ALIEN REJECT

Fated Mates of the Sea Sand Warlords

Book Four

By Ursa Dax

Table of Contents

Title Page

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

NOTICES

TRIGGER WARNING

CHAPTER ONE | Kat

CHAPTER TWO | Galok

CHAPTER THREE | Kat

CHAPTER FOUR | Galok

CHAPTER FIVE | Kat

CHAPTER SIX | Galok

CHAPTER SEVEN | Kat

CHAPTER EIGHT | Galok

CHAPTER NINE | Kat

CHAPTER TEN | Galok

CHAPTER ELEVEN | Kat

CHAPTER TWELVE | Galok

CHAPTER THIRTEEN | Kat

CHAPTER FOURTEEN | Galok

CHAPTER FIFTEEN | Kat

CHAPTER SIXTEEN | Galok

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN | Kat

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN | Galok

CHAPTER NINETEEN | Kat

CHAPTER TWENTY | Galok

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE | Kat

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO | Galok

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE | Kat

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR | Zoey

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE | Kat

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX | Galok

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN | Kat

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT | Galok

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE | Kat

CHAPTER THIRTY | Galok

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE | Kat

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO | Galok

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE | Kat

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR | Baldor

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Thank you so much to all of you for following me this far into this wild alien journey! I would not be writing these books without your continued enthusiasm and support! Like always, I wish to thank my mother, SMD, and husband, RSH, for their unrelenting support. Thank you!

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 Reject Copyright © 2021 Veronica Doran

TRIGGER WARNING

This novel contains battle scenes and graphic violence described on page. There is also the mention of addiction, incarceration, and parental neglect – these are mentioned briefly in a character’s backstory and are not described on page.

CHAPTER ONE

Kat

“What happened?”

My voice came out as a hiss as suspicion flooded me. Melanie’s eyes were red, her cheeks wet and flushed. My eyes flicked to the brooding, scarred alien behind her. If that fucker, Taliok hurt her, I swear-

“Happy tears,” Melanie said quickly, shaking her head. “I just accepted the alien version of a proposal.”

Melanie and Taliok had just returned from the valley, and I noticed now that Taliok’s clawed hands held a bunch of shiny rocks.

“So it’s official, then? You and Mr. Broody over there?”

Melanie smiled and nodded, and I couldn’t help but soften a little. She didn’t smile often, so seeing it was a treasure unto itself. And if Taliok had put that smile there, then I guess he was OK in my eyes. For now. As long as he stayed in line.

One by one, my friends had fallen, like little human dominoes, to the mystifying charms of these alien kangaroo dudes. What exactly those charms were, I had no fucking clue. I wouldn’t be touching an alien suitor with a ten-foot-pole, thank you very much. And I honestly couldn’t believe my friends, Chapman, Cece, and Melanie, some of the smartest women I’d ever encountered, had jumped on that alien dick so damn quick.

There must be something in the water… Or there would be if this planet had any water nearby.

Well, whatever it was, I had no interest in partaking. These aliens could just keep their weird tongues and tails and who knows what else to themselves.

You know what else…

I’d seen Taliok naked, very briefly, in Fallo’s hills when we’d stopped to use the talka plants, the little soap succulents.

And it wasn’t just Taliok…

“Are you ready, Kat? I have prepared the irkdu for you,”

Galok.

The giant alien stood grinning behind me as I turned. These guys were all huge, but Galok was one of the tallest ones I’d seen. Taller than Melanie’s Taliok, who himself was at least 7 feet. Galok was longer and leaner, his long black hair falling loose to his back, not braided like so many of the other men of the Sea Sands. The glimmering copper swirls of his eyes pulled tight, focusing on my face.

“Yes, I’m ready,” I said curtly, hefting my pack.

“Very good. I will pack up the tent for you.”

I rolled my eyes.

“You’re not doing it for me. It just needs to be done. In fact, I can do it.”

I dropped my pack and jogged to the tent. Since Melanie had decided during our little trip that she’d be sharing Taliok’s tent, this one had been mine alone. Although Galok had slept so damn close, outside the tent, that it had basically felt like he’d been in there with me.

If there was one alien who was determined to get close to me, it was definitely this one.

Although so far he hadn’t said anything weird about the Lavrika or mates or bonds or anything like that. And honestly, thank fucking God for that. I didn’t know what I would do if one of the aliens claimed I was their mate the way Fallo, Buroudei, and Taliok had done with my friends.

I started disassembling the tent at one end, but Galok ran around to the other side, snatching up some of the tent material in his hands. I glowered at him, tugging, realizing we were holding the same piece of hide.

“I said I can do it,” I grunted, pulling hard. Galok had done nothing but try to give me things, offer me things, and do things for me. Maybe some girls found that appealing. But I found it fucking annoying. He probably just has one thing on his mind…

Well, doing random chores for me was not going to get me naked with him. Not a chance.

“I have no doubt you can do it, little Kat. But I wish to do it for you.” He hadn’t let go of the hide. I pulled harder and harder, digging my feet into the cracked red dirt of Taliok’s land. Galok smiled, watching me, now holding the fabric with only two clawed fingers. My strength and pulling were doing nothing.

I guess 105lbs of 5-foot-nothing human doesn’t do a whole lot against almost 8 feet of pure alien muscle.

And Galok fucking knew it.

He grinned, his tail whipping as I yanked and grunted. Finally, with a huff, I stopped pulling and let my side of the fabric fall. I’d lost this particular game of tug-o-war, but fuck it. I didn’t even need to engage at all.

“Fine, you do it,” I snapped, going back for my pack and hoisting it onto my back.

“I will do so gladly, since you’ve asked,” Galok said, smiling more broadly now, his fangs glinting in the light.

“Whatever,” I grumbled. He’d make shorter work of it, anyway. I watched him as he quickly disassembled the tent, tucking the rolls of hide and bone poles under a long, muscled arm.

“Hurry, you two. There may still be danger here,” Taliok said. He and Melanie were already up on his irkdu, ready to go. I snorted at his words. This whole planet was dangerous. We’d met with life-or-death situations basically every day since we’d arrived. So, actually, not that different from Earth.

But I knew what he was referring to. Yesterday we’d been attacked by a neighbouring tribe, one us humans hadn’t yet encountered. A tribe that wasn’t in our flimsy little alliance back at the Cliffs of Uruzai. I flushed angrily as I remembered the events of the previous day, the flying spears. And the way Galok, always smiling, had gone so serious, throwing me over his shoulder like I was a fucking doll, before sprinting through the valley and stowing me in a little crack in the rock.

“Stay here, small one,” he’d said, his copper sight stars pulled so tight they were like pulsing pin-pricks as he’d stared at me.

I mean, technically I guess he had saved me. But who said I needed freaking saving?

“Here, Kat, take this meat I have hunted just for you. You will need to replenish your strength after all that pulling on the tent hides.”

“Excuse me!” I snapped, whirling.

All traces of yesterday’s seriousness were gone, and Galok was back to his laughing self. In his hands he held meat, and a valok plant, the cactus plants we drank out of.

I was about to shoo him away like I usually did, but at that moment my treacherous stomach decided to give a very insistent, very loud, growl.

For fuck’s sake.

Galok’s coppery gaze fell to my abdomen, and even though I was fully dressed and wearing my solar protection jacket, I crossed my arms over my torso defensively.

“I’m not hungry,” I retorted. I didn’t need his gifts of food. I didn’t need anything from him. And the sooner he learned that, the better.

My stomach growled again, and I tightened my arms against it, tensing. Please, body, kindly shut up.

Galok’s warm gaze swung back up to meet mine.

“Your stomach says what your tongue does not. It is more honest than you are.”

“Yeah, well… none of your beeswax, buddy,” I muttered. Luckily, since it was in English, he wouldn’t know what a lame retort I’d come up with.

“Beeswax… is this different from the cool story bro you mentioned the other day?”

He remembers that? I scowled at him, though I had to admit I was slightly impressed. There was something golden retriever-esque about this guy. Something playful and unflappable and frankly, kind of goofy. But there was an intelligence behind all that that I couldn’t deny. I, myself, was shit at learning languages. If someone had said a random phrase to me in a language I didn’t know, there was no way I would be able to recall the sounds the way he had just now.

His gaze had gotten sharper, keener, somehow, and, what the fuck, had he gotten closer to me?

Yes, he definitely had. My nose was practically brushing his shining, bronzed pecs. Before I could jerk away from him, I felt something press into the palm of my hand. Then Galok stepped back, and my fingers closed immediately on instinct so that I wouldn’t drop whatever it was.

“For when your mouth finally listens to the wisdom of your stomach,” Galok said, flashing that haughty alien grin once again. Then he turned and started strapping the tent to his irkdu. I looked down, finding strips of smoked meat in my hand. With a sigh, I shoved it all into my pocket. OK, yeah, I was hungry. And I was definitely going to eat this. I just wasn’t going to let Galok see it.

It would be hard to hide, though, since we’d be riding together. Now that he was done packing everything up, he had turned back to me, waiting expectantly to help me up onto his irkdu. And there was no way around getting that help. I’d discovered pretty fucking fast that it was impossible for me to scramble up onto the massive creatures that us humans had designated the dino-centipedes.

And Galok knew it. I couldn’t help but think the guy got some sick satisfaction in knowing that I was helpless in this. That I needed his assistance. My lips tightening into an annoyed line, I settled my bag against my shoulder and walked over to Galok. He held his hands out, inviting me to place my body into them the way he did every time we danced this dance. And like I always did, I raised a foot, signalling that he could boost my foot up rather than grab my waist. His teeth flashed again in a knowing sort of way, as if to say, “Ah, so I have not yet been successful,” and he bent, flattening his palm for my foot.

He didn’t even need to use both hands to boost me the way a human would. When I stepped onto the palm of his hand, it was as solid and strong as stepping onto the first step of a stone staircase. Or maybe an escalator, because once my foot was on his hand, it moved upward, guiding me up so that I could scramble into the makeshift human saddle on his mount. A moment later, he leaped up, settling himself behind me. I fiddled with the straps of my backpack. It was hot, and I didn’t really want this thing on my back for the whole journey, but I liked that little wall it created between us. Not that Galok had tried anything fishy. He’d never tried to touch me without consent or anything like that. But the dude was just way too friendly. I didn’t trust it.

So the backpack stayed on.

And then, we left.

We took off through the mountains, heading back out into the desert from which we’d come only a few days ago. Our trip had seemed both long and brief. It seemed like we’d been gone from the Cliffs of Uruzai for ages, and yet our trip had been cut way too short. I would have liked to have stayed in the mountains a lot longer – there was so much to look at, so much to collect and to analyze. But Gahn Baldor’s men attacking had put an end to all that. At least we got a lot of samples, I thought to myself. Melanie and I had collected a bunch of different kinds of stones, minerals, even samples of dust, to take back to our ship’s lab to analyze. We were looking for something that would function like zinc oxide or titanium dioxide – something that could function as a natural sunscreen. And as much as I’d enjoyed exploring the mountains, I couldn’t help but admit I was dying to get back into a lab. I’d been doing my MA in Chemistry back home, and it was a huge part of my life. My passion. Specifically, I had a passion for blowing things up. It was how I’d gotten discovered by my university. How I’d gotten my scholarships. In my final year of high school, I’d made a homemade bomb and detonated it in a field. It wasn’t to hurt anyone, I didn’t want to do any damage or anything. I just wanted to feel… powerful. I wanted to see something explode, I wanted to see the fire and the smoke and know that I did that. But I got caught. Of course. I was looking at time in juvie, but the social worker assigned to my case’s husband, Dr. Hanson, worked as a chemistry prof at Wayne State University. She told him about me, and together they got me on the right track, which included paid entry into the chemistry program there.

And I’d fucking loved every second of it. I’d finally been able to channel all of my energy into something productive. Something that interested me. Something other than the ruin of Detroit’s streets and the stuff I could blow up. I was no longer the kid with the addict mom and the dad in jail. I was becoming something. Someone. And I was good at it, too.

But then I’d been scooped up right off the street and brought here. Against my will.

And everything had changed.

But if I could get to a lab, start getting back into my work again… it would be like reclaiming a little bit of my life. It wasn’t like I hated this place or anything. So much of my old world had been danger and anger and pain. And so far all of the aliens had been pretty decent to deal with. Even Galok, as irritating as that was to admit.

“Are you comfortable, Kat?” he said from behind me, shaking me from my thoughts. “Perhaps you would like to remove your pack and lean back…”

“You mean lean back against you,” I said, wrenching around to look at him as we moved over the reddish ground. We had cleared Taliok’s largest mountains, now, but there were still large red rock formations all around us, and the ground was a deep rust-colour.

“Well, I am here behind you. And I do believe my chest would be very comfortable to lean against.”

I let my eyes fall from his face to the chest in question. Hardened pecs and rippling abs gleamed in the light.

“Yeah, right,” I snorted, turning to face forward again. “You have like 0% body fat. It would be like resting against a stone wall. No thanks.”

“I am much warmer and more comfortable than stone, I assure you,” Galok said, his voice suddenly right beside my ear, filtering through my hood, and I sucked in a breath, cheeks on fire. Fuck this guy. Why was his voice making me react like that?

It’s just because he basically said it right beside you and you weren’t expecting it.

Yes. Totally. That was it. That was all.

We continued moving quickly for the rest of the day. Taliok was anxious to get us out of his territory, where we were so close to Baldor’s tribe, and we didn’t stop until nightfall, finding a small outcropping of stone to set up our tents against. I threw my bag down onto the ground, then ignored Galok’s outstretched claws, shimmying onto my belly and sliding feet-first down the irkdu’s side. I landed with a hard thud, crumpling onto my ass on the ground the way I always did, but it was better than seeing Galok’s proud, inevitable smile if he were to help me down. I stood, rubbing my ass, sore both from the rough landing at the long day of riding.

“Would you like a massage, the way Taliok does for Melanie?”

“Jesus! When did you get there?”

Once again Galok had spoken from directly beside me.

“I have been here the whole time. Since you fell. I came over to help you up, but I should have known, small one, that you would not need my help.”

“That’s right,” I said, nodding fiercely. “And I don’t need a massage, either. Wanna know why Taliok gives Melanie massages? Because they’re fucking mates, Galok. Last time I checked, we weren’t mates. Right?”

Galok’s easy-breezy expression faltered slightly.

Oh shit. I hadn’t hurt this guy’s feelings, had I?

Great job. I may have been a little short with him, but I didn’t actually want to be mean to him.

But Galok recovered quickly, his smile returning.

He moved forward, his coppery sight stars pulsing. Two claws reached out and snatched the sunglasses off my face, leaning down so that we were eye to eye.

“This is true. You are not my mate.” He pressed the sunglasses into my hands but kept my gaze pinned with his. “Yet.”

My jaw dropped open, but he ignored my spluttering reply, turning suddenly and striding away to help Taliok build the fire. I stared at his swishing tail, the confident set of his carved shoulders as he walked away, seething. What, this guy thought he got to just decide we were mates all by himself? Or, what, he thought he’d be able to convince me somehow? He did not know who he was dealing with, that was for damn sure. And besides, weren’t mates chosen by the Lavrika? From what I understood, people didn’t have a whole lot of say in the matter. And that was exactly the problem. I liked having a say in the course of my own damn life. And nothing the Lavrika or Galok or anything anyone else could say would change that.

“All good over here?”

Melanie’s voice beside me made me jump, and I wrenched my eyes from Galok’s back.

“Oh, yes, just peachy,” I muttered.

“Good. You and Galok seemed to be having… a moment.”

If Melanie weren’t one of my closest friends on this planet, her perceptiveness and questions would have made me wanna cut a bitch. But she was my friend, and I knew she meant well. I just shook my head.

“No, no, nothing to worry about. Go be lovey-dovey with Mr. Tall, Dark, and Scarred over there,” I said, looking past her to the stone-faced Gahn who was now setting up their tent. He and Galok were contrasts in almost every way. Where Galok was taller and leaner, Taliok was stockier, packed with thick muscle. And where Galok gave off a carefree air, with his easy, loping movements and almost permanently fixed smile, Taliok seethed with tight, controlled tension, his face a scarred mask. But he seemed to make Melanie happy. And I guessed that was all that really mattered.

Even if I thought it was insane beyond words.

CHAPTER TWO

Galok

Fire built and blazing, I joined Taliok as he erected the tent he would share with Melanie, tying the leather bands across from him. The two new women, Melanie and Kat, were speaking together, and I took advantage of the quiet moment.

“Melanie has finally accepted you, then? She has agreed to be your Gahnala, your mate?”

Taliok’s sight stars tightened as they flashed to me. His jaw clenched, but then he visibly forced himself to relax. I was not of his tribe, and he was clearly still getting used to my questions. He was not the sort to make sport of conversation. But I could not help wanting to hear more of this. To hear how he’d won Melanie’s affection to him. From what I had seen, she had been the slowest to accept her Sea Sand mate. She was hesitant, yet Taliok had claimed her.

I wished to do the same. With Kat. The small, angry one.

“You wish to learn from me, Galok? To win Kat to you? And yet, she is not your mate.” Taliok finished draping the tent hides and fixed me with a hard stare.

“Yes, I do.” No, Kat was not my mate. But as I had said to her but a moment ago, she was not my mate yet. From my first moments with her, I’d been entranced by her. Charmed by her tiny body, her fierceness, the fire in her eyes. I was sure that the Lavrika would come to me, and soon.

And when it did, I wanted to be prepared.

Gahn Taliok’s gaze shifted to the women behind me. I knew the moment his eyes caught on his mate. Because his sight stars pulsed, as if the sight of her caused a great ache inside him.

“I do not have good advice for you, Galok. If I were Gahn Buroudei, I would tell you some cryptic tale about using your tongues. But I do not think that Kat would even let you get that close. For me, Melanie was hesitant. Kat is…” He paused then, frowning, before saying, “Severe.”

I grinned, my chest puffing in pride for my feisty human’s reputation.

“I know. Is it not wonderful?”

Taliok’s tail jerked, and he cocked his head at me.

“I will let you be the judge of that. But I cannot say exactly what I did to win Melanie. I only loved her beyond measure, and waited for her. I did not push her. I did not press.”

Hmm. While I would not mind waiting, I could not help but want to press, just a little. I enjoyed the flush that cascaded over Kat’s pale cheeks when I got close to her, when I offered her food or a massage. I liked the way her eyes, the most brilliant blue I’d ever seen, narrowed, and the way she hissed and spat. Most of all, I’d like the way her little mouth had dropped open, the way she’d stammered, when I’d told her she was not my mate yet.

Because she would be. I was sure of it. More sure of anything than I’d ever been in my life. Even without the Lavrika awakening the sacred mate bond in me, I felt an attachment to her growing and growing, layer by layer, like intricately woven peet grass rope. Even before I’d volunteered to come on this trip with Gahn Taliok, before I’d ever spoken with her, I’d been drawn to her. She was the smallest of all the new women, and yet somehow seemed to be the loudest. And one of the strongest, in spirit if not in body.

I turned to look at her now, feeling my gaze soften as it fell upon her. Now that the sun had disappeared and the moons had risen, she’d pushed back the hood of her stiff human cloak. The moon- and starlight caught on the impossibly pale hair that grew, short and soft, from her head. Melanie’s hair was well past her shoulders. But Kat’s was less than a claw-tip in length. I clenched my hands into fists, longing to run my hands over it, to feel its shorn softness.

Do not linger, Galok. Set up her tent for her.

I jogged over to my irkdu, pulling down the supplies for Kat’s tent. I began to set it up next to Gahn Taliok’s when Kat’s voice cut through the air.

“What are you doing? I can do it.”

“I have no doubt you can,” I said, energy thrumming in me as she stepped up beside me. The moonlight caught on the high bridge of her slim little nose, her cheekbones, her pointed chin. All of the new women had interesting faces, but I could not help but acknowledge hers as the most exquisite. The most delicate. And the one with the most impressive scowl.

“I have no doubt you can do it,” I said again as she yanked a bone pole from my arms. “But I simply wished to do it for you.”

“Well, don’t,” she said, driving the bone pole into the ground with a strength that belied her body’s tinyness. “And about what you said earlier. That I’m not your mate yet.”

She stood then, turning and fixing me with her large white and blue yes.

“I’m not your mate now and I won’t be in the future, either. I won’t be any alien’s mate. I didn’t need a man back home and I don’t need one now. Kapeesh?”

“Kapeesh,” I said slowly, adding it to the other words I’d learned from Kat’s pretty mouth. Cool story bro, beeswax, Jesus, fuck, kapeesh… “I do not know this word yet. Explain it to me.”

She breathed out heavily.

“No.”

She fumbled with the rest of the tent, and I stood back and watched her work. She did it all quickly then stormed away. I regarded her work critically. She had been too rushed, and the tent would likely collapse on her in the middle of the night. For a moment, I considered leaving it like that. I would like to hear the squawk she makes when she’s awoken by such a thing…

But the thought that she may be hurt in the collapse had my fingers flying, fixing the tent so that it would be a sturdier shelter for her. Though the ferocity of her tongue made it easy to forget, these new women were soft and vulnerable of body.

After fixing up her tent to my satisfaction, I joined the others at the fire. Melanie was sitting in Taliok’s lap, her form dwarfed by his size. I sat next to Kat, gesturing to my own legs.

“Look, Kat. I can make a comfortable seat for you, too.” I crossed my legs at the ankles the way Taliok’s were, creating an inviting dip for Kat’s small body. The thought of her rump settling there made my cock stir. I ignored it, smiling at her.

But she was ignoring me the way I was ignoring my own cock.

Unfortunately.

We ate mostly in silence after the long journey of the day. As Kat chewed and sipped her valok, my eyes wandered to her. I watched the way the muscles of her jaw worked as she ate, and admired the glint of the firelight off of the strange little rocks that were stuck in her face. Melanie had similar little rocks in the soft bottom part of her ears, but Kat had many more in her ears, and even rocks in her nose and her brow. I wonder what it means… Probably a sign of prowess among her people.

I decided I would ask her soon. But not tonight, as she was already standing to go, brushing the dust from her leg-coverings and then heading for her tent. A moment later Melanie rose, too, leading Taliok back to their tent by the hand. A great ache opened in my chest at the sight of it – the simple beauty of two mates heading together to their tent, hands safe in one another’s, wrapped in soft bliss. I tried to ease the ache by searching out Kat’s form.

But she was already gone.

CHAPTER THREE

Kat

Damn, when that girl decides to be someone’s mate, she really goes for it.

I sat up with a groan, rubbing at my eyes. I should have told Galok to move my tent somewhere else, I thought sleepily as sounds of Taliok and Melanie’s banging drifted through the hide walls.

Hold on, ask Galok? No, I don’t need to be asking that guy for anything. Ever. The less encouragement he gets, the better.

I scrubbed my hand over my scalp, wincing at the feeling. Since I was sixteen, I’d worn my hair either completely shaved, or maybe as long as a buzz cut. In my time on the ship and now here on the planet, it had grown longer than I liked. I scratched at my scalp, tugging on the tiny little hairs before throwing my hands down in frustration. Maybe I can find an alien razor somewhere…

I swallowed hard, remembering the giant knives that basically every one of these guys wore strapped to their backs at all times. Kind of a sobering thought. Most of the aliens had been really good to us. Other than Chapman’s nutso mate, Fallo, they’d all been pretty respectful and chill towards us. Especially Galok. He was the chillest of all. It was easy to forget these guys were fucking killing machines.

You shouldn’t forget…

I mean, something had happened to those warriors who’d attacked us in the mountains, right? Taliok and Galok had killed them. I’d seen the blood on the stones afterwards.

It was hard to imagine Galok killing anything, even the animals he hunted for the meat he offered me incessantly.

Melanie let out a particularly loud moan, and I realized I wasn’t going to be getting any more sleep anytime soon. I kind of had to pee anyway, so I rose, yanking on my pants. I’d been sleeping in my tank top already, so I didn’t need to put that on. I didn’t bother with shoes since I wouldn’t be going far.

I pulled the tent flap aside and stepped out.

Only to trip over what felt like a massive log wrapped in velvet. I landed hard on my hands and knees, something solid beneath me.

What the hell’s bells…?

“As pleasing of a view that this gives me, I cannot help but think I should offer you assistance.”

Fucking Galok.

I was tossed over his thighs, ass in the air.

“That’s not necessary, thanks,” I muttered, scrambling off of his lap and then crab-crawling backwards away from him, face on fire. “And just what are you doing sleeping directly outside my tent’s entrance, anyway?” I shouldn’t have been so surprised. Galok had slept directly beside my tent every night on this trip. But this was the first time I’d found him right outside the door, so to speak.

“This was the most comfortable place,” he said innocently, almost looking affronted at my words. I mean, the guy did look comfortable. He was leaning up against the craggy wall of the rock outcropping that sheltered our tents. His muscled arms were crossed over his chest, his long legs splayed in front of him. When my gaze drifted between those legs, I froze, jerking my eyes up to his smirking face.

“Alright, well, whatever. I’m going to pee.”

Galok was up and at my side in an instant.

“Let me escort you. It is not safe to go anywhere alone in this desert.”

“Somehow, I think it would be safer to be alone than to be anywhere near you with my pants down,” I said, but the words had no bite. Even though Galok definitely had prowess and strength as a warrior, I was certain that he wouldn’t purposely do something to hurt me. Annoy me? Hell yes. But actually threaten me, or do anything to harm me? I just couldn’t see it.

But that didn’t mean a girl wanted an audience.

“I will not spy,” Galok said, and for once his gaze and voice were serious. Like, really serious. Shockingly so.

“Fine,” I grumbled, knowing I wouldn’t be able to get rid of him even if I tried. Besides, he’s right. There’s a lot of monsters in this desert… I’d seen what some of the creatures out here could do to a person. Hell, I’d watched most of the people on our ship get shredded by the zeelk within minutes of landing here.

We walked around the stone outcropping. As we walked, Galok stayed between me and the open desert. I let my hand trail over the stone, feeling the falls and cracks in the surface. It felt almost kind of nice, rough and cool in the night -

“Shit!” I yelped, yanking back my hand. I held my stinging fingertips up in front of my face squinting in the gloom.

“What has happened?” Galok said, his voice deadly and low. He grasped my hand firmly and pulled it away from my face, bending to look at it.

“I don’t know what happened. That’s what I was trying to figure out before you so politely ripped my hand away from my own damn eyes.”

Galok didn’t answer me, his face moving lower. His giant head was blocking my view. For all I knew, my fingers were turning black, shrivelling up, and about to fall off.

As I stared at his high, pointed ears and glossy black hair, I realized that this was the first time he’d ever touched my bare skin. He’d touched me before – boosting me up onto the irkdu, for example. Or when he’d grabbed me up during the attack in the mountains. But this was the first time I’d felt his fingertips on my skin. A shiver ran through me, zinging up my spine and making goosebumps break out over my bare arms. I should be pulling my hand away. I should be fighting.

But there was something so firm yet gentle about his prodding touch that I just… couldn’t.

His fingertips brushed along my palm, then to my inner wrist. His movements paused there.

“I can feel your heartbeat,” he said. His voice came out so low it almost sounded strangled.

“Well, luckily I still have one after whatever just bit me or whatever. Can you please let go so I can look at my freaking hand?”

The last thing I needed was to get bitten by some venomous alien creature and not treat it in time.

But Galok didn’t let go. Not yet, anyway. He ran his claws from my wrist back up my palm, up to the injured fingers.

“And what would you do, small one, if I gave your hand back now? What would you make of this wound, you who know so little of the monsters in this world?”

I froze. That wasn’t something I expected Galok to say. It sounded way too dark, way too serious. And, it was way too spot-on. I had no idea what I was dealing with 99% of the time on this planet. But frankly, that had never stopped me before. I’d always gone in, guns blazing, no matter the opponent or situation. I’d always figured my shit out.

“Well, I’d at least get to see if my damn fingers were still attached,” I grumbled. Though I had to admit the pain was already disappearing, a slight pulse in time with my heart. And that pulse was going much faster than it should have been.

It’s just the adrenaline of getting bitten, or scratched, or whatever. It has abso-fucking-lutely nothing to do with Galok’s hands on your skin.

“Your fingers are still here,” Galok said. “A scopti caught you with its claw. It is a shallow wound. It has already stopped bleeding. And the scopti has no venom.”

I breathed out in a sharp whoosh.

Well, that’s good, I guess.

“OK, alien doctor man, now that you’ve given me your expert opinion, you can give me my hand back.”

Galok raised his head to look at me, his eyes meeting mine. And I sucked in a sharp breath. Because out here, in the darkness like this, he looked… Different. His normally relaxed, happy expression was deeper, painted by shadows. His eyes were darker, his fangs gleaming sharper. And there was no trace of a smile.

Fuck it. He looked attractive. He had a nice face, I couldn’t deny it, and with the deep, sharp angles of the shadows, there was an intensity that wasn’t normally there.

But thinking one of these dudes was slightly good-looking didn’t mean anything. It didn’t change anything.

“Your hands are so… soft,” Galok whispered. There was a reverent growl to his words that shot right down my spine into my pelvis, and I yanked my hand back as if I’d gotten clawed by yet another creature. Trying to ignore him, I raised my injured hand up to my face. Galok was right – it had been a shallow wound. A crust of blood had already dried around it.

“If you are feeling faint from your injury, I would be happy to carry you back to the tent.”

I jerked to look at Galok, and there was that smile again. It was kind of nice to see it. It felt familiar after the weird intensity of the previous moment.

“I’m good. My feet are working just fine,” I snorted. “Besides, I haven’t even gone pee yet. So… turn around.”

Galok did so obediently, and I thanked my lucky stars he didn’t try to complain or wiggle his way out of that one. No way was I letting some alien perv watch me pee.

I quickly pulled down my pants and squatted.

And nothing happened.

I blew out a frustrated breath.

“Can you, like, go back to the tents? I can’t pee with you standing so close.”

“Why not? Does your human anatomy in that area stop working in the presence of an attractive, virile, mate-worthy male?”

“Wow, real modest.” I rolled my eyes. “No, that’s not what happens. I just… can’t pee. You’re too close to me. Go back to the tents.”

Galok took a couple of steps away from me then stopped again.

“As I have promised, I will not turn around and spy on you. But nor will I leave you here alone. You are strong, small Kat. You have more spirit than most of the creatures here that would do you harm. But where you are ferocious in will, you are soft in body.” There it was again. That word. Soft. I’d never been called soft before. Usually, it was words like skinny, loud, aggressive, rebellious.

Soft.

He really wasn’t going to leave me to do my business in peace. I guessed it kind of made sense. We weren’t in the more protected areas of Taliok’s mountains or the Cliffs of Uruzai. We were in the middle of the open desert of the Sea Sands now, with only this one small shelf of stone to provide some shelter.

“OK, then, can you plug your ears?”

“Plug… plug them? With what?”

Oh my God. I can’t believe I’m spelling this out.

“Just cover your fucking ears so I know you won’t hear me peeing!”

“Hmm, I have never done such a thing. I have always used my ears to their fullest capacity.” Galok reached his huge hands up, hands that, just a moment ago, had held mine. He pressed them against the bases of his cropped Doberman-like ears.

“Like this?” he called, much louder than normal. I didn’t bother answering him, knowing he probably wouldn’t hear me anyway, now. I closed my eyes, forcing myself to relax, and was finally able to pee. I quickly cleaned up and got dressed again. Standing, I saw that Galok still had his hands planted dutifully against his ears.

I thought about shouting at him to get his attention. But decided against it. I didn’t want to bring any predators down on us because of my loud-ass voice. So instead I walked up behind him.

I paused for a moment behind him before tapping him on the shoulder. My eyes slipped over the weapons across his back, then between and below them to the thick ropes of muscle beneath his skin. His skin shone in the moonlight. During the day, it was a deep, warm copper that swirled into areas of brown and black. But out here in the dark, he looked like he was made of burnished metal. Dark chrome and black marble.

Stop staring and get yourself back to bed.

I raised my uninjured hand, stretching up on my tiptoes to tap him on the shoulder. When my fingertips met his skin, everything in him tensed, a barely perceivable reaction rolling from his shoulders downward, causing his tail to twitch.

Barely perceptible.

But I perceived it.

He lowered his hands and I pulled mine back, clearing my throat.

“All done.”

Galok turned to me, his sight stars spinning then settling as they found me in the darkness.

“Good. Shall we return to the tents?”

“Um, yeah,” I said. I started walking, and Galok fell into step beside me. I walked quickly around the stone outcropping, but even speed-walking, I could tell Galok was walking unnaturally slowly, cutting his strides shorter to stay in line with me. And that was extremely fucking annoying.

Who the hell does he think he is, being so freaking tall…

The rational part of my brain knew that I was being stupid. It was genetics. All these guys were giants. But the annoyed part of my mind frankly didn’t give a flying fuck what the rational part said. I was a bundle of weird, surging emotions that I did not have the energy to untangle right now.

Luckily, by the time we got back, the other tent had gone quiet.

“Thank God. I was worried they’d be going at it all night. They’ve hooked up every freaking night,” I said shaking my head. I was glad that Melanie was happy, but man, I was kind of shocked at the enthusiasm of their joining. Hadn’t she gotten tired yet?

“It is the sacred mate bond. I have heard tell that the desire one feels for one’s mate… It is insatiable.”

I jerked to look at Galok. His face had gotten all dark and weird and intense again, his eyes hard on me, and I was not prepared to deal with more of that right now.

“Well, it’s a good thing I don’t have a mate, then. Sounds like a lot of work,” I said. Then I yanked my tent flap aside, turned my back, and went inside.

It took me a while to fall asleep. Because instead of closing my eyes and tuning everything out, I found myself listening, and listening hard, for the sounds of Galok getting comfortable right outside. The scrape of his weapons against the rock as he leaned back. The settling of his legs in the sand. I could picture him perfectly, muscled arms crossed over his chest, head tipped back, large eyes closed…

And just, what, exactly, are you doing picturing Galok?

Shit.

I could not fucking wait to get back to the Cliffs of Uruzai and away from him.

CHAPTER FOUR

Galok

I awoke before the dawn, my back stiff against the rock. As soon as I opened my eyes, I turned my head towards Kat’s tent and breathed in deeply. Yes, there was her scent. She was safe inside. I closed my eyes once more, focusing on my ears, listening for her breathing through the tent walls. The sound was a soft melody. Though I jumped when that melody was punctured by a loud snort.

These new women are charming creatures, truly.

And Kat was especially so.

I must hunt and secure Kat’s breakfast.

With this thought in mind, energy surged in my muscles and I rose. I rolled my shoulders to ease the stiffness there, swinging my arms back and forth to limber up for the hunt. I would probably catch a rakdo. They were small and easy enough for one hunter to catch on his own. Not to mention they were everywhere in this desert.

I made sure my blades were secure at my back, then hefted my spear, stepping away from the rock and calling my mount I tried to be quiet so that I would not wake Kat, but loud enough that my irkdu would hear wherever it had gone during the night.

A moment later, the massive beast came lumbering around the other side of the stone, its jaws working as it chewed its own breakfast of peet grass.

“More grass for you when we come back, friend. We have work to do.” And a pretty woman to feed.

