The Voris' Mate

by S. J. Sanders

  ***

  The packed only a few essentials that could easily be carried. Vadal assured Reggie that they could come back later for their other possessions, but the jungles of Vora were too dense for land vehicles except along the thinner forests along the coast. For this reason, they could only take what few necessities they could carry. To her credit, though she hated the idea of walking all the way to Norveth, she didn’t grumble about the inconvenience. She silently followed their lead, stowing essentials in her small pack.

  “Make sure you never stray away from us,” Vadal warned as they exited the nest. “Stay between us within the safety of our coils while we travel.”

  Reggie shouldered her bag and arched an eyebrow at him.

  “Just how long are we going to be traveling?”

  Vadal pressed his lips together doing hasty calculations.

  “I calculate three days at most. This is taking into consideration your slower speed as a bipedal, and that at some point during the day one of us will probably carrying you, since I doubt you possess the level of endurance we have.”

  Reggie winced and let loose a self-deprecating laugh. “Yeah, you got me there. Exercise and building muscle weren’t exactly part of my daily routine before I left Earth. I never even went hiking or camping when I was a kid. I’ll probably be completely useless, to be honest,” she added with a sheepish grin.

  Shaagra, on her opposite side, laughed and hugged her to him, startling Vadal all over again.

  “Do not worry, female,” Shaagra scoffed, his eyes lit with a teasing gleam, “you have two strong Vori to care for your every need in the vast jungles between here and Norveth.”

  Reggie’s lips quirked as she looked at him. “Vast jungles, huh? You really aren’t selling me on this luxury vacation very well,” she giggled.

  Shaagra adopted an expression of mock confusion. “You are saying that romantic retreats into the wilderness are not done by humans?”

  Their female’s eyes danced, and she snickered. “Not unless you’re married to someone like Steve Irwin.” She shook her head at them. “Most romantic retreats are more like… reclining on the beach with a fruity alcoholic beverage.”

  Shaagra wrinkled his nose in disgust; Vadal couldn’t agree more. “You want to sit on sand and poison yourself?”

  She giggled, ducking beneath a broad leaf Vadal held out of her way. She flashed him a sweet appreciative smile.

  “Are you guys really telling me that Vori don’t go to the beach or drink alcohol?”

  Vadal shuddered in his scales. “We only go onto the beach when necessary to meet a trading vessel, or if we choose to fish. It takes hours to get all the sand out from between our scales, and, additionally, the salty water makes my scales itch.”

  His nest brother made a face and jerked his head in agreement. Reggie snorted with laughter.

  “As for alcohol, our species has a horrible allergic reaction to fermented and distilled substances. We do not care for its taste, and it takes little to make us seriously ill. We understand that makes humans ill when consumed too,” Vadal said with a scowl. “There will be no alcohol in our nest. We won’t let you poison yourself with fermented juices.”

  Reggie patted his arm gently. “Fair enough, big guy. I’m pretty sure it’s time for me to quit drinking anyway.”

  ***

  Reggie wanted to smack herself. Why did she have to open her big mouth? The last thing she wanted these guys knowing is what an incredible loser she’d become in recent years.

  How many nights had she fallen asleep alone with an inch of liquor still in her glass beside her bed? Drinking had been a convenient way for her to forget her pain. Really, giving it up was for the best, even though the idea of never again tasting an icy daiquiri or a before-bed Bloody Mary made her tongue feel dry and leathery with want. She hadn’t even thought of having a drink the last several days she’d been on Vora, but now she found it would be never it made it a lot more difficult to face.

  They walked for hours, bright little bugs buzzing around her to her great annoyance, but she found herself entertained by all of the beautifully colored plants. Even the leaves came in a mottled variety of hues from verdant greens to darkest purples, and the flowers were lush and larger than anything that bloomed on Earth. Trailing vines with honey-colored trumpet-shaped blooms hung from trees, and compact bushes thick with small blue and pink flowers grew between the tight confines of the trunks.

