Wheeling Gull Isle maybe it’s not the moon at all

Coelacanth awaited the Earthstalker’s reply with steel in her spine and stars in her eyes — and when at last it came, she met it with suspicion. She longed to melt bonelessly into the comfort of that rollicking, reassuring burr — but she could not forget how fiercely he had lashed out at her mere moments before. The serrated edge of his foulmouthed accusation still stung, skimming along each nerve like a whetted razor. If he did not want to leave, what did he want? Vigilantly, she searched the Angakkuq’s face, weighing each of his words with a critical ear. She nodded at his admission — it was a simple fact, a law of nature, that Komodo couldn’t be kept, couldn’t be tied down — but cocked her head sharply in unfeigned bewilderment when he confessed he wanted to.

Because he wanted her.

In mere minutes, he had infuriated her, frightened her, confused her, and hurt her. Where was her protector now? How could Komodo ever hope to heal these wounds? It was the first time Coelacanth could ever remember his touch being utterly repugnant to her, but the pound of her blood craved the physical contact, even as it warred with her unspoken lack of consent. Tufted ears folded meekly against the gentle slope of her crown and it seemed for a moment that he might tame her — she trembled as he buried his great head within the feathered hollow of her décolletage, but did not flee outright. “I want…” he begged, pressing boldly against her, taking liberties she had not afforded him; and, “No,” she breathed, her lips and teeth chattering together.

His mouth was at her ear now, nibbling hotly at the wisps of feathery fur as fine as dragon beard candy. “I need…” he offered in a husky murmur, and a whine stirred timorously in her throat as something warm and foreign curled tautly in her lower abdomen. The throb in her bloodstream was a heady pulse that drummed from the tips of her ears to the pads of her paws. I want, I need, I want, I need… The fluttering banner of her tail tick-tocked slowly like an unbalanced pendulum —

— hesitated, sweeping low and arcing sinister —

“— stop!”

It was not Stockholm’s face that swam before her but Komodo’s, at his intractable, volatile worst. He didn’t get to touch her — not after he had challenged her, insulted her, and hurt her. That her affection was being used in such a way — that she was being toyed with like a mountain cat’s prey! — wounded her and cracked the obelisk upon which he stood. The Earthstalker came crashing down before her, and she saw him fully, not a perfect, infallible being but simply a man, flawed and lonely and hungry. Her feathered tail clamped between her thighs and she whipped her head to the side, angling her muzzle so that if she made contact with his skull, she would do so painfully, with the scythelike profile of her upper canine. In the same fluid motion, she snapped at him with glaring intent, baring every tooth in her fox-fine muzzle as she made to hip check him and skitter away.