***** Author's Note *****
Be advised: This chapter contains content that may be explicit. Read at your own discretion with the tags/rating of this story in mind. If you do not want to read such content, a summary of important plot details is available at the end of the chapter.

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99

Frosty dew was beginning to settle all around, but Alaesia couldn't even feel it as it clung to her eyelashes. Steam rose from Ar-Tashk's thick mane as he moved through the woods as silent as a shadow.

How she had missed the feeling of his strength to hold her, how perfectly safe he kept her from anything that crept through the dark. This was what she had been so desperate for in the village, and she had not the heart to put it to words; it was not just the heat the olog exuded that warmed her. A terrible fire was building within her that she feared would melt her into his arms as he strode purposefully through the darkened woods, clutching her close to his chest.

Alaesia's fingers moved, as if they had a mind of their own, tracing across the blackened scars above Ar-Tashk's heart. His heartbeat beat wasn't fast at first, but the pulse quickened as she shifted more upright in his arms.

The olog paused as he felt her practically climbing him to perch like a bird upon his forearm, standing to press her face into his chest.

She breathed deeply, trying to absorb the moment, to take a picture in her mind she could cherish forever. He smelled iron and blood, Mordor's touch clung to him like a parasite, but it was masked beneath sweeter smells of pine and earth. She couldn't fathom how long he must have been lingering around the forest to pick up such a scent. His skin near his clavicle was softer than the rest of his hide, and it seemed to grow warmer too at the touch of her lips. The woman's hands dug into his mane, disappearing into the thick of it. She could feel him curl in pleasure at the touch as she stroked his neck.

"Az bolk lat... I... I need you," her voice wavered, hesitant and unsure of the black tongue. But all it took was that single whisper, breath tickling his skin, to send chills down his spine.

Ar-Tashk's pale eyes flashed dangerously, and he snatched her wrist with his free hand to stop her, with a low warning growl, "NAR. Az fulakat lat."

"I know you won't..." Her green eyes glittered in the dappled moonlight, as she pleaded softly, "Please... Every night I've had to spend alone, I've had nightmares. He haunts me. I.. I don't want to only ever know his touch. I need to know I'm not dreaming. I need to know you are real."

"Isla... Nar... Not ask that..." The olog took a sharp breath and knelt to place her on the ground.

He bowed low, bringing his forehead to hers as he grit his teeth.

Why didn't she believe he was real? He wondered. Did that mean she had dreamt of him before? Was it like the waking dreams she cried out from in terror? Or something else, the peaceful dreams of sleep, safe and warm in one's den? The idea that Alaesia might have been waiting for him in her dreams nearly split his heart in two.

Ar-Tashk could hear the fluttering breath in her lungs, feel her heartbeat thrumming faster, scent the desire that rose within her. It was a scent he had never truly known before. This was nothing like the brief encounter, cut short in the cave, where he'd desperately hoped she wanted him the way he wanted her. No, this was not tainted by compulsion or manipulation. This was something pure; a honeyed poison he knew he shouldn't indulge in, but so temptingly sweet to create a rise of heat within his gut. "Az ful urdan."

"Please..." Alaesia whispered again, feeling his arms begin to shift around her.

His hands gathered her with ease, and he pressed his face into her chest to let out a scalding hot breath, before lifting her to rest against a hillock at the base of an old oak tree. The whole thing was carpeted in a thick layer of moss that almost seemed to swallow her up as she sank into the soft plant growth.

A humming sigh parted her lips as the moss around her compressed beneath Ar-Tashk's weight as he knelt, braced by his hands on either side of her. If it hadn't been for her cloak, the frost likely would have chilled her to her bones, but the olog was plenty warm for the both of them. It was too warm, even!

Alaesia could feel her face filling with heat as Ar-Tashk purred deeply and started to find his way with a hand under her skirt to resume the explorations he had once started. She squirmed, trying to unbuckle the belt holding her dress wrapped around her, hoping he wouldn't destroy it, but his touch sliding up her inner thigh made it so difficult to concentrate.