  When they finally settled down for the night, up in a wide-limbed tree of all places, Reggie barely managed to climb into the heavy coils of her guys. As soon as she settled against them, their tails lifted and coiled loosely around her, keeping her warm and protecting her from the bugs.

  She looked up at them. “What about you guys? The bugs are gonna eat you alive.”

  Vadal chuckled. “Do not worry, Reggie. Vori have very thick skin. The bugs have a difficult time biting us, nor do they care much for the taste of us. They will not bother us,” he murmured, his body relaxing with exhaustion.

  As much as she wanted to jump them and enjoy a repeat of their previous sexual escapade, she was just as exhausted as her guys—if not more so. A huge yawn cracked her jaw and she wiggled into a comfortable position against her males, settling between Vadal’s and Shaagra’s abs.

  She was comfortable, but she already missed their nesting mound.

  She felt the tip of a tail slide against her upper thigh. With a giggle, she reached down and gripped it in her hand, smiling at the vibrant orange color of it against her pale palm. The tip curled gently, caressing her skin as it wrapped around her hand. Reggie looked up at Shaagra, his brilliant eyes shimmering like gems as they reflected the waning sunlight. She pressed herself into their embrace, a small smile still tugging on her lips as she drifted into content sleep.

  Chapter 9

  Three days of traveling in the dense jungle and Vadal was done with it. The jungles of Vora may have been the natural habitat of the Vori, but he preferred the comforts of a nest. He lifted his tail and pulled out another thick thorn with a grunt.

  He looked over at Reggie propped over Shaagra’s arm as he carried her through the undergrowth. She had exhausted herself two hours ago as they climbed into higher elevations approaching Norveth. Her ass swung enticingly in the air, the gentle scent of her pheromones drifting around them in the muggy heat.

  That was another thing he missed. Sex. Despite years of keeping himself true, he found that Reggie had wakened a voracious sexual appetite of the likes he’d never expected. Three days of being too exhausted to enjoy the pleasures of their mate’s body between their coils was three days too many. They traveled until the sun went down and they were too tired to go any further in the dark.

  “Somehow, the journey from Norveth to Evath seemed a bit easier,” Vadal muttered as he winced, pulling off some bits of bramble stuck to his scales.

  Shaagra laughed. “It probably had something to do with the fact that we were ten revolutions younger when we made to journey to Evath to establish our nest.”

  Reggie snickered.

  “How much further is Norveth?” Reggie asked, pulling herself up slightly to look around.

  “That,” Shaagra pointed out the shadow of a half-moon set deep against the mountain in the distance, “is valley of Norveth territory. That is where our clan dwells,” he continued with a broad smile.

  Vadal squinted at the still far-off valley of his home and sighed. That settled it; he was going to procure a small shuttle at the first opportunity. Land vehicles may struggle, and shuttles didn’t do much better, but a shuttle could at least get them from Norveth to Evath without too much difficulty.

  He watched Reggie wincing as she rubbed out a cramp in her leg from where she dangled. He wouldn’t have their mate uncomfortable if they ever needed to make the trip to the capital again. Traveling through the jungle had been brutal on all of them, but more so for their delicate female unaccustomed to the harsh landscape of Vora.

&
nbsp; “I believe we should arrive before nightfall,” Shaagra observed, his tail thwacking aside a large, flat-faced, hairless rodent before Reggie saw it. She had demonstrated an impressive vocal range when she’d seen the first one that had left their ears ringing. Neither of them wanted a repeat performance.

  “Is your clan expecting us?” Shaagra asked.

  Vadal made a positive clicking noise in his throat.

  He hoped that made Shaagra a little more comfortable knowing that they had clan looking for their arrival. Even mated, though he didn’t mind spending days at a time outdoors on a hunt, he knew Shaagra didn’t like being so exposed. He felt vulnerable and he didn’t like that feeling. The longer they spent traveling, the tenser Shaagra became. At this point, he hadn’t even notice that he was hissing in low tones until Reggie’s hand tangled in his crown coils and gently tugged.

