Claimed: The Warriors of Nur (7 page)

The deep drone of chanting voices and the scent of sweetly burning incense surrounded him.  His skin, no longer melting from him, sizzled in awareness of the cool cloth that skimmed sensuously across his sensitive skin.  His body arched as the cloth smoothed across his chest to the puckered flesh of his stimulated nipples, then dipped to torment the etched plains of his tightly muscled stomach.  His painfully engorged root jerked in anticipation as the cloth danced lightly over his hips and down his thighs.  He groaned deeply when he felt its warmth hesitate as it hovered uncertainly over his throbbing cock.

“Please
.
”  He begged for the caress denied him, thrusting his hips upward in supplication. 

Her beautifully haunting visage chased the last tendrils of fog from his mind.  She hovered worriedly above him, her face creased in concentration as he helplessly pressed himself into her palm. 

He hissed with pleasure when she cupped the heavy sack beneath, gently tugging it, rolling it in her palm.  He reached for her, wanting to weigh the heavy mass of her hair in his hands.

“
Mati!
”  He growled, baring his teeth in sexual aggression. 

Another growl --this time of frustration-- left him when she snatched her hand away in embarrassment.  His arm fell to his side, as she backed away. 

“Stop!” he demanded, straining to rise from the cool stone table where he lay. 

Unable to follow, he watched her melt into the engulfing cloud of incense.

Broken, he closed his eyes, silently willing her to return to him. 

Again, cool hands caressed his body, exploring him with equal parts aggression and gentleness.  They tickled lightly up his calves and thighs- -tracing over his chest and tensed stomach-- to cup him firmly.  Oiled hands stroked deeply from the base of him to the heavily veined mushroom head, already coated with the weeping evidence of his need. 

Roughly, he thrust into the hand fisted tightly around him, while more hands pinched lightly at his inner thighs, the combined pain-pleasure causing his body to bow deeper into the tormenting caress.  He barreled--on increasing waves of heat-- towards the cresting storm of his climax, as he awaited the pinch--the stroking twist-- that would send him over.  His body tensed into a knot of strained nerves when he exploded, shooting jets of hot, thick seed onto his sweat drenched body. 

Vaguely he noticed the tormenting caresses cease as a warm cloth returned to cleanse him.  Bonelessly, he drifted into the floating sweetness. 

“
Mati…
”  He growled, before sliding into the healing arms of sleep.

Neron watched silently from the ledge above the healing chamber.  Four priestesses swayed in rhythmic undulations around the large
irħam
stone altar centered within.  The chamber was set deep inside the
Tobba
dwelling, some three miles beneath the
Inġenji Mountains
. 

It had taken half a day’s time to journey to the region where the
Tobba
made their home,; and upon arriving, only Neron was allowed inside their sanctuary.  Atif balked at having to remain behind at the entrance while Neron continued on, but as Erol worsened, he’d had no choice but to stay. 

Brought before the
Mexxeja Tobba
, Neron had requested blessings and healing for his brother, but she denied him. 

‘“
I know of your brother’s refusal to humble himself to us
’,” she’d said. 

She had felt that his brother’s arrogance was now being rewarded. 

Unwilling to release his brother, he’d begged on his knees, and when those pleas too were denied, he’d bartered.

Keeping his attention on the room, he watched the hasty retreat of the lovely young
Tobba
that had bathed this brother.  The absence of ritualistic markings, showed her to be a novice.  Not yet fully initiated. 

He could see little of her disappearing figure through the thick haze of burning
Oppju
and
Kava Kava Root
.  The burned herbs induced a state of high sexual stimulation, and were often used in healing rituals. 

The Gwerriera Nies were highly sensual, and a strong sexual release trigged the body’s healing during times of intense illness.

His attention returned to the altar, where his brother strained and moaned beneath the seeking hands of the remaining
Tobba
. 

Erol would be beyond angry when he realized the lengths that Neron had gone to in order to heal him. 

