The VaDorok: The Mate Index Book 1

by SJ Sanders

  Although, if Vidok were honest with himself, it was probably also in part due to the fact that had sampled most of the females not only in his own tribe, but in several neighboring tribes when they met for the sun gathering once a sun cycle. The options had long since began to dry up.

  He had given up hope of ever feeling it, if he were honest. Vidok wanted to weep with relief. Wanted to rejoice at the end of his loneliness, and the ability to begin his own blood line. His parents were gone, and they had no other young other than himself. He had no close family, other than his distant relations.

  And Vidok was lonely, suffering many solar cycles from that slow death of spirit. Although he attended all summoned and regular gatherings as a matter of duty, he was alone. The VaDorok were a solitary species, united by tribal territorial ties. Although, sometimes lonely males, or lonely females, would share a den in order to minimize the loneliness.

  Taking a temporary pleasure partner to den with also relieved it for a short time. Yet the temporary balm did little long term, especially as males aged and were less desirable among the fewer females as pleasure partners. Many older males, after the onset of the second decade of their primary adulthood, slowly withdrew from the community, becoming more and more isolated until finally dying. Not from old age.

  The VaDorok were an astoundingly long lived species, many reaching fifty solar cycles in their primary adulthood, over one hundred solar cycles from birth. Sickness of the spirit killed far too many males in their prime. Even the young Scout Vidok had encountered just hours earlier had such a likely fate to look forward to, even though such thoughts would be far from the mind of a young male in his first stage adulthood.

  This stage, in which all males spent their first ten years of adulthood as scouts, where their abundant energy and lean youthful muscle would be put to best use, were juvenile years with thoughts of mating far away. They relished the frequent female company that their youth and vitality attracted. Always on the move, they covered the vast territory of the tribe, and enjoyed the comforts of any female happy to lure in a scout entering into her territory as he passed through. Every male remembered the pleasures of his scout period, sometimes it was his only comfort while waiting endlessly solar cycles patiently to find his ulukska, his mate. A mate that every aging male in primary adulthood knew would likely never come.

  Like many ancient species in the universe, the inability to find many compatible offworlders to interbreed with and bring new blood into the tribes made the VaDorok increasingly susceptible to fertility issues. For some species, the females outnumbered the males on their home worlds. For the VaDorok, and many others, this manifested with many males birthed per each female born. But, unlike some of these species, nature didn’t equip the VaDorok with the ability to enter into breeding family groups. The VaDorok joined solely in pair-bonded matings.

  Some more adventurous males might share a pleasure partner, but no male would share a mate. Not only because of the violence of the mating instinct that would endanger another rival male, but also because mated males gave off a musk that repelled other adult males from overstaying in their personal territory. This made mating bonds infrequent, and for the VaDorok, who needed the bonds with a mate to be healthy and thrive, it was a death sentence for too many.

  Vidok was not at great risk for this yet. His responsibilities as warrior-priest still kept him engaged with his tribe. He communed on behalf of his people and their gods, and blessed the mated and newly born. These were the pleasures of his duty that warded of the despondency in his own being, born from the lack the blessing of a mate and young in his own life. Just that easily, Vidok felt his heart lighten from the weight of all those years.

  Crooning low in his throat, his chest rumbling with his deep rattling purr, Vidok regarded his tiny mate thoughtfully. She inspired his mating heat, his ulukskinon when no other female among his kind could, she was his ulukska. He couldn’t deny he was slightly concerned about how he was going to keep such a tiny fragile female alive. The climate swung brutally, and the predators were easily twice her size. While males of his species were protective of their mates, usually they didn’t have to overly worry about them too much. A female VaDorok was only a head shorter than a male, and had plenty of her own muscle, dense fur and retractable claws.

  Vidok pushed pack his female’s upper lip, and groaned to himself. She didn’t even have any fangs with which to protect herself, just flattened teeth. His female was fragile and helpless. He couldn’t help but wonder how this species even managed to survive on their own planet as delicate as his mate looked. He only hoped that she was slightly intelligent so he wouldn’t have to supervise her every move.

  Her tiny face scrunched up as he flicked his tail absently against her jaw, her nose wrinkling and twitching. Suddenly her eyes blinked open, and Vidok found himself staring into warm brown depths. Her soft lips parted, making his cock inflate further, and then shrivel in alarm when the entire shelter was instantly filled with her shrieks. Vidok leaned back and flattened his ears against the piercing noise as his mate shot up from the nest, her limbs thrashing as she gained to her feet.

  For such a tiny thing, Vidok had to admire how spry she was. It took her little time to scramble to the far side of the shelter. He raised a brow when she snatched up one of the larger sticks he had gathered for fire the previous day and waved it threateningly at him. It was adorable. She stiffened as he chuckled at her bravado.

  “Stay back Yeti-beast-thing,” she hollered, poking the slightly less dull end of the branch out at him.

  Vidok snorted and lazily flicked his tail without concern. He couldn’t imagine how she thought she was going to hurt him with that twig. He cocked his head at her curiously.

  “What is that?” he asked.

  The female blinked, “What is what?”

  Ah, just as I feared. A cute little thing but not very bright.

