and she began walking again.

We finally stopped for good, and I realized we were in the most breathtaking place I’d ever seen.

I dropped Tilka’s hand, my head straining back as I took in the space.

We had to be in a cave atop some sort of peak or crag on the mountain. Because the entire spike of the arching, cathedral-like ceiling was clear stone. Aguir or kaktuir, I couldn’t be sure. But either way, the result was astonishing. It felt as if there was nearly no roof at all, the cave arrowing up right into the sky.

It was only Tilka’s voice that made me stop staring.

“I did not know he still had nightmares.”

I looked at her questioningly.

“He had them as a child,” she explained. “My sister, his mother, used to tell me about them. About how he’d cry out in his sleep and wake in such a state she could barely calm him down.”

I remained silent, knowing exactly what she was talking about. I’d seen it myself.

“They started up again after his parents died,” she continued. “He fell asleep in the hall, once, and I happened upon him during a dream. I tried to wake him, to comfort him and… Let us just say, it did not go well.” She sighed. “If I remember correctly, he told me he was simply hunting in his dream, and that if I wanted to extend my pity to someone, it should be to the beast he’d just slaughtered in his sleep.”

That certainly sounded like something Errok would say.

“Well, he admitted to me that he’d had a nightmare,” I said. “He told me… He watched me die in the dream. And he couldn’t help me.”

Once again, Tilka looked shocked.

“Then he has already changed more than I would have thought possible. He never would have admitted such a thing before.”

I decided not to tell her that he’d kind of had to, to explain the reason he’d kissed me when neither of us had seemed to have expected it.

“Well, it doesn’t even matter,” I said. “Because the next day he basically told me to go away.”

I wandered over to the massive, heart-breakingly comfy-looking bed and hopped up onto it. Damn it. He was right. This mattress was better than the one in Thaleo’s mountain. And instead of being a bed carved into the floor, it was up high on a gigantic slab of stone. A bed fit for a king, that was for sure. Beside the bed was a large heated pool, its steam rising up to stain the darkness. There was no fire – likely because Errok had been gone so long.

Tilka came to sit beside me on the edge of the bed.

“A nightmare would have sent Errok spiralling back into his helpless childhood. And back into the even more helpless moments after his parents’ deaths. He certainly would not have wanted you to see him like that.” She took a strained breath. “My sister… Lerokan and Errok’s mother… She died first. And their father entirely fell apart. He died soon after. The two brothers reacted in different ways. Lerokan reacted by rejecting the Vrika when it called him, because he never wanted to love and then lose everything like his father had. Errok… Errok just grew harder. And he was already not a man anyone could accuse of having soft edges. He leaned more furiously into his power as Gahn. Grew more commanding. As if he could command the world, command fate itself, the way he’d command a simple warrior.” She gave a small laugh. “Clearly, that did not work. His greatest wish was to have a mate, and no matter what he did, he could not seem to make the Vrika come. It came to his younger brother first, the brother who did not even want a mate, but not to him.”

For fuck’s sake. She was going to start making me feel bad for Errok again. And I didn’t want to feel bad for him or to understand him. It was easier to be angry with him. Because that meant I was justified in keeping the distance between us.

“Well, he could have told me all of that,” I huffed. I flopped back on the mattress, closing my eyes. This had been an incredibly long day.

“You think he could have?” Tilka asked. “Really? Errok has certainly begun to change, thanks to you, I am sure. But even so, I doubt he could bare what he perceives as his weaknesses so easily. It would make him feel too vulnerable. He did not even want me to see him have a nightmare, so I can only imagine how he felt knowing you, the one person he wants to please but cannot, had seen him in such a state.”

Neither of us wants to look weak in front of others.

I knew in my bones that she was right.

“If he kept you away from him after that, it was only to protect himself. He has likely been quite frantic, trying to pull himself together enough so that he can feel safe around you once again.”

Goddamnit, I felt like crying. Again. The fact that Errok didn’t feel safe around me hurt. A lot. Especially after he’d vowed so fiercely that I would always be safe with him.

“But he is safe with me!” I didn’t want him to feel weak or exposed. But I did want to see the real, vulnerable part of him again. The honest part. “Why can’t he just talk to me about this stuff instead of barking at me and telling me he doesn’t need me to look after him?”

Tilka looked down at me from where she sat beside me.

“I do not know enough about your people,” she said. “Are such confessions easy for your kind? For your males?”

“Well… No,” I admitted. Hell, it wasn’t even easy for me! Hadn’t I been the one who’d cried on the flight here with Errok all while hoping that he wouldn’t see? Plus, I hadn’t even been able to tell him how he’d hurt me by sending me away. I’d just retreated into anger. Like I always did.

Am I asking more of him than I’m even capable of myself?

Now, that was an uncomfortable question. Especially considering how, in a way, Errok had already given me more than I’d been willing to give back. I knew I was developing feelings for him. And yet, I hadn’t told him that. I’d hidden it behind constant rejections, even as he hammered me with unrequited expressions of his love and devotion. I’d been furious at Errok for not breaking down the protective walls of his pride all while adding layers of bricks to my own.

If I want him to be honest with me, then shouldn’t I have to do the same thing? Isn’t that only fair?

If the sheer terror that ran through me at the prospect of opening up to Errok was anything like what he’d been feeling, I could suddenly understand why he’d pushed me away. Because, right now, all I wanted to do was run.

Tilka interpreted my silence as exhaustion. She bid me a quiet goodnight and stole out of the cave.

And maybe her interpretation had been right.

Because not long after that, among hides that smelled of Errok, I fell asleep.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

Errok

Ihad dragged myself all over his cursed mountain, growing more panicked every moment I could not find her, and the confounding creature had been asleep in my bed the entire time? I dropped Zuh-Tephanie’s bag on the stone floor of my cave, staring moodily down at her peaceful face.

It was only a chance encounter with my aunt Tilka in the tunnels that alerted me to where my mate had ended up.

“Don’t forget, Errok,” she said, eyeing me intently after she’d told me where Zuh-Tephanie was, “to be gentle.”

I’d scoffed at her, laughing bitterly. I’d told her that my mate required no gentleness. Her heart-wrenchingly beautiful eyes were hard as blades and her one little tongue was as swift and sharp as an arrow.

But Tilka had slashed her hand through the air.

“She is not who I meant.”

Who else would be in my cave with me besides my mate? Who else deserved my gentleness?

Clearly, the entire mountain had gone mad in my absence. Lerokan defied me with even greater vigour than before, and now my eccentric but usually sane aunt was talking utter nonsense.

Or maybe they hadn’t gone mad in my absence. Maybe they were simply following in their Gahn’s footsteps. Because as I stared down at Zuh-Tephanie, I felt madness closing in on quick wings.

But even though she’d driven me out of my mind, I could not hate her. Part of me almost wanted to. Because hate would not hurt me like love had.

I sighed, weariness making my limbs heavy. I did not like to admit it, but I still needed some time to return to my full strength. I was well on my way, but the flight had been a long one, and I was tired. It was more than the physical strain that wore on me, I knew. It was also her. Her presence. Her absence. The fact she was right in front of me and yet totally unreachable.

I slid my bow, quiver, blades, and weapons straps from my body. I almost wanted to, out of spite, let them clatter loudly to the floor so that she’d be forced to wake up to the sight of her mate, her Gahn, standing before her.

But, my eyes trained with painful devotion on her sleeping face the entire time, I instead lowered them silently to the stone. Then, I turned from her and prepared a fire in the fireplace, worried about the fact she slept atop the hides instead of bundled warmly beneath them. I’d told her that if she came here, I’d show her every luxury this mountain had to offer. I could not have her be cold on her first night in my cave.

My cave.

I’d waited for this moment. Yearned for it. The moment I’d have my mate in my cave for the first time.

It… Did not quite live up to my expectations.

I stood, regarding the fire critically, before turning towards the bed once more.

I started, finding Zuh-Tephanie’s eyes open and watching me.

“I tried not to wake you,” I grunted defensively.

“Thank you for the fire,” she said softly.

I waited for it – for her harsh words. Or for the dread they might cause me. But they didn’t come. The coldness in her had cracked. Or maybe melted under the heat of the fire I’d built. I added one more surreptitious log to the blaze, hoping the trend might continue, before striding back to the bed.

She sat up and took off her hooded cloak, dropping it on the stone as I came to a stop before her. She stared down at the floor for some time before finally meeting my gaze.

“So. Will I be allowed to stay here tonight? Or not?”

“Do you want to stay here?” I asked, my heart crashing in my breathless chest. I did not even know what I wanted her to say. I hoped she’d say, “No,” so that I could remain safe and strong away from her just a little longer.

And, piercing peaks of the Deep Sky, how I ached for her to say, “Yes.”

Clearly, she was as unsure of her own feelings as I was.

“I don’t know.” She hopped off the bed. I’d left so little space between myself and the bed that her front was now pressed to mine. “It depends on who’s going to be here with me.”

“You and Tilka are both talking in riddles. There would obviously only be me in here with you,” I muttered. Curse me, she was so pretty. Her skin like silk of the finest fashion. Her mouth a sweet temptation that drew my helpless gaze.

“But which version of you?” that mouth asked me. The eyes asked it, too. “The arrogant, closed-off Errok? Or the real, vulnerable one?”

My tail smashed the stone. My cock stiffened. My head ached.

I raked agitated claws through my hair. “You mean the frightened, blathering idiot who woke up and started pawing at you like an untried youth? That Errok? Skies alive, mate, please do not tell me that pitiful creature is the one you want. He is gone.”

He was not gone. He was deep inside me, growing more and more panicked by the moment.

I will lose her. I will lose her like this and never get her back.

But how could I hope to keep her if she wanted something impossible from me?

When my eyes found her face again, I balked. Her mouth trembled, and her eyes were oddly shiny.

“Don’t say that,” she whispered thickly. “The person I was with that night… I want…”

“You want what?” I snapped. I nudged closer until her palms fell back behind her, pressing into the edge of the mattress. My hands moved there, too, as I leaned over her and caged her in. “You want me weak again, Zuh-Tephanie? Is that it? Fine. It’s your love that’s made me weak. I am weak in my need for you. Weak. Mad. Pained. I’m sick in my love-struck head and I’m convinced I’ll never be quite right again.”

“You hate feeling weak,” she said, her angry words caressing my lips. “And yet you say I’m the one making you that way. So why don’t you just go ahead and say you hate me?”

“Never. I don’t. I can’t,” I groaned. My cock jerked against her abdomen. She made a small, high sound that boiled my blood.

That blood stilled, my heart stopping entirely when she spoke her next words.

“You hurt me, Errok.”

The inside of my head went black.

What? What?

My heart roared back to frantic life.

A sickly tremor went through me. My trembling hands flew to her jaw. I searched her face desperately.

“Where? How? What have I done? Tell me what is wrong and tell me how to fix it.”

If she didn’t tell me this instant, I’d tear all her clothes from her little body, and not for the reason I’d fantasized about doing so up until now. But because I needed to see where she was hurting. My hands had already skittered from her jaw to her neck, prodding as gently as my surging anxiety would allow. My hands dragged down her slender arms, grabbing at her hands so that I could inspect each fragile finger.

She yanked her hands from mine with remarkable strength.

“It’s not something you can see.”

“Are you sure? I have excellent eyesight,” I rasped.

“It’s not a physical injury,” she clarified.

“What, then?” I said, barely keeping myself from roaring. I was barely keeping myself together at all. “If I have hurt you, if I have damaged you somehow… Curse me, Zuh-Tephanie. My life would be over.”

She shook her head back and forth. “Has anyone ever told you that you are absolutely insane?”

“Yes,” I muttered darkly. “Me. No one else need tell me such a thing. I remind myself daily. I have done so since the day I met you.”

“So, I’ve made you both weak and crazy. Anything else you want to blame me for?”

“I don’t blame you,” I said. “I blame myself for not understanding how to be worthy of you. I have tried to make you love me every way that I know how.” I sounded pathetic. I was pathetic. “Instead, I’ve fallen apart. Shown you everything I lack. And I have only earned your pity.”

“Pity…” Her face was white, her eyes piercing. “You think I pitied you that night? You think I stayed with you, let you touch me, that I kissed you back, because I felt sorry for you? That wasn’t pity! That was care. Against all sanity and reason, I’m starting to care for you! And, fuck, Errok, I wish I didn’t care. Because it’s making me just as crazy as you are! If anyone deserves pity here, it’s me! For losing my mind over an absolute idiot of a Gahn like you!”

“What does that mean, ‘care’?” I asked, not allowing myself to dare to hope. If I hoped, and I was wrong, I’d never come back from that despair.

Care could be many things.

Care could be something close to love for a mate.

But then again, one could also care for an animal who couldn’t walk straight because it had had a rock dropped upon its head as an infant.

“It… It means…. It means that it hurt when you pushed me away, that’s what!”

I swallowed, my throat tight and dry. So that was what she’d meant earlier? When she said I’d hurt her?

“How could that have hurt you?” I asked, not understanding her at all. Like usual. “You have made it clear, over and over again, that you take little pleasure in my company.”

“Well, I took pleasure in it that night.”

“That night…” When I was injured. When I was afraid.

“And before you jump to any conclusions, I don’t mean that I enjoyed seeing you in pain. But…” She bit her lip, looking so miserable that I wanted to punch myself in the face. “But you let me see parts of you that I don’t think you show to anyone else. You let me in.”

“I didn’t let you in,” I hissed. “I dragged you, desperately, practically against both our wills.”

“Not against my will.” She took a steadying breath. “I let you touch me, and I touched you, too, because I wanted to. I held you and kissed you back because I wanted you. Not because I was just trying to make you feel better.”

Oh, no. I am so far gone that I am starting to hallucinate.

And the hallucination was apparently not just auditory, but tactile. She reached a hand for me, placing her palm flat on the place she’d healed me. And it was like I’d been torn open all over again.

“This isn’t easy for me either, you know,” she murmured. “You were right when you said that we’re more alike than I’d realized.” She traced a slow circle over my skin, making my muscles clench. “I thought that we’d gotten closer. But then you told me not to come back. To sleep in another cave. I was angry because… Well, you are infuriating, let’s be real. But it was mostly to cover up the hurt.”

