Page 27 of Crush

Page List

Font Size:

“You may.”You are. He could not say that part even though she was already entwined in the sensitive part of him, her sounds, her smells, the rush of the pulse of her blood.

With a touch more subtle than air, she speared her fingers through the fronds of his antennae. “Oh,” she whispered. “It’s like electricity, makes me shiver inside.”

He couldn’t quite hold back a sound of surprise. She was not orc hatched but she felt the i’lva?

Rather than ask her what she couldn’t know or seek an answer of his own, he plunged his face between her legs, fastening his mouth over her soft curls and even softer flesh below. And if he was maybe a little less refined than he might’ve wished for her, she seemed to want it more, letting out a sound and a shake that exceeded all the others, her hands wrapping around his tusks and drawing him even closer, the width of his jaws and her clenching fists forcing her thighs wider, opening all that vulnerable flesh to his hungry mouth.

And he feasted.

His tongue delved deep, so deep, as if he sought to lose himself—and instead found his fortune. Sweeter than dewdrop whorls, lighting him up inside like… No, not like the slymusk, because he did not think she would appreciate the comparison. But like the brightest, clearest gemstones born of the most violent geologic catastrophes, the simplest of atoms coming together, pouring into voids in the deepest earth, and crystallizing into shining treasure.

He had thought her soft and fragile, but she gripped him now like he was a rock she would crush into rubble, her thighs clamping around his shoulders, her fingers tightening on his tusks until he thought the bone would squeak, even the muscles hidden within her clenching on his tongue as if she might never let him go.

Intimately attuned to her, the i’lva trembled through him, threatening to seize him before he brought her to her own release. Fighting to hold on, in a way he hadn’t had to do since that one time he foolishly stepped into a crevasse and almost died, he refused to lose himself.

Then he remembered they were in space, and gravity was only sometimes an issue, so stepping off into the unknown could take one to thrilling new places.

Unable to resist any longer, he convulsed with a guttural groan, the i’lva pulsing out through him in violent waves. As the vibrations washed over her, Adeline echoed his cry, and he knew she was seized by the same ecstatic resonance of the i’lva.

They clung together, all of his arms holding her up, pulling her close as her spasms rolled on, each wave washing through him and bouncing back into her in a storm of eternal bliss.

But eventually the waves eased, although he still felt the tremors racking her, and he rather suspected the encounter would mark him forever.

His own muscles, though honed on solid rock, trembled too as he dragged himself up to align himself against her, tucking their myriad limbs to comfortable configurations. Though theDeepWandermaintained an optimal ambient temperature suitable for orcs and Earthers, for some reason, he wanted the protection of the lightweight covering she’d folded at the end of the sleeping nest. Made of many strings, the blanket didn’t really offer much protection, more comfort, like the brittle eggshell that some part of him vaguely remembered. Still, the texture of the woven pattern beneath his fingertips was pleasing, almost as much as the sensation of cocooning with her.

After another long moment, she let out a breath as the last shudder of the i’lva left her limp. “What was that?”

“I assumed you brought it,” he said. “A memento from Earth.”

She let out a low sound, an exhausted chuckle. “I know what the blanket is, silly. My grandmother crocheted it for me when I was a baby. Maybe not the most important thing to bring as a mail order bride, considering our limited poundage. But I couldn’t leave it behind. It was meant as a promise for a new baby, a new beginning. And that’s what I wanted too.”

A new beginning, a hatchling…

“It’s soft and beautiful, just like you. This is a good place for it.” In a bed, beside him.

“Anyway, I meant what was that…” She waved one limp hand over their bodies, almost smacking him in the tusk. “That earthquake?”

He hesitated. But he could not lie to her. “That was the i’lva,” he said, managing to say it in a way that was as careless as her hand wave. “It’s nothing of consequence.”

“I thought it was consequential,” she objected. “I thought it was going to rip the ship apart, or at least me.” She let out a long, deep—and maybe he was fooling himself, but it sounded deeply satisfied—breath. “I know not all sex has to be penetrative. And I know not all penetrative sex needs to be a penis. But I swear, that went through my every molecule.” She cuddled closer to him, so apparently she didn’t mind being ripped apart. “I don’t remember reading about that effect in the handbook.”

“The i’lva is more like…Ollie’s ghost in the graveyard. Not the sort of thing that is written down in basic handbooks.”

“I suppose that’s part of the adventure.” The way she held herself against him fit perfectly into his side. How could that be when their two species had evolved nowhere near each other?

How could that be when he specifically shouldn’t think he could stay so close?

Suddenly the intricate fibers of the grandmother’s blanket felt like the sticky weave of the ravenous arachnids that set their traps in the worst parts of the cheapest space station service yards. That was no more flattering to Adeline than slymusks, and he knew it wasn’t her fault. It was his. He’d known he wasn’t suitable for this sort of closeness, this sort of feeling.

Carefully he disentangled each arm from her soft, delicious weight. For the merest breath, her hand, splayed over his chest, weighed heavier than any crushing boulder, then she angled her arm against her side, her fingers fisted over her own heart.

Tight, protective.

“You probably need to get back,” she said.

“Yes.” He sat up, making sure that the blanket stayed tucked close to her. “Mag and Sil were arguing about what we can do with the rock and the Luster.” He reached for his storage belt; he didn’t even remember letting it drop. “I don’t know what they’ll decide, I should at least make sure they don’t come to blows.”

“Let me know if there’s anything we can do to help, at least once Ollie gets some rest.” She angled herself up onto one elbow to watch him, and although he thought maybe he was starting to learn the quicksilver changes of the mobile Earther expressions, she might as well have been carved from some distant, lifeless asteroid.