Savage Seed by Ivy Sparks

8

Kade

We hada long way to go. It had taken me several days to get to this unfamiliar portion of the desert, but that time had been spent hunting and tracking the sand tiger. If we walked directly, briskly and without interruption, we could make it back to my village by nightfall tomorrow.

If we could avoid sand beasts—and the sand tiger—I might be able to keep Leslie in one piece until we arrived. She kept pace behind me, closer than she had before. Just knowing she was there was enough to stir my attraction for her. The time we would be spending alone meant there would be plenty of temptations and opportunities to explore whatever I was feeling.

But even though I knew her body desired me as much as mine desired hers, it was clear that her mind did not agree. This would normally not be a problem; in my tribe, we pursued desires of the flesh more than the mind, until one’s true mate had been found.

But with Leslie… something was different. She wasn’t of my kind, or of my tribe, and didn’t know our customs. And something was keeping her from being true to herself and her physical needs.

Maybe it was me. I wasn’t of her kind, either. But that hadn’t seemed to slow her down or stop her earlier. So perhaps her problem was with males in general. Either way, if I pressured her, she would become afraid of me and more distrusting. That was the last thing I wanted.

I had no way of truly knowing what had caused her hesitation without speaking with her, but that still wasn’t an option. So I tried my best to simply focus on our journey through the desert, no matter how many times my mind circled back to the way her body had reacted to my touch. The pull had been so strong for us both, and her body sang to my touch.

Just thinking about it caused my cock to stiffen, and I was glad Leslie was not in front of me or I would have been hard pressed not to pull her into me and take her right then.

This was going to be a long journey.

I clenched and unclenched my jaw, once more forcing the thoughts away. The sand tiger may have escaped, thanks to Leslie’s innocent interference, but it was only a matter of time before she returned. We needed to put more distance between ourselves and the sand tiger so that we could rest properly.

Withoutany congress involved.

The sand tiger had gotten closer this time and had cleverly made it past my traps. But as I replayed her approach in my mind, I remembered something strange. While she stood there on the small hill, she seemed interested in Leslie. I had expected her to attack on sight, but she merely stood there. Was it Leslie’s presence that gave the beast pause?

I turned over the events of the past day, ticking through my motions, the sand tiger’s actions, and how I came across Leslie. Something else strange occurred to me: I would have never found Leslie if the tiger hadn’t roared in her direction, and if I hadn’t then made chase.

But surely such a thing was coincidental.

Leslie’s voice filled the air, and I smiled as she began speaking again. She still had not realized that I understood her when she had asked about my father and the sand tiger. She had not made the connection that I had a translator implanted in my ear.

I supposed I could have tried to communicate that fact to her. But doing that might have caused her to hold back, and the truth was, I was quite enjoying her speaking without any inhibitions.

“You know, I actually work in a mine,” she commented, and I heard her boots padding the sand as though she were toying with the ground. Was she enjoying herself?

“My father’s the owner. And while he’s good at what he does, I feel like his heart’s not in it anymore. But mine is. I want to take over as soon as he lets me. There are so many advances we need to implement, and he just doesn’t get it. Things have changed since he first opened the mine.”

She sighed. “I’m trying to prove to him that I can do this, that I can run the mine just as well as he can—better, actually! But he just doesn’t seem to get it. I think he still sees me as his little girl. But I’m more than that.”

The way she spoke of her father, with a mix of admiration and frustration… It was something I could easily understand and relate to.

I felt Leslie’s fingertips brush my elbow. Was she trying to get my attention, or was the contact incidental? Looking back at her would only deepen my desire, so I pushed the feelings aside as best I could.

“We mine Vyrec. Have you heard of it?”

I grunted. She seemed to like that response.

“Well, it’s this really pretty crystal that’s popular across the galaxy. A lot of people say it has metaphysical properties, but they’re just trying to sell more crystals if you ask me.

“Anyway, there are more sustainable ways to mine the Vyrec. We just need better equipment. Margins have been too tight for us to afford the good stuff, though. But I plan on applying for a grant from the Intergalactic Council that would help a lot. And if I ever do get to be in charge, there’s a ton of money that can be shifted around and contracts that can be renegotiated that would go a long way toward affording the equipment we need.”

I felt my ears twitch as she continued to ramble about Vyrec. The crystal was something my people were very familiar with. More so than she seemed to realize.

Our planet had once been a vast jungle. The land and the creatures that roamed it were once very different. What few beasts and plants survived could be found in the oases that dotted the landscape, the small patches of land that were the only things left that resembled the jungles we once called home.

Vyrec crystals were not something to trifle with so casually. These outsiders didn’t know what they were dealing with. Not really. But I did.

Many years ago, the people of Xersie had coveted the Vyrec as the outsiders do now. They had dug in the ground for them, carelessly pulling them away without concern for consequence. They had taken the crystals for their own petty pleasure, enjoying their luminescent glow, reveling in the small comforts they brought.

What they hadn’t known, hadn’t understood, was how the crystals had been connected, running beneath the land in vast networks across the entire planet. The more they took, the more volatile the remaining crystals became. Without their connections, the crystals became weaker and weaker. It only took a spark of unknown origin for the crystals to ignite.

When one ignited, it ignited the next. And the next. And the next. A series of explosions rocked our planet to its core, culminating into a single, massive explosion that changed our world forever.

The natural landscape dried up and shriveled until the winds blew away all nutrients the plants needed to survive. Only small pockets of life remain in our oases and by our seas. The rest of the planet turned to desert, unforgiving, deadly.

The price we paid for our sins.

These outsiders would make matters worse for us. If only my father had not been a coward. If only he had allowed me to lead raiding parties to the outsider camps and mines, as I had requested. We could have disrupted their mining, perhaps prevented them from furthering the damage our people had already done.

I lived in constant fear of our world becoming even more uninhabitable. The Vyrec crystals could be mined successfully. But these outsiders were greedy; they took and took with no regard for what they left behind.

Leslie continued rambling about her mine, and the equipment she desired. What she spoke of, a sustainable way to mine, sounded almost too good to be true. It struck me then that perhaps she was different from the other outsiders. Perhaps she actually cared about the damage their mining could cause, and would actually follow through if given the chance.

Further, what if the technology these outsiders possessed could actually return our world to the way it was before? Was such a thing possible? Could the jungles somehow, someday, return?

It was, perhaps, nothing more than the dreams of a savage. But it was a good dream. And if these outsiders possessed that kind of technology, perhaps they could use it to help my planet and my people.

Maybe there could be an alliance between us after all. But I dared not let myself hope. Instead, I continued to trek, the little female I was growing attached to following close behind.