GREN

I wait for disappointment to change her expression, for sadness to take over her smiles. She can speak to me now, so she will know the truth of who I am.

She wishes to know who Gren is? I am a killer, a destroyer, a creature unleashed upon the arena to maim and kill others. I have but one goal in life—to win the next battle. If I do not, I will end up sold—or worse. There is no more to me than that.

But Willa's beautiful smile does not change. She touches my face and shakes her head. "That's not who you are. You were a gladiator, right? You fought in arenas? Like the other males?"

I grunt, because I suppose there is truth in that. "We are all killers."

"Did you choose to become a killer?" she asks. When I shake my head, she continues. "Do you want to kill me?"

"I would die before I let anything harm you," I tell her fiercely.

"Do you want to kill Mardok?" Willa continues. "The one who gave you the ability to hear me? And for me to hear you?"

"The mesakkah? No. He can live."

She wrinkles her nose slightly at my words. "Muh-sackuh?"

"His people."

"Oh." She strokes her hands down my chest, full of touches and pettings, always touching me, my Willa. "So let me get this straight. You think you're a killer, but I haven't seen you kill anyone on this planet. Nor do you want to at the moment. So I feel like it's less about killing people and more about surviving."

"If I am put into an arena with the others, I would not hesitate to kill them," I warn her. I do not want her to paint a pretty picture of me when I am nothing but a monster.

"You're never going to be in an arena again," Willa says stubbornly, scratching lightly at my chest, under the thick mat of my fur. "I know no one told you what's going on, but the spaceship that had us? It was hijacked by pirates. The pirates came here to this ice planet and were killed by the natives. The ship was destroyed right about when you and I left. There's no 'going back.' There's no leaving this planet. We are here for good, and there are no arenas, no cities, no nothing. There's a couple of tribes and that's it."

I am not sure I believe her. It sounds too good to be true. "Which ones are the slavemasters?"

"There are no slavemasters, Gren! You are free. I'm free. Everyone is free." She leans in and nibbles on my lower lip, teasing it. "We are free to do whatever we want. We can leave these people behind and no one will stop us. It can be just you and me…forever."

My hand—the one slung around her hips to hold her close—tightens against her body. "I do not trust it, Willa."

Her expression is sad. "I know. Maybe in time you will."

I do not like her sadness, either. I prefer her pretty face contorted in one of the expressions she makes when I am buried deep inside her. My other hand is still between her thighs, so I rub my knuckle lightly along the little bump that makes her wild with lust, and I can feel her clench and quiver. "I trust what I can touch. I trust what is in front of me." I move closer to her, breathing in her scent as she pants and clings to me. "And I trust you, my Willa."

"Oh Gren, I love you," she moans, her eyes closing as she leans into my touch. "I need you so much."

"I need you, too. My hunger for you is unending." I wrap my arms around her, rolling our bodies to the floor and to the furs. A moment later she is under me, her legs spreading to welcome me. I thrust into her, surprised at how good the wet heat of her feels, and how tightly she grips me. A low groan escapes my throat.

This is what I trust. This is what I believe in.

"Gren," she pants with every thrust of my cock into her warmth. "Gren. Gren. Oh god. Remind me to tell you about resonance. Oh god. Right there!" She arches against me, her mouth open in a wordless cry as her cunt tightens around my shaft. I pound into her, clenching her hips tight to hold her against me as I drill into her slick heat. Our matings have grown more frantic as the days have passed, as if our bodies cannot stand prolonged touching without climaxing in a rush of need. The moment I feel her body's release, I allow mine to pour forth, my sac tightening as I flood her with my seed.

Only after we are panting and sated do I lie down on the blankets next to her, pulling her close to me. After a few days of matings, she carries my scent in her mane and on her skin, and I love knowing that if others were to scent her, she would be marked as mine and mine alone.

Willa sucks in a few deep breaths, and then nestles her head on my chest, twining her fingers in my fur. "I'm going to tell you everything I know about this place, okay? Because you deserve to know."

"Then speak." I brace myself for the awful truth of this cold place we have found ourselves. There has to be something wrong with it, some sort of “catch” that will destroy the fragile happiness I have found with her. I know I am not meant to be content, and that I must take everything one day at a time, one battle at a time, as I always have done.

But she tells me of this place, of the glowing worm called a “khui”—or a “coo-tee” as she calls it—that enables me to survive on this planet. She strokes my chest, as if worried this will upset me, but I have had dozens of modifications to increase my fighting prowess, or to alter my senses. It is just another small change. She tells me of the fact that this khui will choose a mate for me by signaling with “resonance”—the buzzing in my chest and the insistent need to mate until I have made the female it has chosen for me pregnant.

It chose Willa.

I am…not upset about this. I hold her close and bury my face in her fragrant mane, which smells like sweat and sex and all the good things in life. "Does this upset you? That you were forced to mate with me?"

