by Ravyn Wilde
She was waiting for Shalan to see if there was anything she could do to speed up the process of last rites. She was nervous, edgy. Impatient. She wanted this phase of her life taken care of. She paced the edges of the room glancing idly at the Zylar’s Moon: Selven Refuges, seeing them, but not registering their content. A small black leather volume, embossed with gold lettering, lay closed on the desk at the back of the room. The Zylar’s Moon: Selven Refuge cut through her mental musings, ‘Book of Rare Skills’. What?
She stopped her restless wandering, picked up the book and opened it to the first page. It was hand written. Scanning through the tome, she noticed the writing changed; several people had made notations. Only half the book was written in. The first notation was dated over 400 life cycles ago and was almost impossible to read. Flipping through the pages to find the last entry, she found a short one dated this bi-non. The words jumped out at her.
‘Tala—ruling daughter. Special markings: burgundy-black hair. Ability to mind travel without her body, other indications…’
There the writing stopped. Great. She was an object of study. An oddity. She wasn’t sure how she felt about that. Looking over her shoulder, not wanting anyone to catch her reading from the book, she quickly scanned some of the other notations. No one she knew. Wait. Mica.
The date was many life cycles ago; he must have been a child of about 10.
‘Mica—future High Priest. Designated by presence of hair color and born with full cognitive speech abilities. Abilities…’ What followed were several pages of an exhaustive listing of his control over weather, shifting, etc. She was just about to put the book back where she found it, when the words, ‘Dream Walking’, caught her attention.
“What is Dream Walking?” she muttered to herself. As she started to read, ‘rare ability to enter and direct…’, she heard someone coming. Feeling as if she’d been caught spying, she replaced the book and quickly resumed her pacing.
A priestess-in-training stood at the door. “Shalan sent me to tell you that something came up that needs her immediate attention. She won’t be able to keep her appointment with you. She is very sorry and will find you next bi-non, she said.” Then waited politely for Tala to leave.
Damn! She thought to herself. What in the moons was Dream Walking? She’d have to come back another time and see if she couldn’t finish reading that book. With difficulty Tala dismissed the Book of Rare Skills from her mind and thought about what she had learned over the last couple of bi-nons as she walked back to her chamber to rest. Her head was swimming from all of the information.
She had studied herbs, and potions this bi-non. Who knew that the lovely ‘yellow jasmine’ or Gelsemium, she reminded herself that she was supposed to use their true names, could completely stop your breathing and kill you? It was such a beautiful climbing plant that grew all over the place, and smelled so wonderful. But…if you used the right amount in a potion it would stop convulsions. Tala shuddered; she was not sure she was up to this. Don’t use enough, person dies of convulsions; use too much, person dies from not being able to breath. She didn’t think her strengths lay in being a healer.
As she put on a sleeping robe, she ran through some of the other discoveries the day had brought. She winced, thinking of the words written about her in the book. Her body had disappeared from sight and her mind had gone all the way to Tanar. She’d been able to see her brother, watch him. Her body had only reappeared when her mind had reentered it. Her trainers were amazed…they said if she’d taken her invisible body with her, that wouldn’t have been all that extraordinary. But she would have felt her body as she did this. Tala knew her body wasn’t with her. No one was sure where her body went when her mind traveled, they just knew it was gone. Current speculation was that it went to a different dimension. Great.
Added to that, the information that she’d gone all the way to Tanar and not just to another room at the Refuge was wildly unusual and interesting to her teachers. Interesting enough evidently to warrant a page in the rare skills register. Okay, thinking about that was not going to be conducive to sleeping.
The Selven—the history of this group was incredible. They had been here, in this place, since what seemed the beginning of time. It had started out as a school of sorts for young women. They trained here and then went back to their families when the time came for them to be claimed. Then someone had figured out how to remove the links that were embedded in every Zylan female body so that they could never be claimed. Tala wondered if the Selven knew that Mica could form chains from individual pieces of your soul. She hadn’t mentioned to Shalan that he had done this to Nyssa. Surely they knew that once the true mate had been found, he could fashion a true-link? I wonder if that ability was mentioned in “Rare Skills”? She needed another look at that book. With thoughts of Mica firmly taking space in her thoughts, she drifted into an uneasy sleep.
