Page 38 of Rok's Captive
I hesitate, my hand hovering above her face. The last time I touched her, I felt…
Too much.
But I have no choice. I press my palm to her brow. The moment my skin meets hers, a jolt rushes through me, a sensation so foreign, so violentlyalive, that I nearly recoil. My glow pulses like a struck gourd, answering her fire, responding to something in her blood, her bones. A thread pulls taut between us, unseen but unbreakable. The flood of sensation is immediate.
Heat. Softness. The strange, soft beat of herdra-kirbeneath my hand.
She stirs at my touch, a weak sound escaping her lips, and my glow flares brighter, responding to her even as I fight to control it.
Her lips part, her voice barely a whisper. “Please…”
The word is small, fragile, and I do not understand it, but it strikes me like a blow.
Whatever we find in the dust, we keep.And I found her.
A daughter of Ain.
Here. On Xiraxis.
I do not know where she came from.
But I will not let her die.
So I lift her.
She is light, softer than anything I have ever held, her body molding against mine as if she belongs there. My glow flares as she settles against me, and something tightens deep in my chest, something raw and unknown.
Her skin is damp where it presses to mine. This water seeping must be how her kind cools themselves. But it is not enough.
Ineed to cool her.
I stride toward the cave entrance, stepping into the night air. Xiraxis is a world of extremes—blistering heat during the day, bone-deep cold at night. The moment the night air touches her skin, she shudders, her body reacting to the sudden change.
Her lips part again, her head tilting toward my chest, and I feel the ghost of her breath against my skin.
Something stirs in me. A deep, primal thing.
I do not know what she is. Not fully. Not yet.
But she is female.
The first. The only.
And she is mine to protect.
She shifts slightly in my hold, her fingers curling weakly against my chest, and I look down at her face. Something shifts deep within me. A force I cannot name surges through my being, pushing me toward her in a way that defies reason. It is as if the very core of me recognizes her—something ancient, something buried—and refuses to let go. I am not meant to have this. I am not meant to feel this. And yet… I do.
She is not Drakav. Not of Xiraxis. But she is here. And I found her.
The dust takes.
But it also gives.
And I will not let it take her back.
Chapter11
SOOOO…AWKWARD MORNING-AFTER VIBES CAN BE EXTRATERRESTRIAL. YOU LEARN SOMETHING NEW EVERY DAY
