I pass by males in rut and feel my own xora’s steel shaft brush against the barrier concealing it. Given the severe temperatures, my fur coverings are constructed to allow only my xora release for this first rutting. It is late in the season for a Mountain Run. Too late. But it could not be avoided. The moment she woke from the merillian tank, I knew I needed to organize such a run, no matter the conditions or how extraordinary they are. Because nothing about finding my Xiveri mate on that meager, nondescript moon was ordinary. Nothing about her is ordinary.
When I returned for her on that moon, it was to find that she had battled khrui, vicious creatures that my own warriors avoid for they demand respect. And even here on this Mountain Run she battled the warrior who came upon her before me. Of the fight I saw, I was impressed. Humbled, even. When I take her to our den, I will need to tend to her wounds, for she fought like something from the depths of the sea. A she-beast, a gift for our nation. A gift for me.
I have been favored by Xana and Xaneru and by the Okkari ancestors to have been given the fiercest of all females — a warrior — for my Xiveri mate. Among all females in the universe, I know that I could have no better. Because there is none.
Every male on the mountain vied for her.
Every male. And I defeated every single one.
My injuries are not enough to stop me from hunting her scent, marred by the mire, towards the tundra. I wonder if she seeks to lose me in the mist. If so, fortune does not favor her, because it’s thinning, the storm settling as it prepares for the icefall that will come upon us quickly and with reckoning.
As soon as I am free of the mud, I arrive at the tundra’s closest edge. I peer into the dark, watching as white ice and falling snow swirl to meet the darkening sky. A deep maroon, it can scant get any deeper. This is the night here. Almost, but not quite deafening. But not quite.
A scrap of movement floats between ice and sky, as if carried by the mist herself. I charge for it, using my skills on the ice developed and honed since I was a kit when I learned to glide atop water and swim beneath it at the same time that I learned to walk. My chest is burning with the Xanaxana I have so cautiously repressed this past rotation without my Xiveri mate. Now it is fully unleashed and unrepentant.
A snarl disintegrates the composed male I once was. I feel light burst from the ridges above my eyes in an unbecoming display of emotion, but I do not attempt to tamp it. I will let her see just what it is that she does to me.
She cloaked her scent from me, and I am still savaged by the fact that I was not the first male to root her out. I sate myself with the knowledge that though I may not have been the first male to have found her, I will be the last.
Thoran’El discovered her first in the mire and was the male that delivered the bite in my side, but I do not know what he was thinking, attempting to challenge me for her. Did he not know that it would take much more than claws ripping through flesh to slow me in my pursuit? Did he not know that I would take his plates just for his attempt? I will not be shamed by him or any male. Not before her.
Nox, my Xiveri mate, my Xhea, my Va’Rakukanna, my warrior queen, does not demand weakness. I must be worthy of her and this I must do in the human custom. I must not only defeat males of my own tribe, but I must best her in battle as well. The thought makes my chest swell. The custom is not mine, but I feel honored to be able to meet her on the battle plain and prove to her in her own traditions that I am the male that she seeks.
Wind whips my hair into a rage around my face as I close the distance to her by half, and then by half again. She must sense my approach for she glances over her shoulder and begins to slow. I slow in response, proceeding with greater caution as I watch in wait for her body to face me. When it does, I am not prepared for it. Neither for the heat of her fire nor the depth of her beauty.
Even caked in pink mire and the copper blood of my kind, the sight of her catches me. I stumble. I am my nation’s Okkari and yet, I stumble before my queen like an infant.
I could say it is her eyes, as dark as screa and just as cutting. Hard. Scalding. And somehow that makes the beauty of them all the more potent. The sharpness of that heat-filled gaze against the delicate curve of her cheek. They sit slightly rounded and high before tapering to a smooth chin.
Her mouth is large. Obscenely so. I have never seen a female with pillows on her mouth like these. And stranger still, they contrast the darkness of her skin with a lightness not found in Voraxian biology. Much lighter than the mire, they are the palest pink — a color that could be interpreted as either mild anger or fear, even embarrassment. It makes me embarrassed to see it, as if I am seeing something sacred, a permission not yet given. But I do not look away.
Even in her swollen garments, I have seen no greater beauty. The cloud of her hair is tucked away inside the hood of her coat, but I remember what it had been like to see it, and the rest of her, fully bare on the hot, gritty sands of that human moon. Full breasts, a taut abdomen, delicate collar bones…
My Xaneru had wept for her and the Xana had pulled at me, daring the Xanaxana to come forth. I had locked it down and battered it back, knowing that my Raku would never have allowed me to take home my Xiveri bride when he was denied his own. I am a strong warrior, a disciplined Va’Raku and a fair Okkari and it had taken every ounce of power I had to not challenge the younger Raku there. But I had resisted. And I have already used up the reserves of that resistance. What is left behind is but a tendril, a thread, diminishing smoke.
My xora is in a state and all three of my stones pulsate beneath it. Clenched hard against my body, they do not care that the winter winds of the tundra are enough to douse even the brightest flame and take life from the strongest warrior. I had never been foolish enough to consider braving it, but for her, I’d have continued on until the last breath left my lungs. Not even for her, but for the promise of her. For her in the flesh, watching me with the hatred in her eyes that she carries, I’d do much more. I feel as if I am Okkari no longer. Nox, I am Kinan. The male I was before I took my title. The boy.
“What are you waiting for?” Her voice rips from her lungs and even though I can sense she is shouting, the words arrive to me bitter and torn. They are a battle cry, I sense, a challenge. My Xiveri mate is not to be disappointed.
I charge.
She jerks, as if surprised by my speed, but she does not run. Warriors far larger and more fearsome than she have withered beneath the coming of the Okkari. I am known. But she does not know me. So she fights me without context, without history. A fight I have not fought since I was a kit. Since I was Kinan. I am impressed, proud and above all else, grateful.
My human lunges out of my path. As she dives, I snag a swatch of her muddy sleeve. She brings her right arm across my wrist hard enough to break my hold. I feel white flash along my ridges, followed by a splash of black and on its heels, a wave of green — surprise, bloodlust, amusement — before finally my ridges settle on a fierce orange pride.
The wind picks up speed and when I grab for her, she ducks and I catch only fluttering ice crystals. She holds both fists at her chin, just below her eyeline and though I understand the posture, I have never before seen a female assume it. This is why, when she strikes, my hands are lowered and my torso is left exposed. She strikes me. My warrior queen is savage.
The pressure is enough to slow my advance when she strikes me again with her other hand, I realize she is a dual handed warrior. I am impressed. Not all of my most seasoned warriors are and yet she attacks me with both hands and with confidence.