* * * * *
Mica paced. It seemed he was doing a lot of that lately. He was still no closer to having any clear answers. Raj’s condition hadn’t changed. He was unconscious but his body continued to breathe and his heart beat steadily. He swallowed when he was spoon-fed broth…but that was it. None of the ancient healers he had talked to, either telepathically or through com portals, had any idea of what the blue threads meant. Toma had been frantically researching archives of old healing and history texts. Mica knew time was rapidly running out. He was waiting to hear from Naja, one of the oldest of the ancient healers. If Naja didn’t know anything, he would have to go back in and try something else.
To top it all off, he was worried about Tala. He couldn’t leave his brother but he was well aware that his time to claim Tala was fast running out. He needed to get to her soon.
Tonight he had decided to take the Dream Walking one step further. He would make sure she couldn’t draw back from him. With the distance between them, it was the only way to connect with her. Reaching out with his mind, Mica lightly touched Tala’s subconscious. Yes, she was asleep and already dreaming of him. Good. Settling himself comfortably on his bed, Mica went into her dreams to play.
* * * * *
Tala moaned. Mica was here! She had missed him so. She sought his mouth hungrily with her own, delighting in the spicy taste of him. She wound her arms around his powerful neck. They were standing in a field of brightly colored flowers. The hot sun lightly kissed their naked bodies. Tala had been so busy exploring his mouth that to this point she hadn’t even noticed that they were naked. The feel of his skin against hers was glorious. It just seemed right somehow. “Don’t leave me,” she whispered between kisses.
“Never, love.” And Mica lowered his mouth to capture hers once more. He played at that delicious mouth. Nibbling, sucking her lower lip between his teeth, dipping his tongue into the honeyed warmth. He ran his rough hands down the column of her arching back, smoothing them together over the soft globes of her ass. Pulling her to him, he shifted her back and forth over his growing erection.
Tala growled soft and low in her throat. She pulled his mouth even closer to hers and tried to force him to press harder against her seeking body. Frustrated, she moved her hands down his back. Stopping right above his buttocks, she pulled on both sides to bring him closer.
Mica moved his mouth from Tala’s lips and bent to the hollow at her neck. He knew how sensitive she was there. Knew how sucking that soft skin would make her frantic for more. He was right. She inhaled sharply and shivered in his arms.
“Mica.” Tala gasped. Her body was burning. Small flames stretched from where he feasted on her neck, to burn at her sensitive breasts and then send tendrils of heat licking down to tickle her core. “More!” she moaned into his ear.
Moving slowly, Mica lowered Tala to rest on the soft pallet he had fashioned. Gently moving her onto her side so that she faced him, he wrapped one arm under her head and bent it to pull her to him. He seized her mouth with his own and began to drive her insane with his free hand. Tala was tall and abundantly curvy
. Her breasts were large and overflowed his palm as he cupped first one, then the other. He kneaded the soft flesh with his open hand and then brushed lightly over her extended nipple. Her rasp of pleasure drove him to close his fingers over the tight little nub and pull softly.
Tala arched into the pleasure of Mica’s hand. Breaking away from his mouth to gasp for air, she bent her back and pushed her breast into the blissful torment caused by his seeking fingers. He rubbed and plucked at her nipple, then pulled and pressed it between finger and thumb. The sensation it caused shot directly to her core and she moaned as she felt herself grow wet. “Mica?”
Mica knew that Tala was unsettled and a little nervous about the sensations coursing through her body. She wanted him, but still had a virgin’s fear of the unknown. He knew that at this point, the confusion would always cause her to wake up. He wouldn’t allow her to escape this time. Gently he probed Tala’s mind with his own and held her captive in the dream world with him. He rolled her gently onto her back, shifting his arm out from under her head. Scooting down her body he continued to torment one breast with his fingers and hand, his mouth seeking a delicious path from her shoulder and down her chest, finally allowing his tongue to play with her other waiting nipple.