I jumped up onto my mount. As I settled myself, my eyes fell onto the saddle in front of me. The hides had a slight imprint from Kat sitting there. I could almost imagine her in front of me…

Do not get distracted.

The sun was already rising, chasing the long line of moons away. Bending low and holding my spear close to my side, I clicked my tongues, urging my irkdu forward.

We took off over the sand, the sky flying past as. I grinned, leaning lower, relishing the speed, the feel of the early morning air whipping through my long unbraided hair. I would turn my attentions to the hunt in a moment, but for now, I was enjoying the ride. The freedom of it.

I wonder if Kat would like to ride fast like this.

It was hard to say. Part of me imagined she would grumble and complain if I were to take her riding fast. And yet another part could see her loving it, her tiny teeth shining in a wickedly lovely grin. Both images filled my chest with light. Kat was a wonder in all her forms and moods.

Something in the distance caught my eye, and I commanded my irkdu towards it.

A dakrival herd.

Normally hunters approached dakrival herds in a group. They were huge beasts, with tusks that could rend a man from skull to spleen. But I decided to approach, just to assess the situation. Dakrival meat was far superior to rakdo flesh.

We moved towards the herd. The herd was moving quickly, thundering across the desert. We chased them, bringing up the rear. The creatures were fast, but not nearly as quick as my irkdu with its many, many legs skittering over the sand.

One dakrival in particular caught my attention. Slightly smaller than the rest, and moving more slowly, too.

It would be foolishness to try to take the beast down alone.

And yet…

I can do it.

I knew it with a certainty so sharp it burned.

I screamed for my irkdu to charge, and we picked up yet more speed. My hair whipped behind me. I snarled, raising my spear and drawing another blade with my other hand. The herd was moving ahead of the one in my sights, now. Before I could give myself the chance to hesitate, I hurled my spear through the air, watching its dark form streak through the early light.

It found its target, and I gave a cry of triumph as the dakrival fell. The rest of the herd moved on, not bothering to come back for the fallen one. I quickly put the beast out of its pain, then hoisted it onto my irkdu, securing it with leather cords and turning to go back to the tents, smiling all the way. Felling a dakrival alone was a great feat. I had never done such a thing before. But it made sense I had done it for  the first time for Kat.

I have not even claimed her as my mate, yet, and already she makes me a stronger warrior.

When the rock outcropping and tents were in sight, I leaped down from my irkdu, patting its back before hefting the heavy dakrival onto my shoulder. As I strode into the camp, Kat emerged from her tent, yanking up the hood of her cloak and pressing her strange black eye-shells to her face as she did so. She froze when she saw me, her head tipping back to take in my kill. Pride swelled inside me, and I stood a little taller, pulling back my shoulders and inflating my chest with a large breath.

“Good morning, small one. I have killed a dakrival for you. This is a difficult task. Normally it takes at least three men -”

Her pale face grew even paler.

“Gross,” she said, turning and walking quickly away.

Hmm. That was not the reaction I had hoped for.

But it was no matter. She would be happy to have fresh meat once it was butchered, I was sure.

I tossed the dakrival down a little ways away from the tents and began the laborious task of cleaning and butchering the beast. Normally the women of the tribe would do this sort of thing. But it did not bother me to do what some would call women’s work in order to ensure that Kat had fresh meat to fill her belly. So it was with great joy that I did my work, and because of this, it went much more quickly than it perhaps would have otherwise.

“Wow, you’re covered.” A soft female voice drifted haltingly towards me. But it was not Kat’s voice. I knew it right away, even before I raised my head to see who spoke. It was Gahn Taliok’s mate, his new Gahnala, Melanie. Her dark eyes were wide as she beheld me.

“Covered?” I repeated, unsure of her meaning. I was clothed as I normally was, as all men of the Sea Sands always were – a simple loincloth, and the straps for my weapons.

“The blood,” Melanie clarified, waving a dainty hand up and down. Gahn Taliok drew up beside her.

“You hunted this yourself this morning, Galok?”

I could not help but notice the note of impressed surprise in Gahn Taliok’s voice, and I stood, raising my tail over my eyes respectfully, but grinning behind the gesture.

“Yes, Gahn. Knowing it would feed Kat made me strong enough to do it.”

Taliok’s tail swished in agreement. His arm looped around Melanie’s back, making her soft cheeks glow bright pink.

“It is indeed true. I believe the new women make us stronger. But this is still no small feat, felling a dakrival alone. You are a hunter of great prowess, Galok. And a strong warrior. I am glad to have you on this journey.”

Once again, pride expanded in my chest. To have a Gahn say such a thing was high praise indeed. I tilted my head, looking behind Gahn Taliok and Melanie, hoping that Kat would be right behind them to hear such words. But alas, she was not. She was still, as she often said in her language, peeing. If she was gone much longer, I would have to go looking for her. I was not as worried about predators during the day as I had been last night, but it still was not good for her to be alone for long.

But she rounded the rock a moment later.

“Oh, Jesus, what a mess. I was not prepared to see this much blood first thing in the morning,” Kat grumbled. I was surprised by her reaction. Most women of the Sea Sands would be overjoyed to have such a kill dropped at their feet, especially a kill that they did not have to clean and butcher. But Kat was not of the sea sands. And thus she was as mystifying as she was fascinating.

“Do not worry, small one. I am almost done cleaning this kill. Soon it will be palatable to you.”

“OK, but what about you? Are you going to make yourself palatable? You need a bath, my dude.”

My dude. I wonder what it means.

I hoped it was a term of endearment, but knowing the woman saying the words, I doubted it.

“I think we still have a couple of talka plants,” Melanie said, looking back towards the tent she’d been sharing with Gahn Taliok. Her mate swished his tail.

“Yes, we do. You can clean up when you are finished, Galok.”

I raised my tail to the Gahn again, then sat back down on the sand to finish my work. Melanie bent beside me.

“Do you need any help?”

I glanced sideways at her. Her face seemed more relaxed, more open than before. Ever since she’d come on this trip and had agreed to be Taliok’s mate, she’d been happier. I liked that. I wonder how much happier Kat will be when she finally accepts me…

But I was getting far, far ahead of myself. The Lavrika had not even called me, yet. But it would. I knew it would. I did not need the sacred mate bond to confirm that there was no other woman, of the Sea Sands or of the new tribe, for me now. Even now, looking at Melanie, I felt nothing beyond the deep respect owed a Gahnala and the slight curiosity I felt towards any new woman I would have the chance to see up close. They were an entirely different people, after all, and their faces and forms were so different from ours. But once I had met Kat, none of the others had held my interest beyond a polite curiosity.

She was waiting for my answer, so I spoke.

“You need not concern yourself, Gahnala Melanie. I am almost finished,” I said with a tilt of my head. It was true. I was nearly done.

“OK, well, when you’re done with the carving part, I’ll take it and smoke it so you can go clean up.”

I smiled at her.

“Thank you, Gahnala.”

Within moments, I had finished my task. I wiped my blade on a spare bit of hide then stood. Melanie trotted over to her tent then came back with a talka stalk.

“Thanks for breakfast. I’ve got this, now.”

I took the talka stalk with a raise of my tail, then moved around the stone outcropping to clean myself. I did not really feel the need to do such a thing out of sight, but last time the new women had stumbled upon Gahn Taliok and I undressed and cleaning ourselves, they had seemed shocked and alarmed. It was not the expression of adoring joy I would have hoped for upon the first viewing of my cock by the new women. If I remembered correctly, Kat had actually completely turned around, pressing her hands to her eyes.

I hope she gets over that reaction soon, I thought to myself. I wonder how I can make her more comfortable around me. And how I can make my cock more alluring.

Behind the stone, I quickly slipped out of my loincloth. I kept my weapons on, but aside from their straps across my chest and back, I was nude. I split the talka stalk with a claw then squeezed the milky gel into my hands, lathering it all over my skin, starting at my neck and shoulders. I stroked downward, down my bloodied arms, wiping everything away with a square of soft hide. Then I moved down my chest to my pelvis, running the sudsy stuff across my hips before moving onto my cock spears and shaft.

And the touch of my fingers, my member began to swell slightly. I have gone too long without a woman.

I snorted at myself. I was still a young warrior. Yes, I’d never been with a woman, but many warriors older than myself had waited much, much longer. The majority waited their entire lives without the perfect joy of a mate. With so few women, we were doomed to such circumstances.

But not anymore. Not since the arrival of the new women.

Not since Kat.

Finally, I had a chance at happiness. At companionship. At a mate and cubs and a life lit up with the fiercest sort of glory. The glory of a family.

The thought of Kat as my mate only made my cock swell more, growing hard under my fingers. I stroked along its length slowly, sighing. I wonder what her hand would feel like here… It was a dangerous thought. It had me growing to my full length within half a moment. I stroked faster, pleasure building.

“Jesus fucking Christ on a cracker, are you jerking off?”

I squeezed myself, my eyes wrenching open. Kat was standing before me, her tiny mouth hanging open. Then she whirled around, covering her eyes the way she had done last time. She had spoken in her language, and while I did not completely grasp the meaning of her words, she was clearly displeased. Unfortunately, I did not think she was hiding her eyes because she felt herself unworthy of the sight of my glorious cock.

Not an ideal reaction.

“What are you doing back here, Kat?”

Had she come looking for me? Warmth filled my chest, and I stepped towards her…

…Only to have her toss a terribly angry look over her shoulder. I froze, immediately stepping back to my place.

“I was coming to pee, thank you!”

She was?

“I thought you already went pee. Not long ago, you left the camp and came back here.”

“No,” she said, still facing away from me, “that was just to get away from the dead cow thing you’d dragged into the camp. Now I actually have to pee.”

“Well, go ahead,” I said amiably. “What I am doing here will not take long to finish.”

Oh. Hmm. Maybe that was the wrong thing to say. Perhaps I should have proclaimed how long it would take, how long I could last. To woo her with my stamina.

“Yeah, no. I’m not going pee in broad daylight right next to you with your massive cock just hanging out in the breeze. Goodbye.”

She stormed away, and as her tiny form retreated around the rock, I found myself smiling, hanging on the one shining word she’d spoken among all her angry ones.

Massive.

She’d called my cock massive.

This was turning out to be a very good day indeed.

CHAPTER FIVE

Kat

That was the second time I’d seen Galok’s dick in the past few days. And it was two times too many.

At least the first time it wasn’t hard. Not like today.

Because, oh boy, today it was fucking hard. And huge. Even in the grip of his absurdly giant hand, I could see its impressive size, its dark head pressing out of Galok’s fist. Not to mention the other two things on either side. Melanie said the Sea Sand men called them cock spears. But that cock was already big and bad enough. What the hell did it need spears for? Did it think a vagina was some animal that needed to be hunted down and speared? I mean, from the sounds I heard nightly from Melanie and Taliok’s tent, it definitely sounded like everything was pretty enjoyable. No spearing, at least not a painful kind. But still… What the hell?

Cock spears. Ridiculous.

But no matter how many times I huffed and sighed and grimaced as I stomped back towards the tents, I couldn’t get the image out of my mind. The image of Galok, naked from the waist down, skin shining with talka gel in the bright light, jerking along his cock with dark, clawed fingers. He was such a boyish idiot most of the time, that seeing him like that – like, well, a man – was jarring.

And arousing.

What! No. No, it was not.

Oh, God. What is happening? Am I going insane?

I still hadn’t even gone pee!

I raced back around the tents, ignoring Melanie’s curious look, and found another private spot just out of sight on the other side of the big stone outcropping. Quickly finishing up my business, I headed back to the tents, praying Galok wouldn’t be there yet.

He wasn’t, but this only sent me into a spiral of wondering just what exactly he was doing with his hands now, and why things were taking so long…

Oh, God, No, Why. Why am I so batshit crazy?

This was not a road I needed to go down right now.

Forcing out a heavy breath through clenched teeth, I plopped down next to Melanie. She was crouched in front of a small fire, cooking the meat that presumably had come from the big animal Galok had dragged back this morning. I stared into the flames as Melanie spoke beside me.

“Are you sunburned? Your face is all red.”

Sunburned? Ah, no, good Melanie. Sweet Melanie. Innocent, concerned, kind Melanie. No, I’m not sunburned. I’m just feeling the effects of walking in on an alien masturbation sesh for the first fucking time.

I didn’t say any of that. I just grumbled something about the fact that I already had put sunscreen on today. Though I had to admit the tube had been feeling pretty empty when I’d squeezed the stuff out today. This was finally enough to get Galok out of my head as I remembered why we’d even come on this massive trek in the first place. We’d been scouting the natural minerals and stones in Taliok’s mountains to hopefully find something to create a sunscreen natural to this planet. Our own human supplies of the stuff wouldn’t last forever, and our weak-ass human hides needed all the protection we could get out here under the alien sun.

Luckily, the one thing we didn’t need to source or manufacture was any kind of healing or antibiotic ointment. The fancy-schmancy milk stuff that everyone called Lavrika’s blood had fantastic healing properties, and, not for the first time, I wondered what the heck I’d find when I looked at it under a microscope.

And then, everything stopped. I sucked in a breath, heart hammering.

Lavrika’s blood…

Could that be the compound we’d been brought here to study in the first place?

I knew we’d been dragged out to this planet on some kind of hair-brained mission that involved collecting and analyzing a certain energy source on the planet. I’d never actually learned what it was, but what if it was the Lavrika’s blood? What if, not only could it heal, but it was also an energy source, too? The only time I’d encountered the stuff in any meaningful quantity had been when Cece’d dunked me in it to learn the Sea Sand language. Maybe you should be thinking a little harder about the fact that taking a bath in some milk literally imparted an entire foreign language in your brain…

What other properties did that Lavrikas blood have?

And would the humans want to come back for it?

Humans? Good grief, I’d already started thinking of the other people from Earth, the ones who’d brought us here, as a separate species. But then again, I was pretty much OK with that. They’d abducted us, drugged us, brought us into hostile territory against our wills. And those actions had been sanctioned by basically every Earth authority there was. Yeah, I was OK being away from all that. Away from those people. The ones who’d done so much wrong.

But what if they do come back?

We’d assumed that after the chaotic results of the first mission, that Earth might just cross this planet off their list as a lost cause. But there was no guarantee of that. They could come back… With weapons.

Oh, hell no. If they did come back, I’d fucking fight them off myself. As annoying as I found guys like Galok, and especially the insane Fallo, they’d still welcomed us, fed us, kept us safe. As weird as it was to admit, I felt way more at home here now than I did on that ship among my own kind.

It helped that all the humans left on this planet were ones I actually liked. We were basically all in the same boat. Chapman had been the only one who was part of the mission that had abducted us, but she’d already apologized and made up for that fact. So, yeah, if other humans did come back? There would be hell to pay. Especially if they did what humans love to do, and destroyed this planet and its inhabitants in order to get what they wanted.

Lavrika’s blood…

More and more, it seemed like that had to be what the Earth authorities had wanted to study. Hell, I wanted to study it, and I didn’t even have any evil plans tucked up my tiny human sleeve.

Lost in thought, I started eating the meat Melanie handed me, forgetting to make my usual show of not eating whatever Galok had procured. I chewed, thinking hard, mind whirling. But Melanie welcoming Galok back to the camp distracted me.

“You look much better. I bet you feel better, too,” she said to Galok. I snorted at her words, choking on my meat, coughing wildly. Galok sprinted to me, clapping a heavy hand against my back until I was breathing again.

Yeah, I bet he feels better after that… Fucking hell.

“Are you alright, Kat?” Galok said, crouching beside me as I wheezed, his sight stars buzzing in his eyes.

“I’m fine,” I croaked, swallowing the offending food. “There’s probably just something wrong with the meat you brought back.”

Galok’s look of concern melted into a grin, and I felt my cheeks grow weirdly warm. Again.

“There is nothing wrong with it, Kat. It is just that your tiny mouth perhaps cannot handle all my meat.”

I stared at him in shock, about to come up with some scathing retort. But he was already standing and striding away to take down my tent and pack it up.

“Motherfucker…”

“Don’t you mean, Kat-fucker? At least, you want him to be.”

Now it was Melanie’s turn to get stared at.

“Ex-squeeze-me, Mel? I think I heard you wrong.”

Her serious face pulled into a brief smile.

“You heard me right.”

I shook my head, over and over again.

“All that time with Taliok has addled your damn brains. You’re not thinking straight,” I sputtered.

“Maybe,” she said noncommittally. Then her smile disappeared. “I’m serious, Kat. You can talk to me about this stuff. I’m not going to judge. Just, let me know…”

“When hell freezes over. Or Zaphrinax, because apparently they’re the same freaking place.” I jumped up and hurried away. Maybe that was a little dramatic. I didn’t feel like I was in hell, here. In fact, a lot of stuff in this place was extremely cool. But then Galok turned towards me, pinning me with intense eyes and a gleaming smile, forcing heat throughout my body, making my mouth go dry.

Yup. This is definitely, absolutely, 100% Hell.

CHAPTER SIX

Galok

The desert rolled past us as we rode through it. We were well and truly beyond Taliok’s territory now. All the rock outcroppings had given way to swaths of sweeping desert. The open Sea Sands. I knew this territory well, though we were technically in desert that belonged to no tribe. Neutral territory. In the distance at our sides, Fallo’s hills rolled out against the horizon. But no one requested that we stop there today like the women had when we had first started this journey. And so we continued, the sand expanding all around us.

I kept my eyes focused on the land around us, spear at the ready, watching for zeelk activity. A small group like us likely would not attract them to the surface, but it was still prudent to stay alert. Though staying alert to anything besides Kat’s body in front of me was proving to be a challenge.

I could not see her face, hidden as it was by her stiff hood. She faced dutifully forward, never turning back. My eyes flicked between her and the open sands. Though my gaze was often on the sand instead of her, all my thoughts were of her. Wondering what she was thinking. What she was feeling.

So I decided to ask her.

“What are you thinking about?” I called over the sound of irkdu’s legs churning over the sand.

“What?” she called, not turning back to look at me.

“What are you thinking about, Kat?”

But she did not answer.

The rest of the ride was made in silence. As night approached, we stopped at a small collection of boulders and babkit trees, tucked against the side of a dune. The trunks and flat branches of the babkit trees, normally brown, looked red in the darkening light. The boulders moved through shades of indigo and black against the dark sand, casting long shadows. Peet grass and valok plants grew sparsely here and there between the rocks, and my tail jerked in satisfaction that my irkdu would find sustenance while we were resting.

Kat was shimmying off the irkdu in her usual odd fashion, slithering on her belly, but doing it backwards. Like always, she landed much more heavily than one would expect for one so tiny, falling into a crumpled lump on the sands.

“If you accepted my assistance, small one, you would not have such painful landings,” I said with a grin, leaping from my mount and landing in a quiet crouch. I may have leaped a little harder, arched my limbs to show their strength a little more than was necessary to accomplish the feat. Kat stood shakily, rubbing her backside with one hand and pushing her eye-shells up to rest on the top of her head with the other.

“Believe it or not, accepting your help would be even more painful than landing on my ass.”

I could not understand this. I was not asking her to be my mate with such an action – simply offering an easier way down from the mount. I could not help my confusion from bubbling outward in a single word.

“Why?”

Kat’s slim, almost invisible, little brows crinkled inward sharply, her mouth bending into a crooked line. She bit down on her lips, fixing me with her large eyes. They were exceptional eyes, I had to admit. During the day they were a lighter, brighter blue than any rindla flower I had ever seen. And now, in the darkening air, they were like the dusk. Deep and drenched in shadow.

“I don’t know,” she said finally, and for once there was not so much hot bite to the sound of her voice. I found that encouraging, and took a step closer. Her eyes flashed, but she didn’t move away.

“Well next time, let me help you, then, if you do not know why you fight it. Either that, or let me massage the pain out of your tender rump.”

Her brows shot upwards, then back down in a startling display of muscular agility. She said some quick, sharp phrase in her language then turned and walked away, joining the Gahnala Melanie who was beginning to build a fire with babkit branches Gahn Taliok had cut down. I retrieved the rest of the dakrival carcass from my mount, and we smoked the rest of its meat, settling in for the evening meal.

I sat next to Kat, of course, though she gave a great roll of her round, human eyes as I did so. This was a uniquely human gesture, and so far, of all the new women I had witnessed, Kat seemed to repeat this gesture the most often. Therefore, I assumed it was one of annoyance, displeasure, or some other negative emotion.

Perhaps she is extra angry because she is hungry.

“Here, Kat. I have saved the dakrival heart for you,” I said, offering the tender organ to her. She looked down at my offering, then scrunched up her nose.

“Not interested, thanks.”

“Are you sure?” I said, looking down at it. It was a delicacy and would lend her much strength.

“I’m sure,” Kat said, setting her delicate jaw.

I tried not to be discouraged at Kat’s rejection of my heart. I spent the rest of the meal making sure she was fed well, and that she had valok, but it did not seem to do much to improve her mood. Not that it particularly mattered. I was happy to be next to her in any fashion, in any circumstances.

My attention was turned from Kat by Melanie’s voice across the fire.

“Do you think we’ll still stop at the ship on the way back, so we can get a head start on analyzing the samples?”

Gahn Taliok grunted, then spoke.

“Though I do not ever wish to deny my Gahnala anything, I do not think this would be wise. We need to return to the other tribes as soon as possible. I must inform the other Gahns of Gahn Baldor’s attack on my mountains, and I must send back reinforcements to secure my territory.”

Melanie nodded her head, another human gesture I had still not completely learned the nuances of. I was glad to hear Gahn Taliok’s words. I, too, was eager to report back to my own Gahn, Gahn Buroudei. Though the thought of returning to the cliffs did send a slight pang through me. Once this trip was over, I would have no reason to be alone with Kat so often. And that thought was a desperately sad one.

No. I will find other ways, other reasons, to be near her. I would bring her fresh meat every day and offer to massage her every night.

Even if she refused, every time.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Kat

The guys got up to set up the tents, and I shuffled on my butt over to Melanie, wincing as I did so.

Maybe I shouldn’t have blown off Galok’s offer for a massage.

Um. What? Jesus. The little voice in my head was betraying me left and right. Although, I was still stuck on Galok’s question from earlier, when I’d told him accepting his help would be more painful than falling on my ass. He’d asked me why. And there had been none of his usual jocular arrogance. Nothing but deep, curious sincerity. And I had been totally unprepared for the question. It turned out I didn’t really have a good answer. I mean, it wasn’t like he’d asked me to get down on my knees and suck his dick, or something. All he’d done was offer me help down from his giant irkdu.

I guess it’s just… unfamiliar.

Growing up with a dad in jail and a mom who was completely unreliable, I’d never had someone just offer to help me like that. Not without wanting something in return. And while I got the vague idea that Galok did indeed want something from me, more than I was willing to give, it also didn’t seem like any of his offers hinged upon that. No matter how many times I rejected him or pushed him away, he popped right back up, smiling away, ready to proffer some other random alien kindness before me. He’s like a freaking weed. Cut him down once and he comes right back, even stronger than before.

Maybe he was some kind of masochist. Or into some other kinky shit. He did seem to be weirdly unfazed by my rejections and harsh words. Sometimes I even wondered if he was seeking them out.

Or maybe he truly is just a good-hearted, generous person who likes you.

There was that annoying, treacherous voice again. Shut up. I didn’t want to think of him as kind and generous and good. It made it harder to push him away.

And even worse, it made me feel like an asshole while I did it.

Time to stop thinking about this.

I turned my attention to my friend Melanie. Her eyes were glued to her mate’s muscled back as he set up their tents for the night.

“Already ready to jump into that tent with him, huh?” I couldn’t help ribbing on her a little, especially after what she’d said earlier about me wanting Galok to be a Kat-fucker.

But Melanie didn’t have any artifice. No self-consciousness at all. She just turned to me, looked me dead in the eye, and said, “Yup.”

I blinked, stunned by the way she’d been so… honest like that.

“He’s no slouch between the sheets, then, I take it,” I muttered.

She cracked a small smile.

“Definitely not. Why do you ask? Wondering what Galok might be like?”

“Um, no! Subject change, please!” For fuck’s sake. What was Mel trying to get at with this line of poking and prodding? Up until now, I’d considered her an excellent judge of human behaviour. She was intensely observant and often noticed things I didn’t. But she was way off-course with whatever she thought she was seeing between Galok and me. Way, way, way out to lunch. On a whole other planet.

I cast my mind around for something else to talk about, since Melanie was just regarding me coolly with her dark eyes, saying nothing more.

“Too bad about not going to the ship on the way back,” I finally said, latching onto the first thing that came into my head. She nodded, frowning.

“Yeah, it is. I was excited to get into the lab. But I think Taliok’s right. It’s best to get back to the Cliffs of Uruzai and report back about what happened.”

“Yeah, yeah, you’re probably right,” I sighed. I kicked my feet out in front of me, stretching my legs and leaning back on my palms. “Hopefully we can get to the ship soon, though.” I was dying to get cracking analyzing the samples, doing what I did best in the lab.

Melanie didn’t say anything else, and I glanced over at her. She was staring into the fire, her eyes far away. I realized suddenly that I’d never asked her what had happened during the attack. She’d obviously been unharmed. I’d just assumed she’d been stuck behind some rock by Taliok the way Galok had done to me.

“Hey, you OK? I never asked you about the attack and where you were during it.”

Melanie flinched and looked at me. She glanced over at the men, then moved closer to me.

“I’ve been thinking about it a lot, to be honest. Wondering if I’m crazy… But no, Taliok said he’d scented someone else there, so I can’t be crazy…”

Huh? What was she going on about?

“Care to fill in some blanks, there, Geo Girl?”

She smiled at the familiar nickname I’d created for her, being a geologist and all. Then her smile faded.

“When Gahn Baldor’s warriors attacked, Taliok hid me in a sheltered spot behind a rock.”

“Ugh, yeah, same. That’s what Galok did.” At the sound of his name, the tall warrior looked up over the top of the tent he was finishing erecting. I gave him the finger, and he jauntily did the same to me, not understanding what the gesture meant. I couldn’t stop myself from laughing. Shaking my head, I turned back to Mel.

“Well, I didn’t stay there for long. I was too worried about Taliok. I ended up leaving that spot and climbing up the ravine wall, up to a ledge above the entrance to the valley we were in.”

“No shit,” I said, impressed. That took guts. I had peeked out of my spot a few times, but hadn’t actually walked out of it until I’d been there quite a while. And by then, all the fighting was over, and Galok was already loping back through the valley to get me. Let’s just ignore the fact that when you noticed he was alive and well after the fight, you felt an unmistakable surge of relief, shall we?

“Yeah. So I ended up on this ledge. And one of Gahn Baldor’s warriors followed me.”

I felt the blood drain from my face. I had no idea she’d been face to face with one of those guys.

“Did he hurt you?” I asked through clenched teeth. “Because if he did I will go all the way back to those mountains myself and fucking -”

“No, no,” Melanie interrupted, raising her hands and shaking her head. “He didn’t get the chance to do anything. Someone killed him.”

“Taliok,” I said nodding. That made sense. I didn’t know him very well, but what I did know told me he wouldn’t let anyone touch a glossy dark hair on Melanie’s head. But Mel was shaking her head again.

“No, it wasn’t Taliok. It wasn’t a Sea Sand warrior. It was an alien we’ve never seen before.”

I sucked in a breath, then whistled low.

“Holy. Shit.”

“Yeah,” Mel breathed out shakily. “He was even bigger than these guys and less humanoid. He had scales and a snout. He looked like a fucking crocodile on two legs.”

OK. No wonder she was worried she was crazy.

“You mean to tell me that one of Gahn Baldor’s men cornered you, but then was killed by a fucking alien lizard man?” Man, could this planet get any weirder? Don’t ask that. It definitely could. “So then what happened? Don’t tell me lizard man did anything shady.”

“No, and I was surprised by that, too. And he even spoke the Sea Sand language. We could communicate. All he did was ask me where the other woman who looked like me but not like me was. But then he noticed Taliok coming back, and he climbed right up the freaking stone wall and disappeared. I was worried that the woman he was looking for was you, but obviously, if he was, he never found you.”

The thought of a lizard man stalking me, even one that may have helped Melanie out, made goosebumps erupt over my skin. I glanced sideways at Galok. Suddenly, he was looking a lot more appealing. If I had to choose between him and a lizard man, I’d 100% choose him. Not that he needs to know that.

“And you told Taliok about this?” I asked. She nodded.

“Yeah. He had no idea what I was talking about. He’d caught an unfamiliar scent of something when he found me. But he’d ever heard about another species like the one I described.”

“Well, isn’t that just swell. There’s potentially a whole undiscovered race of lizard men lurking on this planet. It’s a conspiracy theorist’s dream.” I swallowed, narrowing my eyes and squinting out at the desert. Nothing moved out there. But with what Melanie had just told me I felt fucking weird.

And I still felt fucking weird when I went to bed in my tent. I tossed and turned, unable to fall asleep. After the fiftieth readjustment of my hides/bed, Galok’s voice cut through the tent walls.

“Are you not comfortable in there, Kat? I can hear your shuffles and sighs. If you like, I could come in and help you get more comfortable.”

“Haha, very funny. No,” I said automatically. But as I lay there in the blackness, I realized that right now, I just didn’t want to be alone. Melanie’s story about the lone lizard man had given me the heebie-freaking-jeebies. Not that that meant I was going to invite Galok into my tent. With a sigh, I rose, dressing quickly and stepping outside.

Galok’s head jerked up when he saw me, as if shocked by my appearance before him.

“What?” I snapped. “I couldn’t sleep.”

“Neither could I, not over the sound of you rolling back and forth and sighing.”

“No one’s making you sleep right outside my tent, you know,” I said. Galok’s grin widened.

“This is true,” he said. “And yet, I find there is nowhere else I’d rather be. Well, almost nowhere else…” He glanced meaningfully at my tent’s entrance.

“Yeah, yeah I get it. I’m a hot piece of human ass on a planet with almost no girls. We all get it. Everyone gets it.”

My words came out more venomous than what was usual, even for me, and Galok looked shocked.

“Have I offended you, Kat?”

He rose instantly, standing before me, bending his head down to capture my gaze.

“For fuck’s sake, you haven’t offended me,” I muttered. But something was bugging me. Niggling at me.

It was doubt.

Doubt that anything Galok said or did meant anything real. Not that I wanted it to mean something real. Of course not. But if I hadn’t been the one to come with Melanie on this trip, would he be lavishing his attentions on whatever other human girl was nearby? Did anything he did or felt have anything to do specifically with me, or just the fact that he was horny and suddenly had a chance to get some?

Oh my God, is Galok the alien equivalent of a fuckboy?

And if he was, why would it even matter to me?

It doesn’t. It shouldn’t…

“Well, I am glad to not have offended you. Why are you doing that?”

“Huh? Doing what?”

Galok raised a hand and scrubbed it over his head, through his flowing hair. The star- and asteroid light caught on the flowing strands as his hand moved. I wonder what it feels like…

It was then that I realized he was doing the gesture in an imitation of me. I was picking and pulling at my hair without even realizing it.

“Oh. It’s my hair. It’s getting too long. It’s annoying.”

“Too long?” Galok said, sight stars pulsing. “But you have less hair than any other new woman. Less hair than any female I have ever seen.”

“Yeah, so? You got a problem with that?”

Galok’s lips curled back in a grin.

“No. I like everything about you, Kat. Including your lack of hair which you claim is not a lack at all, but rather a surplus.”

Thank God it’s fucking dark. I could feel the blood rushing to my cheeks and neck and ears. I would practically be glowing. I like everything about you, Kat.

OK, now I know he’s lying. Because there’s a lot of me that is definitely not likeable.

And that thought kinda made me feel like shit. I crossed my arms tightly over my torso, hunching down into myself, frowning at Galok’s carved-from-marble abs.

“Would you like me to help you with that?”

Before I could ask, “With what?” the massive alien reached a hand behind him and pulled out a knife. Its black blade glimmered as he lowered it to his side, and I eyed it warily.

“And just what do you plan to do with that?”

“You hair. We can use the knife to shear it shorter for you.”

Oh.

“That’s… actually not a bad idea.” It’s not like there was an alien barbershop around here, and I could not imagine having hair all the way down to my shoulders or even longer than that. My neck was already itching at the thought. “Great. Give it here.”

I reached for the knife. Galok whipped it out of my reach with lightning quickness, holding it up over my head. The position made his muscles ripple and stretch under his skin.

“I will admit I am not the cleverest of warriors to walk this world. But you must think me truly a fool if you believe I will give the mighty Kat, angriest of the new women, my blade. Believe it or not, I like my innards intact, just as they are.”

“I promise to leave your innards alone,” I said, jumping for the knife. But the damned tall idiot had no trouble keeping it out of my reach.

“No, small one. I will do this for you. Or it will not be done.”

Panting from my useless jumping, I stopped, huffing and staring up at him. I planted my hands on my hips, chest heaving. Galok’s eyes fell there, to my chest, and I flushed. I was wearing the simple grey tank top that had been part of our uniform. And no bra. And while I wasn’t huge or anything, he was probably getting an eye-full.

Yeah, he definitely was. Because his grin disappeared, and his sight stars grew tight with focus, his nostrils flaring.

I snapped my fingers between us.

“Eyes up here, Bucko. If you’re going to give me a haircut, I need to make sure you’re actually going to keep your eyes on your work.”

His gaze jerked back to mine. His tail twitched.

“You will let me do this? I swear, I will not fail you.”

“Jesus, it’s just a haircut. Chill,” I grumbled. “OK, you sit there.” I pointed to the rock that he’d been leaning against before, and he sat dutifully, back to the stone, legs splayed.

I eyed those long legs, with their weird, three-toed kangaroo-like feet and high ankles, and the loincloth between them, suspiciously. Fuck it. I walked over, spun around, and plopped my ass down as far away from his crotch as possible.

“Kat, I may have long limbs, but you are too far away like this. I need to have good control of the blade against your skin. If you are not close enough, I could cut you.”

I had a feeling this was a ploy, but I really wasn’t keen on a bunch of shaving nicks, so with a heavy sigh, I scooted backwards.

“Closer, Kat,” Galok drawled.

“Christ,” I mumbled, scooting back yet again. His thighs shone on either side of my hips, and I had to wrench my eyes away from the muscled girth of them.

“Closer,” he said, and there was a low, husky edge to his voice that made everything in my body clench.

“This is the last time,” I snarled, scooting the tiniest bit back. I wasn’t right up against his crotch, but I was close. There was only a hair of space between us. And that space buzzed with hot energy. My spine was ramrod straight, and my pulse raced.

Get a fucking grip, girl.

I kept my gaze straight ahead, tense and waiting. Behind me, I felt Galok lean to the side, and heard a snapping sound. The bitter green tea scent of valok filled the air. I stifled a yelp a moment later, flinching as wetness slopped down onto my scalp.

“Kat, please do not flail about so much when I am using the blade,” Galok admonished me.

“Well, you could have given me a warning that you were about to dump all that shit on my head.”

“I did not think such a slight thing needed a warning,” he said with a mocking tone of apology. This fucker…

“Whatever. Warn me when you’re gonna start shaving.”