“I had to,” I groaned as her fingers drifted slowly lower, across my taut abdominal muscles. “I couldn’t risk… Couldn’t have you near me… When I wasn’t… Myself.” My breath was hitching, making my words stutter out of me.

“You said that before. That you weren’t yourself that night.”

Her fingers stopped their torturous caress, curling into a fist against my stomach.

“But the Errok I was with that night is the one who convinced me that maybe I’d been wrong about you. He convinced me that I could… I could maybe even love someone like you. But if that wasn’t really you, then I don’t know where that leaves us.”

I stared down at her, wide-eyed and shaken.

“But here’s the thing,” she said softly. “I think that really was you. I think it’s the part you hide. But if you want me with you, if you want me to trust you and maybe even love you, you can’t hide anymore.”

I’d wanted her to make me into something worthy.

Instead, she was going to tear me apart.

And I knew that I could do nothing but let her.

She grasped my hands and pulled them back down to the mattress so that I was once again leaning down over her. She put her soft arms around my neck, and I nearly lost myself in her scent.

“I want to see it all, Errok. The strength and the pain.” Her arms tightened. “That night, when you were ‘not yourself,’ you told me that your love for me felt like a wound. That you didn’t know how to heal from it. Well, you don’t need to heal it. I will. I’ve healed you once and I’ll do it again. But I can’t help you if I can’t see the wound in the first place. I can’t reach you if you shut me out.”

“So, you want me wounded. And weak. Those are the conditions to earn your love,” I whispered against her hair. My claws curled hard into the hides, slicing the mattress.

“No,” she said, drawing her mouth along my jaw. “I just want you honest. I want you real. I want to know if you’re afraid because I’m afraid, too.”

“You have nothing to fear. Not with me at your side.” She should have known that by now. And the fact she didn’t only proved how much I’d failed her.

She laughed softly, the breath cascading warmth on my skin. My cock strained. My heart pummelled my insides.

“I’m scared of the same things you are, Errok. I don’t like letting people in. Even just admitting I’m scared makes me feel like I’m standing on the edge of a cliff right now. My heart is racing.”

My nose dipped to the side of her throat, brushing along the franticly pulsing column. She was telling the truth. I couldn’t stop my lips drawing back from my fangs at the luscious scent I found there. When my fangs grazed her skin, her back arched.

“I can’t be the only one who’s vulnerable,” she moaned when the tips of my tongues flicked over her skin.

“How can you be the vulnerable one?” I said, loathing how I could barely get the words out without needing to taste her skin again. “You still have your heart. I don’t. I have a crater. One that you so kindly left me with.” I laughed mirthlessly. “And I love you so much that I don’t even care. Steal my heart. Go ahead. You own my entire life, my world. What’s a heart compared to that?”

“A heart is everything” she whispered.

“You are everything,” I corrected her. Somehow, my mouth had found its way to the place just above hers. “I think it’s very likely that you will be the death of me,” I murmured against her lips. “And even as you kill me, I already know that I will beg you to do it again.”

“I won’t be the death of you,” she said sharply. “There was a moment, back in Gahn Thaleo’s mountain, when you were bleeding and you nearly lost consciousness. You slumped over, and do you know what I thought at that moment?”

“Thank goodness I’m finally free of him?”

She frowned at me. “No. I thought, ‘Oh, hell no. How dare he try to die on me now?’” Her hands cupped my jaw, her eyes shining and deep. “So, no, Errok. I won’t be the death of you. I’ll be the one dragging you back from the brink, every single time. Even if you fight me. Even if it hurts.”

I flinched, curling forward, my forehead bumping hers.

“It hurts now,” I gasped.

I hated that it hurt.

And I hated that I’d told her.

I wanted to run. To hide. To throw up walls and laugh and make a mockery of the pain. I wanted to fight someone, beat someone, just to show her that I could. Even if it was only myself that I bested. Myself that I doomed.

“Where does it hurt?” she breathed, her fingertips fluttering down my neck to my shoulders.

She’s too warm, too soft, too beautiful and I can’t do this, I can’t-

“Nowhere.”

Everywhere.

My head and my cock and the hole of my heart and everywhere, everywhere, everywhere.

“Errok. You begged me not to run. I’m asking you the same thing, now.” She pulled back slightly so that she could look me dead in the eyes. So that she could look at me while she repeated every pathetic word I’d said to her that night.

“Please,” she said. Her voice was ecstasy. And it was poison.

“Don’t leave me behind.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

Stephanie

Iknew I was pushing him. Maybe even too hard. But there was no turning back now. We’d come this far and we had to see it through.

Errok’s shoulders shook with his ragged breaths. His sight stars were going wild – a tempest of broken starlight turning everything to chaos. His lips twitched, his fangs flashing, and his arms shook as he dug his claws into the bed.

We were at a breaking point. I could feel it. If he turned away, now, if he pushed me away again and retreated into his shield of bravado, I wasn’t sure we’d ever find our way back to this place.

It has to be now.

I knew he was afraid. Because I was, too. Just like I’d told him. I was terrified that he would back away from me. That I’d never again get a glimpse at his deepest inner truth. That I’d never get a chance to really learn to love him. And I was even more terrified of just how wrapped up in him I’d become. It had happened so fast, and I was still reeling. Free-falling through the winds of his storm.

I held onto him more tightly, needing to anchor myself to him. One arm stayed tightly looped around his neck. The other moved down until my hand was once again over the place his wound had been. His heart beat, strong and hard, under my touch.

“Where does it hurt?” I asked again.

He gave a broken moan against my throat. I expected him to say “Nowhere,” again.

But he didn’t.

“Everywhere.”

“Errok…”

My mouth searched for his, but he drew back a fraction of an inch. It was as if now that he’d started talking about his feelings, he couldn’t stop.

“It hurts everywhere because you are everywhere,” he rasped. I jolted when his hands clasped against my waist. “You are all I can see. All that matters. But I’m scared of losing you the way my father lost my mother. And I’m even more scared that I’ll never even have you to lose in the first place. I’m scared that no matter what I do, it will never be enough. All my instincts have led me astray. Everything I thought I knew of love has been crushed under your little foot and all I can think to do is lie down and ask you to crush me again. And that is terrible. And it is wrong. Because I am a warrior – a Gahn – and this is not the way.”

“Then what is the way?” I whispered, fighting back tears at his onslaught of tumbling emotion.

“You are supposed to rely on me and me alone. I should always be strong for you.”

“We’re supposed to rely on each other,” I told him softly.

He made a bitter sound. “Have you ever once had to rely on me? Have you ever even once come close to needing me?”

I hadn’t. I knew I hadn’t. Being independent was important to me, and I’d needed him to know that I wasn’t going to let him stomp into my life and rule it. But at the same time, I now knew I’d been hurting him the same way he’d hurt me when he’d told me not to sleep in his cave anymore. He’d never gotten the chance to take care of me, to be strong for me, because every time he’d tried in his over-the-top (and often offensive) ways, I’d essentially slapped his hand for doing so. In some ways, he’d really needed that hand-slapping. But in others… In others, I realized he was doing his best with the meager tools he had. He thought I’d love him back when he met me, and I didn’t. He thought the things his culture valued – strength, pride, and masculinity on steroids – would woo me. But they hadn’t. Just as he’d said, every instinct had led him astray. And left him utterly adrift.

“Well, I need you now, Errok,” I told him. “And I need you to know that opening up and telling me how you feel is a sort of strength. I think you’re stronger now, in this moment, than I’ve ever seen you before.”

His fingers tightened on my waist.

“That makes no sense. You are confusing me,” he said miserably.

“I know. But we’ll figure it all out together. I promise.”

I stretched up to reach his mouth. But I didn’t need to go far.

He met me halfway.

His mouth on mine was slow and tentative at first. As if he still couldn’t quite believe this was happening and he was scared I would pull away.

But I wasn’t going to pull away.

I opened my mouth against his.

And then, the kiss turned to chaos.

One of his hands shot to the back of my head, supporting it as the force of his kiss wrenched my neck back. His tongues surged into my mouth, tasting, searching. Claiming. I met them with just as much force, my clit throbbing at the feeling of his three tongues running over mine. Wetness flooded between my legs, my nipples aching. I didn’t know how badly I’d needed this. Needed him.

His chest shuddered under my hand, his breath coming ragged and hard. He dragged his mouth from mine, slicking his tongues along my cheek to my ear, then down to my throat. I moaned, keeping my head tipped back. It wasn’t difficult, and it didn’t hurt. Because his strong hand was still there, supporting me.

“I love you,” he rasped against my dampened skin. “I love you so much I can’t untangle it from obsession. I love your skin, your scent. Your anger and your joy. Your hair. Curse me, I love your hair so much I want to swallow it. Want to choke on it. Want to feel it slide across my cock. Get strangled by it.”

Holy shit.

His words sent desire slamming through my bloodstream. It grew even hotter, thicker, swirling through my core when he hoisted me onto my back on the bed. I half sat up, wanting to drag him back to me, but I didn’t need to. With urgent, panther-like grace, he climbed onto the bed, looming over me on his hands and knees. It was so much like the last time we’d been together in a bed. He’d loomed over me then, just like this.

But it was also nothing like that. Because I knew that things were changing between us. He was changing.

And so was I.

Under the feral heat of his gaze, I drew trembling fingers down to my tank top’s bottom hem and yanked it up and over my head, tossing it aside. I laid back down beneath him, and then, before I could lose my nerve, I pulled down my pants and underwear. They caught on my ankles (I was still wearing my stupid fucking boots) but a flurry of kicking soon had everything sliding off my feet and onto the floor.

I panted, completely bared to him, trying not to be afraid. Afraid of what he’d see when he looked at me. He’d given me something tonight – he’d opened up and let go. I could do the same. So, I forced myself to be still. To not curl up and roll away and hide.

It was hard, though. Because his sight stars lit my skin on fire.

They stormed over me, dragging up and down my form, over and over again. His cock jutted out from his groin, stretching his loincloth to its limits, and it twitched whenever his gaze passed over the place between my legs.

“How long are you going to keep staring?” I asked shakily after what seemed an excessively long time.

“As soon as I regain use of my limbs,” Errok wheezed.

A tremulous smile passed over my lips. He was adorable like this.

“Do you want to touch me?” I asked, feeling just a little bolder. Flushing, I drew my fingertips slowly over my breasts. My nipples puckered, and I arched, moaning.

“Skies help me,” he groaned, watching me touch myself with feverish eyes. “I’ve wanted this, wanted you, for so long, that just watching is pushing me beyond the edge of reason.”

His words squeezed my core. I licked my lips, my eyes dragging down to the evidence of his arousal – his throbbing cock.

“Can I take this off?”

He gave a strangled-sounding, “Yes,” then breathed some curse I didn’t quite catch.

I reached one of my hands down, tugging at his loincloth until one of the knots came loose and it fell away. His cock sprang free, hard and huge. It was a deeper indigo colour than the rest of him, with twin blue spears of flesh on either side. His balls were velvety, dark, and heavy. Under my gaze, they visibly surged upwards towards his body. At the same moment, a drop of wetness appeared at his tip, a shining bead that remained round and perfect, like a dew drop, against the slick dark hide.

That bead didn’t stay there long, though. When I drew gentle fingertips along the bottom of his shaft, that bead of semen dribbled down, pushed out by more seed. Every muscle in Errok went taut as a snare drum’s skin. He screwed his eyes shut, and his breath became choked. More seed ejected, this time in a small spurt instead of a dribble, making me gasp.

He’s about to come. Just from one touch…

That thought was shockingly arousing. It made me want to see more. To have him entirely lose control.

“You can come if you need to,” I whispered. My fingertips remained still against his hot, throbbing organ. It jerked against my touch at my words, forcing out another little spurt of pearly liquid.

“No. Not yet. Too fast… I can’t-” His words melted into a needy whimper as yet more seed dribbled, glistening on his skin, making everything wet. He ground his fangs, his neck straining.

I slid my index finger up to the dark slit at his tip, pressing it there like a stopper.

Errok’s eyes flew open. He straightened up onto his knees and his claws flashed through the air.

He raked them in a savage motion across his chest until lines of dark blood appeared.

I scrambled up onto my knees, too.

“What are you doing?!” I cried.

“Needed some pain,” he grunted. “To distract me. To… Regain control.”

I decided not to tell him that someone clawing their own skin until they bled just to avoid coming didn’t really seem like an indication of control. It seemed absolutely crazy.

But maybe I was crazy, too. Because I slid forward on my knees and kissed his wounds.

Thankfully, they weren’t deep, so they weren’t bleeding too much. But there was enough blood that I felt it smear over my skin, could taste the tang of it, as I kissed along each torn strip of flesh.

“Zuh-Tephanie,” he gasped. His hands snapped to the sides of my head. But he didn’t exert any pressure one way or the other. As if he still wasn’t sure if he wanted to push me away…

Or pull me closer.

My hands slid along his waist as I pressed into him. His cock was trapped between our bodies, its sticky underside twitching against my stomach.

“Beloved, you’ll get filthy. You – ah!”

My lips grazed his nipple. His cock twanged with tension.

I fastened onto the taut bud and sucked.

Errok’s fingers tightened. His tail twisted in the hides. His voice disappeared into a harshly fractured howl.

His cock unleashed a torrent against my skin. It bucked wildly against my abdomen, coating me with desperate spurt after spurt of seed. I jerked back from Errok’s chest, helpless to do anything but watch his untouched shaft unleash all his pent-up need. And apparently, there had been a lot of need. Every time I thought he had to be finished, he shivered, and another hot jet coated me. Finally, his cock still half-stiff, the explosion tapered off and ended. We both breathed heavily, staring down at the mess. The undersides of my breasts, my ribs, all the way down to my belly button – all of it was slick with Errok’s viscous fluid. It dripped down my skin the way it had dribbled over his sensitive tip, rolling in shining beads towards my pubic hair.

Between that and the blood I now remembered was streaked across my face, I probably looked like a disaster.

No doubt Errok thought the same.

Because his fingers fastened around my waist.

And then he dragged me into the heated water of the pool.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

Errok

I’d told her I would cherish her. And instead, I’d made a mess of her.