The damp trail of Mica’s mouth drove all question or thought from Tala. Every ounce of concentration she had went to focusing on the intense pleasure he brought her. When his wet warm tongue laved her nipple, she couldn’t suppress a cry of delight or stop the bucking of her hips. Afraid Mica would leave her, she moved her hands to his head and wove her fingers through his hair. She wanted him to stay there, wanted to keep him anchored solidly to her.
Mica allowed her to hold him to her breast for several passionate minons. Her involuntary moans and the gyrating push of her hips told him that she was as mindless as he needed her to be. He finally pushed himself back, ignoring Tala’s moan of denial. Taking her wrists in his strong hands, he moved them above her head and secured them with a binding thought. Glancing down was almost more than he could handle. He groaned at the picture of her soft body spread naked before him, unconsciously open to his view. Her plump breasts were pushed forward from the arch in her back, the dark rose-colored nipples gleaming from the moisture of his mouth. Her legs were angled out with knees slightly bent. She was breathing heavily and her eyes were tightly closed.
“Don’t stop,” she whispered brokenly.
“I have no intention of stopping, Tala. Not this time. Not ever again. Open your eyes and see what you do to me.”
Tala opened her eyes slowly, twisting her head to look first into Mica’s fire blue eyes. Had she ever thought them cold? They burned through to her center now. Her eyes moved down to the hard pulse visible at his neck, then to the light sprinkling of dark hair that dusted his massive chest, hair that couldn’t disguise the hard points of his nipples. Drawn now by the line of hair that narrowed to his slim waist, her gaze dropped lower still. She gasped, “Goddess!” Thrusting proudly out from the dark curls at his groin was his cock. It was huge. The blue veined tumescence throbbed and leapt at her gaze. The tip gleamed with drops of fluid. Tala’s eyes snapped back to Mica’s.
“You, Tala. You do this to me. You make me grow thick and heavy. Hot. Only you.” Mica slowly lowered his head to continue feasting at Tala’s tantalizing breasts. Sucking first one and then the other, he heard her moan and felt the movement below him as she resumed bucking her hips. Kneeling over her with one hand holding him up, allowing him to bend over her, he settled his other hand on her stomach. Starting to pet her in small circles while his tongue worked the same pattern at her nipple, he drove her to respond to him.
Tala was frantic. The sight of Mica in all his glory burned behind her closed eyelids. That sight, with the feel of his hot, wet tongue at her breast and the slow circular glide of the hand at her stomach had her straining for something just out of reach. She knew her legs were bent at the knee and flung open. She knew that she was digging her heels into the ground and frantically pumping her hips up and down. But she didn’t care. The only thing she did care about was not having it end. She struggled to reach an unimagined goal, somehow knowing that Mica was the only one who could help her achieve it.
Tala hissed. Mica had moved the hand at her stomach to tangle in the nest of damp curls at the top of her thighs. “Please,” she cried.
Mica was so enthralled with the feel of Tala’s heat that he didn’t hear her. The warm dampness coming from her cunt beckoned him. Popping the nipple he had been sucking from his mouth, he licked his way down her flat stomach. He was dimly aware that Tala’s hands were still bound by his thoughts, her mind still held to his in order to prevent her from leaving the erotic dream. He used his hands to hold her thighs open to him as he kissed and laved his way to her sweet heat. A quick glance showed him that Tala was thrashing her head back and forth in tormented pleasure, eyes tightly closed, her breathing ragged. The new sensations overwhelmed her, she wanted to touch him, but was lost in this first pleasure.
Mica paused a mere inch from his final goal. He savored the spicy fragrance that was Tala, stuck his tongue out to tease her senses with a barely-there lick at the tip of her aroused clit. Losing the slim line of control he had preserved at that first taste of her, Mica fell to his reward. He’d known it would be only seconds before Tala reached her first peak. Her deep shudders and wild cries and the rush of liquid release told him that he’d been right. But he wasn’t finished with her yet. He had waited for this moment for many life cycles. He knew Dream Walking this joining was far from what the true glory of her would be. But, for now, it was all he had. He licked and laved and sucked on the hard nub between her silken thighs. With long loving strokes, he savored the sweet taste of her. He buried his tongue inside her, shifting his head from side to side and using the pressure of his face to stimulate her clit.
