She pushes back against me, whimpering, and her hand knots in my mane. I push her skirt down her thighs and she kicks it off even as I rip my breechcloth off my body. Then we are pressed against each other, flesh to flesh, body to body. Her khui hums loudly in her chest, and mine answers.
I murmur her name as I push her thighs apart and enter her from behind. She gives a soft little cry and holds tight to my hands as I begin to thrust into her, my spur prodding against the tiny bud of her backside with each pump.
We are perfection like this, me and my Har-loh.
? ? ?
The next morning, Har-loh wakes up and moves the small arrowhead from the first notch in her kahl-un-dur to the second one. “Dee-sem-burr second,” she announces. She rubs her side and winces. “This baby has to be coming soon, right?”
“I do not know.” I wish I had answers for her. She has so many questions and I do, too. The hollows under her eyes seem to be worse today, despite the fact that she slept heavily through the night. But there is no one to ask, and I do not know if this is normal. My memories of my father are so faint and growing dimmer with every day. Instead of his face in my dreams, I see Har-loh’s smile, her freckled skin, her soft body. “Come eat,” I tell my mate and gesture at her stool by the fire. I’ve even put one of her fluffy puffs on it to ease her bottom.
She sits down and gives me a grateful smile. “The baby’s active today.”
I put a hand on her belly and feel the flutters there, the gentle movement. I grin up at her, and then jerk my hand away as the kit kicks hard.
Har-loh winces. “Pissy today, too.”
“He is hungry. He need eat. You eat, too.” I get a chunk of dried, smoked meat and offer it to her.
She wrinkles her nose at the sight and looks unhappy. “Is that all we have?”
“No.” I pull out one of the baskets she’s woven and take out additional chunks of meat she has salted and smoked. “This one is raptor, and this one is spagayteemawnster, and this one is…” I hold it to my nose, sniffing. Burned dvisti. “Dvisti.”
“Maybe just water,” she says, and rubs her belly again.
“Eat,” I tell her, and ignore the gnawing worry that creeps up. I give her a bit of smoked dvisti since it is the tenderest, and she takes it from my hand and gamely nibbles on it. I notice she drinks more water than anything and eats slowly.
My worry threatens to consume me, and so I stay by the cave with her that morning. I tell her I have hides to cure, but we have more hides than two people can use. She stuffs feathers into one of her leather puffs for the baby, and then sews the edge shut. When I take a break, she pulls out her boots and smiles brightly at me. “Can we go get clams? I’m hungry for those.”
Our cave is bursting with dried meats, and it seems wasteful to hunt more. But I will do anything for my Har-loh. I nod and help her put her boots on, lacing them for her while she comments about being unable to see her feet. I tell her they are swollen and fluffy like one of her puffs.
She snorts.
Then we are off to the beach, and the weather is nice. I can see Har-loh improving as we walk. Her face has the pink color in it that tells me she is healthy, and she smiles when the two suns come out from behind the clouds.
I am worrying over nothing, I tell myself. I give her belly a small pat as we get to the edge of the water. “Clams?” I have my spear to use as a digging stick.
“Yes, please.” She clasps her hands in front of her and looks excited. “The big dark ones, hopefully.”
She has told me before that her home place has something very similar to the clams, but they are smaller. I watch the surf, looking for a small spout of water to surface from the sand once the tide rolls out.
I spot one and jam the end of my spear into the sand, then push the end up, trying to dig it out. I catch a glimpse of dark shell before it burrows deeper into the sand. Growling in frustration, I forget all about the spear and dig my hands through the sand, determined to get this for my mate and to make her smile. Harlow laughs as I try to shovel faster than the creature can dig, and sand flies everywhere.
At last, success. I grip the thing in my hand and hold it aloft. “For you!”
“Yay!” she claps her hands. “That’s one! Let’s get more and then we’ll go home and boil them.”
I nod at her belly, as if speaking to it. “Your mother is hungry today.”
“She’s starving,” Har-loh answers warmly, and rubs her stomach.
“Then your father feed you,” I declare to her belly, and get to my feet.