Her hands quickly locked behind his neck and she held on tightly, the wistful image of being a princess springing to mind for a full second.
Kavi’s footsteps were slow, testing the ground beneath him before going forward. His clear, intelligent gray eyes were focused ahead. Sounds of bird life echoed from the woods afar and the breeze that played with his hair almost sang her a lullaby.
Liana stared at Kavi’s rugged profile and tried hard not to feel gooey. But she was being embraced by a big, muscled, very attractive Foher. It was impossible to remain solid.
“I’m tired and I want to know where we’re going,” she said. His neck was huge under her linked hands and the warmth of it began to seep into her bones.
“We go home.”
“Where is home, Kavi?”
It was a while before he turned to stare deeply into her eyes. “Fohers have been looking for home for a hundred years.”
She stared at his rugged face, her heart constricting. She could relate to that on a certain level. She’d been torn away from her home nearly a decade ago, and now she barely remembered which direction home was. She was wandering aimlessly too, with no immediate plan for her life at all. She had no goal except surviving, no direction except where she was taken.
Maybe it was time she tried to find home too.
In the meantime, she just tucked her head under Kavi’s chin and sighed.
But it wasn’t fair that whenever Liana was walking, the group could go on for hours. And now that she was being given a nice, comfy ride—better than a first-class ticket anywhere—they paused to rest when they reached a wide clearing because the children were thirsty.
“You may get down, Liana,” Kavi said when he remained standing and she remained in his arms, swinging her feet and daydreaming of a cocktail.
“Hmm?”
“I will release you now.”
“Oh!”
Her flush turned crimson when he loosened his hold and let her body slowly slide down the length of his, his protuberant cock stroking a perfect line up her stomach. She was a second away from falling at his feet in a pile of melted bones before she had the mind to straighten and clear her throat. “Thank you.”
Galina, Ajay’s mate, had become Liana’s first real friend among the Fohers, and the only female among thirty who knew how to speak English. Now her dark-haired, muscular new friend stepped forward, tapping her shoulder and saying, “I will teach you to use a knife, yes?”
Liana stared down at the knife in Galina’s outstretched hand with uncertainty. It was bigger than the usual kitchen knives she was used to, the handle wider than her wrist, the tip glinting menacingly.
“She’s human, Galina,” Kavi said from behind Liana.
Liana snatched the knife from Galina’s hand, pivoting on her heel and pointing it directly at him. “I’ll have you know humans are capable of many things and cutting things for eating purposes is one of them!”
A lone eyebrow shot up in surprise then Kavi’s deep-throated chuckle skimmed up her flesh until she was covered in goose bumps. Even with the haughty look on his face he managed to look incredibly sexy—and she couldn’t stop the image that s
prang to mind of his tongue on her. And the memory of the enormous cock under his thick-skin breeches.
Galina tugged on her wrist. “Come. We go practice.”
Liana scowled at Kavi. “Somewhere he’s not!” she said accusingly.
Galina’s chocolate-brown eyes sparkled. “Yes.”
Liana stomped away as Kavi crossed his arms and watched her go. She was determined to show him she wasn’t completely useless—and if he wasn’t convinced after she herself killed and decapitated whatever unfortunate animal crossed her path, then she shouldn’t care less what a big tree like him thought!
Twigs snapped under her feet as she and Galina made their way into the rife, shadowed forest, sunlight barely slipping through the thickset branches high above. Oriana’s forests were those from dreams, with thousand-year-old trees reaching high toward the skies.
They succeeded in making Liana feel tiny. A little dot in the whole universe.
“What’s mipe, anyway?” she asked.
Even though she was big and healthy, Galina walked soundlessly through the trees in a way that had made Liana eerily uncomfortable at first. Her hair was the same dark, rich color of the bark on the trees around them, and as it fell loose past her shoulders and down to her waist, it provided decent camouflage, letting her blend in with the wilderness.