"She's getting ill again,” Solvun snarled. “M'yote!"
Both warriors needed to leave me to this healing work. I drew the energy from deep inside myself into a stream of tingling heat and directed it down my arm.
My hand sparked with white light.
Healing corrective stars. I reached for the curve of her waist.
Skin to skin meant all was final. No turning back. She would be mine. She would crave me beyond what the nanites in her body already did to her. Cry for me. Lie in her bed listlessly until I came to her in her state of melancholy in my absence. But she had to remember she was also Solvun's and expected to give him a son. Mine by right... And I broke no laws healing her now. Refusing to consummate the relationship would only torture her mercilessly after my touch. I had to mate with her. Had to. I laid my palm against her ribcage, right over where her irritated gut tormented her relentlessly.
She gasped, eyes widening, and sucked in an enormous breath.
Yes, heal, little one. “She'll be fine now,” I said. “Leave us."
"What?” Solvun demanded.
"Go. My time with her is private. Go eat. Play cards. Break each other's bones. I don't care. Just leave me alone with her. She's exhausted. And I need to heal her."
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Cybernetics... “a science concerned with the study of systems of any nature which are capable of receiving, storing, and processing information so as to use it for control.” ~A.N. Kolmogorov
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Chapter Twelve
M'yote held his D'ena's slim curves against his body and wondered if life would ever feel as it had before skin-to-skin contact. Before sheer ecstasy. Over four-hundred years. A long time. Four times as long as most. But with one's brother, the rightful king, irreversibly locked away, it became imperative to wait out the psychic Blood Wars until a time both the King and I could share a D'ena as tradition dictated. By right. To promote Prall's clan behavior through examples set by their high King's clan. I took her into my arms.
Her rigid body relaxed.
A sign of the touching. But the touching was more incredible than I'd ever imagined. Her skin was so soft. Sleek. Warm. So much a man imprisoned behind leather only dreamed of experiencing.
Still, she was exhausted. Solvun and Flonn had torn her down to what was left in my arms. Now, I needed to rejuvenate her. What a Handler could do. “How do you feel, Theone?"
"Strangely calm.” She blinked slowly and slid her gaze to my lips.
No warrior could miss that invitation for a kiss. But I wanted her to understand what would pass between us. “The serenity is what you feel when you touch my skin. Elation. Peace. Your body will crave my touch for the rest of your life now. Like I am an addiction you cannot shake. It's why I always remain covered. To protect others against this curse of my mother's people. Especially my hands."
"It's almost miraculous. Crazy. Like something people claim to feel when touching a renowned religious figure.” Her pale-blue eyes stared into mine. “Is this some type of pheromone? I figured you just wore those gloves because of your elemental powers."
That explanation would work for now. “Yes, pheromones.” My D'ena. So smart. So mine. I leaned down to touch my forehead against hers.
She matched the gesture tipping her barely parted lips toward my mouth.
Seductively. Begging I satisfy her yearning for a kiss. But she must understand everything. There can never be secrets between us. I paused, microns from those satiny pillows waiting to latch onto my lips. “I cover myself to protect the universe from the very yearning you will now suffer to be near me. This will be difficult for you with your Marshal duties. But I swear I will travel with you wherever you must go. Be your companion. Always your companion. Even with Wrank as your blood mate. I will do what must be done to see to your welfare and happiness."
"That sounds nice.” She smiled, energy coming back to her, wicking through my skin.
"Always yours, Theone. May I kiss you?"
She almost sighed. “You're the only one who asked."
A !Dakos warrior and Prall's King deserved to be flogged. I carried her sleek form to the bed and sat beside her.
She lazily lifted one hand.
So small. So delicate. Not the hand of a warrior. The hand of my D'ena.
Gently, she raked her knuckles across my cheek. “M'yote, you should have warned me how noble you were. Unlike your brother who needs to get the crap kicked out of him before he softens up to says sweet things."
When we arrived back home, she'd see more of the romantic Solvun. The King's goal now was to get his Queen safely home to produce an heir.
She leaned forward until the delicate swell of her breast brushed electric friction from my arm. Her cheek passed mine, allowing her mouth to stop near my ear. “I'm ready for you to kiss me now."
Sweet merciful heavens. I took those velvet cheeks in my hands and stared into her blue eyes. For just a moment to see if something in those glistening blue spheres promised we would be friends. Just until I could draw a truce between the battle raging inside me with the irrational half wanting to take her and the other rational part of me wishing to make love to her.
She smashed her lips against mine.
So soft. So eager. Hungry.
Exotic flesh. Hers. My reality.
She slithered atop my lap.
Hot. Driving me backward. Pinning me against the bedding with her rounded breasts and rocking hips. Her glorious hands lured me into absolute bliss. The state I'd yet to achieve in my years of existence as merely a Handler. All the rumors, the tales of melding, merging, unification—the stories of desperation in those moments before consummation, proved themselves firmly based on a solid foundation of truth. Peace awaited inside her. I grabbed her firm ass and held her still while sliding the aching head of my arousal into the moist crack between her legs.
"M'yote,” she groaned into my ear.
