Totoka River baby, when I whisper, can you hear?

The little sheepdog’s spine arches impossibly as her mate’s teeth comb warmly through the silken feathers at her breastbone. His touch is magnetizing. Slim hips wriggle appealingly, a soft, undulating whine wheedling from her lips, and the wavering rise and fall of her whisper is mirrored in the way every nerve seems to reach for him. Tremors ripple outward from the slow, tantalizing tread of his tongue as it slicks sleek fur against the grain and traces a meandering path to her chin — and it is here, in the tender hollow of her throat, that she seems the most vulnerable to his touch. With his mouth he will find the perfect constellation of scars left behind by Marbas — four perfectly spaced, individual punctures — he can read them like braille, if he so chooses, or dabble in margaritomancy. It is by his judgment that she will determine herself guilty or innocent.

“Stockholm,” she sighs, her breath catching in her throat as the tip of his nose meets the bulb of one sensitized ear. “I love you, too,” she tells him without speaking, scuttling close, burrowing into his warmth and finding sanctuary beneath the weight of his broad arm like a Ramsey under a litter box. It’s when he mentions going back to the island that she stiffens and almost seems to flinch — she knows now how the Earthstalker feels about her marriage and about her in particular, and she doesn’t want to think about how he might react to the Groenendael and the Gampr flaunting their affections. What keeps her from shying away completely, even with the frenetic concoction of urgency, anxiety, and desire in her bloodstream, is what he says to her next:

“Don’t have to do anything. Or we can stay here. Can do whatever you want.”

The choice is given to her. She draws back to look at him as if she can’t quite understand what he’s offering or why, finely sculpted head tipping first to the right, then to the left.

“Still love you, always love you, no matter what. You know that, right?”

Coelacanth does not reply immediately; she is always quiet, but this time she is not “talking” to him in any perceptible way. Her expression is still and withdrawn, but her cerulean eyes are alive and glimmering with a keen, if tentative, understanding. He will not keep her unless she asks him to — he will not take her unless she gives herself. At last she nods, fox-fine muzzle dipping low, and she slips from his embrace to stand over him. She can smell the spiced cologne of his need for her, but he does not act on it — and she is confused. Where is the violence, the fierce usurpation born of passion? Isn’t the struggle necessary for pleasure? It baffles and frustrates her, because she cannot articulate what happened in the Labyrinth with Komodo and why it still feels so confusing. She would be lying if she said she didn’t enjoy the medicine man’s ministrations to some extent —

“Love,” she whispers, and nudges firmly at his ribcage to coax him to roll onto his back.