Bringing him to the
Tobba
was bad enough, but for him to stand aside and allow them to release his seed unwillingly…he wasn’t sure if he’d be forgiven for that. 

The chamber slowly emptied of the attending priestesses as Erol was bathed and covered with a soft, fur blanket.  He rested quietly now, the harsh tension caused by his illness, relaxed away in slumber. 

Oppju
continued to burn in clay pots set incrementally throughout the large space.  The chamber was cavernous in its dimensions, with a ceiling set some twenty feet above. 

No
pjanti
grew here for illumination; instead, there were torches set into openings high on the walls.  The altar was centered within the circular dropped floor that fell twelve feet below where he watched. 

The
Tobba
hadn’t offered him a place to rest while his brother healed, which was fine with him.  Neron wouldn’t leave Erol unattended in his vulnerable state and preferred to remain nearby. 

When only the two of them remained, he stepped from the ledge to drop to the floor below.  Landing soundlessly, he moved to the darkened corner beside the arching doorway that was the only entrance and squatted, resting on his heels.  He neither trusted nor distrusted the
Tobba
, but he didn’t know why his brother had been attacked and would remain vigilant until Erol was able to defend himself.  Though they were a warrior class, they rarely fought except in times of war, or over territory or breeding rights, and it’d been obvious that Erol was attacked by a large party, the dead left behind attesting to the involvement of at least four fully phased males.  He’d carried nothing of value, nothing to provoke an attack.  They’d found him still in his phased form, unable to shift back to his natural form due to the severity of his injuries.  Male Gwerriera Nies phased only during times of heightened rage or physical aggression, and he wondered, not for the first time, what could have precipitated it. 

The small, rounded figure that hovered hesitantly just outside the entrance grabbed his attention.  Her gaze flitted nervously around, never touching the shadows where he rested.  With light steps, she moved quickly towards his brother’s sleeping figure, not noticing as Neron silently shadowed her.  He recognized her from his brief glimpse of her retreating form during the healing ritual; she’d been the one bathing his brother.  The open back of her
miġbuda
left bare all but the curve of her firmly rounded ass, the material only long enough to touch just below the plump cheeks.  Her hair, a deep bluish purple, reached well past her waist, to end just above the bend of her knees.  Novice
Tobba
weren’t allowed to cut their hair, and they preferred to wear it free or with small priestess locs at the temples.  She smelled of the soaps she’d used on Erol, and he was reminded again of her participation in the ritual.  He remembered her hands on his brother, how she’d gently cupped him.  Anger washed through him as he thought of those hands caressing, stroking another male.  He shook this off as irrational. He shouldn’t feel anything for this female; she was nothing to him. He should be concerned about her intentions towards his brother instead.

Her gaze carefully measured the breathing of the male that lay before her.  Na’Dwah felt shame at her desertion of him during the healing ritual.  The ‘healing release’ was her least favorite part of the ritual, and as a novice, she’d only taken part in one other, and that was with a female.  His reaction had taken her by surprise, and she’d left the chamber, to the embarrassment of her
Għalliema
.  She’d been severely reprimanded, and rightfully so.  Irreparable damage could be done if, once begun, the ritual was not completed, and she’d jeopardized his body’
s
ability to heal.  She’d come to make sure that he was as comfortable as possible.

“DO NOT!”

At the harshly whispered words, she dropped the hand that had reached to test his brow, dropped back to her side at the harshly whispered words.  The hairs on her nape tingled at the sudden heat that blasted through her. 

That voice
…

Even in whispers it gave her shivers. 

Turning from the altar; she met the gaze of the most intimidating male she’d ever seen.  She’d seen many males come to curry favor in hopes of gaining the Goddess’s blessings; some were warriors, some merchants, others farmers.  All showed reverence, usually averting their eyes or lowering their heads, even to her.  As a novice, such show of respect was not yet her due, but the
Tobba
were not known for their forgiveness of slights, whether intended or not.  This male did none of those things.  There was nothing submissive in the male before her.  In fact, he looked…angry?