“I will,” Galok said, and all the mocking was gone. The words fell, heavy and serious, once again tinged with that thickness that made me want to squirm.

His fingers descended onto my head, gently working the valok gel across my scalp. I gasped without meaning to, every nerve in my body lighting up like a freaking neon sign. His warm, strong fingers worked firmly but gently, slipping up to my forehead, down the sides of my skull to the back of my neck. When a big alien knuckle caressed the back of my earlobe, tingles erupted everywhere, cascading through me and congregating in my pelvis. I had been sitting cross-legged, but I straightened my legs in front of me, pressing my thighs together hard.

“How long is this gonna take?” I whispered. Two desires tore at me. The desire to pull away, stop this before it felt too good and I got in too deep. And the desire to lean into it with everything I had.

“I am deft with a knife. I do not think it should take long. That being said, I wish to take care with the task.” On that last word, he caught my earlobe again, this time with the gentle edge of a claw. I clenched my teeth, squeezing my thighs harder.

“As promised, I am giving you the warning now. I am about to start with the knife. Do not move.”

I breathed out, long and hard, realizing I’d been holding my breath.

“Be fucking careful,” I hissed as one heavy hand descended, covering the entire top of my head, holding me steady.

He didn’t bother replying to that, and half a second later, I felt the pressure and slip of his blade stroke up the back of my head.

Fuck. The sensation was… weirdly alluring. Thankfully his knife was beyond sharp. There was no roughness, no tugging or catching. Just the soft yet firm stroke of the blade, up the back of my head, then across its top. I let out another long, slow breath. OK. This felt fucking good. And not just physically. It felt kind of nice to have someone else take care of me for a minute. Just a minute, though. I wouldn’t let this go on too much longer, of course. But for now… For now…

“You have a very small head.”

“Excuse me?” Only the threat of the knife cutting me kept me from jerking back to look at him, glaring daggers. “Have you ever stopped to consider that maybe you just have a giant head?”

Galok laughed softly behind me, and I flushed harder at the sound.

“I need a large head to take in the full image of you. You are small in body, but you take up much space inside me.”

“Is that supposed to be a compliment?”

A prickle ran through me as Galok’s blade slipped across the spot where my skull met my spine.

“It is just the truth,” Galok replied. His voice grew low. “So many of my thoughts and feelings are shaped by you, now.”

I gulped, totally frozen, barely breathing. But when he spoke again, his lighthearted tone was back.

“And where else would I make sense of all that if not in my giant head?”

Now it was my turn to laugh. I felt him whip the blade away from my skin as I shook with the force of it. This fucking guy. He had a smart-ass remark for everything. When I was done laughing, I stilled myself again, and he continued his work.

“Well, maybe you should be using that giant head to think of more productive things,” I said, smiling into the darkness.

“More productive, perhaps. But not nearly as pleasant.”

Goddamnit. If nothing else in this desert killed me first, this guy really would be the death of me.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Galok

My blade smoothed over the back of Kat’s head, slipping behind her ears. I would not miss a single spot. I would do a perfect job so that she would have no choice but to admire my skills with the blade. As I worked, I let my hands press into every round curve and groove, memorizing the shape of her. I’d never touched her for this long. I’d never touched any female like this, but somehow I still knew that this was special. My cock was responding to her nearness, hardening under my loincloth. But it was more than that. I longed to be near her for so much more than physical reasons. The sacred mate bond must truly be awesome. Because I cannot imagine feeling even more strongly for her than I do right now.

I was mostly finished at the back, now. I just had to do the short hair that framed the front of her face.

“Turn around so I can finish,” I said. For some, reason this made her snort, but she did so, settling cross-legged between my thighs, facing me. I paused before I resumed my work, admiring the fall of moonlight over her features. The new women were smaller and softer than us. But Kat was smaller than any of them, her features more delicate. Her nose so slim and bony, her chin small and pointed, her eyes large and round and framed by long, pale hairs. And yet, despite the delicate nature of her features, her expressions were always the fiercest. It was a charming combination.

“Well, what is it? What are you staring at?” She asked, big eyes narrowing. There was almost none of the crystalline blue visible, now. Not in the darkness. Just deep wells in the white.

“You,” I answered honestly, wiping my blade against the fabric of my loincloth at my hip so it was clean and ready for the last bit of work. Kat tossed her head back and groaned, though I was not sure why. When she lowered her chin again, the movement made moonlight catch on all the stones in her face and ears. I reached out, brushing a claw along the soft shell-edge of one of her ears, probing the many stones and shining loops there.

“What do all these stones mean?” I asked, my gaze moving from her tiny pale ear to the stone in her eyebrow, then down to the one in her nose. She even had one in her lower lip.

“They don’t mean anything. At least, not to me. Some people’s piercings may mean something to them. I just like how they look.” As she spoke, I felt my brow falling and furrowing. Something in her mouth had caught my eye.

I pressed a claw to her lower lip, my fingertip brushing the stone there. She tensed beneath my touch, and my cock jumped.

“Let me see your tongue.”

“Um, what the fuck? How about no,” she hissed smacking my hand away.

“I will not do anything unsavoury with your tongue. Not unless you ask.”

She groaned again.

“OK, that’s it. We’re done here. I guess I’ll just be rocking this reverse mullet.” I had no idea what those last words meant. She moved to stand, but I caught her wrist in my hand.

“Stay, small, angry one. I will finish my work as promised. I wanted only to see your tongue. Do you have a stone, a piercing, there too?”

“Oh.” She settled herself back into her seated position. “Yeah, my tongue is pierced. And my belly button.”

I felt my tail jerk, and I could not help my eyes falling to her tiny waist. I stared hard, as if by sheer will, my gaze could penetrate the fabric of her clothing. When I ripped my gaze back up her body, it was to the sight of her wet, wide, single tongue pressing out of her mouth. In its pink centre was a shining round ball. I bit back a groan. There was something brutally erotic about the image.

I promised I would not do anything unsavoury with her tongue… Unless…

“Please ask me to do something unsavoury with your tongue.”

The words came out hoarse and thick, and that slick tongue disappeared.

“You are so fucking weird, you know that?” she growled. Even in the darkness, I could see the stain running up her neck and across her cheeks. But I could not tell what it meant. The new women changed colour all the time, flushing in the heat, and, it seemed, due to various emotions. It was not hot out here now that it was deep into the night, so which emotion was it this time?

Probably anger.

But it was not with anger that Kat shifted closer, her knees bumping my inner thighs, making my cock jump and swell.

“You said you’d finish. So go ahead.”

I clamped my mouth shut, now knowing I could not control the foolish words falling out of it, and began stroking my blade from Kat’s smooth forehead up towards the top part of her skull, shearing short hairs as I went. Her eyes fluttered closed as I worked.

“You are not in danger of falling asleep, are you, Kat?” I asked, pausing to look at her. “If you fall asleep and slump forward, I could cut you.”

“No. Just feels nice, OK?”

Feels nice.

Those words were a bolt straight to the groin. My tongues pressed against the back of my fangs, longing to erupt forth and lick the valok gel from Kat’s scalp.

Feels nice.

“I am glad,” I muttered, focusing on my knife, trying to replicate whatever sensation had made Kat close her eyes. She sighed, her shoulders relaxing slightly. But soon enough, I was finished.

Perhaps I can keep going. Pretend there is more to do…

But I did not want to risk irritating her soft human skin. I had a feeling that even with a blade as sharp as mine, her skin could not take much more of this shaving.

“I have finished,” I said, somewhat regretfully. No, not even somewhat. I was full of regret for that fact. Curse her small head. The job was done too quickly.

But as her lovely eyes opened, I could not truly curse anything about her. Because every aspect was perfect. A harmony of curves and edges and anger and light. Small and pointed and yet so very soft.

A surge of affection, mingled with pulling desire, tugged low in my abdomen. Kat was rubbing one of her small hands over her head. A smile slowly unfurled on her lips, and I had to physically restrain myself from leaning forward to taste that rare, perfect smile.

“Thanks, you did a good job.”

Pride puffed inside me.

“Of course. I am masterful with a blade, Kat. And now you know this You have witnessed it first hand.”

Her smile fell and she stared at me blankly.

“You know how I was talking about you having a giant head? Because, yeah. Wow.”

“What do you mean, because yeah wow?” As far as I knew, my head was perfectly in proportion with my Sea Sand body. It had always served me well, though it had been said more than once, and by more than one person, that it was filled more with dakrival dung than brains.

“I’m saying your head is going to get even bigger if you keep talking like that!”

She raised up on her knees and plopped a tiny hand down on the top of my head. A shower of sparking sensation ran down my back, making my tail snap behind me in the sand.

“Whoa, your hair is really soft,” Kat muttered. Even with me sitting like this, and her up on her knees, her face was level with mine. And closer than it had ever been.

“Does it please you?” I asked, throat tight, my eyes locked on her mouth.

“Yeah, it’s nice.”

Nice. That word again. But I wanted more from her. I wanted more than nice. I wanted deep desire and lust and affection all entwined. I wanted her hot mouth to open under mine. I wanted her to move forward, straddling my hips, taking my stiff cock deep into her -

I choked out a gasp, reaching between us and squeezing hard. Just the thought, the image of Kat like that, combined with her nearness, had come close to making me spill my seed.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, slim brows pressing inward. Then, when she saw where my hand was clenching, her eyes flew wide open. She whipped her hands away from my scalp and tumbled back onto her rump.

“What do you think this is, some happy ending massage?” She snarled, kicking her foot between us, nudging a wall of sand up to my groin. As if her tiny wall of sand could stop my cock. Taking a deep breath between clenched fangs, I released my aching shaft.

“I do not know what a happy ending massage is. Though I admit, I would be willing to take any massage from your small hands that you were willing to give.”

“In your dreams, buddy.”

My most fevered of dreams.

“I apologize for the prowess of my strong cock. I do not mean to make you uncomfortable. It is an inevitable reaction to your nearness. And your loveliness.”

“Loveliness? OK, now I know you’re bullshitting.”

“What is bullshitting?”

“Lying.”

I felt my sight stars cloud outward in confusion.

“Why would I lie about this?”

“Because I’m not lovely. I’m, like, loud and hard and tough and will fight a fucking bitch. I’m not lovely. So I know you’re just saying that to try to get in my pants.”

Her words were making less and less sense.

“How would I get inside your pants? I would not come close to fitting.”

I tilted my head, looking at her. All this inane talk of pants was pointless.

“It does not matter about the pants. But you should know that I am not a liar. I speak only as I find. And I find you lovely, in all your loudness and toughness.”

Her eyes grew big in her face, as if astounded. How could such words astound her? How could her large eyes, pink mouth, and angry eyebrows be anything but lovely? Her glittering stones, stuck in her face and ears, were lovely. And I wanted nothing more than to make her see it.

“I will never ask anything of you that you do not want to give. Though I may say things in jest, and make joking demands of you, you should know that I am serious about you, Kat.”

All trace of my usual laughter and joking was gone from my voice. It was strange, speaking from the heart like this. I’d spoken true before – I never lied. But there was often a veil of humour over my words that perhaps served to guard me. But this – this was all real. All vulnerability.

“But you already said I’m not your mate,” Kat said, her voice falling quiet on my ears. I raised a hand, slipping the pad of my thumb along her tiny chin.

“And I already told you that this does not matter. The Lavrika will bind you to me. And even if, by some breaking of fate, this does not come to be, I would defy its wishes and claim you anyway.” I paused then, running my claw along the inside of her lower lip, feeling her shiver under my touch. “I want to say that I will claim you anyway, if you will have me. But I already know this, too.”

“Know what?”

“That you will accept me. It may not be today. Or tomorrow. It may be many ages from now. We may be old and decrepit by then. But someday, somehow, I will make you feel for me what I feel for you. I will win your guarded little human heart. And that, tiny Kat, is my vow to you. And you should know, I never break a vow once uttered.”

Kat stared at me, her tiny chest heaving with sharp breaths. She swallowed, and I watched the track of her slim throat in the darkness. I couldn’t stop myself from trailing my claws down from her chin to her throat, then down to the shelf of bone below. My cock strained, but I stopped myself from doing what I wanted. From going lower, and hefting the soft curves of her small breasts in my palms.

Kat grumbled something about my giant head once again. And before I knew it, she had hopped up again on her knees. She gripped my fingers and jerked forward, almost falling, her tiny mouth smacking against mine. I jerked at the unexpected sensation – the hard blunt teeth behind soft lips, the little lip-stone pressing against me. But then, once the savage wonder had worn off, I fell into the sensation, my lips opening, my tongues searching.

Searching for something that was not there.

Kat had already pulled back, her hand thrown across her mouth in shock, her eyes wider than I’d ever seen them. A flurry of quick, stunned words in her language fell from behind her fingers. Then she turned and scrambled to her feet, taking a few sprinting steps before flinging herself into her tent.

I stared after her in silent shock, my mouth tingling from the violence of her assault.

I couldn’t wait for her to do it again.

CHAPTER NINE

Kat

I’m out of my fucking mind. I have well and truly lost my marbles.

I just kissed a fucking alien.

Not just any alien. Galok. The annoying, idiotic, goofy alien that had been driving me up the wall for the last few days.

I replayed the moment over and over again, trying to pinpoint the exact moment I had completely taken leave of my senses. Was it when he’d called me lovely? Or when he’d vowed to wait his whole life for me, to make me his no matter what?

Oh, fucking hell. That should have been annoying, not endearing. It was kind of… both. I couldn’t untangle the rapid-fire feelings somersaulting through me. There was one feeling, though, I could identify with no fucking problem at all.

I was fucking horny.

For an alien.

Oh, God.

I still vividly remembered the moment Cece had been reunited with us and she’d shared that the big Gahn, Buroudei, was her new alien boyfriend. I’d been shocked. Appalled, even. I’d thought she must have hit her head to get into an arrangement like that. And then Chapman had fallen after her, and then Melanie. And now, me?

No. Hell no. I am not falling anywhere, for anyone. My body may have had a physical reaction to Galok’s proximity, to the feeling of his hands working over my skin under the light of the asteroids, but that was it. It was purely chemical. Nothing more.

So then why did you kiss him?

My hands rose to my head involuntarily, and I tried to pull at the short hair, only to find that it was gone. I sighed, settling my palms against my scalp, running my fingers over the smooth skin. Galok hadn’t missed a single spot. And my skin wasn’t irritated, either. No cuts or nicks. The guy has good hands.

Good hands? What the fuck? Don’t even think about other places you want those hands. Those hands are going to stay right where they belong. AKA, far away from you.

On his own dick…

The image of Galok, straining and clenching, his hand tightening between his legs, made me gasp, heat spearing down, straight to my pussy. My clit pulsed, and I fought the urge to touch it.

I did fight it. I did.

And if I lost that fight, well, at least no one was around to see how far I’d fallen.

When I woke up the next day, rubber-limbed and groggy, it took a moment for the events of last night to come back. But when they did, they exploded. I groaned, rolling onto my stomach and burying my face in my hands. I’d been outside with Galok. I’d kissed him. And then I’d fucking finger-banged myself to the thought of him.

God. I am insane.

“Kat, you awake?’

Melanie’s voice made me lift my head.

“Yes. Even though I wish someone would put me out of my fucking misery,” I grumbled, sitting up as she entered the tent.

“Taliok wants to leave soon. Think you can get ready in the next few minutes?” Her dark eyes narrowed as she looked at me. “What is it?”

Fuck her observant nature, man.

“Nothing,” I huffed, grabbing my solar protection jacket from next to me on the ground.

“Doesn’t look like nothing. You seem more out of sorts than usual.”

“I’m not out of anything, OK?” Except my goddamn mind.

Melanie’s brows rose at my bitter tone, before settling back into neutrality.

“Sorry for prying,” she said. And then she left. And I felt about as big as a fucking inchworm.

“Shit,” I muttered, slapping my sunglasses onto my face. This is what I did fucking best. What I’d always done. Pushing people away. I mean, if I disappointed them enough at the beginning, no one would ever get close enough to me have any actual expectations I might not live up to, right? I thought I’d finally been getting over this trait when I got my scholarship. For the first time in my life, I was opening up, I was trying hard, and I was succeeding because of it. Before that, I’d always mouthed off in class, pushed away friends – hell, I’d set off a fucking homemade bomb just to show the world how irredeemable I was. But the world had kept on dragging me back. I’d started carving a new life for myself, and I’d seen the glimmers of potential. Of what could have been.

But then my whole freaking planet had turned against me, pulling me out of my life and dumping me here.

Not my whole planet, though.

I still had the other women who’d been taken with me. Friends like Melanie, who only wanted the best for me.

And, of course, there were the aliens. Like Galok.

OK, I can’t think about him right now. First I’d focus on Melanie, then I’d sort Galok out.

I packed up all my shit and smeared my sunscreen on. Tightening the straps on my bag, I stood and headed outside.

Only to collide with the one guy I did not want to deal with right now. I stumbled backward, squinting up at Galok’s blinding smile.

“Good morning, Kat. I have your breakfast ready. Please enjoy it while I pack up your tent.”

I… did not have time for this. I muttered a half-hearted thanks, avoiding his gaze, looking for Melanie. I spotted her next to Taliok’s irkdu, bent over and doing up her backpack. I jogged over, dropping my own bag down next to hers.

“Hey, Geo Girl,” I said, smiling down at the top of her hood. A moment later she rose, and I could feel her gaze on my face even behind the opaque lenses of our industrial-level sunglasses.

“Hey,” she said coolly. I blew out a sigh.

“Look, I’m an asshole, OK? I didn’t mean to snap at you. I just…”

I glanced behind me, making sure Galok was out of earshot, then turned back to Mel, whispering.

“I just feel totally fucked in the head, you know? Last night I…” Oh, God. Was I really going to do this? I was really going to do this. “Last night I kissed Galok. And I have no fucking clue what to do about it. So… sorry.” Apologizing had never really been my strong suit. Punching people in the face and blowing shit up was. So I hoped it was enough.

Turned out, it was enough. Melanie’s face softened into a little smile.

“Honestly, I understand how you feel. You’re not crazy, I promise.”

“How do you know? Maybe we’re all just crazy. Maybe there’s some alien virus taking over our brains, making us wanna bang the locals.”

Melanie laughed softly then sat on the ground. She patted the spot next to her, and I sat heavily, drawing my knees up and planting my chin on them moodily.

“Honestly, even if it is some virus, even if it is crazy… I wouldn’t change a thing. Taliok is the best thing that’s ever happened to me. He’s so good to me, so kind. But even so, I was shocked by my feelings for him, too.”

“You were?” My voice sounded tiny, pathetic, like a little kid. But if Mel thought so too, she didn’t bug me about it.

“Yup. Before him, my relationships were… not good. It was so hard to trust, you know? To open up. I was so scared I’d be hurt. I felt like I was betraying myself by loving him.”

My throat tightened. She had perfectly encapsulated so much of what I’d been feeling. My eyes fell on Galok as he dismantled my tent, the muscles bunching under his shining skin, his clawed fingers working deftly.

“So what made you trust him? What made you think that it was real?”

“It wasn’t a single thing,” Melanie muttered. Her head turned as Taliok came out of their tent, and her mouth turned upward into a smile. I’d never seen her smile so much. And she’d never talked this much, either. Being with Taliok had really changed her.

Would being with Galok change me? And would I even want it to?

“It wasn’t one moment that made me trust him. It was his… his enduring love, I guess. He never pushed me, never rushed me. He just made it clear, over and over and over, that he was there for me. And that he’d always be there for me.”

I pressed my lips together, thinking of Galok’s words last night.  I will win your guarded little human heart. It may not be today, or tomorrow…

“But you knew he was supposed to be your mate already. They have that mate bond or whatever that makes them into fucking romance novel heroes. Galok already said that the Lavrika hasn’t told him I’m his mate.”

Man, why did I sound so freaking insecure? This was painful. Why am I even talking about this? I should just go back into snark mode. Back where it’s comfortable.

“Hmm. That’s a good point. I guess having the whole mate bond thing was some extra assurance about his motives. But do you want my honest opinion?”

“Depends on what your opinion is,” I grumbled.

“Alright, well I’ll give it to you anyway. The way I see it, without the mate bond in the background, this is basically like the beginnings of a human relationship. With human men, you don’t have the idea of fate and the mate bond to secure everything. So you just have to go on your gut instinct. Not that that always works…”

Her voice went cold at the last words. She turned to me, her face serious.

“I think, if you have any sort of feelings for Galok, you need to approach it the way you would with a human guy. Test the waters. Date, so to speak. If you want to, that is.”

“That doesn’t help,” I moaned, pulling the sides of my hood tight against my cheeks as if I could disappear inside. “I’ve never even dated a human guy.”

“For real?”

“Yes, for real,” I snapped back. “Like, I’m not a virgin. I had sex with a guy in my first-year chem class. And it was awkward as hell and never went beyond that. Up until him, I’d never let any guys get close to me. And even that guy was a one-time thing.”

“Well, if you did want to give this any kind of shot, something tells me Galok would be the perfect first boyfriend.”

“Why do you say that?”

I pictured Galok rolling up in a car, flowers in hand, ready to take me to dinner, his kangaroo gladiator muscles threatening to burst out of the suit he was wearing. It was an absurd image.

“Because he seems safe. Some of the alien men here seem kind of intense. They’re warriors, after all. Even Taliok is intense in his own way. But Galok… he’s like the happy-go-lucky version of these guys. I’d never tell you to go against your instincts or to do anything you’re not comfortable with,” she said firmly. “But in my opinion, from what I’ve seen, Galok seems like a good guy. And Taliok trusts him, which says a lot to me.”

I sat silently, absorbing her words, letting them churn around my tiny human skull.

I didn’t feel any closer to figuring out what the hell I wanted to do, but at least I now felt slightly less crazy for kissing him.

“Thanks, Mel,” I muttered, standing, brushing off the seat of my pants. Galok had finished with my tent and had secured it to the irkdu. Then he jogged over to me, his long alien legs covering the distance in no time.

“Did you eat, Kat? I left your food there.”

He pointed to some meat and a valok plant, already cut open, laying on a flat rock nearby.

“Oh, um. No, I didn’t.” I stared up at him incredulously. There was no hint of embarrassment or awkwardness coming from him, despite what had happened last night. He was totally fucking unflappable. And here I was, flapped to the high heavens. Not cool.

I turned from him, scooping up the breakfast and shoving some into my mouth to distract me. Melanie and Taliok finished securing all their stuff to their irkdu, and soon enough it was time to leave. I swallowed the last of my breakfast then hoisted my pack. Galok was already waiting, bent low, his hand flat and ready for my boot. He was exactly where I’d expected him to be. Exactly where he’d been every other time we had to travel on the irkdu. I remembered Melanie’s words – words about Taliok proving over and over that he was there for her, that he would be there for her.

Steeling myself, I crossed to Galok, placing my foot in his hand. He boosted me up as usual, but this time I felt the slightest press of a steadying hand on my lower back as he did so. Heat exploded along my spine, and I fell into the saddle with a thud, face on fire.

A moment later, Galok leaped up behind me. I could practically feel him breathing behind me. He seemed to be sitting closer than usual. I tested the distance by leaning back slightly. When I made contact with his hard chest immediately, I knew that he was in fact closer than usual.

I straightened, severing the contact.

Then, heart pounding, I leaned back again.

And this time, I stayed there.

CHAPTER TEN

Galok

I did not think I was imagining it. Kat’s tiny frame was leaning back against my chest. No – I was not imagining it. I could feel the stiff fabric of her cloak. I could feel the press of her frame beneath it. And I could feel the heat it sent pulsing through my body.

Did she know she was doing it? She had seemed closed-off this morning. Not so unlike her usual demeanour, but it was a bit disconcerting after she’d pressed her mouth to mine in such a fashion last night. She was an enigma, my Kat. Throwing her mouth onto mine, then ignoring me the next morning. And now, gently settling her back against my chest. She is a collection of unspoken words. I must learn to read her body the way I’d understand someone else’s voice.

Because even pressing against me the way she was now, she was saying nothing. I longed to lean down and speak against her hood, ask her if she was comfortable. Tell her how much I loved feeling her against me. But I knew that that would scare her off.

We rode on and on, and the sands began to take familiar shape around me once again. We were now entering territory not far from the places I’d grown up, in Gahn Buroudei’s territory. Apart from the occasional boulder and outcropping of stone, or babkit tree grove, the sands extended, unbroken, into the distance. I eyed them with appreciation and a healthy respect, keeping my gaze focused for predators like the zeelk who may emerge from the sand with their skittering claws and barbed tails. But the sands were calm today.

Eventually, the great structure that the new women called their ship came into view. I felt Kat tense against me then sit up, her head cranking to stare at it as we passed. I regretted that we would not be taking her and Melanie there immediately as had been originally promised. I could tell by the way she stared beyond her dark eye shells that she was eager to engage in her work there. I held my spear ready at my side, but with my other hand, I brushed the sleeve of her stiff cloak.

“I will take you there as soon as I am able, small one.”

Kat did not respond with words, but I was sure that I saw the slight dip of her head, the human gesture that was, at least some of the time, an agreement or affirmation.

As the ship disappeared behind us, I pondered its strangeness, and the strangeness of the new women. Buroudei had seen the ship land in the desert. He’d said it had flown, like a brazelbird without wings. A great flying disc, like those our cubs threw for sport. It flew like a winged animal, and yet it was not alive. The new women may have been small and soft of body, but they were mighty to create such alchemy. To create movement and flight and life where there was none. I looked down at Kat’s tiny form before me in wonder.

It was not long after passing the ship that the Cliffs of Uruzai came into view, a jagged band on the horizon. Our new home in sight, we rode faster, flying over the sand, approaching the vast wall of stone. We moved in line with it until our encampment came into view. Gahn Fallo’s people’s tents dotted one side of a dip in the cliff face, and our tribe’s tents stood on the other. Between them, in the central and most sheltered part of this dip in the cliff, was the large tent where the unmated new women stayed. And considering that only Zeezee, Chapman, and Melanie had accepted mates, most of the women, close to twenty in number, slept there. Gahn Taliok’s tribe had arrived at the new settlement last, and there was not enough room for his people’s tents. He had settled his tribe further down the cliffs, in a crevice that opened into a great clearing.

But we did not approach Taliok’s settlement yet. Gahn Taliok urged his mount into the larger settlement, and as we approached the tents, we slowed. The irkdu did not graze among the tents – their lumbering forms were too massive. They found their food and shelter elsewhere in the labyrinth of the cliffs.

Gahn Taliok swiftly dismounted, then assisted his Gahnala to the ground. I stopped, waiting to see if Kat would slip down the irkdu’s side in her usual clumsy and painful fashion. But shockingly, she did not. She swung her leg over the saddle and scooted to the edge of the seat before turning to me, her soft cheeks stained red.

“Well, are you going to help me or not?”

I felt my sight stars pulse in surprise, but apart from that, I did not let it show. I did not hesitate. I would not lose out on this chance to be of assistance to my tiny one. I leaped from the irkdu, landing in a crouch then standing and turning to her, hands outstretched.

“Jump into my arms, Kat!” I cried. Her mouth twisted, her face growing even more red.

“Oh. Nope. You know what? I changed my mind.”

I stepped closer, closing in on her, my hands on either side of her slim hips, but not touching her.

“Do not be silly. Nothing will be left of your backside at the rate you’re going, falling onto it as you seem so wont to do.” Her small mouth opened to argue, but, feeling emboldened, I quietly added, “Besides, I quite like your backside. Let me help you down so that you may preserve it.”

Unfortunately, she did not accept my offer. The hard shell of her foot-covering connected with my shoulder as she shoved me out of the way with her foot. Then she flopped, in truly spectacular fashion, landing hard on the sand. But she jumped up before I could even reach a hand towards her.

“See? My backside is just fine, thank you.”

I let my eyes roam over her form, my lips pulling away from my fangs in a smile.

“Why yes, it is.”

Kat’s entire face and neck, from what I could see under her head, were positively glowing red. I was starting to grow concerned that she was overheating. But clearly, she was not unwell, as she had the energy to stomp away towards the new women’s tent, muttering what I assumed could only be foul words in her language the entire way. I watched her go, warmth flooding my chest. I was vaguely aware of the Gahnala Melanie speaking briefly to Gahn Taliok, telling him she was going to go visit with her friends. And then I was aware of a strong hand clapping against my shoulder.

I turned to find Gahn Taliok looking at me. In the harsh light of the sun, the scars that raked down his face, neck, and torso looked dark and angry.

“Come. We must inform Gahn Buroudei of all that has happened.”

“You are right,” I said with a raising of my tail. I cast one glance back towards where Kat had been going, but she was already out of sight. I felt a pang at that, but I pushed it down. Gahn Taliok was right. We had business to attend to.

We did not need to seek out Gahn Buroudei, my Gahn and good friend. He was already striding towards us from our tribe’s side of the settlement.

I raised my tail, as did Gahn Taliok, and Buroudei did the same, a mutual show of respect among the Gahns.

Though I was closer with Buroudei – I was of his tribe, and was his closest friend and battle commander, I allowed Gahn Taliok to speak first.

“We have much to tell you of our journey. We should go somewhere to speak in privacy and peace.”

Gahn Buroudei’s tail swished behind him.

“This is agreeable. But if there is important news, then we must include Gahn Fallo.”

Taliok’s fingers tensed into fists at his sides.

“I said we must speak in privacy and peace. If Gahn Fallo is included, we will have neither.”

I could not help but note the bitterness of Gahn Taliok’s words. I did not doubt he was correct, but his words went deeper than annoyance at Gahn Fallo’s antics. Fallo had killed the old Gahn of Taliok’s tribe, Gahn Irokai, in battle. Taliok had forgone his blood-revenge against the Mad Gahn Fallo, but the hate still ran deep inside him.

“I wish to respect your feelings on this, Gahn Taliok. But you and I both know if important matters are discussed without Gahn Fallo, we will never hear the end of it. He is a Gahn, and he has a tribe to lead, not to mention a mate from among the new women. He must know of whatever you have to tell.”

Taliok remained still for a long moment, then spoke again.

“Fine. But I will bring my man Oxriel to the meeting.”

Gahn Buroudei agreed to this. Thus, we parted, after pledging to meet again tonight.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Kat

I trudged through the sand, my backpack thudding heavily against my back as I did so. With the rock samples we’d collected in there, it was fucking heavy. I heard steps behind me, and I turned my head to glance under my hood. Melanie nodded as she caught up to me.

“Ah, so the princess of the new alien tribe is going to deign the mortal tent with her presence?” I teased. I’d assumed she’d go right to Taliok’s people’s territory.

She shot me a testy look as we reached the tent.

“I need to get some of my stuff that I left here. Besides, I want to fill everyone in on what happened and where I’m going in person. And I’ll be coming back here a lot, I’m sure. Taliok’s tents aren’t very far away. It’s not like I’m disappearing off the face of the Earth. Although, that kind of already happened, huh…”

I smiled and nodded, heartened to hear that. Cece and Chapman stayed in their mates’ tents, but they were still in this general area. I didn’t want to feel like Melanie was leaving.

I pulled the tent flap aside for Mel, and she ducked under my arm. I followed, letting the flap fall closed, cutting off the spear of sunlight our entrance had let in. I shoved my sunglasses up my face to the top of my head, my hood falling back. I blinked rapidly trying to let my eyes adjust to the darkness after the brutal sun outside.

“Hey, y’all! You made it!”

Theresa and a few of the other girls were taking refuge from the heat in here. Theresa rose to meet us as Mel and I dumped our bags on the ground and shrugged out of our jackets.

“And you got a haircut!” Theresa, said with a broad smile, eyeing my scalp. I felt Melanie’s dark eyes burning into me from the side.

“When did that happen?” Mel asked. And I did not like the knowing undertone to her words.

“It happened on the road,” I said quickly with a wave of my hand, ears burning. I did not particularly want to tell everyone how I’d sat like a good little girl between a massive alien’s thighs while he shaved my head. And I definitely didn’t want to talk about what had happened afterwards. Time for a subject change.

“Melanie has an announcement,” I blurted. Theresa’s gaze swung from me to Mel, and the other three girls who were inside the tent – Serena, Taylor, and Jocelyn, looked over curiously

Melanie settled herself on the sand and I did the same, suddenly totally wiped from all the work, travelling, and stress of our journey. Theresa sat, too, and the other girls scooched forward, waiting for whatever Melanie had to say.

“I guess I’ll just say it. I’ve accepted Taliok as my… my mate. It still feels a bit weird to say that.”

Gasps went through our little audience, and Theresa’s mouth fell open.

“Oh, wow, Honey. I guess congratulations are in order! Too bad we ain’t got any bubbly…”

Melanie grimaced, waving away the suggestion, as if uncomfortable being the centre of attention.

“Not necessary, but thank you.”

“Well, go on. Tell us everything!” Theresa’s Southern drawl thickened in her excitement. Melanie filled everyone in on the details of our trip, including how and why she’d finally accepted Taliok. I fidgeted as she spoke, filling in my own details in my head – haircuts and kisses and a whole bunch of weirdness that Melanie had left unspoken. By the end of Mel’s account, Theresa’s eyes were shining, her cheeks pink.

“Well, I’m just so damn happy for you, girl. I hope you have a wonderful life with him.” Then a devilish twinkle sparked in her brown eyes. She tucked a straw-blond strand of hair behind her ear and lowered her voice. “When you guys were getting ready to go, I couldn’t help but notice the other one who went with you. I think his name is Galok?”

A hot jolt went through me.

“Yeah, it is. And what of it?” I said, staring Theresa down. Her brows shot up in surprise at my completely fucking stupid jealous tone of voice.

“I didn’t mean nothin’ by it. Why are you gettin’ upset?”

Melanie’s knowing eyes were on me once again. Heat and jealousy and shame were mounting in me, higher and higher. I pushed them down, blowing out a breath.

“Well, I just mean, when did you change your mind about these aliens, anyway?” When Cece had first been reunited with us. Theresa had been, like me, horrified by the announcement that Cece was banging the Gahn of the other territory.

“Well, when Cece first talked about this issue, I was worried she’d been taken advantage of. I was worried she’d been coerced into a relationship, or that she was tradin’ sex for safety. But have you guys seen how Gahn Buroudei treasures that girl? And now with Chapman, the way Gahn Fallo basically falls to his knees for her every day? Cece and Chapman just seem so happy. And now you, too, Mel,” Theresa’s eyes swung to Melanie, and she smiled. “You’re just glowin’.”

I grumbled something unintelligible while Mel thanked her. Theresa looked at me once more, cocking her head.

“Anyway, I was just thinking that the Galok guy, he’s cute. That’s all. Some of these aliens are pretty serious. But he’s always got a smile on his face. He just seems like a nice, funny guy. But if he’s already spoken for…”

She gave me a questioning raise of her brow, and I groaned, pressing my forehead into my knees.

“Definitely not spoken for. At all. By anyone.” So then why did the thought of Theresa, or anyone else, pursuing Galok make me wanna punch something so bad? So hard that it would make my knuckles bleed?

Theresa sighed, shuffling down and laying on her back, crossing her hands over her chest.

