Alien Romance Box Set: Alien Former: Sci-Fi Alien Romance (Books 1-5)

by Ashley L. Hunt

  Joanna returned the smile with her lips. “Alright, I suppose it’s not entirely fair for me to grill you on this when I just went through the same thing not a week ago.”

  “Well, I didn’t get my heart ripped out, so I think I got the easier deal,” I joked.

  Joanna smirked. “But you can’t strike people with lightning. I’d say that’s worth a little heart-transplant.”

  We just sat there together for a while basking in the glow of the fading fire and enjoying each other’s company. When the embers finally died, and all that remained was ash and a circle of stones, I asked, “Has Perwik gotten you set up with a place to sleep yet?”

  Joanna shook her head. “Not as such. He has had his hands full stamping out all the little fires that idiot Vassa started. Not to mention Lot and his people. Fortunately for us, I think the other Stormcallers are a little afraid of your sister. Something about her ‘ripping down’ my barrier storm ‘when Lot and all his people were barely hanging on?’ I think Thukkar has been telling stories at the ranger lodge, and the myths are already being made.” She stood. “As for a place to sleep, I’ll probably bed down in the ranger lodge. They have extra bunks, and maybe that will help with my image- make me ‘just one of the people’.”

  I shook my head. “Nonsense. This hut is mine now. You can stay here. You take the bed, and I’ll sleep on the floor or the worktop. Tomorrow we can see about getting you a proper home.” I tried to keep any trepidation out of my voice, hoping that my suggestion had come out casual and unassuming.

  Joanna wasn't fooled. Her smile was slow and wicked. "I wouldn't dream of making you sleep on the floor in your own home, ‘Deepseeker.' You must sleep in the bed, I insist."

  Sensing a trap, I plunged blindly ahead anyway. “There is no way I’m letting a woman sleep on the floor of my hut while I’m sleeping comfortably in a bed.”

  Joanna’s smile widened. “I didn’t say anything about me sleeping on the floor.”

  I knew it was coming, and still the kiss surprised me. We were pressed together, all of a sudden, touching and tasting, the heat rising between us. Through the intoxication of her scent, her touch, her voice, I had the presence of mind to stand and pull her with me into the hut. People would talk anyway, but there was no sense in making it easy on the gossips.

  We stumbled back into the darkness of the hut. For one mad second, I was convinced that I needed to find and light a candle so that we could see, but the thought was driven thoroughly from my mind ahead of the onslaught of Joanna’s relentless kisses. I seized her about the waist, lifting her easily- she was so light- and she wrapped her legs around me. I could feel the muscles sliding beneath her skin as she pressed herself to me, and I kissed her mouth, her neck, her jaw, her ear.

  "Jo-" I tried to say, but her mouth sealed on mine and she seized on my lip with her teeth, tugging just enough that I felt a short jolt of sweet pain. I felt a growl rising instinctively in my chest. She growled back, perhaps less ferociously, but no less insistently. I dipped my head and kissed her neck, then let my fangs score against her skin. Just a little- not enough to draw blood. My fangs could do serious damage if I weren't careful. Still, she sucked in a deep breath like I had clamped down with all of my strength, throwing her head back and tossing her hair as she let out a low, hungry moan. I staggered back with her to the bed and sat down hard. She let herself forward, uncrossing her legs at the last moment so that she pushed me down onto my back, straddling my waist. "Joanna, I-" I began, but whatever word I meant to say next was swallowed in a sound somewhere between a yelp of pain and a bark of surprise. She had leaned forward, and in a perfect mirror of me, she had bit down hard on the big muscles on the side of my neck. It didn't really hurt, but it surprised the hell out of me. One part of me felt a prickle of irrational outrage. But something else, something much more important within me loved it.

  I growled again, and the sound came out as a deep, feral rumble. The beast inside me, the one that lived inside every Erinye, lifted its massive head and began to sniff around. Joanna must have seen it in my eyes, because her face split into a smile, wide and triumphant. "Yes," she hissed. "That's what I'm talking about. Let it out. You aren't going to break me."

