Feral Fever

by Feral Fever (lit)

  There was no denying the crackling energy between us. Or he smelled Lehd on me.

  Borun scanned the other's faces. "Wryn was accepted by the Ice clan. Happily. Allowing me to depart a day earlier than planned."

  "Lok is strong. He will protect her," Var said, emotionlessly, with a nod.

  Borun chuckled. "I watched him seduce Wryn en route to the palatial village. None of his half brothers dare cross him." His gaze slid to mine. "Aisling, this is the first low-caste Queen in history. Change is upon Luvk."

  If the firelight would have reached his face and driven back the shadows consuming his features, I knew his mask would twist with enthusiasm. His voice was drenched with the drug. I laid a palm on the corded muscle of his arm.

  His eyes flickered like I shot a bolt of electricity through him.

  His intoxicating skin lured my hand down along the steely length of his forearm to his hand where I curled my fingers around his knuckles.

  His eyes flashed again. But he turned back to the men. "There are a few other younger orange daughters of the Queens. We could encourage the Queens to arrange marriages…"

  Not good. They needed to focus on forming a council of adults, males with duties to keep them challenged. Whatever type they fancy though. "Uh, I don't think that's a good idea." I squeezed his hand.

  Five pairs of glowing eyes turned to mine.

  Double not good. "Listen. They're children. Younglings. Is it right to wed them off for a political advantage?"

  Nobody blinked.

  It's a standoff. "Okay, explain to me why these children will want to be part of arranged marriages."

  "Because low-caste females are shunned by their mothers when it comes to creating political alliances," Mart explained. "You said yourself Morna spoke of these things with you. For the low-caste princesses, this is a chance to place them in power and seat thrones with level-headed females."

  Why did that sound odd coming from Mart? He seemed trapped in his superiority before. In his whiteness. But now he pushed for change. Maybe there was more than a seductive self-centered soul hidden beneath those stripes. "Fine. But arranging the marriages will instigate favoritism among low-caste females, and they won't be so level-headed after they've been pampered by their doting power-hungry Queens. I say just let it go and let the mothers marry off their daughters later. See how things play out."

  "Maybe she's right." Borun studied my hand.

  My white hand. I gulped at the pure color of it. "Back on my world, my skin might be the choice of colors but we lie in the sun and change it to the golden color of Var's stripes." I shot him a glance.

  The Ice warrior's features shifted curiously.

  "It's true." I held up my other hand, unwilling to let go of Borun's handhold. "This skin is considered sickly on my planet. Nobody would dare walk around with this pale flesh with our ideas of beauty." I chuckled. "Isn't it insane how differently cultures can evolve to perceive the same thing in such a different way?" And here I was pushing the Luvks to change. Against everything I ever believed back home. It wasn't my place to make them alter their culture. "Look, I don't like feeding you ideas and causing social upheaval. But something is going on. The political powers aren't going to be placated with a few arranged marriages."

  "Time, Aisling. Arrange marriages give the clans time," Var said.

  For what? "What kind of time?"

  "Time to allow us the chance to ensure the wrong clan doesn't end up in power."

  Was that what everything was truly about? Between the raid the other night, Kruk's departure, the Queens' murders, and the determination of those warriors trying to capture me once I passed through the portal, Var had to be right. "Well then we'd better come up with a solution before someone else dies." I slid my gaze to Borun's. "Proy was killed in a Slaken raid a few nights ago. I'm fairly certain Kruk was behind it."

  Borun studied the ring of eyes around the table. "Should we replace him?"

  The question set off a series of shrugs from my guards.

  What were they saying in mindspeak?

  Borun shot me a speculative glance. "Little one, I can request another Royal Guard for you if you like."

  No. "Five are enough." The thought of my juggling another sex-starved male boggled the mind.

  A low chuckle curled around the room from Borun. He squeezed my hand beneath his two wickedly dancing eyebrows.

  Royal Guards thought of nothing but sex. Grant it, Queens did by default simply because their guards thought of nothing else. "Stop it. I have more to tell you."