“I think it’s just great that some of you girls have found love here. Now that we have a sense that the aliens aren’t some creepy gross guys, it’s really nice.” She sniffed, and my heart clenched, realizing she was on the verge of tears.

“You guys know I grew up in foster care, and that I’d just dumped my cheatin’ boyfriend before I got taken here. At first, I was so sad to be taken away from everythin’ I knew, but in all honesty, apart from my job, I didn’t have much back home. I didn’t have any friends in my new city. I didn’t have family. So I just hope… I hope…”

Her voice caught and her chest jerked as she sucked in a choked gasp. Biting my lip, I reached out and yanked one of her hands away from her chest, squeezing it. Mel grabbed her other hand, and the other girls shuffled closer. Theresa smiled tearily up at us, her words hanging unspoken in the air. But she didn’t need to say them. Because we all knew what she was going to say.

That she hoped that one day she might have a mate here, too. A family. A home.

I thought about that for myself. Reluctantly, I pictured a life with Galok, Sharing a tent, enduring his sass for a lifetime.

My cheeks heated, and I decided it wasn’t a totally horrible image.

I mean, I guessed.

Sort of. Or something.

Ugh.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Galok

I arrived at Gahn Buroudei’s tent just as the sun was lowering against the sand. Nearby, our tribe’s men were building the evening fire up, and the women were butchering the hunters’ kill for the day. I looked across the sands, past the new women’s tent, to Gahn Fallo’s area, where the same thing was happening. Besides the Gahnala Zeezee, the new women had lived with Gahn Fallo’s people from their arrival here, and they ate at Gahn Fallo’s fire each night. This annoyed me, as it meant that Kat would be far from me during the evening fire. There would be no easy way to insert myself at Fallo’s fire for the night. I could try, certainly. If it were Gahn Taliok’s fire I would do so with some confidence, especially after the time we had spent together. But I did not know Gahn Fallo well, and what I did know told me he was a vicious, territorial Gahn, not likely to welcome an outside male to his fire.

I scanned Gahn Fallo’s tents, then let my gaze fall back to the large new women’s tent, hoping for a glimpse of my tiny one. But I did not see her. It was just as well. I needed to focus, now. I needed to be present for this meeting, not lost in images of Kat.

“Hello, Gahn Buroudei, I am here.”

I heard rustling inside, then the tent flap moved aside. I was greeted by the smiling face of the Gahnala Zeezee, Buroudei’s mate. I raised my tail over my eyes in respect for her, then lowered it with a smile. She had been the first new woman I had ever seen. I still remember the shock and fascination I had felt at her features – her strange little face, her breasts. Her arrival, and the news that she had come with yet more women, had been a burst of hope for me. A new hope that I may yet end up with a mate, a family. Zeezee’s arrival had shifted the fate of all the tribes. And Kat’s arrival had shifted mine.

“Greetings, Gahnala. I come for the meeting with Gahn Buroudei.”

“Enter, Galok,” came Buroudei’s rumbling voice from inside the tent. Zeezee moved aside, then followed me in.

Inside, Gahn Buroudei was seated in the sand in the centre of his tent. My eyes fell upon the bundle of hides that served as their bed, and I felt my skin heat with the image of a Sea Sand man sharing his bed with a new woman. What would it be like to have Kat in my bed?

It would be like sharing my bed with an angry beast of the sands, I was sure. But a small one, with blunt claws and tiny teeth and very loud growls.

“Galok…”

Gahn Buroudei had seen where my gaze had fallen. I wrenched my eyes to my Gahn and raised my tail. Zeezee sauntered to Buroudei, brushing her light brown braid over her shoulder as she bent to him.

“I’m going to go to the fire and get some food,” she said, smiling sweetly at her mate. Then, she pressed her mouth to Buroudei’s. My tail jerked at the sight. It was so similar to what Kat had done with me. Although slightly less… violent.

“I will meet you there, beloved,” Buroudei said, running a clawed hand over Zeezee’s small white one. Zeezee smiled again, then turned and flounced out of the tent. I watched her go, then turned back to my Gahn with a smile.

“She has tamed the mighty Gahn Buroudei, truly,” I teased. Buroudei fixed me with a flat glare.

“I will not deny this. Her love has transformed me. But I believe it has made me into a better man.” His words echoed Taliok’s from earlier – that the new women make us stronger. My tail thrashed in vigorous agreement. Even I had experienced this somewhat, felling a dakrival alone for the first time for Kat. Once Kat and I are joined as mates, how much more will I change? How will her love change me?

I would accept any changes that Kat brought to my life. I would accept them all, and cherish them for the gifts that they would be.

A moment later, there was a sound outside. I recognized the deep grate of Gahn Taliok’s voice.

“Gahn Buroudei. Oxriel and I have arrived. May we enter?”

Buroudei stood, and I moved to join him at his side, turning to face the tent’s entrance.

“Come in, Gahn Taliok and Oxriel.”

Gahn Taliok entered, followed by his man Oxriel, a strong warrior I had met before.

“Gahn Fallo has not yet arrived?” Taliok asked, glancing around the tent.

“Not yet. I have informed him of the meeting. I do not doubt he will be here soon.”

As if Gahn Buroudei’s words had summoned him from some dark pit, Gahn Fallo swept into the tent, his red eyes tracking through the space. When that gaze fell on the group already gathered, he hissed.

“You have brought your men to the meeting. I was not informed of this. I wish to have my man, Vakal, here.”

Gahn Taliok visibly tensed, his claws twitching at his sides.

“You bring disrespect on Gahn Buroudei, and on all of us, for entering this tent without asking and making such demands without raising your tail,” Taliok growled. My heart thundered, and I watched every man with wary eyes, my fingers ready to reach for a blade at any moment. I could tell my friend and Gahn, Buroudei, was also ready to fight. He always was. He was the strongest warrior of our tribe, and one of the greatest Gahns to have ever lived. But he was also level-headed. Unlike Gahn Fallo.

“Gahn Taliok, it is no great matter. Gahn Fallo, if you wish to delay the meeting, you may go and retrieve your man Vakal.”

Gahn Fallo’s great tail thrashed.

“If I leave now, who knows what secrets will be spilled without me. No. I will stay.”

“Very good,” Gahn Buroudei said, watching Fallo closely. I did the same, then turned my attention to Gahn Taliok. Their rivalry simmered, tangible in the air. But neither man made a move against the other.

“Let us all sit and be comfortable,” Gahn Buroudei finally said.

Buroudei sat first, then me, then the other three, forming a loose, uneasy circle. Taliok was beside me, and I was glad for this. After our trip together, I had grown to like the scarred and quiet Gahn. I looked at him expectantly, waiting for him to speak. But he did not. His stony face stayed still, his sight stars never straying from Gahn Fallo.

Where Gahn Taliok was still, Gahn Fallo was not. He rolled his head around on his shoulders, cracking the joints, then shifted his position in the sand. Finally, his red gaze moved across all our faces.

“Well, go on and speak, whoever needs to do so. My mate is out there without me, and I would much rather be in her company than any of yours,” the Mad Gahn said.

I could practically feel Gahn Buroudei taking his steadying breath beside me. When he answered, his voice was even and controlled.

“You are not alone in this, Gahn Fallo. My mate, too, is out there. As is Gahn Taliok’s.”

Gahn Fallo’s head jerked to Gahn Taliok, his dozens of braids swinging with the movement.

“This foul Gahn has been awarded a mate from among the new women?” His red sight stars shot outwards, then pulled in.

A muscle twitched in Gahn Taliok’s jaw, and his lips drew back from his teeth. A deep warning growl sounded in the back of his throat. I tensed, once again ready to reach for a weapon. We were moments away from utter chaos in this tent, I was sure of it. I could smell the blood lust in the air. The stink of years of enmity upon us all.

“Peace, Gahns,” Buroudei roared. “We all know that we cannot enact violence here. Access to the new women demands it. We are allies, now. And we have all come to hear Gahn Taliok’s report on their journey.”

Gahn Fallo gnashed his fangs, but ultimately settled. Taliok remained stiff and still, forcing Buroudei to prod him again with his words.

“Gahn Taliok, please tell us all you wish to share.”

Taliok took a great breath, then spoke, his words coming harsh and chopped.

“As has been spoken, I have claimed the lovely Melanie as my mate. The Lavrika showed me her face many, many days ago. And she has agreed to be my Gahnala.”

Gahn Fallo gave a snort, and despite his power and status as Gahn of his people, I could not stop myself from pinning him with a hateful look. Gahn Taliok somehow had the grace to ignore him, and continued.

“Our trip into my territory was without incident. But on the second day in my mountains, we were attacked by Gahn Baldor’s men. A small raiding party.”

“Hmm.” Gahn Buroudei’s huff rumbled low in his chest. Gahn Fallo said nothing, watching all of us with his red eyes.

“I have already sent more of my men back to secure my territory. Galok and I killed four of the five men who attacked.”

“Only four? How weak are you to let one of your attackers escape?” Fallo hissed.

Taliok growled, his tail jerking.

“We did not kill the fifth because he was dead by the time I reached him. He was killed by another warrior. One the likes of which I have never encountered.”

My ears pricked up, and I leaned towards Taliok. Taliok had mentioned something about Melanie glimpsing a strange warrior in the mountains, but I had not gotten much of a description before now. A hush fell over the tent as the others bent closer to listen. Even Gahn Fallo seemed to be listening seriously for once.

“I did not see this warrior. My mate, Melanie did. She said he was like us, but not like us. He had two arms, two legs, and a tail like a man of the Sea Sands. But she said he had a snout like an irkdu. And dark scales.”

Silence hovered, broken a moment later by the sharp yip of Gahn Fallo’s laugh.

“You expect me to believe that there is an irkdu man out there, and that he killed one of your attackers? Why is your mate the only one who glimpsed this monster? Perhaps the heat and fear addled her brains.”

Gahn Taliok was up in an instant. The large curved blade he wore strapped to his back swung through the air to Gahn Fallo’s throat, a hair away from slicing through skin and bone. I jumped up, unsheathing my own blade, followed by the others.

“Speak of my mate again with anything other than the astounding grace and wonder she is owed, and I will have your tongues, Fallo.”

Gahn Fallo grinned madly, and Taliok tensed, muscles bunching. It was as if he was warring with himself – half of him surging forward to strike, the other half fighting to pull back.

“Gahn Fallo, mind your foul tongues. Gahn Taliok, we need to hear more of this. If this is true, it could affect us all. We must be prepared to face any new threats.”

After a long, tense moment, Taliok sheathed his large blade. He did not sit, though, instead pacing the tent with clenched fists.

“It is true I did not see the irkdu beast my Melanie described. But I caught his scent. A scent unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. Bitter and strange…”

Gahn Buroudei turned to me.

“What do you know of this, Galok?”

“Very little,” I admitted, putting away my weapon. “I was busy in battle with two of Gahn Baldor’s men. Once they were felled, I ran back into the valley to fetch Kat and ensure her safety. I did not see the strange warrior, and I did not catch his scent. I saw the body of the man he killed, but that is all.”

“How was that man killed?” Buroudei asked. I cast my mind back to the body lying in the valley.

“He had a wound that went right through him, as if from a blade or spear.,” I answered.

Taliok grunted.

“Melanie said he used a spear like us. And that he wore a loincloth like us. He was clearly not of our kind, but she also says he spoke in the tongue of the Sea Sands.”

“What?” Fallo spat, standing. “So there is an irkdu warrior out there, some abomination of a creature, who knows our ways and knows our tongue?”

Taliok’s tail thrashed.

“Yes. This was Melanie’s account. And I believe my mate without question.”

“These are strange tidings indeed,” Buroudei muttered, rubbing his chin with his claws. “What words did he speak to your mate?”

Once again I found myself priming my ears forward to catch Gahn Taliok’s answer. I had not heard this part of the account yet. And when Gahn Taliok spoke, a great shudder ran through me.

“She said that he was looking for a new woman. She believes he may have a mate among them.”

Silence descended, dark and thick. An unfamiliar anxiety jolted through me. What if this creature, this monster of a man, had been looking for Kat? My fingers curled into fists. Let him come looking for her. I would fight any man, even this unbelievable irkdu monster, for her. No one would touch a hair on her tiny head.

Or, since she had no more hairs on her head… No one would touch her at all.

Gahn Buroudei was the first to break the quiet.

“What else have you to tell us, Gahn Taliok? I will not deny this report has unnerved me. If there is nothing else, I would like to set eyes on my mate and ensure her safety.”

“There is not much else,” Gahn Taliok said, stopping his pacing. “Only that we do not know if there were any more of Gahn Baldor’s men who escaped from the attack. It is possible that at least one man escaped, if not more. And it is also possible that they have seen Kat and Melanie and are relaying the news of the new women to their Gahn as we speak.”

“We must prepare for this possibility,” Gahn Buroudei said, his tail jerking. “Between Gahn Baldor and this new irkdu man, we may have enemies closing in on us from all sides. Not to mention the fifth tribe…”

“Let them come,” Fallo hissed, his tail thrashing, his sight stars vibrating. “We will kill them all. Rend them limb from limb. No one can threaten us or the new women. We will destroy any enemy who comes our way.”

Ghan Taliok grunted, as if in agreement with his enemy, Gahn Fallo, but Buroudei sighed.

“We will not let anyone take a new woman from this place against her will, that is true. But you know as well as I do that if the Lavrika has granted a man from one of the other tribes a mate, then we have no right to stop that union.”

“And what about this new man, this monster?”

Everyone jerked to look at me, and it took me a moment to realize I had spoken. But I could not help myself. If it turned out that this irkdu warrior indeed had a mate, and if that mate turned out to be Kat, would he be allowed access to her? That cannot happen.

“We will assess that threat when we have more information,” my Gahn responded. “If he attempts to enter here, and is willing to speak in our tongue, we can hear him. But if he attacks, or tries to steal a new woman, he will be killed.”

“We should all eat together each night. Share a central fire,” I said. Once again, all eyes fell on me. Oxriel looked astounded that I had spoken so easily among the Gahns. I was a little astounded, myself. But this concerned Kat. And I could no longer be silent. The thought of having her away from me each evening was pricking under my skin in the worst sort of way.

“Your man’s tongues are loose among Gahns, Buroudei,” Gahn Fallo said, fixing his gaze on me. I met it head-on, setting my jaw.

“Galok is my closest man, and sometimes speaks above his station, it is true,” Buroudei admitted. But his next words filled me with pride. “But he is my most trusted warrior, and I will hear what he says in this.”

The others waited for me to continue, and I plunged onward, knowing it was unlikely I would ever have an audience of three Gahns like this again.

“We need unity now more than ever. We are not of the same tribe, it is true, but we have all placed our tents in the same place, now. We have a common goal, a common treasure to protect. The new women have brought us together, and in order to protect them properly and defend our territory, we must act as one tribe. We should share a nightly fire and meal, so that all the warriors may get used to each other and come to know and trust each other. Every night, the three tribes can consult each other, plan, and feast together.” The image was a good one, in my mind. All the warriors together, growing closer, becoming stronger allies. And Kat, munching on her meat at my side, instead of at Gahn Fallo’s fire. “But we can go even further than this,” I blurted, suddenly feeling inspired. “There is room in the main settlement for the tents of all three tribes. I understand, Gahn Taliok, why you have settled your tribe further down the cliffs. There would not be room to live in the main settlement while also keeping your tents separate from the other two tribes. But our tents can all be close, intermingled, with the new women in the centre. Then there would be space for all. There is safety and strength in numbers like this, and if an attack were to come, all the warriors would be able to meet it together immediately.”

Fallo sneered at me as I finished speaking.

“You do not care for unity or strength. You just want the new women by your fire each night.”

“I can not say this is not appealing,” I ground out. The allure of eating next to Kat every night was a strong one. “But I do believe in my original premise. I believe it can do great things for the tribes and for our futures.”

Gahn Fallo looked incensed, his teeth bared. It did not surprise me he did not like my plan. As of now, all of the new women but Zeezee, and likely now Melanie, ate at his fire. He would be loath to give that up.

“Why not ask the new women what they want?” I offered. Gahn Fallo tensed, and I knew then that I had trapped the Mad Gahn. Because then the decision would no longer be in his control.

“Yes, allow the new women to decide. They can choose to stay at Gahn Fallo’s fire, or they can choose to have a central evening fire. The other matter, about moving the tents, will have to be decided among the Gahns. The new women’s tent will not be affected by that,” Gahn Buroudei said. I tossed my friend a smile for supporting my ideas in this.

“I agree. Let the new women choose,” Gahn Taliok said. He turned his golden gaze on me. “I am not yet sure about moving my tribe’s tents here. But I will think on what you have said, Galok.”

My tail swished.

“That is all I ask, Gahn Taliok.”

“I will propose this to my mate, Melanie, and ask that she pass the message along to her friends. We will know by tomorrow what the new women choose.”

“I will do the same with Zeezee,” Gahn Buroudei added. He glared at Gahn Fallo. “You must do the same with your mate, Chapman. We must collect all the new women’s wishes in this, and see where the majority fall.”

Gahn Fallo gave a snarl, then turned and left the tent. Gahn Taliok raised his tail to Gahn Buroudei, then turned and left as well, followed by his man Oxriel.

“You spoke well tonight, Galok,” Gahn Buroudei said. “Now I will go find Zeezee and relay your ideas to her.”

“Thank you, Gahn,” I said, meaning it.

We left the tent together. Gahn Buroudei immediately turned towards our tribe’s fire to seek out the one human face among all those of the Sea Sands seated there. I would have to join them there, too. I would not be welcome at Gahn Fallo’s fire where Kat ate, especially after I had angered him tonight.

Ah, well. Hopefully by tomorrow we would all be eating together. I would forget all about Fallo and his ire, and I’d be able to focus on my lovely little Kat. I wondered what she was doing now, and I gazed across the sands at Gahn Fallo’s fire, hoping I would be able to see her beside the flames. But at this distance, in the dark of night, I could not.

It was no matter. I would eat quickly, then wait for her to finish her meal. I could meet her as she walked back to the new women’s tent. It had been too long since I’d spoken to her, since I’d heard her sharp words and seen her large eyes. Even though I had just been with her earlier today.

Yes, I would see her tonight. I would make sure of it.

Plan in place, I finally headed towards our tribe’s fire.

But as I walked towards one tribal fire, my eyes were on another.

And I realized that, anytime Kat was not directly by my side, I would be searching for her.

Always.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Kat

“Have you heard the news?”

“Jesus!” I yelped, surprised. I’d just emerged from the area in the cliffs we’d designated the human pee-zone, and the words coming at me from the darkness were not expected. Reacting on pure instinct, my fist shot out, as if someone had just come at me from a dark alley back home in Detroit. My knuckles connected with what basically felt like a brick wall wrapped in a thin layer of velvet. I yanked my hand down between my knees, crouching and hissing between my teeth.

“Tiny Kat, has my chest injured your hand?”

Fucking Galok.

At least he had the courtesy to sound somewhat concerned.

“I’m fine,” I muttered, rising to look at him. We were standing by the wall of the cliffs, not far from the human tent. Most of the other girls were still at the fire, or were already in bed in the tent. I planted my uninjured hand on my hip, shaking my sore hand violently in the air, fingers flapping, trying to eliminate the ache. Galok stepped towards me, catching my hand right out of the air and pulling it up to his face.

He was so damn tall he had to bend down just to look at it.

“Why does it seem like half the time I see you, now, you’re looking at some stupid injury on my fingers,” I grumbled. But for some reason, I didn’t pull my hand away. His fingers were incredibly strong and smooth against my palm. He ran the pad of one across my sore knuckles. Then, to my shock and slight disgust, he raised that pad to his mouth, licking it.

Licking it with one of his three fucking tongues.

“No blood,” he said cheerily.

“Great, thanks. See, your muscles aren’t all that, Mister Man. Couldn’t even make me bleed.” That was bullshit, of course. Like all these aliens, Galok was built like a damn bodybuilder. Just a slightly taller, lankier one than some of the other aliens. I bit my lip, my eyes tracing the carved edges of his pecs and abs. Sucking in a breath, I re-focused on his face.

“I should be the one asking you if you’re OK. Where I’m from, I’m known for throwing one mean punch.”

Galok looked at me blankly for a moment, then collapsed to the ground.

“Oh, send for the healers! Please! The mighty Kat has felled me with one of her tiny, beautiful fists.”

“Get up, loser,” I said, but I couldn’t help but laugh at his antics. He rose immediately, grinning, the light catching on his fangs.

Silence fell between us and my laughter died in my throat. I was staring at his mouth, I realized. The mouth that I’d kissed last night…

“So, Have you heard the news?”

I blinked. Huh?

Oh, yeah. The words he’d scared me with in the first place.

“Nope. Don’t think so. What news?”

Galok stepped closer until we were toe to toe. Or, alien claw to tip of boot.

The asteroid band that surrounded this planet shone behind me, illuminating Galok’s face. His long, loose hair gleamed in dark waves around his shoulders and down his back. Long shadows filled in parts of his face – a face that was narrower than some of the other aliens I’d seen. But a face whose smile was so, so wide.

“The Gahns will bring a proposal to the new women. A choice. A choice to either remain at Gahn Fallo’s fire, and be separated in the evening from those women who have mates among the other tribes. Or, to instead have one central evening fire where all three tribes will join and eat.”

I felt my eyebrows rocket upward.

“I can’t believe Fallo would go for that,” I said incredulously. From what I’d seen, Gahn Fallo was the most insanely territorial, and frankly the most annoying, of the Gahns.

“You are not wrong. It was no easy task to convince him and the others.”

I cocked my head.

“What do you mean, convince?”

“Ah, did I not mention it?” He smiled with what seemed to be mock modesty. “I was so enamoured by the idea of eating the evening meal with you, Kat, that I convinced three of the mighty Gahns of the Sea Sands to hear me on the subject. But now the matter will be in the hands of the new women.” His smile faltered a little, and his voice dropped lower sending shivers skittering along my bare arms. “I do hope that you will lend your voice to my proposal.”

“If I do, it’ll be because it’s just a good idea, not because of you,” I scoffed. But I could feel my cheeks heating.

“It is a good idea,” Galok said more seriously. “Beyond the fact that I wish to spend every evening meal next to you, I think it will be good to unite the tribes. Our trip to the mountains has proven that we have enemies of more than one kind out there.”

“More than one kind? Oh, you mean the lizard man? Or, irkdu man, that Melanie saw.”

Galok’s face twisted, turning more serious than I’d ever seen it. Well. Maybe not more serious. He looked the way he did when Gahn Baldor’s men’s spears had started flying. The moment before he’d tossed me over his shoulder like a sack of human potatoes.

“Yes. This story has unnerved me. I do not like the sound of a creature I do not know, out there in the sands, looking for a mate among the new women.” He heaved a big sigh, running his claws through his long hair. “Even less, I like the sound of him potentially looking for you, out of all the others.”

My mouth fell open as I stared at him.

“Oh my God, Galok? Are you scared? Or jealous? Or both?”

“Ha! I have no reason to be jealous. I have said before, you will be mine, tiny Kat. And I would not say that I am scared, either. You certainly do not need to be. I am a fine warrior, and I will protect you at all costs.”

I knew I shouldn’t have. I knew that maybe it was just a bit too cruel. But I couldn’t help but push this button. Just a little bit more.

“Well, I’m not scared at all. I’ve always had a Godzilla fetish. Maybe this guy is meant to be my mate. Maybe I’ll run off into the sunset with him. Adios amigos.”

I gasped as two strong hands caught on either side of my face.

“I am not a possessive warrior. At least, I never imagined myself to be.” Galok was so close that I could feel his words fanning across my face. His sight stars pulsed, thousands of shimmering shards, focused just on me. “But I will tell you right now, Kat, that this will never come to pass. I will not allow it to happen.”

“What about what I want?” I asked, and my voice came out sounding broken and raw. So often, what I’d wanted had been thrown to the wayside. My parents hadn’t cared what I’d wanted. And neither had the powers-that-be on Earth, thrusting me into an insane life I’d never even asked for. Absurdly, I felt tears gathering in my eyes, and I blinked hard, scrunching up my face.

Everything in me tensed as Galok’s warm forehead met mine. Somehow my hands had ended up plastered against his chest. When the hell had that happened?

“It seems I care only for what you want now, Kat. And that is the problem. I am too wrapped up in you.”

I opened my eyes, almost blinded by the intensity of his sight stars, turned a burnished gunmetal-grey in the dark night. Galok’s expression was aching, almost fierce, as he looked at me.

“I care so much for what you want, and for your happiness. But know this tiny one. I will make you happier than any other man, even this irkdu creature, the one you joke about joining with. I pledge my life to it – your happiness.”

“You make it really hard to hate you, you know?” I whispered, my voice thick.

“I take responsibility for your happiness, tiny one. But I will accept your hate, too, if that is what you offer. I will take it all. Whatever you have to give. I am ravenous for you, every facet. Every feeling.”

Every feeling. Every desire.

What about what I want?

My words pounded in my head alongside my own heartbeat. Replacing it.

What did I want?

Right now, I really wanted to kiss an alien.

Not just any alien.

Galok.

With a strangled sound, my hands slipped up his shoulders to his neck, pulling down with all my might. At first he tensed against my movement, but when he realized what was happening, he bent his head further eagerly.

Our mouths met hard, but not as clumsily as last time, and we opened against each other. I arched against the totally bizarre sensation of his three tongues. Or one tongue forked into three – who fucking knew – entering my mouth. Everything about Galok was so fucking huge it was overwhelming – his giant hands cradling the sides of my head, his massive body pressed against mine, his huge tongues invading my mouth. I wasn’t going to let him win that easily, though, and I pressed back with my own little human tongue, slicking along him. Galok’s pelvis jerked against me and he moaned at my movements. And, oh Jesus, there was that massive alien cock, rising against my abdomen. I did my best to ignore that because, hoo-boy, I was not ready to go there just yet.

A hot moment later, Galok pulled away, breathing hard. Our mouths made a horrifically erotic, wet popping sound as they separated. When his lips left mine I gave an involuntary, needy little moan that made me cringe internally.

“What is it?” I panted, staring upwards.

“You are perfect, Kat. But you are so small. It is not easy on my back.”

Embarrassment and shame rocketed through me, and I pulled my hands down from his neck to his chest, pushing off from him.

“Well then go find a tall girl, idiot!”

But Galok just slid his hands down to my hips, pulling me tighter against him.

“I do not want anyone else, Kat. I hope that soon you believe me. Besides, something like a height difference is not enough to stop me from doing more of this.”

He swooped down and captured my mouth with his once more, sucking down all my retorts and arguments and complaints. His hands tightened at my waist, and I yelped against his mouth as I was suddenly airborne. Galok lifted me easily upwards, and instinctively I wrapped my legs around his waist, my ass settling against his hard abs. His grip shifted downwards, gripping my ass to support me better, and I couldn’t help but arch at the sensation of those strong fingers there. I was only wearing my tank top, no bra, and my nipples hardened at the feeling of being brushed against Galok’s chest.

Galok’s kisses became more urgent, the swipes of his tongues more forceful. He stopped kissing me for a moment, and when I opened my eyes to look at him, I gasped at what I saw there. The intensity of the desire, spelled out among the cloudy spill of his sight stars.

“I have been waiting for this since last night. I have been hoping that you would do this with me again, Kat.”

“You mean kissing?” Oh man, was this guy going to continue being so awkwardly blunt with this kind of stuff? Like who said exactly what they felt and thought all the time? What was I supposed to do with that?

“Do you know what else I have been waiting for?” Galok muttered against my lips, his breath making goosebumps erupt over my skin.

“What?” I asked, against my better judgment.

“I had been waiting to see your other piercing. The one in your belly button…”

I let out a short laugh.

“It’s not that exciting, I promise,” I said. Galok’s hands tightened on my ass, shifting my crotch harder against his body, making me moan softly.

“And I promise you, Kat, that it is very, very exciting.”

Feeling drunk on the moment, I slumped back, hunching away from him. I yanked my tank top halfway up my abdomen. The light of the asteroids and stars caught on the simple piercing there. Galok’s eyes looked fucking glued, his nostrils flaring.

“Did it live up to your expectations?” I asked, and there was a reedy note of insecurity there that I hate, hate, hated. But Galok simply groaned, his tail jerking behind him on the sand.

“Like everything you have to offer, it exceeds every expectation I have ever had.”

“I can’t take you seriously when you say shit like that,” I said shaking my head. “It’s too over the top.”

Galok wrenched his gaze back up to meet mine, dragging heat all the way up my body.

“It is the truth. You do not seem to understand that before you, I assumed I would never have a mate. Never have a family. I had made peace with that life, but now…” His gaze grew dark, the curve of his mouth wolfish “Now that I have tasted you, have had a glimpse of your loveliness in my life, I do not plan to let you go.”

“That’s a lot of pressure to put on a girl,” I said, frowning. I didn’t want to get into big conversations about mates and families and futures. Because, frankly, those conversations scared the shit out of me.

Galok brushed his lips softly over mine, and I sighed against the sensation. He pulled back slightly to speak once more.

“I do not wish to pressure you, Kat. But nor can I deny the depths of my feelings for you, and towards you. It is more than I ever thought I could feel…”

“Less talking, more kissing,” I muttered, pressing my lips to his again. I wasn’t ready for this conversation. I remembered what Mel had said, about pretending Galok was a human guy without the mate bond in place. To treat this like I was dating him. Well, who the fuck told someone they wanted a girl to be their mate and bear their children during their first real makeout session? Freaks of nature, that’s who.

And yet, as Galok swept through my mouth hungrily, I felt kind of… endeared to him. Endeared to his boyishness. The way he spilled his hopes and dreams so easily to someone he cared about. I wondered if I even deserved it. His affections. The pinning of all those dreams. Though he’d said he didn’t want to put pressure on me, it still felt like a lot.

But I didn’t have to worry about all that right now. I could just see where this thing was going. Because right now, I was really fucking enjoying having Galok’s tongues in my mouth.

And it was more than that. I was enjoying his nearness, his sturdiness, the feel of his skin under my fingers, the thunder of his heartbeat against my own chest. I moved my hands upward to gather in his hair, relishing the feel of the thick, smooth strands. I curled my hands into fists, tugging gently, only to feel Galok grunt and buck against me.

Interesting… I did it again, slightly harder, And Galok moaned into my mouth. He drew away, panting.

“What are you doing?” he asked. “Do you wish me to be bald like you?”

“I don’t know. I just wanted to. Seemed like you liked it.”

“I did,” he answered instantly. “Too much. The feeling ran right down to my tail, and then…” I blushed as I realized what he was getting at. It went straight to his cock.

“Look, man. I don’t want to give you blue balls or anything. Do you even have balls? Nevermind.” I was babbling like a total fool. “But I’m not ready to do anything more than kissing tonight.” I was about to ask if that was alright, but a defiant voice piped up inside me. He has to be alright with that. If he’d not alright with it, if he wants to push that boundary, then he’s not the good guy he’s made himself out to be.

But Galok only confirmed his goodness with his next words.

“When I told you I would take whatever you had to offer, I spoke true. Even this, this kissing, has been a great glory in my young life.”

I choked on a half laugh, half gasp at his ridiculous proclamation. Kissing me is glory? For fuck’s sake… But when I caught his gaze, so sincere it almost looked broken, I knew he was telling the truth.

“Well, I think I can bless you with a little more glory before the night is through…”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Galok

Letting Kat go after all our kissing was the hardest thing I’d ever had to do. And as a warrior, I had done many, many hard things. I had killed beasts and men. But none of that compared to letting her soft and tiny body back down to the sand. Even harder than all of that? My untouched cock, aching in my loincloth.

I walked her back to the new women’s tent, unwilling to let her go alone. This was possibly the safest place in the Sea Sands, now, protected by the cliffs on one side and the warriors of the tribes on the other. But I still would not let her walk through it all alone. Even the short distance to the new women’s tent.

“Well, I guess this is goodnight,” she whispered when we reached her tent’s entrance. Inside, I could hear only silence punctuated with the odd little snorting sounds that so many of the new women seemed to do in their sleep. Kat included.

“It has been a very good night, indeed,” I answered with a grin. She rolled her pretty eyes.

“You know what I mean. This is goodnight, as in, goodbye.”

The word felt strangely barbed, a pain in my ribs. I reached a finger forward, swiping the edge of my claw under her pointed chin, forcing her face upwards.

“Never goodbye, tiny Kat. Not with me.”

“Not even if you get a goodbye kiss?”

Hmm. This was a difficult balance indeed. On the one hand, I certainly did want another kiss. On the other, I did not want it to mean that we were separating for the night.

But we would be separating either way. So I leaned down to claim my goodbye kiss.

“I will see you in the morning, Kat. I will fetch you a fresh breakfast, and make sure it is all ready by the time you awaken,” I said as I withdrew.

She groaned.

“Please don’t. I can only imagine what kind of questions that will make the other girls ask.”

I grinned.

“If they have questions, you need only answer them truthfully. Tell them that the finest warrior of Gahn Buroudei’s tribe has set his sights on you, and that he plans to win your love to him with endless deliveries of fresh meat in the morning.” She looked affronted, but I continued. “And tell them that that same warrior made you moan against him with his kissing tonight.”

“Excuse me!”

“Hurry inside, little Kat, before you get so worked up that you cannot sleep.”

“Speak for yourself,” she muttered, eyeing my cock meaningfully. I laughed, though really, it was no laughing matter. My cock ached something fierce.

But I would not burden her with that now.

“Do not worry. I will take care of this before sleep. And after that, I will be so rested that I will sleep like a new cub curled in its first hides.”

“Alright, weirdo,” she muttered, that last word coming out in her language. It probably meant something along the lines of powerful warrior. Or maybe, my future mate. One could hope, at least.

And with that, she lifted the tent flap, disappearing inside, leaving me to the night and my desires and my painfully neglected cock.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Kat

I stumbled into the dark girls’ tent, feeling feverish. Drunk. Drunk on Galok.

I couldn’t deny how I felt. Kissing him had been… OK, it had been really, really nice. My whole body felt loose and tense at the same time, energy buzzing under my skin, pinging up and down my spine, pooling low in my abdomen. I bit my lip, recalling the sensation of his tongues in my mouth, his huge hands on my body, holding me securely. His hardness. His stability.

Fuck. I am not going to be able to sleep right now.

It was a totally foreign feeling, but I felt like I needed to talk to someone about this. Someone who knew what I was going through. I squinted in the gloom, my gaze roaming over the still bodies of the sleeping girls in the tent. All the other insane alien lovers – Cece, Chapman, and Melanie, were in their mates’ tents. So it was just me, alone with my fucking weirdness.

Except…

Theresa’s blond head caught my attention at the far end of the tent, poking out from her bundle of hides. I crept over to her and crouched beside her.

“Theresa,” I hissed into the darkness. She stirred groggily, opening her eyes. Then, seeing me above her, she jerked and flailed an arm at me.

“Relax, it’s just me.”

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, with your bald head and big eyes you look like a damn demon in the dark like that. What’s going on?”

She sat up, placing a hand on her chest as she took a deep breath. Oops. Guess I really shocked her.

