Rendash was dying.

He knew, through tattered remnants of his rationality, that he wasn’t truly dying, but that didn’t change how he felt.

The room was dark, the air a comfortable temperature, if a bit too dry, and the only sounds were the muted wailing of the wind — hardly enough to keep him awake — and the creaking of the bed as he shifted restlessly in his search for a position that would allow sleep to finally overtake him.

Believing that he could find the right position was his first mistake. The bed should have been comfortable; though his feet hung off the end, the mattress had a good balance between softness and support. Yet no matter how he lay, comfort remained elusive.

The largest portion of blame fell upon his own arousal; his cock ached, and he’d grasped it through his pants several times in fruitless attempts to alleviate the pressure. He’d left the restraining garment on, fearful of what his instincts would demand if he released his throbbing shaft from its confines. It was nearly impossible to sleep while his blood was ablaze, while his lips tingled with the remembrance of Zoey’s kiss, while her scent lingered upon him.

During the final game of checkers, he’d managed to swing the battle in his favor on multiple fronts. Despite her insistence on putting space between them, despite her deciding not to mate with him, he knew Zoey desired him, and he’d turned her desire into a weapon. He’d won the battle, but her final effort…

She’d won the war. He’d maintained a tenuous control throughout, even with her sitting on his lap and her bottom pressed over his cock, but that kiss!

Control. Detachment. Control. Detachment.

The words repeated in his mind until they lost all meaning. Neither were currently attainable to him; why should they hold any significance?

The rest of his discomfort couldn’t be attributed to anything physical; it was the same as it had been the night before, when he’d tossed and turned, his fitful sleep ending well before dawn light stained the sky beyond the window.

The reason for his broken sleep had been simple, and even though it affected him now, his pride demanded he not admit it. Better to cast truth aside and carry on without giving it acknowledgment.

Rendash — Aekhora, Blade of the Aligarii, forged by a lifetime of war — had become dependent on a human. A little female human who had become the most important thing in his life, who was perhaps the only reason he hadn’t been recaptured. A human who’d fought him to a stalemate. They warred with desire for each other, but she refused to succumb, and he wouldn’t force her into something against her will no matter how much she seemed to want it.

As foolish and unlikely as it might sound if spoken aloud, he needed her near to sleep soundly. Zoey’s presence seemed to keep his mind at ease, somehow holding back thoughts — some of them memories, some imaginings — of his captivity and the many battles he’d waged. She’d provided his only comfort on this world, his only companionship, his only hope. With her, he could be Rendash — or simply Ren, as she affectionately called him. He could be who he was, or who he wanted to be: an aligarii who’d done his duty. An aligarii who could know peace.

Without her, he was simply a fugitive on an alien planet, desperate and alone.

No more of this. No more of this separation, no more of this loneliness.

Even if they didn’t mate, he needed to be with her. He needed to hold her in his arms and have that little taste of hope.

He thrust the blankets aside, sat up, and left the bed. A long stride brought him to the door, and then he stalked down the walkway to the room Zoey had claimed. She was likely asleep by now. He’d slip into bed beside her, gently take her into his arms, and find his comfort. Any issues she had when she woke could be dealt with in the morning. Until then, she’d never know. She was a heavy sleeper.

Ren opened the door silently and entered the chamber. A powerful scent — familiar and tantalizing — struck him immediately.

The fragrance of her arousal.

Though the sun had set long before, and snow continued to fall outside, enough light streamed in through the windows to grant Rendash visibility without engaging his nyros. Still, it took him a moment to realize what he was seeing on the large bed as he crept toward it. Instinct — that old, bone-deep instinct that superseded all his training — roared to the forefront.

Zoey lay naked in the center of the bed. Her head was turned to one side, hair spread out around her. One of her hands clutched her breast. The other was between her legs, stroking her sex. She bit her lip and moaned, tilting her head back.