  "More?"

  "There's a second portal." I reached for the rolled up leather of my map.

  All the warriors began sighing except for Borun.

  "Don't listen to them, Borun." I shook out the leather and pointed to the Sunrise clan. "It's somewhere down here."

  "She wants to start searching for a portal in the ruins, Borun," Mart clarified.

  I scowled at his patronizing tone. "No sex for you for a month!"

  He shot me a dismissive look.

  Var burst into laughter.

  Like I could hold sex over Var's head. "So much for respect when my voice of reason laughs with the rest of the guards." I shot to my feet with map in hand and went to my personal quarters.

  Borun didn't follow me for a few minutes.

  Have your testosterone-imbued discussion. They were probably talking about how I was a stupid female. The chauvinist dolts.

  The squeak of Borun's boot announced his presence behind me where I fumed, sitting near the fire pit. He descended, wrapping himself around my back to sink his mouth to my neck, his whiskers tickling up a chilly wave that coursed through my body.

  I shivered and grabbed his arms that snaked around me.

  His massaging hands worked at my breasts. "Don't be angry with them, little one. They do what's best for your safety."

  "Don't make me snort. They've been treating me like an idiot every time I mention a hidden portal-"

  "Hidden?" he whispered against my ear.

  "To function as a secret entrance for Slaken raids. The type of attacks through time indicates they move outward from the same point, moving farther only when they've taken everything they've come for. It's a simple explanation."

  "When I have finished with you, you will show me this map."

  He didn't laugh. He didn't discount my perspective. He just slid his warm hands beneath my shirt and twisted the clasp of my bra.

  When his hands slid beneath the cups to mold to my breasts, I ached so badly in my groin that my soul melted into my panties. "Borun," I groaned, turning my body to face him.

  His eyes begged I touch him, kiss him, cling to him. "You mated with them."

  It wasn't an accusatory statement. Just more like he knew. "I don't want to talk about that now." I just wanted to push him backward and ride him into the ground.

  "They care about you the way I do, Aisling. Don't be angry with them."

  "I'm only going to be angry if you don't make me cry out your name one time for every day you've been absent from my sleeping skins."

  A low growl gurgled in his chest. He grabbed me against his bulging pectoral muscles, pulling up my shirt, and yanking it over my head.

  That's my Borun. A mate who knew exactly what he wanted. I slipped off my bra and ran my hands over his shoulders until I could pull the tie from his queue.

  He watched me touch him and studied my gaze as my movements shifted.

  I shook out his hair.

  The firelight kissed his features as if he were some kind of golden Norse god with sharp cheekbones and full lips. Maybe it was his glowing eyes. But Borun was my first and last hero with his wild orange hair and python arms. Like Atlas merged with Hercules. And the longer I stared into his probing gaze, the more I wanted him to hold me forever. Keep me safe. I stretched up a few inches to nip at his lower lip.

  He just watched me nip and nip at his mouth.

  What entranced him? "Borun?" I waited for
him to react.

  He slid a hand up to cup my face and turned my head as if he searched for something important.

  Maybe a flaw? The way I'd been acting about sex certainly stamped me flawed. Feral. Fevered. But what darted behind those misty eyes?

  "We'll leave to search for the portal tomorrow," he whispered.

  What?

  My heart raced.

  "You and I have business to tend to first." He leaned my head to the side and latched that hot sucking mouth onto my neck.

  He didn't care I reeked of Lehd. He just wanted me. Now. And I wasn't complaining.

  He raised me up until I crouched on my knees as he hungrily nibbled my nipples into peaks, back and forth between each breast like a man starved for nourishment. Or he wanted me so damned wet that he could just ram into me and burst.

  The thought made me ache so deeply that I almost fell to the floor.

  He shoved me to my feet where I could look down into his serious golden eyes, and he turned to my boots, yanking them off like slippers.

  I felt drugged.

  Lazy.

  So ready to be taken that I could only look at him.

  Begging him to hurry.

  He pulled off my pants and snatched me into the air.