  Vadal watched as his nest brother’s coils wrapped gently around her hand and lower arm. He appeared to relax, and a smile stole over his lips. While he was still hesitant to initiate touch, Vadal noticed that Shaagra had ceased instinctively shying away from her touch. His body was aware of her to such a degree that his coils reached for her at the slightest brush of her body against his. That made for some interesting traveling and often left Shaagra pulsating within his salet, yearning for her. Vadal’s reaction wasn’t much better. Lust was a constant companion on their journey

  Vadal flattened his palm against himself and demanded that his body obey his silent command to calm, when a clicking noise made him jerk his head up. He froze, his coils slowly shifting, his entire body hyperaware as his ears tracked the vibrations of something big moving through the brush.

  “Shaagra,” he murmured worriedly.

  Shaagra had his lips pulled back from his fangs, already alert to the presence of whatever was hunting them. This deep in the jungle, there was always the risk of encountering a large predator. Vora had no shortage of them.

  Shaagra’s lower tail began to tremble in warning, the tiny rounded protrusions running down the sides of his lower tail making an ominous rattling sound. Vadal picked up the tempo, whipping his own rattling tail in a defensive coil, warning any predators concealed in the brush. Vori males were never more dangerous than when defending their nests, their mates, or their nestlings.

  Any who dared to attack them only got this one warning.

  The deep rumbling growl had Reggie, already clinging nervously to Shaagra, scrambling up higher into his arms, her body slick with terror. As Shaagra tucked Reggie securely in a tree, whispering cautioning words to her, Vadal felt his coils tense, knowing that their warning had failed to impress whatever predator hunted them.

  He allowed his claws to extend and lengthen as he circled around the tree their female was secured in. Shaagra slid to his side, his own wicked claws arched and ready. Vadal could taste the acrid tang of his venom dripping onto his tongue, his body preparing.

  ***

  When the orluyth burst from the trees, Shaagra’s breath caught momentarily is his throat. Almost twice the size of a Vori, the beast had a large hinged jaw filled with razor-like teeth as it crashed through the brush on eight legs, its body flying effortlessly through the greenery, bladed tail whipping and massive jaw snapping.

  “Shit! It’s a fucking giant mutant alligator!” Reggie cursed above them from her safe perch. The pungent stench of her fear became stronger, and he could hear her scrambling for a better grip on the tree’s limb.

  Shaagra darted to the side just in time to avoid the vicious teeth of the creature, his tail lashing out as sharp barbs extended from it, cutting deep grooves into the creature’s flank. The orluyth hissed, a rolling deep sound, and turned to charge again when Vadal leaped forward. Wrapping the end of his tail tightly around its neck, the barbs dug deep into the creature’s flesh. The orluyth fell forward, whipping its head, attempt to shake Vadal’s tail loose. Shaagra pushed forward and threw his tail around its head as well. Both males faced each other at either side of the beast, tightening their coils as they began a serrating back and forth motion, dragging their sharp barbs deeper into the thick flesh.

  The orluyth struggled against them, and Shaagra nearly lost his hold a couple of times. Vadal, sprayed liberally with blood, strained to maintain his hold as well, but sheer determination kept their coils tightening on the beast as it gurgled and choked on its own blood until it ceased moving.

  Shaagra dropped his coils and grimaced down at himself as he saw how badly he too had been sprayed with the foul dark fluid.

  “Well, guys, I dunno if that was impressive… or the stuff of nightmares,” Reggie stated, her face pale, as she hung over the branch looking down at them.

  “How about an impressively awe-inspiring, masculine display of bravery?” Vadal panted. Despite the unaffected countenance he was going for, he was clearly winded and fighting for control.

  Shaagra stared at his nest brother, incredulous that he had actually made a joke. Vadal never joked.

  “It was certainly disgusting,” Shaagra laughed, swiping at the blood dotting his skin and scales in a morbid display.

  Vadal’s long tail reached into the limbs of the tree above them.

  “Come on down, Reggie. It is safe now.”

