“We will remedy this soon enough,” I tell her. “Once we return to my tribe, we will organize a hunt to take down one of the great sa-kohtsk. They carry many khui in them. We shall provide enough for you and your tribeswomen.”
“Vektal,” she says, her face unhappy. “You’re not listening to me. I . . . I don’t even know that I want a khui.”
My heart turns to ice at her words. “You must. It is a death sentence—”
“Only if I stay,” she says softly. “I’m not sure. If there’s a chance I can go home . . .” Georgie drops her gaze and looks away. “I just haven’t decided yet, all right?”
“And where is your home, if it is not here?” My heart starts to pound a slow, unhappy beat. Georgie talks of leaving me as if she does not feel as I do. As if her heart is not torn apart at the very thought of being separated. My khui brought us together, but I am proud to have her as my mate. I want no other. Not now, not ever. It is unthinkable.
She lifts a hand, points at the cave ceiling. “In the sky. A really really long way away from here.”
My eyes narrow at her. I do not understand.
“Like in this ship,” she continues. “Your ancestors came here in this thing from another place.”
“This is the cave my ancestors came from,” I agree slowly. “But it does not fly.” I imagine a flying cave, moving through the skies like a bird. The thought is ludicrous.
Georgie makes a frustrated sound. “It’s a ship. Do you know what a ship is?” When I remain blank, she drums her fingers on her lip, thinking. “It’s a craft that floats through the stars, Vektal. You know I’m not from here, right? I don’t have a khui. So I can’t be.”
I nod because I know this to be true. But the thought of her coming from . . . the stars . . . is strange and bizarre. Unfathomable. But there are things I cannot answer. Her strange language. Her clothing. Her lack of khui. “You . . . wish to go back to the stars?”
Her expression softens into something sad. Her pale eyes gleam for a moment, wet with unshed tears. “I don’t know. I think I hate not having a choice more than anything.”
So it is not me she hates. My khui begins to thrum in my breast again. I press a hand to it. “Then I will go with you.”
Her tears vanish, and she gives a soft chuckle. Then she moves close and squeezes my arm with her good one. She lays her cheek on it and sighs. “I wish that you could.”
I trace my fingers down her soft cheek. Does she not realize? Anywhere she goes, I will gladly follow. She is my heart, my resonance, my soul. My mate. It grieves me she is so miserable here, with me.
“Even if I wanted to stay,” she says softly, “I cannot make that decision for the others. If there’s a chance we can go home, I have to let them decide that for themselves.”
My mate is noble. I grunt my understanding, though the animal side of me wants to drag her back to a hunting cave and keep her there, naked and pink, until it is out of the question.
But then my Georgie might die, because she has no khui. And the other girls will certainly die with no rescue. And all of my tribesmen who have no mates—Dagesh and Raahosh and Haeden and so many others—will never know this pleasure. Like Georgie, I cannot be cruel.
“We must go and rescue your friends,” I tell her. “If we travel swiftly, we will make it to my tribal caves tonight. We can collect the best hunters and return after them in the morning.”
“Let’s do it, then,” she says, determination steeling her voice. “Every moment that passes is another moment I feel guilty.”
“Guilty?” I ask her, cupping her small face up so she can look me in the eye. “Why guilty?” Why does my mate carry such burdens?
Her cheeks pink again. “Because I’m here with you, and I’m warm and happy and fed, and they’re not.”
Ah. My thumb strokes over her full mouth. “And because my cock makes you cry out with such pleasure?”
The pink deepens, and she ducks her head. “Ohjeez,” she says in her language. Then in mine, “Let us keep such talk between us.”
I am amused. Is my mate shy? Is this what the pink of her cheeks means? A sa-khui woman gets a flush at the base of her horns when she is embarrassed, but Georgie has no horns. “It is but talk between mates, my resonance.”
She tilts her head. “Resonance? What is that?”
I take her small hand, her good one, and press it over my chest. My khui responds, thrumming a content beat inside my chest. “It is this. Only you call to it. Only you make my khui hum in my breast with happiness. It is a sign that one’s mate has been found.”