  I reached up and ran the very tips of my claws down the side of her face, tracing them along the perfect curve of her jaw. I continued the trail down from her jaw to her neck and down over her collarbone. She was breathing hard now, and she didn't want to waste a single moment. Her arms came up, crossed in front of her, and she stripped the sealskin shirt off of her body in one smooth motion, shaking her hair out as she tossed it casually aside. I reached up and took hold of her breasts, letting them fill my hands. I crooked one finger, just one, so that the tip of my claw touched the sensitive skin around her nipples, and she sucked in another deep breath, letting it out in another low moan.

  I reached up, bracing myself with one arm, and wrapped the other one around her, pulling her close. Then, with a twist of my hips, I turned us over, depositing her firmly into the piled furs of the bed. Joanna wriggled with pleasure as the luxurious comfort of the furs received her, and her joy coaxed a purr of pleasure out from somewhere deep in my chest before I could stop it. She laughed with delight. I bent and seized one of her nipples with my mouth, drawing circles around it with my tongue. She gasped and sighed, her body arching beneath me. I did the same to the other breast, and this time, her moan was a little higher pitched than before. Her hands flowed over my body, starting from my shoulders and flowing down the muscles of my back towards my waist.

  I pushed myself up off of her pulled back, just enough that I could undo the two large buttons that fastened her trousers. I stood and took hold of both trouser legs and tugged them free, tossing them to land in the dark somewhere behind me. I realized that I was still fully dressed and stripped out of my clothes in a hurry. All of that cloth and hide was just getting in the way. I stepped forward, back towards the bed, my body painfully hard from wanting her, but instead of moving to take her immediately, I dipped my head down between her legs and sought the sharp, sweet taste of her sex.

  Joanna moaned as my tongue flicked out, caressing and licking inside her. I started with long, slow strokes, tasting her, exploring her. Her hands clenched in my hair, and I could hear her breath coming faster and faster. I changed my rhythm then, licking more quickly and exploring deeper inside her. She cried out, and her legs squeezed the sides of my head, but I didn't stop. Just a little further... Joanna came suddenly, all in a rush. She bucked hard, and I backed away as she writhed in the grip of the orgasm. I didn't want her to crush my skull with her thighs. She was very, very strong now, and right at this moment she wasn't thinking about holding back.

  When she relaxed, I settled down over her, bending to kiss her lips even as I gently pushed myself inside of her. She wrapped her arms around my neck and cried out again, and crossed her ankles behind my back once more. I took her with slow, deliberate thrusts of my hips. I didn’t want to rush things. I wanted to feel all of her. I ran my hands over her breasts and rubbed her nipples lightly between my fingers. I traced the tip of one claw carefully down from her chin to the hollow of her throat. All the while I held the same slow, meticulous rhythm, struggling to hold back the mounting need inside me. I wanted to savor this. I wanted to take every second of it with me.

  Joanna came again in a sudden clenching spasm of concentric shudders, and she stretched her back and neck all the way out, pushing her head back as far as it would go. Her eyes rolled back in her head, and her cries took on a plaintive, pleading quality that took hold of something deep and primal within me. "Please," she sighed. "Please, Vol."

  I think it was “please” that shattered my control. I thrust into her with redoubled need, all thoughts of holding back blown away before the fire inside me. Her moans rose even as my own came to my lips unbidden, and then we were both calling out, wanting more, needing more. The dam broke, and everything inside me came surging forth, gathering with a temp
est’s promise and blasting out of me as I spent myself inside her.

  Suddenly drained of all of my strength and energy, I fell forward over her and lay panting, my mouth against the side of her neck, my forehead swathed in her hair. We lay tangled together for a long time, just breathing. Then, regaining some semblance of consciousness, I carefully extricated my sweaty body from hers and rolled onto the furs beside her. I was exhausted as if I had just fought a battle or run for half a day. This hadn't been my first tumble in the furs, but it had been a long time for me. A moment passed, and then Joanna cuddled up next to me, her head resting on my outstretched arm. She blinked up at me with huge smoldering eyes and sighed with satisfaction.