“Sorry. I just… I just didn’t want to be alone.” I didn’t think I’d ever uttered those words in my entire life. I’d had some casual friends back home in Detroit. Well, guys who would break into hardware stores with me, securing ingredients for my bomb. But I’d never longed to hang out with someone and have girl talk. Until now.

“Aw, hun, that’s OK. I’m here, You can always wake me up for that,” Theresa said, and even in the darkness, I could see her smiling. It made my chest ache. Damn her sweetness. Next to her, I felt like a total jaded asshole. I remembered her commenting on Galok’s cuteness, and I seethed, hunching into myself. She would be so much better for a happy idiot like him. She’d probably jump into his freaking arms.

I wonder what he sees in me…

“Kat…?” Theresa’s whisper brought me back to the moment. “Is there something you wanted to talk about? Or we could just sit in the quiet if you want.”

She’d make an amazing mother.

The thought was a sincere one, but a painful one. Theresa was staring at me with caring eyes, not even bothered by the fact I’d just woken her up out of a dead sleep. That was true maternal loveliness, bottled up in the body of a Southern blond vet-tech. The kind of caring that every kid deserves. My own mother had never wanted the job, and had told me more than once she’d wished I’d never been born. I never knew if that was her or the drugs talking. But it fucking hurt all the same. So I made it so that I was so loud, so angry, that no one could reject me, because I’d already pissed them off so much they wouldn’t even want to get close to me in the first place.

“I kissed Galok,” I blurted into the darkness. Serena stirred nearby, and I lowered my loud ass voice to a whisper. “Tonight. Right now.”

Theresa clapped her hands over her mouth, smothering a gasp.

“Oh my goodness! Galok? The cute one? Go, girl!”

“No, don’t encourage me,” I moaned, pressing my hands over my eyes.

“Why not?” When I lowered my hands she was looking at me with confusion.

“I don’t know. It’s weird. He’s an alien. And like… I don’t have a ton of experience with guys in general. I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing. Or if I even should be doing this.”

Theresa sighed, then smiled wanly at me.

“Look, the way I see it, this is our life now. We’re here, and we need to make the most of it. We’ve lost people, Kat. The people from our old lives. And people here. The entire crew of our ship was killed, and even one of the other girls, Zoey…”

My throat tightened painfully at the mention of Zoey. She was the only girl we’d lost in the zeelk attack in the desert when we’d first landed. Theresa, Melanie, and Cece had been my roommates on the ship, and I’d been closest to them. I hadn’t gotten the chance to talk to Zoey much, but I could still picture her walking the halls of the ship or sitting in the mess hall, her eyes huge behind her glasses, her black braids shining under the ship’s lights.

I didn’t like the sadness I felt at her memory. So I replaced it with rage. Rage against Colonel Jackson and the crew and my whole freaking planet for doing this to us. It bled through me, making my heart pump harder. But Theresa’s next words brought me back, like a cool balm thrown over my skin.

“We don’t know what’s going to happen next, honey. No one does. Once, what seems like a long time ago, now, I would have said that God does. And I would have been real certain. Now, I’m not so sure. The only thing I’m sure of is that we gotta grab every little scrap of joy we can in this life, wherever we are.” She paused, and her eyes glinted in the gloom. “And if that joy comes in the form of mackin’ on some tall glass of cool alien water, then I say go for it.”

I breathed out shakily.

“How are you so optimistic?”

She shrugged.

“Dunno. Just the way I’m wired, I guess.”

“Can you teach me?”

She laughed quietly.

“That’s what I’m tryin’ to do right now, girl! That’s why I’m telling you to go for it! You like him, right?”

“No!” No. Definitely not. No fucking way. He was annoying and arrogant and a fucking alien -

“OK, before we work on the optimism thing, maybe we need to work on the honesty thing.” Theresa’s words cut off my cycle of denial, and I scowled.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that you need to start being honest with yourself about what you really want. What you really feel.”

It was easy for her to say. She already knew how to do that. Like it was instinctive.

How do I really feel about Galok?

I pictured his easy smile, his long hair, his copper-coloured eyes. And, fuck me, if I didn’t feel goddamn butterflies, like the most awful cliché you could imagine.

“Alright, let’s say I do like him. A little.”

“Good. The first step is admitting it,” Theresa teased quietly. “And now that you’ve admitted it, that you do like him, you can start figuring what you want to do about it. I mean, you said you kissed him, right? Maybe you should do some more of that…”

Her brows waggled suggestively.

“You sound like Melanie. Galok isn’t supposed to be my mate or anything that we know of, so Mel said that I should treat it kind of like a new human relationship. Try dating him.”

“Well, I think that’s a marvellous idea. That Melanie is one smart cookie. And look what it’s landed her – a hot, scarred hunk of alien man candy who waits on her hand and foot!”

“I mean, I guess…” To be honest, Galok had already been waiting on me hand and foot. Bringing me food. Offering me massages. Giving me fly-by-night haircuts.

“What’s the worst that could happen?”

Theresa’s sudden question made me freeze. It was shocking in its poignancy.

“The worst that could happen is what always happens. I push him away and he realizes I’m not worth it. Or the Lavrika tells him someone else is his mate, and he ends up with someone nicer than me.”

“Oh, honey.” Theresa scooted towards me, wrapping a tender arm around my shoulder. I tensed, simultaneously wanting to lean into her touch and throw her arm off in a huff. So I did neither, sitting frozen as she rubbed her hand up and down my arm. “Those worst-case scenarios you’re worrying about? Those are things completely outside your control. The only thing you can control is you and your own actions. So don’t push him away. Let him in. Take advantage of the here and now.”

“Carpe diem and all that jazz, right?”

“You got it.” I could hear the smile in Theresa’s answer. Finally, though it was hard as fuck, I leaned into her, sagging against the embrace, revelling in the warmth.

After that, I crawled to my own hides, my own bed. Dating Galok… Could I make that work somehow?

And just how, exactly, did one ask an alien out on a date, anyway?

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Galok

I smiled broadly at the new women emerging from the tent in the early morning. Some of them ignored me, some tossed me curious glances, and more than one returned my smile. But there was only one face I was waiting to see. Kat’s.

As promised, I had brought her fresh meat for her breakfast, along with valok so that she would be fed and hydrated for whatever day’s work lay ahead for her. I, myself, had been commanded by Gahn Buroudei to join the hunters for the day. But I still had time to join them, yet. The sun had only just risen, the blush of morning light cascading over everything.

One new woman stopped when she saw me outside. She was wearing the customary hooded cloak and eye shells that protected the new women from the sun, so it was difficult to see her face well. But I could see strands of pale hair peeking out from her hood.

“You’re Galok, right?”

I raised my tail in greeting.

“Yes. Greetings. I do not know your name.”

“I’m Theresa. Are you here to see Kat?”

I puffed my chest, tail swishing.

“Yes, I have brought her breakfast, as promised.”

Theresa smiled and nodded her head.

“Thought so. The lazybones is still snoring away in there. I’ll go tell her you’re here.”

She disappeared inside, then returned a moment later.

“She’ll be out in a minute. Although maybe I shouldn’t have woken her up. I may have just made things worse for you…”

“Worse in what way?” I asked, puzzled. Theresa sighed.

“You’ll see.”

Theresa hurried off to join the other females who had already left the tent. Feeling my brow furrow, I turned back just in time to see Kat emerging. Even with her hood and eye shells, I could see the lines of her scowl. And it made my heart sing.

“Good morning, small one. I have brought your breakfast as promised.”

After last night, it was hard to be near her without touching her. My eyes fell over her form, lingering on her abdomen. Though it was covered by her cloak, all I could see was the bare soft surface of it, glittering with the stone at her belly button. My cock stirred, and I breathed out heavily. Do not get so excited this early in the morning, fool. You have other duties to attend to.

Kat walked up to me, glancing down at my hands. I’d wrapped her breakfast in a very thin, pliable layer of babkit bark, creating a little bundle. Surprisingly, she took it from my hands without argument, and even muttered a quiet thanks in doing so. I was not sure if I should be happy she had accepted my gift so easily, or worried. This was… unlike her.

“Is all well, Kat?”

“Yes. Why wouldn’t it be?” She frowned, and I cocked my head at her.

“You are not reacting with your usual anger. Though please do not take this as a complaint.”

“I’m… trying something new,” she mumbled, staring down at the breakfast bundle in her hands. Then, her chin jerked up to meet my gaze.

“Galok, do you want to go on a date with me?”

“Yes,” I answered immediately, though I had no idea what she was actually asking of me. “What’s a date?”

She groaned.

“Oh my God, why did you say yes so fast without even knowing what I’m asking? I should have realized there would be no translation for that word…”

“I said yes because I would happily do anything with you and for you,” I said. “Though I would appreciate an explanation of this date.”

“It’s… It’s… It’s like…” She dropped the bundle on the ground and started gesticulating wildly, her words coming in short little bursts. Her face had turned deep red under her head.

“It’s like…” I urged gently, and perhaps somewhat wickedly. I was enjoying this far too much.

“It’s like something you do to get to know someone. You go someplace, just the two of you… And talk. Maybe eat something.”

Happiness poured through me. This had to be a good sign of things to come. Kat wanted to be alone with me. To go somewhere with me.

“Tell me what you wish to do, and we will do it. Tell me where you wish to go, and we will go.”

“I don’t know. I didn’t actually get that far in my plan.”

She bit down on her little pink lip, and once again I felt my cock swell.

“I could take you to Gahn Buroudei’s territory. It is less than a day’s ride from here. It is where I grew up.”

I could show her all the secret places of my childhood. Welcome her into the land of my birth. The thought was a stirring one.

“Um, OK. Yeah. Sure.” She nodded several times, then gasped. “Oh, hey, on the way back, can we finally stop at the ship? I really need to start getting to work on the rock samples Melanie and I collected. We’re running low on sunscreen. While we’re at the ship I can see if there are any other stores of sunscreen to use in the meantime.”

“Of course, this should be no trouble.”

“So… when do you want to go?” Kat’s voice was so quiet and soft, almost tremulous. I liked seeing her like this. Asking for things. Wanting things. From me.

“Today I must hunt for the tribe. But we can leave at first light tomorrow.” I would have to clear it with Gahn Buroudei, but I did not think he would deny me this. He of all people knew what lengths a warrior would go to please a new woman.

“OK. That works,” Kat said. She quickly bent for the breakfast I had brought her, scooping it back up in her little hands. “Well, thanks for the chow. Bye!” Her voice was positively squeaky as she tossed the words over her shoulder, ducking back into her tent. Charming.

For the rest of the day, my mind was consumed with Kat and our future date. I hunted well, and our group felled three large dakrival beasts. As I secured the body of one to my irkdu, preparing to bring it back to the settlement, I pondered the details of the days to come. I should have asked her more about what a date entails… She said people got to know each other and ate food. I was not entirely sure how that was different from just eating beside each other at the fire, but then again she had mentioned it required being alone.

My heart (and cock) surged when I realized that, for the first time, Kat and I would be truly alone. We had had some time together on the trip to Taliok’s mountains, but this time it would just be us. I wonder if she will agree to sleep in the tent with me…

I laughed at myself for that thought. I would probably once again be relegated to sleeping outside. But that was alright. As long as I was near her, it was enough. Though, of course, one could always hope for more.

When I returned with the other hunters to the settlement at nightfall, I saw one very large fire blazing towards the centre of the settlement. I felt a wide grin break out over my face. The new women had agreed to my proposal. All the tribes were sharing the evening fire. As we got closer, I saw more clearly that yes, all three tribes were in attendance. Gahns Buroudei and Taliok were seated with their mates. Gahn Fallo was seated with his mate, too, though he looked decidedly angrier than the other two. This did not surprise me. No doubt he felt he was losing control of his status as protector of the new women. But in my mind this could only be good. We all needed to act as one, now. To work together.

I leaped from my irkdu, dragging the dakrival to a group of Sea Sand women who were waiting to butcher it. I was pleased to see that there were several new women there, too, ready to lend a hand and learn our ways. Kat was not among this small group, though, and I scanned the settlement looking for her.

My gaze landed on her. She was seated with the woman I now knew as Theresa. The flames danced across Kat’s face, making her large eyes shine.

Though everything in me arched towards her, urging me to sprint right to her, I decided to speak with Gahn Buroudei first, and tell him about our date. I wanted to be able to tell Kat our plan had been secured when I approached her.

My plan settled, I walked around the fire to where most of our tribe was settled. I worked my way through my seated tribe-mates until I was in front of Gahn Buroudei and the Gahnala Zeezee. I raised my tail to them.

“Be seated and eat with us, Galok,” Gahn Buroudei said.

“I will sit, but only for a moment,” I said as I settled next to Gahn Buroudei. “I wish to speak to you on a personal matter.”

“Oh?” Buroudei looked at me in surprise.

“Yes. I wish to ask leave to take the new woman, Kat, back to our territory.  I wish to show her our lands… as a date.”

Zeezee, seated on the other side of Buroudei, leaned across her mate, her eyes wide.

“You’re taking Kat on a date? How’d you manage that one?”

“It was Kat who proposed this idea to me,” I said, abuzz with happiness.

“You’re kidding,” the Gahnala said, slack-jawed.

“I am not. I speak the truth,” I assured her.

“Wow. I… I can’t believe it. Good for you, Galok. I hope you have fun on your date!”

Buroudei, who had been listening to the exchange in silence, finally spoke.

“Not so fast, my beloved. I am not so sure about this.”

My joy faltered, dipping in my chest. What argument could Buroudei possibly have against this? Not only was he my Gahn, but my truest friend. Surely, he would not get in the way of my happiness now.

Zeezee seemed to experience the same confusion as me.

“What are you talking about? Is it because the Lavrika hasn’t come to him yet?”

“No, it is not that,” Buroudei responded quickly. “While the Lavrika awakens the mate bond, it is not needed for companionship. I have no problem with Galok taking Kat on this date.”

He turned from his pretty Gahnala back to me.

“No, my concern is about you taking her from the settlement alone. You saw how Gahn Fallo reacted when Gahn Taliok tried to leave with Melanie and Kat. We all agreed that he had the right to leave with Melanie, as she was his mate, but not Kat.”

I sighed, crossing my hands in front of me, thinking hard. Gahn Buroudei was right. It was the reason I had gone on the trip to the mountains in the first place – as a sort of chaperone, so that the new women weren’t under the protection of just one tribe when outside of our territory.

While I would not object to the idea of a similar chaperone accompanying us this time, I did not think Kat would like that idea.

“Kat stressed the fact that a date requires privacy. I do not think I will be able to achieve such a thing within her wishes if others accompany us,” I told Buroudei.

Buroudei pursed his lips as he often did when he was thinking. Zeezee leaned across him once again, placing a soft hand on his inner thigh, making his throat tighten as he swallowed.

“Come on, Buroudei. Let him go. Fallo’s an imbecile. He doesn’t need to know.”

“I do not like the idea of deceiving another Gahn,” Buroudei said slowly, raking his claws over his chin.

“But if Kat wants to go with Galok, and she wants to go alone, she should have the right to do so,” Zeezee said, bristling. “When we first met, we had so much time alone together. You took me wherever you wanted. It’s not fair to deny Galok that same chance.”

Thank you, Gahnala. She was truly a generous spirit, to help me in this.

And she was stronger than I had realized. Her face hardened, her eyes sparking as she stared her mighty mate down.

“I’m serious, Buroudei. Let him go on his own.”

Buroudei slipped a claw down the side of Zeezee’s set jaw.

“My lovely mate, you have truly conquered me,” he murmured in a voice so sweet it was unrecognizable to me. Turning to me once more, he said, “Go Galok. Go tomorrow. You have my blessing to take Kat with you if this is her desire. But do your best to be quick and quiet about it.”

I clapped Buroudei on the shoulder, squeezing.

“Thank you, my friend. Thank you.”

With that, I leaped up, ready to track Kat down and tell her the news.

Tomorrow we would leave together. Tomorrow, our date would begin.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Kat

I woke up before the sun had risen. I could tell by the little ghostly finger of predawn light swiping in at the sides of the tent. It didn’t surprise me I’d woken up so early. I’d barely slept in the first place. Ever since Galok had told me last night that we were good to go on our date trip today, I had been a bundle of stupid, nauseous nerves.

I dressed quietly in the darkness, not wanting to wake anyone. I got my pack ready, but before I left, I did poke Theresa awake to tell her I was going. Galok had said we needed to be pretty quiet about our trip, since technically guys weren’t supposed to be taking girls out of the main settlement without chaperones. But I needed to tell at least one of the other humans where I’d be going. I didn’t want anyone thinking I’d disappeared or gotten eaten or something.

“Theresa. I’m going now.”

Theresa rolled to me, opening one eye. She smiled from her bed.

“Have fun, you two.”

“Fun? How? I’m so nervous I feel like I’m gonna puke.”

“That’s normal on a first date,” she murmured, though I found that hard to believe. If everyone felt this way before a date, why the fuck would anyone ever want to do it?

I said goodbye then stood, heading to the tent’s exit, trying to calm myself the whole way.

You need to chill. It’s just Galok.

But when I went outside and saw him standing there, I knew, with a certainty so strong it almost bowled me over, that he wasn’t just Galok. Not anymore. He was becoming a whole lot more than that, a whole lot faster than I would have liked. A whole lot faster than I was comfortable with. But as I took in his smile, his form, I realized there was no way around this. A few days ago, he was the annoying guy I’d rejected over and over again. And now? Well, he was still kind of annoying. But like… in an endearing sort of way.

I walked up to him, wishing I’d already put my sunglasses on so I wouldn’t have to meet his eyes. They were stowed in my pack, and it would look even more awkward if I put them on now in the gloom, so I met his gaze with a pinched, forced smile.

“Hey,” I said, shifting my weight from foot to foot.

“Hello, Kat. I have brought you something.”

I expected it to be breakfast – not that I would be able to eat anything right now – but instead it was… a bunch of grass?

Peet grass, the tough, fibrous plant native to these deserts, was collected in a thick bunch that Galok held out to me. I took it, frowning.

“Thanks?”

Galok cocked his head, his smile fading.

“Does it not please you? Last night, I asked the Gahnala Zeezee for advice. She said that it is often customary for a male to bring his date plant matter.”

Plant matter?

I burst out laughing, quickly clamping my hand over my mouth to muffle the sound.

“I think she meant flowers. We have lots of them on Earth, like your rindla plants” I said, fighting my laughter down. But I stopped laughing completely when I saw Galok’s crestfallen expression.

“Ah, I see that I have gone astray. I will seek to do better. You need not keep the grass.” He reached for my hands.

“No, it’s fine,” I said, moving out of his reach, suddenly protective of my weird little grass bundle. I bent, face on fire, and shoved it into my pack with all my other stuff – my extra clothes, sunscreen, sunglasses, and all the rocks I planned to analyze in the lab on the way back here.

Once everything was tucked away and secured, I stood.

“So, should we go?’

“Yes. We shall.”

We moved quietly through the settlement, out towards the open sands. Galok’s irkdu was already waiting there, roaming and snuffling. They were truly insane-looking animals, with big croc-faces and way too many eyes, not to mention way, way too many legs. But they definitely got us where we needed to go, and I had started warming up to them.

The irkdu snorted and tossed its massive head as we approached. I could see my saddle, along with several leather bundles and the makings of a tent strapped to the beast’s sides.

“Would you like to eat before we depart?” Galok asked, but I shook my head, nerves returning.

“Nah. Let’s just go.”

Galok grinned down at me, sight stars spinning.

“Good. I, too, am eager to depart on our date.”

Oh, God.

Galok boosted me up, then leaped up himself, settling behind me. And settling very, very close. He made no effort to keep space between us as he had before, and I felt his chest against my back like a wall of pure muscle.

We took off, moving swiftly and smoothly over the sands. Behind us, the asteroid belt was falling away, and the sky grew lighter and lighter. The sun raised its head over the horizon, beginning its hot track up through the sky, and my breath caught in my throat at the beauty of it. The sky glowed in various shades of tangerine and translucent scarlet. In this light, the sand shimmered, practically glowing in and of itself, a tapestry of copper and gold as far as the eye could see. It was hard to believe so much beauty could exist in one place. And I was awestruck to think that this was where I lived now. The path to get here had been thorny as hell, but the ending destination was so freaking sweet.

I leaned harder against Galok, revelling in his warmth. It wasn’t just the beauty of the landscape that was making this moment so perfect. It was also the alien at my back. The one who brought me breakfast, even when I didn’t want it. The one who’d proudly brought me a fistful of grass just because he thought I’d like it.

The one whose tongues lit my pussy on fire.

Think what those tongues would feel like other places.

OH, GOD. Shut up brain. Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP.

Galok’s words against my hood made me jump, and I burned with embarrassment that he had somehow heard my fucked-up inner thoughts. But it seemed like I was in the clear when he spoke.

“When I ride out here on the open sands, I like to go very fast. I was wondering if I could show you this. Would you like to go fast?”

I sat up a little straighter, heart beginning to pound.

I reached over and into my pack, strapped near my side, yanking out my sunglasses. I plastered them to my face, then yanked up my hood. The sun was rising higher, now, flooding the desert with white-hot light.

I wiggled my butt in the saddle, clutching at its leather edges, grinning.

“Let’s do it! Giddy-up, motherfucker!”

Galok gave a cry to his mount, and we rocketed forward. I thought we’d been going fast before, but this was like being on a roller coaster. Or what I imagined being on a roller coaster must have been like, seeing as I’d never actually been on one. I gave a whoop as my stomach slammed back against my spine, making me feel giddy and light. My hood flew back, but Galok yanked it forward quickly, holding it against the top of my head with one hand, his spear brandished at his side with the other.

“This is incredible!” I screamed into the wind. It felt like I was flying.

Like we were flying.

We raced over the sands, rising up over dunes and skating down them with a speed that made me feel like I was both floating and falling. I hollered and laughed, feeling so fucking free. More free than I ever had in my whole goddamn life. I wanted to live inside this moment. To never let this perfect joy go.

But at some point, we had to slow down.

We slowed down to a trot, and I fought to catch my breath, my heart pounding.

“That was extremely cool,” I tossed over my shoulder to Galok.

“I’m glad you feel cool! I was worried you were hot in the sun.”

I laughed and shook my head and we continued on our way.

After some time, we passed a spiky outcropping of huge dark boulders. A few tents were perched below them.

“This is where our tribe’s tents once stood, before we moved to the Cliffs of Uruzai. As you can see, there are still a few tents for the guard parties that remain here to keep our territory secure.

“Is this where we’re stopping?” I called over my shoulder.

“No,” Galok replied. “I have something else I want to show you. But we will pause here for a break.”

He commanded his mount to stop, then leaped down.

He held his hands up to me, and, grimacing, I took them, a jolt running up my arms at the contact. Every instinct in me told me to shoo him away, kick him back, and to slide down to the ground the way I always did. But doing things the way I always did just ended up leaving me with a bruised ass. Holding Galok’s hands, I slid down the side of the irkdu, landing unsteadily on my boots for once. Galok’s grip tightened, moving up to my wrists to help steady me.

“It has not escaped my notice that you have not yet eaten today,” Galok said, opening one of the packs he’d secured to the irkdu. I nodded, watching him. Now that I was a bit more relaxed, I was starving. Galok offered me the usual array of meat and valok, and I gulped it all down, scanning what was around me.

There wasn’t a heck of a whole lot to see from here. Apart from the huge spikes of stone and tents beside us, there was nothing but copper rolling sand.

“What do you want to show me?” I asked through a mouthful of meat. Galok’s lips glistened with valok gel, and my core clenched.

“A little further away, the land changes. I spent many days there as a boy. It is a unique place, I think. I believe you would like to see it.”

“Huh,” I said, finishing my food. I couldn’t really picture anything else being around here. It all seemed so uniform in this part of the desert.

Guess I’ll just have to see when we get here…

After eating, we rested for a few minutes. Galok wanted to see if any of the guard party in the territory would come back to the tents while we were there so he could greet them, but they didn’t.

“Gahn Buroudei’s territory is vast,” he said, his sight stars expanding as he scanned the horizon. “They could be far, far from here.”

Bellies full, we got back on the irkdu for the last leg of the journey. I was starting to feel a lot more relaxed, now. Things with Galok just seemed to be… easy. Even kind of fun, now that I was letting myself feel it.

We continued over the sands for a long time. After what I was sure had been the passage of several hours, I turned around in my saddle.

“Are you sure you know where we’re going? I asked, eyes narrowing behind my shades. I wanted to make some kind of let’s stop and ask for directions joke, but something told me it would have gone over Galok’s giant alien head.

“I know this land better than my own blades,” Galok replied, his mouth pulling into a smile that made my chest feel all melty and weird. “You need not worry. We are almost there.”

“I wasn’t worried,” I grumbled, turning around, facing forward once again.

Just as the sun was beginning to lower behind us, I noticed the landscape beginning to change. We were no longer travelling over mostly flat sand with a few rolling dunes here and there. We seemed to be going upwards, higher and higher, up a big hill of sand. The slope got steeper and steeper, until gravity forced my back hard against Galok’s chest. Thank God he was back there, or I would have slid right off our ride. Just as I was thinking that there was no way we could keep going like this, that the irkdu would have to start sliding backwards soon, we crested the hill. And when I looked down the other side of it, I gasped.

It was an oasis. A bright flash of colour and life in the middle of the stretching sands.

“Holy shit,” I breathed, taking it all in. At the bottom of the big hill we’d just climbed was a large, circular, flat area. Brown babkit trees lined the perimeter, interspersed with bushes I had never seen before. The bushes were tall, as tall as me, with shimmering pine-like boughs. But instead of deep green, like pine trees of Earth, they glittered in metallic shades of silver and gold and bronze, their surface glinting like foil. Within this circle of babkit trees and metallic bushes was the usual coppery sand, as well as flat stones in varying sizes, broken up with some plants I recognized, like peet grass, valok plants, and talka stalks. There were other plants, though, that I hadn’t encountered before: pale yellow mushroom-looking things, puffy white flowers that reminded me of pussy willows, and tall, shining black plants that looked dark glass spikes growing straight upward out of the ground. And most exquisite and exciting of all, was the water.

Real, honest to goodness, wet fucking water.

There wasn’t much of it, but it was there. It was real. A thin brook that travelled through the area, ending in a small pool at the far end of the oasis. Beyond it, and beyond the trees and bushes, the Sea Sands continued endlessly.

Galok helped me down from the irkdu, and I took off, half running, half sliding down the sand of the hill, skidding to a clumsy stop and the bottom, narrowly avoiding colliding with a thick-trunked babkit tree. I steeped away from the tree, pausing to admire the metallic gleam of one of the spiky silver bushes next to it. It looked like it had been gilded, like it was a sculpture in a museum rather than a bush that grew naturally. Shaking my head in wonder, I ducked past it, entering the clearing of the oasis.

It was like entering another world entirely. Once inside the ring of the trees, the desert seemed to disappear. I could hear the rustle of a slight breeze through the plants around me, and the whirring of insects and small creatures. I went towards the stream, hopping from rock to rock as I did so. The ground became rockier at the edges of the small stream, and I walked along that edge in awe, all the way to the little pool at the end. The pool was the deepest area, and it only looked like it might come up to my knees. But shallow or not, I was getting in that fucking water.

Grinning gleefully, I kicked off my boots, peeled my socks away from my sweaty skin, and rolled up my pants, splashing into the water. I probably should have gone more slowly, and maybe asked Galok if there was anything in the water that could bite my toes off. But I just couldn’t fucking wait. I didn’t know if I’d ever see water again. We had the valok gel to drink, and we used the talka stuff to clean ourselves, but it wasn’t the same as deliciously wet, silky water on my skin. I stopped in the centre of the pool, wiggling my toes against the sandy bottom. So far, nothing had bitten them off. We were off to a great start.

I was vaguely aware of the sound of Galok’s footsteps behind me, coming up to the water’s edge. The fact that he wasn’t calling me back in a panic made me think that this was pretty safe, so I relaxed further, digging my toes further into the sand. I stared down at the ripples I created, the way they moved outwards in the bright sunlight, fractured under the shadows cast by babkit branches and the tall bushes. I gasped and took a step back as a small animal I hadn’t noticed before started spinning through the water away from me. At first glance, it looked like a tiny turtle, smaller than the palm of my hand, with a round dark shell. But instead of four legs, a tail, and a head, it just had a bunch of identical tentacles, each about an inch in length, sprouting from its shell. The tentacles propelled it in a spinning motion, and it swirled through the water away from me. Disturbed by its motion, a fluttering cloud of insects departed from a nearby bank, a collection of silver antennae and translucent wings. Another small creature nearby hopped from the water onto a stone, fixing me with four bulbous eyes in a frog-like face, and an emerald flash of wings streaked by me as a bird that looked more like a gemstone than an animal passed.

I laughed, shaking my head, shifting my weight from foot to foot. The feel of the water on my skin, and the strange beauty of all the plants and animals here was a heady combination. I felt like I’d fallen into some vivid, Willy Wonka-esque dream.

“What are you doing?” Galok finally asked. I turned around to look at him, hooking my fingers into my right pant leg that was threatening to flop back down into the water. I rolled it tighter above my knee then straightened.

“What does it look like? I’m enjoying the water! Why aren’t you, isn’t that the whole point in coming here?”

Galok’s sight stars spun outward in surprise.

“The point in coming here? To go on the water? No, that is not the point in coming here. I wanted to show you a place from my youth. I thought you would appreciate the different sights.”

“I do,” I agreed enthusiastically. “This is fucking cool.”

“That is good. I am glad. However, I do not understand why you are in the water.”

Huh? So this guy had come here all through his childhood and had never splashed in the water?

“We do this on Earth. We go swimming. Or go in hot tubs or pools or hot springs. A lot of humans like water.”

Galok pulled a face, and I snorted at him.

“What, don’t wanna get wet?”

“There is only one part of my body I wish to get wet, and I do not wish to wet it with water.”

I ignored the blatant innuendo of his words.

“You’re like a cat. Which is ironic, considering that’s my name.”

“I am like a what?”

“Nevermind.”

I bent, swishing my fingers through the water, delighting in the smooth pull of the surface against them, the clattering, glassy surface under the sun. Then, before Galok could react, I flattened my hands beneath the surface, then pulled them upward sharply. Water splattered across Galok’s chest and legs, and he jumped, yelping.

I couldn’t stop fucking laughing. He’d really looked like a cat just then. One that had fallen into a full bathtub by mistake.

Galok stopped flailing, taking a deep breath and fixing his eyes on me.

“You forget, tiny Kat, that I am a warrior.” His sight stars pulled in tight, and my abdomen clenched, heat rising in my cheeks. “I am a warrior of the Sea Sands. And you have just declared war.”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Galok

My Kat was a strange one. I could not imagine any creature, besides the ones native to this stream, willingly submersing themselves in the liquid. And yet there she was, happily splashing away, looking like she’d dive in head-first if there were enough depth to the water to do so. I was happy to watch her from the banks, absorbing her obvious joy from her foray into the wetness, when she dared to splash some of that water down my front. And that was an offence that had to be answered.

I charged forward, splashing into the water towards her, ignoring the set-your-teeth-on-edge creep of the liquid past my ankles. Kat flailed, her mouth snapping shut at my determined trudge towards her. She spun away from me, wading through the water towards the banks of the pool. But her legs were too short to outpace me, especially when slowed by the water. I caught up to her quickly, grabbing one of her wrists in one of my hands, and scooping up water with the other.

“No! Ha, no!” she screamed between laughing. She wriggled in my grip, trying to escape. But there would be no escape.

I reached my sopping hand into her hood, letting the water in my palm run under her cloak and down her back.

She was breathless with yelping laughter, doing a strange little dance in my grip. I drank her joy down, staring at her broad open smile, her pink cheeks, the mirthful shaking of her limbs. I thought about getting more water to torment her with, but I decided against it, Still holding fast to her wrist, I reached my other arm around her back, pulling her close. Slowly, her laughter subsided, until she was staring up at me in silence. A single bead of water running down her cheek caught my attention, glimmering on her face like the stones she wore. I swiped at it with the tip of my claw.

“I do not like water,” I rasped, my voice suddenly thick. “But on you, I must admit that it is beautiful.”

Kat swallowed, and I tracked the movement down her slim throat in the shadows of her hood.

“You know, this is the part of the date where you should kiss me.”

She did not need to tell me twice. I yanked her upwards, tensing at the strangely erotic feeling of her cool wet legs hooking around my waist and wetting the skin of my back. Her small hands clutched my shoulders, and we collided. Her mouth was hot and hungry on mine, her hands growing tighter on me, the blunt claws pressing into my skin. Blood rushed to my cock, swelling under Kat’s rump, and I groaned into the kiss. I lowered her slightly so that her backside was pressed against the top side of my cock. Kat gasped and arched, the tensing of her muscles an agony against my hardness. We explored each other like we had the other night, opening up into each other, but I wanted more. Needed more.

I drew back, my breath coming harsh and ragged from my chest. The sight of Kat’s mouth, swollen, wet, and red, made my balls ache.

“Kat, I would kiss you forever. But please, please do not ask me to continue doing it in the water like this.”

She laughed shakily then nodded her head.

“Yeah, yeah, fine. Let’s go on the sand.”

Gripping her rump, I moved through the water, my strong legs sluicing through it until we had reached the bank. I moved through the rockier areas until I came to a soft and flat stretch of sand. Still holding Kat, I slipped down to my knees, depositing her on her back in the shade of an especially large babkit tree.

I could have stayed looking at her on her back like this for a very long time, but my Kat was an impatient beauty. She reached up with a huffing sound, hooking her hands around the back of my neck and pulling me down on top of her with surprising force. I barely stopped myself from putting my full weight on her tiny form. Instead, I fell heavily onto my elbows and knees above her.

“Whoa,” she said.

“What? What is it? What is whoa?”

“I don’t know. It’s just… Having you on top of me like this… it’s… whoa.”

“Then I will assume whoa means something very good,” I said with a quick smile. Kat pushed her eye-shells up to the top of her head. Though she was shaded by both the babkit tree and now me, it was still very bright around us. The single black sight star in each of her eyes had pulled to a minuscule point, leaving the rest of her eyes an extraordinary combination of white and shockingly bright blue. I never would have thought I would find eyes like hers beautiful before. Eyes that were not black, with many sight stars, moving to and fro. And yet, now, I would not be able to find any other kind of eyes lovely. Not in comparison to hers.

Not anymore.

In that moment, with Kat panting below me, her eyes so bright and wide, I knew that I was lost. Well and truly. I was lost to her, lost in her. I did not need the Lavrika to tell me that she was meant to be my mate. I already felt it, deeply, in every arch of my muscles, every breadth of bone. Every beat of my heart. Every ache and pull and clatter of my being, every stroke of my life, was alive with her. Alive with my love for her.

And as I lowered my head once again to capture her sweet mouth with mine, I knew that I would fight endlessly, woo her tirelessly, until she felt the same. Until she was just as lost in me as I was in her.

