Mej also cried out, thrust, and found a sharp rhythm. I rocked against him, repeating his name, while he lifted me to an explosive pleasure that hammered through my nerves just as he hammered into me. Each of us finally allowed to boil into our finale before the bows.
He also said my name, assuring me of its truth, along with frantic sounds that were almost words. I felt the surge in his body, vibrating muscles, then rush of him inside me.
While I craved thirty more seconds, Mej still thrust. Slow and breathless, he held himself in until his body defeated him. Losing rigidity, he slid from me, accompanied by liquid that trickled deliciously down my thighs while my feet returned to the floor.
I rocked my head back into the window frame, eyes shut, now aroused with the wonderful sensation from part of him coating my skin, filling me so full it had to overflow like a swollen river after the thaw. I wished Demik were here. My own body reflected love I felt for both with this pleasure—part of the gift they gave by granting kits that could grow inside me—yet there should have been more.
Mej folded to his knees, bending with his head between my knees, holding up my skirts with one hand. I pulled the material high, giving him freedom while he licked the sticky trail up each one of my legs until he reached the middle and licked there, cleaning me as if he’d been in fur.
I moaned afresh with his attentions, wishing he could rouse himself enough to have me again. Two mates would banish such a problem.
Yet Mej lingered. More than cleaning my skin, he pressed in with his mouth. I leaned back, knee lifted against the sill, shoulders on the window’s frame, shivering, until, with his tongue, he brought me to that pleasure I’d just missed. I held onto his head and the window, rocking, almost falling, wanting it to go on and on rather than ever ending this dance.
When he finally moved away he recovered my severed underwear buttons. I met their return with a breathless laugh, so touched that he would notice and find them after many distractions, I hugged him, kissing his jaw, giddy.
The sun was low by the time Mej returned the key and fetched Komu to go home.
My spirits were so buoyant, floating over mountaintops at sunset, I offered a quick prayer to Earth Mother that we could visit Dawson City every night.
Chapter 29
Day 4
“I’m not going to let you keep treating me this way forever. Not a damn kit anymore.” Komu muttered incessantly as he stripped off behind the den, bathed in sun just emerged from an overcast morning.
Mej lifted his cigarette from his lips and blew smoke from the corner of his mouth, watching the “not kit” impassively. When had his once-loyal student turned into such a whiner? One who hunted the same dead trail ten conversations in a row?
Around at the front of the den Demik’s voice sounded concerned, fretful—big shock—while he sorted through a traveling pack he was bringing with matches, extra rounds for his rifle, food, and so on. At least Komu had done a good job winning ammunition last night.
“Should we bring your dress as well? Even though you have that now? What if it rains? You might need extra.”
The vixen’s voice answering Demik was light as butterfly wings. Mej couldn’t hear what she said, only that she sounded cheerful.
Why all the fuss? Between an elder who wasn’t an elder and a kit who wasn’t a kit, it was like traveling with the whole settlement. All they were after was a couple days upriver, see if the vixen sniffed anything familiar—or they found a silver fox. Mej wouldn’t have bothered to bring a pack at all expect that Komu insisting he would not change unless he had clothes along so he could trade the burden with Mej. Mej, who had no intention of changing if the vixen remained in skin—therefore on equal footing—had agreed just to get him to clam up. It hadn’t worked.
“I’m not doing this tomorrow. You’ll go in fur. Or Demik. He was the one who wanted this. Thinks he’s some gray-whisker.” Komu peeled off his socks, standing on one foot at a time while morning sunlight bathed skin and hair that kept falling in his eyes. “It’s only fair. I have just as much a right to walk and talk with her.”
Funny, how he proved himself more a kit with every breath.
Mej looked away, the sound of that step, that voice, catching his attention. Coming this way? He gave a sharp, involuntary inhale through his nose and almost burst out coughing as smoke seemed to go down the wrong way.
What was the matter with him? Not as if he could catch her scent from here. Yet, almost?
He couldn’t go on like this.
