She moaned when he lifted his head, then her warm lips trailed over his jaw as her hands lifted to clasp behind his neck and her legs hooked on his hips, her ankles locking behind him. He could feel the brush of her naked flesh against the ridge of his tail through the sensory scales that tipped it.
He grunted in pain as the feeling of her lips working their way down his neck to his collarbone caused his salavik to evert enough that the fire of the seal scorched the sensitive flesh and muscle.
“We must stop, Sarah.” He pulled her away from him, and his body immediately ached for the warmth of hers. Fortunately, the pain of the seal caused his salavik to retreat back into his slit, but it was still eager, just as he was, to find its place inside his drahi’s body. “We cannot go any further until we are bound. My seal is burning with how much I want you right now.”
She didn’t have the strength to resist his withdrawal as he set her back on her feet, then steadied her and kept her in place as she swayed towards him again. Her eyes were glazed, her lips plump and reddened from his mouth and tongue. Her head fibers were wild around her shoulders, mussed by his embrace. He wanted to let her come closer, wanted to answer the need he saw in her eyes with his own.
Seta Zul’s seal had never felt more like a curse than it did now. If it wasn’t there, he would have taken Sarah to the floor in that moment, showing her everything he knew about mating, and learning everything he wanted to know about her body before entering her hot vessel to feel it burning around him. He would never need a warming stone with Sarah in his bed, wrapped around him, writhing beneath him as he thrust into her.
“When you are bound to me, Sarah, I will make love to you every single cycle of our seclusion.”
Her gaze sharpened as she sucked in a deep breath, swiping one hand through her head fibers to smooth them. “I never did ask what seclusion was, or a seal, for that matter.”
He huffed in amusement as her gaze lowered to regard his natuk—his lower garment. His seal burned so brightly from their recent activities that some of that glow showed through the thick weave of the fabric. “I know. You have so many questions.”
Her eyes shot up to meet his. “Yes, I definitely do. Um, your crotch is glowing orange. That’s from the tattoo I saw when I first met you, isn’t it?”
He nodded, once. “That is Seta Zul’s seal. I am bound by it until the first mating ceremony, where you will take it upon you as well, and then my salavik will be free to enter you.”
“So, I’m going to have a glowing orange crotch tattoo too?” Her brows drew together in obvious concern as she glanced down again.
He would have to approach this carefully. She had already told him she did not like pain. He wasn’t sure how she would react to know that the seal would burn her flesh in a brand. He also knew that he had to tell her before the ceremony so she wouldn’t hate him when it happened.
“It will not glow, once we are bound together. For either of us.”
A yan-kanat female went into a first mating ceremony understanding the upcoming pain, and the euphoric pleasure that followed. Most looked forward to it, knowing that the first mating was the most intense, but the nixirs knew so little about magic, if they knew anything at all. He wasn’t certain if Sarah would anticipate it—or fear it—if she knew all the details.
So instead, he focused on her other question. One that he hoped she would find more palatable. “The seclusion I spoke of happens after the first mating ceremony. We will be taken from the temple and returned to our home where we will be confined for fifteen cycles, which is the length of a yan-kanat female’s fertile period once she has completed the mating ritual. No one will interrupt us when we are in seclusion, but food and supplies will be left on our doorstep so we will want for nothing during that time.”
Sarah’s expression was unreadable as he explained this, and he realized that certain things would not necessarily be the same for them. He knew that nixir and yan-kanat blood could mix, and there were those even among the Draku Rin citizens who had some nixir blood running through their veins, though it would not be evident from their appearance. Many were descended from the exodus to Theia, when nixir females were taken as captives to punish the nixir armies that hunted them to extinction—then kept and claimed as mates, in the time before Seta Zul decreed that all matings must have her blessing to be fertile.
Nixirs had different fertile periods, and some records said those periods of fertility happened continuously, without any rituals or aid from potions and elixirs. The idea that a nixir female could become pregnant at any time, without preparation, explained much about the fact that the nixirs had so many more people on their world, and had always held an advantage of numbers over the yan-kanat.
Sarah might not even need fifteen cycles. She might even become pregnant with his nestling during the first mating ceremony. The thought filled him with hope, though he would look forward to the fifteen cycles of uninterrupted mating with great anticipation. He could not wait to begin their family, though he had concerns, despite knowing that their offspring would take after him in appearance. It wouldn’t be the physical appearance of his nestlings that would bring them judgement, but rather what inherent nixir darkness might twist their spirit.
“Sarah, our nestlings will inherit all that is good in you. I believe that. They will not become twisted like the nixirs we fought in the urvaka.”
Sarah’s eyes widened, her face suddenly going pale. “Nestlings?” She shook her head, one hand lifting to rub at her forehead. “I hadn’t even considered that yet! Can we even have children together? We’re so… different.” Then her forehead creased and she spoke again before he could respond. “What do you mean, we fought ‘nixirs’ in the urvaka? Are you talking about the bat-cat monsters? Those weren’t humans.”
“You have never seen the twisted ones in your world before?” He studied her, realizing that she was not pretending her shock. “They were of nixir blood. Even the urvak zayul identified them as such.”
She pointed to herself. “Look at me, Jotaha! Do I have fur? Fangs? Claws? Those things were not like me!”
He rushed to reassure her. “I know, my drahi. You are not twisted by darkness as they were. You are all that is good within the nixirs. I know that you aren’t like so many of them.”
Sarah rubbed her forehead so hard that her skin creased and folded from the pressure. “No, you don’t understand. Humans don’t just… change into monsters. That’s not….” She shook her head hard. “We don’t have magic, Jotaha. We can’t just shapeshift. There’s no scientific explana—oh, no! Please, please, tell me the government isn’t experimenting with genetic engineering on humans!”
Her words confused him, especially since she seemed to be asking him a question to which he couldn’t possibly have the answer.
She threw her hands out, her anger palpable, though it wasn’t directed at him. That much he could tell. “Damn them! How could they be so stupid, and reckless, and unethical as hell? We don’t even understand these technologies yet! Experimenting with human DNA is so… god! It’s so incredibly idiotic! That’s how half the goddamned horror movies freakin’ start!”