Absolute desperation. Why stop now?
Her hand shot to my aching shaft and held it steady as she eased back along its full length.
Heat, beautiful clamping heat. Strangling my throbbing essence. Micron by splendid constricting micron. Devouring me. Nothing but my pulse pounding in my cock existed. With the divine heat. The pressure. And then I was fully encased in the warmth of her soul.
Embraced by my D'ena's soul.
"Oh dearest M'yote, this is so different,” she gasped.
Yes. Very different with a Handler. Stars swirled around our whitewashed bodies. Bright white sparkling twinkles of light. As if the room no longer existed. We made love alone in the starry cloud. “Do you see them, Theone?"
"What?"
"Open your eyes, my love. Look at the stars."
She levered up from my chest with her forearms. “What is it?"
I'd keep my virginity to myself and surmise. “An elemental gift from the universe.” I angled a kiss at the soft skin she stretched between her neck and chin.
She leaned into my mouth, groaning. “Well,” she whispered against my lips, “they say back on my home world that if you see fireworks or stars when you kiss someone, that's the right person for you."
Her heat tightened around my engorged rod.
Yes, she was the one for me.
My head dropped back to the soft bedding.
"Oh, M'yote. Dance with me in the stars.” She shoved until her hips held my cock upright like a lightning rod and began rising along its full length until I couldn't keep my eyes open.
Rain. Rain. My soul would shower across the universe any moment. In a massive effort to soothe some demand. Somewhere. Whatever the demand was. Something begged my soul ease the need. Pulling. Drawing from the root of my shaft. From my tightening balls.
So Gods-damned tight.
My hips thrashed upward. Shoving those rock-hard balls at the heat of the universe. Toward the wringing vise.
The darkness of space exploded.
Light streaked from every direction.
Only to be sucked into a black hole.
Gone.
And then there was Theone, pumping every last drop of my essence from my soul. Sweet Theone. Those round breasts and their perky tight little nipples. Her chin thrust upward. Our hips grinding our sticky groins together into one throbbing sculpture of bodies hinged below the navel.
Oh blessed life. Give me a child to remind me of this moment of completion.
Maybe not to rear here in prison. But to hold back home. A child would have to wait until Solvun's nanites gave him his heir.
Our dance of love slowly died in the starlight until we fused so solidly in exhaustion we no longer had joints for motion.
Stars whirled around us still.
She sighed, lowering her chin to stare into my eyes. “You should have told me making love with you would be so perfect."
"I didn't know."
Her head slightly tilted. “You didn't? How could you not?"
"There's a first time for everything, Theone."
"Theo,” she amended. “My mates call me Theo.” She shot me a wink. “And any man who can make me feel so incredible without an augmented penis definitely gets to call me Theo."
Who had an augmented penis? “Are you telling me there's something I need to know about my brother?"
"Well, your new brother.” She leaned forward, winking, and pressed those taut little nipples into my ribs.
New brother? “And who would that be?"
She smiled. “Flonn."
The title brother was anything but good with Solvun's animosity against the !Dakos warrior.
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Cybernetics... “the art and science of manipulating defensible metaphors.” ~Gordon Pask
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Chapter Thirteen
M'yote held his D'ena's humming body in Solvun's bed as her eyes widened from sleepy satiated to full awareness.
"Flonn is my mate too, dearest, M'yote. And I believe he is our only means of escape,” she whispered.
She'd lost her mind. “He might be able to help us escape. Yes, Theo,” I tried to keep my voice down and press my lips against the rigid curve of her ear. “But he won't share. !Dakos warriors aren't programmed to share."
She backed off to stare me in the eye from among the swirling cocoon of stars. “Are they programmed to defy orders? He saved me even though the Council argued against it. Threatened him. I don't even know if he realizes I could overhear his conversation. And I'm psychic too, M'yote. I'm intuitive. I can sense his behavior is genuine. You have to trust me."
Dare I trust her? She was drugged with a !Dakos warrior's pheromones that swayed her thoughts about Flonn. I slid my palms over the swell of her hips to her trim waist.
A faint gray pattern like a tattoo etched across her belly like a scrolling vine.
The mark.
"What's wrong?” she blurted, reaching for her belly. “No. Dear. Gods. No!” her words barely audible.
For the record, yes would be my appropriate answer in she now wore the Luvk mark of a youngling. Wrank's. Now, she definitely had four mates.
She just pressed the youngling mark beneath both palms and pinched her eyes shut.
My poor, poor D'ena. I slid my palms up her soft lean arms to her starkissed cheeks and turned her face to mine. “Look at me, Theo."
A glistening teardrop escaped the corner of her eye.
Fear. Pain. Both resonated from her soul.
My heart ached for her.
"Theo."
Slowly, her eyelids opened to reveal that palest-blue gaze.
The one that could haunt a man every second of a day.
"Oh, M'yote. Everything is so messed up,” she whispered, leaning her slim form down to press into my heart, placing her soft fingertips against my lips. “I've made such a wreck out of my,” she paused as if thinking twice about speaking, “life.” She closed her eyes as if she strained to hear those almost inaudible words. “In only a couple of damned days."
