CHAPTER THREE
He moved like pure, raw power. Every step he took, every action he performed, full of purpose and control and direction. K'Shai watched R'chnt as he led her through city streets, then through empty and long abandoned subdivisions, until they reached sprawling overgrown fields that led into woods.
He was acutely aware of everything around him, so much more than she could possibly perceive. Even without his helmet on, he was fully capable of using his highly developed senses of smell and hearing, along with visual capabilities that allowed him to see threats hidden behind solid objects and walls. His helmet and computerized technology only amplified what R'chnt was naturally capable of.
She stalked carefully behind him, listening attentively whenever he offered up a bit of direction or guidance, telling her anything from his awareness of his environment to how she should move and step and think when on a hunt.
She could not help but to feel like there was no "when" she was on a hunt, because the way he acted and moved and educated her, it seemed like he always was on the hunt, and thus, she was too. She could not imagine there was a difference in his mannerisms when he was on a hunt versus when he was not, except for the moments he allowed himself to relax when he was with her.
Right now, technically, he was not on a hunt yet he moved gracefully, gliding through the woods they had entered with stealth and certainty, constantly surveying their surroundings, his alertness and wariness never fading. She did her best to mimic him, to hold her breath and listen more closely whenever he stopped to evaluate a specific location, but she was quite certain it was simply not in her nature or capabilities to learn to maneuver and absorb her surroundings the way he did, although he did not stop instructing her on how.
Their round-a-bout path had taken them directly back to the very same river she had gotten her first spear fishing lesson in yesterday.
K'Shai had not even realized that he was taking her to the same spot until the river came into view. He navigated her around an entirely different route with more familiarity than she could have managed with active GPS in her hand.
She swallowed and sighed in reservation, realizing that he probably knew far more about her world than she did; knowing full well he had hunted on Earth many times.
He led her to the water and instructed her again, guiding her on the use of the spear over and over, for what seemed like hours to K'Shai. She was exasperated, frustrated, and yet he seemed perfectly content, patiently crouched, barely moving beside her.
She looked him over, one of the few times she stood taller than he, although even crouched next to her as he was, his head still reached above her elbows. She smiled softly as she surveyed him.
"Hul'tin-de, K'Shai!" He reminded her. Focus!
"Sei-i, ki'ha n'tu." She assured him she was.
R'chnt chortled under his biohelmet, "'en l-teel."
K'Shai pressed her lips together and tried to stifle a giggle at his reminder that her focus was to be placed on the fish.
It was the same river, the same rock plateau, and only slightly different carp than the ones she successfully speared yesterday. R'chnt had edged himself so tightly close to her, crouched next to her that his shoulder was brushing against her backside in a distracting manner.
She was sure he was doing quite on purpose. He was all business when it came to his lessons, though even despite his helmet on, she thought he was just bored enough to cause a little mischief.
When she raised the spear and began the downward lob the way he had shown her, his hand came completely up against her back, brushing between her butt cheeks before landing lightly on the small of her back. She dropped the spear in the water and sighed an amused bark.
"What was that for!?"
"eilk-Yautjan," R'chnt corrected her smoothly, reminding her to use the new language she was also learning.
"Th'lu-hul'tin-de," he grunted. I told you to concentrate.
She jumped off the rock yet again and retrieved the spear. The water, in the early November air, was frigid, and her shoes and socks were soaked.
She returned to the rock brushing off a flush of déjà vu from yesterday's spear-fishing calamity that had sent her into the water so many times she had the mind to just catch the carp or shoot them with her rifle.
By the end of her first adventure, she felt like she was getting a feel for the alien weapon, the technique he showed her, and the force needed to pierce the meaty fish, and she had already spent enough time today struggling to make a kill that she realized she somehow had apparently forgotten everything she learned the day before.
R'chnt stood and moved in tightly behind her, resting one hand on her hip, and guiding her other hand on the proper way to hold the spear once again.
His naturally heated body, which operated at a much higher temperature than hers, immediately soothed her prickled skin and she leaned backwards into him, accepting his warmth as well as his guidance, spurring him to issue a correction again.
"Hul'tin-de, K'Shai."
His voice echoed with patient annoyance, a playful tone knowing full well what he was accomplishing with the close contact yet still striving to make for an educational session.