“Why are you here, female?” he growled suspiciously.

Lifting her head, she tried as best she could from her height of 5’8”, to look down her nose at him.  It really was an impossibility with him being at least five inches taller, but she’d learned at a young age not to let that intimidate her. 

She’d become aware of being ‘different’ early on.  Most Gwerriera Nies females were not much smaller than the males, at least not in height, but Na’Dwah was an
Aljeni
hybrid.  Her mother’s people were smaller even than Na’Dwah, some of the males barely cleared five feet, nine inches at maturity.  Her mother had only been five feet tall herself.  The combination of her mother and father had left her with a height of 5 feet, 8 inches, petite by Gwerriera Nies standards.

“You would dare to question the
Tobba
?” she demanded.

Amusement sparked briefly in his gaze as it raked her from head to toe. 

The front of her
miġbuda
was made completely of tightly strung beads that draped in layered lengths around her neck to cover her breasts.  Her sex was covered by strips of
fenek
fur, held in place by intricately beaded chains at her hips.  She was dressed as any other
Tobba
, the only distinction being the absence of the ritualistic markings.  Those were earned only at the time of your first summoning of the Mother Goddess.  The
Tobba
believed that the essence of the Mother Goddess entered the physical form of the female, there to mingle with her own, strengthening the link between the two.  It was only after this that the individual markings appeared and one was no longer considered a novice, but a true
Tobba Priestess
.

“I would dare much for my brother, even to question a
Tobba
Priestess
.  But you, even more so…little novice.”  He crossed his arms over his broad chest: a deceptively relaxed pose.

“I answer only to the Goddess Mother…warrior.”  Mocking his perusal of her with one of her own, she strode imperiously from the chamber.

CHAPTER SIX

Leo’Nya flexed her fingers in an effort to dispel the numbness caused by being forced to sleep with her arms chained beneath her.  She listened for the soft wailing that’d gone on for the last few… days?  Weeks?  She had no real way to mark the movement of time.  Her body had yet to settle into the longer sun cycle, and she found herself dozing often. 

She was also bored beyond all possible mental limitations. Really bored.  The initial threat of death was gone, and the more pressing one of rape became less immediate as the hours passed.  She was brought vesi fruit every few hours, and since her ‘conversation’ with the grieving widow, she’d been fed just as frequently.  Guess they’d taken her at her word.

The food wasn’t bad.  It usually consisted of meat, in some form, a kind of flat red bread, and some sort of citrus fruit that tasted like a cross between an orange and a mango.  It was an odd greenish-blue color, but it smelled and tasted delicious.  She was taken to a bathing chamber every so often to relieve herself, and then returned to what she was unaffectionately calling her ‘cell’. 

Her first ‘bathroom’ experience had been humiliating.  The chamber , was equipped pretty much like any other bathroom; there was an area for bathing, an area for simple washing, and an area for, well…everything else.  What she considered to be the ‘sink’ area was made up of three large bowls, which looked kind of like gravy boats without the handle, set in a row on a mid-level ledge.  Well, to them it was mid-level; to her it was shoulder level.  Each bowl rested above a small fire, the water kept fresh by a cascading stream of water that constantly fed it from above, while the lip drained into a small channel set into the wall of the ledge.  The declining slant allowed it to drain into an opening at the base of the wall.  The bathtub was of a similar design, only much more gi-nificent.  To fill it, water was directed from a larger channel, which directed the cascade of water, much like a dam.  By removing a larger stone, the water was allowed to funnel into the tub.  The fire beneath burned until the water reached the desired temperature and then mysteriously extinguished.  To drain it, a stone was removed from an opening that fed into a channel located at the bottom of the tub, where it then drained into a hole at the base of the wall.  She’d been hesitant to bathe in what look to her like a big old fashioned cook pot, but she relaxed slightly when she realized that the fire would be extinguished before she got in. 

