Page 17 of The Naga Warlord’s Virgin Mate

Her question startled me, as far as I knew, the Clans had always been that way. Mingling just did not occur, or if it did, it wasn’t seen favorably by anyone. In Bitter Storm, it had never happened as far as our history had recorded, and our memories were long. I shrugged, because I didn’t have an answer and Naomi started speculating.

“You must have mingled in the past. On those images stored on the cube, there were several pictures of Naga of different shades together.” I wondered if that meant mingling was a bad thing that had contributed to the downfall of our race, was that why Bitter Storm kept to itself so much?

When I didn’t answer, Naomi fell silent and just watched her surroundings while I traveled. We angled north, turning our back on the luscious wetlands and soon we were beneath sparse trees and on rocky terrain. The journey took a lot out of me, but I was well at home in this environment. Traveling through gullies and climbing steep slopes. If there was one thing Bitter Storm warriors were good at, it was rocks.

My mate had fallen asleep in my arms by the time I reached the rock bowl with the natural well I’d been headed for. There were no trees, but the rock was shaped to shelter us from any wind, and the water was cold and fresh. “Get down, Kiwi,” I said, curling my mouth for the first time around the strange name my mate had given to her pet.

The little Sleara lifted his tiny fanged snout from Naomi’s chest where he’d been sleeping to eye me with a baleful look in his velvet brown eyes. Then he rose on four legs, bowed his back in the deepest stretch that shuddered up his long, slender tail. With a flap of his wings, he spiraled to the ground, tendrils of smoke curling up from his nostrils as he huffed. No bigger than my hand, he was just a little dot of emerald against the slate gray rock beneath my tail.

I didn’t want to put my mate down on the cold stone when she was sleeping so trustingly. I liked how her lashes were these darker feathers against her cheeks, her nose pink from the brisk temperatures. Hooking my tail beneath the flap of my backpack, I managed to curl the tip around the fur at the top and yanked it free with a bit of fiddling.

Once it thudded to the ground, I straightened it out with a bit of effort. More effort than should have been necessary because the Sleara seemed to think my waving tail was an invitation for play. Finally, I carefully laid my mate down, still keeping Kiwi occupied by flicking my tip around for him to chase.

She didn’t wake and I hurried to shrug out of my pack of supplies so I could cover her with more furs to keep her warm while I made camp. “Watch her little one,” I warned the Sleara when I was certain she wouldn’t get cold without my body heat. Kiwi instantly scuttled to her side to park his little body next to her head.

Swiveling his own round face and pointed snout around, nose twitching to do exactly as I’d said. I froze and kept watching with a bit of surprise. I knew Sleara were clever creatures, but they were still rodents, and with how hungry the Clan was, they usually went into the stew. Kiwi was far smarter than I’d ever given his species credit for.

I gathered the needed sticks quickly from the surrounding area and then set up the tent I’d fashioned of old, de-haired leathers. Making a soft bed inside with the remaining furs, I was quickly ready to settle my mate into the much warmer shelter. Our body heat would warm the tiny space, allowing us to stay comfortable, even at these higher elevations. Naomi would need it the further we traveled north.

I didn’t crawl into the tent with my mate and her pet until I’d set up trip wires around the perimeter and a snare further away along a trail of paw prints. I hoped to catch us breakfast while we slept, sparing our rations as much as possible.

My muscles ached when I laid down, I’d carried a lot, and crossed a great distance today. I’d done it on very little sleep too, considering how many preparations I’d had to make before we could leave, and how early nightmares of Naomi coming to harm had woken me. I was still worrying about my precious scrolls and clay tablets when I settled myself beneath the furs with Naomi. Would they remain safe and unharmed from water damage, undiscovered by the Clan, until I could retrieve them?

*

Naomi

I woke up warm, my head pillowed on a slowly rising and falling shoulder. My arms were trapped between my body and Krashe’s, one of his arms a heavy weight across my waist. I wasn’t used to getting this many cuddles but I really wanted to; I liked waking up like this. If not for the burning need to go I would probably want to stay there for as long as I could. Yesterday morning, Krashe had been gone before I woke up.

Wriggling out of his grip was hard, especially because it turned out he’d wrapped several loops of his tail around my legs. My feet were warm to the touch when I pulled them free, which was a nice change from normal. The blood flow wasn’t the greatest in my legs and feet because I couldn’t move them; they were always cold.

Kiwi was curled up near the exit of the tiny tent we were in. He lifted his head when I scooted myself through the flap, cracking the biggest of yawns. When I crawled over the rocky terrain outside in the pre-dawn light, he followed sleepily. Then he scuttled off into some nearby bushes, tail wagging.