Rendash narrowed his eyes to sharpen his vision. He inhaled deeply, taking in her scent. His chest heaved with his quickening breath, and he bared his teeth, clenching his fists at his sides. His erection strained against his pants.

A low growl clawed its way up from his chest.

Zoey screamed, eyes snapping open, and hurled a pillow at him. It struck him in the face with a soft whump.

She scrambled away as he tossed the pillow aside. Rendash threw himself atop the bed, catching her with his upper hands before she could dive to the floor.

“Zoey,” he rasped as he pulled her close, catching her flailing arms at the wrists and straddling her thighs to protect himself from her wild kicks.

Her struggles ceased, and she stared up at him with wide eyes. “Ren?”

“Who else would it be?”

“I don’t know! It’s dark and you…you… Oh God. You saw me.” She tried to yank her arms away.

Something glistened on her fingers in the faint light. He slowly drew her hand close to his face. That scent, that intoxicating scent, drifted from her hand. He closed his eyes and growled again, painfully aware of her body pinned beneath his.

“I saw you,” he said, “and I want you.” He dipped his head, took her fingers into his mouth, and sucked. Her flavor burst across his tongue, unlike anything he’d tasted. Unlike anything he’d imagined.

Zoey’s breath hitched. “I can’t…I can’t believe you just did that.”

Ren slid her fingers out of his mouth, running his lips and tongue over their length to catch any remnants of her taste. “I will have more of this. Directly from the source.”

“What?”

He pressed her arms onto the bed as he slid his lower palms down her sides. His mouth settled on the hollow at the base of her throat before traversing the valley between her breasts, slowly moving lower and lower as he crawled backward.

“Ren?” Zoey asked breathlessly. “What are you doing?”

“Tell me, Zoey.” He reached her abdomen, brushing hungry kisses over her soft flesh. Her stomach quivered. “Tell me you want this. You want me.”

“We shouldn’t…”

“No more games.” Another kiss, another small taste. “No more denial. What we want,” his lower arms reached her legs, and he grasped her thighs, forcing them wider apart, “we take. Tell me you want, like I do.” He kissed just above the thatch of hair on her pelvis.

Zoey shivered, and her fragrance strengthened. Ren’s mouth watered.

“Yes,” she breathed, clutching fistfuls of bedding. “Yes, I want you.” She raised her head. “But what are you—”

Zoey gasped, hips jerking when his mouth came down on her open sex. She attempted to close her legs, but Ren held them firmly in place.

“Oh my God, don’t...don’t… Oh, don’t stop!” She fell back with a throaty moan.

Her scent and taste dominated his senses. He’d wanted to do this to her from the moment he’d seen it on the TV, had imagined it, but his imagination could do no justice to how incredible the reality was — not merely her taste, but her reactions, the way her entire body responded to the motions of his lips and tongue. Zoey exhibited none of the hollow reactions he’d seen from the male and female on the TV; she came to life with his touch.

He explored her with his tongue, greedily lapping her nectar as he lavished her soft, slick flesh with his attention.

“Ren!” Zoey cried and bucked her hips when his tongue flicked the top of her sex.

He paused, looking up along her body to watch her face, and flicked his tongue again. She twitched and released a muffled moan. He hummed his pleasure.

Releasing her wrists, he slid his upper hands to her breasts, stroking her nipples with his thumbs. She covered his hands with hers and arched her back. Her hips undulated, demanding more — more pressure, more of his mouth, more of him. He didn’t keep her waiting. He latched onto the tiny bud that gave her so much pleasure and sucked.

Zoey’s body went taut, and then she writhed beneath him. Her cries of pleasure filled the room as she gyrated against his mouth. She moved her hands to his head, clutching his crest and bringing a sharp sting to his scalp, but he didn’t care; the hint of pain drove him on. He licked, nipped, and sucked, unwilling to waste a drop of her sweetness as she came.