Alaesia whimpered, causing Ar-Tashk's hand to tense against the meat of her leg; softer and fuller than he last recalled. His breathing stuttered, "Znugat..."

"No... You've done nothing wrong..." The broach of her cloak had easily come undone, along with the rest of her clothing, allowing it to slip from her shoulders, and granting the cold night air intimate proximity to her sensitive skin. Alaesia reached up, grabbing Ar-Tashk's face with her hands, and pulling to invite him closer so he might guard her against the elements. He didn't need any extra coaxing to discard his own clothing and armor.

Alaesia couldn't help, as the olog unbuckled his belts, that the clattering of metal rivets and studs made her tense. But she stifled the lump it summoned to her throat quickly, desperately.

As his armor fell away, Ar-Tashk's hand moved up, sliding under the small of her back and lifting Alaesia's body to his lips. She shivered as her stomach flipped; how was it that this giant could be so different than everything she had experienced before? His touch was so gentle, so warm.

Nothing like the yellow-eyed...

She shook her head and swallowed thickly, trying to force the comparison from her mind. It took all of her willpower to suppress the instinct that welled up in her to flee, instead focusing her attention on capturing the picture of Ar-Tashk's face bowed before her in her mind.

His neck was riddled with the burn scars she had inflicted, claw marks tracked across limbs and body; his once-singed mane had grown in full, thick, and wild. He was a truly beastly sight, a predator bred for lands much crueler and dangerous than these. The wicked tusks framing his mouth made his face look like the stuff of nightmares. But as she had come to realize on their flight out of Mordor, it was the face of a monster that had protected her every step of the way; whose loss she had wept for over the whole of winter; whose strength she longed for in a land foreign to her.

She wanted nothing more than to put all of her trust in him now. Let that uruk be erased. Scour the memory of his touch from my skin. Rewrite his claim as your own. Make me forget that pain. Please...

Her body burned at such thoughts.

Ar-Tashk paused to glance up at her when she gave a slight jump as his mouth brushed over her perked breasts, worried he might have hurt or frightened her; but this wasn't the time to change her mind or let doubts creep in. Her scent could not lie; what once was full of fear, now carried hardly a trace of it. She chose him, she wanted him. The taste of desire, warm and heady, coming from her made Ar-Tashk's breath roll from his lungs in powerful, rumbling gusts.

Alaesia arched towards him to taunt and entice him, allowing the olog to take her breast into his lips. She moaned as he sucked and pulled, sending sparks to her stomach, only adding to the building heat between her legs. It was horrible, a teasing heat that she had never experienced before. The sampling she had coaxed from him in the mountain cave was unfathomably incomparable. This felt like she was melting like ice before a fire. It was like a burn she could not ease.

For a moment, worry flashed through her, that such a sensation might be something wrong with her until Ar-Tashk brought his free hand down and pressed hard against her mound with one of his thick fingers. She winced in anticipation of the pain she thought was to be expected of such intimate violation, but it never arrived. His hand was rough, but not unpleasantly so as he started to draw back and forth around the burning spot with long strokes. His touch grew slicker with each pass until she was writhing in rhythm with his movements. Nothing was wrong at all, it was her body screaming with need for him.

Ar-Tashk exhaled a hot breath against the breast in his mouth, and moved the other, not wanting to play favorites. The hand behind her back manipulated his toy with ease, but she seemed more than willing to play along. Her hips lifted involuntarily, making his body respond in kind, like puppets pulling each others' strings. His hips shifted slightly, seeking of their own accord...

No... He couldn't take her that way; not if he wanted to avoid injuring her.

After tending to her breasts, an angry throb made a growl ripple from his throat and he moved down with his lips drawing the length of her scarred abdomen carefully so as to not introduce any new cuts to her soft skin. His tusks were still among the many vicious natural weapons he had to mind. The memory of tasting her blood at her throat churned in him, torn between his lust and hunger; controlling either was a battle in and of itself.

He was painfully aware of just how easily he could break her, but he couldn't fight his own needs. If there was a way he could devour her without doing any real harm...

