Move. I force my legs to work, but walking is its own torment. The seam of my pants rubs against my swollen clit with each step. I'm so sensitive that even that indirect pressure makes me gasp. My pussy clenches on nothing, desperate for something to fill it, to ease this manufactured need that has no peak, no relief, just constant demanding ache.
The coral spires offer no protection from rain. They rise twenty feet at the tallest, twisted into shapes that remind me offingers beckoning. When I steady myself against one, it flares to life under my palm. Bioluminescent blue-green spreads from my touch in slow ripples.
I jerk back, but the glow continues spreading. Following the path of my handprint, yes, but also blooming brighter where drops of my arousal have touched the base. The coral is responding to my pheromones. Tasting what the tonic has done to me. Broadcasting my condition in light.
Thunder crashes. The rain turns from drops to sheets. My shirt is unbearable now, the wet fabric clinging and rubbing. I peel it off, not caring about modesty. There's no one here but him, and he's already in the water, probably tasting every molecule of need my body is pumping into his ocean.
The island's center rises slightly higher. There I find a hollow in the clustered coral formations, barely large enough to crawl into. I strip completely before entering, unable to bear the wet clothes another second. The space amplifies everything. The coral walls pulse that blue-green, growing brighter where my bare skin touches them. Where drops of my slick have fallen, the coral glows steady like stars.
I try to ignore it. Try to think about Sam, about escape plans, about anything but the throb between my legs. But my hand moves without permission, fingers finding the swollen flesh that burns for touch.
The first contact makes me cry out. I'm so sensitive it borders on pain. My clit is enlarged, protruding from its hood, demanding attention. I circle it carefully, feeling the wetness pour from me in response. But something's wrong. The touch brings no climb toward orgasm, no building pressure. Just more need. More wet. More ache.
I try direct pressure. Indirect teasing. Two fingers inside, curling to find that spot that usually works. Nothing. My body responds—clenching, dripping, burning—but won't crest. Won'tbreak. The tonic has rewired me to need something specific. Something my own hands can't provide.
A sound escapes me that's part sob, part moan. The coral flares brighter, and I realize my arousal is feeding it somehow. The whole shelter glows now, pulsing in rhythm with my desperate attempts at relief.
I give up after what feels like an hour, fingers cramped and pussy still throbbing. No release. Just this constant state of need that makes thinking difficult. Every nerve ending is alive and screaming for touch. My nipples ache so badly I cup my breasts just to provide pressure, but that makes it worse. Everything makes it worse.
The storm continues for hours. I watch the water rise through the entrance of my shelter, creeping up the beach grain by grain. This isn't like Earth tides. The water doesn't just rise. It transforms the landscape. What was solid ground becomes ocean floor. The coral spires that seemed tall begin to disappear.
By the time rain stops, I'm sitting in three inches of water. It's warm as a bath and makes my skin tingle everywhere it touches. The salt finds every sensitive place—the scratches on my palms, yes, but also my pussy, my ass, making everything swell further with need. I have to get out before I'm underwater completely.
The tidal pools appear as water recedes. Perfect circles carved in coral, each one glowing from within. I approach naked, having given up on clothes. Everything hurts too much against my skin. The night air itself feels like hands touching me everywhere.
The pool is three feet across, eighteen inches deep. The water inside is crystal clear and faintly luminescent. When I lean over to look closer, a drop of my arousal falls from between my legs into the pool. The water flares brilliant blue-green, spreading from that point like ink. Calling to him. Announcing my state to everything in the ocean.
That's when water behind me goes completely still.
Not calm—held. Like something massive has stopped the waves from their natural rhythm. I turn slowly, every instinct from my rescue swimming days screaming predator.
He's there. Just beyond where waves break. Eyes above water, but I can see the bulk beneath. Tentacles spread in every direction, too many to count. Each one thick as my waist where they join his body, tapering to points that move independently, tasting the water. His eyes are silver-blue like deep ocean, with pupils that dilate as they focus on my naked form.
“The tide-touched female leaks sweetness into sacred waters,” he says, and the words come from him but also through the water itself, vibrating up through the coral under my feet. The implant translates, but his syntax is strange, not quite human. “This one tastes her need from depths beyond light.”
I cover myself instinctively, though it's pointless. He can smell everything. Taste everything.
“High tide comes,” he continues, moving closer but still keeping distance. A tentacle breaks the surface, tip pointing at me like an accusation. “Female will climb or drown. Choose.”
“I'll swim.” My voice cracks.
“In night currents where flesh-renders feed? Female's blood-scent already calls them. They taste her readiness, her emptiness waiting to be filled.” Something that might be laughter ripples through water. “Would not survive one song's length.”
Flesh-renders. Of course there's something worse than him in these waters.
“What do you want?” Though we both know.
“This one wants what tide brings. What female's modified flesh sings for.” A tentacle rises beside me, carefully depositing items on coral before withdrawing. But not before its tip trails through the puddle of my arousal on the ground. The tentacle flares with bioluminescence where it touched my essence.“Tonight, survival. Tomorrow, pursuit begins properly. Soon, female enters water willingly. Begging.”
Three items lie on the coral. A fish wrapped in kelp, still fresh. A shell formed into a cup, full of clean water. And a scale the size of my palm, iridescent blue-green, still radiating body heat.
His body heat.
“The scale marks claim,” he says as I pick it up, the warmth of it making my pussy clench. “Other hunters will taste this one's intent on female. Will know she is chosen for specific purpose.”
He starts to sink, then pauses. Only eyes above water now.
“Female's body prepares well. This one tastes her emptiness, her chemical begging. By third tide, she will wade into water seeking relief only tentacles can provide.” He disappears completely, but his voice carries through the waves. “Twenty-nine days remain. But female won't last five before entering ocean to be caught.”