  Reggie clutched his tail, patiently waiting as it wound around her and gently lifted her out of the branches.

  “Doesn’t look like anything on Vora is safe,” Reggie grumbled as Vadal set her on her feet.

  They twined around her, pressing their bodies against her as she choked out, “Guys, guys—you’re getting blood all over me! Ewww!”

  “Brother, what are you two doing to that poor female?” a voice spoke from off to the side.

  Vadal’s brothers Eyuul and Orith slid out from the bushes. They raised a hand in greeting to Shaagra, and he cheerfully returned the gesture.

  “You two are late. You missed all the work—as usual,” Vadal grumbled at his younger brothers, a smile twitching at the corners of his mouth.

  Orith, his milky white scales well cleansed, smirked at his brother. “Cleaning orluyth blood off my scales would take all day. Our absence was not intentional, but it was fortuitous,” he laughed.

  Eyuul, his scales a deep bronze, elbowed his sibling. “Don’t listen to our brother. He’s the first to go crawling through the deep brush when we hunt the shoyla,” he said with a chuckle. Orith merely shrugged, his eyes peering with interest at their female.

  To his surprise, Shaagra felt an aggressive spike of territoriality. Vori protected their nests, but these males were clan; they were not threatening at all, and still Shaagra wanted to assert his dominance and, with Vadal, claim possession of their female in front of these other males.

  Vadal, identifying his aggression, frowned at him.

  Shaagra pushed his churning hostility back and settled to loop a coil around Reggie as she curiously peered at the other males.

  “Is this female yours, Vadal?” Orith asked, leaning forward at an unsettlingly close proximity. “When you said you were coming with your female and wished to reopen your nest to protect her, I did not realize you were speaking of a human female.”

  Vadal looked at him incredulously. “You think the Kampi would try to gain a Vori female?”

  Orith offered a good-natured shrug. “The Kampi will copulate with anything if it ends up in their harems. It would not surprise me if they attempted to mate with a younger small female of our species.”

  Eyuul tasted the air with interest as he inhaled deeply, grinning at his older brother. “She certainly seems something special. Maybe I should order a mate from the Mate Index,” he chuckled again as though joking, yet his eyes gleamed eagerly at the concept.

  Shaagra repressed an angry hiss at the way the male was not so innocently looking at his mate. Even if it was because he was entertaining ideas of gaining his own human female, Shaagra’s scales itched with aggression. Even Vadal frowned at his younger brother in disapproval, his coils drawing up in irritation
.

  Eyuul raised his hands. “Easy now. I’m not looking to try and steal your mate. I have enough funds tucked away to get my own. I am just admiring the sort of female the human species produces,” he said with a lascivious grin.

  Vadal grunted unhappily but settled back into a calm state.

  Orith gestured to the brush from which they had passed.

  “Let us depart then. Our parents are eager to see you. The whole clan has been in an uproar since we received word that you were returning with your family.”

  Eyuul slung his spear onto his shoulder, his grin still firmly fixed in place.

  Shaagra narrowed his eyes at the male.

  ***

  Reggie stared aghast at the males around her. Vadal was struggling to keep it together, and Shaagra looked ready to strangle someone. The two new additions to their group seemed carefree, and Eyuul certainly struck her as the crude one in the family. She had a sneaking suspicion, as they traveled through the brush with Eyuul covering the rear, that his eyes were glued on her rear.

  She scowled at him, and he smiled innocently at her.

  Innocent my left foot!

  “How many siblings do you have, Vadal?” she asked.

  “I have seven brothers,” he stated. “I am the eldest, followed by Agorth, Vithol, Avvis, Selvith, Berol, and then Eyuul and Orith are the youngest.”

  “That’s… a lot of boys,” Reggie said slowly, imagining how horrifically outnumbered she was going to be.

  “I also have forty-three cousins, six of whom are female.”

  Her stomach sank further. She was going to be really outnumbered.

  Shaagra slid up beside her, scowling at Eyuul. He then smiled down at her, his red eyes soft as the red petals of a rose.