Alaesia felt Ar-Tashk lift her with one swift move taking her in both of his hands and holding her intimately to his mouth. She flushed blazing red, and twisted in protest, but he held her fast and drew his tongue between her lips while eyeing her with those piercing white eyes of his, wild with starvation.

She whined when he withdrew, making the hulking brute grin and thrust his tongue against her again working slowly back and forth to find purchase.

The threshold of the heat between her legs being utterly trampled by Ar-Tashk's tongue only served to rile the fire until she felt like she was going to go mad. Then finally, he crossed it. The tip of Ar-Tashk's thick tongue plunged into her, making her cry out in a mixture of alarm and pleasure. He sucked hard, raking the rasp of his tongue up and back inside, making her moan and gasp, "Hhhnng... Ar...Tashk...!"

Her whole body felt like it was alive with lightning, but he wasn't done teasing her yet. Ar-Tashk lowered her back to her cloak on the ground and started to work her with his hand again. Alaesia danced according to his desire, puppeted by his touch; lifting when he wanted her to, pressing back against his hand when he wasn't giving her enough. He slowly ground his hand against her slick folds until finding her welcoming his finger.

For a moment, Alaesia tensed, but Ar-Tashk stroked her hair, while murmuring softly to calm her, granting him access.

His finger slid slowly, but firmly, into her, filling and stretching her lips. At the first sign of resistance, he slowed, waiting for her to relax again. Then the real fun could start. His finger and thumb shifted to work counter to each other as he built a slow tempo both inside and out.

Alaesia's breath shallowed, matching his pattern. She had expected pain, force, blood. But none of that came. Instead his touch filled her all the right ways. It was brutal in his own way, almost too much all at once, but it felt so good. He felt too good!

She wondered, why it felt like she had to fight that burning sensation so badly, why it was becoming so unbearable! Alaesia lost all power in her voice, devolving to tortured moans as Ar-Tashk easily lifted her with the hand under her hips to rotate so she was placed astride the barrel of his chest. His finger was still buried deep within her flicking against her wet silk interior as he took himself with his free hand, stroking long and hard with raw, visceral power. He matched the motion to his finger, and the building contractions inside Alaesia's lips, conducting both hands with precision.

Alaesia felt like she was going to explode at any second. Her heart was racing, her breath short and labored to the point of dizziness.

Ar-Tashk's throat rumbled, as he read her face.

She was close, but she reached out, pressing a hand against his chest to pause him. He glanced at her, worried he might have gone too far, when she tried to pull off his hand. But it seemed his worries were unfounded as she barely managed to say once more, "I... said... I need you..."

"NAR," Ar-Tashk frowned, bearing his fangs in an attempt to get her to back down from the idea. Why did she have to be so stubborn?! And moreover, why was it so hard to refuse! "No. I hurt you..."

Even as he said it, his hand was moving as if of its own accord, pulling gently out even as her wet lips clung to his finger. She whimpered needily, hating the emptiness of his absence. They moved in tandem, though Ar-Tashk tried to stop himself, as his Isla positioned her hips over his.

He couldn't let her do this... It was too dangerous!

Alaesia felt his tip brush teasingly between her legs. She pressed down, demanding more friction, only to gasp as Ar-Tashk's hips jolted involuntarily and rammed his length upwards. He took desperate, explicit care to only slide across the outside folds of her lips, rasping the slick until her wetness coated him and causing the olog to moan angrily.

Alaesia could see the agonized expression on his face becoming more severe; he had wanted her as badly as she wanted him, but he had fought his desire far longer than she had. While hers was a newfound, frighteningly spontaneous need, she knew he had suppressed his urges for so long, all for the sake of her own well-being. She didn't want to deny him now.

On his next pass, Alaesia tilted the angle of her hips to capture him. The tip of his member entered her like a sword to a sheath, guided home by its long, sharp point until his girth wouldn't allow him any deeper. The olog's whole body under her tensed, as if struck by an electric shock. The rock of his movement slowed causing him to quake with restrained energy, desperately holding back the desire to thrust entirely into her, to prevent himself from splitting her in two. The strength of his hands gripping her tightened as he tried to snarl a protest, but she had bewitched him, stealing any desire to stop her.

