She stirred against him, her leg sliding between his, and fresh wonder flooded his system. She’d screamed his name last night, had clutched at him like he was the only safe thing in a world gone mad. The memory of her tight heat clenching around him made his cock stir despite their marathon session.
He was never letting her go.
The fierce thought surprised him with its intensity. She was essential to him, as necessary as breathing.
His fingers traced the curve of her hip, feeling the slight give of soft flesh over lean muscle. She’d had a life before him, he knew that much. Had mentioned adult children back on Earth or one of the colonies. The thought of her with another man, bearing another man’s children, should have bothered him. Instead, a possessive heat curled in his gut.
She was his now. No other male would ever touch her again.
The possessive certainty should have scared him. Should have reminded him what he was, what poison ran through his veins. He stared at the faint scar on his hand, a pale line against his skin. The sight was enough to pull him back decades. Eight years old, playing with his cousin in the courtyard on V’Taak. One moment laughing, the next consumed by rage so pure it turned the world red. When he’d come back to himself, his cousin was on the ground, throat bearing the marks of childish claws that shouldn’t have existed yet.
Snapshots of memory hit him like laser blasts… The horror on his mother’s face. The way his father had grabbed him by the shoulders, shaking him, demanding to know what he’d done. The healer’s diagnosis of blood rage had changed his life and condemned him.
Within hours, he’d been bundled onto a transport with a dozen other boys and a handful of older warriors making the same journey. He remembered pressing his face against the viewport, watching his homeworld shrink to nothing while tears dried on his cheeks. The older boys had tried to comfort the younger ones, but they’d all been scared. All headed for the same exile on a planet none of them had ever seen.
Michelle shifted in her sleep, mumbling something that might have been his name. He pressed his lips to her forehead, breathing in her scent, and using her presence to anchor himself in the present. That frightened boy was gone. And good riddance.
His legion purred contentment, a sensation so new he was still learning to interpret it. Yesterday, when those ferals had threatened Michelle, something had awakened in him. The symbiont had roared to life, flooding him with strength and speed beyond even normal feral capabilities. Now it rested in his veins like a satisfied cat, occasionally flexing to remind him of its presence.
Unlike other ferals he’d spoken to, his legion didn’t speak to him. No voice in his head offering advice or demanding violence. Just sensation and instinct, a wordless communication that felt more like enhanced intuition than true consciousness. Right now, it radiated the same bone-deep satisfaction he felt, as if it too recognized Michelle as theirs.
The fire had burned low during the night, just embers glowing in the hearth. He should add more wood, but that would mean moving, potentially waking her. He wanted to preserve this moment, stretch it out forever. Just the two of them in their private world, safe from ferals and storms and the harsh reality waiting outside these walls.
His hand resumed its slow exploration of her body, tracing the dip of her waist and the gentle swell of her breast where it touched his ribs. She was so small compared to him, fragile as spun glass. When he’d taken her, he’d been terrified of hurting her, of letting his strength slip and breaking something precious. But she’d taken everything he gave her, had clawed at him for more until he thought he’d lose his mind.
A branch cracked outside.
The sound was wrong, too sharp for the weight of melting snow. His body responded before conscious thought, muscles coiling beneath the furs as his heart rate spiked. Michelle didn’t stir, too deep in exhausted sleep to notice the sudden tension radiating through him.
Another sound, this one closer. The hair on his arms stood up, warning systems firing as his ears strained for more information.
His legion shifted to sharp alertness between one heartbeat and the next. Not speaking but screaming a warning through every cell, pumping him full of adrenaline that made his claws itch to drop.
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
The forest had gone quiet. There were no bird calls, no rustle of small animals in the underbrush. Even the wind had stilled, as if nature itself held its breath. His nostrils flared, trying to catch scent through the cabin walls, but the lingering smoke from the fire masked everything beyond.
Movement through the window made him turn his head slowly, careful not to wake Michelle as he looked out. Shadows shifted between the trees. Too deliberate to be wind-blown branches, too careful to be regular wildlife.
Ferals.
Holy trall. Smoke from the chimney was a dead giveaway. They’d been tracked.
How many? His eyes tracked the shadows, counting movement patterns. At least three, possibly more. They were being careful, approaching slowly, which meant they knew someone was here.
Michelle made another soft sound, nuzzling against him. Her breath tickled his throat, warm and slightly humid. So trusting, so vulnerable.
A sharp, insistent pulse raced along his spine, a silent warning from his legion. Every second he delayed gave their enemies time to position themselves, to cut off escape routes.
Another shadow passed the window, closer this time. Near enough that he caught a glimpse of wrong-jointed movement, the distinctive lope of ferals who’d lost themselves to the rage. His jaw clenched as killing instinct rose in his throat.
They would not touch her. He’d tear them apart before they got within ten feet of his female…
“Michelle.” Zeke’s voice cut through her dreams, low and urgent against her ear. “We need to move. Now.”
Her eyes snapped open as she pushed up from his chest, already reaching for her clothes. The leather pants were still damp from yesterday’s snow, but she yanked them on anyway, fingers working the laces fast. No questions, no hesitation. When someone used that tone, you moved first and asked questions later.
“How many?” She grabbed her shirt, pulling it over her head while scanning the cabin for essentials.
