Page 42 of Tharn's Hunt
But privacy is a luxury afforded only within the safety of clan caves. Out here, in the open, during the dark? It is a death sentence.
She makes a frustrated sound, then more vocalizations that rise in pitch before dropping to a resigned grumble. Whatever argument she was making, she seems to have abandoned it.
She pins me with a final, sharp look, then turns and steps past me into the dark. I drop the sandfin immediately, rising to follow her. Her shoulders hunch when she realizes I'm behind her, but she doesn't try to send me away again.
She moves a short distance from the cave. I follow, stopping a few paces behind her.The soft breeze brings the scent of the open dark to me. From here, I can see everything. Hear everything. She is a warm, small point in the center of the world.Nothing will reach her.
"Fine," she vocalizes, the sound sharp but quiet. "It's not like you can see in this pitch black anyway."
The sharp sounds she makes mean nothing to me. It is the movement that follows that steals my breath.She lifts the strange hide covering her lower half. It rises, revealing pale thighs that gleam like polished bone in my glow.
My glow, which had been a soft, ambient shimmer, suddenly flares with the intensity of Ain herself.The entire area is instantly bathed in brilliant golden light, turning the sand white and the shadows to sharp, black spears. It is, for all intents and purposes, a beam of solid light. Pointed directly at her.
She freezes, a startled, squeaking sound escaping her. Her entire body goes rigid, caught in the beam of my traitorous light.
For a long moment, she doesn't move. A strange look crosses her face. The lines around her eyes tighten, her small teeth dig into her lower lip, and her body gives a small, involuntary shudder. She presses her thighs together again.
"Oh no, no, no, not now," she mutters, the vocalization a low, strained sound.A soft groan rumbles from her chest. It is the sound of a body fighting a battle it is about to lose.
What is she doing? I should scan the surroundings for any threat, but I cannot tear my eyes from the sight of her.
The curve of her backside, round and soft. The smooth expanse of her thighs. The glimpse of something between them,hidden in shadow but unmistakably different from my own anatomy.
Heat floods my veins, pooling low in my gut with an insistence I've never experienced before. My member stirs in its pouch, pressing against the confining tissue with growing urgency.
And then her body gives one final, sharp tremor, and the tension breaks.
At the first hint of water leaving her being, I freeze, alarmed. But then the scent of her fills my nostrils.Dust. Sorich. Not just the waste she's expelling, but something deeper. Muskier. It stirs something in me, something that makes my claws itch to extend, my fangs ache to descend.
It is like Rok's scent after he claimed Jus-teen. That same heady musk that clung to him for sols afterward, marking him as changed. As…a male who claimed a female.
By Ain. I dig my claws into the meat of my thigh to keep them sheathed.Control, Tharn. Jah-kee is vulnerable, exposed. You are meant to be guarding her, not... whatever this is.
The thought flickers through my mind that there are no goldweeps here to reclaim her water. The round, thirsty plants cluster in the clan caves, hungrily absorbing what we give them to be purified. Because the dust swallows everything. Precious moisture vanishes in uncaring sand.
A poor trade. Jah-kee’s water is precious.
Yet my focus isn't on wasted water. It's fixed on the differences between our kinds. The water Jus-teen shared with Rok wasn’t this waste Jah-kee is expelling now. How can there be two waters from the same source? One for waste, and one for… sharing?From some hidden wellspring I've never seen but now can't stop thinking about? A soft, hidden place between a female's thighs that my body now aches to touch. To taste.
Jah-kee finishes quickly, lowering her hide-covering and rising. Her face is still flushed, her gaze avoiding mine as she hurries back toward the cave entrance.
I remain where I am, needing a moment to collect myself. To wrestle my suddenly unruly body back under control. My member strains against its pouch with a strange, unfamiliar readiness, as if it prepares for a hunt I do not understand.It is a demand, but for what, I do not know.
I command it to be still. It does not obey.
With intense focus, I slow my breathing. Center my thoughts on duty, on protection. On anything but the curve of Jah-kee’s behind or the scent that still lingers in the air around me.
When I finally return to the cave entrance, Jah-kee has already retreated inside. I retrieve the partially cleaned sandfin, resuming my work with single-minded determination. My claws move. They slice. They clean. This is a thing I know. It is a quiet, steady thing in the noise of my head.
By the time I've finished preparing the sandfin, my member has settled, my breathing steady once more. I gather the meat and head into the cave, moving quietly in case Jah-kee has fallen back into rest.
She hasn't. She sits near the back of the cave, knees drawn up to her chest, watching me with those water-blue eyes that seem to see too much. Her face is still flushed, but less intensely now.
I do not look at her yet. I can already smell her. I can hear the soft sound of her breath. A low rumble starts in my chest as Imove to arrange the meat on the stone shelf that runs along one wall of the cave. This place is known to me. An established camp, one marked with dust stalker waste to warn away other predators. It has firestones and offers good shelter, though the water source is small.
It is not the clan caves,but it will keep us safe through the dark.
I retrieve the firestones, arranging them carefully within a circle of smaller rocks. Jah-kee watches with undisguised curiosity as I strike them together, creating the spark that ignites and spreads between them.
