Page 13 of Caveman Alien’s Terror (Caveman Aliens #25)

13

- Astrid -

My skin creeps as I use the wooden torch to hit at the predators. But despite being just hatched, they easily evade my strokes until I thrust the burning torch into the whirlwind of attackers. It disrupts their flow, but then they start to focus on me. Their snapping jaws close in, and something tugs at my hair.

Before any of them can bite onto me for real, Praxigor grabs me and runs, slapping away the small attackers. “This place is actively guarded. Now I’m sure there’s something here worth guarding.”

The wind whistles past my ears as he storms away from the pack, zigzagging between plants and bushes until we’ve put the brushfangs far behind us. But they’re coming after us, so this was only a temporary escape.

A green and black shape shoots past us.

“Luna!” I exclaim. “Follow her, Praxigor!” I don’t know why I say it, probably just because I think we’ll be stronger if all three are together.

To my surprise, the dragon follows my suggestion and catches up with the stevik.

Luna does a quick turn and rushes straight back towards the pursuing pack, but now Praxigor doesn’t follow her.

“I have no desire to seek out injury,” he growls. “Or worse.”

And Luna’s actions do look suicidal. She’s smaller than those newly hatched dinos, and while her teeth and claws are impressive, and her tails are in their most war-like configuration, on her own she’s not as scary as the brushfangs. There are dozens of them and only one of her.

Praxigor goes under one of the light holes and lifts me to the ceiling. “I think you’ll fit inside. I’ll push you in, and you can stay there.”

I see his point. If I can find a foothold inside that light pipe, I’ll be out of his way.

Putting one hand on the rocky ceiling to steady myself, I gaze over at Luna. “Wait.”

The pack tries to form their tornado of intimidation, but Luna ignores it and seeks out a single member of the pack to attack. That brushfang panics and runs wildly away from his pack mates, and Luna chases him away. Unable to find a hiding place, he flees to the stairs and bounces up them as if his life depends on it. Which it probably does.

Luna doesn’t slow down. She zooms right back to the pack, which is now in a confused disarray trying to keep up with her. She repeats the tactic, seeks out one of the brushfangs and chases it up the stairs.

After a couple of more times, the pack is so close to the stairs that they suddenly all have the same idea and run upstairs, moving as one, like a flock of starlings.

Luna runs after them and disappears into the darkness of the upstairs level. This level is suddenly very quiet.

Praxigor lets me down. “Interesting fight.”

My heart is beating hard and fast. “Maybe her kind is used to fighting those things.”

The dragon straightens his pants. “At any rate, you chose your companion wisely.”

I adjust my own clothing, fighting with the ripped chest flap that keeps making me spill out.

It takes me a moment for his words to sink in. “Did you just say something nice to me?”

He shrugs his massive shoulders. “Just pointing out a fact. Don’t get used to it.”

“I think you’re a big softie,” I tell him, giddy from excitement and relief from escaping that pack. “You made sure I didn’t get bitten. And you wanted to get me away from the fight and into that tube.”

“Indeed I’d prefer to not be smeared and sprayed with your blood,” he growls. “Are you sure that makes me soft?”

“Uh-huh. So some of us don’t mind that a deadly monster like you has a different side. I mean ‘monster’ in the most terrifying way, of course. It makes you seem even scarier.” I think I know how he likes to be seen now. And in a way, what I said is not wrong. Because while it’s impossible to fall for someone who’s just teeth and scales, someone who also has a different side can be downright loveable. That in itself could be really scary.

“Oh?” he smirks. “By that reasoning, you like scary monsters.”

“Just one. And I know how hard and scary that monster can get.” I glance at his crotch.

His eyes flash dangerously. “Believe me when I say that you don’t know the first thing about that.”

“Then maybe show me?” I’m letting my instincts take control again. I guess that’s one thing this planet does — it strips away all the pretense of civilization and shows you exactly who you are deep down. As it turns out, I’m either really scared or really aroused. And those two things are much closer together than I thought, with a very fuzzy division between them.

“I can’t show you in this pitiful form,” he growls. “It is that which is soft, not me . It’s not me! ” He claws at his scales as if he wants to tear them off.

“Try,” I urge him, a wave of pity washing through me. He’s in pain and barely keeping it together. I want to help. “Try to show me. Without killing me,” I add as I reach out with one hand to lightly touch the scales at his chest. “Even like this, you’re about as hard as I can take it.”