  After a moment, Joanna lifted her head to look at me. “You kept trying to say something. What was it?”

  I laughed feebly, exhausted. “I was trying to say I didn’t want to rush you into anything.”

  “Oh,” Joanna remarked with a chuckle, her burning eyes smiling at me from beneath long lashes. “Well, never mind that.” She let her head rest back on my upper arm, and before long, her breath slowed as she drifted to sleep. I felt the dark dragging at me, tugging my eyelids closed as well. I didn’t fight it. This was the most peaceful rest I had in a very long time.

  I was moments from sleep, drifting a hair's width from the abyss when I smelled it. Rotting meat and burned oil. My eyes snapped open wide, and I focused on the thing just as it dropped towards my face. It was metallic and segmented and had entirely too many insectoid legs. I snapped my free hand up and slapped it away from me, sending it bouncing away into the dark of the tent. I twisted, rolling with Joanna to deposit her on the side of the bed closest to the wall of the hut. She woke suddenly, thrashing in confusion and blind panic, but I couldn't stop to calm her. There was an abomination in the tent with us- a Child of the Eater-King.

  I leaped to my feet, claws scratching on the stone. The metal insect came springing at me again; legs spread wide to pierce my flesh. I ripped cloth covering the worktop away and flung it in the little monster's path, tangling it in the worn rags and sending it thrashing to the stone. I crouched and snatched the evil bundle up off of the ground, then whirled, putting my whole weight into smashing it against the stone of the mountain. It hit the ground with a nasty crunch, but incredibly it wasn't dead. I kicked it out of the hut, sending it tumbling into the remains of the fire pit. Not wasting a moment, I grabbed the dragon pipe off of the worktop. It was familiar in my hands, which made sense. I was Palamun, after all. I had made it. I aimed without thinking, flicked the crude safety off, and squeezed the trigger with my first two fingers.

  The weapon belched a sphere of fire into the air, bright as a star, sending the seething comet arcing into the ash of the night's fire. The metal monster was just struggling to its feet when the bright orb struck it. There was a crack like thunder, a flash of blinding light, and a bloom of heated air that dried the sweat from my face. Flecks of rock clattered against the stone as they bounced off of me and the sides of the hut. Nothing remained of the Eater-Spawn. I looked down at the dragon pipe with new respect. "Not bad. I need to work on splash damage, though."

  "What the hell was that?" Joanna had pressed up against me from behind so that she could see over my shoulder. "Are you alright?" I could hear shouts from down in the village. Any minute now, rangers would be sprinting up the path toward us to investigate the blast. I must have been going insane because the only thing on my mind at that moment was that if people weren't talking about Joanna and me already, they would be soon.

  “I’m fine,” I said over my shoulder. “This was an assassination attempt. It seems the enemy wants one of us dead.”

  “Why just one? Why not both?”

  "Only one Eater-Spawn. It was meant to puppet one of us, use us against the tribe." I turned and saw only Joanna's eyes burning in the dark. I could feel her anger, however, boiling within. I wasn't sure what was going on behind those ember eyes; I only knew that the enemy out there had made a grave mistake. "Go back to bed," I said, scrambling back into my discarded clothes. "I'll handle the rangers, and I'll see that a search is done. This may not have been the only monster sent to sneak into our home."

  ...

  Chapter Twenty: Bedlam

  Joanna

  It was a rough night. Volistad tried to insist that I go back to sleep, but there was no way that was happening. I had gotten us in charge of the tribe on a shaky claim of divinity. The people expected that kind of power, that kind of responsibility from me. There was no way I would stay curled up in the furs of Volistad's bed and sleep while he tore the village apart looking for any trace of other Eater-Spawn. We searched for hours, teams of rangers and Stormcallers going to every hut, down into every inhabited tunnel, searching for any trace of metal insectoid menaces. We didn't find any others. This had been a single attack, an assassination attempt. Was it meant for me, or was it meant for Volistad?