She gasps, shocked at my question, and sits up. "No! How could you think that?"

"I am ugly, Willa. A beast."

"You are not." Her hand goes to my chest. "Don't you remember how I'm the one that touched you? I've always wanted you. It doesn't matter to me that you look different. Everyone here looks different. I think you're wonderful." She leans in and presses her mouth to mine, even though they do not fit together well. "I could not be happier, and I want your baby. I want us to be a family."

A baby. I do not know what I think of that. "I am not certain I am a breeding male," I warn her.

Her brows furrow together. "What do you mean?"

"I am a slave constructed for violence, for fights." I flex my claws to show her. "For endurance. For harming my opponents. I am not designed to breed."

Willa still looks confused. "I don't understand. You're just a person, Gren." She shakes her head. "Just like the rest of your people."

"What 'rest'?" When she looks even more puzzled, I continue. "There is no 'rest,' Willa. I am a…" I struggle to find the right words. "A beast. I have been altered to perform to my master's precise requests."

She shakes her head. "But—wait, that doesn't make sense. What about people that look like you?"

"There are none. I was created."

My female looks…shocked. "Created? From what?"

I shrug. "No one has ever told me."

"But what about your family? Your parents? Kin?" When I shake my head, her words become even more upset. "Anything? What about when you were little?"

"When I was a youth?" I give her a surprised look. "You do not have arena battles amongst the youth in your world?"

"No," she cries out. "We don't have any of that…least I hope not." Willa looks distressed, and then her hand slides lower onto my belly as her expression changes. "Wait. Is that why you don't have a belly button?"

"A what?"

She says the bouncy words again, spoken in that half-melodic, loud way of hers. "A navel. It's where your umbilical cord attaches to your body from your mother." She gasps as it occurs to her before I can say it. "But you don't have a mother. Oh, Gren, sugar. My heart hurts for you." She moves against me and snuggles low once more. "Who touched you with love before me?"

I brush her mane back from her face. "No one has ever touched me of their own accord…unless it was for medical purposes."

She sniffs, and I realize she is making water from her eyes. "That hurts my heart. My poor beast." She nuzzles her face against my fur, and then rubs her mouth against my nipple. "I'm so glad you're not stuck in that world anymore. How did you end up on that ship, do you know?"

"I was being sent for an arena battle, I imagine." I want to shrug, but her small, soft body is pressed against mine and I do not want to disturb her. "No one ever told me where I was going or who I would be fighting. I would know when the doors to my cage would open and I would see my opponent."

"This is awful. Did they educate you? Anything?" At my silence, she sighs heavily. "Well, you are with me now, and I will cut out the eyes of the next person that tries to hurt you or make you a slave."

Pleasure spreads through my chest. "You are very fierce in your protection of me. Are you not a gladiator from your own world, then?"

"Me?" She chuckles. "No. Not at all. I was a waitress, sugar."

"I do not know this word."

"People would eat and I would serve them."

"Ah, a slave then."

"What? No. They paid me to tend to them and then they would leave. I didn't have a master. I could choose to leave at any time."

"But you did not? Did you enjoy this wait-resting then?"

"God, no. People can be real dicks, you know? And it didn't pay great, but it was steady work and I needed the money. Right before she went to prison, Mama opened a bunch of credit cards in my name and ran them up to buy gift cards to exchange for drugs. I didn't find out until it was too late, but I'm payin' it back anyhow." She sighs heavily. "And now Mama gets to spend time in prison just like Uncle Dick, may he rot in hell." She plays with the fur on my lower belly, making my cock stir and my mind turn to mating once more. "You know, I'm all outraged over how people treated you on your world, but then I remember how terrible Mama and Uncle Dick and all their friends were and sometimes I think there aren't any good people in the universe." She sighs heavily. "Maybe that's why I have such a hard time trusting these people. I don't like how they treated you. Still don't."

I say nothing. She does not need to know that I thought this was an arena challenge of a different scope than I am used to—sometimes I still do—and that I would have torn all of their throats out just to “win.” I do not want her thinking badly of me, so I say nothing. I simply caress her teat, teasing the pinkish-brown tip with my claws and enjoying the way it hardens under my touch.

She sits up, her curly mane spilling over her speckled shoulders, and looks down at me. "I guess all that matters is that you and I are together and we're happy." Her fingers brush down my chest. "Tell me…are you happy?"

For some reason, it is hard to speak. I swallow the knot in my throat and take her hand in mine. "Sometimes I wake up afraid that I will find this has all been a dream and that you are not real. The thought terrifies me, because I want this—want you—so very much."

Willa sighs and slides her leg over my hips, straddling my aching cock and rubbing her slick cunt along its length. "Sugar, I feel exactly the same way. If this is a dream, don't ever wake me up, all right?"

“Never,” I tell her, and mean it.