No matter how long it took.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Kat

We kissed for so long it was like time disappeared. All I was aware of was the soft heat of Galok’s mouth on mine, the drag of his fangs against my lower lip, and his hands roaming from my face down to my waist, and back again. When he moved away from my mouth with a groan, lapping and nipping at my jaw, I finally dragged my eyes open to see that the sun had begun to set. I laid there, panting, stroking my hands up the ridged muscles of Galok’s strong back, shivering against the feeling of his mouth moving from my jaw to my neck, staring at the sky. The sun’s descent turned the sky into a collection of watercolour streaks illuminated by the rising asteroid belt and the smattering of stars coming into focus.

I raised my hands to the sides of Galok’s face, pressing slightly upward. He raised up on his elbows, his chest heaving against mine. His sight stars were blown wide apart, spread with desire, making my breath catch in my throat.

“It’s getting dark,” I said, like an idiot. Obviously it was getting dark.

“Yes, it is,” Galok agreed, the growl of his words sent fire zinging straight between my legs, making me clench. There was no doubt about it – I was fucking aching for him. I could feel how wet I had grown. But now that we had stopped, the momentum of the moment had ground to a halt. I felt myself clamming up, not ready for whatever was coming next.

I shimmied out from under Galok’s massive frame then stood wobbily.

“Well, we should probably eat dinner and get the tent set up.”

Galok looked at me from the ground, rising to a seated position.

“Yes, I will gather food from the irkdu and set up the tent as soon as possible. But for the moment, I do not believe I will be able to stand.”

My face erupted with heat when I realized what he meant. My eyes fell to the huge, spear-like bulge beneath his loincloth. It inspired more than a little unease in me – because, holy shit, how would it fit? But there was also some thrilled pride. I had turned him on that much. I had made him that hard.

For a split second, I wanted to walk right over, fall to my knees, peel that loincloth off, and see what was beneath. The image made something hot and achy pull low in my abdomen, and I whirled away from Galok. I hurried to the side of the little pool, gathering my socks and shoes from where I’d left them before splashing some of the water on my face. I made sure not to get the water in my mouth, because who knew what kind of alien microbes would be in it. But the cool liquid felt great on my hot face. I ran my wet palms up over my scalp, scrubbing. I heard Galok rise behind me, and by the time I had composed myself and turned around, trudging back with my boots, Galok had fetched supplies for dinner and for the tent.

Since the meat was already smoked, we didn’t need a fire, and we ate quickly as darkness continued to fall. After the meal, Galok jumped to action, setting up the tent. As he pulled the last cords tight, I saw him hesitate slightly before turning back to me.

“The tent is finished. Perhaps you would like some company inside. It can get quite cool here during the night.”

“I’m good. Hot-blooded and all that jazz,” I squeaked, practically sprinting for the tent and launching inside it. I pulled the flap closed tightly, heart in my throat, teeth clenched. I didn’t want to make Galok sleep alone outside. But having him in here would definitely mean a continuation of the kissing form earlier, and probably even more than that. I mean, what else would happen when a horny girl and an even hornier alien warrior ended up in the same bed?

I thought of Galok’s erection again, my fingers clenching around the hide of the tent flap. I couldn’t deny that by now, I wanted him. I wanted him bad. But I also couldn’t deny that, apparently, when it came to this guy/girl stuff, I was awkward as fuck. What if I’m no good at this? The one time I’d had sex on Earth hadn’t been a stellar experience, and I really didn’t know what the hell I was doing. Has Galok done this before? That thought was… not a good one. The thought of Galok fucking someone else made me seethe, even though I knew that was unfair.

With a groan, I tossed myself down on the hides Galok had put in here for the bed. Laying on my stomach, I buried my head in my crossed arms, sighing into the fabric of my solar protection jacket.

I was annoyed at myself for being such a wuss. What would Theresa tell me if she were here, or Mel?

They’d probably say something nice about how far I’ve come, how much I’ve opened up already by even inviting Galok out here in the first place.

Because they’re too nice.

I rolled onto my back, slipping out of my jacket without sitting up, lying on top of it, bare arms splayed to the sides. I laid like that for a while, but even with the whirring and chirping of the various animals and insects of the oasis, it felt too quiet. I wanted to hear Galok’s voice.

Oh, God. I missed him. I actually fucking missed that alien goofball.

With a sigh, I sat up, trying to decide if I could beat down my prickly pride enough to go outside and see him after I’d told him not to come in the tent. But it was Galok who spoke first, his voice filtering through the tent wall, warming me from the inside out.

“I can tell you are not sleeping in there, small one.”

I smiled, shaking my head.

“You eavesdropping on me? Guess it makes sense with those giant ears to match your giant head.”

“I will not deny that my ears work very well. It is imperative for a warrior to have sharp senses. So I will take that as a compliment, thank you,” he chuckled.

“You’re welcome,” I mumbled, still smiling like a total fool. When his next words came, my smile tightened, and I bit down on my lower lip.

“So, will you join me out here, little Kat? Or do I need to come in there and carry you out? Or perhaps neither of us needs to be outside…”

“I’m coming out,” I said quickly. I left my shoes and jacket off, heading out in my tank top and uniform pants.

I stepped outside and froze.

I thought this place had been gorgeous during the day, but it was something magical at night. The asteroid- and starlight made everything glow. The metallic bushes glinted with even more exquisite foil-like beauty. There was almost something wintry about it – as if the babkit trees and bushes were coated in glittering frost. The water was still and reflective, a silver ribbon leading to a shining round coin of a pool. Every once in a while, when a small animal or bug moved, there were glistening ripples, floating outward with melodic beauty.

“Beautiful,” Galok said behind me, and I jerked around to look at him.

“Yeah, it is,” I said. He quirked a crooked smile, looking up at me from his seated position.

“I was not talking about the land.”

His smile faded and he stared at me soberly, laying me totally bare. The night had done the same thing to him as it had done to the plants and water and sand – made him metallic and strange and lovely. By this point, I could admit that he was really, really good-looking. But out here, like this, with the light turning his skin to quick-silver and his eyes glinting like shattered stars, he liked like some kind of dark alien angel. It was the kind of beauty that made my chest tighten. The kind that made me feel unworthy.

“Ah, I almost forgot. I was working on something while you were huffing and rolling around in here.”

Galok reached across his lap, grabbing something from the ground beside him. From where I stood I couldn’t see it clearly. I walked over, then plopped down cross-legged in front of him, my knees brushing his shins.

“There are no rindla flowers here, but I have tried to make a better gift for you. To mark the occasion of our date.”

Galok held something long and spindly out to me. I took it delicately, bringing it close to my face to examine it.

It was more peet grass, like he had given me before. But this time, the long fibrous stalks had been twisted and intricately twined together, creating a stem and four pointed petals.

It was a flower. A flower made of grass.

“You made this?” I breathed, staring at the fine curves of the petals and the twisted, twined stem. It was hard to imagine this big lug creating something so fine and detailed. Something of so much beauty.

The fact that he had made this for me… kind of fucking broke me. It broke something inside me, whatever had been holding me back so strongly. Galok may have been a bit of a goon, but I also couldn’t deny any longer that this was real. There may have been no mate bond or whatever, but what Galok was offering me was solid. He was legit, 100%. Behind all his jokes and bragging and teasing was a sincerity so real it stole my breath. And I wanted to grab onto that sincerity, those emotions, with both hands. I didn’t want to lose it. I didn’t want to lose him.

Fire flooded my core, and I put the flower gently on the ground.

“Thanks,” I whispered, rising to my knees.

“I am glad you like it,” Galok said, his signature grin returning. “You should know that I have many skills, small one. I can -”

“Shut up.” I moved over onto his lap, straddling him, and cutting off his words with my mouth. I felt Galok’s intake of breath, the sudden rise of his chest in surprise. And I felt his strong hands come up to cup my jaw. And his cock jumping to life under my ass.

The feeling of his cock pulsing and pressing against me was my undoing. Before I could talk myself out of it, I leaned back, yanking my tank top up and over my head. Galok’s eyes looked like they were about to bug out of his head. His dark gaze raked over my torso, up and down, before finally settling intensely on my nipples.

“My eyes are up here,” I joked. Galok’s nostrils flared, but his gaze didn’t shift even a fraction of an inch.

“Yes, your eyes are up there. And they are lovely beyond compare. But so is this part of you. And I have never seen this part. So you must forgive my staring…”

He said it in a way that made me think he didn’t actually want any forgiveness at all. And I wouldn’t grant it, either. Because the staring wasn’t bothering me. It was turning me on even more. Seeing the way my body excited him was like a drug.

“Do you want to see more?”

“I cannot imagine experiencing more beauty than this,” Galok choked out. “But I will not deny this chance. Yes. I want to see more.”

I shimmied off his lap, standing and jerking my pants and underwear down, kicking the clothing off. Totally naked, I started to feel some self-consciousness finally start to kick in, and I crossed my arms over my chest as Galok drank me in.

Galok rose to his knees, sliding his hands up the backs of my legs and pressing his face between my breasts, breathing deeply. His hands clenched around my ass, making me arch. Galok drew back slightly, tossed his eyes up to meet mine, then ran one long, slow lick of his centre tongue over my right nipple.

It was an electric fucking shot to my groin. I moaned, burying my hands in his hair, tossing my head back. Galok groaned, and then I felt, not just his tongue, but the wet heat of his mouth enveloping my breast. I wasn’t huge. It was pretty easy for me to get away without wearing a bra. And Galok’s mouth was so wide that he was basically sucking in my entire breast. His fangs prodded my sensitive skin, his tongues swirling in an overwhelming cyclone of sensation. He popped off a moment later, switching to the other side, one of his hands rising to knead the breast he’d just been suckling.

My clit was throbbing, the feeling pulling straight into my centre. I clenched and arched, knowing I needed more. As if reading my mind, a second later I felt the tentative slip of the pad of Galok’s finger along my pussy.

A shudder ran through him, and he pulled back, examining his finger. Then, before my fucking eyes, like a total maniac, he licked his finger. He growled, and before I knew what was happening, he’d jerked me off my feet, lifting me and then placing me on my back. His face was pulled into a desperate snarl I’d never seen there before. It made my whole being pulse.

“Kat, I do not wish to push you. But you must know how I feel. How I ache for you.” As he spoke, he loosed his loincloth from his hips tossing it aside. My eyes grew wide as they settled on his cock, up close, for the first time. He moved up on his knees, straddling my waist so that his massive cock, with its two spears, was right in my eye line.

And, holy fucking hell it was… impressive. Huge, slightly curving upward, the skin melting from a blush of bronze to black at the tip. His balls hung heavy, black like the tip. Let’s just hope he fucking knows how to use it…

Use it? Was I about to have sex with him? Sex, like penis-in-vagina penetrative sex with an alien?

Yes. Yes I was. My own ache matched Galok’s. I felt so painfully empty, clenching around nothing. I’d had my birth control shot right before getting abducted, so even if we could procreate, I wasn’t going to get pregnant anytime soon. There was nothing holding me back.

“Have you ever done this before?” I whispered. The last thing I needed was a horny virgin with no idea how to use his massive cock. Not that I was much better, with my whopping sex count of a single one-night-stand.

“I have never done this before.”

Uh oh. That was a slightly scary thought. And yet, it made me feel kind of… good. That I would be the first.

“Have you done it before?” Galok asked.

Should I tell him? I considered lying, but then thought, Fuck it. If he loses interest in me because I’m not a virgin, then he doesn’t deserve to get with me in the first place.

“I have done it. Once. And to be honest, it kind of sucked.”

“It sucked?” Galok’s brow furrowed. “You mean, sucking? As in, the cock was sucked?” His own dick seemed to like that idea, bobbing above me. “This sounds very pleasant…”

“No, I mean, it sucked, like it was bad. It wasn’t pleasurable.” It hadn’t been a disaster, or anything. And it was totally consensual. It just wasn’t great.

“From what I understand, it should be immensely pleasurable. If the male has any skill to speak of, that is.” I licked my lips as a bead of moisture appeared at Galok’s dark tip.

“You just said you’ve never done this before. What kind of skills do you expect to have?” I asked. Galok grinned down at me. But it was a dark sort of smile. Tinged with brutal desire.

“Do not worry. I believe much of it is instinctive. And I have… many instincts.” On that last word, his hips rocked, his cock pressing forward into the air in a shockingly erotic movement. “And whatever I lack in skill, I will make for in enthusiasm.”

I laughed at that. In a quick movement, Galok slipped down over me, on his elbows, his dark hair falling around my face like a curtain.

“Let’s go slow,” I panted, even though I was already spreading my legs.

“I will do my best,” Galok grunted. He adjusted his hips, and I gasped at the feeling of his head against my slick entrance.

“Oh, fuck,” I groaned, long and low, throwing my head back, already dying to have him inside me. But that would be a terrible fucking idea, considering the size difference. So I stayed still, every muscle and nerve thrumming, as Galok stroked his tip up and down my folds, spreading the wetness.

With every stroke, at the top of his movements, he brushed my clit, making pleasure bunch along my spine.

“You are a beauty, Kat. And your pleasure is… intoxicating. It is becoming difficult to stay like this.”

Groggily, my unsteady eyes met his. I nodded clumsily.

“It’s fine. Fine. Just press in a little bit. Not too much.”

“How will I know how much is too much?”

“I’ll tell you. Stop asking questions.” I reached for him, pulling his face to mine, licking along the seam of his lips. My hands moved down to his neck, revelling in the strong, hard pulse there, beating against my hands like a battering ram

Galok opened his mouth to mine with a grating groan. At the same time, his hips rolled, and his tip nudged inside. I yanked my face away from his, unable to stop myself from crying out.

He froze immediately.

“Kat! Have I hurt you?”

“No, no,” I moaned, my nails scrabbling against his back, my heels coming up to hook behind his waist. “It’s the opposite. Don’t stop. Do a bit more.”

Galok nudged further inside. My hips arched up to meet him, rocking side to side as if to give him more leeway. It was so tight, so much. And yet not enough. I needed that curved hardness further inside.

“More,” I breathed.

“I will oblige,” Galok ground out, his voice hoarse with both desire and restraint. He pressed in yet further, completely filling me. As he settled as deep as he could go, his cock spears slicked upwards, the pliable flesh pressing into my clit. I reached down between us, trying to gauge how much of him I’d taken. There was still about half the length of his cock outside of me. I stroked its hard length, enthralled with the way Galok stiffened and breathed out harshly.

“You can move a little. Just not too fast,” I said quickly. His eyes screwed shut, Galok drew back a bit, then plunged back in, making me mewl.

“Again.”

And again, he moved. He built a slow, steady rhythm, his cock hitting every point of pleasure in my body and then some, the cock spears slicking over my clit making my whole core thrum. I did my best to keep stroking the length of him that hadn’t entered me, but as the pleasure built, I couldn’t do it anymore. I was losing myself to sensation. My whole body splitting open against him, shattering, splintering like the spray of his sight stars.

As I came, Galok’s eyes wrenched open, roaming my face. His expression was dark with lust, but also etched with something intense and unnameable.

“You are all I have ever wished for, Kat,” he grunted, beginning to move faster as I pulsed around him, unable to speak. “All I could have imagined and more. You are my all.”

You are my all.

My orgasm rose once more, cascading through my body in a double-winged pleasure that made tears spring to my eyes. Galok lowered his head, his mouth dragging along my neck as he pumped faster, his rhythm turning erratic. I sensed he wasn’t fully letting go, though. For fear of hurting me, and that made more tears spring to my eyes. I felt them leak from the corners as Galok jerked, then exploded inside me, giving way to pleasure. He gave a few more long, slow pumps, heat radiating off of him like the sun, before, spent, he stopped moving. He lifted his head slightly, pressing his forehead to mine. His breath fanning over my face made goosebumps skitter over my skin.

His cock twitched and pulsed inside me, softening, but still huge. His chest was pressed against mine, now, and I could feel his heartbeat, so strong and steady, thundering against my own.

And inside my head, the words behind that pulse echoed over and over again.

You are my all. You are my all. You are my all.

CHAPTER TWENTY

Galok

I did not ever wish to pull myself from Kat’s tight heat. Being inside her was a bliss I did not know could exist in this world. The finest pleasure to ever grace my body. And the greatest glory. I breathed hard, my forehead against her flat pale one, wanting to stay like this forever. For as long as she’d let me. In fact, it would not be long before I grew hard again. I could feel the beginnings of a sensitive stiffening even now, wishing to plunge in and out of her tiny body yet again.

But I did not want to overwhelm her, either. I pulled back, looking at her small, pointed face. Her eyes were closed, and I traced the fringe of lashes at the seam of her eyelids with reverence, marvelling at the utter, unbelievable softness there. My fingertip slipped down the bony bridge of her high, pointed, human nose, down to her swollen lips. Her lips parted immediately at my touch, making my cock stiffen further. Her eyes cracked open.

I liked all versions of my Kat, but this was quickly becoming a favourite. This sated, loose version, one who’d just tumbled off a steep cliff of pleasure. Pleasure my cock had produced. I felt a grin break out over my face at the pride of that fact.

“So, did this, as you said before, suck?”

“Huh?” She blinked several times, then focused in on my eyes. “Oh. No, that most definitely did not suck.”

“I did not think so. Though, I will not deny I am open to any form of sucking you would like to engage in…”

Kat rolled her eyes, showing the strange whites beneath the dark blue, but she smiled.

“I’m sure you would. But right now, I honestly just need to rest for a bit.”

“Of course,” I said. I slipped out of her, feeling a quiver of pleasurable regret. “It does not surprise me that the power of my cock has taken much of your strength.”

“Wow. OK, your head isn’t just giant, now. It’s freaking astronomical.”

I moved off of Kat, fastening my loincloth around my half-hard cock, hoping it would calm on its own. It seemed unlikely, though, when next to Kat’s naked form. Her pert little breasts, with their puckering pink tips. The golden curls and slick skin between her legs… I bit back a groan.

But she was not naked for long. Unfortunately.

She dressed quickly, wobbling on spent legs. I rose immediately, my hands falling to her slender shoulders to steady her as she fastened the top of her human leg-coverings.

She looked up at me, then breathed out long and low.

“Galok?”

“Yes?”

“You… you can sleep in the tent with me.”

She said the words stiffly, as if they were difficult. And perhaps they were difficult. It appeared that many things that seemed easy and straightforward for me caused more hesitation in Kat. But every day, I sensed her coming closer, opening to me. And I appreciated her words all the same.

I looped my arms behind her, one under her knees, the other behind her back, lifting her from the ground and cradling her to my chest. She yelped and hissed in typical Kat fashion, screeching that she could walk on her own, but I knew she was not speaking the truth.

“I saw your shaking legs, like a newborn dakrival, as you tried to dress yourself. Do not worry, Kat. I feel no weakness from our coupling. If anything, I feel even stronger.”

She mumbled some bitter argument, but I did not hear the words because she had snuggled into my chest, speaking against my skin. And that was almost better than being inside her – having her curl into me, so warm and soft, like this. It made my whole body swell with proud joy. I had tamed the fierce and angry Kat. Had pleased her small body, and had gotten past her defences until she curled into my warmth.

Just as we reached the tent, Kat screeched again, pulling away from my chest, her head whipping back and forth.

“Wait! My flower!”

“Your flower?”

“The one you made! It’s on the ground. I don’t want to lose it.”

I stilled myself as a wave of affection broke over me. I pressed my mouth to the top of her head, squeezing her tight, then turned back to the spot we’d been before. I bent towards the ground, and Kat’s little hand snapped out with astonishing quickness, grabbing the twisted grass from the ground. I was glad she seemed to like it. I had been worried that, like my first attempt at a date gift, it would not be acceptable.

Flower in hand, I carried my small one to the tent, moving inside and placing her gently on the hides. She wiggled, snuggling down into the bed. I stared at her with a happy grin stretched across my face. Just happy to be near her.

She placed the grass flower on the ground beside the hide bedding, then looked at me over her shoulder.

“Well, what are you waiting for? You going to join me or what?”

She did not need to extend the invitation twice.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Kat

I woke up groggy and weak-limbed, my arms and legs flopping like useless rubber. I stared up at the top of the tent, my mind weirdly, almost blissfully, blank. And then it all came back. Every event of last night, in vivid detail.

I yanked the hides up over my face, squeaking into them.

I had really fucked Galok last night. And I had liked it. I had liked it way too much. And it wasn’t just the physical aspect I’d enjoyed. It had been the fact that it was with Galok. Feeling connected to him.

I’m falling for him, I thought grimly. I wasn’t ready to be totally happy about that just yet. There was still plenty of time for things to go wrong. On the one hand, it was kind of nice not having the pressure of the Lavrika’s mate bond in the background of everything. But on the other, it was kind of… sad? In a weird way? Like there was an element of solidity missing. I didn’t think that anything was missing – I could already tell my feelings for Galok were getting stronger every day. But would it be the same for him? The sacred mate bond was like falling in love for the people of the Sea Sands. Could they still fall in love without it?

My chest ached as I remembered Galok’s fierce look, and his statements of devotion last night.

For now, I’d just have to cross my fingers, hoping against hope that those statements were true. And that they would stay true.

I sat up, rubbing the back of my neck, wondering where the big lug had gotten to. I pulled on my jacket, socks, and boots, then slapped some of the rapidly depleting sunscreen across my face before stepping outside.

The sun had already risen pretty far, and the light was blinding. Squinting, I fished my sunglasses out of my pocket and pressed them on, relaxing as their darkness shielded my eyes.

“Good morning, Kat!”

I turned to find Galok behind me, next to the tent. On a flat stone, there was an array of smoked meat, valok, and what looked like some of the yellow mushrooms that grew around here, sliced up.

“Um, hey,” I muttered, walking over slowly. As I walked, I felt a pleasant ache between my legs, the reminder of what we’d done last night. But Galok seemed to feel none of my awkwardness. He was beaming at me, gesturing down to the flat rock.

“I have prepared your breakfast.”

“Thank you,” I said, feeling famished. I sat down, poking at the yellow mushroom slices.

“Are these… you now… safe to eat?”

“I have eaten many in my life and it has caused no harm. I do not believe it should cause you any trouble.”

“Hmm…” I was wary about trying some weird fungus, but at the same time, the repetitive menu of meat and valok was getting pretty old. I decided to go for it, picking up one of the slices and taking a nibble. Galok sat across from me, watching me closely, and his face lit up when I cried out in surprise.

“Oh my God, it tastes like… like cheese! Like mozzarella!”

On Earth, it probably wouldn’t have been all that special. But here, where I hadn’t eaten anything but meat and cactus gel in ages? It was a goddamn delicacy. I gobbled the mushrooms up, and Galok happily trotted away to gather more. I ate some of the meat, too, then some valok, and yet more mushroom cheese slices of heaven. Full, I leaned back on my hands, sighing.

Galok was just finishing his own portion of the meal across from me. I watched him eat, fascinated by the bunching of the muscles in his jaws as he chewed.

“How long are we staying here?” I asked, suddenly realizing I had no idea what our actual plans were.

Galok swallowed, then wiped the back of his hand across his mouth.

“Regrettably, Gahn Buroudei only gave me two days of leave from tribal duties.”

My heart sank, and I was shocked at the depth of my own disappointment. I wasn’t ready to go back to the tribe just yet, to break the spell that had fallen over us.

“But when you came with Melanie and me to the mountains, that was more than two days.”

“Yes,” Galok replied, “but that was as commanded by Buroudei. Those were my duties; it was a trip done in service of the tribe, helping you to complete your work. Unlike this trip, which has solely been for…” he grinned, his sight stars pulsing mischievously, “personal pleasure.”

Heat crept up my neck at his words, and I coughed, suddenly choking on my own spit. That’s a great look, Kat. Really.

“So, if you still wish to visit the ship on the way back, we should leave soon.”

“Alright,” I said with a sigh. “But you have to promise to bring me back here sometime.” Galok’s sight stars tightened as he looked at me.

“It would be my great honour. And pleasure.”

I groaned, rising to my feet.

“Do you have to make everything dirty? Look, if we’re going to leave soon, I want to take advantage of the water one more time. Have a bath.”

Galok rose, too.

“What is a bath?”

“It’s when you get in the water to clean yourself.”

“Ah. You will have to do this without clothes, yes? To properly clean yourself?”

His gaze had turned positively lascivious.

“Yes, I will. But no funny business, Mr. I Hate Water.”

Galok’s tail jerked and he threw his hands up between us in a very human gesture of placation. Turning from him, I jogged back into the tent, grabbing my spare set of clothes then heading to the banks by the deeper pool.

“Don’t watch me, creeper,” I called over my shoulder, though I wasn’t sure why I was feeling so self-conscious. He’d already seen all of this last night. He’d literally been inside this, for fuck’s sake.

But still. That was last night, when it was dark. Out here, in the bright light of morning, it made my ears burn.

“What does creeper mean? Bringer of great pleasure? Adored one? Mighty warrior?”

“None of the above,” I tossed back, smiling now. I glanced over to see that he had obediently turned his back. I stripped, then plunged into the water. I waded over to a spot shaded by the overhanging paddle-like branch of a huge babkit tree, then splashed happily downward, crouching so that the water came up to my shoulders.

“I really should be watching you, you know. In case of predators,” Galok called over. I stared at his muscled back, lined with straps and weapons. My gaze tracked down his powerful glutes, his muscled thighs. The spinning track of one of those weird little tentacle turtles distracted me, and I snorted.

“Predators? You mean these little shell things? I think I’ll manage, thanks.”

“But what about your talka gel? Do you not require that for your bath?”

Shit. I’d been so excited about the water part, I’d forgotten about the soap. I looked around, and there weren’t any stalks within reach. I didn’t really want to get all the way out of the water to get one.

“Fine.”

Galok spun to face me immediately, sight stars buzzing. I crouched down further, wondering just how much he could see beneath the water. He snapped off a talka stock growing near his feet then loped over to me, sitting on the banks directly behind me. I twisted, still crouching and submerged, reaching for it. But he held it just out of reach, fangs glinting.

“Not so fast, my little Kat. What will you give me in return?’

“Excuse me?” I balked. He’d always just… given me stuff. I narrowed my eyes at him in suspicion.

“A fair trade is all I ask,” he said, almost sweetly, dangling the talka stalk over my head.

”Well, what do you want?” I snapped, scowling.

His smile faded, his gaze darkening.

“More kissing.”

I jolt of heat went through me, and I licked my lips.

“Fine. Bend down here.”

He didn’t move.

“No, you must come out of the water to me.”

This fucking guy. He was going to make me get out of the water, all dripping and naked, just to get some soap? But even if I went to grab my own talka from somewhere else, he’d still see me running around naked, anyway. Pretty sure that my entire body was beet-red, I quickly stood, water spraying around me at my aggressive movement. I splashed up and out of the water, bending to where Galok stood, planting my mouth firmly on his. His lips opened immediately, and, fuck me, I wanted to dive right into them. Wanted to slick my tongue inside. But I didn’t. I yanked the talka from his hand then ran back into the water, splashing down into a crouch once more.

“Thanks,” I said, grinning at him. He cocked his head at me, but sighed, acknowledging my victory in the battle for the talka. I cracked the stalk open, squeezing the herbal-smelling stuff into my wet hands and sudsing myself up, cleaning everywhere. The entire time, though It’d turned my back, I could feel the heat of Galok’s gaze on me. And it was growing hotter by the second. Eventually, when I was finished, I tossed the talka husk onto the banks and drifted around in a half-crouch, sighing in relaxation.

“I have always considered myself a disciplined warrior.”

Galok’s words had me wrenching my eyes over to him. He was standing now, and I gulped, eyes bulging at the fact that, besides his weapons, he was now buck fucking naked, his cock so huge and hard it cast a shadow down his leg.

“But that discipline is being tested mightily now.”

His words sent a thrill through me. Good thing I’m in the water. He won’t come in here for me. He hates it too much.

Well. I found out pretty quick that I was wrong about that.

Because a moment later, Galok was stalking through the water. He reached me in no time, and crouched beside me. I flinched and squealed, falling back onto my ass. He moved to his knees, his hands planted in the water on either side of my back.

“I thought you hated the water,” I whispered, my eyes falling to the firm set of his mouth.

“I do. But I hate aching for you from a distance more.”

And then his mouth was on mine. This time, I opened myself without hesitation. I felt a growl build in his throat, and his hands moved from the rocks of the bottom to my waist, then up to my breasts. He groaned into our kiss, then in a rough, sudden movement lifted me and laid me on my back in a shady spot on the bank. He towered over me, though he was still on his knees, then plunged downward, burying his face between my legs.

Oh, fucking fuck. Jesus Christ. Holy shit.

Every curse word I knew ran through my head as my mouth fell open in a blank, soundless scream. Galok’s centre tongue was inside me, stroking in and out with fervour. His hands were like iron at my hips, and I could hear him making small moans of pleasure against my pussy. Into my pussy. I felt the vibrations of the sounds. As his centre tongue worked in and out, his side tongues slicked back, then up, tantalizing the nerves everywhere. I gripped the back of his head, no longer willing to put up a proud front, no longer willing to fight him. This was just too fucking good.

So I leaned into it. Let myself go completely. Lost myself in Galok.

My scream was no longer soundless as I came, hard and convulsing, around Galok’s tongue. But he kept going, not stopping until I pressed on his head, crying out in sensitized agony.

He rose, his gaze fierce, his mouth wet, and I felt like I was going to come all over again.

“I cannot wait. Your taste has driven me to the edge of madness,” he groaned, positioning himself on top of me.

“It’s alright, go, go,” I replied in desperation, already spreading my legs wider. This time, he pressed inward without hesitation, and my jaw cracked as my mouth widened at the sensation of stretching fullness. Galok grunted, pausing for a moment, before beginning a merciless rhythm, his hips snapping. It felt like he was somehow even deeper inside me than last night, and I moaned endlessly, pleasure building again. When I came, I felt Galok tense, his breath shuddering out of him.

“When you peak, you… squeeze me,” he said, his sight stars unspooled and unfocused. He was right. I could feel myself pulsing around him. The next time, I squeezed on purpose, activating my muscles to pulse around him harder. His sharp intake of breath made me burn, so I did it again. And again.

Galok’s lips twitched. A muscle in his jaw jumped. He remained totally still, no longer thrusting, just letting himself go against my body’s squeezing. A low groan emanated from him, and his eyes squeezed shut. A moment later he gave a loud cry, and on one last squeeze, I felt him explode, pulsing inside me, filling me. After his cock had stopped twitching, I gave one last squeeze for good measure, which earned me a sharp bark as Galok opened his eyes. He pulled out of me and hovered over me.

“You are otherwordly, it is certain. The way you have milked my cock… It is the stuff of dreams.”

I flushed hard at his words. The idea of milking his cock sounded filthy. But wasn’t that kind of exactly what I’d done?

And something that I already wanted to do again?

Galok pressed his mouth to mine, then kissed my cheek, then my forehead, then the soft place behind my ear, making me shiver. I would have let him keep kissing me, but I remembered his earlier words.

“Should we leave soon? To go to the ship?”

Galok made a disgruntled sound, but pulled away all the same.

“Yes, you are right. Your body makes me lose all reason, all sense of obligation.”

He stood and returned his loincloth to his hips. I had a quick rinse in the water, splashing between my legs, then dressed a few minutes later after the hot air had dried me.

Galok called his irkdu in from its desert roaming, and we packed up quickly. We were ready to go in less than what seemed to be about twenty minutes. Galok boosted me up, then joined me, and just like that, we were ready to go.

“You swear you’ll bring me back here,” I said, wrenching around in my saddle to face him. Galok looked surprised by my question.

“Yes, Kat. Of course. I have already promised you this. Why do you ask?”

I faced forward again, biting my lip.

“No reason. Nevermind.” Of course there was a reason. The reason being that I was scared that once we left this place, everything that had continued to grow between us would disappear like it had all been a dream. But shook my head to myself fiercely. That would only happen if I let it happen. Theresa’s advice came back to me. You can only control your own actions.

As we took off over the sand, I came to a decision. I was going to go for it with Galok. I was going to give this a shot. Come what may, I was going to do whatever I could to protect our new connection. I knew we’d still drive each other crazy, and that I’d probably still be my usual awkward self at times. But this was something real. And I wasn’t going to let it go without a fight.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Galok

We sped away from the land of my birth out into the neutral territory of the Sea Sands. The sand gleamed more delightfully, the sun shone brighter. Everything took on a new, pristine sheen of glory, now that I had lain with Kat. Even now, just having her lean back against me, for once not fighting the contact, was a blessing of untold value. It made everything arch with tighter beauty around me, remaking my entire world.

I did not want our trip to end. It was glorious, flying as we were, the wind whipping past us, driving over the sand. But before long, the ship came into view. I knew that it was Kat’s dear wish to go there. And I would not deny her this.

I turned my mount towards the massive domed creature. Only, from what I understood, it was not a creature. A ship. I still did not quite know what that meant. But I supposed now was the time I would get to see it all up close. This vessel that had brought the new women, brought Kat, to our world.

Kat sat up straighter, stiffening as we approached the massive thing. It gleamed in the late afternoon sun, though winds had begun to drive sand up at the sides. Slowly but surely, it was becoming one with the desert.

I slowed my mount as we got close. I felt, rather than heard, Kat sigh in front of me.

“I was so excited to come back here. And I am. I want to get back to the lab. But damn, the things that happened here…”

She was no doubt referring to the zeelk attack that had killed many of her fellows. Gahn Buroudei had witnessed the attack, and had saved Zeezee. Gahn Fallo’s men had taken the other new women.

“You mourn them,” I said, placing a hand on her shoulder. She sighed again.

“It’s not that simple. Some of them I don’t give two fucking shits about, man. Like Colonel Jackson, and some of the others who were responsible for all this. Fuck ’em. They deserved to get eaten by zeelk. But some others…”

She didn’t finish her words. Instead, she turned in her saddle. I leaped down, then helped her to the sands, glad that she was accepting my assistance so easily now.

“Well, no matter how weird it is, I’m here now. And I do have work to do. So let’s go.”

There was a large, broken-open part of the ship where we stood, but Kat led me around the back to another large, open part. I peered in, unsure about entering the cavernous space. There was something unnatural about it. Something off-putting. But my brave little Kat marched right in, and I could not let her down now, so I quickly followed. I held my spear ready at my side, scanning the space, but nothing seemed to move.

“This way,” Kat said, pushing back her hood and taking off her eye-shells now that we were shaded by the interior of the ship. She grabbed my hand, tugging, and with a spark of joy I curled my fingers around hers. Letting her lead me onward. I’d let her lead me wherever she wanted. Right into the path of a krixel, if she so commanded.

Luckily she did no such thing. Instead, she led me through a mangled-looking opening at the back of the large cavern we’d come into.

“Where we just came in was the cargo bay. It’s where we stored supplies for the journey. On the way out, I’ll have a look and see if there’s anything worth taking back with us.”

Now that we were through the opening into the belly of the ship, I gaped, staring up, then down, then all around me. This was unlike anything I’d ever seen. I was in a strange, long, tube. It was like a cave, but long and perfectly symmetrical, every surface shining and bright.

“Weird that all the lights and stuff are still on,” Kat murmured, frowning.

“Why is that weird?” I really had no idea what she was talking about, but asking her questions helped me feel grounded.