There had been something right away. Then his own doubts and uncertainties about her. Then it was clear she was up to her whiskers with Demik—all over him like scales on a fish. Mej had almost been ready to let the matter rest. Anything she may or may not have promised him didn’t seem to be at the forefront of her attention. Besides, was she even his type? Why not let Demik keep her?
He’d never seen a fox so impossibly clean and honest. Even a fresh kit came into this world ready for the wild—ready to dodge danger and wait at a rabbit hole for the off chance of fresh blood.
Not even close to his type.
It scared him, how she was. At first because he didn’t like things he didn’t understand. Lack of understanding made danger, made fear: fight or flight. No wild creature wanted to wrap itself around something it couldn’t comprehend.
Then he’d second-guessed himself again, taken her more at face value, less with his own biases. He’d thought of her for two days, watched her, taken pride in her new ease with words. She’d wanted to come with him. To return to Demik’s hell hole city without Demik. With Mej. It wasn’t about them personally. Only that she wanted to visit Dawson and Mej happened to be going. But it didn’t matter. It had felt personal—just like her “yes.”
Then uncertainty had vanished, a tease had become real, and Mej had ached to punch Demik for the way he’d treated her like a human would treat a mule—his property. Or go right ahead and shoot him—put him out of his misery, the paranoid bastard. As if Mej couldn’t look after her.
If Demik had taken one more step when Mej blocked him, Komu by his side, that fretting dog-fox would have been on his back.
No, Demik still had sense, even in the face of besotted blindness. He’d stayed, they’d gone. Then everything had changed. Again.
She wasn’t “the vixen” anymore. She was Summit, an elegant, flowing wisp of a fox, with the spirit of the wind, majesty of the mountains, and agility of the river bursting from her every move. He’d never seen anyone, not even a fox, dance as she had danced—much less joined in. He had never felt like he had there with her on stage: the world gone, blank, leaving only the two of them. He had never wanted anything like he’d wanted her in that moment.
Back at the table, for the second time in one night, he’d wanted to shoot someone. The hotel manager’s comment: “Even an Indian.”
The manager had been shocked by the welcome response from his patrons—flowing from humor at the comedy act with the dogs and gestures, to open mouths and stiff dicks as they’d followed her dance. She could make the Flying Salmon hundreds in a week. Maybe thousands. “Even an Indian” had some use, some talent now and then.
It was simply the way they were, the humans—no, the whites in particular. Mej knew that. They made it so easy to cheat and steal from them with their own attitudes—assuming everyone who was not a white man was stupid. It wasn’t often that it got to him anymore. Until she was there beside him. And Mr. Daniels of the Flying Salmon stepped up with all the authority of one never refused anything to say he’d pay her the handsome sum of ten dollars a week—even though she was only an Indian.
It was as well the Royal Canadian Mounted Police did not allow anyone into Dawson city heeled. If Mej had been allowed, he’d have been carrying a revolver. If he’d been carrying a gun the manager’s brains would still be being scrubbed from grooves in the warped tabletop. Which would have ruined Mej’s and her evenings: her remembering her name, his bringing it to her a
ttention, the view, upstairs.
No, those Mounted Police were right. They watched over a surprisingly clean show, no matter what the likes of Demik might say. Dawson City could be a hell of a lot worse.
So Mej’s evening hadn’t been ruined. It had gone from stunning to paradise.
He hadn’t been able to keep himself off her, didn’t want to, couldn’t stop. Then she’d responded—hadn’t been afraid of him, passionate and comfortable with their bodies together as much as she had with her stunning dance skills.
He’d been blindsided—all over again. Every new shock with her took him to another place. Also, he’d been scared and confused. He hated both those feelings over any others.
Maybe there was no way around confusion with her. They were such opposites. He couldn’t know her, couldn’t grasp how she would face a storm with a smile. But the fear? Fear remained for her. He could do something about that. Even if it meant teaming up with his brother-mate in the making.
She wasn’t actually walking back here. Demik was still talking to her out front while she made cooing sounds to the latest husky puppies that were tumbling all over the settlement lately.
