His hand wraps around my throat. He could snap my neck with no effort. I don’t move. My life is literally in his hands.
To my relief, his fingertips slowly drag down my throat. Therough pads of his fingers stimulate more than my skin. Pleasure, as simple as the male’s touch, moves through me in an unbidden wave. I’m shocked that he can be gentle and that I can feel something other than contempt for him.
“You won’t hurt me?” I ask, hiding my trembling.
“Oh, I will hurt you,” he says, a grin emerging. “But you will enjoy it.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
ATOX IM GRAK
My female asks if I would hurt her. It’s not a question I expected, and it makes me wonder what if anything humans know of my people. Pain is meant to teach, to heighten the senses, nothing more. Even to our enemy we don’t inflict pain unnecessarily. A quick kill, that is what we seek. With our females, pain is used to pleasure, not cause fear or harm.
Unless you are a grak who thinks himself a god.
But my father is no longer alive. I’m my people’s grak now.
“Pain is a tool, female, not a punishment.”
“Wh-what do you consider punishment then?”
I hate hearing fear in her voice, especially toward me. She is mine to protect, mine to give my seed. She need not fear me, but I must overlook her questions, mistakes, and even some disobedience while she learns our ways. That does not mean I will tolerate outright defiance, not much at least. And certainly not in the presence of my people.
“Come,” I order as I walk away from the cart.
She doesn’t follow. I draw a deep breath, restraining myself from lashing out. I have more patience than my father, less than my sister and brother. I glance over my shoulder to see her looking in the direction of the human colony. This is the first of many trials and I will reward or punish her depending on her actions. She will learn, I will see to it. Until then, I must watch her closely.
Finally, I hear her footsteps behind me. Soft, but untrained as she snaps twigs and crunches dried leaves. These humans know nothing of survival. Even the youngest of Ossa’s younglings, Evve, who is all of eight seasons, walks through the woods as silently as a warrior.
When I reach the bottom of the hill, I turn to wait for my female to catch up. “What are your duties in the human colony, female?”
She’ll do whatever I tell her, but if she has a unique talent that could benefit my people, I’d be foolish to ignore it.
She stops ten feet shy of me and lifts her chin. “I have a name and it’s not female.”
That defiance in her eyes stirs my cock too easily. I’ve gone too long without taking a female. Five years to be precise. A month before my father launched our people into a war that we couldn’t win.
“Your name will be whatever I choose to call you, female.” I emphasize the word female because she doesn’t like it. I will push her until she learns to accept everything I say and do. I’m her grak and her mate, or I will be soon enough. Her life and everything she does is now my responsibility. Shewilllearn her place.
Her eyebrows, small like the rest of her, pull together in disgust.I growl, thinking of how my father would have made her a concubine, an ancient practice centuries-dead until he became grak, But we are on Kovos. And I’m not my father.
Thinking of my father sours my mood.
“My name is Paloma. I will answer to nothing else. You’re asavage, and you smell worse than the animals you haul in that cart. I’ll never give you what you want, so you might as well let me leave. Find another woman, orc. One who wants to be with you.”
With two strides, I tower over her, which doesn’t take much. She is shorter than female orcs. Shorter, smaller, with less muscle mass, though I like how full her breasts are, as is much of her body. While a grak should only care how sturdy his female is and if she can birth strong younglings, I will enjoy sinking into her softness.
I resume walking toward the lake. “You will give me what I want in time.”
“And if I don’t, you’ll kill me. So let’s end this now, one way or the other.”
I turn sharply. “I did not buy you to kill you, female. Why would you think this?”
“My father said—” She stops talking, then lifts her chin. “Orcs kill those who anger them. Everyone knows that.”
Her sire has filled her head with lies. I regret leaving the weak male alive, but he is one of their leaders. If I must sacrifice a part of who I am to secure my people’s future, then so be it.
“I do not need to kill an unruly female when it is much more fun making her obey.” I flash my tusks, but that does not impress her as it would a female orc. She steps back, in fear.
