Setting her writing practice aside Fang looked up at the time and over at the prince hunched at his desk, scribbling steadily on his tablet with one hand holding an old ledger open and his tail swishing quietly under his chair. She stood, crossing to the desk and tapping him on the shoulder. Though his head came up fast, Fang was starting to recognize the way Valen's orange eyes went glassy when he was tired from poring over stacks of manifests and legal records all evening. "Hngh?"
"It's late, let's go to bed."
Valen's ears perked in that cute way he had that brought some of the light back into him. "Bed?" He glanced at the display on the wall, "Eyah, I didn't know it was that late." He marked his place with a silk bookmark embroidered with silver thread and switched his tablet off. Fang smiled to herself. It's like a magic word, always gets him moving. Not that it always led to sex – over the week that had passed since she'd practically dragged him into bed Fang had come to discover that Valen was quite the cuddler. Even in his sleep he stuck close, and Fang had decided she liked that. He's just so damned sweet – I'm used to Drass being more dominant. Valen was far from that, still shy and tractable even though they both knew he held most of the power. Not that I mind.
Valen stood, and reached out to pluck at Fang's sleeve. "It's been a few hours since dinner, do you need something to eat before we turn in?"
"Um... That's actually not a bad idea." She'd been practicing writing whole words and phrases while Valen drafted the proposal he intended to show his father by week's end, and the effort of getting her calligraphy just so left her hand tired and her head a little light. That, and Valen was trying to put weight on her so she wouldn't be as cold. "I'm not that hungry, though, so nothing too heavy."
Valen shook his head, "That's fine, we can share something out of the cabinet." He waved her on and Fang left him to find them something to eat. In the bedchamber Fang shrugged out of her dressing-robe and slid naked between the sheets – the staff had changed them from red to black – to wait for him. Listening to Valen shuffle around in the hearth-room, paper rustling and glass clinking, Fang twisted her hair into a rope and let her mind wander. I should ask Abita what she uses to make my under-robes so soft. When Fang had worked for a commercial laundry service, she'd learned that Drass preferred to pummel their linen fabrics in a tumbling machine loaded with small steel balls, literally beating the linen soft rather than treat it with chemical conditioners. It wouldn't surprise Fang if she learned that the palace compound had one of these giant tumbling drums, they had everything else. In the past week Valen had shown her enormous chambers deep in the mountain where they grew vegetables and fruit next to the heat of underground springs and lava tubes, the hydroponic systems shelved on rotating racks some thirty feet high. The kitchens next door housed not one but three bakeries, one exclusively for sweet pastries and cakes, as well as room upon room of smoked and cured meats, dry goods, liquid items like milks and juices, and a cavern larger than some villages packed with hundred-kilo blocks of butter and cheese. And near those sat even more caves stacked with cases and barrels of aging whiskey, spicy liqueurs, sweet wines and sparkling vintages enough to keep the port city of Kitsara properly tanked for several years.
Her thoughts were interrupted as Valen came into the bedroom, hooking his tail around the edge of the door to pull it behind him. In one hand he carried a paper parcel, the other balancing two glasses of pale orange-pink liquid. Fang watched him set the parcel down before handing her one of the glasses. "You know, I can't believe I've never asked before, but what's it like to have a tail?"
Valen's ears flicked, and he gave Fang a bewildered look before he looked behind himself. His tail, a long skinny thing covered in red scales like the rest of him with a black paintbrush tip, swished behind him an inch above the carpet; it was longer than his legs, though from the way it was constantly moving it was hard to tell at times. "Um... I guess it's useful? I've always had it, so I don't know what it'd be like without it." Shrugging, he added, "Sorry, that's not very helpful."
"No, that's fair. I just realized I've been living among Drass for years and I never really thought about it." I never thought I'd be basically married to one. "It looks like it'd be useful, though."
Valen nodded, unbuttoning the cuffs of his linen under-tunic now that his hands were free. "It's good for balance, mostly. If I turn too fast and hit someone it can hurt, like a whip. Sometimes I'll hold things with it, but they can't be very heavy." Sweeping an arm behind him he pulled it forward and showed Fang how the end curled and uncurled. "It's not like my hands, it's more like... an extra finger, I guess." He let his tail drop and went for the buttons at the base of his neck, shedding the under-tunic and leggings before joining Fang in bed.
Though it had been a little over a week since Tias's prank forced them together, a kind of ease had begun to settle in and while Valen's eyes still seared her at times with a healthy young man's appetite (which Fang didn't mind), some of the hesitation had given way to friendlier, more thoughtful glances. Valen unwrapped the package, one of the handful of sandwiches and stuffed rolls he kept in his suite for convenience and split it with her, leaning close over the paper wrapping so that their shoulders touched.
Fang caught flashes of gold as he bit through layers of bread and cheese, his short tusks tearing through the cold meat like scissors where they met with his much shorter fangs; when he bit down, Fang heard a tiny click. Something tickled at the side of her neck and Fang rubbed at it with the tips of her fingers, remembering how smooth and warm those tusks felt and how carefully he'd grazed over her skin. A Drass could kill a human and barely break a sweat, but she'd slept with easily a dozen Drass men and each one had handled her with considerably more care than her own people. Valen's not as big, but he's just as careful.