He directed her again, chortling a bit in amusement as she lobbed the spear again and it thudded uselessly to the rocky riverbed.
She retrieved yet again, and returned to the rock, spying another fish in passing and tried again. Again she retrieved the spear and tried again and yet again introduced water into her shoes for no reason.
"Ok! What…" she started and R'chnt cut her off.
"K'Shai, eilk-Yautjan."
R'chnt spoke English well enough to have a capable conversation with her. She had been amazed to discover that he also spoke some significant amounts of French, Spanish, and words of three other languages she did not recognize, although he assured her they were spoken languages of his world.
She had no reason to question that, but yet could not help wonder exactly what region the languages were from, or in fact, what era, given that he was well over four-hundred years old by the Earth calendar.
Despite his extensive abilities to speak foreign languages, there was only one language he preferred to speak and he reminded her again to pay attention to her lessons and speak as he taught her.
Whenever she got hung up on a word, she would speak her mind in English and he would, if he was able, translate the correct Yautjan word to match her intention.
The Yautjan language was fairly simple as far as actual vocabulary, but the pronunciations and remembering word order and differences in tone and infliction or varying pronunciations depending on if she was speaking to, or about, a male or female was difficult.
Certain sounds were made on exhalation, and others were made on inspiration, and the difference mattered, which was a concept that K'Shai had a hard time with. Likewise, many sounds included ticking, gurgling, and trilling of the Yautja vocal cords, simply were not possible for K'Shai to make.
The language did not have a lot of redundancy. There were no multiple different words that all meant the same thing. There was no real slang that she knew of, only a few phrases that could be deemed slang.
The Yautjan language was universal, too. He informed her of the confusing nature of the human race, to speak so many different languages, and that was when he thought there were only a handful.
When she had told him there were dozens of different languages spoken on Earth, even hundreds, she was not even sure, R'chnt stared at her in amazement, questioning how any human could possibly communicate with another given the complexity and diversity of the languages.
The Yautja language was full of simple and concise vocabulary that the entire species shared. It was sprawling and cryptic in the written form, and frustrating to pronounce, but yet still it its own way, it was simplistic.
Much of Yautjan communication relied on body language and scent, which R'chnt said was less confusing and never lied.
R'chnt was a keen and capable student when he got English lessons from her, hearing a word once, maybe twice, and not only committing it to memory immediately, but also able to pronounce it correctly.
Like K'Shai who struggled to make certain sounds in his language, he lacked the humans' ability to emphasize inflictions and syllables in order to make subtle differences in pronunciation, but he learned at a nearly photographic-memory pace.
When he was teaching her, he insisted she work her way through his language, however slowly or badly pronounced that she must.
He remained patient with her, never letting his temper to flare or cancel lesson plans because he wasn't getting anywhere. He simply held quiet and still, displaying his awesome ability to turn into a statue and wait for her to work things out on her own or ask for help.
"Su'thin ki'nyh-ko," she questioned again, unable to make the proper inflictions in the Yautja tongue to indicate a question, but R'chnt understood all the same.
What am I doing wrong?
He clicked his mandibles together for a moment, making a dull drilling sound before he responded.
"Th-kha'te." He said simply.
She sighed deeply and steadied herself. He was right. She was rushing.
She lost her focus because of his proximity to her. He was toying with her senses quite purposefully, exactly to distract her, and she had completely lost the ability to retain what she had learned the day before.
She felt embarrassed and could not help but to think how the mighty towering hunter hovering behind her must have thought her such a fool, struggling with something as ridiculous to him as spear fishing, when she had seen him spear and kill a kainde amedha queen by clinging to her back and puncturing the base of her skull.
She returned her focus on the fish and the task at hand, and forced his utterly pleasing musky scent out of her mind. She quelled the stimulated arousal in her body and channeled her focus back to the tip of her spear.
She raised it again and took careful study of the fish slowly easing by, just under the rippling surface as the afternoon sun glimmered across it in shimmery bursts.
She listened to the water whisking by the rocky plateau, she felt it brush past her soaking wet shoes as it ran over the surface where she stood. She listened to the cool autumn breeze blow the orange leaves off the nearby trees while a few birds chirped happily oblivious to the destruction of the world around them.
