He chuckled and wrapped his arms around her back, feeling her hair like a cloak over his skin. Her heartbeat and his were aligned. He drifted, content, and finally slept.

*

They traded up the car at a piss-stop just out of town. It was easy enough. A single driver followed Kane into the male’s privy. Kane followed him out, nodding to his females to come close after. A claw to the human’s throat took whatever vocal complaint he may have made, and then Kane was pushing him into the backseat and sitting beside him. Raven had the wheel and Sue-Eye the front. No one else noticed.

Humans. They never noticed anything.

They drove for a while, Kane holding folds of the human’s shirt to its neck to keep the mess at a minimum, until it was time to pull over and finish the job. Kane paused then, with his hand on the back of the human’s head, to consider Raven. She needed to know better how to do this, but he supposed he could let it go for today. She’d done it for him before, but it had been a punishment then and it would be a punishment now. He didn’t want her to feel punished. Today was her day to have him. He wanted her in as good a mood as a human could possibly be.

Kane broke the bone himself and harvested the gland, idly wondering what use to put her to once she was crew. He found it a little remarkable that Urak had never tried to teach any of his slaves simple ship functions. For that matter, beyond a few simple commands such as ‘eat that’, ‘stop’, ‘be quiet’, and ‘fuck me’, Urak hadn’t even taught his humans Jotan. He’d been fascinated by them all right, but more for what their Earther habits were, not what they could be taught to do for a Jotan. But then, maybe Urak had simply never gotten his claws on the right sort of human. If his father had ever lit on Raven, it would be whole worlds of difference, Kane was sure.

Ferocious, far-thinking, fuckable Raven. Who had begged him so prettily for the privilege of mating with him in human fashion. Kane could see for the first time the attraction in indulging some of those Earther habits Urak had been so keen on. He had seen enough of the human’s mating programs on the tee-vee to know humans could be incredibly creative when the urge was on them. So could Jotan, for that matter, and there were things he knew of that he would greatly enjoy schooling his Raven in someday.

Ah, but this was Raven’s day. And for now Kane settled for telling Raven nothing but the right names for his instruments as he worked the harvester. Once they got back to space, he’d find out what her strengths—other than the purely sexual—were, and train her up for them. He noticed that Sue-Eye tried to repeat him as well, and he met her efforts with a faint smile.

“Not for you, ichuta’a,” he said, gesturing for her to join him in the backseat. “You already know everything you need to. Go, Raven.”

Raven aimed them west along the highway and Kane leaned back in the seat, his hand on Sue-Eye’s thigh and a feeling of comfortable excitement nestled in his gut. He was making damned good time. Two more big hunts and he would be full and ready to find his ship. The speed with which he was moving now more than made up for the shitty beginning he’d had. Raven alone almost made up for that.

Mm, and soon he could put thoughts of Vahst aside for the night and give himself over to her. He didn’t even know the last time he’d been so keyed up about a tussle in the sheets. He wondered what she had in mind, exactly. His hand stroked a little up Sue-Eye’s thigh, although his eyes were fixed on Raven’s reflection in the little console mirror. Sue-Eye tentatively returned the gesture, bringing his attention to her.

He considered slapping her, then settled back and left her hand where it was. “Which eye is your good one?” he asked.

She locked up tight, terror etched in every inch of her.

Kane smiled, lazily running his hand higher. He loved that look on her. She’d gotten too used to him too damned fast; he liked to give her a reminder now and then that she was really not very safe with him. “I think you’d better answer me,” he said.

Slowly, she brought up her free hand and let her fingertips brush the thin skin below her left eye. He could see the pulse in her throat beating faster.

Kane leaned in, examining the right. He saw no scarring, but the pupil did not expand when he blocked her light. “What happened to this one?” he asked.

“Someone hit me.”

“Did you deserve it?”

She didn’t answer right away. Kane ran his gaze over her and saw she genuinely appeared to be thinking about it.

“No,” she said at last. “I didn’t. I didn’t even deserve to get hit and I sure didn’t deserve to lose my eye.”

“You didn’t lose it,” he pointed out. “It’s still there.” And if it was just the nerve that was damaged, he could fix it up easy when he got home. Or grow her a new eye, if it came to that. Still, the damage wasn’t visible. It wouldn’t affect her price, anyway. “What did you do that got you hit?”

“Apparently, I brought him the wrong kind of beer. It was the only kind we had, and he bought it. Asshole.”

“Your dead commander?” Kane guessed.

She started to shake her head, and then laughed and nodded. “Sure, why not? My first dead commander, only I don’t really think he’s dead, I just like to believe it.”

Kane grunted, his interest ebbing. Raven was watching them in the mirror. Her eyes were so sharp and clear. “Say your lesson,” he told her.

“Se ven garrug-ta.”

I belong to you.

Kane smiled, squeezing Sue-Eye’s thigh with the anticipation of having his Raven. “Find us a hotel,” he ordered.

“What, already?” She made a play at surprise, but her eyes shining in the mirror were teasing.

“I’m only giving you one day,” he told her, and then leaned in close to growl, “But I’m going to give you the whole day.”

“You’re too good to me.”

“I know it.” His hand slipped up Sue-Eye’s thigh unthinkingly and lightly rubbed. “What are you going to do first?”

“I haven’t decided yet.” She tossed her hair, slapping him deliberately with purple. “And I wouldn’t tell you even if I had.”

He snapped his teeth at her and leaned back with a smile on his face, stroking the flesh of the female at his side. He could smell musk in the air, Raven’s and Sue-Eye’s both, and it made a sweet perfume. He supposed he should really care more about losing a day’s work, and he knew damned well what Urak would have thought of him throwing off a chance to hunt for a little sexplay, but he didn’t care. There was nothing around here now but road and the distant blocks of human houses, but sooner or later, they would come to a hotel, and then his Raven would stop. No hunting, no Vahst, and no Heat. Just him. Just her.

He couldn’t wait.

*

When Tagen woke for the second time, it was to the sound of the door closing as Daria left. He was losing all his Fleet training. He hadn’t even felt her leave the bed, and these wayside hostels did not bankrupt themselves providing the comforts of their quarters.

And yet, here he lay, succumbing to its incommodious magnetism once again.

Tagen threw back the thin bedding and rose, teeth bared at the brutality of action when sleep yet beckoned. But Daria would be returning presently, he knew. She had gone either to fetch food or to sign them free of the room and in either case, it behooved him to make ready.

He opened the door to the privy-room (easily the smallest he had ever seen, on this world or any other), letting Grendel streak past him and out into the main chamber. The cat had spent its frustrations during the night shredding the privy-paper. It lay in drifts nearly ankle-deep. Tagen marked himself to give the animal a stern lecture at a later date on the subject of showing respect to public properties and those employed to clean same, but he did not trouble himself to gather up the mess. He stepped into the shower instead and activated the water.