  "Here, Borun, here by the fire." Moving to the sleeping skins meant I couldn't see his body. Without the light orbs.

  He halted and studied me.

  "I can't see you in the dark."

  His breath knifed.

  Did he realize I loved seeing his stripes?

  He knelt, placing me gently atop some pillows, tugged off his boots, rose, and slowly peeled off his leather pants. Inch by glorious inch. Revealing his mesmerizing body I so desperately needed to touch.

  My heart raced at the unmasking of his muscular build enhanced by all those incredible stripes, even more so by his engorged shaft.

  My Norse god stepped out of the pool of leather at his feet and shoved a foot between my legs to push them apart.

  No problem. I granted his wish.

  He descended, kicking the pillows beneath my knees out of his way.

  What was he up to?

  He slid a hand beneath one of my knees and raised it only to settle his soft lips against my inner thigh. Slowly, methodically, he kissed a trail of smoldering gooseflesh down my leg. Down to where my body subconsciously took over and blindly rocked. Begging for him.

  When he reached the end of my thigh, his presence slipped away, only to begin the same torture on my other leg. It was so overwhelming I had to shut my eyes, dive into darkness. Whine. "Borun!"

  His mouth came off my inner thigh. "One."

  Oh. Dear. God, Luvks could count.

  He slid his fingers into the tender nether folds of my sex and circled my nub with a fingertip then returned to the spot on my inner thigh, kissing while working his finger in mind-numbing circles at my clit.

  I thought I'd lose my mind gasping for breath. Somehow I sucked in a deep one and tried to hold back my pleas. But he was so damned dogmatic. I needed his hard shaft inside me. I grabbed fistfuls of fur and rocked my head back and forth.

  But his touch was too overpowering. "Borun, please, I need you."

  "Two."

  I bucked against his finger where he pinned me to the pillow and climaxed with a thousand stars shooting behind my eyelids.

  But he didn't ram his steely cock inside me. No, he latched that hot mouth onto my aching nub and sucked me back down into the darkness. Head under. Gasping at air. I became his. Again and again. He claimed me as I gasped his name. Marked himself with my scent. Rubbed away any vestige of the others until I couldn't lift my head from the pillow he so graciously placed me upon.

  Somewhere inside me, my soul rallied a second wind, and I wrapped my legs around that mouth and rode it until my building orgasm peaked so explosively tears came to my eyes.

  He must have seen the tears because he crawled up to run the tip of his pointed nose along the length of mine, staring into my eyes. "Little one, forgive me, I've hurt you."

  How could my heart melt again? "No. It's just too much at one time. Please, inside me. I ache for you." At least, he hadn't said five.

  He gently slid his thick shaft into me, ever so carefully. "Blessed stars, you're so wet, Aisling. My Aisling. So hot. So soft."

  I clenched my inner muscles around him.

  He hissed. "I dreamt of you doing that every moment of every day we were apart."

  "Then you know never to leave me again."

  He growled and began his plundering of my soul. Gaze locked overhead on mine. Knees leaning into mine, holding my sex completely open for his pleasure.

  I wanted to grip his harness and ride him. "Let my legs free, Borun."

  A wicked grin split his cheeks. He found the little spot that made me whine and focused short strokes there. I peaked so rapidly I couldn't beg him to stop. To come with me. Instead, I wilted into his elbow and closed my eyes so I could just enjoy being with him.

  * * * *

  Borun drove deeply into his mate's slick softness, watching her lie quietly and contentedly beneath him. Her heartsong had quieted to a calm beat. Hearing it rattle upon my arrival was a far greater gift than anything he could have imagined. And now she stretched out in a pool of long blonde hair with her beautiful breasts calling to me. Not far below, my younglings' mark shivered beneath her knifing breath.

  Her blue eyes popped open.

  She focused on me and started rocking her hips with my movements.

  The sweet little sounds she made noted I'd struck another chord inside her and stood plucking the strings like a master court Hrindlian singing for her supper. I'd give her something to dance about. I shifted away from her knees onto mine and leaned into her, thrusting, lunging, plowing into that clenching womb trying to milk my seed into her.