I sloshed into the heated pool, pulling my mate right along with me. Her knees buckled, or maybe she slipped. I scooped my arms under her, cradling her against my chest. The pool wasn’t deep at this end – a little past my waist. At the other end, it was so deep that I could swim, my claws not touching the bottom.

I didn’t go into the deep end. Instead, I deposited Zuh-Tephanie onto a natural bench of stone. The water sloshed high on her small body, all the way up to her delicate collarbones. That will take care of the spilled seed, at least.

I still could not believe I had climaxed like that. With so little control. She’d barely even touched me. And then, seeing all that spill on her pale skin had made me want to both clean her with manic effort… And do it all again.

Zuh-Tephanie watched me from her seat on the stone. Her cheeks were flushed a deep pink, her eyes large and bright and even more reflective than the water of the pool. Her lovely hair was mussed from my touch, falling in tangled waves around her shoulders, the steam dampening the brown strands. The lower half of her face – her pointed chin, her perfect temptation of a mouth – were smeared black with dried blood.

I fell to my knees before her. Like this, our gazes were level. My motion sent a small tidal wave of heated water sloshing towards her, crashing over her neck and drenching her skin. I used that wetness, dragging my thumb through it and up over her chin to her lower lip, smearing the blood further. The scratches on my chest burned.

“We’re going to need some Vrika’s blood,” she murmured, her gaze dropping to my chest. Her lips parted, letting my thumb in. My cock was already murderously hard again, as if I hadn’t just ejaculated all over her with the untapped force of a virgin warrior.

“We don’t,” I assured her. “These are barely wounds at all. Besides, this water has some healing properties.” The heated water in the pools of my mountain could not entirely heal wounds the way Vrika’s blood could, but it had mild antiseptic properties that made it immensely useful for moments like this. Because I had absolutely no interest in leaving my mate’s side to track down a jar of Vrika’s blood right now. Not when she was naked with me, her eyes alight, her bare skin wet and silken and begging to be touched.

I pulled my thumb from her mouth. The slick popping sound made hot pleasure curl around the base of my spine. I cupped water in my hand, then propped my hand against her cheek, letting the warmth dribble down. She closed her eyes and smiled contentedly, leaning her head against the stone at her back while I poured careful streams of water down her cheeks and neck.

That first annoyingly quick orgasm had calmed me somewhat. I was no longer so overwhelmed by the beat of desire that I could hardly bear to touch her. My hands no longer shook, thank the cursed skies. I’d begun to worry that I would shake every time I got near her and that possibility was too humiliating to even contemplate.

I was still run-through with need, but it had slowed, turned thick inside me. It let me calm down, just a little. Let me realize just how lovely it was to watch water run over my mate’s skin while she gave little sighs of pleasure.

But I wouldn’t take too long with this. Even more humiliating than the fact I’d trembled was the notion I would not please my mate after I had spilled. Ideally, her pleasure would come before my own but… Well… I would just have to improve upon that for next time.

I stroked my thumb, my fingers, along Zuh-Tephanie’s chin, jaw, and neck. When her skin was soft and clean and free from the ugliness of my blood, I tucked her now wet hair behind her round, low ears. I kissed the tender place behind each ear, groaning at the way she tensed, her pulse jumping in her throat.

Beneath the water, my fingers slipped, cupping her breasts. In the heated wet, her nipples had grown puffy and swollen. It made me want to suck them. They contracted under my touch. And that made me want to suck them even more.

But I had an even more pressing urge than that. My fingers looped around her tiny waist and I lifted her up onto the stone edge. She gave a startled cry, her eyes opening. My hands clamped down fiercely on her dripping thighs, silently letting her know that she could not escape. Not from me. Not anymore.

I stared up at her, adjusting my position until I was kneeling on the bench she’d just been sitting on. My head was at the perfect height – directly between her knees.

She tried to slam those knees closed, but I hissed, my thumbs digging into her inner thighs.

“You said I could not hide from you,” I reminded her hoarsely. “Now, you must not hide from me.” As I spoke, my hands slid slowly up her legs, my thumbs coming to a stop at the place where those pretty thighs met her groin. I didn’t look between those thighs. Not yet. Not until she eased the tension in her muscles and let me in because she was as desperate for me as I was for her. I wanted her to want me.

Please, perfect creature. Want me.

Her breath hitched. A red flush stained her cheeks, her neck, and her chest. She met my gaze, and I could see the fear there. Fear, perhaps, that matched my own.

But even more than that, in the glittering depths, I saw the desire.

Her thighs quivered, then relaxed under my hands.

She spread her legs.

And gave me a gift greater than any mountain, any expanse of sky.

Dark, drenched curls glistened around a seam of dark pink skin. Silken folds lined each side, begging to be tasted, teased, and parted. At their apex was a little nub of flesh that sent dark curiosity spiralling through me. So many secret places to discover…

I skimmed a thumb inward, gently parting her until her hot, wet core was revealed. A dark, inviting entrance, pretty as a dark rindla bud at dawn. When my thumb bumped that taut nub at the top, I watched in lurid fascination as her entrance constricted, her hips pulsing upward.

I wanted to see it happen again.

Experimentally, I brushed my thumb over the nub once more. Zuh-Tephanie made a sound low in her throat, her hips rocking against my thumb. More luscious moisture appeared below.

I became aware of a sudden, terrible thirst. The sort of thirst that turned me inside out with need, made me feel like I might die if I didn’t quench it right now.

And I knew there was only one thing that would quench this sort of need.

My tongues were out of my mouth before I even dove, desperate to taste her. I fell upon her in a chaotic tangle of tongues, fangs, and lips. I’d assumed that I’d be able to impress my mate with at least some semblance of skill during our first time together.

That assumption was proving to be naïve at best, asinine at worst.

I was shaking. Again. And I was already close to coming. Again. Her taste and secret softness were undoing every bit of control I’d clawed my way back to. I groaned, rubbing my face back and forth, soaking myself in her wetness as my tongues circled her entrance. I wanted to be so drenched in her goodness that every male would be able to smell her on me for days to come. So that everyone would know that I had pleased her.

And everyone would know that she was finally, inarguably, irrevocably mine.

When the centre tongue nudged inside her, I got to feel that glorious clenching for myself. I thrusted deeper, stroking against every pulsing wall while my other two tongues slipped back up to that little nub that seemed to make her go as mad as I felt.

At least my hungry, feral mess of a technique seemed to be pleasing her. Her fingers buried themselves in my hair, digging blunt claws against my scalp as she writhed.

“Errok, this is, oh my god.” Her fingers drifted out of my hair, pulling away as she wriggled down to lie on her back. My jaw went tight, my tail slicing through the water as she draped her lovely legs over my shoulders and down my back. I stroked my tongue along the front wall of the inside of her wet sheath, and her heels dug into the muscles along my spine.

“Oh! Right there,” she mewled.

I never thought I would enjoy being told what to do before. I found I enjoyed it immensely now. I prodded my two outer tongues along her swollen little nub, and rubbed up and down that front wall of her with my centre tongue once more. I couldn’t get enough of her taste. Of every slick frill of texture inside her. I grasped my cock, pumping hard, when I thought about putting it inside her.

I wanted to close my eyes and lose myself entirely. But I forced them to stay open. I’d waited so long – too long – for this. I would burn the image of her – flat on her back, skin flushed red, breasts shaking, mouth thrown open in an ecstatic moan – into my brain. I would not even blink for fear of missing a single beat of her beauty.

Part of me worried that my vexing little mate would soon come to her senses, kick me in the face, and never let me do this again. So, I had to make it count.

I worked my tongues harder, rutting her in time with the jerking of my fist. Zuh-Tephanie’s pink-tipped breasts rose and fell rapidly, her ribs expanding and contracting with quick, sharp intakes of breath. Delectable wetness gushed over my tongues, and her cunt seemed to get even more swollen and sensitive, the tunnel caressing me as her thighs clamped against the sides of my head. I moaned into her, and her thighs squeezed harder, her feet scrabbling against my back.

Her back arched. She was cresting. I could feel it. Could taste it in her glorious moisture. She rose and rose, soaring to the peak of her pleasure. I was there, too, my cock ready to burst into my sliding grip.

One final swirl of my tongues. One more squeeze of my fist. One breathless moment of rising pleasure completely intertwined.

And then, together, we tumbled over the edge.

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

Stephanie

Iwas vaguely aware of strong arms sliding under my damp body, easing me from the stone. My eyes fluttered open, glimpsing a thick neck, a strong jaw, and the gleam of white sight stars. Errok curled my body against his broad chest as he rose to a standing position. Thank God he could carry me, because that orgasm had damn near made me lose consciousness. And now my legs felt like stretched-out mozzarella cheese.

My whole body felt that way, to be honest. Gooey and warm and not altogether solid.

I made a sound of sleepy contentment when Errok placed me oh so carefully down onto the bed. I could barely keep my eyes open, but I forced myself to stay awake long enough to make sure he got in the bed with me. We’d gotten past something big just now. We’d started working through our shit. And after the exquisite, exhausting night we’d been through, I just wanted to hold him.

Errok joined me on the bed, the mattress sinking under his immense weight. I could feel myself smiling goofily as he arranged the hides around me until I was perfectly tucked in, only my head poking out the top.

“Are you going to come under here, too?” I asked sleepily.

He laid beside me, on top of the hides.

“No. Not yet, anyway,” he said. “Between the flames I built up and the steam and the way your touch has branded me, I feel like I’m on fire.”

It was late, we’d both been through a lot, and I could tell that he was tired. His voice had taken on a gruff, gravelly tone that I’d never heard before. I loved it.

“Remember when you kept saying you were an invalid and that you had a deathly chill and that only my body heat could save you?” I giggled, feeling oddly giddy.

Errok laid on his back, placing his hands behind his head in a perfect pose of leisure. He tilted his head down towards me, and gave me a blindingly beautiful smile.

“I have no doubt that the chill will return at some point tonight. And I will need your naked ministrations.”

I laughed, pretending to be shocked but secretly already looking forward to it.

“But hey,” I said more seriously, my smile fading, “if you were so concerned about looking weak in front of me, what was with all that ‘I’m an invalid, come warm me up with your naked body!’ stuff?”

Errok’s smile faded, too. He rolled onto his side, facing me, resting his head on one arm, the other draping over my body.

“Because I did not truly feel weak in that moment. You’d healed me, I knew I would recover well. The fear hadn’t gotten its hooks into me yet.” He brushed a stray, damp hair away from my forehead. “It is easy to joke about such things from a position of strength.”

I nodded.

“I understand.”

“I know you do,” he said with a weary chuckle. “And that is both comforting and alarming.”

“Don’t be alarmed,” I murmured, my eyes sliding closed. He was so big and warm, and the bed was so soft, and my pussy had been so well-loved that there was no way I could stay awake much longer. A smile tugged at my lips as rough knuckles stroked across my cheekbone.

I barely heard Errok’s whisper in the fire-touched dark of the cave. I only caught the final word, the reverent whisper of, “Beloved,” before sleep finally took me away.

I AM WARM AND I AM happy. Because Errok is here. We’re in a glittering valley, sun painting the stones in shades of blue and bright turquoise. The only way this moment could be more perfect is if he were kissing me. So, I reach for him.

But I fall to my knees. The ground is sharp and cutting. I twist and search, but Errok is nowhere. My hands reach but they’re empty. Fighting panic, I squint up into the blinding sky. I see him on the back of a braxilk, flying as fast as he can away from me.

Leaving me.

And then, there is nothing. No sun. No stones. No sky.

No breath in my lungs because Errok is gone.

And that means my heart is gone, too.

“ZUH-TEPHANIE!”

I took a huge, sucking breath as if I’d been underwater for too long. Wild with panic, my limbs writhed, my eyes wide open but not seeing.

Where is he?

“I am here!” The forceful hiss cut through the inky darkness, steadying me. And it wasn’t just words. But a warm, solid touch. A wall of muscle against my bare back. Two strong arms wrapping around my front, holding me tight. Errok.

“I am here,” he repeated, more softly this time, against the top of my head. My heart pounded, but I slowly started to relax as his words drifted over me.

“You are safe,” he promised vehemently. “Any monster that has charged you, I will slay it. Any pain that’s dared to touch you, I will kill it. Nothing can harm you so long as I am here. Do you understand that, beloved?”

I panted, unable to answer. Instead, I rolled in the circle of his arms, buried my face in his chest, and cried. Errok went rigid against me as I sobbed.

“Zuh-Tephanie,” he said, panic edging into his voice, “precious creature, I think you’re bleeding.”

“It’s not blood!” I gasped, sniffing hard. I rubbed my forehead back and forth over the tense bulges of his pectoral muscles. “They’re tears.”

“If you don’t tell me what in the piercing peaks of the Deep Sky tears are right this instant then I will drag every healer in this mountain to your side.”

“No!” I stammered, throwing my arms around his neck and squeezing. “You can’t leave!”

“Then tell me how to heal the tears,” he begged, sounding distraught.

“You don’t need to heal them. They’re normal. It’s a human thing. Can we not talk about it right now?”

“Fine,” he grunted, though he didn’t sound convinced. “As long as you’re alright. Though it doesn’t seem natural for your face to leak that much fluid…”

A laugh choked through my sobs, then I hiccupped.

“Oh, no. Now what is that sound?” he asked, dismayed.

“It’s just a hiccup! You don’t hiccup?”

“Certainly not. What an undignified sound.”

“Well, excuse me!” I said, scowling at his annoyingly muscled chest. “I guess you’ll just have to get used to all my undignified human things. Jeez, how will you bear to be seen with me?”

“It’s not something I’ll need to bear at all. Hiccups or not, tears or not, you’re still the most glorious thing ever to have graced my world.” His hands skimmed up and down the naked skin of my back. “You may call it vanity, but I’ve decided I don’t care. I’m immensely proud to have you by my side. And I plan to show you off as such.”

Well, shit. I wasn’t quite sure what to say to that. I sniffed, no longer crying, and changed the subject.

“Sorry that I woke you up. Didn’t think I’d be the one having a nightmare tonight. Is this our new routine? Are we going to take turns or something, now?”