“It won’t kill you,” he assures me. “And even if it did, can you imagine a better way to go?”

“No,” I confess. “So may I see? You’ve seen me. All over. Everything.” I notice his bulge twitching in his silvery pants.

“So eager,” he chuckles. “You may see. But you must also keep in mind that what gets revealed must also get used.” He puts a hand on his hip and looks down at me with amused challenge in his eyes.

I reach over and stroke the edge of his pants. It’s not really a fabric, but not really plastic either. Or any material I know. The closest would be some kind of metal weave, but it’s warm to the touch and has a very fine mesh. “I don’t know how to open this.”

He strokes his hand past the middle of the waistband and it opens smoothly. “It’s not very hard.”

I take in his bulge. “Looks plenty hard to me.”

“Turning my words back against me,” he rumbles.

There’s a split down the middle of the fabric that opens longer when I pull at the sides, revealing more and more of his blue skin-slash-scales. “It’s a habit. I mean no disrespect.”

“Of course,” he says benevolently.

His alien cock pops out of the pants and stands skywards, straight and powerful. It’s blue, of course, and there are small, smooth scales with rounded edges. The shape is just as alien and threatening as the rest of him, and it’s big. But not impossibly so, and where I half expected to see sharp spikes, there are only a circle of small, round protrusions that look like they’d hit the right spot.

My insides clench at the sight. “Nothing soft about this.”

“Nor about any of me,” he growls as he comes in close and puts a finger under my chin, forcing me to look up. He bends down and kisses me, soft and warm, but tense and with more of a need behind it now than ever before. That suits me perfectly — I have a craving in me that only he can satisfy.

“Show me,” I repeat, looking into his eyes and nearly forgetting to breathe.

He grabs my breast again, squeezing greedily. With his other hand, he hooks one claw under the hem of my dress and lifts it. “You should be bare for me.”

Having nothing to hide from him except something hidden in the dress, I quickly pull it off me and drop it to the ground. “I should.”

“Fully bare,” he says and uses the claw to pull my leather panties down in the front.

I pull them all the way and kick them off me, standing as bare in front of him as I can get.

“Female,” he growls in a voice that makes my chest tremble. Big hands run up and down my back, down my front, and all over me.

He’s being possessive, stroking me as if he owned me. It’s maybe how he would examine a piece of gold for his hoard, and I don’t mind being made to feel valuable and precious.

H e lifts me, one arm under my butt, and carries me over to a grassy bed of red flowers. In their dried form, the cavemen use them as spices. But I prefer them like this, fresh and sweetly fragrant.

He puts me down in the middle of them, crushing a good few under me and releasing a strong floral scent that fragrance designers on Earth would kill for. Although they might complain that there is such a thing as being too seductive.

“Soft enough?” Praxigor asks as he kicks off his long boots and lies down on top of me, his cock poking me in the stomach.

“I don’t want it soft,” I breathe. “Keep it hard.”

“I meant the ground,” he growls, kissing my forehead and placing a trail of warm pecks down my cheek to my mouth.

“Oh. That too.” I don’t know what I’m saying.

He kisses down my body, the way he likes, sniffing and licking in small spots that catch his fancy. He’s bound for my lower stomach, and the anticipation is building fast. I know he’s good at this. Really good. But I also want more this time.

He pushes my thighs apart with a grunt that has a hint of reproach in it.

“Sorry,” I tell him and spread more, bending my knees to improve his access. The act sends more heat down below - he’s taking possession of me, and I’m helping him as much as I can.

His tongue circles my center in a slowly tightening spiral, driving me crazy with need to be touched, to be made to come. I have to stop my hand from diving down there and getting it started.

“No,” Praxigor growls and grabs my wrist, having seen the small movement. “You’re mine.”

He finally places a kiss right on my over-excited clit, swirling lightly around it with his tongue.

I buck from the touch, whimpering with need. “Yessss…”

“Such a ready woman,” he teases and gets up on his knees. “But it’s appropriate. Open yourself for me.”

Instead I push my knees together, something primal deep inside wanting him to make me.

He puts his hands on my knees and easily pushes them apart. “I thought you liked it.”

“I love it,” I whimper, opening myself more. “Please. I’ve been so good.”

His cock stands between us, blue and dangerous. But also irresistible.

My insides twitch. That is going inside me. It’s both terrifying and the most thrilling experience I’ve had.