The abandon with which she’d so completely lost herself was unlike anything Ren had ever experienced. Aligarii, male and female alike, were far more reserved, and females only received stimulation through intercourse. This — like everything else on this world — was alien to him, but delightfully so. Zoey was adrift on an ocean of pleasure before he’d even entered her.

That was arousing to him beyond description, beyond understanding.

Rendash continued to lap at her sex as she descended from her climax. He watched her the entire time. She buried her fingers in her hair, swept it out of her face, and sighed in contentment. Finally, she lifted her head and met his gaze.

Rendash reluctantly removed his mouth from her sex and licked his lips. He withdrew his upper hands from her breasts and flattened them on the bed, pushing himself up to lean over her as he planted his feet on the floor.

“No one’s ever done that to me,” Zoey said. There was a shyness in her voice that Rendash hadn’t heard before. That shyness made her words genuine to him; otherwise, how could he believe any male would be stupid enough to forgo an experience like this?

Her scent was still driving him wild, and her taste had only strengthened his hunger. His erection pulsed inside his pants, reminding him of its deep, desperate ache.

“I need more of you, Zoey,” he rasped. “Do you want more of me?”

Zoey sat up, wrapped an arm around his neck, and pressed her hand to his cheek. He knew she had difficulty seeing in the dark, but she looked directly into his center eyes. “I do. I need you, too, Ren.”

He dipped his head forward and kissed her, closing his eyes. She returned the kiss with equal fervor. He dropped his lower hands to his pants and unfastened them, shoving them down his hips before lifting one leg at a time to divest himself of the restrictive clothing. Freeing his cock was a relief, but only a minor one. His aches required a different sort of release.

Zoey’s hand fell away, and her right arm joined her left around his neck to pull him deeper into the kiss.

He slipped his arms around her and lifted her off the bed. Her hot, slick sex pressed to his abdomen as he turned around.

Zoey inhaled sharply, pulling her head back. She wrapped her legs around his middle and tightened her hold on him. “What are you doing?”

“I want to see you.” He grasped his shaft with one of his lower hands and guided its tip to her sex. “I want to watch your face as we join.”

Her eyes widened, and her hips undulated as though seeking more of him.

“What about…protection?” she asked.

“Protection from what, Zoey?”

She bit her lip and looked away, fingers idly toying with the locks of his crest. “Protection from pregnancy, diseases — not that I’m saying either of us have any, but you know, stuff like that?” She glanced at him. “Could we…even have a baby?”

He couldn’t help but smile as he touched a finger to her cheek and guided her to face him again. “My nyros destroys diseases, even those alien to me. As for offspring… We are a different species. We cannot procreate, Zoey.”

“Oh.” She frowned.

“That saddens you?”

Though it was difficult to make out the subtle change in the low light, her cheeks darkened. “No. I guess that’s a good thing right now, huh?”

The lie was an obvious one, and her sorrow produced a series of questions he’d not considered. How would Zoey look with her belly round with child? How tender and gentle a mother would she be, how much love would she shower upon her babe? What amount of pride would swell his chest if her child were his? Her sorrow, in that moment, became Rendash’s, and it only heightened his desire for her.

He had no answers. All he knew with any certainty was that his need was raging, scalding his insides like fire. He needed release, and his instinct demanded he claim her, demanded he plant his seed deep inside her in defiance of their biology, in defiance of fate.

She kissed his jaw below his ear. “Just make love to me, Ren. I want to really experience it at least once in my life.”

He didn’t fully understand make love; it was likely one of those human phrases that altered the meanings of the words it contained. It had to mean sex, but he knew that wasn’t entirely right. She was asking for something more.

Ren looked into her eyes. They were deeper and more intense than ever, even if their color was muted by shadow; the strangest, most beautiful eyes he’d ever beheld. This was the female who’d stood beside him at great danger to herself, who’d proven worthy of his trust time and again, though she had no stake in his plight. The woman who shared with him freely, who laughed with him, who confided in him and listened without judgment when he opened himself to her.