At first, Alaesia was afraid she might have actually angered him, but the olog's head tilted back as he purred, eyes closed as he took in the moment. A faint smile threatened to pinch at her cheeks as she lowered herself against him. He held perfectly still, except for his hands, simultaneously bracing and fondling her.

If she was so insistent, then it was better to let her have control.

Alaesia felt herself stretch over him, eliciting a tiny aching whine in her throat. How could she ever have known how such a sensation would only add to the impatient demand of the fire building within her? The narrow spear point of his tip easily reached the back of her soft interior as she pushed down on him, while the width of his shaft stretched her near to her limit. That wonderful pressure radiated up and down as she slowly began to move.

Ar-Tashk flexed his muscles sharply, causing his member to curl inside Alaesia and stroke against that burning spot within her belly, nearly making her lose her balance. Pleasure wracked both at the cries the movement drew from each of them, making it impossible for Ar-Tashk to stop himself from doing it again to taunt her back as she had taunted him. If he couldn't go deeper, feeling her clench and ripple around his tip as he teased her was a torture he would willingly endure.

Alaesia's tiny fire was only fueled by the olog's control of her. He could manipulate her any way he wanted, and that thought was intoxicating for how his whole world seemed to be consumed with her. She quivered as he flexed again, rubbing against the bloom at the apex of her interior. She pressed back, a pale attempt to goad him, only to be met by his own twitch which dared her to challenge him.

Ar-Tashk could feel her tightening around him, sucking at his tip, begging for him; he wasn't one to refuse. The rhythm was building, growing harder, faster. Alaesia whimpered and whined, squirming to press him deeper as suddenly her whole body shuttered and flooded with insatiable lust.

Pleasure leapt from her lips as a sound that made her olog respond in kind; the buzz of unfamiliar ecstacy making her toes curl.

Her muscles clamped down locking around Ar-Tashk, inviting him to join her.

He couldn't help himself.

Even as she writhed top him in her own bliss, Ar-Tashk bucked upwards, thrusting once more, just a little deeper into her, making her let out a faint cry of pleasure, surprise, and pain, before his own dam cracked and unleashed the waiting torrent. He gripped her hips in both hands as he filled her with his heat. A scalding burst rushed into Alaesia's abdomen, pulsing with each twitch of his muscles and threatening to overflow. It was too much!

Alaesia felt like she was going to collapse. Her arms and legs were shaking like they might snap at any second if not for Ar-Tashk's strong arms holding her upright until he finished with a guttural moan. He lowered her gently to his chest, even as he was still planted firmly inside her. Every pulse of Ar-Tashk's heartbeat made him swell just a little, an echo as the highs of their pleasure slowly lulled to a lingering buzz.

Ar-Tashk huffed, leaning back against the hillock to take in the frost-chilled air, hoping it might clear the vicious hunger roaring through his mind. He could have taken her again, right then and there, just to carve the sensation of having her into his skin and body.

It was so surreal.

As much as she had begged to have him prove she wasn't dreaming, he wasn't even sure that it wasn't he who was dreaming. He had her, in ways he never dreamed he could have! He hadn't harmed, maimed, or killed her! Every threat the Voice had ever made, the visions it had tortured him with were nothing but empty air to him now.

She wanted him as he wanted her. He had had her and she was ALIVE! None of his attempts to drive her away, back to her own people, had stopped her. She had sought him out in the dangerous wilds beyond the safety of the caravan, the village, and her own kind.

His Alaesia had chosen him, above all else, even given herself, to HIM!

Alaesia could feel her monster purr through her whole, naked body, as he wrapped his hands around her like a blanket, shielding her from anything that would do her harm. It felt right, basking in the warmth and glow between them. It felt like home.

***** Translations *****

Az bolk lat - I need you

NAR. Az fulakat lat - NO. I'll hurt you

Isla - Lifemaker

Nar - Don't

Az ful urdan - I'll lose control

Znugat... - Sorry...