I felt Errok’s chin bump the top of my head as he snuggled closer. One of his hands began to stroke my hair, the other sealing its warm palm flat to my spine.

“No, I expect not. In fact, I do not believe I’ll ever have another nightmare ever again. Licking your cunt has cured me of every affliction, both mental and physical.”

“Oh, lordy. Has it cured you of your giant ego?”

“No,” he groaned, “spilling seed all over you with barely a touch of your hand did that well enough, I think.”

I smirked, heat flaring at the memory.

“It may have damaged your ego, but it added to mine,” I said huskily. “I liked seeing you like that. Seeing you so affected by me.”

He twirled a strand of my hair around a lazy finger. “You like me when I’m weak. You like me when I’m afraid. You like me when I spill practically just from looking at you. You are an incredibly odd woman. Although I suppose I should be grateful that you are so strangely attracted to all my… Well, I will not call them flaws, because I do not have flaws. But my moments of… Slight imperfection. Even if it does make me worry that you are rather not right in the head.”

I laughed heartily, all traces of the bad dream gone now. “Yeah. Pretty sure we’ve already established that I’ve lost my mind loving you.”

I froze. Errok made a fist around my hair. He tugged until my hot face was turned up to his.

“Did you just say, ‘love’?”

Fuck. I had, hadn’t I? It had just… Slipped out. Earlier tonight I said I cared about him. When, exactly, did it go from care to love?!

“Maybe,” I muttered. I tried to break eye contact, but his fingers turned to iron, still holding my hair tight. His other hand came up under my chin, holding me firmly.

His sight stars were lightning – bright and burning and crashing into me. Leaving a cacophony of thunder in their wake. Or maybe that was just the excessive rhythm of my heart.

He took a shaking breath, then leaned down until his nose brushed mine, speaking directly against my mouth.

“I told you so.”

“Told me what?” I asked moodily, still unable to comprehend what I’d just told him. Unfortunately, I couldn’t deny what I’d said. There was no backing away from it because, goddamnit, somehow I really had fallen in love with the cockiest alien on this entire freaking planet. This is not going to help his ego problems.

“I told you that one day you would love me just as I loved you.”

Yup. Knew it. Ego intact.

“OK, hold on. I am nowhere near as far gone as you,” I exclaimed. “What did you say earlier? That you wanted to eat my hair until you choked on it? I am nowhere near that level of obsession, so just… Cool your jets.”

My blood pulsed between my legs when the burning rod of his cock nudged my hip.

“You will feel that way by the time I am done with you.”

“Oh, well, isn’t that a bold statement – oh, fuck!”

Errok had apparently tuned out my whining. Before I knew it, he had my legs hooked over his shoulders, his tongues sliding in heated wet tendrils over my clit. There was no way to even attempt to keep him out. I needed him there. Just like it seemed he needed it, too. Errok went down on me like it was saving his fucking life. Like I was saving his life. Like being between my legs was more vital to his survival than me stopping the bleeding from the arrow wound had been.

My fingers sunk into the silken mass of his hair, my toes curling against his clenching back muscles. Like before, he fucked me with one tongue and prodded my swelling clit with the others, all the while making filthy, erotic groans of intense pleasure.

It was almost terrifying how fast my orgasm flew through me. It lit me up, sudden and scalding, so fast I didn’t even make a sound. I arched, my mouth wide in a soundless cry as my pussy clamped down on Errok’s centre tongue. He lapped up everything I had to give, so much so that it would have been humiliating if he didn’t clearly love it so much. Even after his tongue withdrew, he continued to lick up and down my soaking crease, his quick, shaking breaths heating the sensitive skin.

I wriggled, too sensitive, pushing back on his head. He moaned in complaint, suckling gently on my screaming clit before he finally let go.

I trembled, staring up at the bulky, hard shadow of his form. He straightened on his knees between my splayed thighs, one hand gripping his already-dripping cock, the other resting possessively against my lower abdomen. I stared down at his massive hand on me – his dark fingers splayed across my stomach, his palm anchored to my pelvis.

My gaze travelled from that hand, up the tense, long arm, to the face wracked with tension. Then back down to the murderous grip on his cock. My core clenched needily when fluid dribbled from his tip, stretching down to land on the skin of my inner thigh in a gleaming, continuous line.

If past me could see me now…

I’d fallen in love with Gahn Errok. Despite every protestation I’d made. Every claim I’d made to the contrary.

And now, I was desperate for him to fuck me.

Shuddering, I rocked my hips, silently inviting him to do it.

Those lightning sight stars flashed to my pussy. His face turned into a feral mask of need. And, God, the sight of him was glorious. Huge and carved from night, eyes and fangs flashing, every inch of him menacing and masculine and mine. He dragged his hand from my abdomen, planting it on the bed beside my head as he guided his slick head to my clenching entrance.

He nudged ever so slightly inside.

Fuck. Yes. Yes!

Explosive sensation spasmed through me. He was stretching my entrance so perfectly. I needed to be that beautifully filled, all the way inside. I needed to feel him get so deep that there was nowhere left for him to invade. And then, I’d need him to push even further. I needed to be so stretched by him that I could barely breathe, even my lungs having to make way for him.

I’ve gone fucking insane.

How many times would I tell myself that tonight?

And how many times would I decide that it didn’t even matter?

Errok wasn’t my shelter in the storm. He was the storm. Stealing my breath and my sanity until there was nothing left to do but give myself over entirely to the swirling madness of his cyclone. His chaos.

His cock.

My head arched back. My fingers scrabbled desperately against his shoulders. My legs cramped up as I spread them as hard as I could for him. Without words, I begged him to drive into my body the way he’d managed to crash into my heart.

But no matter what I did, he wouldn’t move.

I ground my hips upward, whimpering, searching for more of his girth, his heat. With a sharp hiss, he arched his hips backwards. Not enough to withdraw from me completely. But enough so that the hungry motion of my hips hadn’t drawn more of him inside the way I’d wanted to.

I opened my mouth to mewl, to beg, to scold him, to scream. To scream that if he didn’t move right fucking now he really would lose me after all because I was on the verge of dying from a terrible case of not being fucked within an inch of my life. Absurdly, I felt tears gather in my eyes. I’d literally never felt like this before. Sex had always been alright. I’d enjoyed it in the past. But I’d never experienced desire like this. Desire so desperate it became distress.

“Errok-”

The husky gravel of his voice cut me off.

“Say it again.”

An ecstatic shudder ran up my spine as he notched one inch further inside. My eyes fell closed, and I clenched needily around him, about to literally cry for joy that he was going to finally fill me. But, fuck, he stopped again. He made a terrible sound, as if he were in pain, and I only then realized that staying still like this was just as bad, if not even worse, for him than it was for me.

“Please,” I moaned. I turned my face towards his hand, the one flat against the mattress beside my head. I licked frantically at his forearm, then closed my mouth against his wrist and sucked.

There was that sound again. Broken and growly and, oh my God, he was throbbing inside me. I could feel it. Feel how much he needed to -

“Say. It.”

I moaned wetly against his skin. Could aliens get hickeys? I was about to find out. My teeth bit down gently, then harder, as I sucked at his arm.

With a grunt, he whipped his arm away. If he’d been human, I knew my teeth would have broken the skin and left him bloodied. He shifted positions swiftly, grabbing my ankles roughly and slamming them up to his shoulders. Oh, yes, like this he’d be able to get so, so deep.

A tremor wracked Errok’s body. The vibration of it went all the way through his cock and into my core, making me cry out. Oh, shit, his cock spears were grazing my flesh now. If I just got a little closer, adjusted the angle a little more, they’d brush against my pounding clit. I tried to do it, tried to shift against him, just to get that little bit more. Errok made a tight sound, and his cock slid in a tiny bit further. He hammered himself into furious stillness, as if he hadn’t meant to enter me further yet. But I could tell he was losing his control, his nerve. Just like I was losing all sense of time and place. Losing track of what he’d said and what he wanted. Losing track of everything that wasn’t his cock, so brutally hard, in the greedy softness of my pussy.

As if he’d read my unspooling mind, he spoke again. Though, it was barely speaking. More like guttural snarling.

“You know what I want, mate. Say it again. Say it like you mean it. Not like… Ah!” He did that trembling cock shivery thing again. This time a tear actually did slip out of my scrunched eyes, gliding down my temple and into my sweaty hair.

His fingers tightened into vises around my ankles.

“Say it again and not like it’s a mistake this time.”

I cracked my hazy eyes open, forcing them to focus on Errok. His chest heaved with haggard breath. His expression was largely blunted by the darkness, but his sight stars weren’t. They were so obsessively sharp, so exacting, so hungry on me they should have drawn blood. Buzzing arrows of intensity, aimed right at me.

Aimed. And waiting.

Another tear followed the first, a hot trail of salt on my skin. My breath caught, my throat tightening. I swallowed. Swallowed hard. So that I’d be able to speak.

This time, I wanted the words clear with intention. I wanted them properly linked together, all in the right order. I wanted him to hear them. Really hear them. And not just because I was going out of my mind with need for him.

But because, somehow, some way, Lord help me, they were true.

“Errok,” I croaked weakly. I took a shaky breath, steadying my voice. “I-

“Wait! I’ve changed my mind,” he whispered unsteadily. “I’d rather you say nothing at all than try to take it back now.”

He’s scared again. I could hear it in his voice. See it in the frantic dispersing of his sight stars.

“Errok, listen to me. I-”

“Stop,” he gasped. His tail jerked and his cock swelled further inside me. “I can’t take it. Just send another arrow through me. Do it properly this time and put me out of my misery.”

God, he was so infuriatingly, obnoxiously, adorable. So needy and desperate. Just like I was.

“You’re spiralling,” I told him gently.

“I’m begging,” he corrected me, his voice cracking. “Begging for somebody to-”

“I love you.”

Apart from a hard convulsion of the muscles in his throat, Errok went entirely still. Even his sight stars stopped their ravenous vibrations, a frozen universe in the expanse of his dark gaze. A universe that consumed me, surrounded me. This, this universe, this cave, this man. This moment. This was the centre of everything.

More tears flowed. I couldn’t stop them. Slowly, as if moving for the first time in millennia, Errok dragged his pulsing length out of me, then paused, primed to slam all the way back in.

I held my breath in the blood-rushed dark. The beating, blessed calm.

I’d passed through the eye of the storm.

And now?

Now came the fury.

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

Errok

Irammed forward and seated myself entirely in my mate’s clenching core. And it was a revelation. My eyes fell closed as I gave myself up to the rapture of her wet heat. Somewhere, dim in the back of my mind, I was vaguely grateful that I’d already spilled seed twice tonight. Otherwise, I would have exploded inside her on that first wondrous thrust.

And it was wondrous. She was wondrous. Letting me in, finally, after keeping me out for so long. She wanted me. She loved me. Just as I’d always vowed she would. We may not have found ourselves to each other the way that I’d expected, but now that I had her, I did not care one whit about that. All I cared about was the spectacular suction of her depths, the keening of her breath, the smooth skin wrapped around delicate bone in my hands.

I drew out, then slammed back in once more, my body desperate to go faster but my mind, my stolen heart, begging me to make this last. Being inside her was the closest thing to bliss I’d ever known, and already I feared the moment it would end.

But my beloved needed more. I could feel it in the way she squeezed around me, the way she ground her hips so stunningly against me. I opened my eyes, my ravenous gaze roving over her pleasure-tautened form. Her elegant spine arched, bending right off the hides, pressing the teased points of her breasts into the air. Her small fists wrapped themselves in the bedding as she moaned. On another deep thrust, my cock spears nudged against her sensitive little bead of flesh and her voice became ragged and high-pitched.

I slid my hands down from her ankles, marvelling at the sweetness of her skin. I clasped her knees, her legs flat to my chest, then groaned, turning my head to the side and sucking on the tender flesh just above her inner ankle. I wanted to bite down on her, claim her, taste everything inside her, even the hot venom of her hypnotic blood. But I couldn’t – I’d tear her. Break something important inside her. So instead, I sucked, my thrusts growing quicker every time she squirmed and my fangs brushed her flesh.

“Errok,” she mewled. “I can’t. I need… Need to hold onto you.”

I nearly spilled right there. My cock pulsed at her words.

She didn’t just need my cock rutting her. She needed me.

I released her legs. Instantly, they spread for me, falling limply to the sides. Piercing peaks, this was a sight I would never forget. My mate, panting and desperate beneath me, pretty thighs spread as my cock disappeared into her body over and over again.

I leaned forward, planting one elbow on the bed. Immediately, her hands sought my neck, her little fingers sliding down and digging into my shoulders. I leaned entirely on that elbow, my forearm slipping beneath her shoulder, my fingers tangling in her hair. My free hand became a greedy explorer, grasping, searching, claiming everywhere it landed. The dizzying curve of her hip. The delicious, puckered nipple. The slim throat with its melodic, winged pulse. My fingers remained at her throat, held fast by the rhythm of her shattered breath, her racing heart. My palm pressed into the hollow between her collarbones, my thrusts growing more feral and frantic as I hoarded the feel of her heart beneath my hand. How many times had this little neck, this pulse, taunted me? Too many times had I watched, pining, starving, as her heart beat here. And all the while that very heart was telling me, I do not belong to you.

“You belong to me, now,” I choked out against her ear. I wasn’t even sure whom or what I specifically addressed. Her heart. Her cunt. Her entire being.

She wasn’t mine because I’d claimed her. Because I’d stolen anything from her.

But because she’d given herself to me.

And that, I realized, as hot, possessive pleasure spiked in my groin, was the true prize. The true treasure. As she tightened around me, sobbing with the force of her climax, I understood that was how I’d won her. Not by commanding. Not by taking. I’d been chosen.

Now that I had her, though, I would fight to keep her. As copious seed speared out of me and drenched her insides, I finally claimed her the way I’d dreamed of for so long.

Shaking and empty of everything – my seed, my own heart – I felt stronger than I ever had. Entirely wrapped up in her, I became the sort of Gahn, the sort of man, I was always meant to be.

Fate settled around my shoulders, heavy like the hides of a cloak. Giving one last quivering thrust and tasting the pulse of her throat, I stepped entirely into myself.

Destiny seized me.

I raised my tail and welcomed it.

CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

Stephanie

Errok and I slept in a tangled mass of limbs, our bodies sealed together. It was as if neither one of us was willing to let the other go anywhere, even in sleep. Neither of us stirred for a long, long time. No nightmares. In fact, if I dreamed at all, I didn’t remember any of it. All I remembered was deep, comforting black and the hard warmth of his body against mine.

When I finally did wake, the cave was blindingly bright. The hot alien sun crackled, practically electric, as it flooded through the transparent, crystalline roof of the cave. The glittering sapphire-like walls and floor of Errok’s chambers reflected the sunshine in a dizzying array of facets. The result was breathtaking, and for a long moment I simply l lay there, in awe of the natural beauty of the space.

Then, I rolled over, facing Errok, and felt in awe of something else entirely.

I smiled at him. He was still asleep. The sun kissed down his firm jaw, his neck, turning bright blue against the highlights in his long hair. He looked younger like this. Not quite boyish, but more relaxed than I’d probably ever seen him.

I guess a mind-blowing fuck fest will do that to a man.

And not just to a man. My whole body was pleasantly heavy, my joints feeling like they’d been turned to honey. Tenderness ached, in a good way, between my legs. My head felt oddly empty and that, too, was pretty nice. So much anxiety and anger had been drained out of me, allowing me to just relax and enjoy the moment. With him.

I still couldn’t quite believe that I was this happy, this relaxed, because of the thorn-in-my-side Gahn Errok. I had a feeling he was still going to be a thorn many times over the course of my life. But I decided that the annoying poke between my ribs was worth it.

I’m keeping him.

We’d come this far. We could go further. We’d keep learning, keep growing. Keep loving. Even during the moments that we drove each other up the beautiful blue walls of this mountain. Because I had no doubt those moments would happen. He was still Errok. And I was still Stephanie. We both might have given way, started to change, but we still had a long way to go.

But that’s OK. We have time.

Well, we didn’t have time right this very moment, because I honestly thought my bladder was about to explode. I managed to get out of bed without waking Errok, which surprised me. Guess my pussy drained him in more ways than one. Plus, the guy was still recovering from the blood loss, after all. Not that you’d know that from his cock… I was pretty sure I’d never felt anything that hard and urgent in my life.

I stumbled to the bathroom area, did my business, then cleaned myself up. I splashed fresh water between my legs, over and over, amazed and slightly concerned about how much of Errok’s fluid was still drizzling out of me. When I was reasonably satisfied that my inner thighs no longer looked like some kind of come-crime-scene, I washed my hands, my face, and rinsed the sweat from my hair. I thought about jumping into the heated pool, but decided against it. Now that I was up, I wanted to get going. There was something I wanted to do today.

And I needed my mate to do it.

He, apparently, had other plans. When I returned to the bed, one glittering alien eye cracked open, and his hand shot out to grab my wrist. He pulled me down on top of him. I gasped, already feeling the curl of arousal as I straddled his waist. That curl became a tugging claw when I felt his cock stiffen against my ass.

“Come on,” I said, moaning as he hunched forward and captured one of my breasts in his hot, sucking mouth. “I have stuff I want to do!”

“So do I,” he said sternly against my throbbing, damp nipple. “And it involves keeping you confined to this bed for the next ten days or so.”

“Ten days?!”

“Or so,” he reminded me. “I might need longer than that.” He moved to suck my nipple into his mouth again, but I managed to escape just in time. I tumbled off of him, laughing, then slid off the bed, landing on my feet on the stone

“Let’s go!” I said.

I flushed, realizing he certainly looked ready to go. His bare cock swelled further as he licked down my naked form with his eyes.

“And what is it that my beloved wants so badly to do today?” he drawled. He fisted his cock and gave it one agonizingly slow pump. My mouth went dry.

“I want you to teach me to fly.”

His hand stopped, his sight stars pulsing in surprise.

“You said you would teach me. Back in the Sea Sands,” I said.

He regarded me thoughtfully for a long moment. “I remember.”

Then, clearly coming to a decision, he stood. His huge form towered, his cock jutting straight out. I had to force myself to turn away from him. If I looked at his dick too long, I’d forget all about riding the braxilk because I’d be too busy riding him all day. It was alarming, how deep my need went for him already.

Errok made some grunting excuse and disappeared into the cave’s bathroom area. Feeling all hot and bothered, I wondered if he was jerking off while I got dressed.

Before long, we were ready. Me, with my clothes, boots, sunscreen, sunglasses, and jacket. Him, with his loincloth, bow, arrows, and blades.

“Will we go right now?” I asked him, already feeling a thrill at the thought of flying again.

He looked down at my pale, sunscreen-streaked face. He drew a gentle claw along my lower lip.

“No,” he said. “First, we eat.”

I KEPT CLOSE, HOLDING tightly to Errok’s arm, as we travelled through the mountain to the main hall. Even though it was daytime, the inner tunnels of the mountain were basically pitch-black. When we finally did reach the hall, the one we’d come into on Talga’s back yesterday, I found myself squinting, half-blinded by the light streaming in.

“Zakkar!” Errok barked. I recognized that name. Zakkar was the one who’d lent Talga to Errok to fly to Thaleo’s mountains. His right-hand man.

A broad-shouldered, beefy warrior with lapis lazuli-blue sight stars jogged over, his long braid bouncing against his weapons-lined back. He stopped in front of us, raising his tail before letting it fall.

“Commission the installation of kaktuir lanterns in every hall and tunnel,” Errok ordered. “I want the work done today.”

I let go of Errok and crossed my arms, raising a brow at him.

He caught my look and frowned.

“What?” he grumbled.

My brow rose another fraction of an inch.

Realization dawned, and he tensed, scowling. Turning slowly and stiffly back to Zakkar, he added an unpractised, grudging, “Please.”

Zakkar’s sight stars buzzed. The poor guy looked incredibly confused as he once again raised his tail and then trotted away.

I burst out laughing. It didn’t take long to realize that I was not the only one. A hearty guffaw near the hall’s blazing fire joined mine. Lerokan rose from where he’d been sitting beside Priya. She waved, and I hurried over to them. Oxriel was here, too, I noticed with a genuine smile. He was from Gahn Taliok’s tribe, and though my interactions with him had been limited, I recognized his sunny demeanour instantly. His warm, copper-coloured sight stars tightened as he smiled and greeted me.

“It’s good to see you, Oxriel!” I said. I sat down beside Priya, and she passed me some food – eggs and roasted meat.

“And it is good to see you,” Lerokan cut in before Oxriel could reply. He grinned slyly down at me. “Or, rather, it is good to see what you’ve done to our mighty Gahn Errok. I thought seeing him tortured with need for you was the best entertainment this world had to offer. But I now must say that watching him try to be polite under your demanding stare is even better. Plus, I am very glad not to be punched, tackled, strangled, or otherwise abused first thing in the morning. So, the fact that you have accepted him and improved his mood is a great boon to me, as well.”

My face got hot.

“Is it that obvious that we… You know?” I asked Priya.

She shrugged.

“I mean, we all knew you stayed in his cave last night. And these guys have a wicked-good sense of smell.”

“Smell?!” I groaned, burying my face in my hands. I really wish I’d taken the time to have a full scrub-down in the bath after all. Although, that wouldn’t have mattered much if every warrior could still smell me on Errok.

Errok joined our group, looming behind Lerokan like a grumpy storm cloud. Lerokan turned towards him and raised his tail in a dramatic, haughty flourish that I knew had to be meant as an insult. Priya rolled her eyes at me and I couldn’t help but chuckle.

“Despite my mate’s sweetness, my patience still has its limits, Little Lerokan. Mind yourself before my fingers find your throat again.”

“Errok!” I said, launching to my feet. “No way. You take that back right now. Tell him you’re never going to do that again.”

Priya choked on her food, wheezing with laughter on the floor. Oxriel’s eyes went wide with astonished concern.

“Tell him,” I said firmly. “And, frankly, I think you should apologize for last time.”

The helpless look on Errok’s face hardened into one of revulsion as he looked back at his younger brother. Lerokan, on the other hand, looked like he was enjoying this far too much. His grin was wide and full of fangs, his sight stars a manic swirl. He looked like a sugar-crazed kid on Christmas morning. Who was also having a birthday party. And going to Disney World. All at the same time.

“Yes, Gahn, I should like to hear such a thing myself,” Lerokan added helpfully when Errok didn’t speak.

Errok’s hands turned into fists, and I was 100% sure that one of those fists was about to break Lerokan’s nose.

But instead, Errok spoke. The words were ground out, and halting, and it was probably the crappiest apology I’d ever heard in my life. But he did it.

“I am sorry, Lerokan,” Errok seethed, “that you felt the need to enrage me so completely that I could not stop myself from grabbing you. I shall not do it again… Provided you keep your foul tongues in your head and do not provoke me.”

Lerokan made a sound of surprise. “If I were not intimately familiar with that look of loathing on your face, brother, I would not recognize you at all.” His gaze swirled over to me. “Please, Gahnala, continue your ministrations. Perhaps tomorrow we will not just hear a ‘please,’ but, mountains forbid, maybe even a ‘thank you!’”

“I’ll thank you to stop blathering on,” Errok snapped.

Shaking my head and laughing, I went to Errok’s side.

“Come on,” I said, wrapping my hands around his tense, angry bicep. “Let’s finish eating and go.”

He relaxed under my touch. Though he was staring daggers at his brother, he allowed me to lead him down to the floor by the fire.

“My cloud-brained fool of a brother is lucky you are here,” he grumbled.

“So are you,” I crooned, pressing a cooked egg into his hand.

His claws curled around the egg as his tail snaked around my hips on the stone. He drew me against his side as he quietly rumbled, “I know.”

CHAPTER FORTY

Stephanie

Errok led me to the mountain’s roosting cave – a huge, circular cave with a roof open to the air. Braxilk flew in the massive open space, as well as tending to large eggs in gigantic nests lining the lofty crags and shelves of stone. Togo must have spotted us immediately, because Errok didn’t even need to call him before he was diving down towards us.

“Togo,” Errok said as the creature landed before us. “This is your new mistress.”

Togo turned six intelligent eyes on me. They were odd, but lovely, a pale shade of violet with cat-like silver pupils.

Unlike last time with Talga, this time, I’d come prepared. Errok had told me that braxilk ate felkora eggs, so I’d brought one from the breakfast fire.

“Hi Togo,” I said softly, approaching him calmly. I really didn’t need to worry about spooking him, though. It was obvious that he was incredibly well-trained and he seemed to have a relaxed, steady demeanour. I offered the egg, and he made what I assumed was a pleased squawking sound before snatching it up into his shining beak. Once he’d gulped the snack down, he tossed his head and huffed, bumping a feathery head against my cheek. I laughed, fighting back tears, hugging his thick, long neck and exhaling. Home.

FLYING THIS TIME WAS even better than last time. Last time, I’d been a mess because things between Errok and me had been all screwed up. It had made it harder to let go and enjoy the freedom and the beauty. But there was no such issue this time. With Errok at my back, we carved through the air, swooping and spinning. The landscape rolled in mountain-spiked waves of blue below us, shining in the sun. After some training, I even got to take a few short bursts of flight on my own, though Errok continuously barked at Togo to stay low to the ground the whole time. I loved riding with Errok – feeling his hard heat behind me, watching the pride and the pure, raw joy spilling out of him. But I also loved riding Togo on my own. It made me feel like myself again, even if Errok ordered Togo to take me on the equivalent of the kiddy ride version.

We flew for hours, eventually passing out of Errok’s territory and into neutral territory. We passed over the shuttle planted at the settlement site. I whooped, waving down at someone I thought might have been Fiona. But we whizzed past too quickly to be sure.

Eventually, we stopped, coming to rest in a sun-drenched valley with a clear stream running through it. I dismounted, loving the sore, tired ache in my thighs and the way my arms felt limp and slack after gripping Togo’s feathers. I couldn’t wipe the grin off my face as Errok dismounted behind me.

“Excellent flying today, friend,” he murmured, patting Togo’s neck. I watched him, realizing I’d never heard him speak in that low, smooth tone to anyone else but me.

“I like that you’re so kind to the braxilk,” I said, coming to stand beside him.

He turned to look down at me, quirking an indigo brow.

“Why is that so surprising? Have I not always been kind to you?”

I laughed, the sound echoing off the high blue mountains around us.

“I don’t know. I’m still remembering a certain point last night where you seemed intent on torturing me,” I said, poking him in the ribs between his weapons straps.

He snatched my hand before I could pull it away. He brought it to his mouth, then nipped at my inner wrist. My pulse jumped at the touch.

“What are you talking about?” he murmured against my skin. His sight stars bored into me.

“You know what I’m talking about! When you wouldn’t move.” Fuck, just thinking about it made me clench my thighs together. The extraordinary, mind-melting feeling of his fat head nudged inside me… And not going any deeper.

My eyes fluttered closed, and I moaned as Errok’s tongues slid into my jacket’s sleeve, licking further down my wrist.

“In… In fact, I’ve been trying to think of ways to repay you for that kindness,” I said, opening my eyes.

“No repayment is necessary.”

“Ha! Isn’t that convenient for you?”

Errok stopped licking my wrist, and thank God for that, because I could barely think like that. He pulled the hand closer, then laid my palm flat on his chest where his wound had once been. His gaze was serious as it met mine.

“You know I can refuse you nothing,” he said. There was a note of regret there. Like the fact he’d give me whatever I wanted was going to cause numerous problems for him. Which, at least in this moment, was pretty much bang on.

“Then go sit,” I told him. “Over there.” I pointed to a shadowy patch near the sparkling stream. It was shady enough that I wouldn’t get sunburned when I took my jacket off, and the ground was relatively smooth, not too rocky, with tufts of short blue-green grass to soften things.

Errok backed away from me, going to the place I’d indicated without taking his eyes off of me. Dutifully, he sat. Somehow, he managed to even make this little patch of grass look like a fucking throne. He oozed power as he settled himself, his thick thighs spread, his back resting against a boulder.

I walked towards him, heat pooling in my belly as I entered the shady area. That heat was reflected back at me in his star-shattered gaze. It turned molten when I started to undress.