He slipped a hand into her hair, cupping the back of her head, and kissed her lips. At the same time, he lowered her onto his waiting shaft. Incredible warmth enveloped him as he slid into her sex. Her slick nectar eased his passage, and her inner walls gripped him, tightening as they accepted more of him.

Zoey’s breath quickened. He shifted his lower hands to her backside and wrapped an upper arm around her waist, releasing a slow, shaky exhalation as overwhelming pleasure rippled through his body.

“Ren,” she rasped against his mouth, pressing her breasts to his chest.

“Zoey,” he growled as he sat down on the edge of the bed, and the change of position forced his cock deeper inside her. “I need you. Need to take you.”

She tugged on his crest and kissed him. “Yes. Now. Please.”

Instinct collided with his conscious thought, threatening to take control, but he didn’t allow it to yet. He wasn’t sure what she could endure; humans were smaller and weaker than aligarii. It stood to reason that they were also more delicate. If he hurt her, he’d never forgive himself.

Zoey shifted, lifting her hips, and her sex caressed his aching shaft with delicious, maddening insistence.

Rendash’s control shattered. He grasped her hips and slammed her down onto him. Her sex suddenly clamped around him, fluttering, and coated him with liquid heat.

Zoey cried out, gasping against his shoulder, and shuddered in his embrace.

Pressing his fingers into her yielding flesh, Rendash finally gave over to instinct.

Mind-numbing bliss filled Zoey as a second orgasm roared through her, triggered and prolonged by Ren’s thrusting cock. It filled her, stretched her to the brink and beyond, sank deeper and deeper each time they moved. And she took him, all of him. The scales and ridges on the top of his shaft rubbed every spot inside and out to make her reel with pleasure.

She lifted her head and forced her eyes open. Rendash met her gaze fully, his slit pupils contracting and dilating, lips pulled back to bare his fangs. He was so alien, so other, but she didn’t care. This was Ren, her Ren. And right now, he was a beast, pounding into her without relent, releasing feral, guttural sounds that made her wetter.

He left no room for self-consciousness, no place for her to worry about how she looked, if she was jiggling too much, or if she was too loud. All he allowed was for a massive wave of passion to sweep her away; she let go of everything else.

Ren growled a warning when she pulled back, but she wasn’t going anywhere. She moved her hands to his shoulders, digging her nails into his scales, and let him use her as he willed. He lifted and slammed her back down on his rock-hard cock. The sounds of flesh meeting flesh and their heavy breathing mingled with their grunts and cries of pleasure.

Her head fell back, and her lashes fluttered closed. Her inner thighs scraped against his sides; in her lust, her skin’s sensitivity was heightened, and the brush of his scales was a thrill all its own.

He cupped her breast and pinched her nipple between his fingers. Another bolt of sensation flashed through her, triggering another release, another cry. Zoey was awash in pleasure, paralyzed but for the ravenous pulsing of her sex as waves of ecstasy crashed through her.

Rendash growled. He tightened the grip of his lower hands and slammed her down upon his cock, holding her there firmly. His upper arms encircled her, cocooning her in his strength, and his muscles tensed.

He released a roar that reverberated to Zoey’s core, an animalistic declaration that he’d reached his peak. She felt his shaft grow impossibly larger, then strangely unfurl as something pressed even deeper inside her. She gasped and clutched him as a spike of pleasure-pain pierced her. A gush of heat followed.

Ren grasped a fistful of her hair and stared at her; his eyes seemed more reflective, almost supernatural in the gloom. He took her in a claiming kiss, nipping her lip with his fangs, while his cock pulsed inside her, flooding her with more of that heat. He ground his hips, stroking her clit, but kept her pinned in place.

His movements, combined with the fire he’d set inside her, pushed Zoey into another frenzy. She bit and clawed at him and writhed on his lap, unable to move from where he held her. She craved more, needed more, but it was too much, too powerful, not enough. She screamed, throwing her head back in bliss as her sex clenched around his cock, but it felt different than before. Something inside her…fluttered.