  The easy answer was that it had been intended for me. But Barbas had specifically goaded me about Vol when he had sent his ‘messenger’ to speak with me. I already knew the real Barbas had been a little jealous of how attracted I was to the ranger- what could that little seed of envy have grown into now that he had been consumed by a malicious intelligence?

  But even with the frantic, feverish search of the village, even with the threat of assassination, the night’s events had not been all bad. Being with Volistad had been amazing. He was strong but gentle to a fault, passionate and intense in equal measure. I wasn’t sure if sleeping with him had been the right thing for both of us at that time, but I was sure that given half a chance, I would jump his bones again. I needed it, I needed to feel him. I needed to feel human again, and he had made me feel like a normal woman once more. Sure, he had claws and dark bear’s eyes, and sure when he got excited he sounded like he was considering eating me, but none of that mattered.

  What remained of the Elder's Council gathered around a fire that morning, each of us cradling steaming stone mugs of a potent fungal concoction that Volistad told me was a much-beloved stimulant. I sniffed it. It smelled evil, as if someone had melted down an old truck tire and mixed in the sludge with something entirely too sweet. But considering the way I liked my coffee, the smell was something I might be willing to overlook so long as it scratched that particular itch. I took a sip and was surprised to learn that it didn't taste at all like it smelled. It was a rich, savory flavor, completely different than that of coffee, but the difference didn't matter. It was hot and tasted something like roasted hazelnuts, and with every sip that I swallowed, I could feel just a little more wakefulness creeping into my mind.

  Nissikul and Perwik seemed to have taken the news that Volistad was now the Deepseeker in stride. Neither of them had asked any questions. But based on what Volistad had told me of his predecessor, it might not have been as strange as it seemed. As near as anyone but Volistad and I knew, the Deepseeker had just appeared three generations ago and taken up residence on his little stone ridge above the village. He had always been a strange creature. To have him replaced so suddenly by Volistad was just a blip on a sixty or seventy-year history of lunacy. With Volistad in the Deepseeker's seat and Nissikul firmly in charge of the Stormcallers, the Council was almost complete. We still needed someone to take Vassa's place as the head of the priests, and a decision had to be made about our prisoners. Vassa was still locked in a tiny cell beneath the village temple, and Lot was under constant guard in his own hut. Vassa would probably be executed, but Lot was a difficult quandary. I didn't think he would cause any more problems. The wind seemed to have been firmly taken out of his sails. By all reports, he sat in his hut, unmoving, barely eating, just staring ahead. I supposed that it was a terrible feeling to realize that you had so utterly failed your people.

  Perwik, apparently having drunk enough fungal tea to form complete sentences, cleared his throat. “Now then. Last night’s attack.”

  Volistad responded smoothly. “An assassination attempt
on the Akkandaka or me, most likely. I am already working on a magick to secure our borders against further incursions.”

  Perwik blinked a few times, clearly caught off of his guard. Perhaps he hadn’t adjusted to Volistad’s new status so easily. “Er, good, Deepseeker. Have you an estimate as to when that will be complete?”

  "Tonight. I have the basic theory down; it just needs some… fiddling." I smiled, forgetting myself. Vol honestly seemed a little surprised at his own acumen, and it was cute on him.

  Nissikul smirked. “Don’t you think you’ve already done enough ‘fiddling’?”

  Volistad almost spat out his tea. I snorted, feeling a self-satisfied smile creep onto my face. I nodded at Nissikul, acknowledging the point. She didn’t quite smile back, but the intent was there.

  Perwik sighed. “Be that as it may, we still have the issue of dealing with the enemy. My rangers tell me that they’ve seen no sign of overt enemy incursion into our territory since that messenger arrived yesterday. But we cannot stay here and just wait for the demon, Barbas, to attack us. There have been two attempts on your life in a single day, Akkandaka. We have to take the fight to the enemy, and soon.”