by Guin Archer
“My kind is not welcome on land.” He reached up to scratch a claw over his studded right horn. “It is best I am not seen fully, even with the Innintani.”
“Come here,” I snapped at him.
“Why? Do you find me so handsome that You must ravish me?” The lech ‘waggled’ his heavy brow. Like with little kids that do something bad but act cute so you have hard time scolding them, I had to fight not to smile. He might’ve been an old bastard, but he was a charmer and a rake.
“I said come here.” I pointed at the rug in front of me for emphasis. He sighed in a falsely put-out way.
“As my sweet wishes.”
As soon as he was within reach, I began tugging his gloves off. He turned stiff as a board and goggled down at me with horror painting his aura sharply.
“What are You doing?!” He tried pulling away from me, but I snapped my wings around behind him so he couldn’t retreat. He all but shrank under my censorious glare even as he stood heads taller than me. It was almost comical.
Almost.
“You are with me. I told this to my Ruune and I tell it to you now…I will protect you. If there is only one thing I can do as Innintani and that is give you the protection of my name, I will do it.” I tossed his gloves onto the desk and pulled him by his wrists to the armoire-chest-thingy filled to brimming with priceless treasures. I began pushing the rings he favored onto his fingers. “If any dare to treat you as less, I will teach them better.”
“Biis’a,” the male husked. He pulled one of his hands out of mine so he could cup my cheek. It was an extremely tender gesture. I resisted squirming. Barely. “Am I Yours, my sweet? Yours as I see You as mine?”
Ah, Jesus. This guy made me feel like an asshole for refusing him as much as was becoming my habit over the last several days as we sailed towards the nearest port-city. He wouldn’t want to hear it, but I could totally see the family resemblance between him and Kor in their relentlessness.
The double-tusks, too. They were the only two I’d ever seen with a dual set.
Vorch wanted me, desperately, and he was bound and determined to have me.
“I have Dorai already,” I murmured even as I unfastened his damned cloak to get at his long-sleeved jacket-blazer something-or-other. It was a weird garment not quite fitting into any one category besides stifling and ugly.
“You have two of Your Visivi. Can I not be Your Muir?” His thumb rubbed gently along my cheekbone. “I would serve You dutifully. I am old, but I will be a los’kah You can be proud of. Choose me.”
“You ain’t a Pokémon,” I hissed even as I ripped the seams of his butt-ugly shirt. I whirled away from him once I shucked it down and off his arms so I could retrieve one of his chained vests.
“What do You say? Your voice is nearly sweeter than You, but Your tone tells me You are upset. I do not like this.”
“There is a lot you do not like,” I returned grumpily. I handed over the dark brown vest with gold stitching and glinting gold metal to him. He spared it a wary look like he thought it was going to jump out of my hand and bite him, but he took it to put on regardless. “I do not always mean to speak in my tongue. I apologize. It simply happens.”
“You say ‘not always’…purposefully, You do speak in Your way so none can understand You. Still. Even now when You are safe.” His frown deepened. “This saddens me, Calliope.”
“It is learned behavior, Vorch. You should understand that for as much as you have seen of my shame in this world.” He looked crestfallen even as he let me dress him. This was novel. No one let me do a damn thing for them anymore.
Wrong. My Horde catered to me and treated me like priceless treasure. Where their hovering got on my nerves more than it should’ve, I now missed it dearly. I miss them.
True to his word, Vorch kept up with the Tyk’rok only for the night, then set his ship off with us aboard it to port. By whatever means necessary, we were getting me first to Mel’lau, then to find Kor. Whatever horror he was reaping on the continent needed to stop. Now.
It still churned my guts to think that I’d been dead so long. Somewhere around four months according Vorch and my piss-poor conversion abilities.
“This has been one of Your shorter absences,” I remember him saying that first night when he insisted on sleeping in the chair he dragged over to beside the bed I hijacked. He dozed in the damned thing every night since, keeping his eyes on me throughout the long hours at sea. “I recall once, vividly, You not returning for five winters. My sweet, those seasons were the worst of my existence.”