  Her legs slid around my ass to trap me, and she grabbed her favorite handhold on the back of my harness. Her taut channel tightened more, almost choking the pulse from my erection. I had to push harder. Faster.

  Her sweet little sounds amplified to demanding tones that yearned for me to hurry.

  A tightness in balls made me throw my head back as my body flexed to shoot my seed with an unyielding squeeze. I could only pump into her channel and strain, pushing, trying to leave every bit of my soul therein. Every drop of adoration, love, and respect she deserved. Because she'd learned to accept Luvk life. Learned to accept me. And she kept grinding my aching shaft with her amazing hips.

  The blue healing light flashed between our bodies as my last thrust died inside my mate's heat.

  "Oh, Borun," she whispered, sliding her palms down my chest. "Nothing makes me feel like you do. And," she whipped out a small knife, "we have business to take care of." She quickly slashed a scratch on my arm and leaned to suck blood from the crack's beading seam.

  Nothing more erotic than a female's mouth sucking a man's body existed.

  I went rock hard inside her.

  "I hope you aren't tired." I chuckled.

  "I never am after the blue light flashes."

  Healing and energizing. Her magic light could move mountains. Since she'd only shouted my name seven times, I had more work to do since I'd been away nine days.

  ?

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  "It's got to be in the Sunrise realm," Aisling said to the five warriors leaning over her map later that night after Borun had finished with her. Why did my mates hesitate in agreeing with me about the portal so much? I'm not a moron.

  Mart shot me a glance. "Aisling, I spent most of my youngling years wandering around those ruins with my father. I'd know if there was a portal inside."

  "We leave at sunrise," Borun announced and rolled up the map.

  At least my blood mate believed in me. Why was Mart so determined we not search for another portal in his homeland? I headed back into the bath, stripped off my black robe and lingerie, and hopped into the churning water.

  By the time I
surfaced, Borun stripped off his pants. And Ovh. And Lehd. Apparently our relationship went beyond nudity to communal bathing. It's not like any of them hadn't seen me nude. Or in my most vulnerable state, legs splayed wide to their adoration. And why should all three of them in the bath with me prove a problem? Unless they ganged up on me. And Borun was here to protect me. I grabbed a spot at the pool's rim and watched them undress as the warm water caressed my body.

  An orange stripe fest unfolded before me. These Queens were insane. Who wouldn't want the biggest toughest most doting males on the planet even though they were keel-me-over gorgeous in their orange birthday suits? And really all were just sweet as could be.

  Borun shot me a half smile and hopped into the water. Lehd and Ovh were right behind him.

  The waves they kicked up knocked me about a bit. I just propped my derriere on the sunken ledge and enjoyed the view.

  Sexy hunks, gods, surfaced for air, wiping their drenched hair back from their faces.

  Oh, I could get used to communal bathing. But with a long ride by war beast looming in the morning, this might be my last real bath for days. I need to find the soap. I shoved up, grabbed the soap dish, and turned to find all three warriors watching me exactly the way I had been hanging on the pool's rim watching them.

  I suppose turnabout is fair play in community baths. Besides, their interest was kind of nice. I reclaimed my seat and rubbed up a frothy lather with a bar of soap.

  Ovh kind of moseyed past me, slow and deliberately. I grabbed his muscled arm and turned his back to me where I could scrub his shoulders with my fingernails.

  He proceeded to lean down, against the ledge and my knees. "A little over to the left, Aisling."

  I gulped down a giggle and scratched where he instructed.

  He didn't turn, try to kiss me, or anything. He just sighed and wandered off.

  Lehd let no time go to waste in backing up with a wicked grin. So I went to work on his shoulders. He groaned and shifted his shoulder blades so much I ended up massaging his muscles. But who's whining when getting to touch one of Luvks' national treasures?

  Borun just hung out lounging on the opposite side of the pool. So, I lathered up and shoved underwater to swim across the pool to his side. He grabbed me around the waist as I surfaced and pulled me against his warm solid side.