The ‘toilet’ area was what did her in; it looked like… the equivalent of a, well…a urinal.  Like the sink, it resembled a gravy bowl, with a cascading waterfall along the wall behind it.  There wasn’t a fire, thank GOD,’ cause there was just no way she was boiling her girl parts.  She’d just have to hold it.  The problem was that the bowl was set only three inches from the floor.  The only way to use it, if you had to…not pee, was to hunker down until your butt was damn near in the bowl.  Leo couldn’t figure out how to do it without showering her whole backside in the waterfall.  Luckily she didn’t have clothes on, or they’d have been drenched along with the rest of her.  The water had been surprisingly warm, so at least she didn’t freeze, but she’d had no choice but to wait, wet and naked, until someone returned for her.  It wasn’t until her second trip, that she’d learned that it was actually supposed to be used that way.  Apparently there was no toilet paper equivalent here. 

She’d eventually been given clothes too, or rather, she wasn’t completely naked anymore.  She’d been given a
libsa
, which was really a halter dress, or it would be if there was more material to it.  It was obviously made for a slimmer woman, probably the mother of the rapists- to- be, and fell only to mid-thigh.  She was more curvaceous than its original owner, and it clung to her breasts and hips like a second skin.  The only thing covered in the back was her ass, and she had to thank God for that.  She’d looked at it doubtfully.  The drastic plunge of it exposed her to the deep curve at the base of her spine; any lower and--

The material was a soft animal hide, the dark brown color complementing the creamy swirl in her skin. 

Leo noticed the still figure that stood within the doorway.  He was the only one she’d seen or spoken to since the conversation with his oh-so-charming mother. 

Rasipni, the male who’d met Kereteki on the journey here, was the youngest son.  She’d seen no one else; the only indication that they weren’t the sole occupants was the sorrowful wailing that echoed persistently through the halls. 

In the time she’d been here, he alone had cared for her, washing and dressing her wounds before her strength had returned enough for her to make use of the bathing chamber.  He’d feed her broth soaked bread, her stomach unable to take more after such an extended stay in the land of no food.  He’d gently cleaned her when she vomited up the first meal she’d scarfed down, patiently feeding her a second meal when he was done.  When she was strong enough to go to the bathing chamber, but not strong enough to care for herself, he’d carefully bathed her bruised body after finding her wet on the floor after her first toilet experience.  Soothingly, he’d washed her hair, carefully removing the bits of debris as he unbraided its heavy mass.  He’d washed it, careful not to pull on her scalp, still tender from being dragged by his father.  He’d cared for every inch of her, the evidence of his body’s desire obvious, but at no time had he touched her sexually. 

Setting her meal beside her now, he unchained her so she could eat.  Her hands tingled painfully as the blood rushed back into her fingers, and she flexed them to help the circulation. 

“Eat, Leo’Nya. ” His voice rose no louder than a gentle rumble.

Quickly tiring of being referred to simply as
Aljeni
, she’d asked him to use her name.  Since he seemed to be the only one she was going to be allowed to talk to, why not be on speaking terms? Besides, didn’t they always say you’re most likely to make it out of these kinda situations if your captor saw you as a person?  Well just on the off chance, she was going to be as personable as she possibly could be--at least to Rasipni.  Also, she kinda liked him. 

He was ‘nineteen summers’, he’d said.  She wondered if the seasons were measured the same here as on Earth, considering the longer sun/moon cycles; but either way, she figured him to be the Earth equivalent of somewhere around twenty or twenty-one years old.  He hadn’t yet reached his maturity, which is why he was charged with her care.  Apparently big brother got a go at her first, so there were no worries that he’d rape her until
after
that.  Lucky her.

“How long will you mourn?” she asked, drinking deeply from the fruit.

She’d wanted to mention the constant wailing before, but had been reluctant to remind him, that she was being held responsible for his father’s death.  He’d been nothing but gentle with her so far, but who knew what his reaction would be?.

