by Ruby Dixon
I…want her to touch it. I want her to show me this thing. I want to learn all of it for her.
Har-loh reaches for me, and I lean forward, unsure. She tugs at me, indicating I should join her, but instead of lying next to her, she pulls me until I’m practically on top of her. I support my weight with my arms braced on either side of her, not wanting to crush her smaller form with my bigger one.
She smooths a hand over my chest, caressing me. “Rlax.” Her touch glides up my arms. It feels so good that my entire body quakes at those small caresses, and I fight the urge to press myself against her until I come.
As if she can read my thoughts, Har-loh raises one leg up, and then locks it around my hips. Her ankle digs into my buttock, and she pushes me down. I resist for a moment, and then rest my hips between hers. My cock throbs as I make contact with her skin, and I have to fight the insane urge to…push against her? That’s not right.
Har-loh moans, her body moving under mine. I’m fascinated by the sight of her, especially when her hands move to caress the tips of her teats. Then, she points at one. “Kiss.”
Put my mouth there? Or my tongue? Either way, I’m fascinated. I lean down and brush my lips against her skin here. She’s so soft, her scent warmer here, in the valley between her teats. I nuzzle her and then flick my tongue out to touch her pale skin.
She moans and her hands go to my hair, then the base of my horns. She strokes them and it sends an answering surge through my cock. Her touch makes me wild with need. I lick and nip at the soft globe of her teat, but I’m drawn toward those pink tips. I brush my mouth over one and a hiss of breath escapes her. They’re sensitive? Then I want to play with them more. I tease them the way she taught me to kiss – strokes of my tongue, nibbles of my lips – and watch for her reactions. I learn which ones get soft sighs, and which ones make her squirm wildly underneath me.
Then I remember what she did to me, down by the stream. She took me in her mouth and played with me. I wonder if I can do that with her? I move down her soft belly, trailing my lips, and then I brush my fingers over the curls of her folds. “Kiss?” I ask.
Her mouth parts, and a small moan escapes. There’s excitement in her flushed face, and she nods. Her hands squeeze the bases of my horns, and it almost feels as if she’s squeezing my cock with those hands. I stifle my own groan.
“Rukh,” she pants, but she doesn’t seem like she wants to stop me. That’s good, because I’m dying to explore her with my tongue and hands. I slide down her body and bury my nose in her curls. Her scent is strong and musky here, and it sends cravings through my body. My chest rumbles hard, and my cock twitches in response. It wants more of everything.
Gently, I touch her with my hand. After the last several days of our late-night rubbing, I know what touches she likes, but putting my hand here and putting my face here are two different things. I want to please her like she pleased me, so I push her folds apart and tongue her, seeking the small nub that she likes rubbed just so.
She nearly comes off the furs. Her cry is loud and fierce, but her hands clench my horns so tightly that she keeps me locked into place.
Not that I want to leave – I want to stay here forever. Here, her taste is strong, and here I can pleasure her. I run my tongue over her bump, then stroke up and down her silky folds. I find the small hole she has tucked away, the hole that is hot and wet, and I remember pushing my fingers here.
I explore the spot with my tongue, and it seems she is juiciest here. Her flavor saturates my mouth, and I love it. I push my tongue into the spot, and she squeals, her legs jerking. I look up, surprised.
“Wasgood,” she pants, and tugs on my horns, indicating I should return. “Kiss. Kiss!” Her hips rock against me, as if she could persuade me to return with her movements.
I don’t need persuading, though. I love touching her. I return to kissing her, tonguing and licking and nibbling everywhere I can. Her movements become more frantic, her voice more demanding, and I recognize this from our late-nights in the furs. She’s about to clench up in her own release. My cock aches, reminding me that I want release too, but her pleasure is far more important than mine. I love to see my Har-loh lose herself. Her hips arch higher and higher, pushing against my face, and her little cries grow more frequent. Her thighs tremble, and I lick her harder, waiting for her to lose control.
To my surprise, though, she pushes my head away. “Wait,” she pants. “Wait.”