“The lights. They’re not natural, they’re not like fire or the sun. They’re human-made and powered. But I guess the ship didn’t actually crash or anything, and the power source is still intact. Which is really good, actually, since I’ll need light and some of the equipment in the lab.”

“Ah yes, the lab,” I said sagely, as if I understood at all what she was talking about. She squeezed my hand and pulled me down the shining tube.

“Come on. You’ll see.”

The tube wound and forked and wound some more. Like all Sea Sands warriors, I had a good sense of direction, but I found myself getting hopelessly muddled the further into the ship we went. I hoped very much that Kat would know how we were to get out again. But then again, even if I were trapped in here for the rest of my days, it would not be much of a bother if I were with her.

Finally, Kat led me through an open arch of sorts, into a large, strange space. The walls were perfectly flat, as was the ceiling, and everything was a blinding white, meeting at straight edges and sharp corners. There was no curvature or jagged surfaces of stone that I was used to. I held my spear a little higher, my tail twitching, casting my gaze about.

There were many objects in this place. Objects I had no name for. Strange jars made of completely clear stone. Flashing squares of light. Strange knives and tools made from a shining material instead of stone or bone. There were long rectangular slabs that floated in the room, some of them holding yet more strange objects upon them. Kat approached one of these slabs and set her pack down upon it. She opened the pack and began pulling out the stones she had collected in the mountains on our trip with Taliok and Melanie.

“What are you doing?” I asked, leaning over her shoulder to examine the work of her little fingers.

“Jesus! Don’t sneak up on a girl like that!” she scolded.

“I did not sneak. It is not my fault that human ears are insufficient to hear the quiet step of a hunter.”

“Yeah, yeah. So I’m going to be analyzing the rocks, breaking them down, looking at their chemical components. Seeing what might be useful for making sunscreen or other compounds we might need.”

“Right…” I did not want to admit to more of my ignorance, and yet, I did want to learn. But Kat’s words told me nothing. They were completely foreign to me. So I resolved to watch.

And watch I did. Fascinated, awestruck, and at times, a little unnerved.

She moved to and fro in the space as if she’d been born there, as comfortable and confident as I was out on the sands. Considering how formidable and strange a place this was, it was impressive to see. Her small hands flew over various tools and objects. She put on a strange white pair of hand-coverings, and a new pair of eye-shells, these ones completely clear instead of black.

“OK, now you have to stay back a little bit. I’m going to be using acids, and I might even use the laser at some point.”

“Acids… Laser…”

She turned to me, her expression fearsome.

“I’m serious. These are dangerous chemicals and tools. You don’t know what the fuck you’re doing in here, so let me take the lead this time. I listen to you when we’re in you’re territory, right?”

I cocked my head at her.

“Is that true? Do you listen to me?” I seemed to remember her kicking, screaming, and scratching at me when I carried her to safety during the attack in the mountains. And that was only one example. But she flapped her hand at me dismissively, returning to her work.

“Well, whatever. In here, I’m the boss, got it?”

“Yes, I understand,” I said, grinning, finding a spot to sit on the floor a few paces from her. I had no complaints about Kat commanding me. I was in awe of her strength in this habitat, her competence, her skill. She could command me as much as she liked, and I would leap to obey.

In here or out there, anywhere, I was hers.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

Kat

“Would you put those down?”

Galok swivelled to look at me through the two beakers he was holding up to his face like a pair of binoculars. The glass bottoms made his eyes look huge, and I snorted. He smiled in return, then pulled the beakers away from his face, staring at them with a furrowed brow.

“These are strange jars. What do you use them for?”

“All kinds of things. Be careful, they’re breakable.”

Galok placed the two beakers on a nearby work surface with almost comical tenderness. Which to be honest was probably good. He was so strong that I was surprised he hadn’t shattered them upon picking them up in his grip in the first place.

He had been sitting like a good boy for a while, but as time ticked on he’d obviously gotten bored. And now it was like I had a nosy 8-year-old in the lab with me, if 8-year-olds were in the bodies of grown-ass alien warriors.

“Don’t touch that!” I shouted, and Galok froze, mid-reach for a bottle of acid. “It’ll burn. Seriously. I don’t think even your thick skin would fare well against that stuff,”

“I see,” Galok said, stepping back. When he turned to me, he looked stricken.

“The world you’ve come from is fearsome indeed. You are powerful to command it so.”

I laughed so hard my safety goggles almost slipped off my face. Galok, the mighty warrior who rode a monstrous creature over the sands, who hunted huge beasts, who fought and killed other warriors on the regular, thought that the lab was a fearsome terrain?

I mean, I guess he’s kind of right. At least he’s taking things seriously.

“That’s right,” I said, nodding. “So remember what I said. I’m the boss in here. Don’t do anything stupid.”

Galok wandered off to look at some other human object with cautious interest, and I turned back to my microscope. I’d actually found something that was pretty promising. A compound that seemed to mirror a lot of the properties of zinc and titanium dioxide on Earth – something we could use for a natural sunscreen. It had come from one of the white stones we’d gathered in the mountains. It would take a lot more experimentation and analysis to make sure it would be useful, plus a lot of formulating to actually create a sunscreen, and I found myself grinning at the prospect. I loved this – being back in my element. And even though Galok was definitely not in his element, it was nice to have him here. To share this with him.

“Hey, Galok?”

He was at my side immediately.

“Yes, Kat?”

“I just… thanks for bringing me here,” I muttered, cheeks burning. Galok grinned down at me.

“Is it safe to kiss you, small one? Or are there dangerous acids I need to be aware of?” he teased, and I rolled my eyes.

“It’s safe.”

Galok leaned down and brushed his lips over mine. My body awoke immediately, pulses shooting downward. Something about this planet was apparently turning me into a freaking sex maniac, because the simple brush of Galok’s lips was making me grow wet. I parted my lips…

A resounding crash rang through the lab. Galok spun away from me, immediately pressing me behind him.

What the fuck? What is happening?

I wrenched to the side, trying to see what had caused the crash, my lips still tingling from Galok’s kiss.

A warrior stood in the doorway to the lab, snarling, a long dark blade in each hand. His tail had knocked a shelf of beakers to the ground. The glass glinted on the floor, carnage from his entrance.

“Who is that?” I hissed at Galok, then I looked at the warrior. “Who are you?”

Man, woman, alien, human – it didn’t matter. Nobody came in here and messed up my fucking lab.

“I fight for Gahn Baldor,” the warrior growled at me. He turned his gaze to Galok, spinning his blades in his hands. “I am here to gather information for my Gahn. But now that I have seen this female, I must take her.”

“You will not touch her,” Galok snarled, hefting his spear and drawing the largest blade from his back. Galok looked completely different from a few moments before, his face a dark mask of fury.

“You heard him, asshole. I’m not going anywhere,” I snapped at the intruder. My hands curled into fists, automatically raising in front of me. My reaction to stress had always been fight rather than flight. I would take this dude down myself if I had to. He was not taking me anywhere.

“You have no right to keep her, warrior,” the enemy growled. “My Gahn has been called by the Lavrika. And the mate he saw is not of our lands. He described a small pale creature like the one behind you now. I cannot leave her here, now that I have found her.”

Galok roared, a deafening sound that shook the nearby beakers and made my teeth tighten. It was a sound of fury and protection and hunger. A sound that shot through me like a gun, like one of Galok’s spears. It stole my breath.

The other warrior flinched at the sound, but didn’t move.

“You would keep this female at the cost of your own life, even if she is meant for a Gahn? You defy Gahn Baldor and earn your death?”

Galok took a step forward, his blades shining under the lab’s lights, his muscles bunching, primed to attack.

“I would defy any Gahn. I would defy the Lavrika itself. I would defy every god who has ever spoken its will over this world for her. You. Shall. Not. Touch. Her.”

Goosebumps erupted over my skin at his words, and my heart plummeted down into my guts. Because I realized what was about to happen, Galok was about to fight this guy for me. He was strong – I knew he was strong. But so was every other fucking dude in this place. The other warrior’s fangs gnashed, his powerful tail thrashing. He looked gnarly as hell, and panic rose in my throat. Not for me. But for Galok.

“Galok, no, stop!”

But it was already too late. Galok plunged forward, hurling his spear. The other warrior ducked, and Galok’s spear only clipped his ear. And then, they were on each other, limbs flying, tails thrashing, blades moving so fast they became dark blurs.

I had never felt this kind of fear before. I’d had the shit beaten out of me on the street. I’d been arrested, I’d faced things some people couldn’t have even dreamed of. But I’d never felt this helpless, gnawing, fear. The fear I’d lose something precious.

Something I loved.

No. I wasn’t helpless. I’d always been a fighter. And now I had something worth fighting for.

The urge to jump into the fray and put the other warrior into a headlock was an overwhelming one, but for once I made myself hold back. All that would do would be to distract Galok. I scanned my surroundings desperately, my eyes falling on something that might actually be useful.

Yes!

I took two steps towards it.

Then stopped, frozen by the most terrible sound I’d ever heard in my life. The sick sound of a blade crunching through something solid.

Something like Galok.

I turned in horror to find the enemy warrior standing above Galok, his blade sunk deep into Galok’s chest. Black blood pulsed outward from the wound. Galok gripped the blade, his face twisting, his feet scrabbling for purchase. But the other warrior leaned down harder, pressing the blade all the way in until the tile floor under Galok’s back stopped it.

Everything ground to a halt. Not even slow-motion. Everything froze. Galok was no longer moving. I was no longer breathing. The enemy warrior was pinned in his pose. The only thing I could feel still moving, still beating, was my broken heart, getting louder and louder and louder until it echoed in my head like a war cry.

A mangled scream sounded through the air, and it took me a moment to realize it was me screaming. I leaped at the attacker, fists flying, nails raking down his face. He let go of the blade that was buried in Galok’s chest and gripped me around my waist, forcing me away from him. My back collided with the shelves behind me, but I barely felt it. All I felt was the rage pulsing and the blood pounding and my heart calling out for Galok’s.

“You motherfucker. I will kill you for this. I will destroy you.” The words tumbled from my aching mouth. The man holding me against the shelves grew blurry, as if melting away, and for a split-second I thanked my lucky stars that this had all been a dream. He was fading into dawn, and I’d wake up with Galok holding my breakfast out to me in his huge hands.

But I was wrong. A few blinks told me that the blurriness came from tears. Not from dreams.

“Stop squirming, female. My Gahn will have my head if you are harmed,” the warrior hissed, but that only made me fight all the harder.

“I will have to bind you if you do not stop.”

I laughed, bitter, raging.

“You think you can take me? You think you can bind me and do whatever you want? I’m from motherfucking Detroit! I will fuck your shit up!”

With that, I reached up, grabbing for what I’d come this way for in the first place. I unscrewed the lid and whipped the jug acid at the enemy’s face. He screamed, pressing his hands to his eyes, stumbling backward. He felt along the wall, and when he found the exit, he moved blindly through it, disappearing. Every instinct in me told me to grab one of Galok’s weapons and finish that bastard off, but there was no time. I had to go to Galok first. I had to save him.

I tumbled towards Galok, falling to my knees on the tile. It was only then that I became aware of streaks of burning pain on my scalp and face. I’d been splashed by the acid, but luckily the goggles had protected my eyes.

This shit does not matter. Help Galok. Help him now.

I whipped off my gloves and pressed my hands around the source of the blood flow. My fingers slipped in the black liquid, and I cried bitterly, trying to press all the blood back in. But there was too much and it was flowing too fast, even with the blade still lodged in his chest.

“You’re such a fucking idiot! Why did you do that?” I screamed at him. His sight stars were loose and clouded, and he struggled to focus on me. He opened his mouth, but I snapped at him. “No. Don’t answer that. Don’t talk right now. I’m trying to think.”

This was a lab, not a med bay. There weren’t bandages or anything fucking useful. No magic Lavrika’s blood, no stitches, nothing. What I needed was a tribal healer, but Galok was at least two and a half times my weight. There was no way I could carry him back.

Maybe I could get the irkdu in here to drag him out?

But fuck, no, that was stupid. The irkdu would never fit through the doorways.

“There has to be something!” I screamed out loud. I felt the weak slip of Galok’s hand on top of mine. Even now, as he lay bleeding out on the floor, he was trying to comfort me. I fixed him with my blurred, burning gaze.

“Look. I’m telling you this because you’re on the verge of death, and I really need you to not die. Because…” I took a halting breath, then spat, “Because I fucking love you, OK? So you’re not allowed to die. I told you I’m the boss in here. So you’d better listen to me.”

The ghost of a smile pulled at one side of Galok’s mouth, and a well of doubt opened up in me. A well that was growing deeper and deeper. That told me Galok was going to die.

I pushed that thought away. It didn’t exist. Not in my reality. Not while I still existed. Not while I still fought.

Keeping my hands pressed to Galok’s wound, I whipped my head around, searching for something, anything, that could help us.

And when my gaze fell on the figure in the doorway, I wondered if maybe, somehow, in the fight, I had gotten wounded too. I wondered if I’d already died.

Because I was staring at a fucking ghost.

“Zoey?”

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Zoey

“What on Earth…”

I yanked my earbuds out of my ear, severing Power Wolf’s Incense and Iron. Well, I said my earbuds. But they’d actually belonged to one of the crew members. One of the crew members who’d gotten eaten by a crab alien. It turned out the members of the crew were actually allowed to bring personal items onto the ship, unless us girls who’d all gotten abducted, some of us in our literal PJs. Normally I’d feel bad about using a dead person’s iPod like this, but given the circumstances, it seemed fair enough. The circumstances being that I was alone and isolated in a lost ship in the middle of the desert with no one to talk to and not much else to occupy me. And, again, the whole abduction thing. Kinda felt like I was owed free access to this dead guy’s iTunes library. And, bonus, he had good taste – lots of bangers.

I brushed the Cheetos dust from my fingertips, leaning forward and pushing up my glasses. Yeah, the crew had good snacks, too. The whole security room, where I was sitting now, was stocked with chips, candies, granola bars – you name it. I hung out here a lot. It was one of the places I felt safest in the ship. For one thing, it was one of the innermost chambers, protected from the outside by layers and layers of walls and hallways and doors. Not that walls did much to stop those crab things when they’d attacked but still, at least on a psychological level, it helped me feel more at ease. But even more than that was the security cameras.

There were hundreds of them, all over the ship, all feeding into the screens along the walls in this room. I’d kept the ship’s power up and running in this section – not an easy feat, considering the fact that up until a few weeks ago I didn’t even know Earth had access to space travel. But luckily my experience as an engineer had helped me through most of the bumps, and I now had a cozy little spot with lights and AC security footage that I kept my eyes on most of the time I was awake.

I had to. I was constantly on alert for more of those black crabs, the giant monsters that had killed the entire ship’s crew. And besides that, the bipedal alien natives to the planet had come sniffing around here, too. Once, one had even come with a human girl. I couldn’t remember her name, but I recognized her – the pretty brunette linguist. They’d come for, presumably, supplies, taking boxes from the cargo bay. I’d wanted to rush out to the girl, to ask if she was OK, but the huge, alien warrior with her had made me too afraid. And then another alien had appeared, and he fought the first alien, and it just turned into a big old mess. The linguist had left with the first alien, and I’d comforted myself with the fact that she’d at least seemed pretty comfortable with him. She didn’t seem to be a hostage or anything.

More aliens, whom I’d nicknamed the Kangadudes, had come in a small group before that. They hadn’t come with any humans, and I’d watched them from here with growing apprehension, worried they’d charge in and discover me. They didn’t, luckily.

As I squinted at the security feed from the cargo bay, I realized I was being visited by yet another alien. And once again, this time, there was a human woman with him. Her name, I remembered. It was Katerina. Kat. She was kind of hard to forget, with her shaved head and piercings and the way she’d challenged the authorities of the ship left and right. I’d admired her, when I’d seen her speak up for herself, for all of us. Seeing her here gave me a little nudge, a little flash of courage. Maybe this time I’ll come out, Maybe this time I’ll tell them I’m still here…

I watched Kat and the tall alien move through the ship, coming in deeper than any others had before. It made my hairs stand on end, and I scrubbed my palms over my arms. After spending so long here, holed up and alone, the thought that someone was coming towards me was unnerving.

But they didn’t come towards the security room. Instead, they headed into the lab. I rolled my swivel chair over to the lab’s feed, watching intently, wondering what they were doing in there.

Kat seemed to be working on something, and the alien with her just… waited?

Definitely didn’t seem to be a hostage thing this time, either. In fact, the alien kind of seemed like Kat’s hostage, if anything. He sat on the floor, as if waiting for her, then got up and started poking around the lab. I clamped my lips shut, eyes widening a moment later when he… Oh my God… Did he just kiss her?

Maybe it was better to stay hidden here after all. Whatever was going on out there on this planet was obviously getting very weird.

It’s OK. Next time someone comes, if they’re human, I’ll show myself. But for now, I’ll just stay here. Where it’s safe.

Something caught my eye on another feed and I squinted, seeing a second Kangadude stalking through the ship. Where the alien with Kat seemed, at least from what I could see on the screens, mostly relaxed, this guy looked angry. He had weapons drawn, and my heart rocketed up to my throat when he entered the lab.

“Oh no. No no no no.”

I plunked the earbuds into the security jack, turning up the volume. I couldn’t understand a word anyone was saying, even, surprisingly, Kat. She seemed to be speaking whatever language the Kangadudes were. But how was that even possible?

I didn’t have long to worry about it, though, because suddenly the Kangadudes were on each other. I’d remembered Colonel Jackson saying the native species to this planet were war-like, and the more I saw of them, the more that was confirmed.

The second Kangadude got the upper hand, pinning the one who had come with Kat.

“Uh oh.”

Kat exploded forward, leaping onto the second alien. I jumped out of my chair, shouting at the screen, “What are you doing, girl?!” Obviously, she couldn’t hear me. But she kept on swinging. Not that it did much good. The alien grabbed her waist and shoved her back against some shelves.

This was it. This was the moment. Make or break it. Would I stay, or would I go?

I stared at Kat, pinned against the shelves, and knew that, yep, it was time to go. Watching aliens fight from here was one thing. I wasn’t about to watch one of my own get slaughtered right in front of me.

I let my earbuds drop, wiped my hands on my pants once more, and grabbed a taser from the locker nearby.

Then I ran.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Kat

“Zoey?”

The figure moved into the room, coming into the light. Yup, it was definitely her. The lab’s fluorescent glow illuminated her high cheekbones and glinted down the lengths of her black braids. She moved towards me slowly, her mouth pinned into a tight little line.

“What is happening?” she asked, looking stunned. “I thought you were about to get murdered by that other Kangadude.”

“Yeah, I gave him a little surprise,” I said glancing at the jug on the floor. “Stay away from that.”

She stepped carefully around it and came to my side.

“Oh, Kat, your face!” Zoey’s brown eyes were huge behind her glasses.

“It’s fine,” I muttered. The burning sensation had become more prominent, now, streaking pulsing pain down my face and neck. But I didn’t give a shit. Galok had it a hell of a lot worse. And he wasn’t going to last much longer.

“Look, I’m going to assume you’ve been chilling in the ship this whole time, and I don’t have time to explain everything to you. I’m just going to say that this guy?” I looked down at Galok, now gone limp, and bit back a wave of tears. “This guy means a lot to me. I fucking love him, OK? And I am not going to let him fucking die here.”

My chest heaved, my throat burned. Zoey was looking at me like I had two fucking heads which, really, could I blame her? But none of that mattered. All that mattered was her answer to my next question. I stared into her face, begging her with my eyes.

“Will you help me?”

Her face hardened into an expression of determination.

“I will.”

Zoey jumped up.

“The med bay isn’t far. I’ll go get a stretcher. Hopefully he fits on it.”

She cast an unsure look downwards, then dashed out of the room, leaving me alone with Galok. I stared down at him, clenching my teeth so hard it hurt. My hands were slick with his blood. I pressed down harder.

“Galok, I swear to God, if you die right now I’m going to kill you myself.”

But there was no usual Galok smile, no arrogant retort. Nothing to let me know that he was in there and that he would be OK.

“Shit.” My hands were doing nothing to stem the bleeding. And I’d wasted time like a moron. I yanked my jacket off, wrapping it around the base of the blade pressed into his chest, tying it tight to stabilize the weapon and also try to stop the blood flow. Galok didn’t react to my touches at all. And that made me want to scream.

The clatter of wheels and the sound of running feet in the hallway distracted me from Galok. I looked up to find Zoey jogging into the lab, pulling a stretcher. She wheeled it over so quickly that she almost lost control of it before collapsing it down to the ground.

“He’s so big… do you think we’ll be able to get him on there?”

I didn’t bother answering. Because I knew we would. Literally nothing would stop me from getting Galok out of here.

“Grab his feet. And be careful. This big lug is strong, but right now…”

Right now he’s bleeding. Right now he’s dying.

Oh fuck. No. I couldn’t let myself stop to think about it.

Gritting my teeth, I hooked my arms under Galok’s. I met Zoey’s gaze, and she nodded. We both strained upwards.

Jesus Christ, he was heavy. We barely got him a couple inches off the ground. Zoey panted, her boots slipping in Galok’s blood.

“Over!” I gritted out, straining too hard to say any other words. We jerked him sideways onto the stretcher, but the clumsiness of the motion made me flinch. Galok’s destroyed chest was still rising and falling with shallow breaths, but we had to get out of here. Now.

“How’d you get this thing up?” I yelled, fingering the sides of the stretcher, my hands shaking. Zoey was at my side immediately, raising the stretcher. Together we carted it out into the hallway. Zoey started to pull it the opposite way I was, causing the whole thing to jerk.

“Shit!” I grabbed Galok’s leg to keep him steady.

“The med bay is this way!” Zoey exclaimed, moving to pull the stretcher again. God, there was so much she didn’t know. And no time to explain it.

“This is going to sound crazy, but the med bay isn’t where we’re going. We need a healer.”

“A what?”

“It’s like an alien doctor with magic milk that heals you. It doesn’t even sound real, I know. But that’s his only hope.”

Zoey stared at me, her lips pursing. I could tell that she thought I was totally fucking nuts. But then she nodded, and shrugged, as if to say, your alien boyfriend, your rules.

“Come on,” I grunted, pulling the stretcher forward. She grabbed the back of it, and together we ran back out to the sands.

Galok’s irkdu was blessedly nearby. But my stomach sank at the thought of trying to ride this thing without Galok. But without the creature, it would take hours to get back to the tribes.

Fuck it. Let’s give it a try.

The creatures were well-trained, Hopefully, it would kind of just know where we needed to go. Like a sled dog being told to go home.

In the language of the Sea Sands, I called the irkdu over. I didn’t know any of the various sounds or tongue clicks that the warriors usually used, but I hoped that using words would be enough. Luckily, it was. Because the beast lumbered over, stopping in front of us.

But there was yet another fucking obstacle.

“How do we get him up there?”

I could feel the claws of desperation starting to sink inside me. I was starting to panic. And panic was something I couldn’t afford. But how could I not, with Galok dying and no way to get him to help? It wasn’t like the irkdu had arms that could lift him up. And dragging the stretcher behind the irkdu would be too bumpy and slow.

But sweet, wonderful, amazing, alive Zoey had a plan for that too.

“Wait here,” she called, sprinting back into the cargo bay. A moment later she ran back, her arms laden with rope and some other random objects. She dumped it all on the ground, then went back to the ship, dragging back a big empty crate. Sweat shone on her brown skin, and I realized with a jolt she wasn’t wearing a solar protection jacket. Then I remembered that neither was I, since it was currently doing a piss-poor job of keeping Galok’s blood in his body

Luckily, by this point, the sun was dipping towards the horizon. But for some reason that filled me with dread. I had this awful sense that I could fix this during daytime. But that if I didn’t get Galok help by nightfall, he’d be doomed.

Zoey sprang into action beside me, using the crate as a step stool. She tossed and tied rope so fast it made me go cross-eyed. I blinked, grateful tears making my throat close when I realized what she’d done.

A pulley.

Thank fucking God it was the engineer hiding in the ship and not, like, Jocelyn the botanist.

“You hold him steady and push up while I pull,” Zoey instructed, tying rope around Galok’s legs to help keep him on the stretcher before she collapsed it down. I nodded, hurrying into position. Zoey started to pull, and I pushed upwards, up the irkdu’s side, as hard as I could. I could hear Zoey grunting on the other side. I tasted blood as my teeth sank into my lip, but I didn’t feel any pain. Not in that moment. All there was was the push, push, push to keep Galok alive.

The stretcher flattened, teetering, above my head. I held onto it, barely, and stepped onto the crate to have better access. Zoey ran around to my side, getting up on the crate beside me, and together we turned the stretcher lengthwise along the irkdu and lashed it into place. Luckily the irkdu were gigantic, and there was still room for Zoey and me to squish together in the saddle. I helped Zoey into the saddle, then plopped behind her, swivelling so that I was facing Galok.

“Hold on, this thing can go fast,” I said to Zoey in English before calling commands to the irkdu in the language of the Sea Sands.

“Take us to the cliffs. Back to the tribes. Fast!”

And thank fuck, the huge beast listened. I’d have to thank Galok for training it so well later.

We took off. I heard Zoey yelp, and felt her scrabble to grab onto the saddle, hunching down behind me. But I barely registered it. I was bent over Galok, pressing my hands against my jacket, pasting it harder against his wound.

Night was fully descending now, turning the sand a glimmering indigo. The ship disappeared into the distance, a speck of silver in the darkness.

“Keep breathing, Galok. Keep breathing. If we get out of this, I promise, I swear, we won’t just be dating anymore. We’ll do the whole mates thing. So you’ve gotta pull through. Think of all the pussy you’re gonna get on the other side!” I was babbling into the wind, tears streaming freely now. Now that we were on the move and there was nothing else for me to do for the moment, nothing else to distract me, I couldn’t stop the sobs tearing out of me. Galok was still breathing, but it was so laboured. It terrified me.

Zoey’s voice made me jerk.

“Um, should I be worried about the fact a literal dragon is coming towards us right now, or…”

“What!” I wrenched around, still keeping my hands on Galok. It felt like if I took my hands off him even for a moment, I would lose him.

Holy fucking shit, there it was.

The Lavrika.

It had to be.

I hadn’t seen it in the pools before. But this had to be it. It snaked gracefully towards us on the sand, its huge, majestic eyes pinning us. Behind it, the cliffs were a dark streak on the horizon. We were getting so fucking close, now.

The Lavrika stopped, looked at us once more, then turned, moving back towards the cliffs, faster this time. Realization dawned, and I yelled down to the irkdu, “Follow it!”

We didn’t need the tribal healers. Galok was too far gone for that. We needed the Lavrika.

At least, I hoped that was why it was here. To help us. It had to be… right?

The Lavrika led us away from the tribal settlement, and I hoped against everything I had that I wasn’t making a huge mistake to forgoing the tribal healers. But honestly? Galok needed a miracle. I’d never believed in miracles before. But I was ready to be proven wrong this time. I ached for it.

We approached a dark opening in the cliff face. A tall alien woman in a white tunic stood there with a spear, watching us approach with curious eyes. She raised her tail for the Lavrika, watching the huge dragon creature shimmy into the cliffside, its translucent starlight body disappearing into the darkness.

Zoey and I slid clumsily off the irkdu. I sprang right back up after my painful landing. But without the crate we’d used at the ship, neither Zoey nor I were tall enough to get Galok down.

“Fuck!” I screamed in English. I looked over at the Lavrikala, the woman guarding the Lavrika’s caves.

“You’re tall enough. Can you help us get him down? Please?”

I’d never begged anyone for anything in my life. But I was prepared to fucking beg if needed. I’d offer up my life in this moment, if it would make a difference.

But thankfully it didn’t come to that. The Lavrikala let her spear drop to the sand, running to us. Her long, strong arms undid the ropes holding Galok, and she helped shift the stretcher down into Zoey’s and my arms. We almost toppled right over under the sudden weight of Galok hitting us, but the Lavrikala grunted, jaw clenched, arm muscles bunching, righting the stretcher and bringing it down gently to the sand. Zoey popped the stretcher’s locks open, and it sprang up.

“Thank you,” I said to the Lavrikala.

“The Lavrika has summoned you to its caves. I do its duty. Its will is not for this warrior to die here tonight.”

Her words were a bolt of hot hope through me. Hope that the Lavrika wasn’t going to let Galok die.

“Let’s go!”

Zoey and I pushed the stretcher, but the wheels caught in the sand, barely moving.

“Lift!” The Lavrikala, commanded, going to the front of the stretcher and lifting it slightly while pulling forward. Zoey and I lifted, straining, getting the wheels out of the sand. We half-carried the stretcher to the entrance of the tunnel into the cliffs. I sagged with relief when we made it inside and could lower the wheels to the stone floor, rolling the rest of the way.

“I must remain at my post. You are in the care of the Lavrika now,” said the Lavrikala. I nodded to hear, unable to speak, and Zoey and I took off, me leading, her behind, through the darkness of the Cliffs of Uruzai.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Galok

When I came to, there was no pain. I floated in a vastness of white, unsure of where I was or how I’d gotten there. My head felt as if it were full of sand. I turned my head stiffly, this way and that, trying to get my bearings.

Kat.

I jerked and thrashed, everything flooding back. Kat had been threatened, I had fought…

Was she alright?

If I were dead, now, it would all have been worth it, a great glory, if she were safe now. I thanked my deep, wondrous luck that I’d gotten to sink myself into her cunt not once, but twice, before I’d fallen in battle.

But I did not know if she was alright. I swung my limbs, trying to propel myself from this place, my tail pumping. But I did not seem to move at all.

A shift in the white ahead caught my attention, wrenching my thoughts from Kat. A great, shimmering, serpentine head regarded me with unblinking eyes. Everything went still as I realized, at long last, where I was.

I was with the Lavrika.

Was I in its pools? I remembered Gahn Buroudei explaining his experience, and it seemed to match up. But he had been called to witness his mate and to receive the sacred mate bond in the pools. Why was I here, and how had I gotten here in the first place?

Before I could ask any questions of the Lavrika, it moved away, disappearing into the blinding white, leaving me with nothing. No answers.

Until I saw her.

Coming into focus more and more every moment. A small round head with no hair, and a perfectly strange human face dotted with glinting stones. Blue eyes so striking they ripped a hole in my heart.

It was Kat.

The Lavrika had summoned me. It suddenly did not matter how I had gotten here. I was here, and I was finally, finally seeing the face of my mate in the pools. My heart thrummed, my limbs burned. I was right. I had been right all along. Kat was mine. She was meant for me. She was my fate, my end, my everything.

And she had given herself to me before the mate bond had ever been born. We had come together of our own choosing, making everything that much stronger. We were bound both by our own hearts, and by fate.

And now, I would find my way back to her.

My Kat. My mate.

My all.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Kat

“So… now what?”

I glanced over at Zoey. She was standing near to me, next to the stretcher that was once again collapsed down to the ground. We’d dragged Galok off the stretcher and into the pool, and he’d sunk like a stone. I didn’t know if that was a good sign or bad. But considering the fact that he’d been barely breathing by the time we’d gotten in here, it was our only fucking shot.

“I don’t know. Wait, I guess.”

Zoey came to sit next to where I was crouching. The glow of the pools lit up her profile, glinting on the frames of her glasses.

“So this has been… a lot. I’m still not entirely convinced I’m not dreaming on the ship,” Zoey said.

“You’re telling me,” I muttered. “You don’t even know the half of it yet.” I started to explain everything to her, as much as I could. It was providing a good distraction from going out of my fucking mind with worry for Galok.

When I got to the parts about the mate bond, Zoey’s head swung to me, her eyes going wide.

“Um, what?”

“Yeah, I know. It’s fucking weird.”

“So… you and this Galok guy have this mate bond thing?”

“Actually, no. We just… fell in love. Like two idiots.”

“And the dragon thing that led us here? What the hell was that?”

“I don’t really know,” I answered. “Some kind of alien creature. The Sea Sand people imagine it to be some kind of deity, which maybe it is, considering it makes people fall in love and heals people with its blood. Or milk. Or whatever.”

“So this stuff heals, huh?”

“Yep. Like you wouldn’t believe.”

Zoey moved to her knees, bending forward and touching her fingers to the surface, brow furrowed. Then she slipped her hand beneath the surface, cupping some of the liquid and scooting on her ass back to me.

“Look at me for a sec, would you?”

Reluctantly, I did so. It felt wrong. Like looking away from the pools would mean I’d lose Galok. But I knew everything was out of my control, now. And I hated every second of it.

Zoey smeared the Lavrika’s blood over my face and scalp. She gasped quietly, then whispered, “You weren’t lying.”

I was so out of it it took me a minute to realize what she was doing and what she was seeing. The acid burns. I wasn’t very aware of the pain – it was a stinging throb I’d pushed to the back of my mind. But I could feel it growing less and less every second. Zoey dabbed some of it along my lower lip. I flinched at the contact.

“You bit down there pretty good,” she muttered, leaning back to admire her handiwork.

“Thanks,” I mumbled, turning my attention back to the pools. To be honest I didn’t really care if I got healed or not. It was nice she had done it, but it was pretty much at the bottom of my priority list right now.

“You’re a chemist, right?” Zoey said, once again wrenching me back from my thoughts.

“Yeah. Why?”

“Well… what do you think is in this stuff?”

She was standing at the pool’s edge now, staring down at the glowing surface.

“Don’t know. I’m hoping to look at it in the lab soon.” I felt my face tighten, my thoughts darkening. “I’m pretty sure this is the compound we were dragged here to study. I think that it can be used as an energy source somehow.”

“That makes sense. That would make it pretty valuable.” She swivelled to me. “You think they’re gonna come back for it?”

“They’d better not,” I hissed. I had no love for anyone involved in bringing us here. Except for Chapman, but she had paid her dues. Everyone else involved could get fucked, and if they came back. I’d fucking fight them all myself.

But I couldn’t think about that right now. I stood, breathing out harshly. It had been too fucking long. I was going to dive in there and drag Galok back out myself. I’d fight anyone – men or aliens, even dragon gods, to protect what was mine. And Galok was mine.

Just as I plunged one boot into the pool, a set of ripples came to meet me, and I froze. My heart exploded in my throat, and I heard Zoey draw in a sharp breath beside me. A dark shape floated to the surface, nudged towards the edge of the pool by the end of a snake-like tail.

It was Galok.

And I was about to find out if it was Galok Galok, my Galok, or just his body.

I splashed forward as fast as I could towards him. And it echoed a memory inside me. Memories of being at the oasis, wading through the water with him. And that opened up a great spewing tsunami of more memories – Galok grinning at me, his teeth glinting, his sight stars spinning. Galok shaving my head, running the blade over my skin so smoothly. Galok kissing me. Galok inside me. Pledging everything to me.

I seized his shoulders and fell to my knees in the shallows, pulling his head up into my arms.

His eyes were open.

His eyes were open.

And then, his sight stars pulsed, focusing in on me.

His grin was weak when it came, but it still came.

“Hello, small one.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Galok

I thought Kat would be happy to see me, but I should have known better by now. My Kat’s joys were always shrouded in her prickly anger. Her mouth fell open when I spoke to her, her brows pulling down into a sharp scowl. She took several shaking breaths.