He slides the tip down until it rests against my entrance, warm and insistent, alive and eager, barely being held back. His blowtorch eyes bore into me. “You’re mine.”

My eyes widen as he pushes in. It slides on my own juices, helped into my deepest center by my own treasonous body.

He fills me up slowly, making my body adjust. There’s a slight burning sensation, but that feels only appropriate with a dragon.

“Fuck me,” I plead. I’m already really close.

He pulls slowly out, touching every sensitive spot and bringing me even closer. There’s a lot of heat in my center now, pent up over a long time and finally having a chance for relief.

As if he knows, Praxigor pushes in again, firmly but slowly. This time I’m ready for him, and I swear I can sense every rounded scale, every gentle protrusion on his cock. It sets my midsection vibrating and I grasp for something to hold on to, finding only flowers and stems beside me and clutching them as the climax washes over me.

I hear my own whimpers and moans echo from the stone ceiling, but I don’t care. I want the world to know that this incredible dragon is fucking me good. And the climax doesn’t end, the way I’m used to. He keeps thrusting and I keep coming, as if there will be no end to this bliss.

“Mine,” Praxigor growls. “Mine. Mine. Mine!” The last word is a deafening roar. His cock swells inside me, and his thrusts become faster and slicker.

He just came in me.

The dragon just came in me.

The total unreality of this all sends me for another delightful loop around the planet. I’m making love to a dragon.

I have a sudden thought: I’m not a virgin anymore. Is he going to eat me now? Or leave me here? Kill me?

No, I don’t even care. There’s nothing I can do about that now. And seriously, was there ever a better way to go?

He rolls off me, but keeps a hand on my hip. “Was that hard enough?”

“Yes,” I pant, still riding out aftershocks. “Exactly as hard as it should be. Was I soft enough?”

He chuckles. “Soft and wet and noisy. Remarkable.”

“I’m glad you liked it.”

He grunts, his hand still on me, fingers drawing little circles on the skin.

“I’m not a virgin anymore,” I carefully point out.

“I’d be very upset if you still were.”

“You don’t mind?”

He puts one arm behind his head. “Dragons are different. To some, the virgin thing is of great importance. To me, not as much. And believe it or not, I knew the consequences of the act.”

I roll over on my side so I can reach his chest and stroke it.

“Praxigor.”

“Hmm?”

“I have another question, I’m afraid. It’s not an interrogation. I don’t care about your hoard.”

He scratches his chin. “Being around you in the first place is suspiciously similar to being interrogated. I’m getting hardened to it.”

I put my head on his chest. “I sometimes see you carving a piece of stone. What are you making?”

He sighs. “With anyone else, I would be furious about that question because it concerns my hoard directly. But I do believe you don’t care about gold nearly as much as you should.” He feels around us for his pants, finds it and takes something out of the pocket. “This is… ah, the Chalice of the Sun. A small piece, but the first one I plundered myself. I stole it from the Palace of Queen Spru, of a species I don’t recall, on a planet I don’t remember. Oh, how I studied the Chalice! I held it for days at a time, just admiring it. It was the first item that I could lie on and feel the full strength from. Not only was it gold, it was highly valued by its previous owners and had taken a great deal of care to make. I grew four feet in length from the force of that little chalice alone.”

It’s a thimble-sized cup, finely carved from a beige, fine-grained rock. It’s perfectly smooth and covered in an immensely exquisite pattern of thin lines. The workmanship itself would make it valuable.

“But this is not the Chalice itself, of course,” I take a pretty sure guess. “That must be made of gold.”

“Of course!” he snorts. “This is merely a laughable counterfeit of the real thing. A mere trinket, a bauble.”

“But it’s really nice.”

“It’s not. It’s a paltry, worthless piece of congealed dirt. I made it because I am desperate for gold, and I hoped that if something had the basic appearance of a real piece from my hoard, it might give me some of the same force. It didn’t. And yet I keep making them.” He carelessly flicks the tiny Chalice with one claw, setting it ringing with a clear tone that no rock should be able to make.

“Well, I think it’s wonderful,” I tell him. “Can I see more of them?”

He slowly reaches into his pocket and gathers a handful of objects in his hand. “If you must.”

I sit up and hold out my hand. “May I?”

He gives me a hard look that makes my life flash in front of my eyes.

“Actually, never mind—” I begin.