Her hesitation spared her from uttering her state of pregnancy to anyone listening. Hopefully, the stars hid our words as the brilliant cocoon hides our bodies from the surveillance cameras. But, ultimately, she had no other way to conceal what she meant to say—the mission. “You did what you had to do. Now let's plan how to survive this nightmare."
She chuckled a gasp. “Night terror. Far worse than a nightmare. Too damned many penises chasing me. I'm surrounded by a swarm of attacking penises.” She laughed with a touch of hysteria. “Flonn and his pheromones just sucked all my thoughts but mating away.” She eyed me warily. “You warned me. I should have been more cautious.” She rolled those magnificent eyes and leaned down to brush her velvet lips against my ear. “Do you know what a youngling mark is?"
I buried my lips into her warm silken hair covering her ear. “Wrank's child."
She nudged my ear lobe again with her mouth. “No one can know. You and I must say I'm sick because of the nanites warring inside my body. I need to use marking sickness and any morning sickness in my favor to keep Flonn worrying about me. He calls me his soul and doesn't want to lose me. He's our secret weapon. I will find a way to make this pregnancy turn into a means of escape. To use him to help us."
Excellent plan. I nodded.
Until then, you'll just have to heal me with your magic wand.” She backed up enough to smile at me, wriggling her hips to ensure I knew exactly which wand she mentioned—the one still buried inside her warm tight sheath. “I'm counting on you to keep my baby alive. Anything can happen in this hellhole."
Her hair had begun drying, shifting in thick serpentine tresses around her shoulders. Like the lifeline she so desperately needed me to throw her. “A promise I never needed to make. You're my life now."
Awareness washed over her starkissed features, shuddering through her body as if a chill graced every nucleus of every cell in her being, leaving her sheath quivering around my arousal, like a glove.
Absolute stimulating perfection.
Her body fell, descending back to rest the almost negligible weight of her astonishing curves upon my chest. “You're the only person I can trust completely in here,” she whispered and grabbed my hand, clenching it against the swell of her breast as if it offered comfort. “I've got to get out of here."
And nothing would stop me from saving my D'ena.
"How long do you suggest we stand here and look at the entwined lovers?” Flonn timbered where he stood beside me, watching our mate sleep with her body wrapped around my little blue brother.
"Get used to it, Flonn. You brought her here to share her with me to save her life. Remember? Now, you have to share her with M'yote too.” Stupid machine. Why couldn't he just compute in another factor to his mating dynamics? Oh yeah. That's right. He's not a total fucking machine. He's just partially augmented. His body still wants to fuck the seed out of him into my D'ena. To procreate. Dumb stupid !Dakos and their never-ending quest to perpetuate their species. That was why I and my D'ena were trapped here in this black hole of !Dakos insanity.
M'yote's elegantly muscled blue form stirred beneath Theo's sleek pale curves.
The bulge of her breast pressed against his chest made all my blood rush to my groin. Not now. I shifted my footing to try to reposition the damned serpent in my pants.
M'yote slowly slid a palm along the curve of her lower back. “She needs to sleep,” he whispered.
"At least she isn't heaving.” I flicked my gaze to Flonn. “He's right."
Flonn nodded.
He almost seemed overemotional for a computer. Cyborgs. They are truly confusing. I grabbed the edge of the comforter and turned it back upon itself to cover my brother and our sleeping D'ena.
She burrowed deeper into his blue chest.
The little tick. I should have known she'd look perfectly matched wrapped in M'yote's arms. He was so faultless. Even hi
s spirit was as flawless as his form. Females zeroed in on M'yote like a prized morsel. That my half-brother was. And I, well, I just got to be King. In itself, the title won me all the affection I could stomach from females before I wound up imprisoned. But what I'd give to have M'yote's strong character and sense of being. His power of elementals, though, was another issue. I didn't want anything to tempt me into shifting the powers around me. My power? I was weaker than M'yote. And he and I knew I'd take a Handler's gift, kill the microbes on our planet, and steal me a mate.
M'yote should be king.
We both know it.
"Stop staring at us.” M'yote snarled in a whisper. “You'll wake her up. We're not going anywhere."
Flonn snorted and made himself at home in my chair.
"Is she cured, little brother?"
"We won't know until she awakens. But there is something you need to know."
Alright, out with the news. I nodded and found Flonn staring.
"She's pregnant."
I could feel the color drain from my face before I turned through the lavatory's doorway and caught my ghostly appearance in the mirror.
"Whose child is it?” Flonn asked loud enough to wake the dead.
I didn't have to turn to watch Theo rise and take in her audience. The mirror's reflection was equally accommodating with what unfolded in the bed.
"I don't know whose child I carry."
We couldn't know until the day it arrived. My child? Flonn's? Or M'yote's blue little saint? Who was the lucky father? That was the least of my worries. I turned, paced back to lean in the biting doorframe, and watched my D'ena. “Everything's going to be alright, Theo. We're all going to see to it. You just go back to sleep.” And I'd decide when and if someone needed his ass kicked if he got out of line.
Feral Series IV: Feral Fallout Page 14