Body trembling, Zoey went limp, sagging against Ren as she floated down from the heights to which he’d carried her. He remained upright but his muscles eased, his broad chest heaving with ragged breaths. He ran one hand down her spine to possessively cup her ass cheek.

“Tell me again why I waited to do this?” Zoey mumbled against his chest.

“Because you are stubborn to the point of foolishness, kun’ia.”

Zoey chuckled. He hadn’t released her, and she still felt that strange fluttering inside her. She attempted to rise, but his fingers flexed on her hip, and he held her in place.

“No,” he said. “Not yet.”

Zoey tilted her head back to look up at him questioningly.

“I need…time to relax,” he said. “Let me hold you for a while longer.”

She turned her head to rest her cheek on his shoulder and smiled. Running a hand over his chest, she marveled at the feel of his scales as she traced their tiny seams with the tip of her finger, wishing there were enough light to see their color.

The quivering continued inside her, accompanied by that faint pinch of pleasure-pain. Zoey furrowed her brow and swiveled her hips. The sensation intensified. Though it didn’t hurt, the feeling was strange. She moved to rise, but the pinch sharpened into something more pain than pleasure.

Ren hissed and tightened his grip on her, pressing her sex back down upon him. “Be still, Zoey.”

She stilled, but now her previously languid body thrummed with tension. “Ren… What is going on?”

“I imagine we discovered another difference in the reproductive anatomy of our species. Aligarii males…latch on. Inside.”

“Latch on? You mean your…your…your penis is attached to me?” Her voice steadily rose with her fear.

“Not attached,” he replied, smoothing a hand over her tousled hair and down her back. “It is temporary, Zoey. Aligarii females cannot reach their…” He raised a hand and wagged it in a small circle, as though searching for a word.

“Climax?”

“Yes. That is a good word. They cannot reach their climax before that point.”

She struggled for calm; she trusted that Rendash wouldn’t hurt her, and that this would turn out fine, but a little forewarning might’ve been nice.

Oh, by the way, Zoey, my penis is going to open up and latch onto your cervix. No big deal, we’ll just be stuck together for a while. And if you move it’ll hurt. Well, let’s get to it!

And if I’d known and turned it down, I wouldn’t have experienced those mind-blowing orgasms.

Perhaps it was best that she’d been kept ignorant.

“But why…latch?” she asked.

“To maximize the chances of conception,” he said.

“But you said we couldn’t have kids.”

“We can’t,” he assured her, sliding his hand to her cheek and holding her gaze. “This is just the natural process for my kind.”

Zoey relaxed a little. It was strange to know that part of him was physically connected to her, but it didn’t hurt as long as she didn’t attempt to pull away from him. As she stilled and focused on the sensation, the lingering pain faded, and she discovered it was pleasurable — very pleasurable. She soon found it difficult to keep from moving.

“Um, Ren?” she asked, voice breathy. Her skin tingled with spreading warmth.

His tongue — barely visible in the shadows — slipped out of his mouth and ran over his upper lip, reminding Zoey of what he’d done to her with it. The memory made her pussy clench.

“Yes, Zoey?” By the huskiness of his voice, he already knew what was happening.

“I don’t know if I’ll be able to sit still much longer.” A tremor swept through her. She caught her lip between her teeth and leaned against him, gasping.

“Then don’t,” Ren replied. His hands guided her hips through slow gyrations without lifting her pelvis. The movement stroked her clit and increased the pressure in all the right places.

The steady, deliberate rhythm built her gradually to a climax, urged on by his touch and their increasingly ragged breathing. When it hit, it was no less powerful than the last. Ren growled along with her cries, filling her with a burst of new heat.

Shortly after they’d both settled, he lay back on the bed, drawing her along with him, and his cock released its inner hold. Liquid gushed from her, trailing down her thighs.