But he hands me a small chain, a bracelet of some kind. It’s made from black stone and is also perfectly polished. The small, triple links of the chain move as smoothly as water.

“You’re an artist,” I tell him as I examine the fine piece. He has carved each part of the chain from solid rock, making it look like it was forged like that. “On Earth, we often hang pictures of the people we love on the walls to remind us of them. You have sculptures of what you love.”

“I know what you think the word ‘love’ means,” he scoffs. “It’s what lesser beings call it when they vaguely like something. But what I feel for gold is far beyond anything you could imagine. You don’t know what ‘love’ or ‘longing’ actually means until you’ve been a dragon, separated from your hoard by light years of Void.”

“You might be surprised,” I mutter under my breath. “I’m sure you’re right,” I say louder. “If these pieces are similar to those of your hoard, it must be a very splendid one. Don’t worry, I won’t ask more about it.” I hand the chain back with both hands.

Praxigor puts it all back into his pocket, and despite his disparaging talk I notice he’s careful about it. Those things really must be to him like what a family album would be to an Earthling.

The light in the hall has grown redder and dimmer. It must be sunset outside.

“I wonder what happened to Luna,” I ponder. “Did she chase those things all the way up to the surface?”

“That creature returned some time ago,” Praxigor tells me. “It’s currently prowling along the wall over there.”

I glance to where he looks. Indeed Luna is walking calmly along the wall, muzzle to the ground. “Oh. I didn’t notice.”

The dragon smirks. “You were busy with other, more important things.”

My cheeks heat up a little. “Oh. Those things.”

He lies back, supported on both arms. “You were absolutely absorbed with those things, as is appropriate for a female. No, I doubt she would have been able to chase them away in the first place, if they hadn’t been newly hatched. If they had even the tiniest amount of experience, they would know that she posed no threat to them. But newborns are strange and dangerous in their ignorance. Notice how they weren’t even that afraid of me .”

“That is really strange,” I agree. “Maybe that’s why someone sent them down here as eggs that hadn’t hatched yet. Someone who must still be thinking of how to chase us away.” I glance up at the light holes. That whole thing totally left my mind because I was so focused on the sex. Those eggs were definitely dropped into this place by someone. Someone who may well be watching us right now.

Praxigor gets up, blue body shimmering in the most hypnotically attractive way as he stands right under the nearest light hole and looks up. “It all suggests that there is something to guard here. Yes, you up there! We will find your treasure and plunder it!”

His voice resonates through the room. The red light from above strikes his naked form in the most sensational display of light and shadow I’ve ever seen, emphasizing his muscles and sending new tingles to my core. He is clearly the center of the universe and I already want him in me again. “Can we stay here? For the night?”

“Of course we’ll stay here!” he says up to the light hole. “Perhaps we shall make this our home! Unless someone pays us to leave! In finely worked gold!”

There’s no reply from up there. And as long as I’m here with a dragon, I’m actually not that worried about what the owners of this place will do. I think the brushfangs were their main attempt at chasing us out. Now they have to consider other, more peaceful ways. Or they might just give up.

The torch has long since gone out, and the light from above fades quickly as the sun sets up there. Still it doesn’t get completely dark. Many plants in the jungle have some kind of bioluminescence going on. Some of them are growing down here, planted either because they make light at night or because they bear some kind of fruit. I don’t know which, and it doesn’t really matter. It just means that there’s a mild, greenish sheen all around us.

I get up and stretch, deciding against putting on any clothes because I enjoy the dragon’s searing hot gaze on my naked body.

Wandering around the greenhouse-like hall, I munch on fruits and berries while I make sure not to stray too far away from Praxigor. If the guardians of this place decide to attack us again, I want to be able to get to him within a few seconds.

I keep him in the corner of my eye. He’s not bothering to put on his pants or boots, and he looks even more remarkable without them. A big part of me wants to spend the rest of my life down here with him. Or anywhere on Xren.

It all messes with my mind, which is already in a haze whenever I’m close to him. Because all he wants is to leave.

What if he never finds his gold? Will he have to stay on Xren forever, and could I make sure that he stays with me? I mean, this can’t work. I know it can’t. We’re far too different in every way. But just for tonight, I will do my best to think that it can. Or for as long as possible.

Sauntering all the way up to him, I enjoy the feeling of danger being converted into hotness down below.

I offer him an especially fine piece of alien fruit. “Sure you won’t try?”