She felt her skin prickle into goose bumps in protest to the soaking cold. She felt her own heart beating and in the still moment, she was sure she could hear R'chnt's hearts beating smoothly and powerfully in his own chest a few inches behind her head. She lobbed the spear again as he had shown and it sailed smoothly down into a fish.
Brimming, she turned to him and he simply nodded his sleekly helmeted head, crouched back down and waited for her retrieve her kill and do it again.
"Gkei'moun," he said finally after the lesson ended with eight fish on the short spear.
K'Shai beamed proudly at R'chnt as they waded through the water and returned to the shoreline to head back to camp as the afternoon cleared into evening and the winds carried in imminent rain.
"Gkei'moun," K'Shai agreed. Simple.
He extended his clawed hands towards her once at the shoreline and traced his large fingertips along her fine chin, tickling her neck with his talons as he stroked her delicately and moved against her, pressing his body so closely into hers. He forced her to the ground just by making a massive, nearly four hundred pound blockade.
He sank down low, crouching over her, an aroused growl emanating from under his helmet and through a flutter of panting breaths and heated touches as she removed her garments. He positioned K'Shai on her knees before him, hands on her hips as he kneeled behind her, solid erection dripping.
He pushed himself into her wet and ready opening, grunting and groaning in pure enjoyment of the sensations he experienced with her.
He was thrilled by her acceptance of his penetrations, and even more so overwhelmed by the pleasure she elicited willingly and readily in him and received from him.
As he inserted himself and withdrew again and again in and out of her, he allowed the feelings to rush through him until they erupted back out of him and into her to their harmonized breathing and moaning.
K'Shai was so very different than the creature he had once mistaken her for, and as he redressed and stood and watched her prepare to move back to the camp herself, he could not help but feel a flush of guilt once again over his arrogant judgment of her.
If she only knew, he would imagine she would consider him quite the fool. He was humbly grateful to the gods for giving him the wisdom to put his arrogance aside.
After returning to camp and providing her fish kills to the group once again, disregarding their shocked looks, K'Shai returned to R'chnt's side for the night.
She was silently grateful he was taking the time to spend a few days in her company. The others in his group all seemed grateful too; both to him for allowing them some much needed rest and to her for keeping him occupied enough to allow them a few extra days' rest.
The smell of their combined pheromones left no questions to any Yautja that he was mating with her. Although while K'Shai was not aware of it, they were rather shocked by the quantity of musk that implied they were mating multiple times.
R'chnt received a few tenderly handled inquiries from W'rsa and G'toun-de, who knew him best and longest, and were at least somewhat comfortable enough in asking with much risk of inciting R'chnt.
He raised his mandibles in amused smiles as they processed the hard to understand concept that K'Shai was most definitely as actively ready and willing to mate as she smelled. He was equally ready at all times, and the others, he knew, were more than just a little jealous, but they hid it well out of respect. Still, he knew not all would.
After a short visit with his group, K'Shai and R'chnt retreated to her private chambers, where she ate some jerky and when she was full and rested enough, he growled his intentions to her and soon laid her on her back, spread leg before him, once, then once more a few hours later, and again before the sun came up the following morning.
She met him with equal vigor each time, showing no signs of disinterest or inability to mate, or loss of desire to please him.
She put her hands, lips, and tongue on all parts of his body and he purred and chuffed and growled in delight as he filled her with his juices over and over while she squealed, moaned, and pleasured him to his very bones.
She rolled over from next to him and sat on the edge of the bed in the morning light and stretched in a long arc of her back as she laced her fingers together and reached for the ceiling.
R'chnt watched her bones glide smoothly under her skin and his eyes followed the curve of her back down to her butt. Her scent was a mixture of multiple satisfied rounds and his own musk and he spread his upper mandibles into a thin smile, pleased by the signal her body would emit.
He briefly thought to last night's quick conversation with the others about K'Shai's very different physiological abilities and desires.
She was willing to bring pleasure and be pleasured as equal to him, and she seemed equally as proud to wear his scent as he was to lay it on her. It was an unfamiliar thing to him, and he very much found adjusting to the scent of her constantly ready state difficult.
