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Page 16 of The Royal’s Bumblebee (Operation Colonise #2)

Izule’s siblings

Izule

I reclined into the steaming sunken bath, tolerating it a tad warmer than usual for me because I know it’s her preference.

I watch her as passively as I can as Billie drops out of her sleeping shorts and shirt.

Communal bathing is normal for Ucfeni…more so for mating pairs.

Dust of the ancestors, did I want to mate with Billie Blac.

I wanted to rip my own heart out when I upset her by not thinking to ask her to come to the festival with me.

I had assumed-but no I shouldn’t have.

I see that now.

In future, I will always leave those decisions with her to make, and I will simply support her in whatever her choice is.

I think that had she not wanted to go to the festival, she still would have been hurt that I didn’t think to ask her first.

In truth, I am delighted that she wants to come.

My siblings can be tiresome, but they have been relentless in asking to meet the human that I finally managed to become sponsored to.

The human I am so eager to hunt quick and efficiently, so I don’t have to be parted from her for longer than necessary.

The human I go out of my way to find gifts for when hunting.

So far, Billie has not been impressed by any of the precious stones, pearls, gems, or vibrant feathers I have brought back for her.

My brothers keep teasing me that I ‘struck out again’ when I grumble about needing to try something else.

I can’t help my need to hunt for her.

I can’t bring her meat, as she doesn’t eat it alive or raw as we do, but I can bring her fruit.

I can bring her fine tokens of my…affection.

I watch with a polite smile masking my near-insane desire to launch at her as she walks into the bathtub with me.

I do not glance at her soft breasts.

They didn’t draw my eye before she revealed to me in our first bath together that they had a secondary sexual purpose as an erogenous zone…but they do now.

I certainly don’t pay attention to her exposed slit beneath the neat thatch of fur-no-hair between her thighs.

She lowers herself to sit beside me, and my right arm rests on the rim of the sunken bath to provide a rest for her shoulders.

She comfortably sits beside me and I…don’t know what I’m going to do.

My mating drive is getting the better of me.

In my heart, Billie is already mine.

I consider us a mated pair, but she hasn’t chosen me yet.

I consider myself an honourable man, a Royal with principles, and yet I leapt at the chance to ask her to share in my inner nest.

Knowing it would be an intimate request…because of how I feel about her.

For, it won’t be like when I shared a nest with my siblings.

No, when we nest-down tonight, I will be holding the woman I…love.

The woman my biology is pushing me towards claiming as mine.

Especially at this time of year, and today of all days.

My tail tip tentatively moves to rest over her toes and she giggles and looks at my mouth.

Not my eyes.

In normal comfortable moments she stares at my mouth or my hood.

She has no idea that looking at my mouth makes me look at hers, and draws my attention to those soft-looking lips.

I want to know their taste and feel against mine.

Yes, my mating drive is worrying me greatly.

“Izule?”

“Yes Billie.”

“You’re staring at me.”

“Yes I am.”

I didn’t know why she was pointing it out.

“I enjoy watching you.”

“Oh.”

Billie ran her hands back through her hair and water trickled down her back, neck and shoulders…daring me to watch their journey… “I don’t mind, but when I stare or fixate on people, Hannah tells me that people don’t like that.”

“Humans, you mean.”

I cant my head and hood to one side.

“If an Ucfeni does not wish you to stare, they will tell you so.”

I chuckled and didn’t stop looking at her cute round face.

Her little freckles made me think of tiny scales teasing beneath the surface.

She didn’t tell me to look away either, so I didn’t.

“You said you would tell me about the festival of Gcorket and your family.”

Billie declared, and I gave her a wide gummy smile.

“That I did.

Let me start with my family.”

She nodded with approval and watched my scaly brown and cream lips as I told her of my family.

The family I wanted her to join through mating to me-and I had to shake that thought away.

“Proceed.”

She stated impatiently, and I chuckled at her.

“My father is the King Xulei of Orna.

He and my mother, Queen Zhulula, mated 37 times and she laid successfully each time.

I was the last, the youngest.”

My smile was sad as I thought of the mother I would never know.

“Of clutch siblings, most have moved to the palaces of other Royals in other cities across Thelia.

To keep the alliances and bloodlines strong.

As is tradition, the eldest 3 and the youngest 3 always remain in the place of their hatching.

I am the youngest, largest, and strongest of my line.”

I looked off to one side and realised that wasn’t strictly true, and she was going to learn that very soon.

“Of the male line, of course.

My sister Jajana is larger than me and our father, but she is gentle.

In fact, she scolds me at the end of every hunt that I have not yet allowed her to meet you.”

I chuckle at the last time she tried to follow me across the bridge to my private nest, and how I had to expand my hood and warn her to back off my territory.

She didn’t take it personally of course, but she sulked all the way back to her luxurious wing of the palace.

Probably to whimper to our eldest brother.

“Allow me to go in order.

My father, King Xulei looks like an older version of me.

His colours are the same, but his hood markings are more like diamonds, than eyes.

He has more scars on his body from many hunts.”

Billie nodded dutifully and comfortably held her knees as she snuggled to my side.

I coiled my tail around my woman-no, around Billie, and ignored her lovely ambrosia scent in the air.

“My eldest brother and crown prince, the future King of Orna, is Vrujac.

He is attached to our father’s side, and has been since he hatched first, because he has been raised his entire life to take the throne one day.

His mate, Sacxi, is a Royal who came to us from another city called Erya.

She is our future Queen and is gravid at the moment with their first youngling.”

“Gravid means pregnant?”

Billie clarified, and I nodded at her.

