---Raala’s perspective---

  I lie on my side in the warm tent, staring across the firepit of glowing embers at the back of a round head, covered in black ropes of hair.

  The wind whistles past the tiny smoke vent overhead.

  One of the many advantages of having a shelter like this is that there’s less need to keep a watch since any animal attack would wake us up before they got inside.

  I should be sleeping… but I can’t!

  My heart’s pounding in my tight chest, liquid fire’s flowing through my veins and my guts are twisting and writhing like a nest of adders that’s been disturbed before their hibernation’s over!

  I want to get up and run, jump, fight something!

  Unfortunately, what’s making me feel this way isn’t something I can fight… The only way I could deal with these feelings is something I’m not going to do!

  Though, just because I’m not going to do it, doesn’t mean I can’t imagine it…

  I look down to Ksem’s feet, by the door, and picture myself standing there.

  The fantasy me reaches to her chest and unlaces her top before shrugging it from her shoulders.

  She brings her hands to her hips to push her lowers to the floor.

  Stooping beneath the slope of the tent, she brings her left foot to Ksem’s right side and sits herself down on his midriff.

  Occupying the same space as real Ksem, fantasy Ksem wakes up, looking at fantasy Raala, confused.

  It takes him a moment to notice she’s nude but, when he does, he smiles warmly.

  Fantasy Raala swoops down to bring her lips to meet his.

  He passionately returns the kiss, running his hands across her skin while hers work to undress him beneath her.

  She gets to pulling off his lowers and, because of his prudishness, I have to use my imagination for what’s down there…

  I’m thinking it’d be long and thin, like him? Hopefully not too thin though(!)

  Fantasy Ksem’s cock springs up and nestles between fantasy Raala’s cheeks, letting her feel its warmth against her backside.

  There’s a pause as the two look eachother in the eyes, realising this is the point of no return… Once this happens, there’s no taking it back… They’ll belong to eachother until they die…

  Without speaking a word, fantasy Raala slowly lifts her hips and brings them back down as fantasy Ksem’s woman, now and forever!

  Waves of sensitivity and arousal wash outward from my groin as I watch these apparitions I’ve conjured consummate their bond… That is until the moment I catch my left hand sliding under my clothes.

  Fantasy Raala and fantasy Ksem disappear, leaving me as the only one awake in this dark tent… breathless, horny, wet and frustrated!

  I haven’t touched myself since the cave… I should’ve taken a chance at Hyena or Speartooth but… I didn’t…

  Now I’ve got all this tension and no way to get it out unless I want to risk waking him up!

  If he wakes up to hear me rustling around and the tent smelling of my sex, he will think I’m an absolutely pathetic loser!

  I can only imagine how much worse it’d be for him to find me masturbating with his prude culture!

  Absolutely not!

  I’m just going to need to sleep off my sexual frustration… ignoring the way my jaw is clenched, my brow furrowed, my shoulders tensed and my pussy absolutely begging to be touched!

  ---Ksem’s perspective---

  I wake up feeling suspiciously well rested.

  Concerned, I look to my left and am relieved to see Raala there, sleeping…

  Wait! Hang on! Sleeping?!

  Wondering whether I might’ve just woken up randomly in the middle of the night, I look up to the top of the tent, making out fairly unmistakeable daylight through the smoke vent!

  Raala always wakes me up?!

  Her people are natural early birds in a way that mine just aren’t!

  Why would-?

  Ooooh! It must be because she’s ill!

  I’ll have to keep an eye on that!

  If she overexerts herself while sick, it could exacerbate her symptoms which might slow us down… or worse!

  I briefly consider postponing the language lesson but… well, I did promise her I’d go until noon last night.

  I’d hate to let the chance to teach her escape because she resented me for breaking my word!

  Trying not to enjoy the role reversal too much, I get up and arrange myself between her feet and the door.

  Reaching behind me with my left hand, I pull the curtain aside.

  Light and cold stream into the tent.

  The beautiful redhead is quickly roused by the disturbance.

  She props up her torso and peers blearily up at me.

  Her eyes are bloodshot and ringed with heavy dark circles.

  I resist the urge to tease her about needing to be woken up or comment on how flattering the tired look is on her(!)

  Instead, I hold up my right palm and smile “Good morning!” in Deltaspeak.

  “Whuh…?” she grumbles.

  Speaking slowly and enunciating clearly, I repeat “Good… morning…” before extending my hand in a five fingered point and waiting for her to return the greeting.

  It takes her a few heartbeats to seem to piece together what’s happening.

  I see realisation hit her before she answers “G-gumarren…”

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  That’s good enough for now!

