This Orki affected her.
And she was sick. Something was wrong. A weird and terrible stomach sickness ruled her mind and body, turning her insides mushy, her outside feverish, and her mind to sex. Out in the middle of nowhere, no medicine or doctor, maddened with a desire to do things to the male who had taken her off on the adventure of a lifetime. She was out of her element and without control.
He'd cut off her air until she passed out!
Put her to sleep and silenced the raging ache beneath her skin.
Since he didn't speak, she assumed the purposeful act of setting her hand on Zerzer explained his expectations while he went elsewhere. Look straight ahead, at nothing, and no one else. Wait. She could do that. Movement that didn't involve satisfying her cravings hurt. She couldn't lift her head to look where the Orki had gone.
She hated this. She'd only rarely been sick as a child, and Mama always knew what to do. That first year of her woman's cycle, before Mama died, had been especially hard. A lighter version of what she felt now. Her mother clucked and fussed and gave her lots of hot, sweet things to drink. A memory surfaced of snuggling into bed, three warming bottles lined up along her midsection, Mama humming, spooning bitter medicine into Annabell's mouth. Watered down and honey-sweetened. She hadn't liked the oily stuff. But it made her feel better. Her mama tested the warmth of the heated cow hide warming bottles. "Well, Annabell Roe, they say that when the heat takes a girl young, it is a sign she is a natural Orki bride. Would you like that?"
Sweetly indulgent, Mama's soft smile curved her lips. Annabell had forgotten that smile, the pleasant tones of her speaking voice. A wisp of a smoky memory-then-gone. How had she forgotten that?
Returning, Doku-ni gave Zerzer water. Zerzer complained in a series of beastly grumbles and whines. Her rider grunted back. More than once she'd seen Doku-ni move his hands in deliberate shapes, communicating.
Unexplained tension surged through Zerzer's muscles under Annabell's hands where she leaned on her. Something captured the beasts' attention. Annabell buried her face in Zerzer's side. Capable of doing damage, of taking care of himself, Doku-ni could deal with it. Annabell had no energy and wasn't supposed to see anything beyond her nose. She heard the back-and-forth conversation of war beasts. Grass swished and rocks moved as the beasts reposition themselves.
She didn't care. At all. If the hunting party of twelve Orki surrounding her lacked the ability to take care of whatever kind of upset was happening, then she was going to die anyway. At least she would feel better. Orki warriors joined the conversation. There was movement around her, shifting. Zerzer huffed and made noises. With her ear pressed against Zerzer's side, Annabell heard new variations in the war beast's vocalizations, the dense variety of tones more noticeable.
Finally, Doku-ni returned to her, his hands closing on her waist. She relaxed, let him move her back onto the war beast. His touch eased the building tension under her skin. The remedy for her current affliction, she wanted to crawl inside him and wrap him around herself. She hurt when he wasn't touching her and holding her—making that calming noise for her. But when he was doing all those things, the ache to take him inside of her grew in waves of greed. This wasn't enough. Only fucking was going to be enough. The frustration of not being close enough increased in tandem with the relief he gave her, in a juxtaposition of needs Annabell couldn't make sense of.
Strong and steady, the male sat her down how he wanted her, refusing to indulge any of her cravings. The loping gait of travel to wherever they were going started again. And with it, that buildup of madness. Restless, she smoothed her hands back and forth over his skin. She licked and bit and rubbed.
This ongoing rejection was agony. Rational brain taking flight, Annabell fell from one tormented emotion to the next, faster than Zerzer covered the land. "I need you to do something. I need you."
He replied with his deep-chested one-grunt.
"What does that mean?" she asked. Her voice crackled with irritation. She wanted that thing he had done with his fingers and tongue. She'd woke up wanting it and he decided they had to travel. Choked unconscious, she woke wanting it then too, but he was off doing something else. Maybe he didn't understand that it hurt, that she knew he could make it stop hurting.
Another grunt.
Not the answer she wanted. "Did you take me just so you could watch me fall apart?"
Shifting in the seat, Doku-ni dug into one of the pouches at his waist. It was not the right kind of shifting. She bit the skin on his chest, not even sure he could feel it. After digging between them, his knuckles brushing bare skin, he pulled out a little clay vessel topped in wax. It was one of the popular Orki trade goods. Annabell recognized it. Contained inside of the little jar, made from plants in Original territory, was a pain reliever and sleep-inducing oil. Mama taught Annable to use the remedy for her cycle. Gently touching her cheek to get her attention, Doku-ni rubbed off the seal, holding it up for her to smell.
He must have gone to get some from another Orki at their last stop. A familiar herbal scent wafted up. He lifted it to her mouth, wanting her to drink. She'd never taken it that way. The stuff was potent. It might make her sleep for days.
Which, considering her current state, that option sounded nice. Maybe she would sleep and wake feeling like herself again. Maybe she would wake from this dream. Or nightmare. Or whatever this feeling of unreality was. She chose to trust him, hoped he understood human bodies, and let him pour the bitter mix onto her tongue. Gratefully accepting the water skin, she washed the taste down.
Her tongue went numb first, followed by her throat. In her stomach, the oily stuff cooled her fever with a creeping frost. Next, her cramps faded, as the chilling oil spread out, bringing relief to her nausea with it. Annabell brought her hand up to her mouth, stifling a cough. Now was not the time to be emptying her stomach all over herself. Doku-ni lowered his head, sniffing and smelling her, before enclosing his hand around her throat and stroking fingers down her jugular. That was how he caused her to pass out and the touch should have made her nervous, but it soothed her need to gag, calming her. Trying to figure out how that worked, pressed into his chest, she relaxed into the peace of sleep.
*
Burning. She was on fire. Annabell couldn't stand it. Filmy and blurred, her eyes refused to focus when she opened them. Her head hurt again, she had cramps from her belly to her knees, and she couldn't see. New softness surrounded her, bumpy, lumpy, in the wrong place. The fur pelt rasped in irritation instead of lying smooth. The blanket she used was thin and flat when she wanted full and soft. Growling with frustration, not sure if she was awake or asleep—and not caring about it either way—she attacked the blankets and furs in the shallow indent she found herself in. It wasn't right. She would fix it. Extra smells and textures bombarded her senses. They didn't belong here, and she didn't want them. Who had dared put them in her bed? These were not hers. Once and for all, she would beat this bed into submission.
"There are no treats for wicked girls who don't do their chores,"Mama said.
A proper bed meant a proper rest. Annabell always made her bed fresh every day to climb into at the beginning of each night. She did not know what had happened here.
A grunt and a growl from Doku-ni made her stop and look up from the task to see why he interrupted. Doku-ni. Her white Orki.
Beefy arm slipping around her waist, he lifted her, sitting down with her in his lap, next to the blurred shape of a waterskin and a wooden plate and bowl of obnoxious smelling food. Did he think she wanted to eat? It would be time to sleep again soon, and this bed had to be fixed.
He squirted a little water from the pouch onto her face. Hot enough to make steam rise, Annabell licked her lips—still the wrong stuff. She groused at him, leaning to fix the out-of-place blanket on her left. At the same time, she realized she was sitting in the curve of his lap facing outward, on top of interesting shapes and textures.
Her male was nude.
He pushed the water against her lips again.