In that one pronouncement, he blew away all my preconceived notions that I’d just dropped dead and popped back up again somewhere else. I really was fucking dead.
I tried not to think about the fact that there was nothing for me in that time. Nothing. No awareness. No memories. No nothing.
Does that mean…does that mean that there’s no existence after death? That who we are just disappears and we are just…just…
Goddammit. Don’t think about it.
“Look at me, my sweet.” Vorch’s stern voice brought me back to the present. I had my hands fisted around the lapels of his vest while his own hands gripped my wrists tightly. His aura was brushing against mine worriedly. He half-bent, half-crouched to bring his face close to mine. “Where did You go, sweet Biis’a?”
“Nowhere pleasant,” I choked out before shaking my head clear of my morose wanderings.
“Tell me.”
“You are a stubborn beast,” I chastised him faintly before deliberately jolting my arms so he’d realize he was still restraining me. He knew, though. He’d never forgotten because he kept his hold steadfast. He reeled me into his chest by them. He didn’t stop until he had me wrapped up in him, his head bowed way down low so he could rest his chin on my scalp. It couldn’t have been comfortable for him, but he hugged me without complaint just the same.
“You never have to hide from me, Calliope. I am Yours for now and for forever. There is nothing You cannot tell me.”
I found myself chuckling a little hollowly into his chest. I wasn’t going to admit it out loud, but his hug felt nice. Like, really nice. What amounted to a hair over three days with him, he had wormed his sneaky, white, devilish ass somewhere into the vicinity of my heart. I didn’t love the guy, no, but he was hard not to at least like. Even if he was a bit of a horny hound dog in orc’s clothing.
“What happened to asking me, Muir?”
Vorch snorted loudly over my head. When he spoke, he sounded amused. “I have decided that You will come to see reason in Your own time. I insist and You will see I am right. There is no need for me to keep pushing You when You know the truth of my words. I will be patient and wait for You to admit to my rightness as Your Muir.”
“You are a stubborn beast.”
“Yes.” He hummed happily before squeezing me gently one last time. Then he set me away from him so he could finish securing the garb I forced onto him.
I watched with a keen eye as his stance shifted from cocky and assured to timid and a smidgen afraid. I hated seeing him so subdued. It just wasn’t him. It pissed me off, too, that there were any number of people out there that made him feel so low about himself. He wore his arrogance and smarm like I wore my sass and bitchitude. We were too much alike, hiding behind cloaks of bravery so no one saw the broken, battered individuals underneath.
Knick-knack-that-paddywhack, he’s going to have me swooning and crushing on him like a lovesick fool given any more time. I don’t stand a chance against troubled souls. They call to me.
Sighing deeply, I turned away from him to pick up the boots Lenira gave to me from the ship-city before we left. She was remaining behind. As far as I was aware, I was the only female on the entire ship. It should’ve made me uneasy to know that, but it didn’t. Vorch’d never let anyone hurt me, let alone touch me.
“Help me,” I snipped at him, perching myself onto his chair. He didn’t even wait to finish securing his chains
. He was on his knees in front of me before I could fully sit back against the cushioned back. My wings flopped despondently as I wiggled my dainty, claw-tipped toes. “I do not like this body.”
“It is different than You have known, yes, but it is the most opari I have seen in all my sol. You were Skyvryn-sent before. Now, You are as the One always meant You to be.”
“I still do not like it.”
“I know.” He kissed the top of one foot before working the odd boot up my heel to my calf. “I know, my sweet.”
We were the only two disembarking from the titan of a ship.
As we made our way down the gangway, my wings forced to be on prominent display while Vorch’s ivory-hued, ruby-studded horns glimmered in the filtered daylight, we must’ve looked something like a lily-white Hades and his prismatic Persephone come to take a stroll.
