Orc’s Forbidden Claim (Red Planet Dragons of Tajss #33)

2. Khiara

2

KHIARA

H er lips are as sweet as the cleanest water from the deepest springs of the mountain. An electric tingle races from my lips straight into my heart. I pull her slight form into my arms and cup my hands under her perfect round ass.

She runs her hands through my hair, tugging on my braids making me groan. My cock strains against my pants, begging to be free, but that is not possible. Behind us, I hear my brother and his mate moving around our rooms. It’s distraction enough to cause me to break the kiss, no matter how much I do not want to.

“Oh, I missed that,” Saylor whispers, her fingers trailing over my face and then up my tusks.

“I too,” I say, speaking as softly as I can to avoid attracting attention.

“If only we could be alone,” she grouses.

“I know, but they moved someone into the room next to us,” I say, pushing down my anger.

Blasted lizards. They do this to spy on us. There is no trust.

I keep my thoughts to myself. If I’ve learned nothing else after the rise of the Shaman, it was to keep my own counsel and even then to keep it quiet. One misspoken word, even an improper facial expression, could be enough to pull the attention of the Maulavi.

Dilacs and I figured out how to navigate our way through the wreckage of what was once our great society. Now we are so far reduced that we must depend on the lizards. I cannot imagine a worse fate if some great power was designing it specifically to torture us.

But the Queen is alive, and she is with us. Not here, of course, the lizards would not allow that no matter how we fought or argued. When she had acquiesced to their demands, we had no choice. She is our Queen, after all. If she is willing to put her trust in the humans and the lizards, then it is on us to follow. Follow, but that does not mean we have to like it. Those are two very different things indeed.

I study my dragoste. The moment I saw her, I knew she was the one. I was being led by the stupid lizards towards what was to become my unacknowledged prison when my eye caught her in one of the dining areas. She was standing with a group of females, but she outshone them all. It was as if one of the twinkling stars I saw on my journey to the surface had come below the mountain the way she shined and sparkled so brightly. Then I heard her voice, and it was music. As if an entire symphony was playing in perfect synchronicity, performing the most beautiful, incredible song ever crafted. So amazing it must have been shaped by Tajss itself.

Her voice called to my soul. I had stopped dead in my tracks until the stupid lizard had punched me in the back. A coward’s blow, but what else would one expect from a treacherous lizard?

“What are you thinking?” she asks in a whisper that caresses my ears like the touch of a feather.

“Of you,” I say, which is only half-a-lie.

I was thinking of her, but not only her. She smiles and trails her fingers over my cheek and then down my neck.

“I want to be alone,” she says, longing heavy in her voice.

I growl. I can’t stop it from slipping out. I tighten my grip on her waist. She is so tiny compared to an Urr’ki. My hands almost meet around her waist. She rises onto her toes and claims my lips. I give all I am into the kiss, but the moment is broken when I hear footsteps approaching from inside.

I break away, reluctantly but having no choice. The heavy leather door pulls aside with a dragging sound. Saylor and I step apart only a moment before it is open enough for whoever it is to see.

“Bed?” Dilacs asks.

“Soon,” I say, voice husky with unspent desire and need.

“Heh,” he grunts, and I feel his stare on my back.

My brother is no fool, he knows what is happening, but I do not wish to discuss it with him. I had thought Gwen, his mate, was my dragoste, but I was wrong. My feelings for her were nothing compared to what they are for Saylor. How was I to know, though? I had given up on ever finding a dragoste. My life, before Gwen was thrust into it, was consigned to ending this world. Even if Gwen was not my dragoste, I care for her. She brought the one thing I didn’t know I had given up. Hope.

“I said a moment,” I growl, looking over my shoulder.

Dilacs grimaces, his eyes narrowing as he looks past me to Saylor. I growl again and he shakes his head and then drops the door back into place.

“I should go,” Saylor says, looking at the way down.

Her hands are in mine. I tighten my grip on hers and then pull her closer. I wrap my arms around her, inhaling the sweet scent of her hair. It is an exotic scent that I can never quite place, but it is uniquely her. Many are the nights I have laid in bed remembering the way her scent fills my nostrils.

“A moment,” I whisper. “Only a moment more. Please.”

She murmurs something into my chest, but it is too muffled for me to hear. It doesn’t matter because the tight grip of her arms is all the assent I need. I layer kisses on the top of her head then do the hardest thing I have ever had to do, I let her go.

She takes a step back, her hand still in mine. Our arms stretch as she continues to walk backward while our eyes are locked onto one another.

“Wait,” I ask.

She pauses and I pull out the gift I have been working on for her. I extend my hand, letting it dangle from the string. The green gem catches the light from the single torch nearby and explodes with colors as it breaks down the light.

“Beautiful,” she says, a bright smile on her face.

“Wear it,” I say.

She hesitates only for a moment before coming back to me. She turns and lifts her hair, allowing me to fasten it on her neck. She stands fingering the gem between thumb and forefinger before walking forward. She stops after a few steps, then turns away.

“This is wrong,” she whispers.

“How can it be wrong?” I ask my throat so tight the words barely come out. “Your friend, Wrenlee, is with a lizard. Am I so much different? Am I less than a lizard in humans’ eyes?”

Her eyes glisten with unshed moisture. She blinks rapidly, swallows, then shakes her head.

“Not to me,” she says.

Only the tips of our fingers remain in contact, but she pauses there, letting the touch linger.

“Nor you to me,” I say. “And Gwen is with Dilacs. The others back in the city, are with Urr’ki, how can this not be okay?”

“They’re… different,” she says.

“You say that,” I say. “But I do not understand. Are they not humans too?”

“Yes, but not…” she trails off, shaking her head. “I cannot explain it again. I have to go.”

She jerks her hand free and moves quickly down the ramp. Her white dress is fading into the darkness before I can speak.

“Saylor, wait,” I call after her. She stops but doesn’t turn around. A white blur in the darkness, but I see her head is turned to one side. “I… I am sorry.”

“I know,” she says, and I hear the tightness in her voice too.

Her shoulders slump, her head drops, and then she rushes off down the ramp. I stand alone, watching the shadows that dance where she was but moments before. My heart aches as if a hand is squeezing it tight, making it hard for it to beat.

Giving up, at last, I turn and head into my assigned room before Dilacs comes to inquire yet again.