I did it slowly. On purpose. To make him ache the way I had last night. First, I removed my sunglasses, then my jacket. I let the sleeves slide silkily down my bare arms before it fell to the grass. I wasn’t wearing a bra beneath my tank top, and my nipples pricked under Errok’s greedy gaze. His loincloth tightened.

Not yet. I wouldn’t go to him, yet. He could just sit there and watch me and take it. Until neither of us could take it anymore.

I stripped out of the tank top, tossing the fabric aside. Errok’s hand flew to his crotch, and he adjusted himself viciously as his gaze snapped back and forth between my tits, as if he couldn’t decide which nipple to stare at longer.

“Come here,” he bit out.

I smiled sweetly.

And took a step back, moving even further away.

With meticulous, wicked slowness, I worked my pants down over my hips, moving sensuously as the grey clothing pooled around my ankles. Errok hissed, no doubt pissed I’d left the undies on.

“Take those off too,” he panted.

“All in good time. My Gahn needs to learn some patience.”

He tipped his head back against the stone, groaning long and low, staring at me through dark, hazy slits.

“That’s the first time you’ve called me your Gahn.”

I stopped mid-panty-removal, which earned me another petulant hiss.

“What do you mean?” I asked. “I call you Gahn all the time. At least, I used to.” It was only recently I’d started thinking of him as just Errok. Most of the time we’d known each other, I’d called him Gahn Errok.

“No,” he croaked. “Not just Gahn. Your Gahn.”

Oh.

“Do you like that?” I whispered, finally sliding my undies all the way down.

I bent, taking off my boots and socks until I was finally standing naked before him.

I gasped, seeing he’d also been busily undressing while I’d been bent down. His loincloth lay on the grass, his cock hard in his fist.

“I love being yours,” he replied, voice strained. “I love it even more when you actually admit it.”

I smirked.

“Still my arrogant Errok, I see.”

He groaned again, and I realized it was because I’d once again called him mine. My Errok. It felt… Good. Natural.

It made me happy.

I walked towards him, then kneeled between his splayed thighs. He reached for me, but I jerked back.

“Nope. No touching,” I said firmly.

Errok’s gaze grew suspicious.

“What foul game is this?” he muttered.

“Not a game. Repayment. Like I said before,” I explained. As I spoke, I bent lower and lower, until I was breathing my words directly onto the smooth head of his cock.

“It’s impossible not to touch you,” he complained. “You’d have to bind me.”

My core squeezed at that image.

“That could be arranged,” I said slowly before drawing a languorous swipe of my tongue over his head.

“Piercing peaks of the Deep Sky,” he swore, his cock jerking eagerly up towards my mouth. He stared down at me over his heaving chest and clenching abdomen as I prodded his dark slit with the wet tip of my tongue. “You are the only creature brave enough to even think of binding a Gahn.”

“But you’re not just a Gahn. You’re my Gahn,” I reminded him before giving him another long, luscious stroke of my tongue. I paused, pulling back a little. “Of course, we don’t have to if you don’t want to.” Although, now that the idea was in my head, I really, really wanted to. Hot, raging, arrogant Errok, tied and hard and begging and –

“Do it.”

My mouth opened in shock at his vehement reply. He took advantage of my surprise, rocking his hips up so that his tip nudged between my parted lips. I gave a gentle suck, then let go.

“Are you sure?” I breathed.

He looked down at me imperiously.

“I am always sure.”

I smirked. My mate could never resist a challenge or a chance to prove himself, that was for sure. Whether it was a deadly taklok or proving to his human mate that he could handle whatever she threw at him.

I hurried over to Togo, unstrapping my pack from his side. I didn’t need the pack, so I set it down. But the long hide straps Errok had used to lash my pack to Togo would be perfect.

After I had the straps, Togo trotted away, tactfully finding some little mountain animal to chase and leaving us alone.

I walked back to Errok, my pussy throbbing at the way he stared. Like a very thin thread of restraint was about to snap inside him.

I came to a stop before him, holding the durable, leathery straps. I thought about tying his wrists together behind his back, but that likely wouldn’t be very comfortable. The straps were long, so I ended up looping the lengths of hide around each of his wrists separately, then connected the straps together behind the boulder he leaned back against. The result was that each of his hands was held down on the grass, out at his sides, beside his hips.

“Give that a tug,” I told him. He did so. There wasn’t much slack around the back of the boulder, so each hand only rose an inch or two off the ground.

“Let’s come up with a word,” I said, once again kneeling between his thighs. “If you want me to stop at any time, or to untie you, say… I don’t know. Say, ‘braxilk.’”

“Or, I could just snap the straps,” Errok said, a dark bite of warning to his words. My stomach swooped when I remembered just how fucking strong he was. How easily he could tear the thick bindings that held him with a mere flex of his muscles.

“Well, I guess the real show of strength will be how long you can stand to stay like this,” I murmured.

Then I grabbed his cock and sucked the silken tip into my mouth.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

Errok

Skies above, that mouth was a vicious wonder. Sweet and suckling, it worked over my tip almost gingerly. Lips brushing, tongue swiping, everything wet and slow and tender.

It was nowhere near enough.

“More,” I grunted, my hips rocking.

Wickedness flared in her gaze.

She went even slower.

“Confounding, beloved creature,” I breathed, agony mixing with the teasing pleasure. Already, my arms were tensing against the straps. I forced myself to relax so that I did not break the bindings that quickly. I was a strong, disciplined male. I would not lose control so soon.

At least, that’s what I told myself. But as Zuh-Tephanie slid that terrible, beautiful tongue in a long, slow line up and down my shaft, I wasn’t sure how long I’d actually be able to last like this. Since those hide straps could not really hold me if I pulled them hard, they were merely a metaphor for my restraint. A physical reminder of what my mate had dared me to do.

That dare glowed in her heated gaze. Like she knew I was already on the verge of failing. The verge of breaking. I bucked involuntarily, a groan ripping from my throat as she sucked one cock spear into her mouth. She nibbled at it, sending sharp tingles into my groin. Then, keeping my gaze locked mischievously with hers, she moved lower, sucking one testicle, then the other.

Seed dribbled, and the straps came close to snapping as everything inside me clenched. Zuh-Tephanie reached out to the sides, drawing gentle, teasing fingertips over the bonds of my wrists. If she was attempting to soothe and steady me, it did no good. My breath hissed harshly out between clenched fangs as tremors ran through my arms. It was taking far more effort to stay still than it would have taken to heave forward and snap the cursed straps binding me.

Zuh-Tephanie returned her grip to my cock, squeezing slightly. Her slender fingers were cool against the urgent heat of my erection, a dizzying contrast of sensation that made me whine with need.

It was a pathetic sound, and I slammed my mouth shut. My mate chuckled, puffs of breath skimming across my howling flesh.

“Yeah. That’s how I felt last night,” she murmured, her tongue darting out to swipe at my slick tip.

“But the difference is I took no pleasure in making you wait,” I grunted, staring down at her with an expression I hoped conveyed menacing, masculine desire. Based on her grin, I surmised that my expression had shown her precisely the opposite and instead was that of a pitiful, panting fool.

Only a fool for her.

“Fair enough,” she said, drawing the agonizingly smooth pads of her fingers up and down my length. She stopped to trace a particularly swollen vein on the underside which made my tail snap with sensation against the ground. “But I don’t think you can tell me you’re not taking at least a little pleasure in this right now.”

I couldn’t deny that I loved her touch. Even though the cool fire of her slow fingers and the silken drag of her mouth were driving me slowly (or perhaps not so slowly) out of my cursed mind, I loved it. Loved that she was touching me. I loved the look of giddy fascination on her face as she found a new, more sensitive place to torture me. And some strange, unexpected part of me loved giving up the control, just for these few snatched moments.

But even so, I made a husky sound of warning, deep in my throat. I couldn’t have my mate thinking that I’d allow her to tie me up every night. My claws dug into my palms with the need to touch her. Her skin was so smooth and so close. Her breasts moved with her movements, their peaks growing taut when they brushed the grass. At one point, her breasts pressed against my inner thigh, and I dug my claws into my palms even harder, until I bled, simply so I wouldn’t come on the idiotic spot.

“OK, I think you’ve waited long enough,” she finally panted, her cheeks flushed red. “And I can’t wait anymore, either.”

Oh, thank the piercing peaks.

I watched her with violent adoration as she straightened up on her knees. She pressed closer, sliding her gorgeous legs over top of mine until she was straddling me. My chest hitched as her soft hands landed on my shoulders.

These straps are lucky I have something to prove, I thought darkly, otherwise they’d have been obliterated by now. It took everything I had not to snap them and grip my shaft, guiding it to her secret, slick place that hovered so tantalizingly close.

I wanted to grasp her hips, hold her still, and hammer into her so hard that she forgot the way her insides felt without me.

Zuh-Tephanie leaned forward, pressing her forehead to my shoulder as she adjusted her hips. Skies help me. Her slick entrance rocked over my tip, spreading wetness.

“I’m so wet already,” she murmured.

Oh, my mate was playing a dangerous game with words like that. The kind of game that would end with me, once again, spilling seed all over her in a humiliating rush.

But, fool that I apparently was, I couldn’t get enough.

“So wet for me. For your Gahn’s cock,” I said gruffly.

Her moan was a damp thrill of breath against my chest. I realized one of her hands was strumming her nub of sensitive flesh, pleasuring herself as she eased down a little further onto me. Her heated channel felt silken and swollen as it stretched for me, and I couldn’t stop myself from urging up into her.

“So impatient,” she murmured before licking my neck.

“I have been more than patient,” I growled. “I have not been with a woman since taking the title of Gahn.”

She paused.

“I didn’t know that. That you’ve been celibate.”

“Once I became Gahn, I did not want dalliances with just any woman,” I told her. “I only wanted the one who’d warm my bed as my Gahnala. And then, even after I met my mate, she denied me mercilessly for far too long.”

She shook with laughter, the trilling sound cutting off abruptly when she shunted further down onto my length.

“Merciless… You are so dramatic.”

With a soft grunt, she let her weight drop. We both gasped as she took me all the way.

“How about now?” she murmured against my neck. “Still merciless?”

“I don’t know how to answer that,” I huffed, the straps vibrating with tension against my arms. Her cunt was the sweetest mercy I could possibly imagine. But it belonged to a wicked woman who currently seemed fixated on making me beg.

“Are you going to move?” I said, on the verge of pleading with her already. “I am sorry for last night. I am sorry I put you through this.”

“Hold on,” my mate moaned. Her insides swelled around me, squeezing my desperate shaft. Her hand moved faster between us, her breathing changing as she leaned against my chest.

She’s going to climax, I realized, rather slowly and stupidly. She’s going to come like this, perfectly still, without me doing a cursed thing.

It was both an irritating and tantalizing thought.

“My cock is so good that you’re going to come just from sitting on it like that?” I purred against her soft ear. She shivered.

“Arrogant,” she moaned.

“I’m never arrogant without cause,” I told her before nipping at her ear.

She didn’t manage a reply to that. She was too busy panting and rocking against me in tiny, maddening movements. By the time her cunt started fluttering around me, milking me up and down with the beginnings of her climax, I was near blind with arousal. My eyes rolled back in my head, and my breathing was so loud in my own ears I almost missed Zuh-Tephanie saying my name.

“What is it?” I slurred. It was hard to form words when her cunt was doing that to me.

My mate’s words, though, were perfectly clear. A command that split the haze of desire in my brain.

“Break the bindings.”

How helpless I am but to obey.

The straps tore like they were nothing more than the blades of grass beneath us. My bloodied hands flew to Zuh-Tephanie’s hips. I lifted her slightly, holding her in place, as I unleashed my pent-up need in furious, punishing thrusts.

But there was no real punishment in it for either of us, now. Zuh-Tephanie collapsed against my chest, giving into her climax completely, tightening around my cock like a vise. I drove through her pleasure, never letting up, surging and raging and loving her, loving her, loving her until there was nothing left to do but to come undone as she had.

I spilled inside her, adding my seed to all her potent wetness.

And I drowned in her merciless mercy.

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

Stephanie

“How do I always seem to end up with your blood all over me?” I asked shakily, frowning at the smears of black blood that streaked my waist and hips. “What happened to your hands?”

“You happened,” Errok growled. He gave one last thrust inside me, making me clench. “You and your absurd notions. This is what happens when you try to bind a Gahn and keep him from his mate.”

Sitting up straighter on his lap (and shivering at the slight twitch of his cock still inside me) I grabbed his wrists. I turned his palms up and examined them.

“Let me guess. Dug your claws in to stop from coming everywhere again?”

I would have called Errok’s look hateful if I didn’t know he loved me so much.

“I will neither confirm nor deny that.”

Laughing softly, I planted a gentle kiss on each of his palms. At the contact, he hissed and his cock stiffened again.

“Hold on. We need to at least clean and bandage this before we do anything else,” I told him as he began to move his hips.

He gave a bitter, resigned sigh. As if I’d just told him he had to move a whole mountain before he could have me again.

“Fine. But let’s make it quick.”

I tossed my jacket on and jogged over to where I’d dropped my pack, bringing it back to our shady spot in the grass. Luckily, I had a first aid kit in there. Working quickly, I disinfected his palms and taped some gauze in place to help stop the bleeding.

As soon as that was done, Errok reached for me with a thrilling, possessive growl. But we both stopped when an alert sounded from my bag.

“What in the Deep Sky is that sound?” Errok said, snatching my bag away from me as if it contained a bomb about to go off.

“Well, if you’d give that back I could actually take a look!” I held my hand out for the bag, and he reluctantly handed it over.

I reached inside and grabbed a small comms tablet that Valeria had given me. It was connected to the drones I’d put out in Gahn Thaleo’s territory.

“Oh, damn,” I said, staring at the data the drones had transmitted. The alert had gone off just as I’d programmed it to – to alert us of bad weather incoming.

“There’s a storm coming,” I told Errok. “Looks like a bad one. It will probably hit Gahn Thaleo’s territory late tonight. Or maybe early tomorrow morning.”

“You know the storm is coming that far ahead of when it does?” he asked, his sight stars misting in shocked confusion.

“Yup,” I said. I held the screen up to his face, showing the data. “I’d be able to predict it even further into the future if I had proper equipment. Satellites and things like that. But the drones are the best we can do for now.”