The city folk stumbled and stuttered, gaping up at us with a mixture of disbelief and awe. I did my best not to let my pasted-on smile waffle. I knew some of my unease was showing, though, because the fucking clouds were swirling in and out like some cosmic deity was taking a paint brush to them. Vorch was far more poised than me for all of his nerves. He’d already barked out orders to his crew on how they were to proceed without him – i.e. return to the Tyk’rok city – and then took to my side. His expression was a mirror of Kor’s ‘don’t fuck with me’ and I could see the family resemblance again if only for that alone.
Really, they only shared some personality traits. Physically, you’d never pin them as uncle and nephew.
The breeze off the water might’ve been cold as it gusted against me, but the trou I was wearing were a creamy white leather and the blouse with its missing back fully wrapped my tits to hug around my neck. My wings emitted their own heat so it felt like there was a happy little furnace dancing around my back.
One brushed Vorch and he groaned. I jerked my head towards him, horrified that I might’ve hurt him with it. Instead, his face was pinched in obvious pleasure and his hands were fisted tight by his thighs. If his kii wasn’t tucked safely away in its sheath, I had the feeling he’d be waving it at me.
Woo-hoo. That’d be a show for everyone.
“I apologize,” I whispered to him alone and focused on pulling my wings in tight. For being nothing more than colorful curlies of smoke right now, they felt awfully cramped and uncomfortable, like I was trying to squeeze myself down onto a kindergartner’s tea table.
I was startled when he reached out with one long, powerful arm to drag me stumbling into his side. My wings popped back open automatically, one of them wrapping around his back a lot like his arm was around me.
“There is nothing to forgive, my sweet.” He was still talking in that odd mix of dialects. I was pretty good at understanding him now. It helped considerably once I realized that his dual-tones were actually managing both languages at once. “I must grow used to Your touch. Otherwise I will not be a good los’kah. How am I to keep You safe if every time You touch me I lose myself?”
Snake charmer. That’s what he is.
Hissssss.
The male had a satchel loaded on his back – full of some of our necessities for several days of hard riding to get to Mel’lau – and he shifted it now as he smirked down at me. The way he held me was very familiar and he acted as though we had been together-together, like Pasha and Dorai, for years. He was a ridiculous flirt and too damned personable for his own good.
“Let us proceed, Calliope. We must get mounts.”
I don’t know if it was their shock and awe of us or the expanse of my wings, but we were given a clear berth to the stables.
This city, Blaisoon, brought me back to Blackburhn in my mind. It was hard to keep my spine straight and my shoulders back when I just wanted to hide in Vorch’s side. I kept expecting the little street urchins to come running to me looking to share stories or for Mathai or one of his goons to peer around corners looking for me. My conditioning to be a thief gave me itchy fingers, too. So many pockets looking to be picked.
I didn’t feel like this in Granzee, but Granzee was a totally different beast. It had been filled with Gishtak who were completely immersed in Horde-life. They didn’t have the eclectic mix of bodies from other regions like Blackburhn and Blaisoon. Granzee was filled with the Innintani-worshipers. The port-cities? Not so much.
The clustering clouds gave me away and Vorch tucked me in tighter, releasing a puttering purr to sooth me. It worked better than I thought it would. It was a nice sound and a good distraction against the agitation of the crowds.
A shoppe selling instruments pulled my attention for a minute. A black wood ashati inlaid with mother of pearl – or something akin to it – and red glass dragged me to it. I’d become outrageously fond of the lyre-like object.
Vorch barking in the warrior’s tongue startled me. I looked up at him to see his bitchface on. He had his opposite hand not cupping me pointing to the ashati demandingly. The vendor didn’t hesitate to pull the instrument down to hand over with much genuflecting and thanks.
I took it with a sincere smile stretching my lips.
“Dashka,” I told them both earnestly.
Vorch started pulling me away and back into the crowd. My wondering over his lack of payment must have radiated because he rumbled a chuckle at me.
