Barbarian Lover

them.

 

It's hard not to feel like a reject at times because my khui is silent. When it finds you the perfect mate, it starts to vibrate. It's a bit like purring, but more songlike. The aliens call it "resonating," and a male will only resonate to his female and vice versa. And despite the insta-mating, everyone that has hooked up is blissfully happy. Georgie adores her alien, Vektal, who's the leader of the tribe. My friend Liz is fiercely protective of her mate, Raahosh. Stacy and Marlene and even weepy, terrified Ariana love their men. And it's clear that Nora is into her mate, if the sounds of sexy spanking are any indication.

 

All the "leftover" girls-aka the unmated ones-are piled into a cave together. I was lucky enough to get the nook in the corner with a curtain for privacy. Not that it does much to muffle the sounds. I can still hear everything . . . and I can also hear when someone sneaks out to visit a guy, like Claire is currently doing.

 

Claire's one of the tube girls, so I don't know her as well as some of the others. When we were captured by aliens, several were held in stasis in pods stuck into the wall, oblivious of their surroundings. The rest of us-Liz, Georgie, me, and a few others-were crammed into the dirty, crowded hold like animals and lived there for weeks. You bond when you're in a situation like that, and I miss them.

 

I don't know Claire as well as I know them. I haven't bonded with her over weeks of hugging to share warmth and melting snow just to have something to drink. In a way, I almost resent the tube girls because they had it easy while the rest of us were scraping by to survive. It's not their fault, and they're just as shocked and traumatized by the alien abduction as we are. We just had it worse for longer.

 

I call a mental image of Claire to mind. She's pretty, with a soft, downy cap of white-blonde hair cut in a pixie style that frames her small face perfectly. She's extremely quiet and isn't prone to excessiv