Biting at the nub, Mica watched as she came unglued. He continued to feast, ignoring Tala’s pleas for him to stop. Listening to her scream she couldn’t take it anymore, he took more.
Tala was completely mindless. One raw nerve ending and the nerve existed solely beneath Mica’s mouth. The muscles in her stomach and ass were tight and trembled with every flick of that fiery tongue. She lost count of her orgasms. Each peak seemed to take her higher and leave her closer to the next one. She felt him pull back. Numbly she opened her eyes and glanced up at him.
He was bent above her, on his knees between her thighs with one hand resting on the ground beside her and one hand wrapped around his magnificent pulsing cock, his eyes locked on her. He nudged the tip at her quivering entrance. Not seeking access yet, he used the blunt tip of his engorged penis to spread his juices on her and tease her into another frenzy of need. Slowly he fit himself to her opening and increased the sensation by sinking in just an inch, then pulling back out to rub. He repeated this several times in slow torment. Tala would have sworn that she wouldn’t have been interested, so sure she couldn’t take anymore. But the blunt hardness of Mica slipping in, then out, now slicking up and down her folds made her hunger all over again.
“Please, Mica, release your hold on me. I want to touch you the way you are touching me,” she frantically begged him to comply. Instantly she was released from his mental hold. She put her hands on his shoulders and stroked tenderly down his chest, lightly brushing across his beaded nipples.
Mica sucked in a breath, immediately sitting back on his heels. He put both hands on her hips and moved to position her for his pleasure. He then plunged forward into the tight heat that was Tala’s core.
There was a slight pain to this invasion of her body, yet it immediately turned to unbelievable gratification. His mouth had been beyond wonderful but his cock made her feel complete. She caught his rhythm as if born to it and felt glorious when he lowered his body to hers so they were touching from hip to chest. She wrapped her arms and legs around him, and curled her hips upward, driving him deeper.
Mica moaned, “Mine.” He was
deliriously focused on the incredible feeling of Tala’s inner muscles squeezing his cock. They pulled at him with every stroke, milking him. He knew he couldn’t hold back much longer and wanted to take Tala with him his first time. Pulling back from her just enough to allow him to slip his hand between them, he dipped his fingers in their shared fluids and rubbed at her hard nub. Simultaneously, he started to pound into her. Then he felt her break. Felt the hot juices of her orgasm flow over him as her sweet cunt contracted over and over again. With a roar, Mica screamed his own release.
* * * * *
Tala woke in a daze. Her body was heavy and replete. For a minion, she lay there with a silly smile on her face. Stupidly thinking of the difference of some words between Nyssa’s Earth and Zylar. Like minons, on Earth they would be minutes. Then, as her thoughts began to settle, she frowned. She remembered she was with the Selven. She hadn’t just been with Mica in a field of flowers. It had been a dream. Only a dream. Damn! Sighing, she went to roll over onto her side. She was naked. There was no sign of the gown she had put on before going to bed. She swore she could smell Mica on her skin.
This was too much. She couldn’t bear it any longer. Throwing off the blankets, Tala began to prepare for the new rising. She would confront Shalan this bi-non and force her to allow Tala to speed up her training. She had to. She was sure the only way these thoughts and dreams of Mica would go away would be if she completed the final rites. If she didn’t do it soon, she was sure she would go completely insane.
Chapter 5
Toma walked slowly into Mica’s room and crossed to the com portal. “Naja has finally responded,” he remarked.
Mica looked up vaguely. Torn away from restless thoughts of his Dream Walk the previous night with Tala, it took him a moment to focus on what Toma had said. He sighed. It had been frustrating waiting for Naja to return from his nomadic travels. The ancient one refused to use his mind for conversations and shielded himself against telepathic communication, always saying he didn’t want others running around in his head. Therefore, they had to wait for him to get to one of the many places they had left messages. “Where is he?” Mica asked.