Zoey rolled out of his embrace and got to her knees, reaching to switch on the lamp on the nightstand. She immediately turned back to Ren and dropped her gaze to his cock.

If she hadn’t felt him inside her, if he hadn’t explained what had happened, she might have freaked the fuck out. Even having experienced it, she had a hard time believing that his cock had been inside her like that.

Did I let myself forget that he’s an alien? Of course sex would remind me of that.

His cock lay against his inner thigh, but it didn’t look anything like it normally did; her closest comparison was a stargazer lily. The head of his shaft had unfurled like the petals of a flower, revealing unscaled, pink skin inside. At the center was a smooth, pink, tube-like thing, a cross between a penis and a chameleon tongue. Before her eyes, the central thing withdrew, and the petals closed, their seams vanishing a little at a time.

“Holy shit,” Zoey said, unable to look away even after it was sealed. Because of the overlapping scales, she couldn’t even see the seams where it had split open.

“Your parts aren’t exactly normal-looking to me, either,” he said defensively. He’d propped himself on his elbows to meet her gaze.

Zoey looked down at her thighs, fearful she’d find green goo oozing out of her like in one of the sci-fi romances books she’d read. There was an awful lot of seed running down her legs, but thankfully it looked like it could have come from any human male; no stringy, neon green globs to be seen.

“How do your females look?” she asked, only barely stopping her imagination from picturing some kind of Venus flytrap vagina opening wide for his lily-cock.

“More…discreet.”

She lifted her eyes to meet his gaze, her eyebrows falling low. “What does that mean?”

His brow furrowed with a blend of confusion and mild alarm; even though he was a different species, it seemed he, too, was hardwired to recognize the danger when a woman used that tone.

“Female aligarii have a slit. It is in the same place, but it is essentially hidden. Obviously, for your kind, things are a bit more…exposed.”

Zoey pressed her thighs together and crossed her arms over her chest, suddenly very self-conscious.

“No,” he said firmly as he sat up, making no effort to mask his nudity. His upper hands pulled her arms away from her breasts, and his lower hands slid between her thighs, forcing them apart. He cupped her pelvis, sliding a finger into her sex.

Zoey gasped, abandoning her brief struggle. She grasped his upper biceps to steady herself.

“This is beautiful to me,” he said. One of his hands closed over her breast. “This is beautiful.” He touched her hips, her stomach, her legs; her hair, neck and face. “All of this is beautiful, Zoey. In part because it is different. Because it is you.”

Her eyes strung with tears. Her first instinct was to mistrust his words, but she knew he was being honest. She felt his sincerity. There was no disgust in his eyes, no regret. He was touching her and seeing her. In the light.

“You see me,” she said quietly.

“I have since that first night.” He removed his hand from between her thighs — not without reluctance — and slid both of his lower hands around her, cupping her backside to pull her close. “I will always see you, kun’ia.”

Zoey searched his eyes, all of them. When she blinked, her tears spilled, trailing down her cheeks, but she smiled despite them. “You called me that before. What does that word mean?”

He gently brushed way her tears with his thumb. “It is just something to call a person you care about.”

Zoey reached up and placed her hands on his jaw. “Then I also see you, kun’ia.”

Ren returned the smile, and the reflection in his eyes took on a more tender, sentimental cast. He closed them as he dipped his head down, pressing his forehead to hers. “It is late. We should rest, little human.”

“Considering this little human just had four orgasms, I think so.” Zoey grinned.

“Orgasm… Is that another word for climax?”

“Yes.”

“And you only had four?”

Zoey tilted her head back and narrowed her eyes in response to the mischievous tone in his voice.

“Surely we can do better,” he suggested.

“Um…”

Holy hell, what had she gotten herself into? From virtually no sex to being sexed to death.

Heh. What a way to go.