Should they bring dogs along? Good for bears and warnings about humans approaching. On the other hand, they would then have to feed and look after them. Besides, it was the point of Komu putting on his fur. Mej would not dream of denying the yearling of this character-building experience.
Komu changed while Mej finished his smoke, listening to voices around front—one glum, one chipper—and trying not to hear painful popping, cracking, contorting body of Komu as he shrank from a lanky two-footer to a skinny, long-legged, featherweight four-footer.
Komu staggered and panted, his little pink tongue curling up. The change hurt like hell. Not that it had been Komu’s motivation for dodging it this morning.
Mej smirked at him. He couldn’t help it when looking at that thing in fur. A brush like a tent rope, absurdly long but lacking fluff of maturity, mud-colored limbs like a heron. He would fill out in time. Another winter or two and Komu might look like a proper dog-fox. Now? Pathetic. Mej had seen snowshoe hares in summer with more bulk.
He took a final drag, drawing the burning end to a stub, then stepped into the den to snuff it in the tin cup of butts.
Final preparations: stuffing Komu’s clothes into the waxed canvas pack with shoulder straps, pushing moccasins in on top.
Komu shrieked at him, rushing in, biting his ankle through boot and trouser cuff.
“Scram off. What do you want? Me to carry your blasted boots around?” Mej tied down the flap. “No socks, no boots, easier. You don’t need them on the trail. It’s high summer.”
Below the den flap, Komu flashed a cold look at the pack. He fanned his jaws open at Mej, all four rows of teeth exposed, his huge ears flat against his little skull, screaming at Mej as if his paw were in a trap.
“Clam up! Your clothes? If you wanted them folded down nice you could have done it yourself, you little sand flea!” Mej kicked him, hitting him in the ribs and flinging him toward the birch trees.
Not as if it hurt him—just a light thing. Unfortunately, at that moment, Summit came dashing around the den to see what the screaming was about and witnessed Komu’s tiny body flying through the air. His screams of outrage changed pitch to a quick yelp of surprise, then silence as he landed on all four feet and shook himself.
He glared around at Mej, ears dropping once more, then spotted Summit.
There was a second, a break, in which Mej swallowed, drawing himself up, unconsciously ready for a tongue-lashing. She would naturally be upset to see Mej kick his student across the brush and almost into a tree. At the same time, Komu was taking her in, his eyes widening and ears springing forward. Mej knew what he was thinking as if Komu’s deliberations were painted over his head like a banner on a timber wall: what favors could he get out of her if he acted like he’d been hurt?
In the same moment, one breath, Summit was there—pausing, staring at Komu, gasping.
Oh, Earth Mother—and God and Moon and Jesus Christ and whatever all there was supposed to be. Mej sighed. That frog’s liver of a kit was going to milk this for days.
“Komu?” Summit hurried to him, no longer in her green town dress, but a deerskin outfit with skirt and belt on her tiny waist—everything the stray vixens had pieced together for her. Even Mej, who favored human fabrics and clothing, thought she looked beautiful in the traditional summer outfit: more herself, more fox.
A few huskies followed her, having also come to sniff what the screaming was about, but losing interest as they spotted Komu. All the settlement dogs, unlike those of the men, were used to foxes in both their forms, including total foxes, which they did not chase.
Mej narrowed his eyes as, in that flash of time, Komu lifted a forepaw. He changed his mind just as fast, deciding it was a hind leg he’d broken in the savage kick and fall that had nearly ended his miserable little life. A smart choice. If he had an injured leg, he could go on limping and milking it for a day or two in skin whenever she was around him. It would be too easy to let her forget that Mej had “broken” his arm.
That damnable maggot. Mej was already seething by the time Summit dropped on her knees on the trampled, dry ground that was their back space.
“Oh, Komu,” she crooned, her voice like the sweetest birdsong. “You’re so beautiful.” She scooped him into her arms.
Mej took an involuntary step back.
Komu blinked at him over Summit’s shoulder. His face was partly hidden by her endless black hair, now smooth, loose, and brushed out from the braid. She kissed the puff of white on his furry cheek, stroked repeatedly down his red back, massaged his neck, and exclaimed over his handsome black ears, his silken coat, and his lovely long brush and legs.