“He will be swarmed by Gishtak looking to purchase from the los’kah who provides goods favored by the Innintani. He will raise the price and they will pay. One ashati, as valuable as it is, is nothing to what he will pocket this sol.”
Still, I felt like a heel not paying. Once back with the Udon, I’d find my way back again to offer him proper payment. Somehow.
We didn’t make it to the stables. They were within sight, yeah, but our feet never made it to the patched wood and sand floor.
Instead, a familiar trumpet of velociraptor-sound rent the air so loudly I thought my ears were going to bleed from it. I moaned and scrunched my shoulders up around them in and effort to mute the noise. My inattention is what led to me being able to be snatched clear out of Vorch’s hold and yanked into the chest of a familiar beastie.
“Hathor,” my greeting was garbled against her thick hide. The retired matriarch crooned and clicked at me even as she petted and stroked me wherever she could. My wings folded in around her to offer her a more complete hug back.
“I had forgotten You knew the old Xxyx,” Vorch intoned calmly. It sounded like he was moving behind me, but I wasn’t sure with Hathor snuggling me like I was her long-lost teddy. I also couldn’t hear much around the stomping of other Mahzri feet and the many clawed hands breaking around the crone’s to pet me, too. “The Mahzri have become a little wild in Your absence.”
“Sweetie, can you just…”
I yelped as a claw cupped my ass and lifted me up. Like a toddler – kinda sorta – I found myself gripping her neck and torso with my hands and thighs. Her face came down with the arch of her long neck to nuzzle all around my head. She tittered and cooed in her raptor way.
“Hathor,” I mumbled out around her kissy-facing of me. Her tendrils slipped into my mouth and I spat them back out in disgust. “Eww! Dammit, stop!”
She did, but only so she could pivot and begin carrying me away.
Hathor barked to the other Mahzri that were with her. Not surprising, they fell in line. She was obeyed without hesitation. I needed to learn that trick because, for all their devotion, ‘my’ people tended towards sheepishly soldiering on if they thought I should be doing something different.
“Wait! Wait!” I slapped her chest and reverted back to the Tongue. “I am not alone, Hathor! Stop! My Muir!”
Oooh shit…
I put my foot in it now.
“What did You call me, sweet?” He’d likely had to run to keep pace with the old female, but his eyes were bright and he had a huge smile across his face when the matriarch halted. She let me down again right in front of him.
I felt my cheeks heat with a blush.
&nb
sp; “My Muir,” I admitted as firmly as I could, though I knew taking on a third male – and after so little time in knowing him, too – was locking me in fully to this new life. I was accepting this damn, godly role.
Trickier, I was accepting Kor’s uncle into my harem.
It’s all in the family, darlin’.
Vorch growled dually. Dually because of his physical makeup and also due to his spiked aura – saturated with relish and euphoria – which leaked through in his tone.
His hands lashed out, cupped my cheeks, and then reeled me into him. He dropped his mouth onto mine, gentle despite the almost-rough tug that dragged me flush to his chest, and kissed the breath right out of me. I wilted right then and there.
The sonofabitch knew me better than anyone in this world, had seen everything I went through, and so he knew what kissing was all about. Lips to lips. Teeth narrowly clacking. Tongues and a tasteful amount of exchanged spit. My knees felt weak as shit as I threw my needy ass into his loverly, lusty mauling.
“My Innintani,” he rasped once he pulled my mouth away from his. Kudos to him for managing the two words. For me, I couldn’t even summon a coherent thought.
When Hathor bark-chuffed at us, clearly hurrying us along, I was dragged back into my new reality.
Shiiiit.
I’m going to end up fucking one of my other lover’s uncle.
I had a new body with pretty wings as useful accessories. A new life. A fucking harem. I was a fallen-angel-cum-queen.
And, regretfully, I had a job to do now, which started with chasing down my wayward Tohtahk who’d likely lost his damn mind.
Fucking Vorch was going to have to wait.
Chapter Twenty-Seven