Again he reminded himself of something he seemed to keep forgetting; that she was not Yautja. Female Yautja would cycle into a breeding season annually. It was a time when any available male gathered and displayed their interests, fought for the rights to breed, and if they were lucky, succeed.
R'chnt was a proud sire of hundreds of offspring, some of whom he had heard over the centuries had done his bloodlines proud, becoming capable hunters, leaders themselves.
He had survived challenge after challenge from males vying for the same females, to the point where males saw him coming and suddenly decided on a new female to pursue instead. More so, he had successfully survived the challenges his selected females presented to him.
It was expected that any male daring, or foolish, enough to display solid interest in the best of the females would be expected to prove his mettle against her to her satisfaction. The risk of dismemberment, broken bones, and death, was usually enough incentive to keep lesser males out of the breeding pool, but R'chnt had proven himself over and over.
He thoroughly enjoyed any chance to mate that he earned, but as he thought about K'Shai having pleased him in a matter of days more times than he had the opportunity for in the last decade, and without a fight, only wanting to elicit pleasure, he felt himself flare with a protectiveness that he never imagined himself capable or caring enough to display.
He reached for her and moved across the bed to sit next to her, gently placing his hand on the small of her back and she immediately and happily leaned into him, drawing out a purr from his chest as if she could produce it at will.
He did feel content with her and it was obvious to him she found the sound soothing. She tucked her head under his chin and sat quietly in his embrace for a moment, feeling his tusks tickle through her hair, the puffs of his quiet breaths shifting her hair a bit as she shut her eyes and enjoyed the peace of the moment to the sound of his purr.
She started kissing him, touching him in her gentle way, caressing her hands across his chest, down his abdomen, over his thighs, across his groin. He moaned and heaved at the sensation of her fingers stroking his shaft, turning it from flaccid to functioning in seconds. R'chnt growled an enticing welcome and crawled atop her as she leaned back into the middle of the bed.
"What is it?" K'Shai asked him, forming the words in his language more easily.
There was a certain look in his eye, a tone in deep vocalizations, yet again hitting into moods and sounds she had not experienced from him. He purred and chuckled softly, almost reluctant to tell her his thoughts, but the words slipped out as his brain functions dropped to a lower level.
"I was just wondering how long your breeding season lasts."
K'Shai laughed gleefully and wrapped her arms tightly around him, thoroughly amused.
"Humans don't have breeding seasons. I just want to bring you pleasure." She said with a gracious smile.
R'chnt purred deeply, caressing her, his voice quieting as he confirmed beyond a doubt that he treasured her company and would not do anything to harm her. She cooed softly to him and felt him slip himself into her as she inhaled deeply and rolled her eyes closed, tipping her chin towards his cheek and nudging into him while she gently played with his long hair as he pumped steadily and slowly.
She wrapped her hands around his shoulders, caressing him; her body relaxed as he eased himself smoothly back and forth, never increasing his pace. Rather, he was taking careful feel of every inch of her as he worked himself deeply forward then nearly completely out.
His skin soon heated up so much that sweat began to bead. Her fingers slid easily along his back as far as she could reach across his shoulders as she continued to lightly glide them over him.
The pressure built and K'Shai soon became aware of the nodules along his shaft hardening; a process she had quickly come to learn meant not only that he was getting near his peak arousal, but that he would be triggered into a sort of frenzy as he pleasured himself, which to her, seemed rather like the urge was beyond his control, drawing on pure instinctual drive.
It was just then that R'chnt paused in his thrusting. She held still and listened to him exhale a long, slow, deep breath, channeling his inner control as he tucked his body tighter against hers. She tenderly wrapped her arms tighter around him and waited, before he began again, slowly withdrawing himself and smoothly easing back in, overriding the natural urge to mate in a fury as if she might fight him away in the final moments.
K'Shai moaned loudly at the sensation tickling her tract from end to end, the rigid skin along R'chnt's shaft gliding over every detail of her body, eliciting a shock that made her tense her legs and squeeze him tightly while she howled and he joined her in bellowed moan.
"Alright, K'Shai?" He asked is well articulated English, though the lack of inflictions in his voice made the words sound more like a statement than a question.