Fine, that gave me some privacy to quickly take care of business. When I was done, I tossed some dirt over the mess and then located a nearby clean-looking patch of sand to rub my skin clean with. Then the gurgle of water caught my attention and I couldn’t resist the temptation. I carefully picked my way over the gray rock, scooting along the ground that looked the flattest and least covered with pointy pebbles and edges.

A small pool of clear water had gathered, a natural spring. I cupped my hands and shivered at how damn cold it was, drinking a few quick sips and daring to quickly wash up. I was shaking, my teeth clattering together when I was done but I felt much better now that I was clean. I crawled back to the tent, just in time to catch Kiwi’s proud return, some small feathered thing in his maw that he was still trying to swallow.

“No,” I said when he tried to follow me inside, tiny feathers drifting down around me. “You can come in when you finished eating, buddy.” His ears perked toward me then dropped and he settled down on his belly to finish the rest of his meal. I ducked into the tent, relieved I wouldn’t have to clean up blood and feathers.

Krashe’s deep red eyes glowed in the dark interior of the tent, proof that he was wide awake. He just lifted the furs and then pulled me close so I could warm up again, not a word uttered, his expression grumpy and sleepy. Despite rising early yesterday, he was a total sleepyhead this morning. I appreciated that he’d woken but not followed me out, it felt nice that he wasn’t hovering, thinking that he needed to do everything for me when I could take care of myself.

“Your nose is cold,” he muttered when I pressed it to his chest and let out a deep, content sigh. I had to giggle at the grumpy tones when his body language said something else, his arms pulling me closer, his tail winding around me. I was toasty warm in seconds and the way he was always so eager to hold me felt good too, like my disability didn’t matter to him.

Except it did, I realized with a shiver of cold dread. He was taking me someplace where he could ‘fix’ my spinal injury. I’d been wondering about my Warlord’s motivations from day one, and our rushed escape from his home had made me feel like I could finally put those worries to rest. Nothing said you could trust a man quite like leaving and betraying his whole Clan did, just to keep me safe.

But while the idea of being able to walk again someday was a dream that made my own breath stall, just from how badly I wanted that, the thought that Krashe wanted to fix me because he thought I wasn’t good enough was painful. I was probably leaping to all kinds of wrong conclusions but I couldn’t shake the feeling. I told myself that if I could help a loved one walk again, I’d do so in a heartbeat too, this was no different.

Then I recalled how Krashe had talked of his own Clan tossing me out even if I were Naga because of my paralysis. I’d been sleepy last night, and crashing after all the excitement from before, I struggled to recall if he thought that was a good thing or a bad thing now. I must have communicated some of my internal struggles by tensing up because Krashe shifted, his head dipping down to press his face against the crown of my hair.

“What is wrong, my mate?” he murmured, his voice still groggy from sleep. Nope, he was not a morning person, or maybe he was just really tired. I couldn’t help but find that cute. The tip of his tail curled over my hip, snuck up along my belly between my breasts, and then nudged my chin upward so I was forced to look him in the eye.

As soon as I saw his face I knew he was well aware he was grabbing the excuse to cop a feel with his tail. There was a mixture of curiosity and a hint of smugness in his wine-red eyes. They became more serious, and more alert when he saw my face. “Tell me, Naaah-ohmi,” he insisted, drawing out my name when he did his best to pronounce it correctly.

“You’re not…” I started but then bit my lip, struggling to figure out how to say this in the nicest way, after all he’d done for me, and there was no denying at this point that it had been a lot. From giving up his Clan and his mission to save them, to his home, his things, and basically everything he knew. Turning his back on hatred for outsiders, for strangers, and even on some of his distrust for technology.

But this was the braver, better me, the one that had faced down death so often that she wasn’t going to live life with regrets ever again. “Look, I just want to make sure you’re not trying to fix my legs because you think I’m not good enough.” As I said it, I still vividly recalled how he’d spoken of me to his Queen. Abomination, disfigured, a threat to the Queen. Not to be trusted. He’d said all of that very convincingly, and it still lingered in my mind.

“An abomination, something your Clan would cast out even if I were one of you…” My breathing hitched embarrassingly on the last words. I’d felt cast out in my own world back on Earth. Unable to afford the treatments that would help me walk again, unable to work any jobs due to discrimination and lack of accessibility. Watching my brother and parents slave away while the best I was allowed to offer was to clean the apartment and cook their meals.