I'm no longer on Earth, I remind myself. These hunters are not innocent.
It's definitely an us or them situation.
I carefully suppress all those thoughts. They are luxuries from a different life in a different reality. They won't help me find or help all the missing women. In this reality, I need to feel grateful that we have such a protector.
He is absolutely magnificent.
He's scanning around him, obviously assessing if there are any additional threats. There's a raw purple score across his flankthat's oozing blood. At least the bullet only grazed him, but it's yet another reminder of how dangerous even stupid hunters can be.
He stops scanning and stills, his bright eyes losing focus and his ears no longer moving.
I remember he commented that his venom made it difficult for him to think clearly. It occurs to me that this is our most dangerous moment and I'm nowhere close enough to him to help ease it or to watch out for him.
If there is another genali hiding, he could be killed.
For now there's nothing I can do. I'm not able to get myself out of this tree, which tells me just how little we actually thought this through. I have no way to help him if he's injured. If he is killed, I'll be stranded or captured.
I know both of us are smarter than this.
This certainly warrants a conversation as soon as possible.
I sigh, thinking of how few of the skills I focused on building in my life are a natural fit for this insane situation. Then I push all of those thoughts aside and focus on Thivoll. I hope he breaks out of his trance soon. I watch him closely, hoping for a sign that he is working through whatever has him locked down.
I'm pretty sure a hiding hunter would have struck by now and some of the tension leaves my body.
Now that the danger has passed and I've rerouted my overthinking brain, there is nothing to distract me from the ever-present lust. My nanites are telling me he is everything my body needs and wants.
Right. Now.
Even though the violence bothered me, I have to admit there was a beauty to his movements and the raw power is incredibly attractive. He was as poised as he was brutal and as I play the sequence of his motions back through my mind, I have to squeeze my legs together to provide some relief.
I shouldn't enjoy seeing that level of efficient violence, but I can't deny that it turns me on.
The thought of him up against me with such a graceful and powerful body makes me moan.
Thivoll whips his head toward me, his mouth open and his lips pulled back as he takes a deep breath.
Then he is on all fours and bounding in my direction.
27
Thivoll
Part of me knows it's not a good idea to be letting the euphoria make my decisions, but the sound she made and the smell of her on the wind is all the excuse the other part of me needs to tell that voice to shut up.
This lovely, heady feeling from my venom release would be all that much better if she was in my arms.
And so I make it happen.
It takes far less time to make it back to her than the slow stalk I made before that brief fight. I hadn't been sure if it was a ruse, but took a chance the genali were just as idiotic and unprepared as the shouting made them seem.
The frisson of pleasure I feel isn't just from the venom, but also from the satisfaction that two fewer hunters are a threat to my Ree.
Her smell is much stronger now that I'm at the base of her tree and I scramble up it, completely unconcerned with hiding my trail.
Anyone who looks at the genali I envenomated will know who I am, or at least what I am.
The little space left in my mind for those sorts of thoughts is overtaken completely when I finally reach her. She has a stranglehold on a nearby tree branch and her eyes are wide and wild. Her long indigo hair is draped all around her and I brush against it as I move from the enormous trunk of the tree to the thick branch I left her on.
