Kai squealed again when he felt the icy cold berries and tried to buck him off, but Lucas simply enjoyed the ride and then spanked his bottom a couple of times. He bit his ass cheek. “Stay still, boy. Accept your punishment for teasing me,” he said, laughing. He bent to his task, nibbling and biting at the sweet berries, licking them from Kai’s delectable ass. Kai was moaning and alternately sticking his little ass back up higher and then trying to pull away. Lucas held him still as he ate several more of the berries, enjoying Kai’s screams and groans.

When he had Kai trembling and thought his boy’d had enough, he licked the juice off Kai’s balls and his thighs and reached beneath him to grab his rigid cock. “Had enough, baby? We can save the rest for later if you want.”

Unable to speak, Kai nodded frantically, and Lucas moved up behind him, turning Kai to his side and spooning him. He slid his cock inside Kai as he stroked his shaft, setting up an unhurried rhythm that soon had Kai gasping.

“I-I won’t be able to last,” he said, moaning and trying to thrust harder in Lucas’s hand. “Please, please, Lucas, I’m going! I’m going!”

Lucas smiled against the nape of his neck and crooned in his ear. “You mean you’re coming. So do it. Go ahead. Come in my hand, baby.”

Kai writhed in his arms as the first wave of his orgasm hit, screaming out his name. He seemed to be hit again and again by fresh waves of the climax, and he reached behind him, gripping Lucas’s hip as if reassuring himself Lucas was still there, still with him, watching over him.

Seeing Kai’s pleasure brought Lucas to the edge too. He pushed harder into Kai, beginning to pound into him, making him arch his back and cry out. He pushed himself in so far his balls were resting against Kai’s ass. Kai surprised him then by snapping his hips back at him and with a harsh cry, Lucas slammed into him so hard the bed shook. His hips jerked as his cock throbbed over and over inside Kai, filling him with his cum.

They both lay spent in the aftermath of the storm, and Lucas was physically incapable of pulling out. He felt himself softening, and made himself stop stroking Kai, because he knew how that could become almost painful once he’d come so hard. Finally, he was able to move, and he slid out of Kai and off the bed, going into the bathroom to clean up. He brought a cloth for Kai and tenderly washed him and moved him away from the red berry stains on the sheets.

“I hope the cleaners can get that stain out,” he said with a laugh, and Kai looked down at it and blushed.

“Oh no, what will they think?”

“They’ll think we spilled some juice, baby. What do you care what they think?” He pulled him from the bed. “Come on. I’m still starving, and I need to feed you.” He pulled Kai along behind him, but stopped at the doorway and looked at him very seriously. “I think, considering your reaction to the berries, that I need to visit the fresh market more often. I had no idea the Scythians were so fond of fruit.”

“Oh yes,” Kai said solemnly. “We love fruit.”

“Hmm.” Lucas started out of the room again and stopped. “How do your people feel about vegetables? The cucumbers they eat on Earth are very nice.”

Kai nodded solemnly. “I’m always open to new things. You know the kinds of things I like to eat.”

“Oh, these wouldn’t be for eating. Not at all.” He laughed at the curious expression on Kai’s face and led him to the kitchen.

Chapter Four

Kai bent over to scoop up the mess his little windiga left on the floor of the kitchen. He didn’t want Lucas to see it and perhaps get angry at his little pet. Kai had named the female windiga, Merri, after his old nurse and friend Merrial, whom he still dearly missed, despite her foolishness. She’d been almost a second mother to him over the years and he missed seeing her every day.

He snapped his fingers at his pet now, like he’d seen Lucas do, and she followed him eagerly from the room and outside to one of the trash containers at the back of the house. Kai didn’t bother to snap the leash on her—they were just going right outside and she’d been getting really good about minding him when he gave her little orders lately, like to sit or stay. He didn’t anticipate any problems with her now, and she hated the leash so much, digging in her little paws and pulling back against it until Kai was afraid she’d choke herself.

It was a gorgeous day outside, the sun beating down as mercilessly as ever, but there was a bit of a breeze coming out of the north that made the morning pleasant. Later in the day, the temperatures would rise, but for now, it wasn’t too bad, and Kai lifted his face up to the sun to enjoy the warmth.

He snapped his fingers again and started back toward the house, thinking he might go in the pool for a while before it got too hot. Merri trotted along behind him. Gazing across the courtyard to where Blayde and his mate Ryan lived, Kai wished they were at home. Blayde and Ryan chased bounties all over the galaxies and were gone sometimes for quarter cycles at a time. Kai had met Ryan briefly when he’d first arrived on Lycanus 3 and had liked the young man right away. He was such a pretty little thing, and being around him made Kai wish he wasn’t so tall and big boned. Maybe if he were petit like Ryan and Nikolai’s mate, Prince Jagger, Lucas would be as crazy about Kai as the others were about their mates.