Unable to even produce a sound, K'Shai nodded vigorously and simply tightened her grip around his shoulders again, gaping her mouth open, trying to catch a breath, only able to moan in his ear as he continued on sliding smoothly back and forth, the hurry and guttural growling gone, replaced by a pleasured and relaxed place, deep purr, and overwhelming sensations.
He withdrew and thrusted in a smooth, easy pace, never rushing. His body glistened with sweat as he worked to forcibly shove away his natural aggressive urges and maintain a consistent, steady pace, letting both their bodies throb in overwhelmed sensation.
K'Shai panted and groaned in wild delight as she felt her body fill with his load while he cooed and huffed, jaws pressed against her temple before they both finally relaxed. Her body was still shaking and trembling as he withdrew after a short rest.
R'chnt had gone almost placid and carefully laid over her, keeping himself in close contact with her, sharing his body heat, but staying elevated enough that he did not crush her.
Once they were able to find enough rigidity in their muscles to stand up, R'chnt guided K'Shai once again through the city, past the industrial park at the outer edge, and into the woods. This time, he tracked along the river, instead of taking her to it for more fishing.
He moved cautiously and slowly, crouching lower and lower as he went and indicated for K'Shai to follow exactly before he slipped into silence. They approached a small clearing in the woods and looking ahead, K'Shai spotted a deer tenderly stepping towards the water for a drink.
Her heart fluttered as R'chnt showed her how to stalk the animal, setting her in a position in front of him, silently guiding her exactly how to raise the spear. She was silently sure he was sure she would miss, but he guided her all the same. He paused and she held still.
The young buck, so close to them that K'Shai could see his tiny button emergence of antlers atop his head, was amazingly oblivious to their approach. R'chnt motioned and instantly, K'Shai drew back.
The deer noticed her movement and raised his head in alarm, turning its large brown eyes towards her. It froze as K'Shai pressed the weapon forward, sending it flying.
The spear was light, well suited to her size and easy for her to carry. Like an oversized dart with a lethal tip, it was clearly a weapon made for hunting, more than sparring. It was so slender that it barely seemed suitable for the large hands of a Yautja.
It was sharp, though, made of lightweight metal that K'Shai was certain could probably slice through steel with ease. Its deadliness was of no question, like the Yautja.
K'Shai watched the spear fly silently in the direction she launched it, with as much ease as a paper airplane, halfway making her wonder if the thing had hidden thrusters somewhere on it. She was getting better at impaling fish from several feet away, but the young buck was well over twenty meters away.
The spear, though, did not seem to care about the distance. It performed its job as well as its user could direct it.
The deer shifted sideways and prepared to bound away in the same instant that the spear slid cleanly into its side. It was not a killing blow, but K'Shai felt a momentary thrill that she had even hit the animal, knowing suddenly that her group was most certainly going to eat well that night.
The buck bolted away, leaping clumsily into the river, thrown off by the impact, then its nimble legs pushed the animal away from the water and up the embankment into the woods, spear sticking out of its abdomen at an angle.
Immediately R'chnt was up and after it and K'Shai remained hot on his heels. The deer, full of shock, fear, and adrenaline combined with grace and agility that a human could never possess, was too quick for her to keep up with, but R'chnt caught up to the animal with unwavering focus.
K'Shai bolted to the spot and found the animal down, R'chnt crouched over it. He had not killed it, he had tackled it down. The spear was still sticking out of the creature, and K'Shai suddenly felt a horrific wave of guilt knowing what the poor thing's last moments of life were like, simultaneously wondering how many deer there even were left on the planet, and feeling doubly guilty for killing this one.
R'chnt moved quickly, grabbing a knife from his waist and calling to her sharply to take it. He directed her with a stabbing motion exactly where to insert the blade and K'Shai heard the bones of its skull crunch as the sharp weapon pierced it.
The deer stopped moving instantly. K'Shai could feel her hands trembling. She suddenly felt flush and weak and dropped to her knees next to R'chnt.
She had certainly killed her share of animals before, but that had always been with a rifle, from a distance. There was no way she would have ever even managed to approach a deer so closely without R'chnt's guidance and direction, and there was something about killing it with hand weapons that made the kill so personal it was unnerving.
This was very different than spearing a fish.