  Pronunciation refinement can come later…

  “You. want. breakfast?… Breakfast?” I ask, miming eating something from my right hand.

  “Mmm.” she grunts, affirmatively.

  ---Raala’s perspective---

  I’m miserable!

  I don’t think I even got a thousand breaths of sleep last night and, all morning, I’ve been dragging this sledge while Ksem talks to me in his language like I’m demented, deaf or a baby… Slow, simple, overpronounced and backed up with miming and pointing.

  He’s clearly enjoying himself but I can’t say I am!

  I’m exhausted and grumpy and trying not to let it show!

  I think it’s probably not ideal to start learning a language on this little sleep!

  Ksem did suggest swapping loads today (I think at least), pointing to the sledge and miming putting it on while speaking incomprehensible words.

  I shook my head like his people do for ‘no’ and harnessed myself up… competently!

  “Aaaand… I’d say that’s noon…” he says, looking up at the clouds “…difficult to tell exactly but let’s call it there for today.”

  I’m about to bark ‘Good!’ but catch myself just in time, remembering what he said about stopping if he thinks I’m not taking it seriously.

  “Hmmm.” I say instead.

  “How are you feeling, Raala?” he asks, mildly concerned.

  “I’m fine.” I lie, knowing that the truth would require explaining what kept me up last night.

  “Really? You look tired?” he persists.

  “Wow… thanks(!)” I answer, dryly.

  “I just mean that, if you’re ill, don’t keep it secret, alright? If you collapse, it’ll be bad! Better to stop for a bit so you can recover than go until you’re fighting for your life!”

  Oh, yeah… he still thinks I’m sick…

  I suppose I am… Just with a different kind of sickness than the one he’s thinking of…

  “I’m really fine.” I state “Just not slept well.”

  “Why couldn’t you sleep?” he asks exactly the question I was trying to avoid.

  ‘Oh, just because I was watching a fantasy version of me riding a fantasy version of your cock while desperately restraining the very real urge to masturbate’(!)

  Yeah, no!

  “You really need to ask that?” I deflect.

  “Oh… right, yes… The whole two months of Winter travel and possible death alongside a man you hate… Got it!”

  “I don’t hate you.” I’m saying before I can stop myself.

  He stops dead in his tracks, turning to me with a quizzical look of humorous alarm.

  “Excuuuuuse me?” he chuckles “Did I just hear you, Raala of Bison Clan, say that you, in fact, do not hate me, Ksem ‘Bear Bane’ of the 144 Channels, the way you said you did on the night you stole (sorry, ‘borrowed’) my bow?”

  Shit!

  “Is this a change of heart or did you never hate me in the first place?” he smirks, arrogantly.

  “Don’t make a big thing of it, alright!” I scowl “I thought I hated you but… I don’t know… You looked after me in the cave, you got us across the step, you made friends with the Hyenas, you fought the actual hyenas with me and you got us the sledge and tent from Speartooth… I’ve just… you know, realised you aren’t the waste of space I took you for!”

  He sniffs and brings a finger to his eye to wipe away an imaginary tear before teasing “Wow(!)… Incredible(!) Never have I been given such an accolade as being declared ‘Not a waste of space’ by the meticulously exacting standards of the singular perfectionist, Raala of Bison Clan(!) If only my parents had lived to see the day I achieved such lofty heights(!)”

  I roll my eyes and sigh “If you’re ever wondering why I don’t give you more compliments, Ksem, this is why! The fire of your ego doesn’t need more fuel(!)”

  “Don’t you like the warmth of my fire, Sunbeam(?)” he flirts, fluttering his eyelids.

  “I don’t.” I lie.

  He mimes being speared in the heart and says “You wound me so, my darling(!) You pour water on these flames that burn only for you(!)”

  My eyebrow twitches.

  “I… bet you say that to all the girls…” I challenge, carefully.

  He turns to me and, after a moments hesitation, laughs out loud.

  “Ah! I see! You think I’m just a flirt! A lot of your animosity makes a lot more sense now!” he giggles.

  “I know you’re a flirt, Ksem… I think you’re a womanising wolf!”

  “And your reason for adopting that position?” he asks, innocently, rattling the charcoal with an affected backwards lean.

  “Vibes…” I state “…Bet the reason you don’t have a woman at your age is so you can invite a different one into that big tent you have to yourself every night.”

  He laughs “‘At my age’?!” incredulously “We’re the same age, Raala! Are you single for promiscuity’s sake?”

