Page 24 of A Drop of Venom

I was happy we’d first lain together in the garden rather than in the nest. Not that I’d object to mating, as he’d called it, in the cave, but the garden was my favorite part of our home together and it just seemed right to share our first night of intimacy here under the earliest stars of night.

Terolon’s hand paused in the middle of caressing my bare back. “Shelshi,” he said in astonishment, “what have you done?”

At his tone, I raised my head and looked at him. He was staring over my head at something, but I didn’t turn to look because I was seeing something behind him too.

Every flowering plant and tree in the garden had burst into bloom, and all the climbing vines had seemingly doubled or tripled in length and swallowed up entire sections of the wall. Our garden beds were spilling over their borders, the walking paths were almost completely overgrown, and grasses lapped at the third step leading to the basking stones when before they’d barely reached the first. Even the passage that led into the cave had nearly disappeared behind a curtain of vines.

Terolon and I stared at each other.

“Oh,” I breathed. “That is…unexpected.”

He smiled and guided my head back down to his chest before resuming his caresses. “Your magic is magnificent, my love. Every day, I discover something new and wondrous about you.”

Everything was becoming soft and muddled, as if I’d drunk two cups of nighttime tea. I wanted to tell him he was magnificent and wondrous too, but my tongue and lips didn’t seem to want to form words.

I was already half asleep by the time he added softly, “And you are one of the goddesses’ own miracles, my sweet, perfect light.”

I didn’t have the energy to argue, so I let him think what he wished—at least for now—and tumbled headlong into a deep and dreamless sleep.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

TEROLON

My shelshi slept for three days and nights.

When I couldn’t rouse her the morning after our first mating and discovered her flesh was cooler than it should be, panic sent me racing first for my Izaelon medical texts, with a plan to rush with my mate in my arms to the hidden forest home of Stosior the wizard if answers couldn’t be found among the pages.

In the second volume of texts, in the deplorably short section on human-serpentae relations, I found my answer. With Hazel clutched to my chest, I read the passages no less than five times.

Because of our mating and my bite, my lovely shelshi was undergoing a metamorphosis.

Her normal body temperature would decrease to a level somewhere between that of a serpentae and a human. The process would be gradual, likely requiring several days, during which she would also undergo other changes—some visible, and some not.

According to the text, my mate might grow some scales. The most likely locations for this phenomenon were along the sides of her face, on her upper arms and thighs, and on her sides. She might develop keener senses of taste and smell over time and crave the warmth of either the sun or radiant heat, especially if she were with basilings.

And it was that final passage I studied the longest, because this change meant she could conceive and give birth to a clutch of up to three basilings. What had seemed like a distant possibility had suddenly become a reality.

She’d said quite clearly that she wasn’t sure if she would want to have children, now or ever. I wasn’t certain myself. But the image my mind conjured of my love, my light, lying in my coils with a beautiful rounded belly sent a quiver down the long length of my spine and heated my sartras and my seed pouch.

Finally, I closed my texts, left them on the shelf, and carried my sleeping mate deeper into the mountain, to the heated cave that was my winter haven.

In the circular depression I’d worn into the rock over many years, I made a nest of all the softest cushions and fabrics in our home and settled my sweet mate into its center. The air in here was quite warm and moist thanks to the hot springs, and if I must let her out of my arms for any amount of time, at least I could be sure she wouldn’t be chilled.

Back in the summer cave, I found her tea blend in a jar by the fire pit and brewed a cup as I’d watched her do every morning for the past several weeks. She’d never told me why she drank it daily, but I knew the purpose of the herbs she collected to make it. A similar blend was commonly sold throughout Izaelon.

As it steeped, I set a pot to simmering over the fire to make a hearty meat broth. The text’s instructions, while sparse, were at least clear: she needed warmth, frequent sips of water and broth, and my constant care as her body adjusted and transformed.

But staying busy didn’t prevent me from despising myself for not knowing the consequences of my instinctual bite during our mating. I could only pray to the goddesses that my sincerest apologies would lead to forgiveness someday.

Losing my shelshi would leave me a broken male. But if by my own actions I drove her away, I would simply curl up outside in the garden and let winter take me.

For three days, I tended to my sleeping mate with tea, water, broth, and long soaks in the hot springs. I left the winter cave only long enough to mind the cooking fire and carry mugs back and forth. I didn’t hunt and I got little sleep, but serpentae by nature could withstand hunger and wakefulness much longer than humans. I simply could not leave her side or take my eyes off her for more than a few minutes.

On the second day, the first petal-soft scales appeared along Hazel’s temples and on her shoulders and hips. They began as a lovely coral color with a silver sheen and flowed into a breathtaking lavender tint. My hearts nearly sprang from my chest when parts of them darkened to nearly match my own crimson belly scales.

By the third day, her body temperature settled and her scales stopped spreading. On her face, they were faint along her hairline and disappeared at her jawline. Another set crowned her shoulders and continued down her upper arms almost to her elbows. The final set began along her ribs, curved down her sides over her hips, and ended mid-thigh. All of them were buttery soft even at their edges where they met her human skin.

I prayed the goddesses of the serpentae didn’t think me blasphemous if I looked upon my beautiful mate as the embodiment of their divinity.