“So princess Sacxi has an egg growing inside of her?”

“Yes.”

I imagined for a moment Billie with my egg growing inside her, but dismissed that right away.

One, she isn’t mine.

She has not chosen me.

Two, she’s human and our species can mate, but we can’t breed.

“The second hatched of my father’s line is Jajana, and she is to be honoured this Gcorket.

It is the season of Heat, and therefore crown princes from other capital cities have come to present themselves before her.

She will scent and observe them to select her future mate.

Whomever she chooses, she will become their Queen.”

“She get’s to choose?”

Billie nodded up at me and seemed surprised.

“In human cultures, the King chose the husband for their daughter.

Usually for political gain or a power grab.”

“That wouldn’t work for Ucfeni.”

I chuckled at how odd that sounded and before I knew it, I was leaning down to take in more of her scent.

“You see, the pheromones of our partners have to be complimentary.

Or the…mating drive isn’t stimulated.

We aren’t attracted to just anyone.

Regardless how much power or wealth they may or may not have. Besides?”

I cleared my throat and my yellow eyes dipped to look at the water level caressing her breasts in the water… I swallowed thickly and slid my own tail over my pouch to hide the way it rebelliously bulged.

“The burden and risk of becoming gravid with a clutch is on the female, so she gets to decide who is worthy of filling her with their seed, not the other way around.”

“That sounds very sensible.”

“Yes.

Which is why, in Ucfeni culture, males will carry out great feats to display their worth and skills, along with their scent, for the female they are hoping to woo or seduce.”

I stared at her, hoping she would realise I was doing exactly that, but for her.

It’s why I couldn’t help trying to bring Billie gifts to impress her.

None of which have remotely interested her.

There is a voice in the back of my head getting very excited by the fact she’s going to watch me really show off my prowess today.

“The Gcorket festival is full of such displays, such as—”

Billie raised her hand up and hovered it near my mouth.

I froze, staring at her soft supple fingers and waiting for her to touch them to my lips.

I wanted her to.

I wanted to kiss and suck on each one.

But she didn’t.

“You said there were three older siblings, and three younger siblings.

You have only told me of the first and second hatched, Vrujac and Jajana.

Please continue in order.”

Billie nodded and lowered her hand back into the water. “Please.”

“Of course, you’re right.

I’m so excited to share this part of my culture with you, I got ahead of myself.”

“You are forgiven.

Continue.”

She prompted me and I wanted to continue what should have been her hand’s journey to my mouth, but instead I cleared my throat and gave her want she asked for.

I rewarded my patience by curving the last third of my tail around her in the water to hug her against my side.

More touching was dangerous, but I’d also go mad without it.

I’m in so much trouble.

“Szelor is the third hatched, and he is happily so.

Nothing pleases that boy more than spending his days in the palace repository.”

She smiled, and I knew where her mind had gone.

“He’s also short-tempered and has no patience for anyone.

All he cares about is his research, and he barely holds his tongue around his older siblings and the King.

Anyone younger than him feels his icy temper like a whip.”

“He doesn’t sound very nice.”

Billie concluded and I nodded at her with a scoff.

“Szelor would prefer to the company of his own shucked scales, than anyone else.”

I looked up and realised that wasn’t entirely true either.

“Well, other than the repository keeper’s daughter, of course, but he’s not brave enough to risk telling her how he feels.

He doesn’t have the burden of rule or procreating more pure Royals, so he could mate with her, but he’s too twisted to dare tell her how he feels.

Coward.

She hasn’t shown any interest in him, and they spend enough time together, so their scents don’t match. Clearly.”

“Is he a coward? …telling people how you feel isn’t easy.”

I looked down at her and frowned.

“Especially if you don’t know how.”

“You’re right.

It isn’t easy.”

Here I am, literally holding the woman I want so badly I’m fighting off my own mating drive to keep her trust, and I’m judging Szelor for not telling sweet little Tzuta that he likes her.

“Regardless, Szelor is not a nice guy.

He won’t treat you differently because you’re human.

He just doesn’t like people.”

Billie nodded.

“Now for the youngest three.

Hatched 35th is Uczaz.

What a hunter?”

I grinned.

“He’s my favourite hunting partner.

Quiet, skilled, and saves the chat for once we’re back on our territory.

Unlike our middle brother Halas.

Thorn in my tail that one.

Always in trouble.

No matter what.

Always where he shouldn’t be, doing what he shouldn’t be doing, talking to who he shouldn’t be talking to, and never, ever sorry about it.”

I seamlessly found myself regaling Billie about the time Halas went missing in the palace when we had visitors from one of the outer tribes we trade with.

It was only a couple of years ago, but we all still cringed and laughed about it when we did get together.

“For a horrifying moment, we thought he might have been taken prisoner by one of the tribal Ucfeni, to be used as leverage or revenge for long-buried grudges.

Only, I found the little shucker face first up the skirt of one of the Allico Inc technicians who was overseeing upgrades to one of our city-wide communication hubs.”

I laughed, remembering how I startled the pair of them so badly, Halas’s hood widened and inflated her skirt, before the human squealed and kneed my brother in the face in her attempt to flee.

When I finished laughing I looked at Billie to see she was staring at me with the same curiosity she showed when I spoke of Thelia’s seasons.

“Your brother had his face up a human’s skirt?”

“…yes…”

I deeply regretted this story.

If she was about to ask me why he had his face up her skirt, I might just shuck right out of my scales with humiliation.

“Is that funny because you caught your brother giving oral sex when you thought he had been taken captive, or because he was giving oral sex to a human?”