I lift my head. “Kiss?”
“Bettah,” she says. I frown, because I don’t know this word. I want to return to her folds and keep licking her. But she tugs on my horns, indicating that I should stop.
I growl at her.
She reaches to my hips and tugs me forward even as she lifts her legs to wrap them around me. My cock is pressed against her slick folds again, and she rubs up and down against me.
I groan, my eyes closing, because the feel of her like this is incredible. I want to spray her body with my spend, but I’m torn. I want her to show me how to make a kit with her.
Har-loh slides a hand between us and she grips my cock in her fingers. My breath hisses out, but she’s not stroking me. Instead, she seems to be…aiming me. I feel the head of my cock press against her warm, wet opening a moment later and I realize what I’ve been missing.
Ah. I put my spend inside her, and it will make a kit. This is what she’s been trying to tell me.
Cautious, I push forward a little. Her heat seems to suck me inward, and it takes everything I have not to thrust my way forward. I watch her for a reaction instead. As I push into her, she moans again and wraps her arms around my neck.
“Likedat,” she breathes. “Juslikedat.”
“Good?” My voice sounds like a growl, but I can’t help it. It’s taking all of my control not to come right now.
“Good,” she says in a voice that makes my sac draw up tight with anticipation.
My body jerks, and I’m unable to help myself. I thrust forward, and she sucks in a breath.
Her nails dig into my back. “Yes.”
I barely hear her. I’m too busy struggling with my own control. This is what I’ve been missing. This is what my frantic thrusting against her belly at night should have been about. I should have been claiming my mate by pushing my cock into her, and filling her belly with my spend. This is what feels right. And her body clasping mine so tightly? Her walls squeezing my cock so tight? It feels better than anything I could ever imagine.
I could stay here forever, buried deep inside her.
I move slowly, and notice that my spur nudges against her little pleasure-nub between her legs. She gurgles when it does, but presses up against it a moment later, so I know it’s good. It’s like I’m perfectly made for her, and she for me. I thrust harder.
Under me, Har-loh moans, and I feel the ripple of her body. She tightens around my cock, impossibly. “Gahdi’mcomin,” she moans.
I thrust into her again, wanting to feel her tighten and quiver around me. “Good?” It’s a question, but it comes out more like a demand. My voice shakes as I struggle to keep control. It’s taking everything I have not to lose myself and let pleasure take over.
But I want Har-loh to have her pleasure first.
“Good,” she pants. When I stroke in again, she arches. “Good!” she cries again. I thrust into her harder, pushing at her, and her cries become a babble of words I don’t understand. Her body clenches around mine, and her legs lock at my hips.
I feel it when she comes, her entire body quivering. Her chest purrs so loud I think it might shake her heart loose. Her mouth opens and closes, but no words come out. She just gasps, and her walls clutch me so hard it feels like a fist around my cock.
I lose my control then; I explode, gritting her name as my spend flies from my cock. I feel as if I’m coming forever, my balls drawn up tight. When there’s nothing left to milk from my body, I fall, breathless, onto my elbows over her. I’m careful not to crush her, but I want to touch
her right now, to bury my face in her teats and just surround myself with her scent.
As if sensing my need, she wraps her arms around me and tugs me down against her. “S’good,” she murmurs, stroking my hair back from my face. “My Rukh.”
“Har-loh,” I say, voice thick. She’s my mate now. I’ve put my cock inside her and given her my spend. We will make a kit together. I put a hand to her stomach, wondering how she will look when she has my child inside her. The dvisti grow fat and shaggy, their sides sticking out. I cannot imagine that happening to my delicate Har-loh.
She chuckles and puts her hand over mine. “S’earleeyet. Tahkes tyme.”
“Mine,” I tell her softly. “Mate mine. Har-loh mine.” I stroke her soft skin and revel in the feel of her under me. This feels right. This is what I have been missing for so long.
She gives a small, contented sigh. “Har-loh mate Rukh.”
In this small moment, I’ve never been happier.
