Page 80 of Decadence

I trust you.

Those simple words were like tiny hooks in his soul, tethering him to her for eternity.

He became dimly aware of a soft noise in the background.

Thudthud. Thudthud.

It was rapid and faint, but it was undeniable.

Her heartbeat.

Pounding faster and faster as she stared up at him.

She shifted on her feet and caught one of the stray wisps of hair with her finger, twirling it round and round in a very human gesture that he found utterly adorable.

She was nervous, he realized.

There was absolutely no reason for her to be nervous around him.

“Um,” she blurted, biting her lower lip. “Was it okay?”

“Was what okay?”

“The… the food.” There was a look of expectation on her face, like she so desperately wanted to please him.

What was all the more astonishing to Ikriss was that it was her choice to want to please him.

He had never felt that before; not from any living creature.

Warmth spread through his nonexistent heart. He dropped to his knees before her, taking her hands into his. In the background, Rykal managed to look shocked. Arin’s hand flew to her mouth.

Kordolians didn’t kneel for anyone.

Sienna shook her head slightly, as if she could hardly believe what was happening. Her eyes widened. Her lips parted. Her pounding heart beat even faster.

She was just as obsessed as he was.

Captivated.

His.

His horn-buds were on fire now. His cock was fully erect, straining against his pants. “What I said back there… about food being mere sustenance… I was not being entirely accurate.”

“I thought so.” The look of triumph that crossed her delicate features was spellbinding.

“In my tribe, back in the times when my people truly lived by the Old Ways, certain mating rituals were observed. One of them was the Nakula. Once a male had been struck with the Mating Fever, he would seclude himself from the female for seven rotations. He would go out into the ice-plains and hunt, aiming to bring down the biggest and most vicious of beasts. The bigger the better, in order to impress his female. Every beast that was sent back would be butchered by his female and shared amongst the tribe. See, Aikun females are strong and fierce, and their role was to protect and nourish the tribe while the males were away on the hunt.”

“Wow.” Sienna curled her fingers tighter around his. Her hands were cold. He wanted to feel her hands against his warm skin; to chase every last trace of cold from her body.

Ikriss craved the cold, but he knew that humans were the opposite.

When this was all over, he would take her to the warm, sunny places on Earth that humans seemed to enjoy visiting so much.

“That is not all there is to it, though. See, for every rotation that they were apart, she would send a package back to him. A morsel of meat to sustain him; the juciest, most tender cut from the creature, seasoned with rare minerals and seared slightly over a volcanic fire. Our smell receptors are a lot more sensitive than those of a human, although perhaps your enjoyment of taste is more highly developed than ours. During the act of preparing his food with her bare hands, the meat would become imbued with her scent, and the male, being in the throes of Mating Fever, would grow more and more aroused, to the point of near-madness. He would consume her scent; smell it, taste it, and it would intoxicate him like a potent drug, and he would wait…”

She leaned in slightly, and he was so close now that he was drowning in her heady musk. “And then… what would happen?”

“Many of our kind do not know this, but it is well known amongst the tribes that the Mating Fever also affects the female, although the signs are more subtle. By the seventh rotation, she would also be succumbing to the exquisite madness of desire.” Ikriss paused, allowing his words to sink in. He was rewarded with a little tremor as the delicious scent of her musk intensified. Thank the Goddess he was kneeling, and that he held her delicate hands in his, because otherwise his claws would be out right now. “Then she would travel out onto the ice with her own ceremonial hunting party, flanked by three female warriors on either side. And they would seek out the male, or more accurately, the male would find her. Once they were assured that the female was safely with her mate, the warriors would leave them be, and they would consummate their love on the ice-plains beneath the mercy of the Goddess, under the stars and the watchful infinite Universe.”

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