Female.

The word lodges in my mind like a sandfin’s quill.

These females were said to be precious. Sacred. Gifts from Ain herself, sent to guide the Drakav when the world was still young and full of life. We worshiped them, but they were fragile, unable to endure the harshness of Xiraxis, and one by one, they disappeared, until they were nothing more than echoes in the sands.

I bare my fangs, a growl rumbling low in my chest.

It cannot be. The daughters of Ain are a story. Females do not exist. They are not real.

And yet…

I look at her.

The rise and fall of her chest. The curve of her hips. The smoothness of her skin. I inhale deeply, the scent of her filling me again, and my claws curl against the stone.

Bare now, without those troublesome hides covering her scent, she smells like life. Like water. Like something I was never meant to touch.

The glow beneath my skin pulses erratically, my body betraying me with every moment I spend near her. My instincts are in chaos, torn between the urge to protect her, to keep her safe, and the darker, deeper urge to take her, to claim her, to make her mine.

I shake my head, as if the motion could dislodge the thoughts from my mind. This is madness.

And yet I cannot leave her.

The thought of her alone, vulnerable, defenseless against the shadowmaws, or worse, sends a surge of something primal through me.

I rise to my feet, pacing the length of the cave. The movement does little to calm me. My gaze keeps straying back to her, drawn to the sight of her trembling form.

She is still now, her eyes closed, her breathing shallow. The fire has taken hold of her completely. If I do nothing, it will burn her alive.

My claws flex at my sides.

With a frustrated snarl, I cross the cave and crouch beside her. Her skin is flushed, beads of water glistening on her brow and neck, and her scent is stronger now—richer, deeper, almost intoxicating.

I hesitate, my hand hovering above her face. The last time I touched her, I felt…

Too much.

But I have no choice. I press my palm to her brow. The moment my skin meets hers, a jolt rushes through me, a sensation so foreign, so violently alive, that I nearly recoil. My glow pulses like a struck gourd, answering her fire, responding to something in her blood, her bones. A thread pulls taut between us, unseen but unbreakable. The flood of sensation is immediate.

Heat. Softness. The strange, soft beat of her dra-kir beneath my hand.

She stirs at my touch, a weak sound escaping her lips, and my glow flares brighter, responding to her even as I fight to control it.

Her lips part, her voice barely a whisper. “Please…”

The word is small, fragile, and I do not understand it, but it strikes me like a blow.

Whatever we find in the dust, we keep. And I found her.

A daughter of Ain.

Here. On Xiraxis.

I do not know where she came from.

But I will not let her die.

So I lift her.

She is light, softer than anything I have ever held, her body molding against mine as if she belongs there. My glow flares as she settles against me, and something tightens deep in my chest, something raw and unknown.

Her skin is damp where it presses to mine. This water seeping must be how her kind cools themselves. But it is not enough.

I need to cool her.

I stride toward the cave entrance, stepping into the night air. Xiraxis is a world of extremes—blistering heat during the day, bone-deep cold at night. The moment the night air touches her skin, she shudders, her body reacting to the sudden change.

Her lips part again, her head tilting toward my chest, and I feel the ghost of her breath against my skin.

Something stirs in me. A deep, primal thing.

I do not know what she is. Not fully. Not yet.

But she is female.

The first. The only.

And she is mine to protect.

She shifts slightly in my hold, her fingers curling weakly against my chest, and I look down at her face. Something shifts deep within me. A force I cannot name surges through my being, pushing me toward her in a way that defies reason. It is as if the very core of me recognizes her—something ancient, something buried—and refuses to let go. I am not meant to have this. I am not meant to feel this. And yet… I do.

She is not Drakav. Not of Xiraxis. But she is here. And I found her.

The dust takes.

But it also gives.

And I will not let it take her back.

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Chapter 11

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SOOOO…AWKWARD MORNING-AFTER VIBES CAN BE EXTRATERRESTRIAL. YOU LEARN SOMETHING NEW EVERY DAY

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JUSTINE

Warmth.

That’s the first thing I register as consciousness seeps back into my brain. Not the burning, feverish heat that had consumed me, but something else—something almost pleasant. A solid warmth against my side, cradling me like a cocoon.

My eyes flutter open, vision still blurry with sleep. Golden light fills the small cave, casting long shadows across the stone floor. It takes me a moment to realize that the light isn’t just coming from the sun—it’s also emanating from whatever I’m pressed against.

Then I feel it. The rhythmic rise and fall beneath my cheek. The solid mass of…something…I’m curled against.

Someone.

The memory of last night crashes back—the fever, the delirium, the alien—and I jerk upright so fast my vision swims.

“Holy shit!”

The alien—he’s sitting propped against the cave wall, and I’m in his lap. I was sleeping in his freaking lap, my head on his chest like he’s my personal body pillow. And he’s just…staring at me, those golden eyes unblinking, his skin glowing softly in the early morning light.

I scramble backward, stumbling and rolling in my haste to put some distance between us. My body lands on stone, the sensation of them shooting through me, and that’s when another realization hits me.

I’m still in my underwear. In my underwear, in an alien’s lap.

“What the actual fuck,” I mutter, crossing my arms over my chest, suddenly hyperaware of how exposed I am. “What…how…I mean…” I gesture vaguely between us, as if that explains anything.

He just watches me, head tilted slightly to one side, that same inscrutable expression on his face. The markings on his skin pulse gently. With the light streaming in, it’s even more riveting.

“I was dying,” I say, more to myself than to him. “I was literally burning up. And now I’m…fine?” I press a hand to my forehead. No fever. Not even a hint of it. It’s like it never happened. “That’s not how heat exhaustion works. That’s not how anything works.”

I look around the cave, trying to piece together what happened after I passed out. The smooth stones are still arranged in a circle where he placed them. My clothes are scattered across the floor where I’d discarded them in my fever-induced delirium.

“Did you…take care of me all night?” I ask, knowing he can’t understand me but needing to fill the silence anyway.

He rises to his feet in one fluid motion, and I’m struck again by how large he is—towering over me, all lean muscle and strange, alien grace. He crosses the cave in one stride, crouching in front of me, close enough that I can feel the coolness flowing off his skin. I honestly swore his skin was hot, warm at least, yesterday.

I swallow hard, fighting the urge to back away again. “Look, uh, thank you. For whatever you did. I was in pretty bad shape, and I…well, I’m clearly better now, so…thanks for the alien nursing service, I guess?”