“You are a miraculous creature,” Errok breathed, looking at me like he was almost a little scared of me. “How did you learn such things?”

“Studied it at school,” I told him while pulling the rest of my clothing back on. “University of Calgary. It’s a place you go to learn things with a bunch of other people.”

“To learn about storms?”

“Not just storms. All kinds of things,” I said, putting my sunglasses on. Sensing that his chance at a round two had been blown away by the approaching winds, Errok stood and put his loincloth back on.

“And why did you choose to study storms?”

I froze, fear clamping down on me.

But I breathed through it, and forced myself to face both him and the question. I wouldn’t shut him out. Not now.

“When I was a kid,” I said, “my dad left us.”

“Left you? He died in battle?”

“Nope. He just decided he didn’t want anything to do with my mom or me and he left. Left and never came back.”

“I do not understand,” Errok said slowly. “A man, a father… He abandoned his mate and child? What reason could there be for such a thing?”

Errok’s confusion hurt in the best possible way. The fact that he was as confused as I’d been made me feel so vindicated. And it made me feel safe. He would never leave me. The thought clearly had never crossed his mind as even a remote possibility.

“I didn’t understand either,” I said, my throat thick. “Spent a lot of time trying to figure it out. Never did.”

“He hurt you,” Errok said. His hands curled into fists and I was worried he’d destroy my first-aid job. “I wish he were in this world. I’d track him down on Togo and drag him before you.”

“Oh yeah? And then what?”

“Whatever you wanted,” he vowed fiercely, fangs snapping in his jaws. “Whatever my Gahnala would command. Imprison him. Kill him. Make him work himself to the unworthy bone every moment to make it up to you.”

It might have been fucked up, but I loved his words. The rage he felt for my pain was a strange sort of balm. But a balm all the same.

I sniffed and shook my head.

“Anyway, the night after he left, my mom sat down on the edge of my bed and told me he wasn’t coming back. She was so strong for me. She…” I broke off, too many tears choking my words.

Errok’s arms were around me in an instant. I tensed, then relaxed, allowing myself to accept the comfort of his embrace. I couldn’t keep talking about Mom. Not now, anyway. But I knew I’d tell him more about her soon.

“When she left my room,” I continued after a moment, “a storm broke out. The thunder was insane. Practically shook our house. But I wasn’t scared at all. I felt like… Like someone out there saw me. Like the sky was as mad as I was. Like the rain was grieving with me. And the sounds covered up my crying. I didn’t want my mom to hear me and feel even worse. I’ve loved storms ever since that night.”

For a moment, I was back in that dark, rain-lashed bedroom of my childhood.

But no, I wasn’t. Because Errok was here. His arms were around me. I was safe.

I was loved.

I could have stayed in that quiet embrace forever. But the storm was edging ever closer.

“We have to go warn Gahn Thaleo’s tribe. You don’t have to talk to him,” I added quickly, worried Errok would argue with me. “I’ll just tell one of the women or something. Then we can fly home together and beat the weather.” We were a lot closer to Thaleo’s territory than the shuttle right now, so even with the fact the shuttle was faster, it just made sense for us to fly there and warn them first.

There was a long pause, and I geared up to fight with Errok about this.

But instead, my breath whooshed out of me, arguments unused.

“My Gahnala commands,” Errok said, stroking a hand down my hair. “I obey.”

CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

Stephanie

The mountains glinted as we soared over them, heading for Gahn Thaleo’s home. Errok kept his arm firmly around me as we flew, which allowed me to lean back and go back and forth between taking in the view and checking out the storm’s progress on my small tablet.

By mid-afternoon, Thaleo’s mountain was visible ahead of us on the horizon. I gave a small sigh of relief. Plenty of time to let them know about the oncoming storm. I made a mental note that we’d have to leave a comms tablet with them and teach them how to interpret the data the drones were sending so that they’d have the first heads-up about any oncoming weather systems. We’d left in such a hurry after all the awkwardness with the taklok issue that we hadn’t done so yet. It wouldn’t be practical to have to fly here and warn them every time bad weather was on the way. But I knew we’d get all these snags figured out eventually. We’d only just recently arrived in the mountains, and it would take time to get into a comfortable pattern.

Not that Errok and Thaleo will ever exist in a comfortable pattern…

I glanced back at my mate, twisting to look up at him. The fierce joy from our earlier flights had been replaced with a glowering seriousness. A flash of doubt entered my mind. I worried that he might have agreed to take me back there just so he could start something with Thaleo again.

That’s not going to happen… Right?

I flattened my lips and tried to dispel my sudden unease. We were nearing Thaleo’s mountain, now, and there was no time to turn back.

But we never made it to his mountain.

A catastrophic boom rolled through the air. Togo flinched, his flight pattern thrown off. Errok’s arm hardened like a stone shield around me.

“What was that?” I gasped, jerking my head around. I half-expected to see plumes of smoke from some eruption or explosion nearby. But I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. Just bright sky, clear air, and the mountains and valleys below.

But wait…

There was something in the distance. A man on a braxilk, diving desperately downward.

“Something’s wrong,” I said, wriggling in Errok’s hard grip. “We need to go see what happened!”

“I know what happened,” Errok said grimly. His sight stars combed the place the braxilk had just descended.

“What then?!”

His sight stars swung to me.

“Rockslide.”

Shit.

Errok got Togo focused once more, and we took off, heading for the sound we’d heard. We knew we’d reached it when we saw a lone man clawing at a huge incline of broken rock and fallen boulders.

It was Gahn Thaleo.

Errok urged Togo into a dive so sharp it took my breath away. It also made Thaleo’s braxilk, who was nearby, shriek aggressively. Thaleo’s mismatched sight stars flashed to us. His hard face twitched slightly before he turned back to his work. He was standing near the top of the huge pile of rocks and boulders, never stopping in his movements.

Not even when Errok leaped off Togo’s back, drawing a huge blade.

No!

“Errok, stop!” I screamed, sliding off Togo’s back to follow him. I knew that I’d promised he wouldn’t have to see Thaleo and that promise had been broken, but that was still no excuse to use this moment to exact some bloody revenge.

Heart pounding, chest burning, I sprinted after Errok. But his long, strong legs and clawed, kangaroo-like feet helped him leap up the steep rocky incline with ease while I’d barely managed to climb up the first boulder.

“If you’ve come to try to kill me, Gahn Errok, I ask that you wait until I’ve finished here. The rockslide blocked access to this cave. Some of my people were foraging inside.”

Oh my God.

They were trapped. And not only that, but with the storm coming, time was ticking to get them out.

But that didn’t seem to matter to Errok. He growled as he launched up the final incline of rock. I was about to watch him murder Thaleo right in front of my eyes.

“No, Errok. No!”

Errok raised his blade.

Thaleo turned just in time.

Just in time to see Errok shove his blade between two huge rocks. Errok leaned heavily on the handle of his blade, his muscles bulging with strain. I stared, not quite sure what was happening for a long moment, as one of the boulders gave way under the might of his arms and rolled down to the ground.

He’s helping.

Relief poured through me, followed by pride. Pride for this man who, despite his arrogance, his territorial rage, his long-held hatred for Thaleo, was now putting all of that aside. I wasn’t sure if I’d ever found him so attractive as I did in that moment – head down, working side by side with his enemy to save innocent people.

I scrambled up the stone incline, trying to reach them so I could help. Obviously I couldn’t do much about the big boulders, but I could at least help move small rocks away from the top of the incline until my puny human arms gave out.

Errok snarled as I, sweating and panting, drew level with them.

“Get back down! In fact, stay on Togo’s back above ground. I will not have you harmed by a falling rock.”

“There’s no time! With the storm coming, we need all hands on deck!” I shot back.

Thaleo’s head snapped to me. His hands never stopped working as he asked, “Storm?”

I nodded, snatching the tablet out of my pocket and flashing it at him. “It’s coming. It will arrive in your territory late tonight or very early in the morning.”

I got my first glimpse of unshielded emotion on Thaleo’s face in that moment. A flash of grave and unmistakable fear.

It was gone in an instant, replaced with stony determination.

“Oh, shit, the tablet!” I practically smacked myself for not thinking of this sooner. “I can send an emergency message to the shuttle. They can come help with this.” The sheer amount of rock that had tumbled down and was now blocking the cave’s entrance made my stomach flip. If those people were trapped in a cave by the rock and then the storm for too long without enough food…

No. We’ll get them out.

I typed out a frantic message on the tablet, praying there wouldn’t be any weird communication issues that stopped my message from reaching Valeria.

A few minutes later, a reply pinged back.

Thank goodness.

“They’re on their way,” I breathed. I didn’t waste any time getting back to work alongside the two Gahns, pulling away small chunks of rock and rolling them down the incline. Errok glared at me, no doubt wanting to tell me to stop and also knowing that arguing with me right now would do no good. Even with the oncoming arrival of the others on the shuttle, this was going to be a close one. It’s not like we had a big digger stowed away on the shuttle or anything. The Bitter Sea guys would definitely be an asset, but still…

Errok clearly had the same thought I did.

“It’s not enough,” he said, grunting as he lifted a particularly gnarly-looking boulder and heaved it down the side. “Thaleo, go get more of your men. I assume it was mostly women and children foraging in the cave.”

Thaleo didn’t reply. Nor did he stop digging and pulling at the rock.

“Thaleo!” Errok snapped.

Finally, the other Gahn paused.

“I will not leave my people abandoned here even for a moment with you as their only lifeline, Errok.”

Oh, lordy. I’d come into this situation worrying about Errok’s sense of rivalry and pride. But now I had to worry about Thaleo’s getting in the way.

“I can go,” I said, straightening and dusting off my hands on my pants. “I’ve learned enough about flying on Togo. We’re so close to Thaleo’s mountain – I could make it there and pass on the message to recall any warriors who are out hunting or patrolling.”

“No!” Errok hissed. He threw a rock angrily down the incline. It smashed as it went down, creating a terrific crashing sound. “I will not have you alone out here putting yourself in danger. And we cannot go together. I doubt any of Thaleo’s warriors would believe the message if I brought it.” He turned back to Thaleo. “You must do this, Thaleo. It is the only way. You must call your men here.”

Thaleo’s jaw worked as he dislodged a massive rock, sending it tumbling. I could tell he saw our logic, but that he didn’t want to stop working or leave his people. I approached him, stumbling on a loose set of pebbles. Errok grabbed my hand, righting me. With my one hand held by my mate, I placed the other on Thaleo’s straining shoulders. He went utterly still.

“We won’t stop working to help them. I promise you Thaleo. Please… Trust us.”

It was asking a lot of him. Not just to trust me, a literal alien in his world, but also his oldest enemy.

After a long, tense beat, Thaleo took a sharp breath. He fixed Errok with a pointed stare.

“If you do anything dishonourable while I am gone, I will send another arrow through you. And this time, I will kill you.”

I tensed, ready for Errok to get pissed and ruin everything after all.

But instead, he barked out a sharp laugh, wrenching a rock over his head in a dazzling display of brute strength. His fangs gleaming in a wide, wild grin, he snarled, “I would like to see you try.”

He tossed the rock down.

And then, my mate got back to work.

THE SHUTTLE ARRIVED before Thaleo came back with his men. Which made sense, since he was probably busy rounding up warriors from some far-off hunting territory. But by nightfall, pretty much everyone from Thaleo’s tribe, besides those trapped in the cave, had come to help, even children and the elderly. Everyone doing their part to loosen the rock and the stone.

We may not have had huge excavation machines on the shuttle, but we did have things like pickaxes, shovels, and other tools that made the task easier. Thaleo’s people also had carving and digging tools, which the strongest warriors put to good use while the rest of us carted away smaller rocks. The Bitter Sea men didn’t need any tools – Grim and Tok worked with their bare, scaly hands, their claws stronger than the metal and stone of the tools.

It was an astonishing display of teamwork and good faith. If I weren’t so busy and exhausted from helping, I probably would have burst into stupid, relieved tears. Especially when I caught glimpses of Errok, working side by side with Thaleo. He didn’t even bother making some Errok-like remark about how strong he was, or about how lucky Thaleo was to have his help. He just got his ass down to business. And I fucking loved him for it.

Late into the night, we’d opened up a sizeable hole near the top of the rockslide, and we could communicate with the people trapped inside. Apart from a few minor injuries, everyone inside was thankfully unharmed. Unfortunately, by that time the wind had started picking up. I didn’t need my tablet to tell me the storm was coming, and fast.

“We need to speed this up. Let’s just start hauling people out,” Valeria called. Thaleo grunted his agreement, and we all got ropes from the shuttle and started tossing them down into the hole. The children were lifted out first, followed by the women. I finally did let a few tears escape when I saw Zaria emerge, her face and hair caked with dust.

Thaleo’s sight stars scanned each person who’d been pulled out of the rocky wreckage. The wind clawed at his hair as he did the mental tally.

“That is everyone,” he said. He didn’t show any relief. Or any exhaustion. But he did turn to Errok, who at that moment was busy hauling me against his broad, muscled side. Togo landed beside us, ready to whisk us away. But Thaleo spoke before we mounted.

“Gahn Errok,” Thaleo said.

That was it. Just the name. No other words.

They stared at each other, unheard messages passing between their pulsing sight stars. What those two warlords were thinking, I could only guess.

Finally, Errok said something out loud, calling out over the rising sound of wind.

“Do not worry, Thaleo,” he said. He lifted me onto Togo then jumped up after me. “I am sure we will be back to hating each other soon enough.”

A corner of Gahn Thaleo’s mouth twitched upward ever so slightly.

“Who said I ever stopped?”

Um. Did Gahn Thaleo just crack a fucking joke?!

I didn’t have time to dwell on it. The air howled around us.

Thaleo’s men took off like bats out of hell, carrying the women and children who’d hiked here back to the safety of their home mountain.

Valeria shouted at us from the shuttle as she loaded everyone inside.

“Come with us! My ship can survive the weather!”

Errok clicked his tongues, and Togo lifted off.

“We do not need to survive it,” Errok called down to her as Togo’s wings flapped hard against the wind. “Because we will beat it.”

And my arrogant mate was right.

