Drelix

My mouth feels like Daeos slept with his wing in it. I smack my crusty lips uncomfortably and wonder why someone is dancing on my head.

"Look what's awake." I open one eye to see Crystal at the controls of the flyer. She isn't looking at me. "The universe's biggest liar."

I groan and roll onto my back, running my hand over my abdomen as I attempt to work out what happened and why my mate is flying my ship.

"Wha-?" My tongue fails to comply with instructions to form complete words.

Crystal looks down at me, presses something on the control console, then jumps out of the seat, thumping down next to my head.

She crouches down, eyes raking over me. Her incredible scent rolls in, sending my body into a paralysis I've never experienced before. She takes hold of my jaw and moves my head from side to side.

"Oh dear, it has got you bad, hasn't it?"

"Veno-m?"

"Something called paraxio, not venom. Not as far as I know."

I drop my head back and try to release smoke. It doesn't come, and I don't get the relief. Instead, the embers in my accelerant sacs burn.

My relief at finding I've not been envenomated by my mate is tempered with confusion. How have I ended up in the grip of paraxio? I don't like the drug. I wouldn't take it voluntarily. I wouldn't take it as I have a mate to enjoy and protect.

I huff at Crystal, wanting to speak but not being able to get to the point of doing so.

She glares at me. I find I make a noise I haven't done since I was a sarkarnling, because I want her to like me.

"Are you…?" Crystal shifts position as the noise reaches her, but her features soften. "Are you purring?"

I'm not sure what purring is, but if she likes the noise, I will keep doing it. I'd do anything for her.

Crystal shakes her head. "Just when I thought things couldn't get any weirder," she mutters. "I'm still angry with you." Her glare returns briefly. "But it can wait until you're capable of groveling properly. Come on."

She slides an arm under my shoulders and moves me into a sitting position before helping me to my feet.

My head spins. I grab onto the nearby pilot seat.

"Oh no, you don't get to fly in your state. Now you're up, you're going somewhere you can't cause any damage."

I want to argue, but at the same time, Crystal has her warm hands on my torso, and she smells so good, I'd do anything she asked me to, even if it meant cutting of one of my limbs. I let her help me into the rear of the flyer, through into my small sleeping quarters where she shoves me onto the bed.

She didn't reckon on me taking hold of her wrist and pulling her down with me. My mate squeaks beautifully as she lands squarely on my chest. I make the noise again as I shove my head into her hair and inhale.

"Beautiful."

"Are you kidding me?" Crystal squirms out of my grip. "You lied to me, Drelix, about the bite. Turns out you're just horny."

"S'my rut, heartsfire. Can't help…" I wish my voice would comply with my thoughts. "Need you."

Crystal stands in the doorway to my sleeping quarters, arms folded, and I might not know much about humans, or females, but nothing about her looks like she might acquiesce to my rut. My heart drops alongside my hope.

"Sleep it off, Drelix. We'll talk when we get to Trefa."

I want to go after her, but there's a blanket here filled with her scent, and I can almost imagine my mate is here in my arms. With that thought warming my heart and my head, it's not long before the sound of the engine extracts unconsciousness.

A stuttering,juddering movement shakes me awake. My head pounds, but it's clear, or just about. The flyer jumps, and I'm out of my bed, racing through to the cockpit. Ahead, looming large, is a red-brown planet.

Trefa.

"What's going on?" I demand.

"Oh, it lives," Crystal says, leaning out of the pilot's chair and looking me up and down. "I put out water for you. You should hydrate." She points to a canteen on the co-pilot's chair.

I am extremely thirsty. The need for the water wars with the need to know exactly what's happening.

Thirst wins out. I grab the canteen and suck down the life-giving water.

"Bloody hell, Drelix, slow down," Crystal says. "Don't choke on it. I don't want to have to drag your carcass back to bed."

I finish off the canteen, and panting for breath, I turn to her, wiping my mouth on the back of my hand, well aware some of the contents have sluiced down my body.

"The only creature on this ship being carried back to the sleeping chamber is you, little morsel."

"Someone's confident." Crystal averts her eyes from me, looking out through the cockpit. "Someone who is a massive liar about a claiming bite should not be so confident he's going to get what he wants in the bedroom."

It's then it all comes flooding back, horribly.

The Yetag trader, the poisoned drink…the confession. The fact I was drugged with paraxio…

I have nevved up hugely. Instead of Crystal finding out the bite isn't what actually claims her, it is our mating, she thinks I made it all up.

The ship shakes hard again.

"What the nev is going on?"

"We're being chased by salvagers," Crystal says. "They're trying to take out our engine."

"Why?"

"Because I used your fucking huge cannon to take three of them out when we left Station X42 and now they're a bit mad," Crystal says carelessly. "Who has a cannon that big attached to their ship anyway?" she adds.

"You did what?"

"In my defense, I was also trying to get them away from the station." Crystal puts her hand over her breast and my rut temporarily loses control. "They've been causing problems for a while."

"I don't care," I snarl. "I don't want them chasing us. We don't need the attention."

Crystal sighs. "I had hoped I'd lose them in the nebula, but it wasn't to be."

"What nebula?" My head pounds at me and anger boils in my veins, not helped in the slightest by the mating mix which constantly threatens to send me spiraling and my cock emerging from my pouch.

The feeling of lost time claws at me, along with far too many missing parts of my memory. It only makes me angrier.

I take hold of Crystal and lift her easily out of the pilot's chair, sliding myself into it and dumping her on my lap as I take the controls.

"What are you doing?" she exclaims, wriggling wildly.

"Unleashing my Sarkarnii. No one threatens me or mine and gets away with it."