K'Shai remained morbidly silent as R'chnt lifted the carcass and carried the kill for her, directing her out of the woods.
He filled the silence of the late afternoon air with a story about a kill of his own that had been injured but managed to evade him for more than a day before he caught up with it, though he did pridefully admit that it was when he quite young, as if to imply that such things would never happen anymore.
"We honor our prey, K'Shai, with quick kills. Creatures for food must not suffer. Stalk quietly, select your target, kill quickly."
K'Shai mulled the words over then blurted out the question before she could stop herself, instantly regretting it.
"Is that how you hunt humans?"
R'chnt stopped and fell alarmingly still and silent for a moment. He lowered the carcass to the ground and turned to face K'Shai, the black depthless eyes of his biohelmet locking in on her. She braced her back straight and took in a deep, slow breath.
"M'di," he said simply.
He had no doubt that at some point such a conversation would come up and he had already pondered how he was going to handle it when it did.
She had already seen, touched, and recognized adornments on his neck sashes and on his belt that were trophies of hunts on her world; the pendants around his neck that she had once called dog tags; the human half skull that adorned the sheath to his sword, the shredded flag he retrieved from one battle, and the bones of a finger that had pulled the trigger on a weapon that damaged him once.
He was proud of his kills, proud of his trials and hunts on her world, the injuries they left and the skulls and weapons he collected, which someday, he hoped, she would see upon the walls of his ship and home, though she may never feel the same sense of pride in them, he recognized.
The question sent a ripple through him that brought him to a halt, and suddenly, all the forethought he put into a proper response to this subject seemed completely insufficient.
It was far easier for him to envision how he would puff up his chest, swell his pride, and regale her with tales of the human prey he stalked and killed when he had not grown to know her as he did. It was easier for him to think up dismissive half-answers and vague generalizations when she was not staring directly at him with a wary gaze welling up in her, after he had come to know, to want, to enjoy her company and her body.
He sighed and unclicked his helmet from the computer system and atmospheric controls, removing it from his head. He tucked it under his arm and crouched to the ground, balancing solidly on his large, flat feet.
He did not break his gaze back at her, and she eyed him patiently, apprehensively, waiting for further information.
"To hunt a creature that hunts you back, you already know," he said factually, keeping his words slow so she could understand them, and watching his tone carefully, "is a very different kind of thing."
She said nothing and for a moment, he wondered if she had understood his words or perhaps he needed to explain in her own language, which would have been difficult.
"K'Shai, kei'thin-de?" He questioned after a moment of silence.
She swallowed and nodded that she understood, still motionless, a dozen or so feet away from him, her eyes sinking down to the carcass of the deer he helped her hunt, kill, just so she could gain experience and feed her friends.
She had not meant to interrogate him on the subject of killing humans. She did not mean for the words to spew from her as they did, and she realized after the fact that they even had an uncontrolled bit of sarcasm and bitterness, which clearly he picked up on. He crouched before her trying to reduce his size as he figured out a way to respond, making her feel even more guilty.
She knew exactly what the Yautja were. What R'chnt was. She had not intended to imply accusation or blame or even the slightest hint of hate. Her heart shuddered at the thought and she was sure her hands were shaking.
She knew he had learned valuable lessons that he probably never imagined he even needed, or wanted, to learn during this hunt. She knew his age. For four hundred and thirty years he had been born, raised, walked, talked, and hunted Yautja.
He was a killer, a hunter, a warrior, a wise leader and teacher of hunters and warriors and killers. Fair game was fair game and for a Yautja, no species was off the menu or trophy wall, if they were hunted appropriate to the beliefs of the culture that they adhered so strictly to.
And yet, here was R'chnt, crouched before her in a clearly submissive gesture, trying his best to work his way around a conversation that was uncomfortable for both of them, because he had come to value her, equally as much as she did him.
She simply wished she could go back two minutes and stop herself from blurting out the words.
"What's it like?" She spoke in a shaky whisper, trying to fill the uncomfortable silence with the only thing currently on her mind.
R'chnt tipped his head, carefully watching her. He glanced to the deer and then back to her.
"It is challenging. You stalk. You watch. You choose the prey that will offer the best fight."