She looked… upset.

Or perhaps…?

“Are you as overwhelmed by the sacred mate bond as I am?”

It was proving to be overwhelming. I’d already loved Kat, would already have given anything for her. But now, everything was amplified. She practically glowed above me, the brightest star in my life.

“You idiot!” she finally cried, her words marred by the stream of human eye-liquid leaking down her face. “Why did you fight that guy? You almost died!”

“Ah, yes. I remember it all…” I thought back to the ship, the encounter. “I fought him so that he would not take you.” My voice fell to a threatening growl. “Because nobody takes my mate.”

“Your what? Oh, did you hear me when you were passed out? Promising to be your mate if you survived?”

I had not heard that. I wished desperately I had. I would have loved to have seen those words fall from my proud Kat’s mouth.

“When I was with the Lavrika, it showed me your face. I was right – you are destined to be my mate.”

I smiled widely up at her, but she just kept scowling. Why she was not overjoyed by this news, as I was, was a true mystery to me.

“Well, that’s grand. But I’m more focused on the fact that you almost died, thanks.”

“How could I die before fully claiming you as my mate, now that the sacred mate bond was been awakened?”

“Oh, yay, the mate bond,” she said with a roll of her eyes.

I stole one of her hands off of my skin, raising it to my mouth and kissing the palm.

“Yes. The sacred mate bond. I feel it now, even weak as I am. In fact, it is making me stronger. I am sure it is replacing all the blood that I have lost even as we speak. Because there seems to be plenty of blood rushing to my-”

“Oh my God, stop. Stop!” Kat yelped, slapping a hand over my mouth. Her eyes flicked to the side, and I followed her gaze, surprised to see another new woman with her. And I was even more surprised that this was not a new woman I had ever seen. There weren’t many of them, and it had been easy to memorize their faces. But this face was entirely new.

Slowly, I sat up. Kat scolded me as I did so. I patted her soft cheek, smiling.

“Do not worry, small one. I still have some blood in me. And I promise it has not all gone… there.”

“I guess it’s a good sign you’re joking about bullshit like this,” she said, eyeing me warily. Her gaze moved down to my chest, followed by the soft trace of her fingertips. “Not even a mark,” she whispered, shaking her head. I looked down, too, to see my wound completely healed. I could tell that I was weakened and that I had lost blood. But I was not in danger of death now.

Unless it was danger of dying from my love for Kat. Because as my weak heart thundered for her, surged for her, I worried it might give out.

Ah, well. It would be a good death – to die of love.

But something told me Kat would not let me. Even now, her hands were slipping over my skin, pressing here and there, her eyes serious, checking for more damage.

“I am well, Kat. A warrior as strong as me is not so easy to fell.”

She snorted, her eyes catching on mine.

“The only reason you’re alive is because we got extremely lucky and had some help.”

“Help?” I looked over once again at the other new women. She gave me a stiff wave of her hand, a human gesture of greeting.

“Ah, yes.” I stood slowly, feeling my muscles stretch, trying to gauge my weakness. I frowned when I did not feel even half of my usual strength on my body. My head pulsed, heavy and light at the same time. I ignored that, though, and turned to the other new woman. “I am Galok. I am pleased to meet you.”

The new woman stared at me blankly, then looked at Kat.

“That’s Zoey. She doesn’t speak the language yet,” Kat said with a sigh. One of her small hands was on my lower back, one on my abdomen, as if to steady me. Not that her tiny hands would do any good if I were to fall. But still, I liked the sensation. I should get injured more often…

“Yeah,” Kat continued. “There’s a lot to explain. But for now, let’s just get out of here and go home, alright? I want the healers to look at you.”

“If you insist,” I said as we walked out of the pool. “But you must tell the healers to make their work quick. Because I am impatient to lay with my mate. In fact, I think the sweet wetness of your cunt is all I’ll need to bring me back to full strength. Yes, I am sure of it.”

“And I am sure that you are fucking full of it,” Kat said, still holding tightly to me. Having her as my grumbling protector was strange. As a warrior, I was used to being the one doing the protecting. But Kat’s fierceness made me smile. And when I thought of how she would guard our future cubs, my chest swelled with joy. Along with another part of my body…

Zoey, the other new woman, said something to Kat. Kat stopped, forcing me to halt as well. Confused, considering Kat’s impatience to leave a moment ago, I turned to see why they had stopped. My tail jerked in surprise to see the Lavrika rising from the pools.

Clearly, it was not finished with us, yet.

And its great gaze was pinned on Zoey.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Kat

“Should I be worried about the dragon staring at me?” Zoey said slowly, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Not sure,” I said honestly. “I mean, so far this thing has been benevolent. It probably wants to show you something. We all got, like, imparted with the Sea Sands language by dunking in there. Maybe it’s going to do that for you too.”

She pursed her lips, not moving.

“I can’t swim,” she said quietly.

I shook my head quickly. “You don’t need to. And you don’t need to hold your breath or anything. It’s… hard to explain.” This is why I needed to get the damn stuff under a microscope. See what the hell it was made of.

Zoey still looked unsure. I kept one hand on Galok, unwilling to be separated from the feeling of his warm skin for even a fraction of a second, and patted Zoey’s shoulder with my other.

“I think it will be OK. And honestly, it’s going to be a pain in the ass not understanding the language back at the tents.”

“The tents…” She sighed. “I hadn’t even thought that far. I hadn’t even thought about the fact I’d be coming with you after this. I got so used to the ship…”

“You don’t want to go back there, do you? You’d be alone, and there is weird shit out in that desert, man. Not to mention the warriors from the other tribes who might come sniffing around. It’s safer with us. And I’m sure the other girls will be so glad to see you.” I told her. We’d all been gutted when we’d realized one of our group hadn’t made it out of the zeelk attack. I still couldn’t believe she was real, she was here. And I was so fucking thankful that she was.

“You’re right. I’ve been hiding like a mouse in that ship for long enough.” She squared her shoulders, raising her chin. “I’ll be back.”

She moved to the edge of the pool, wading in. The Lavrika slipped beneath the surface and, after taking a deep, shaky breath, so did Zoey.

I held tight to Galok, watching the surface of the pool. Galok’s arms slipped around me, and I leaned into him. We stood in silence, just feeling each other. The steady beat of his heart under his skin was the most perfect melody I could have ever imagined.

It wasn’t long before Zoey emerged from the pool, wading forward to us. There was no sign of the Lavrika, now. Its business with us, whatever its intentions were, seemed to be done.

“Greetings, Zoey. Do you understand my words?”

Zoey’s eyes practically bugged out of her head. She whipped her glasses off, wiping Lavrika’s blood off their lenses with her tank top. Then she replaced them, staring at Galok.

“Yes, I do. How…?”

“Don’t question the magic alien dragon,” I said with a grin and a flap of my hand.

“Yes, do not question it,” Galok said meaningfully, drawing me closer. I flushed, realizing he was referring to the Lavrika telling him I was his mate. Well, whatever. I’d already decided I was his and he was mine. I was under total control of that decision, and it had happened without the Lavrika. So if the Lavrika wanted to confirm things now, that was fine, I guessed. But it didn’t really matter. Because the love was already there.

We moved through the dark tunnel back out onto the sands. The Lavrikala there greeted us, and Galok raised his tail to her.

“Thank you for assisting my mate,” he said, sounding more formal than I’d ever heard him before.

“The will of the Lavrika has been done,” she replied. “And I am glad to see it.”

LUCKILY GALOK WAS STRONG enough to help both Zoey and me up onto the irkdu before settling behind us.

“Did you bring me here, commanding the irkdu yourself?” Galok said, sounding confused. I turned around to look at him.

“Yes. And?”

His sight stars exploded outwards, and an awestruck smile unfurled on his face. He traced a claw down the side of my cheek.

“I have been truly blessed tonight. Tonight and all nights that I am with you. For you are a fierce mate, to command the irkdu so.” His smile got wider. “And it is only fitting that a warrior as powerful and strong as myself would be mated to you. Who else could tame the mighty Kat?”

I let out a shaky laugh. As annoying as his words so often were, hearing him joke like normal was a balm.

“Yeah, you keep thinking that,” I said, poking his carved-from-stone chin. Before I drew my finger away, he caught the tip of it against his lips in a soft kiss. I melted, the reality of everything crashing down around me. He was alive. We’d done it. We’d made it.

“Come on,” I said softly, settling into a more comfortable position behind Zoey. “Let’s go home.”

CHAPTER THIRTY

Galok

By the time we reached the settlement, the tribal fires had been extinguished. Or, the fire had been, as we were now sharing one fire. This made me glad. Another thing that made me glad was that the settlement was quiet. Any warriors who were awake were out patrolling, and everyone else seemed to be tucked into their tents for the night. This would simplify our return, as I would not have Gahn Fallo’s anger to contend with. Although, really, Gahn Fallo would have nothing to say to me, now. Kat was my mate, and as such, he had no right to stop me from taking her from the settlement. And, even more than that, we were returning with a lost new woman. Every woman was a precious gift to our people, and I was happy to have retrieved her from the ship. Though, really, I had done nothing in this act. Apart from helping her onto my irkdu now, I had done nothing. It had all been Kat, and Zoey, themselves. I had many questions – how they had gotten up onto the irkdu when I was unconscious, and how they had gotten me up there were chief among them. Once again, I was struck by the awesome power of the new women. Their strength. Their cleverness. I would have to have Kat tell me the tale of it, many times over, so that I could memorize her feats well enough to tell them to our cubs.

“OK. So. First thing’s first – you need to see a healer.”

Kat was giving me a sharp, serious look, but I could meet it with nothing but warm joy. Without answering her, I bent, capturing her mouth. She squeaked under me, then jerked back, bumping Zoey, who turned around in confusion.

“You. Healers. Now,” my mate fumed.

“I will see the healers, small one. But I must first see Gahn Buroudei. I must inform him of the attack against us. Gahn Baldor is growing bolder, moving further out from his territory.” With a jolt, I remembered the attacking warrior’s words. That Gahn Baldor had a mate from among the new women. I knew it was not Kat, as confirmed by the Lavrika. But then who? The majority of the new women were still unmated. It could be any of them.

Kat groaned, then sighed.

“Ugh. Fine. I’m going to get Zoey settled in at the human tent. But you’d better be with a healer by the time I’m done that, otherwise I will drag you out of Gahn Buroudei’s tent myself. And I bet Cece would help me.”

“I would not dare defy you, my angry mate,” I murmured.

“Sure, sure. Oh, I just realized, I don’t know where your tent is,” Kat said, looking around the settlement.

I grasped her hand, holding it up and pointing it to my tent. My tent was not far from Gahn Buroudei’s. It was a small tent, one meant for an unmated male. But I was no longer an unmated male. Tomorrow, my strength permitting, I would rebuild it, make it larger.

“It is there, my mate. Learn it well, as it is your tent now, too.”

Now that we had come in from the open sands, it was time to dismount. I did so slowly, not making my usual show of leaping down the way I often did to impress Kat. I really had suffered in the attack. I would have to take some time to heal. The wound was closed, but I was weakened from the bloodloss.

I helped Kat and Zoey down, walking with them to the new women’s tent. Kat did a strange gesture – poking the tips of two fingers towards her own eyes, then pointing them towards me aggressively, before slipping into the tent with Zoey. I had no idea what that was supposed to mean. Probably something like, I am blinded by my adoration for you, my mate.

Once Kat and Zoey were safely inside, I moved towards Gahn Buroudei’s tent. I was worried that I would interrupt an intimate moment between the Gahn and his mate, but all was quiet as I approached the tent.

“My Gahn,” I called softly. A moment of rustling, and then he appeared, stepping out into the night to greet me. I raised my tail, but the force of the movement almost set me off-balance. I recovered, bending and placing my hands upon my knees before rising.

“What has happened?” Gahn Buroudei said, his sight stars drawing tight. He knew me all too well. He knew such weakness was unlike me.

“Let us move away from the tent, Gahn, so that we do not wake your pretty mate.”

He grunted his agreement, and we walked together, not stopping until we were next to the cliffs, not within hearing distance of any tent.

“Kat has been safely returned to the new women’s tent,” I began. “But she will not remain there long. The Lavrika summoned me. Kat is my mate.”

Buroudei’s sight stars flared, and he smiled, clapping a hand to my shoulder.

“This is very good, Galok. There is no warrior who deserves it more than you. More mated women means more cubs for the tribe. A great happiness.”

“Yes, and the happiness is doubled, because it is not just Kat I have returned with, but also another new woman. One not counted among our current numbers.”

Buroudei sucked in a great breath, rubbing his chin.

“This is momentous indeed. Where did you encounter her?”

“I…” I trailed off, realizing I did not have the answer. Kat was the only one who knew. “I am not sure, my Gahn. I will tell you all I know.” I explained all I remembered – returning from our tribal lands and stopping at the ship. Kat doing her work, only to be interrupted by one of Gahn Baldor’s warriors. A warrior who wanted to take Kat, who claimed his Gahn had a human mate.

“The warrior bested you? And yet Kat is safe. Did you kill him but forget it due to your injuries?”

“No, I do not think so. I saw no body.” The more questions Gahn Buroudei asked, the more I became aware of just how much Kat had done for me.

“So your mate, the tiniest of all the new women, defeated a Sea Sands warrior, then managed to get you to the Lavrika’s cave to be healed? And not only that, but she retrieved another new woman?”

“Yes,” I said solemnly, suddenly aching to be near Kat. I longed to press my adoration and gratitude into her small body. And I longed to grow stronger for her.

“These new women are marvels,” Gahn Buroudei said, his tail swishing. “They are so soft of body and yet they possess a fearsome sort of strength. The kind of strength that could bring a Gahn to his knees.”

I bumped Buroudei amicably with my tail.

“Have you been brought to your knees, mighty Gahn?”

He heaved a sigh. “I cannot deny that I have. I am possessed entirely by Zeezee.”

“I have come to understand just what that means.”

Buroudei fixed me with a steady gaze.

“Thank you for your report. When your mate is ready, I would hear hers, as well. In fact, I would have her speak before all the Gahns. We must all know the details of what has happened. But this can wait until tomorrow’s light. Now go. Go see the healers.” He paused then, smiling slightly. “You need to see the healers so that you can regain as much strength as possible for when your mate returns to you.”

“Yes, Gahn,” I said, raising my tail. I left him to go find one of our tribal healers, but my mind was already looking forward to what would happen after.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Kat

It didn’t take long after our arrival in the tent for everyone to wake up in excitement. Theresa had stirred at our entrance, and when her sleepy eyes had settled on Zoey, she’d screamed in delight, jumping up from her hides.  The moments afterwards were a flurry of candles being lit and girls hugging, laughing, and crying at the fact that Zoey was OK. It was so much like when we had reunited with Cece after thinking she was dead, too. We were all OK. We were all back together again. I couldn’t keep the damn smile off my face.

“I can’t believe you’re here. Tell us everything!” Theresa quipped, grinning from ear to ear. Theresa dragged Zoey down into a seated position in the centre of the group of positively agog girls. I stayed at the edges of the group, listening as Zoey explained that, during the zeelk attack, she’d split off from the group and had hidden in the bowels of the ship.

Even though I wanted to hear everything Zoey had to say, my mind was already drifting back to Galok. I fidgeted, scrubbing my hands over my scalp, fiddling with my piercings. When I could tell Zoey was getting close to talking about how we’d met up, I decided to get out of there. I didn’t really want to be the centre of attention, answering a bunch of questions, right now. I just wanted to be with Galok.

I slipped out of the tent, saved from being noticed by everyone’s attention on Zoey. Once out of the tent, I started jogging, then sprinting, to the tent Galok had told me was his. I had been away from him for too long. What if he’d keeled over in the time we were apart? What if he wasn’t OK after all?

Heart in my throat, I reached the tent, whipping the flap aside and stepping inside.

I stopped mid-stride, arms windmilling as I fought to keep my balance and not walk directly into the bent figure of an alien woman. She straightened and turned to look at me.

“You are Galok’s mate?”

“Um. Yes. Hi,” I said in a rush, panting from running. It was the first time I’d said it out loud. I’m his mate…

“You are very lucky to have reached the Lavrika’s pools when you did. He came very close to dying.”

“It was not luck,” Galok piped up from behind her. “Not luck, but the strength of my lovely mate’s stubbornness.”

The healer’s wizened face wrinkled as she grinned.

“You two are a good match,” she said, looking me up and down. And for some reason, this made me flush with a wiggly, squirmy, embarrassed sort of pride. I didn’t know this healer, as I had only met the ones from Gahn Fallo’s tribe, but she gave off a wise, grandmotherly vibe that I instantly liked.

“The Lavrika has healed Galok’s wounds, but he should stay lying down for a few days. I have given him herbs to regain some strength, but he should not rise from the hides if possible.”

I nodded fiercely.

“You got it.” I bent around her, pinning Galok with my eyes. “You hear that? You need to stay lying down.” Turning my attention back to the healer, I said, “I’ll make sure he follows your instructions.”

She smiled again.

“Yes. I believe you will.”

She headed towards the tent’s exit. I had to move out of the way for her in the small space.

“Thank you, Rika,” Galok called brightly. The strength of his voice made me sigh with relief.

When Rika was gone I sat on the ground next to Galok, cross-legged, leaning forward with my elbows on my knees. I squinted at him, letting my eyes run over his form. For once, the straps holding all his weapons to his back were gone. There was a hide blanket draped over his legs and waist, but his torso was on full display. A candle flickered on a small bone shelf behind his head, the light dancing down over his smiling face and the ridged muscles of his chest and abdomen.

“So… you good?” I asked. My eyes fell to the spot where, impossibly, only a few hours before, a huge knife had been. Where he’d been bleeding. Where my desperate hands had clutched and pressed. There was a slight sheen to the skin there, but otherwise there was no indication that he’d been injured. Thank you Lavrika. Thank you Zoey. Thank you Lavrikala…

Damn, I had a lot of people to thank. It felt weird, having people help me so readily. Having people I could rely on. Weird, and nice. Kind of. I was pretty sure.

“I am good now that you are here. I will be better once you are in my bed,” Galok said, a long arm reaching out to brush a claw down my bare arm. And I could have scoffed at the cheesiness of his line. I could have batted his hand away and once again called him an idiot for putting his life on the line for me. But I was just too fucking tired for any of that. Too tired, and too relieved and grateful and full-to-bursting with a whole host of other emotions I was sure it would take me days to make sense of. So instead, I kicked off my boots and socks, wiggled out of my pants, and flopped down next to him.

“Move over, would ya?” His big body was taking up pretty much all of the space in the bed. He rolled onto his side, facing me, then moved over a bit before drawing me hard against his chest with strong arms. And they did feel strong. Maybe not up to the usual intense strength all these dudes were born with, but enough that I was able to really start believing he would be alright after all of this.

“Do not worry about this small space, Kat. Tomorrow I will start preparations to expand the tent to better make room for you.”

I frowned at him, shifting over onto my other side to face him, nuzzling down so that my head was resting on his huge bicep.

“Don’t think so. Rika said you need to stay horizontal. You can tell me what to do, if you want, and I’ll do it.”

A single alien fingertip traced down the bridge of my nose, then across my cheekbone. The touch was so gentle it almost hurt.

“I believe you would, and you would do it well. The more I come to know you, the more you impress me, small one. I am only starting to grasp just how much you have done for me.” Galok’s face turned serious. “What happened to the other warrior? The one who attacked.”

Rage pulsed in my chest at the thought of that bastard, and even though I was tired as hell, I was suddenly ready to fight all over again.

“I burned his fucking face off. And if he ever comes back here, I’ll do a fuckton more than that,” I seethed. Galok’s sight stars shifted outward, then back in, little glimmers of copper shifting in the candlelight.

“You are truly a mighty warrior, Kat. I am proud to have you by my side. Though I must admit, I am a little ashamed.”

I froze.

“Ashamed of me?’ I could barely choke the words out. After everything, was he finally seeing what other people from my old life had seen? That I was too loud, too aggressive… Too much?

And not enough?

Galok pressed his hand to the side of my face urgently, shifting his head down so that we were eye-to-eye.

“No, Kat! No. Never that. Only ashamed that I did not protect you better.”

“Are you serious?” I cried. “You went to bat for me without even a second of hesitation! You almost died for me!”

“Yes. But I still failed you. Because I was bested, because I almost died, you were in danger.”

“Don’t be stupid,” I muttered, poking his forehead. “We’re in this together now, you got it? We’re both going to protect each other. It doesn’t have to be one-sided. It doesn’t have to be all you.”

“I am beginning to see that, now. I am seeing all that the mate bond offers, all that you offer. And I am in awe of my own luck. I have been blessed beyond measure.”

I hunched down, pressing my forehead against his warm chest, not ready for all those compliments. I shifted slightly, pressing one of my legs between his.

“Um, Galok, are you fucking hard right now?”

“Yes. What I felt for you was intense before. But now that the sacred mate bond has awakened…” His words cut off as he gave one hard rock of his hips against me, making me gasp. “It is beyond anything I have ever experienced. Even weakened as I am, I want you. I am desperate to be inside you.”

I was desperate for that too, if I was being honest with myself. After almost losing him, I wanted to do anything to tie him to me, to feel a strong, physical connection. To feel him hard and alive inside me.

But that would have to wait.

“No,” I said firmly. “You are an invalid. You are going to rest. You are going to get better. And then we can do more… mate things.”

I turned roughly, plonking down on my other side, facing away from him and closing my eyes meaningfully.

“Now, go to sleep.”

“I wish to do only as you ask. But I cannot sleep when so much beauty is before me.”

I sighed, rising up slightly and rolling my eyes. With a huff, I blew out the candle, plunging us into darkness.

“There. Now there are no distractions. Go to sleep.”

“Oh, little Kat. You vastly underestimate my desire for you if you think a lack of seeing you gets rid of all distractions.”

I knew what he meant. The press of his cock against my ass was turning my spine into warm syrup. My skin tingled, and my breath came shallower.

But I was not about to fuck my barely recovered mate. No sirree.

“You just save all that energy for healing. No hanky panky!”

“What is hanky panky?”

Good grief, this conversation could go on forever. I ignored his question, clamping my eyes and my mouth shut, hoping that his goofball would take the hint to get some damn rest. Finally, it seemed he did so. He tossed a strong, heavy arm over me, drawing my back against his chest. I felt his face press to the top of my head, and I knew just by the feeling that he was smiling.

“Good night, my mate,” he whispered.

And like that, we let exhaustion overtake us.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

Galok

When I awoke, it was to the dim light of dawn pressing into through the flaps of the tent. I took a long slow breath in, feeling the rise and fall of my chest. There was a slight ache there, nothing more. No pain. And I already felt stronger. As much as I hated to admit it, my brilliant mate had been right. I’d needed the rest.

Speaking of my brilliant mate, she was currently clutching to me fiercely. I was on my back, now, having moved in my sleep, and Kat was holding fast at my side, one arm and one leg tossed over my body as if protecting me even in sleep. Her little hand was curled into a fist against my skin. I stared at her face in the gloom, feeling exquisite love for every feature. I loved her waking expressions, but I loved seeing her like this, too – her face relaxed and still. One of her cheeks was pressed against my chest, squishing inward towards her nose and creating an adorable crease. I could not help but trace that line gently with a finger.

But at that motion, her expression was no longer peaceful. Her nose twitched, her brows bunching inward. She shifted, her leg pressing onto my groin. And suddenly, all traces of sleep were gone from me. I was slammed with a need more powerful than anything I’d ever experienced. I had come close to death yesterday. But I felt that now, if I did not claim my mate in this moment, I might truly die.

“Kat,” I groaned, running a hand up her back. I caught the edge of her tank top as I did so, flattening my palm against the curve of her spine.

Kat slurred something in her native tongue, still drenched with sleep. Heat cascaded through my body, pulsing into my cock. My cock pressed adamantly up against the underside of her thigh. Just the feel of her skin there was sending me spiralling.

“Kat,” I said, a little louder, a little more insistently.

This time, a large blue eye cracked open.

“What time is it?”

“I do not know the meaning of your question,” I said in a rush. All I knew was how badly I wanted her.

I kissed her, and in the tenderness of her sleepiness, she opened immediately, her soft wetness making me ache all the harder. I slipped a hand downward, brushing a knuckle along her folds, touching her through the thin fabric of her strange undergarments. Touching her through her clothing was brutally erotic, and I groaned, bucking my hips. I flipped my hand, palming her, feeling dampness as my tongues invaded her mouth.

But then she pulled back with a gasp.

“Oh no. No. No. It is not time for this nonsense. You’re still recovering.”

I bit down a harsh growl of desire. I grabbed her hand, pressing it to my hardness.

“Feel me, Kat. I may not be at my full strength, yet, But I am strong enough for this.”

Her eyes went wide at the feeling of my cock.

My voice grew hoarse. “I need this. I need you. More than anything.”

I hooked a finger beneath her undergarment, being very careful of my claws. I drew the pad of my finger along her folds, feeling slick heat there. Her wetness made me lurch with a feral desire, and I moved up and over her, on top of her, moving to probe that wetness with the tip of my cock, her undergarments forced to the side. Though it was torture, I would not enter her if she kept saying no.

“You’re supposed to be lying down,” Kat breathed, but I could tell that she, too, was succumbing to this. This intensity. This need. Her legs were spreading beneath me. Her hips arched upward, her entrance tasting my tip, making me shudder.

“I am lying with my mate. Surely that must count,” I ground out. Kat rocked her hips again, and my tip dipped slightly inside her, making my balls draw up tight with heated pleasure.

“It doesn’t count,” she said, more firmly this time, and she drew that beautiful cunt away from me. I felt bereft, but I dutifully obeyed her when she told me to get on my back.

My Kat was a stubborn one. Ah well. Even if I have to wait many days for this, it will be worth it. Though I hope I do not have to wait many days…

It turned out I did not need to wait at all. Once on my back, Kat stripped out of her skimpy clothing before tossing one knee over each side of my hips.

“Good thing you’re not as wide as some of these other guys, or I’d never be able to straddle you,” she said. I watched in fascination as she hovered over the tip of my cock, her hand falling between her legs.

“How does that feel? Pleasuring yourself…” I swallowed hard, feeling my cock stiffen even further at the sight of Kat’s fingers playing between her golden curls and pink folds.

“Stop asking embarrassing things,” she panted, moaning. She moved, her hips rocking in a sensuous motion. And it was the most glorious sight I’d ever been blessed with.

But the glories just kept coming. A moment later, she shimmied back and down, pressing herself against the tip of my cock. Keeping one hand between her legs, with her other she gripped me, making me tense, and guided me into her.

She moved slowly, agonizingly so, pressing down, down, down over my shaft. My body screamed at me to buck upward, hard, grip her hips and drive into her. But I did not. Though it was agony, the tight wet pull of her moving so slowly was arousing me even more. I reached up, no longer able to keep myself from touching her. My thumb probed the glinting stone at her belly button, and then my hands rose to grip her breasts. Seeing her above me like this, her pale chest completely covered by my huge hands, almost made me burst right there. She leaned forward, pressing into my hands and sighed.

“I’ve never done this position before. My legs are too short to do this properly with someone so big.” I could feel her thighs quaking against my hips. I had thought it was from desire, but now I realized it was her muscles quivering from holding herself in this position.

“How can I make it better?” I asked.

“I don’t know. I’ve never been on top so I don’t know the… variations. And you have to stay lying down.”

I had even less experience than she did. But I would make this work for both of us.

There was no way I would not finish claiming my beautiful mate now.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

Kat

My quads were on fucking fire. I was able to (barely) straddle Galok and get him partially inside me. But his dick was too big for me to just sink completely down onto his hips. So I was left in this awkward, half-hovering position that my thighs definitely did not appreciate.

But even so, I didn’t want to stop. Galok wasn’t the only one who was panting for this. Having him inside me, but not able to move very well, was torture.

Galok’s hands slipped down to my hips, and he pulled me up and off him. He grunted as he slipped out, and I gave a small cry. I wanted him back inside me. As fast as humanly possible.

Is sex with aliens just better than with humans? I wondered. My only encounter on Earth had been nothing like this. Or is it better because I love him?

“Here, come lie against me,” Galok growled. I settled on my side, facing him, but he turned me over with his powerful hands. He pulled my back tight against him, settling my ass against his cock. I arched in anticipation, realizing he was about to enter me again.

I felt the heat of his cock nudging forward, and I angled further back against his pelvis. He grunted, gripping my hip with stone-like fingers as he pressed inside.

“Oh, God,” I moaned as he pushed in. This angle was… everything. He drew out slightly, then pressed back in, urging me to open further for him. I mewled, and with a choked sound, Galok let his hand drop forward between my legs to press against my clit.

Waves of pleasure moved outward from my pussy – from everywhere Galok’s cock and fingers touched. Hearing his grunting, ragged breath above and behind my head was making me lose my fucking mind. On Galok’s next thrust, he went even deeper, his cock spears slicking up against my ass.

“Is this position… good?” Galok asked, barely able to choke the words out as his cock slicked in and out of me faster and faster.

“Yes. Yes, holy shit, yes.” The girthy underside of his cock was hitting an invisible point of pleasure that was making me shake. My eyes were wide open, but I couldn’t register anything in front of my face. Everything seared white as I came, pulsing around Galok’s length, bucking against his firm fingers.

Hot breath at my ear made me jolt, and then the slip of three tongues down my earlobe made me cry out and pulse harder.

Galok’s thrusts were becoming more powerful, more quick. I rode them out almost totally limp, my eyes rolling back, lost in the overwhelming sensations of him going even harder after my orgasm. Galok’s fingers moved up to circle one nipple, then the other, before growing tight, gripping my breast as he tensed and came.

I felt him jerk and explode, filling me with heat. His forehead came down against the top of my head, his breath heavy on my skin as he spoke.

“You are mine, small Kat. I have known it so long, and with such certainty, that fate has now made it so.”

“Still so humble,” I muttered, turning my head back to look at him. “Maybe I’m the one who made fate happen. Ever think of that?”

Galok’s lips found their way to my forehead, then my temple.

“I had not thought of that. But it would not surprise me. No one can withstand you, my mighty, tiny mate. Not even the Lavrika would dare defy you.” He wrapped his arms around me, snuggling me inward, his cock still half-hard inside me.

“That’s right,” I huffed. I tried to sound annoyed, but I had a stupid grin plastered on my face. “Don’t you forget it.”

Galok’s chuckle tickled my neck.

“I will not forget it, Kat. Not for the rest of my days.”

The rest of my days…

We had a whole life spread in front of us now. A path to follow together. Not long ago, I would have found the thought absurd. But now? Now, there was no other life I wanted to picture, no other path I wanted to take. I grabbed his forearm, pressing his grip harder against me, making one correction to the last words he’d uttered.

“The rest of our days.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

Baldor

I stared down at Ark. He was seated on the hides of the healer’s tent, his eyes bound. His irkdu had made the journey home without its master’s eyes. Which was fortunate, considering that the healers had only been able to restore Ark’s sight partially.

“Tell me again what the female looked like,” I commanded, seating myself before the injured warrior.

“She was a bitter creature,” Ark hissed. I tensed, about to rebuke him for insulting the woman who might have been my mate. But I forced myself to settle and hear his report. He had killed the other warrior, but he had lost most of his sight in the process and did not know if it would return. It did not surprise me he was angry.

“She had very strange eyes, Gahn Baldor. Large and round and white in a tiny face. Blue and black in the centre. She had no hair, and her face and strange low ears were punctured in many places, the holes stuffed with stones.

I regarded him in silence, thinking. Some accounts of this female sounded similar to the face I’d seen in the pools of the Lavrika. The strange low ears, the white round eyes. But other parts did not match up. The female I had seen had hair. And her eyes had no blue to them.

Ark had seen another new woman in the mountains of Gahn Irokai, too, but she also did not match the description of my mate. Ark had been the lone survivor against the new Gahn Taliok, escaping with his life and news of the arrival of these foreign females. The warrior he’d killed at the bizarre shining structure in the desert had been one of those in the mountains with Gahn Taliok, he’d claimed. And I was glad he’d avenged my lost men, though he’d paid a hefty price for it.

“Do not doubt that I will have the healers tending to you night and day, Ark. If your sight can be retrieved, they will do it.”

Ark shifted in his seated position, raising his tail over his already-covered eyes.

“I am sorry, Gahn. I have failed you. When the bitter small woman blinded me, I was filled with fear. Fear that was not befitting of a warrior. I should have relied on other senses; I should have brought her to you.”

It would have been useful to have captured her, certainly. To have gleaned more information about her kind. And find out the weak points of the defences of the new settlement. Before meeting the other warrior and the female out on the sands, Ark had seen the new settlement at the Cliffs of Uruzai. He’d informed me that three of the tribes had allied themselves, hoarding the females in their midst.

My mate was likely among them.

I never thought I would get a second chance at a mate. I was not even sure I wanted the chance. The sacred mate bond was pulled taut with grief, making my chest ache.

But no respectable Gahn of the Sea Sands could leave his mate among another tribe. Not while he was alive, his strong heart beating.

“Do not trouble yourself, Ark. Sending raiding parties and spies has not worked. Perhaps this was my failing.”

I had wanted to gather more intel before making another move. But the time for that was over.

The time for war had come.

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR reading Kat and Galok’s story! I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I’m really excited about the next few books coming your way. Book five, Alien Exile, (remember him from book three?) is now LIVE in KU! Read it here. Book six will be Gahn Baldor’s story. If you want to be the first to know about new releases and get exclusive content, please sign up for my newsletter here! I look forward to having you on my newsletter list, and keeping you in the loop about all my projects!

ALIEN EXILE

“I have travelled days upon days upon days to get here. Half an age spent crossing the desert to find her, searching with no map and no plan beyond the beauty of her face, hanging in the stars before me. Leading me onward. You can brand me a liar if you wish, you can exile me as I have been exiled my entire life, but know this. The greatest truth, the only truth, that rules my life now, is her.”

Want more? Read Alien Exile in KU here!

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…”

Table of Contents

Title Page

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

NOTICES

TRIGGER WARNING

CHAPTER ONE | Kat

CHAPTER TWO | Galok

CHAPTER THREE | Kat

CHAPTER FOUR | Galok

CHAPTER FIVE | Kat

CHAPTER SIX | Galok

CHAPTER SEVEN | Kat

CHAPTER EIGHT | Galok

CHAPTER NINE | Kat

CHAPTER TEN | Galok

CHAPTER ELEVEN | Kat

CHAPTER TWELVE | Galok

CHAPTER THIRTEEN | Kat

CHAPTER FOURTEEN | Galok

CHAPTER FIFTEEN | Kat

CHAPTER SIXTEEN | Galok

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN | Kat

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN | Galok

CHAPTER NINETEEN | Kat

CHAPTER TWENTY | Galok

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE | Kat

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO | Galok

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE | Kat

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR | Zoey

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE | Kat

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX | Galok

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN | Kat

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT | Galok

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE | Kat

CHAPTER THIRTY | Galok

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE | Kat

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO | Galok

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE | Kat

CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR | Baldor