“Four moon coverings,.” he answered with some hesitation.  “One for the years of my mother’s
Mati
, one for each young she bore him, and one to curry favor that the Goddess will show him favor in her Garden of Rest.”  He sat across from her, legs folded beneath him as he sliced into one of the greenish-blue fruits.

“On the fifth covering, his body will be reverted and offered to the Mother Goddess in further supplication.”  He offered her one of the slices.

“Reverted?” she asked, biting into the delicious fruit, her tongue quickly darting out to catch an escaping trickle before it could run down her chin.

“Yes.  Reverted…burned until only ash remains” he answered, watching  the pink tip of her tongue flick daintily over her lush bottom lip. 

Mother Goddess
…             

He hated the fact that he was unable to claim her.  He’d listened to his mother rant about how she’d tempted his father to steal her, about how she’d been responsible for his death.  His mother had convinced Muda, his brother, that the female was unworthy of anything but the basest of his attentions; that he needed to avenge his father on her.  She’d railed that if the
Aljeni
hadn’t fought him, he’d have been strong enough to journey home before falling into fever.  Muda had determined to only fuck her--to breed her, a punishment to her, instead of claiming her as
Mati
, but he hadn’t seen her yet.  Rasipni had known from the moment he’d seen her what’d tempted his father. 

She was exquisite.  Her skin, so unlike the darker olive green of Gwerriera Nies females, was so creamy it begged to be stroked.  Even beneath the scrapes and bruises, he’d seen hints of its loveliness.  Her hair, though braided, appeared luscious, the chocolaty-black mass thick with the promise of curls.  It now framed her sage-gold eyes in curling waves that trailed over her shoulder to lightly brush the floor. 

His palms itched with the remembrance of its velvety softness when he’d bathed her, stroking it.  An unclaimed female was vulnerable unless she was
Tobba
.  Unless she was bred, she could be stolen if the males of her clan were unable to protect her, but even then, only until her time of breeding was over. 

Any male who saw Leo’Nya would want her, and Muda would be a fool not to claim her as
Mati
to secure his possession.  For
Mati
, a female had to agree, but there was no limit to the time or method a male could use to convince her.  As long as he could keep her from others, he could try indefinitely. 

As the oldest, and now
Mexxeja
of their clan, Muda had rights to her first, and Rasipni had no choice but to concede.  Unless he wanted to challenge his brother, he would have to stand aside while he claimed her, and, newly in his maturity, there was no way he would win a fully phased challenge.  Muda was vicious, a trait learned from their father.  Once claimed, a female was under the protection of her mate and subject to his…pleasures.  She would suffer under his brother, as she had in the brief time with his father.  Even more so. 

“Others will come to witness this, Leo’Nya, and you must not be seen.”  He cautioned anxiously.

“What do you mean?  Why can’t I be seen?”  She finished the last of the fruit and started on the meat.  “What kind of fruit is that…been meaning to ask you.”

“Tangeli fruit…You are exotic to us, and just as my father stole you, so will another want you too.”

Dropping the meat back to the thin metal dish, she rubbed at her stomach, feeling the fruit settle into a large lump.  The archived memory came rushing back.  She remembered all too well the day she been stolen…, and the bloodied body left behind.

“I understand.”  She said, laying her palm gently against his cheek.  Staring into his earnest brown eyes, she imagined seeing him, dead and bloodied, killed while trying to protect her, and shuddered.  “I’ll stay inside where no one can see me, if you promise to take me outside…just for a little while,” she added, seeing the objection on his lips.  “Humans…like me, we need sunlight to stay healthy.  I won’t die without it, but we absorb nutrients through our skin, and it can be damaging to our…um…ability to think clearly, if we are kept inside too long.  It’s called ‘cabin fever’.  Beside, I’m chained.  Where will I go?”

Frowning, he began to gather the empty dishes.  “You won’t be chained after the mourning is done.” 

Surprised, she sipped slowly from the remaining fruit.

“I do not want you to contract this ‘cabin fever,’ so I will take you into the sun, but not until after the rite is complete.”

“Deal!” she smiled, and helped gather the dishes.