He spoke clearly, slowly, keeping his voice in a careful monotone. He tried to remain as diplomatic as possible, sticking to facts, but he would not lie to K'Shai; it was not part of his nature.
He was proud to have hunted the human prey he had, and there had been a part of him that was disappointed that the world would be closed for further hunting in light of what had happened to it.
"How do you know? How can you tell?" She asked, more comfortable now with the flow of the discussion.
"K'Shai, we hunt those that already display a will to defend themselves. Prey that wield weapons, lay traps, try to evade or stand directly to us." He informed her. "We know by watching. A good hunter watches. Studies the prey, learns about what he is hunting."
She licked her lips and nodded, silently acknowledging she understood his words, although she was still trying to absorb them.
She had done things in the last year she would never have done if she had gone to fashion school. She had killed people, but she justified it as actions of self-defense or humane necessity.
Doing so had made her sick to her stomach for days, unwilling to eat, and uninterested in even leaving the safety of her group. Somewhere along the way, she was not sure when, she had put aside the gut-wrenching feelings of those memories, but suddenly they all welled up again.
She could not imagine hunting down and killing a person for pleasure and enjoyment. The very same actions that made one species criminal, glorified the other.
The Yautja had very different views that she was only beginning to understand when it came to culture, spirituality, honor, and morality. Her eyes scanned over R'chnt's body, across the trophy adornments from Earth that he wore, which reflected his age and history, then settled on the deer carcass as she tried to figure out why she felt the way she did for killing it.
R'chnt waited for a moment to see if she had anything to add, and then continued on.
"When intelligent prey offers a challenge, it is an experience like no other." He paused, trying to keep the tone of his voice in check. "Your species, when forced to use wits instead of fleeing as instinct drives, are difficult to kill."
He added in quickly, trying to cover up what could have easily sounded like an insult, which was not his intention, "cunning and ferocious; incredibly challenging."
K'Shai did not move or respond. He ticked his mandibles together in consideration for a moment and then arced his body slightly to reveal an old scar on his left flank.
"They leave their own scars, and they have killed our kind before." He said.
Her eyes dropped to the scar. It was round, puckered in; the faded white lines of the scar tissue crawled away from the center like spiderwebs, barely noticeable against the mottled pale hues of his hide.
She had run her fingers across that scar many times without consideration of how he had acquired it. Suddenly, her posture relaxed and she approached him, lightly running her fingers across the scar.
"A human did this to you?" She asked in a whisper, eyes still locked on her fingertips over the wound.
"Yes." He said simply.
"Did you kill him?" She asked.
R'chnt stifled an amused grin.
"I would not be here otherwise."
She pressed her lips together and nodded softly, then lifted her eyes to his.
"Did you enjoy it?"
R'chnt paused, thinking quickly to the finger bone he wore off his neck; the finger that had pulled the trigger on the weapon that caused the scar. His mind flickered quickly to the skull on display in his ship; a proud kill.
"Yes." He said simply.
He reached for her face, touching it delicately with his massive, clawed hand and K'Shai shut her eyes and tipped her cheek readily into her palm. He leaned in towards her, softly caressing her, feeling her delicate skin under his calloused fingertips as he traced her tiny chin, stroked her lips and slid his palm securely under chin.
"I would never hurt you, K'Shai." He said simply.
She reached for his face, running her fingers along his jaw, and stroking the quills that grew near his temple as she leaned into him and whispered.
"I know."
She breathed heavily, relaxing for the first time throughout the moment and kissed him slowly, wrapping her arms around his shoulders as far as they could reach over the frame of his protective armor and shoulder cannon, which currently slung low, pointing down.
R'chnt inhaled her scent and found himself instantly aroused, clicking invitingly before he shook his head, trying to focus his mind.
"I will teach you. For as long as the gods allow our Paths to be one. I will teach you to hunt, to fight. When you are ready, you may find yourself hunting intelligent prey."
"Oh," K'Shai exclaimed dismissively. "I could never hunt a human."
"There are other intelligent creatures in the universe than just humans and Yautja." He said with a chuckle; a sort of you didn't think we were the only ones, did you type of tone.
He stood, extended his hand to hers as he did, to direct her to her feet before he stepped away, silently wondering what power it was that she held over him to distract him so fully with her scent and touch.