Not that Lucas didn’t like Kai, or at least he certainly seemed to like the things he did to Kai in the bedroom. But there was something missing—a look in the eyes of the other mated pairs that Kai never saw in Lucas’s. He supposed it was because of the things he still couldn’t bring himself to tell Lucas, for fear it would bring down retribution on his mother.

Kai plopped down on the back steps and idly petted Merri’s thick fur. He wanted to tell Lucas everything—he had a nagging feeling that some of the things he’d been taught about the goddess might have been lies. And if it was all lies, then every day, every hour he hesitated, innocent boy babies could be lost. Not re-assimilated into the goddess’s body, like he’d always believed, but terminated, ended, destroyed. His mind shied away from the idea—it was too horrible to contemplate. The headache started back up again and he rubbed at his temple. He wished he knew the right thing to do.

A loud wail at the end of the alley caused him to put up his head as a large, black windiga yelped at his pet again and bounced away, heading down the alley at a fast clip. Instantly, before he could grab for her, Merri took off at a rapid pace, chasing the other animal. Kai yelled for Merri to return, but she kept going, so he had no choice but to take off after her.

They were headed away from the back of the houses, out into the desert. He could see Merri up ahead, still following the large black windiga, and she was getting farther and farther away from him. The rocky ground was hard to run on, and he kept tripping over small rocks and stumbling into small depressions in the earth.

Kai had been trained as a hunter, and was used to running long distances after game, though not in this deep sand. It made running much more difficult. He was so intent on keeping his footing and catching up to Merri that he had gone some distance before he pulled up to look around behind him. Surprised at how far he’d come, he had a momentary twinge, thinking Lucas wouldn’t like him being so far out in the desert alone, but he could still easily see the city, so he wasn’t afraid of getting lost. There wasn’t much out here, really, except the volcanic rocks. When he turned back, Merri was out of sight.

Kai turned and began running again, up toward the high hills in the distance, the direction in which he’d last seen Merri. He figured she’d tire soon, and then she’d need him to carry her back home. He glanced up at the sky. It wasn’t even midday yet—he had hours before Lucas would be home. If he was lucky, he could catch up to Merri soon and get back with her long before Lucas got off work. He tried to put on a bit more speed and scanned the horizon in front of him for some sign of his little windigo. Thus, he failed to see the storm clouds that had begun to gather behind him to the south, and never even realized it was about to rain until the first big drops hit the back of his neck, and he stopped to look up at the threatening sky.

Just this side of frantic, Lucas tightened his grip on the steering wheel and drove through the desert, looking for any sign of Kai. Beside him, Larssen scanned the horizon with his night vision scopes and spoke very little. Lucas figured Larssen knew how close he was to losing it, and was trying to give him a chance to pull himself together.

After searching all night the night before, and most of the day, Lucas was getting badly frightened. The search parties, though still actively looking for Kai, had all come up empty. The anger Lucas had felt at first had quickly shriveled up to this cold feeling of dread that they wouldn’t find Kai alive. He knew it was probably unreasonable, but he couldn’t shake it, and the idea was making him feel desperate.

Lucas and Larssen were searching the northern perimeter again because of a chance remark Kai had made once about the forests. Rising up from the deserts, the foothills to the north of Balenescu City were covered in scrub brush, graduating to a thin treeline and then, as they rose higher, thick, green forests where the underground water sprouted out in rivers and streams. Kai had been fascinated by the forests, so much like his home planet. He’d said he’d like to go to them one day and do some hunting with his bow. Knowing it was highly unlikely Kai would have taken off on his own to hunt, Lucas still needed to check out every possibility, no matter how slim. He was running out of ideas. Kai had been missing for almost thirty hours, and despite the best efforts of the search teams, they’d found no sign of him.

Lucas discovered him gone when he returned from the mines in the afternoon the day before. The doors were open, the compnet was turned on, but there was no sign of Kai and his little windiga. At first, Lucas thought he might be out walking the animal, but when he failed to return, he went out looking for him. His failure to find Kai anywhere precipitated this search and these escalating feelings of panic.

At first when he’d found Kai gone, Lucas had feared a kidnapping, but search animals had tracked Kai directly north from their home to the desert. It was there, in the rocky terrain, that they lost the scent. The northern perimeter had been thoroughly scoured and they had come up empty-handed. Now other teams were searching the desert in various directions, but Lucas had a nagging feeling that Kai might be somewhere in the forests to the north.