Page 135 of Bull Moon Rising

The red haze in my vision grows thicker. My cock is painful in how tight it is, how much the knot around the base of my shaft aches. I’m barely aware of digging into the rubble that covers the tunnels into Drop Thirteen.

Barely aware of flinging aside a boulder as if it weighs nothing.

Mine.

Mine.

She’s in there, and she’s mine.

I don’t know how long I dig. The red haze covers everything. I should take my cock out, jerk off again, try to cool the heat that seems to have lodged itself directly into my groin…but Aspeth is here. Somewhere. I can scent the faint tang of her on the air.

I wantmy wifeon my knot. Nothing else will satisfy.

I’m only vaguely aware that there’s a team behind me, keeping its distance. I sometimes hear them mutter, but it doesn’t stop me in my mission. They’re staying away from me, as they should. A moonstruck Taurian is a dangerous creature, and if I don’t find my wife by the time the Conquest Moon crosses the smaller moon, I’m going to turn and fuck one of them. I won’t be able to wait any longer. I’ll lose control of myself.

I’m barely in control now.

I break through the rocks and then I rush forward down the empty tunnel. Then another. And another. The scent of Aspeth is old here, but lingering, and a primeval sound escapes me.

“Wait,” someone calls from far behind.

I ignore him. My mate is close. My mate is here.

Mine.

Mine.

Dimly, I’m aware of charging through a broken wall into a ratling nest. The others call out a warning but I grab the ratlings as they try to swarm me, snapping necks and tossing them aside as if they’re nothing.

Nothing is going to keep me from my mate.

Nothing at all.

I shove aside a larger ratling, and then the scent of Aspeth hits me, hard and fast. This one has a piece of fabric from her skirt, and when I lift it to smell it, there’s a strand of orange cat hair stuck to the fabric.

I bellow my fury even as the hand of the god claims me.

FORTY-THREE

ASPETH

“Did you hearthat?”

I rouse from sleep, my body aching something fierce. I’m hungry, too, but we’re trying to save our rations because we don’t know how long we’ll be here. The red light from the first ring continues to glow atop my staff, and the second is secured around my neck via a lace broken off from one of my boots.

Lark is sitting upright, her attention focused on the stone walls. Everyone else is asleep, with Mereden and Gwenna lying against the slab and Kipp curled up in Gwenna’s lap, clutching the last piece of his house in his arms.

“Hear what?” I murmur, keeping my voice down so I don’t wake the others.

She looks over at me. “I thought I heard something.”

“Ratlings?”

She considers for a moment, then shakes her head. “No. It sounded different. Like a shout of some kind, but it was far away.”

I sit up, too, and cock my head, listening. I don’t hear anything at all, not even the ratlings. They stopped flinging themselves against the door some time ago, and we went to sleep with one person on guard. I’dtaken the first shift, and passed it over to Lark when I got too sleepy. It feels as if I’ve barely closed my eyes, and I rub them again. “Maybe it’s the stone settling.”

Lark doesn’t look convinced. “Maybe.”

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