Page 34 of Taken to Voraxia
She snorts and lifts her eyes past me, to the skies. I find the expression to be unpleasant and grunt, “Why do you do this?”
“Do what?”
“This eye lifting?”
“Rolling my eyes?”
“Hexa. And you make this unattractive sound with your nose.”
A sudden burst of pleasure explodes from her mouth, sharp and fast and seemingly unexpectedly because immediately she claps a hand over her lips. “Comets…” She makes the pleasure sound again. “Nevermind it. It’s nothing.”
It isn’t nothing. Nothing she does is nothing. Because right now my Xanaxana that should be docile, sated, and content, is uncoiling itself and I am bathing in it anew, as if this is the first time I am seeing my Xiveri mate, all over again.
I do not understand and I feel fury at this uncertainty. The Xanaxana’s first quell should be over, it should have passed. I have spent seed within my Xiveri mate and yet mating with her again, immediately, is suddenly all I can think about.
The pleasure soundmovesme. I want to hear her make it again, but I do not know how and would not debase myself to ask. I am grateful then that she changes the subject, “So Krisxox will be the one watching Svera. But for how long? I’m sure he has things to do.”
“Krisxox will look after the traitor until her trial,” I grunt. Even my voice is laced with the Xanaxana. It wants to be heard.
“And then?”
“And then she will be returned to your moon.”
“Good.” She exhales and the little lines beside her eyes release. She pauses and there is a tension in her tone as she says, “Thank you, Xoran.”
I do not expect this name from her. Not here. Not now. I am troubled to think past it.
“You will repeat your question,” I mumble, realizing she has asked me another.
If she notices me falter, she is gracious enough to pretend she doesn’t. “I asked if Svera would be okay though? We discussed food for her, but not anything else — tools, a safe home. Will she have everything she needs to survive in Qath?”
“You ask many questions for your traitor.” I feel my ridges threatened by another treacherous bloom of emotion, but I am aware enough in this moment to tamp the nerves that fire with color and keep myself restrained. “Should I be concerned that your own concern is not something born by kinship. What is she to you?”
I grip the outsides of her arms more firmly. Her eyes round. “She’s my friend.”
“Friend?”
“Yes, friend. I…does that word not translate for you?”
“Nox, it does not.”
She makes a face, nose pinching, lips falling apart. “You don’t have any friends? Any people you keep close and tell your secrets to? Your hopes and fears? Just hang out with?”
“Hang? Why would I hang with others and tell them my secrets? Is this a form of torture? Does she inflict this upon you?” My hackles rise but the pleasure sound comes from her again and it cools me immediately.
I relax the pressure of my claws on her skin, worrying that I might lose control and cut her. A Raku should behave with more self-mastery than this.
“Nox, not at all. She’s myfriend. Someone I care about very much.”
And just as I think I have regained mastery over my ridges, a fresh surge of color washes over me and I bathe in delicious copper jealousy. “What you speak of we callkin— the affection for mates and their offspring. You do not have mates, you haveonemate and I am he. So forget about thesefriendcreatures and remember that your place is by my side and in my breeding belt and with no others…”
“Nox!” She shouts, and then she grabs me. Her small hands mold to my arms just above the elbows. She shakes me a little bit, demanding my attention. She has it all.But maybe what she wants instead, is my calm.
My Raku before me was known for his temper. He prided himself on it, yet it was his downfall and made it possible for me to issue challenge to him. I vowed the day I struck him down that I would not become him, even if he was the one to sire me.
Looking deeply into my Miari’s eyes, I recognize her strength, hoping to leech it. I breathe in deeply, hold the air in my four lungs, then carefully release.
“Nox,” she says and I can feel her fingers lose some of their stiffness, and become soft again against my arms. “What you describe, we call this something else. A friend is different. Not a mate. Not kin. Not family. Not a baby. You…you are my mate. But Svera and Kiki are my friends. I care about them, but I don’t…touch them like I touch you.”