She raked her gaze over Rendash again, appreciating him in the lamplight. All things considered, she couldn’t let a small chance of death-by-sex deter her from having more of him — lily penis and all.

“Could I…be on top?” she asked. She trailed a finger down his torso, following the valleys between his ridges of muscle, and traced a circle around the tip of his erection with her fingertip. It jerked.

Grasping her hips, he lay back and drew her atop him. Zoey released a startled cry and laughed. Her laughter swiftly became a moan of pleasure as he simultaneously thrust upward and pulled her down onto his cock.

“For as long as you want, kun’ia,” he said.

Rendash watched Zoey sleep, much as he had during their first night together. So much had changed since then, though only four days had passed. She’d kept her back to him and had lain as far away from him as possible without tumbling out of the bed that first night, whereas now she lay facing him, wrapped in his arms by her own choice. Much more than their sleeping positions had changed, though, and those changes had come long before they’d finally succumbed to mutual desire.

She seemed so at peace now, so happy, without worry or conflict on her face. Her breathing was easy, her body relaxed.

This was how he wanted to remember her — content and beautiful, alien but familiar. Everything he’d never known he wanted. His, if only for a short while.

He gently brushed rogue locks of hair from her face. He’d grown accustomed to the oddly full, relatively soft facial features of humans during his captivity, but Zoey’s was the first and only such face in which he saw beauty — beauty as deep in her as his nyros were in him, beauty that permeated all of her, inside and out.

Why should he only have her for a brief time? Why should he leave her behind to become little more than a bright, fleeting highlight in an otherwise troubled life?

As far as Ren was concerned, he’d already earned his peace, had already earned his choice. All that remained was the formality of returning to Algar to declare his intent. Tradition did not dictate that he was required to take a mate. Nor did it dictate that his mate had to be aligarii. The only thing stopping him from bringing Zoey along was his adherence to the nature of the traditions, his devotion to the unspoken duty that lay beneath them — to carry on the aligarii race, to continue to keep the Khorzar strong with his bloodline.

What did all that matter now? His Umen’rak was gone, his life was in danger, and he’d made a connection with another being beyond anything he could’ve imagined possible. His relationship with Zoey was precious. Too precious to throw away if there were any chance to maintain it — or even better, any chance to let it grow.

I can take her with me.

The thought crackled through him like a bolt of lightning, arcing across his every cell. He’d dismissed the notion when it had presented itself before, had been unable to view it beyond the lens of his experience and the culture that had raised him.

It was a thing that had not been done. But that didn’t mean it could not be done.

So few aekhora survived to the point of earning their freedom; would the Halvari truly deny him, when he wouldn’t, in truth, be violating the traditions?

He could take her with him, and thus bring his happiness home rather than return alone and seek happiness blindly, knowing that any life he might make on Algar without Zoey would never compare to what he shared with her now. He could take her with him and hold on to this contentment. He could take her with him and grow more content.

Ren trailed the pads of his fingers over her cheek. Zoey smiled and nuzzled her face against his hand.

Would she want to go? Would she want to leave her world, leave her people, leave everything she knew behind?

He understood how it felt to be on an alien world. Understood the sense of loss, loneliness, wrongness. Even with all his training and experience, it affected him. How would she cope? Ren’s presence had already disrupted so much of her life, but she’d told him she had nothing left, no one left. Did she have any reason to remain on Earth?

“When the time comes, kun’ia, I hope you choose to accompany me,” he whispered.

Until that time, he would not trouble her with worrying over it, would not burden her with the weight of the unknown. Zoey deserved nothing but happiness. He hoped that, one day soon, he’d be able to make that happiness something lasting. He hoped he could grant her the comfort, stability, and love for which she’d always longed.

Wasn’t that what she’d truly meant when she spoke of wanting a home?

Drawing in another deep breath to appreciate their mingled scents, Ren finally closed his eyes and allowed sleep to claim him, keeping his kun’ia — his mate — secure in his arms.