Dagesh holds the carved bone teacup for me as I drink, and then cuddles me against his lap when I'm done. He strokes my cheek, and I smile with pure contentment.
"I liked spanking you," my mate muses. "Is that wrong? It feels wrong to strike you, but…I liked doing that."
"It was the best," I tell him. "And spankings don't hurt, not really. There's a sharp sting every now and then, but that fades quickly."
"You will bruise," Dagesh points out. "I do not like that."
"The more you spank me, the more you'll figure out how to smack me without leaving bruises," I say confidently, though I wouldn't mind walking around with two palm-shaped bruises on my butt. If it gives me orgasms like that? He can cover my backside with welts any day of the week.
He rubs his mouth against my hair, holding me tight against him. "We will sleep in and tomorrow, if you are not too hurt to walk, we will continue on to a better cave."
I won't be too hurt to walk, but it's sweet of him to worry over me. "I'll be fine, but I have an even better idea."
"What is it?"
I reach out and wrap my fingers around his tail, stroking it. "We're bonding, right? Nothing says we can't bond right here."
"This is not the best cave—"
"But I have the best company," I tell him. A wicked smile crosses my face. "And you can always spank me for disobeying you."
His eyes light up at that.
18
NORA
We never make it to the other cave after all. We spend the next three days inside the tiny cave, curled up around one another and having lots of glorious, incredible sex. It's like we've resonated all over again, except that I'm already pregnant and we know each other a little better now.
And we have so much sex. Oodles of sex.
Dagesh has better stamina than any man I've ever met. I don't know if it's a sa-khui thing or if it's because of the khui itself, but he's ready to go again sometimes before I can even catch my breath. Not that I mind. I love when he holds me down and uses me for his own pleasure, dragging my hips up so he can fuck me and then fisting my hair tightly. I come so hard that my body quakes each time.
We're figuring out each other, too. It's sad that it's almost a month after resonance and we're just now starting to really grasp what each other needs in bed, but better late than never. I've learned that Dagesh doesn't like striking me at all, or pushing or shoving at me. The moment we get close to that, he safe-words out, rattled. He likes the chasing games, though, and we can push the limits a bit more as long as things are posed as a game. It's like when he knows it's not reality, he's able to go a little further.
My pain limits are a lot higher than what he's giving me, but at the same time, now that I know that I'm going to get what I need from Dagesh, sometimes all it takes is a rough hand on my ass or a hand grazing my throat and I come hard and fast. Sometimes, just the reminder that we have kinky sex is enough to get me off.
I feel like we're both finally getting what we need, though, and I couldn't be happier. I'm so damn happy that when Dagesh suggests going back to the home cave, I'm sad. I don't want to leave our honeymoon cave that reeks of sex. So what if I've hit my head on the low-hanging ceiling several times? So what if Dagesh has to stoop to move around? So what if we woke up with a trickle of water dampening the furs under us? We're happy out here.
Maybe what we have doesn't work for everyone, but it doesn't need to work for everyone. It just needs to work for us.
And it is absolutely working for us.
We pack up our things after breakfast on the fourth day, and once we put out the fire, I step outside the cave to get one final look at our surroundings. I'm not held back, of course—I can go hunting or out into the mountains any time I want. I…just don't want. I'm not a big adventurer or a traveler. I'm a homebody who likes sitting around the fire with a cup of tea and chatting with friends. I can appreciate today, though, and I take deep breaths of cold, sweet air as I look at the mountains around us. It's all whites and grays—everything's covered in layer after layer of thick snow. It was so overwhelming when I first got here. All the ice and snow, and the realization that this was as good as the weather got was utterly terrifying.