“That’s what Vyastil take, right?”
Something flickers in his face. Something like sadness. He takes a moment to answer. “It was something integral to our species. It is no longer effective enough.”
“Why?”
His gaze is sharp, but he doesn’t answer, and something tells me that for now, I need to leave it.
“It’s safe for humans?”
He twirls the leaf between his thumb and forefinger. “I would not harm you. Icannotharm you.”
I want to say no because fuck knows what this herb is going to do to me, but it can’t be worse than the ruenox, right? I take a breath and decide I’d better trust him. He’s not wrong about not hurting me.
In his own way—however the Vyastil do it—he cares about me.
I open my mouth, and he lets out a pleased rumble, setting the leaf on my tongue. Like the ruenox, it starts to dissolve almost immediately.
The effects don’t happen right away—at least, I don’t think. Not like with the dick drug. My limbs might feel a little heavy, and I have the urge to smile, but that’s it.
“It is working,” he says.
I blink slowly, then laugh, and my words come out a bit slurred. “Don’t be ridiculous. I feel fine. Normal.”
Rathyn cocks his head to the side, then ignores me as he reaches for my shirt and begins to tug it over my head.
“Hey! My hair!” I attempt to fix it as he exposes my bare chest, then feel a groan crawling up my throat as he runs his fingers around my nipples.
“Hold my shoulders,” he commands.
My hands obey before my brain is aware of it, and I glower at him again. “That’s not very nice. I don’t like being told what to do.”
“You have made that abundantly clear,” he says without a trace of humor. He pulls the box open again and produces a wooden case that is definitely not from Earth. It opens with a tiny click, and I glance down to see two small, bone-white needles sitting on something like black velvet.
My head swims, and I start to go sideways, but Rathyn catches me before I can topple over.
“You are still afraid.”
I swallow heavily. “You should distract me.”
His eyes widen. “Distract you? In what manner?”
“Make me feel good. Then I won’t think about needles,” I shudder, “in my nipples.”
He doesn’t find any reason to argue with me, because instead of telling me to be a man and suck it up, his hands move to my pants. He urges me to sit up high on my knees, and with a single tug, he exposes my dick.
It’s limp and soft, but he doesn’t seem to mind. He regards it a little more kindly than the first time he set eyes on it. He makes a cooing, singing noise and begins to rub his fingers along the soft length.
Pleasure shoots through my limbs, and my dick attempts to get on board, though the heaviness in my body from the herb is affecting that, too.
“You are distracted?” he asks as he reaches for the needle box again.
My stomach twists. “Now I’m not.”
He growls in annoyance, but it’s only for a second. His hips shift, and the next thing I know, his tail is snaking between us. The firm, pointed tip touches the base of my cock, then it wraps around me and squeezes gently.
Jesus, to have another opposable appendage like that? It’s a wonder they haven’t discovered pleasure. Something about that must feel good for them.
“It is not an unpleasant sensation,” he says, answering my thoughts.