"Oh, wait." She said in a delicate whisper. "Come over here."
She reached for him and pulled a tiny insect off his shoulder, crimping it between her thumb and forefinger.
"Tick." She said. "Nasty little buggers. Carry diseases. They bite you and you can get very sick."
"A Yautja would not get sick." He said proudly, elevating his chin slightly.
She looked at him in surprise. "You've never been sick? Gotten some kind of virus from an alien bug bite or something?"
He clapped his solid palm against his chest, drawing a dull thumping sound. "Yautja strong. Healthy. Meaningless bug."
She smiled, shaking her head slowly side to side as she stepped on.
"Well, that's lucky. We have to get inoculations just to go to a new country." She muttered.
He did not understand her quickly spoken alien words, but she explained further during the walk back.
They returned to the camp and pulled to a halt some distance away from the human group, but not out of sight. R'chnt ignored the quickly growing crowd of alien spectators that had noticed them approach and began to shuffle out of the building to watch them or eye the food they brought with them.
He noticed K'Shai's two companions daring to come the closest, but paid them no mind as he showed her with slow maneuvers, how to tie, secure, and suspend the carcass.
She watched as R'chnt dropped the deer to the ground, withdrew some deceivingly narrow tether from a small reel hidden on his belt and strung the deer up for her from a street lamp.
The tether, made from braided metal strands of the very same metal that the Yautja's awu'asa hunting armor was made from, could not be cut by anything other than Yautja weapons so far as she knew. It was nearly as thin as fishing line, yet it could suspend hundreds of pounds of weight without fail.
R'chnt lowered the animal down so she could reach it from the very end of the strung up hind legs to the tip of its nose, almost on the ground.
He withdrew a long blade from its holster on his belt and growled slightly, making a show of it for the onlooking humans. K'Shai glanced towards Lewis and Carlos who halted their approach and watched warily.
She offered a thin smile towards them and then paid careful attention to R'chnt's instruction. He handed her the blade and directed her in gutting, bleeding out, skinning, and carving the deer for cooking.
With the thrill and subsequent shaky feelings of the hunt behind her, carving the animal up came easily. She had done it before, many times, just not the way he was showing her. The blade slid smoothly under the hide and she cut it away as he directed, ensuring that she learned how to do it without damaging the pelt.
He instructed her that Yautja utilized every bit of their kills; even the bones, and had managed to make a not-so-vague series of comments about the human propensity to waste everything they got their hands on. She had a hard time disagreeing with him on that point, and many others that he made.
Eventually, K'Shai and R'chnt made their way from the human group to the Yautja group then to the quiet of the bedroom in the early hours of the morning as rain moved in.
R'chnt still could not quite comprehend K'Shai's displeasure with the weather, but he followed her into the bedroom all the same, relaxing enough to strip down immediately upon entering her living chambers and quickly spurring her to do the same.
He had gotten used to sleeping in his awu'asa as a matter of necessity when on hunts, but humans, he noticed, seemed to always sleep in garments. It was just one of the many strange mannerisms he doubted he would ever understand.
She crooned her readiness at his stimulation, her scent filled his nasal passages, and he allowed himself to slip into the distracted state of mind she seemed to naturally create with her scent as he penetrated her. R'chnt growled with pleasure as he pumped her, rocking his hips slowly and easily, smoothly gliding himself into and out of her until he boiled into full arousal.
K'Shai was his mate; she was not going to fight him away or harm him in the process of taking her and she was not going to stop providing him the pleasure of her company.
She had explained to him that humans mated for life. She had made a silent commitment to him with her body. It was overwhelming news that he struggled to try to understand her explanation of, for it was so vastly different than the Yautja way.
It had only spurred him to make the same commitment to her, though she did not ask for it return. He had protected her before, and would continue to do so in the future in any way he could. She pleasured him and he returned her pleasure while providing her with training and safety.
Despite the glaring differences in the beliefs and cultures of both species, R'chnt somehow knew that it was a silent expectation she had of him, to provide for her if he could, in return for her tender touch.
As he released himself into her and she stroked her fingers delicately along his body, he realized that her touch had become a craving, a need, unlike any he had ever had before.