Watching, Mej’s mouth hung open.
That thing? The skinniest, scrawniest dog-fox in the settlement, still gangling and awkward in his pounces?
His pelt was smooth—not plush—because he didn’t even have his full growth of undercoat. His legs looked so absurdly long because he hadn’t finished growing into them. They looked like branches snapped off a sapling and stuck on a weasel’s body.
It was true Komu was handsome in skin. He had an elegant face, a lithe body, a special charm to his smile that drew in women and vixens—and left men feeling a false sense of ease at his implied inexperience around a card table. Mej appreciated his good looks because it was a reflection on Mej. They looked good together. They attracted the right sort of attention together, especially from females—which company was welcome and rare.
In fur? Lovely? No.
Give him a few more winters and maybe. Even then Mej was skeptical. If she wanted to pet and trill over a handsome dog-fox in fur she need look no farther than him—not this stork-weasel. And, to be fair, what about Demik? If there was a handsome dog-fox in fur around here, it was Demik. In his full strength, eight or ten pounds heavier than Komu, carrying the stunning winter coat of the northern fox in his prime—which shifting foxes often kept all summer due to not spending enough time in fur to shed the undercoat—Demik was a painting. Richly dark red pelt with distinct white and black markings, and a thick, white-tipped, lushly furred brush.
Either one, Mej with his bright orange coat, or the ever so fluffy Demik, put that little maggot to shame.
Summit was laughing—a sound like spring in full bloom—as Komu’s whiskers tickled her neck. Encouraged, he licked her skin and she laughed even more.
“Stop—” Laugh. “Komu—” Laugh. “Just look at you. Wait, they tickle—” Laugh. “Those whiskers, Komu…” She held him back, hands in his armpits, so he stood like a doll in her lap, forepaws dangling. Stupid forepaws on those stupid twig limbs.
He lashed his brush back and forth while she touched her nose to his.
“Your whiskers are gorgeous. So long and black. They’re as long as my whole hand.”
He licked her nose in return. She giggled,
pressing her head to his. Chortling and squeaking, he wriggled against her, wagging wildly like a husky puppy.
Fine whiskers was it now? As if. Mej had whiskers that would put any cat to shame. But did she burst her heart with delight over his whiskers? Did she even notice?
At least she wasn’t upset by the kick. No horror or lecture. But, now that he thought about it, he shouldn’t be surprised. Summit wouldn’t know a tongue-lashing if it bit her in the face.
Shouldering his rifle, Demik slowly followed her and the dogs around to the back of the den. He stopped to stare at the spectacle while the whisker discussion took place.
“You’re so handsome.” She was going on and on. “Your ears—” Laugh. “They’re just precious.” And on. “You must hear a mouse in a blizzard under three feet of snow. Have you ever seen how pretty you are? Skeen has a looking glass that shows your own face. Are you ready? Does Mej have your things? Do you want to ride up there?”
Mej felt nauseated.
Komu was climbing her shoulders, sticking his sharp little nose into her hair and sniffing gleefully—as if he had a right.
“You have to stay alert for us, though.” Laugh. “We’re going to find my family. You must be a terribly quick runner. And high jumper?” Laughing while he nibbled her ear. “You’re so tiny, Komu. Tiny and beautiful.”
Mej pressed the back of his hand to his mouth.
Demik, his expression reminiscent of standing over a fresh grave, watched in silence.
Mej started away. Anger cleared his head. He turned back and slammed the pack into Demik’s chest to carry. “You take that. I’m going to change.”
He kicked Komu’s tin cup from breakfast out of his way. This time so hard the side was dented and the cup spun past two other dens, finally crashing among brush and stones, hopefully damaged beyond repair.
Chapter 30
He did not change. He kept his skin and temper—mostly—and walked out with Demik and Summit—Komu was being lovingly carried—to meet the wolf before starting their trek upriver.
Fox’s Dawn: A Foxy Reverse Harem Shifter Romance (Foxes of the Midnight Sun Book 1) Page 15