Chapter Six
One Year Later
HARLOW
I tug a boot off of one of my swollen feet, then kick it onto the rocky shore. Off goes the other boot, and the cold air bites into my skin. I get to my feet – not an easy task given the size of my middle, and then gingerly step into the rushing tide. It’s ice cold, and a shiver moves through me. I don’t go in far, though. Just far enough to cover my toes.
And then I wiggle them and wait.
It doesn’t take long. Never does. A long, white tendril snakes forward, toward my feet. I force myself to stand totally still as it touches one wiggling toe, then another. In the water, I see the thick body of the creature surge forward, toward my foot. I quietly flip my spear over in my hand, point down, and then jam it right into the eye as it opens to look at me.
The creature flails and thrashes in the water, and I lean on the spear to hold it steady. A moment later, the water stills and the tendrils go limp.
Dinner caught.
I shiver and bound out of the water, dragging my freshly killed ’spaghetti monster’ with me. I don’t know what the critter’s called but it’s got a lot of snaky arms and a meatball looking body, so I went with that. It’s also Rukh’s favorite seafood item, so I can’t wait to see the look on his face when he comes home and sees it cooking on the fire. He does love himself a good spaghetti dinner, I think, and then giggle at my own joke.
My back twinges as it has been lately, and I groan, rubbing the base of my spine. The baby seems to be resting on something on my upper right-hand abdomen, as that part of my body constantly aches lately. I go back and forth from rubbing the side of my belly to rubbing my lower back. My shoes suddenly seem like a lot of effort to put on, especially pregnant, so I pick them up and shove them in my shoulder bag. In the other bag goes my kill, and I use my spear as a walking stick as I pick my way across the sand and head back home.
Funny how this weird beach is ‘home’ now, but it is. I hum a nursery rhyme to myself as I hang up my bag on one of the rocky outcroppings that serves as a coat hook. I want to rub my aching, swollen feet, but I can barely reach them these days, so I shuffle toward the fire and stoke it, instead.
After the fire is good and roaring, I chop up, skin, and spit the spaghetti monster on the fire. By the time I’ve done that and washed my hands, I’m pooped. I rub my aching lower back and head toward my furs to lie down. Being pregnant is taking a lot out of me, and it seems like an eternal pregnancy with no end in sight.
I ease my body onto the thick pile of furs and relax, closing my eyes. My swollen feet are propped up on a pillow stuffed with feathers from one of the raptor-looking birds that hunt the shoreline. There’s another one behind my head, and the pelts under my body are soft and supple and warm, even if they’re not all that pretty to look at. I’m not the best at tanning, but I get better every day.
I glance over at my ‘calendar’. It’s the first of December.
Okay, so it’s not really the first. Nor is it December, like it says. We don’t have paper or much wood, so I took several rib bones from different creatures and carved the months of the year into each one, then strung them up like a xylophone. It’s a modified calendar in that I have hash-marks for days and I only put thirty days in each month regardless of how long it truly was. It’s just a general way for me to count time, since the seasons are all out of whack here on Not-Hoth, and Rukh pays zero attention to them.
I rub my belly and muse at the time that’s passed. I created that calendar in ‘January’. It was an arbitrary date, but I got tired of time passing and me not knowing when it was. With a baby on the way, I wanted to track somehow. I’m pretty sure it’s been a year since Rukh and I mated for the first time and made the baby.
I’m pretty sure I’m gonna be pregnant forever. I run a hand along my belly, frowning. It’s big, but nothing’s dropped like I hear in pregnancy stories. I’ve already been pregnant for about two months longer than a human woman. The fourth trimester, I like to joke, not that Rukh gets my jokes.
The baby kicks and then flips in my belly, and I rub a hand over it soothingly. “You get them, though, don’t you?”
A flutter in my stomach makes me think of laughter. Baby laughter. I fall asleep in the furs, wondering what it’s going to be like when the baby gets here. Rukh’s going to be such a good daddy.