"Do I have something on my face?"
Fang snapped out of her thoughts. "Hmm? Oh no, I was just... staring off." Where her eyes had fixed had nothing to do with the thick cord at the side of his neck that stretched from the root of his ear to the base of his throat, or that the muscles in his jaw bulged and flattened as he chewed his food. I must be more tired than I thought if I'm spacing out. That was all, surely. She finished her half and washed it down with the glass of juice.
Settling down, Valen went for his accustomed place behind Fang and she listened to his horn-chains rustle on the pillow. He laid an arm over her side, not hesitating quite as much to touch her now; his hand rested at the apex of her ribs, the tips of his gold-plated claws light on her skin and the back of his thumb just brushing the bottom curve of her breast. Without the weight of a full-size Drass, Fang found she could sleep a little more soundly without worrying about four or five hundred pounds of scales and muscle rolling over on her. Valen had, but his weight (and bone-softening warmth) had been less alarming and more of a comfort. He shifted behind her, and Fang smiled at the friction of his pelvis against the back of her hips. She heard him take a soft breath, something he did when he was still working out how to word something, and warm air tickled the back of Fang's neck.
"Fang... If... If I found a way to get you out of here, where would you go?"
"Where would I go?" Well, I was going to go back to Fed space to get away from Munok, but Tias got to me first. I have money now, I could just pay him off and he'll leave me alone. Ten thousand kai isn't much compared to several million... Beyond what she'd intended to do before bad luck ran her into Tias, though, Fang hadn't really thought beyond getting out and finding another job. That had always been her plan, her only plan if she was honest. "I... I don't really know, I never had the chance to think about it."
At her waist, Valen's hand spread and his palm made soft contact with her skin. "Is there... anywhere you want to go?" His fingers stroked, and behind her ear she could feel the side of his nose and the ridge of his cheekbone. Valen hadn't done much more than cuddle after she'd thanked him for the extravagant shopping spree in Kitsara, and Fang wondered if this was his way of getting the cart rolling. The scent of ashes and incense, wood smoke and mineral-rich water drifted to her nose and Fang turned her head to look over her shoulder; under the quilted silk comforter his tail slithered over her legs and curled around her ankle. Valen rubbed against Fang's jaw, making a soft sound in the back of his throat. The scales on his face were rough but his words were smooth and silky against her skin: "When I find a way out of this contract, you can go wherever you choose. You're a wealthy woman now, once you're free there wouldn't be anything to stop you from going anywhere you want... not even me."
Fang's eyes fluttered closed. Down at her side his hand slid forward, the outside edge of his first finger and thumb encircling the bottom of her breast, and Fang's nipple drew up warm and tight. Valen wasn't even trying to do anything, yet when he licked his lips so close to Fang's ear she could hear his tongue slide over them. She squeezed her eyes shut at the hot thrill that raced down her spine and crackled in her belly. What did he ask me again – where will I go after I leave here? Fang considered a house, a place that belonged to her that she wouldn't have to worry about losing when the rent went up. She had enough kai now to buy a whole street of houses if she wanted to, but the thought of sleeping in her own bed didn't quite have the attraction of the warm, strong hand on her stomach and its smooth gold claws. "Um..." That she wasn't so eager to quit this life disturbed her. I've been on my own for fifteen years, I know how to survive. I have money now, I should be able to take care of myself. I should want to take care of myself. "Sorry, I'm drawing a blank."
Valen pressed his hand to her stomach. "It's fine. I was just wondering if you had an idea, maybe I could help."
"You're already helping," Fang turned her head back again. She could see the outline of Valen's horn if she craned back far enough, and when she did she rolled against his body and his arm tightened around her. "You've bought me clothes, you're feeding me, you're keeping me safe."
Valen went silent for a while. Then, "I might not always be able to do that. Keep you safe, I mean – there might be times when I have to go away like Aeden. I don't know when or even if it'll happen, but I'm letting you know ahead of time."
Fang's stomach sank, and not from the heaviness of their bedtime snack. Wait, why does that bother me? "Well... I figured as much. You've got the colony, of course you'll have to deal with all that–"
Valen's arm curled and his hand slid up between her breasts, pulling her closer. His hand balled into a fist over her heart and he spoke softly, "If that happens, promise me you'll watch out for Tias." His lips brushed against her ear, and Fang's skin prickled. "I've already asked Freya if she'll be your guardian if I'm not here, but there's only so much she can do against him."
Fang nodded. "I will. I don't like him anyway, I already don't want to be anywhere near him."
"Thank you." Valen's fist loosened and all that remained were his bent fingers resting in the valley between her breasts. One finger straightened and a golden claw brushed Fang's chin. The hesitation in his voice was not lost on her, nor the worry. Something was bothering him, else he wouldn't be trying to reassure himself by getting her to promise to be careful. "I don't... I don't want anything to happen to you before I can let you go."
Fang began to shift, turning her hips and then her shoulders to face him. Valen released his hold on her, arm hovering until she settled back down. Fang wiggled until she pressed the full length of her body against his, and Valen's arm came back down. "You don't have to worry about it yet, I'm not exactly in a hurry to go anywhere. Just... enjoy it for now."
Valen nodded slowly. "For now."
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