  “No… but I don’t have as wide a field to pick men from as you do for women. I basically ended up paired off with Morlu because he was the only boy on the Plateau who wasn’t either taken or a relative… You’ve got hundreds of girls I’m sure would be thrilled to become yours and they can’t all be relatives!… I can only assume the reason you haven’t settled down is that you want your options open…”

  Not laughing anymore, he answers “Raala… You’ve got me wrong… I’m not a playboy… I’m not in the habit of regularly inviting women into my tent for nonbinding intimacy and certainly don’t invite a different one every night!!! That really wouldn’t be good practice as my people’s leader. Abusing my power like that sounds like a really good way to cause the kind of resentment that leads to head families getting replaced!”

  “So you’d do it if you weren’t worried about you and your family’s reputation then?” I probe.

  He sighs “I really wouldn’t, Raala!… I know you have trouble seeing me as much better than some shit you’ve stepped in but I really need you to know that I’m a romantic at heart! The reason I’m unpaired is that I’ve never found a woman I wanted to spend the rest of my life with who felt the same way about me…”

  “You’re picky then?”

  “Well, if framing it that way makes it easier for you to accept, then sure… I’m ‘picky’!” he shrugs.

  Knowing full well that he’s found plenty of girls who wanted him but that he didn’t care for, I ask “You… you’ve loved someone who didn’t love you?”

  “I have… At least, she didn’t feel as strongly about me as I did about her.” he states, simply.

  “What was she called?”

  “Vwoha.”

  I frown at the strange name “She was a Korgweggi?”

  He chuckles “She wasn’t Korkwehi. She was a Riverwoman, a Southerner. I met her on a trade expedition.”

  “What… what was she like?” I ask, putting on a mask of neutral curiosity to cover for my thrill at having so subtly led him into talking about his preferences!

  “She was… tall…” damn “She was strong… She was clever. She was beautiful and she knew it! She was a few years older than me. She was cheerful, playful…” damn “She changed me for the better… If you think I’m insufferably arrogant now, you should’ve seen me before I met her! I don’t think you’d last a hundred breaths before deciding that a seventeen Winter old Ksem needed his nose broken(!)”

  That makes me chuckle but I resist the urge to get a jab in about it. The more I let him speak, the more information I’ll have to strategise with.

  “We met and I was immediately smitten… When I was leaving her lands, I asked her back to the Delta with me. She refused… Undeterred, I spent the next sixteen Moons working hard to become a man who was worthy of her… The next trade expedition, I found out she’d moved on… She was another man’s woman by that point and I’d missed my chance… I was crushed at the time but, if you offered me the chance to go back and do things differently, I don’t think I would…” he trails off.

  “I… see.” I answer, feeling sorry for him in spite of things.

  He shakes himself off like an animal that’s just come out of water, smiling “What about you? You and this Morlu you were intended for? What was he like?”

  “Morlu was… Fine… He was… not a bad man.” I answer, reticently.

  “Oof(!) Damning with faint praise(!)” he laughs.

  “No! It wasn’t like that! I didn’t hate him, I just… I didn’t love him either… I wish he hadn’t died but…”

  “But you’re relieved you don’t have to spend the rest of your life with him… Aaaaand you’re uncomfortably guilty about how close you feel that is to being glad he’s dead?” suggests Ksem with his maddening astuteness.

  “…yes.” I admit, quietly.

  He gives a nonjudgemental bob of his head before asking “Well, I obviously think that’s rather silly but logic is a weak defence against emotion, isn’t it… If you don’t mind me asking, what was (for want of a better word) ‘wrong’ with him? What would’ve needed to be different for him to have been your dream man?”

  “He was… like I said, he was decent… he wasn’t cruel, he wasn’t violent, he wasn’t selfish… he was just… boring… To talk to him was like listening to the sound of the wind, like watching leather tan, like staying up on watch on your own!”

  “Oh… I see… And I can see the awkward position that would’ve put you in. It would’ve felt cruel to break off your intention just because he wasn’t a stimulating person… You’d almost rather he give you a clear omen of bad character that you could use to justify ending things to yourself and others!”

  “Right! You get it!” I answer, excitedly.

  “Though… I don’t think it can possibly just have been how boring he was, can it?” he adds.

  I frown “What makes you say that?”

  “Well…” he smiles, smugly pointing to his own adorable, flat face “…I’m willing to bet I’m the most exciting man you’ve ever met! Certainly the one with whom you’ve shared the most excitement! If excitement were all that it took to make you attracted to a man, you’d be head over heels for me(!)”

  He laughs, heartily, at his own joke.

  I chuckle, uncomfortably.

  Fantasising | | |