RUKH
I snarl in irritation at the family of plumed ‘raptors’ that squawk along the beach. All day, I’ve been out looking for small ones, because their feathers are softer than the adults and Har-loh wants them for our kit’s bedding. I’ve ranged far and wide today, looking for the perfect ones, and managed to find one when I was at the end of my temper. Now I come home and see three of the things frolicking in the waves. Irritating. They’ll live another day, because I already have what I came for.
I hoist my kill over my shoulder for the final time, tired and ready to relax with my mate after a long day. The heavy snows have all but disappeared, the thick ice breaking up over the salty waters, and the weather is warming enough that my fragile Har-loh will not need her heaviest cloaks. She will be happy. She did not like that the coldest season was over ten of her ‘months’ long. I picture her small face beaming with excitement at my finding a raptor kit with downy feathers, and my pace picks up.
When I make it home to the cave, though, I’m not greeted by a smiling mate. There’s food on the fire, but the coals have gone down to a licking flame, and the smell in the air tells me that the meat is charred and inedible. My eyes narrow, my nostrils flaring at the awful scent. “Har-loh?” I move toward the bed.
My mate is there, curled up in the furs, her big belly protruding from her clothing. She has a hand under one cheek and sleeps so peacefully. My khui rumbles and purrs at the sight of her, and I feel a fierce sense of satisfaction. She’s mine, and she carries my kit inside her. A burned meal doesn’t matter.
I remove the offensive food from the fire and take it down to the shore, where scavengers can partake of it safely away from our cave. Har-loh is still asleep when I return, so I’m quiet as I carefully pluck the raptor kit clean of its feathers and put them aside for my mate. I eat a few bites of meat while it’s raw, and then smoke the rest, because with my kit inside her, Har-loh does not like the taste of raw meat anymore.
Thinking about Har-loh pulls me toward her. I can’t resist my mate any longer. I kneel down next to the bed and stroke her cheek. Her eyes flutter open and she gives me a sleepy smile.
“Hey, baby.”
“Tired?” I ask. There are hollows under her eyes that I don’t like, but she promises me she is fine. She nods and starts to sit up, but I gently push her back into the furs. “You tired. You rest.”
Her nose wrinkles and she tries to peek around me to the fire. “Oh no, did I burn your dinner? I got you spahgetteemawnster.”
She calls it a weird word in her language, but I recognize the creature from its shape, and know of her thoughtfulness. “Is not important.”
Har-loh look
s upset. “I’m sorry. I was just tired.” She yawns as if to emphasize this. “I’m so tired all the time now.”
My hand goes to her rounded belly. She’s so big, like one of the dvisti females before she’s about to drop her kit. Of course, I don’t point this out. The last time I did, she cried and then blamed it on something called hor-moans. “You carrying kit. Is tired-making.”
“Tiring? Yeah, it is.” She shifts on the bed and rubs her back again.
I know what will make her feel better. I move to the foot of our nest, where her feet are propped up on one of the strange puffy things she insists she wants under her head. I take one cold foot in my hand and begin to massage it. She likes her feet rubbed, my Har-loh.
She moans and falls back in the furs. “God, you’re a good man.”
Her praise is pleasing and I do more, working her small foot over before switching to the other. As I continue to rub, her moans grow louder, and my cock responds in kind. The next time she groans, mine matches it.
A soft giggle escapes her throat and she pulls her foot from my grip to rub it against my cock. I’m wearing a breechcloth like she prefers, and for the moment, I hate it because I can’t feel her skin against mine. “Seems like someone missed me today.”
“Always miss you,” I tell her. Of course I do. She is my mate. The best days are the days we spend all day together. Now that she is carrying our kit, she has to stay closer to the cave. It’s hard not to resent my child at times because he already takes up so much of her time. But then I think of the family waiting for me, and my resentment fades. I have gone from being alone to having a wonderful mate and we will soon have a kit.
I would change nothing. Not a tail-flick of it.
I crawl into bed behind Har-loh and nuzzle her neck. Because her belly is so big, we cannot mate from the front as usual. For the past moon, we have been creative with our mating, and I pull her against me, gauging her mood.