  Vidok sighed, “This Yeti-beast-thing you speak of, what is it?”

  The edges of her lips quirked up slightly as she returned his curious regard. Then just as quickly, as if remembering herself, she sucked her lips in and scowled fiercely.

  “Don’t play games with me,” she snapped.

  “What game?” his frustration mounted. He took a deep breath to calm himself. “Perhaps it is not your fault. Your species must clearly be one slower of wit and so I must be patient. It is ok female” he said kindly.

  Her body stiffened. “Did you just called me stupid?” she shrieked. “Granted I may not carry fancy degrees of study from the university, but I assure I can carry a conversation just fine, you Cretan.”

  Vidok growled low. He didn’t know what a Cretan was, but he was pretty sure, given her tone, he had just been directly insulted.

  “I did not say you are stupid. If I erred in judging your intellect as being low I do apologize; but you were the one freezing to death on the ice flow without supplies or shelter. And speaking nonsense,” he added.

  “I speak perfectly well enough,” she snapped. “The only particular lack of intelligence I suffer from is being tricked into leaving one frozen hellhole for a worse one. The least they could have done was put a lab on a tropical beach somewhere. But hey they didn’t ask my opinion when they brought me here. And I wouldn’t have been stuck outdoors in the ice and snow without provisions if I wasn’t escaping from camp sadistic asshole. Now I am being talked down to a yeti-beast as if there is something wrong with me.”

  Rant concluded, she scowled fiercely in offense. Vidok scratched the base of his horn trying to think of a way to diffuse the situation. The female was clearly traumatized. Wait a minute. His brows shot up, “Are you referring to me? I am not any such thing. I am Vidok of the VaDorok. My people are the children of Dorok, the planet you are on--the frozen hellhole you call it.”

  A pink color infused her cheeks slowly. Ah, she must be embarrassed. His own species don’t turn color with discomfort, one had to watch their body language to discern such feelings, bu
t he had met a few offworlders that did. None of which looked quite so charming though. He was pleased to note that the branch she held in a death grip lowered very slightly, though she narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously. “Did the Agraak send you?”

  “What is an Agraak?”

  She pursed his lips at him, clearly frustrated. Vidok mentally shrugged. He could not help it if he had no idea what she was talking about. Although he supposed he should be grateful that his mate at least was capable of speech and a manner of intelligent thought. Even if, at this moment, her manners were deplorable. But given that she was traumatized and in a very stressful situation he imagined that being polite wasn’t high on her list of priorities.

  The way her eyes flicked over him and her surroundings Vidok was certain she was weighing her options.

  “You are not taking me back then?” she asked hesitantly, her demeanor softening slightly.

  “I am not sure to where you expect me to take you, or what this Agraak thing you speak of is, but be assured if you don’t want to go back I won’t take you,” Vidok offer reasonably. He didn’t feel any need to inform her that, in accordance to his instinct, he wasn’t taking her anywhere but back to his den. No reason to needless panic her by giving her too much at once to handle.

  That seemed to do it. His female relaxed, a broad smile splitting her face as she dropped the stick back in the pile.

  “Well then, that is a horse of another color.”

  Vidok wanted to ask her what a horse was and why it would be another color but wisely kept himself silent.

  “I am Sara...a human, previous property subject 98 of project study group HS10, former captive of the Agraak. A rather nasty species squatting on your planet.”

  ***

  Waking up to see a white furry man-beast staring down at her was not one of Sara’s finest moments. She had looked up...and up, at the male in front of her. And panicked. Instinctively she dug into her pocket for her hard-won shank, and had was dismayed to find it missing. Fuck, she must have dropped it on the ice somewhere. Not that it would do much good against the behemoth in front of her, she acknowledged. Nor was her back-up weapon, a stick, much better. It was actually humorous, in a very sad, desperate way.

  At first she had thought he was a native species about to kill and eat her, but then his speech slapped some sense into her and she took notice of the fact that she was in a warm leather hut of some type--with a crackling fire warming her to boot.

  So, ok, the male saved her and was not working for the Agraak. Nor was he making any kind of threatening move towards her. As infuriating as his attitude was, not to mention his insulting doubt of her intelligence--but hey he did have a point, she would doubt the intelligence of anyone wandering around in the middle of a frozen wasteland without proper supplies too--he wasn’t so bad. As far as her tired brain could make out, that meant she was finally safe. The relief that swept through almost knocked her to her knees as she thanked every and each god that might be listening. She was aware of just how dangerously close she had come to dying out on the ice and snow.

  Her eyes flicked to his as the male--Vidok she reminded herself-- stood up. Her jaw dropped as her eyes ran over the impossibly huge length of him. He had to be pushing eight feet tall! He could certainly almost pass for a Yeti of folklore, if one blurred their vision a bit, with all the heavy white fur. Although that is about where the resemblance ended.

  His face was very humanoid with thick lips, though the cheekbones were sharper and more pronounced, and his strangely silver eyes were distinctively catlike in their shape and possessed a similar elongated pupil. The nose was also broader with a flattened bridge. Sara observed way his nostrils flared and guessed that he had an exceptional sense of smell too. Which made her want to crawl into a hole given how much she knew she had to reek, although the last snow drift she fell into seemed to have done a decent job cleaning her off a bit.

