The Valley of Horses (Earth's Children 2)

“I want to Pleasure you,” she said.

“Ayla, it pleases me so much to give you Pleasure—I don’t know how it could possibly please me more for you to Pleasure me.”

“Will it please you less?” she asked.

Jondalar threw back his head, laughed, and took her in his arms. She smiled but wasn’t sure what had delighted him so.

“I don’t think anything you did could please me less.” Then, looking at her with his vibrant blue eyes, he said, “I love you, woman.”

“I love you, Jondalar. I feel love when you smile like that, with your eyes like that, and so much when you laugh. No one laughed in the Clan, and they did not like it when I did. I don’t ever want to live with people who will not let me smile or laugh.”

“You should laugh, Ayla, and smile. You have a beautiful smile.” She couldn’t help smiling at his words. “Ayla, oh, Ayla,” he said, burying his face in her neck and caressing her.

“Jondalar, I love when you touch me, and kiss in my neck, but I want to know what you like.”

He made a wry grin. “I can’t help myself—you ‘encourage’ me too much. What do you like, Ayla? Do to me what feels good to you.”

“Will you like it?”

“Try it.”

She pushed him back, then bent over to kiss him, opening her mouth and using her tongue. He responded, but held himself in check. Then she kissed his neck, flicking her tongue lightly. She felt him shiver a bit, and she looked at him, wanting confirmation.

“Does it please you?”

“Yes, Ayla, it pleases me.”

It did. Restraining himself under her tentative advances fired him more than he dreamed. Her light kisses seared through him. She was unsure of herself, as inexperienced as a girl who had reached puberty, but had not yet had First Rites—and no one was more desirable. Such tender kisses had more power to arouse than the most ardent and sensual caresses of more experienced women—because they were forbidden.

Most women were available to some degree; she was untouchable. The untried young woman could drive men, young and old, to a frenzy with secret caresses in dark corners of the cave. A mother’s worst fear was that her daughter would come into her womanhood just after the Summer Meeting, with a long winter to face before the next. Most girls had some experience by First Rites with kissing and fondling, and Jondalar had known it was not the first time for a few, though he would not disgrace them by revealing it.

He knew the appeal of those young women—it was part of his enjoyment of First Rites—and it was that appeal Ayla was exerting on him. She kissed his neck. He quivered and, closing his eyes, gave himself up to it.

She moved lower and made ticklish wet circles on his body, feeling her own excitement rising. It was almost torture for him, exquisite torture, part tickle and part searing stimulation. When she reached his navel, he couldn’t stop himself. He put his hands on her head and gently pushed her lower until she felt his hot shaft on her cheek. She was breathing hard, and drawing, pulling sensations reached deep. Her tickling tongue was more than he could bear. He guideed her head to his outstretched rigid organ. She looked up at him.

“Jondalar, do you want me to …”

“Only if you want to, Ayla.”

“It would please you?”

“It would please me.”

“I want.”

He felt a moist warmth enclose the end of his throbbing manhood, and then more than the end. He groaned. Her tongue explored the smooth round head, probed the small fissure, discovered the texture of the skin. When her first actions brought expressions of pleasure, she grew more confident. She was enjoying her explorations and felt her own throbbing inside. She circled his shape with her tongue. He called out her name, and she moved her tongue faster and felt wetness between her own legs.

He felt suction, and moist warmth moving up and down. “O Doni! Oh, woman! Ayla, Ayla! How did you learn to do that!”

She tried to discover how much she could hold, and she drew him in until she nearly gagged. His cries and moans encouraged her to try again, and again, until he was rising to meet her.

Then, sensing his need for her depths—and her own need as well—she rose, moved her leg over to straddle him, impaled herself on his full-girthed and extended member, and drew it into her. She arched her back and felt her Pleasure, as he penetrated deep.

He looked up at her and gloried in the sight. The sun behind her turned her hair into a golden nimbus. Her eyes were closed, her mouth open, and her face suffused with ecstasy. As she leaned back, her shapely breasts jutted forward, her slightly darker nipples pointing out. Her sinuous body glistened in the sun; his own manhood buried deep within was ready to burst with rapture.

She raised up along his shaft, and came down as he raised to meet her, and his breath caught. He felt a surge he couldn’t have controlled if he’d tried. He cried out when she rose again. She pushed against him, feeling a spurting wetness, as he shook with release.

He reached up and pulled her down, his mouth finding her nipple. After a while of drained contentment, Ayla rolled over. Jondalar got up, bent over to kiss her, then reached for both her breasts to nuzzle between them. He suckled one, then the other, and kissed her again. Then he relaxed beside her, cradling her head.

“I like to give you Pleasures, Jondalar.”

“No one has ever pleased me better, Ayla.”

“But you like it better when you Pleasure me.”

“Not better, exactly, but … how do you know me so well?”

“It is what you learned to do. It is your skill, like tool-making.” She smiled, then giggled. “Jondalar has two skills. He is a toolmaker and a woman-maker,” she said, looking pleased with herself.

He laughed. “You just made a joke, Ayla,” he said, smiling askance. It was a little too close to the truth, and the joke had been made before. “But you are right, I love to give you Pleasures, I love your body, I love all of you.”

“I like it when you Pleasure me, too. It makes love fill up inside me. You can Pleasure me as much as you want, only, sometimes, I want to Pleasure you.”

He laughed again. “Agreed. And since you want to learn so much, I can teach you more. We can Pleasure each other, you know. I wish it was my turn to make ‘love fill up inside you.’ But you did it so well, I don’t think even Haduma’s touch could raise me.”

Ayla was silent for a moment, “It would not matter, Jondalar.”

“What wouldn’t matter?”

“Even if your manhood never rose again—you still make love fill up inside me.”

“Don’t ever say it!” He grinned, but gave a small shudder.

“Your manhood will rise again,” she said with great solemnity, then giggled.

“What makes you so full of salt, woman? There are some things you shouldn’t make jokes about,” he said with mock offense, then laughed. He was surprised and pleased at her playfulness and new understanding of humor.

“I like to make you laugh. Laughing with you feels almost as good as loving you. I want you always to laugh with me. Then I think you won’t ever stop loving me.”

“Stop loving you?” he said, sitting up a bit and looking down at her. “Ayla, I looked for you all my life and didn’t know I was looking. You are everything I ever wanted, everything I ever dreamed of in a woman, and more. You are a fascinating enigma, a paradox. You are totally honest, open; you hide nothing: yet you are the most mysterious woman I’ve ever met.

“You are strong, self-reliant, entirely able to take care of yourself and of me: yet you would sit at my feet—if I’d let you—with no shame, no resentment, as easily as I would honor Doni. You are fearless, courageous; you saved my life, nursed me back to health, hunted for my food, provided for my comfort. You don’t need me. Yet you make me want to protect you, watch over you, make sure no harm comes to you.

“I could live with you all my life and never really know you; you have depths it would take many lifetimes to explore. You a

re wise and ancient as the Mother, and as fresh and young as a woman at First Rites. And you are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen. I can’t believe how lucky I am to get so much. I didn’t think I was able to love anyone; now I know I was only waiting for you. I didn’t think it was possible for me to love, Ayla, and I love you more than life itself.”

Ayla had tears in her eyes. He kissed both eyelids, and he held her close, as though he was afraid he might lose her.

When they woke up the next morning, there was a thin layer of snow on the ground. They let the tent opening fall back and snuggled into the sleeping furs, but they both felt a sense of sadness.