We hauled ass back over the mountains, staying just ahead of the storm the entire way. By the time we skidded into the hall of Errok’s mountain, the winds were practically pushing us inside. The cloud cover dimmed the dawn making the sky behind us a dark, unyielding curtain.

Errok lifted me into his arms, striding through the wind-swept hall deeper into the mountain. The tunnels blinked with the lanterns that had been set up in our absence.

“You don’t need to carry me,” I said, poking at his chest.

He frowned down at me.

“I saw you out there. You exerted yourself far too much. And I would like at least some of your energy saved for me.”

I smiled and shook my head.

“I could say the same for you. I saw you lift like a hundred boulders today!”

“That was nothing.”

I laughed as an image of him in the Sea Sands, doing his boulder squats, flashed in my mind.

“Well, I suppose you have had lots of practice. I’ll give you that.”

“I hope you’ll give me even more than that,” he said, heat threading through his words as he carried me into his cave. I was shocked at how, even after the intensity of the day, I responded so fiercely to him. He laid me down on the bed, and I looped my arms around his neck, pulling him with me.

My clothes were stripped off in a fury of flashing claws, as if Errok didn’t want me expending a single bit of strength doing it myself. I let him do it, lying there, blood pounding through me. He was right, I had worked hard today. And my body was heavy with exhaustion. But I felt nowhere near ready for sleep. My mind buzzed. My heart raced. My clit throbbed as Errok snatched off his loincloth, revealing the aching hardness there.

He ran his bandaged hands over my abdomen, gripping my breasts and making me arch. The texture of the bandages scraped over my nipples. I moaned, grinding against that sensation. The damp bandages and his warmth and-

Hold on. Damp?

“Oh, Errok! Your hands!” I gasped, grasping his wrists and squinting in the darkness. There was no fire burning in here, and the stars and asteroids were largely blocked out by the storm outside. But even so, I could see the way the gauze had been soaked through with his blood.

“It’s fine,” he gritted out. “I already told you your cunt has healed me of all afflictions. It will heal this, too.”

“Pretty sure it does not work like that,” I laughed. My laughter dissolved into a long, broken groan as Errok dove between my legs. He parted my folds with his tongues, his bleeding hands pressing possessively into my thighs. No matter what I thought about the potential healing power of human pussy, Errok clearly put complete faith in the concept. He lapped at my surging wetness like it was medicine he desperately needed. A cure he’d searched for far too long.

And I gave it to him. Gave him my desire, my spread legs.

My heart.

“I love you,” I choked out as he licked an explosive orgasm from my depths.

I said it again when he pushed inside me. His slick fingers looped with mine, pressing my hands into the bed above my head as his cock stroked into my clenching core. His movements quickly became hungrier, more chaotic, as if the day’s exertions had left him too weak to hold himself back from me. He fucked me into the hides, his motions both claiming and pleading. Owning and begging. His brutality was reverent. His worship, furious.

“I love you,” I said again and again. “And I’m so proud of you.”

It was that last phrase that did it. That’s what sent him spiralling into uproarious pleasure. He arched, throwing his head back, and bellowed as he spent himself inside me.

I clamped down on him, my teeth grinding, unable to make a sound.

But I didn’t need to reply.

The storm did.

Lightning flashed above us, crashing through the cave’s see-through roof. It cast Errok’s taut form into a brilliant silhouette of light and dark. Hide gleaming and shadows swirling.

Just as he gave his last thrust inside me and leaned in to capture my mouth in a savage kiss, the thunder boomed all around us.

Our only witness and our anthem.

It was the sound of us colliding. Cracking through the air.

Crashing down all around us.

Binding us.

CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

Errok

Zuh-Tephanie’s people and mine stood together in the hall. The sun set outside, casting warm light licking along the walls. It made my mate’s skin glow and added a soft red shine to her hair. Her eyes shone, their colour warmer and deeper than usual as the sun descended.

“Now, you present the Gahnala-Kai Rek,” Aunt Tilka told me. Lerokan and Priya stood beside her, nearest to Zuh-Tephanie and me. For once, there was no insolent smirk on Lerokan’s face, and he was giving the ceremony the attention owed. My claws twitched, but I was careful not to ruin the delicate jewellery I held. I’d spent the past four days crafting it in snatched, secret moments when Zuh-Tephanie was with Priya or her other friends who were currently staying in my mountain.

Zuh-Tephanie’s gaze went to my claws, then swung back to my face. Normally, the Gahnala-Kai Rek was an ornate garment that wrapped around a Ghanala’s tail, presented by her Gahn. But as my pretty mate had no tail, I’d had to make other arrangements. I’d heard that the Sea Sand Gahns had created arm-pieces for their Gahnalas, but my mate needed something different. Something unique that only I would give her. Something fit for a Deep Sky Gahnala.

She was so short compared to me that she did not need to bend her head. I slipped the many loops of soft, thin hide around her neck. The garment settled beautifully against her, accentuating her gleaming collarbones, her breasts. She was not wearing her cloak today, nor one of her usual human sleeveless tunics. She’d acquiesced to wear the garb of my people for the Ghanala-Kai Rek ceremony. Soft hide leg coverings and a vest tied with straps in the middle. Normally, the gap in the two sides of the vest was not so alarmingly arousing. But as Zuh-Tephanie had breasts, confoundingly lovely ones, the garment that had been custom-fitted to her size pushed the soft globes of flesh together. I found it difficult not to drag my tongues down the seductive cleavage there.

“This is amazing,” she breathed, unaware of my heated gaze. Her fingers skimmed over the loops of hide straps, catching on the gleaming blue, white, black, and green gems I’d turned into beads for the piece. At the very bottom of the longest loop, dangling between her breasts, was a shining feather of Togo’s father, Balto. Balto was the braxilk I’d learned to fly on as a cub. When he died, I kept this prized feather, waiting for the right moment to use it.

This was the moment.

This was the woman.

This was my entire life, standing so small and beautiful, right in front of me. She was smiling, and I had put that smile there after so many days of earning her ire.

My fingers lingered at her jaw, sliding back and into her hair.

One of her friends, the one with the dark marks on her arms, said something in their native tongue that I did not understand. Something about kiss ing thuh barride.

Zuh-Tephanie shot her friend a glance, laughing.

“What is she saying?” I murmured, tipping my mate’s head back until her eyes were forced to meet mine. Never let those eyes leave me, love.

“She wants us to do this.” My mate slid her hands over my chest to my neck until she could cup my jaw. She tugged me down, and a ripple of hot pleasure ran through me as her mouth opened under mine. I became vaguely aware of that same friend, Fiona, whooping. But I heard it as a distant sound. My body was too full of rushing love for Zuh-Tephanie to notice anything else.

When she finally pulled away, my knees grew alarmingly weak at just how lovely she looked. Her face flushed, her eyes all big and glossy, her mouth wet from the kiss. My cock grew thick.

“Hey, isn’t there one more thing we’re supposed to do?” my Gahnala asked suddenly. “At Chapman and Fallo’s Gahnala-Kai, he gave her his weapon as a symbol. Something like that… Can’t quite remember.”

“We do something similar here,” I replied. Lerokan held out my bow and quiver for my mate. The bow, and the arrow she selected, were astoundingly erotic in her soft hands. Far too big for those little fingers. I realized then this was the first time she was touching my weapons since that night she’d healed me. The first night we’d ever spent together.

“Nock your arrow, beloved,” I rasped, letting my hands drop regretfully from her hair. She clearly had no idea what she was doing, but she steadied herself and made a good show of stepping back and aiming an arrow at me.

As Zuh-Tephanie fought to keep her arrow straight, I spoke, loud enough so that my voice filled the hall.

“I, Gahn Errok of the Deep Sky, offer my bow, my arrows, my blades, to Gahnala Zuh-Tephanie. I offer her this as I offer her all other things – my body, my strength, my fealty, my love.” My voice grew softer, quieter, just for her. “In this moment, as in all moments, beloved, I am defenceless against you. Do with me what you will.”

Acidic doubt burned my tongues as I wondered, for the briefest flicker, if she might try to kill me after all. If all of this had not been real.

But she was already lowering the weapon, placing the bow and the arrow into my outstretched claws.

“You are mine, Errok. And I’d prefer to keep the arrows out of you for a while.”

I shoved my bow and arrow back at Lerokan, my gaze fixed on my mate. I couldn’t stop myself from capturing her mouth again, this kiss harder, ravaging. She moaned into the embrace as I bent her back, cradling her in my arms.

I nearly forgot all the others were there until someone whistled loudly. The sound shocked me – it was as loud and as piercing as any hunter’s whistle, recalling a braxilk. But I knew no man would dare interrupt my Gahnala-Kai with such a noise.

A new woman. Of course.

Zuh-Tephanie laughed in my arms, her breath stuttering against my mouth until I finally eased her upright once more.

“So, now what?” she asked me, cheeks a deep pink.

“There will be a feast, of course,” I told her. “But there’s one more thing I want to show you first.”

Followed by the strange sound of the new women slapping their hands together, and the cries from my warriors, I pulled my mate, my beloved Gahnala, out of the hall.

It didn’t take too long to reach our destination.

“The roosting cave?” Zuh-Tephanie asked, looking confused as we stepped into the large cave dominated by the braxilk. “I thought we were going to…”

My loins heated as her words sunk in.

“Oh, we will do that, too. I’ll never make it through the feast like this. I’ll be staring at your mouth every bite you take, wishing it were upon my cock.”

Her clear laughter calmed me like water running over my skin.

“But I do have something I want to show you,” I said gruffly, trying to get my lusty mate, and myself, back on track. “Here.” Her hand still in mine, I led her up a stone incline along one wall. The top of this incline ended in a shelf with a large nest. The nest belonged to Togo, who swooped through the open air nearby, and his mate, Kalda. Even though Kalda was a well-trained creature, I did not let my mate get too close. Because Kalda was protecting something.

“That nest there has an egg. It will hatch soon,” I said to Zuh-Tephanie. Her brows rose, and she peered towards the nest trying to get a better look.

“That feather, there-”

I skimmed a claw between Zuh-Tephanie’s breasts.

“-belonged to Togo’s father, Balto. He was my father’s mount, and the braxilk I first learned to fly on. His son, Togo, has been my mount since he was large enough to ride. And now, Togo’s offspring, the one in the egg Kalda protects in this nest, will be yours. Based on the size of the egg, I think it likely she will be female.”

Zuh-Tephanie tensed, a flicker through her muscles, then went entirely still. Above us, the sky was a dark, star-studded hide, the sun long gone. The storm was gone, too, at least from my mountains.

“You really can be quite generous when you want to be,” she said quietly.

“Of course, I can be,” I said. “Despite what you may think, I do listen. I remember what you told me, that first night together in Thaleo’s mountain when I asked you what you wanted in a male. You asked for kindness. Generosity. And to feel-”

“Safe.”

Her word shimmered in the air. I could practically see it, trace the outline of the sound. When she didn’t say anything else, I continued telling her about the gift.

“You will help raise and train her. She will be your mount and yours alone. Well…” My chest constricted. I thumped it, then cleared my throat for good measure. “Until our own cubs should learn to ride, that is.”

Tears, sparkling like dew, rolled down her cheeks. The unique human expression of sorrow was disconcertingly displayed alongside a wide, breathtaking smile.

“Are you happy, Gahnala?” I asked. More like begged. I needed her to be happy. With this gift.

With me.

“Yes,” she whispered. She lifted her hands to swipe at her cheeks, but I beat her to it. I needed to taste that happiness for myself. Let it coat my tongues and get inside me.

She gasped, her hands frozen in the air as I cupped her jaw and licked the moisture from her smooth skin. Cursed skies, I loved the way she tasted in every single place. I couldn’t get enough of these secret slips of salt. The tang of her tears on her beautiful face…

And between her legs.

Cock hard, body hard, heart aching and open and only for her, I fell to my knees, ready to worship her with my hands, my tongues. To love her until every one of her tears was pleasure-slicked, shed because I’d brought her to the brink. Because I’d brought her to where I was. Where I’d lived for so long. Since the moment I first saw her face.

Knowing she was with me now, knowing it was safe, I threw myself over the edge, freefalling into the depths of the clear dark sky.

The depths of her.

Thank you so much for reading Stephanie and Errok’s story! I cannot tell you how much fun I had writing these two, especially Errok with his larger-than-life ego. If you enjoyed the book and want to be the first to know when book 14 of the series releases (as well as getting sneak peeks before release of my works in progress!) make sure to sign up for my newsletter at www.ursadaxwriting.com/contact

Until the next Sea Sand (or Deep Sky or Bitter Sea) love story!

-Ursa

FATED MATES OF THE SEA SAND WARLORDS

BOOK 1 ALIEN TYRANT

“If you should flee, no matter where you run, I will always follow.”

Book 2 ALIEN ENEMY

“They call me the Mad Gahn. But I never felt truly mad until I saw her face…”

Book 3 ALIEN ORPHAN

“I have trained, battled, and fought my whole life. But winning my mate’s love is the greatest challenge I have ever faced…”

Book 4 ALIEN REJECT

“She is a difficult creature, my tiny Kat. But I have never met with a creature I could not tame…”

Book 5 ALIEN EXILE

“Beneath all that makes me strange to you, my heart recognizes yours…”

Book 6 ALIEN HUNTER

“Now that I have found her, I refuse to lose her…”

Book 7 ALIEN VICTOR

“I found her, I saved her, and once I am Gahn, I will claim her. There will be no other tribe left for her but me…”

Book 8 ALIEN SHIELD

“I have always been a patient warrior. But now that I have her in my sights, I cannot wait to claim her…”

Book 9 ALIEN KEEPER

“I will be her keeper, her guardian, her guide. And I will keep her safe no matter the cost…”

Book 10 ALIEN CLAW

“I will go wherever you are. Even if I have to follow you forever. Even if I have to hunt you down…”

Book 11 ALIEN HEART

“I had nothing left to lose. Until her.”

Book 12 ALIEN MASK

“I never wanted a mate. Until this troublesome human showed up and changed everything.”

Book 13 ALIEN STORM

“I will make my human mate see that I am strong enough to win her. Even if she makes me feel weak for the first time in my life…”