  His skin was incredible though; literally white as snow. His face, chest and stomach had a fuzzy crushed velvety look that did something to Sara, much to her mortification, coiling heat down through her belly as she wondered what that would feel like against her own skin. The velvet fuzz gradually turned into thicker fur along his hips, flanks and shoulders looking as soft as a kitten. All around his head he had much longer fur instead of hair, bound into numerous coils something very much like locks in appearance, decorated with crimps of copper-like metal and blue and green gemstones. The same metal seemed to have been used to make the heavy pendant hanging from a cord on his neck. Large curved, cat-like ears peaked out from his mane like that of a lion.

  He also had horns, much to Sara’s admiration. Pearl in color, tiny horns were visible along the slope of his nasal bridge and along the his brow ridges, curving around his eyes in place of eyebrows. Two large horns pushed back from his brow, with a smaller central pair. Thin spiked horns outset the brow horns, and dangerously curved horns jutted from the sides near his temples. It was like someone mixed a dragon, a yeti, and a cat together. Complete with long bushy tail.

  Dragons and cats, what an awesome combination!

  Now this was obviously the native species, designed by nature for its brutal climate. He seemed to need little for warmth. Boots and a beautifully beaded knee-length wrap of material around the hips concealing his genitals was about it for covering. She couldn’t help but to admire him.

  Not only that, but he was producing a wonderful smell. It was an intriguing blend that reminded her of holiday spice blends from home. Her mother’s kitchen. The smell of ginger and clove, with the subtle scent of pine and male musk. Vaguely she wondered if his essence would taste of pumpkin pie.

  The male’s nostrils flared again, and the low growl that rumbled from his chest shot another coil of heat through her. The vibration zipped along her nervous system down to her core filling her cunt with damp heat. Embarrassed, for assuredly he could smell it, Sara clamped her thighs together and cleared her throat nervously.

  “I don’t know what all that means,” Vidok grumbled at her as he rubbed one of his horns.

  Ah the joys of translators. I have a feeling this is going to be a regular issue between us. Oy!

  “My species,” she began slowly, “is human...”

  He waved his hand impatiently, all at once making her irritated as hell again.

  “Yes female I got that part, you are human. Explain the rest of it.”

  Now Sara was the one who wanted to growl, her ardor shriveling into a husk.

  “Look,” she bit out. “there are a bunch of us, well a lot less now, being studied in a lab, a big metal building north of here--I think--where these aliens, the Agraak, are studying us. I think they killed all the human men, and have been using the human women for breeding experiments. They hurt us, and when we get really unlucky, they rape us. They are going to do this to the last of us they are holding there. Anyone with successful impregnation gets sent off planet back to their home world. I escaped from that hell. Is there any of that you didn’t under stand?” she asked sweetly.

  Vidok scowled, “They are doing these things on our world?”

  “Yup,” she said, making it pop. She hoped the clue-by-four would hit him any moment now.

  Sara squeaked and jumped back a bit as the huge-ass male began to pace, his tail snapping irritably. After several paces, he leveled a heavy frown at her.

  “I will take you to my tribe’s territory, we will need to speak to the chief and let him know of this. Such thing is against the laws of the gods. Terrorizing females is an abomination,” he growled.

  Sara wanted to pump her fist in triumph. Booyah! Lets here it for non-terrorizing-females-advocating-deities! This was exactly what was needed. A force of giant deadly looking motherfuckers to trash the Agraak, and rescue her friends.

  “When do we leave?” she asked eagerly.

  Vidok slanted her a long look. “First thing in the morning.”

  Sara could live with that. She still had time before t
he other women would be in danger of another hunt.

  Chapter 3

  True to his word, after a rather awkward night curled up together in the nest Vidok made, they started out early in the morning. Sara jumped from foot to foot to keep warm while Vidok dissembled the shelter, folding and rolling the large swaths of leather and furs, all except one large white fur he set aside, and breaking down the collapsible metal frame poles. Vidok did all work, much to her shame, all while she shivered on the sidelines.

  He waved off her apologies as he put everything into a large leather pack which he strapped on a shallow sled. He turned about a few times before finding what he sought, and dug up a couple strange, large, and very dead, furry animals that he tied at the rear. Sara estimated that each animal was nearly the size of herself if not slightly bigger. He finished by tying down some dark metal spear to the frame. Taking up the long leather cord attached to the head of the sled, Vidok tied it securely around his hips before turning to her.

  She eyed him as he looked down on her, a thoughtful expression on his face. She wasn’t sure if she was going to like whatever he was thinking. Before she could inquire as to what was on his mind, his hand shot forward snatching her up. She yelped sharply as, with quick hands, he wrapped the pelt snugly around her before he pulling her up against his chest.

  She shoved at him. She did not want more cuddle time with the brute. Why couldn’t he just put her on the sled with everything else? Sure, it didn’t look like a comfortable ride, but being held up close while her arousal got kicked back into high gear again was not her idea of a good time either. He ignored her squeaks and shoves, and tightened his arms around her, squishing her firmly against him.