Mirth fills me, the embarrassment an afterthought.“My stamen. Mycock.” Why they insist on calling it a bird is beyond me.
Her eyes glow with interest. It is nothing carnal. It is more like professional curiosity than anything else.
“How fascinating. So it’s hidden behind like a snake’s?”
I am taken aback at her comparison. Snakes! Hah!“I have no knowledge about snake genitalia.”She does not have to know that Idohave serpents. Much bigger than larger snakes.
Her cheeks turn rosy, her half-moon eyes reminding me of peaceful Esoterran nights. When everything was…untainted. “I’m sorry. It’s part of my job. Learning you.”
Instead of feeling revulsion at being studied by a human, something else stirs in me. A hot current sweeping against the coast. A rush ofdesire. This one, raw and unprovoked. It isn’t the pollen making us lustful. This one, though? Much more addictive.
“Study me however you please, Xiaoyu.”I feel the woods rub together in anticipation. I reach for her hand, pulling until she is flush against me.
She jumps to flick my nose. “Later. Now, we voyage this perilous land.”
Biting back a laugh, I pick her foot coverings up from where I’d left it.
“My boots!”
It is torn, but the soles are still sturdy. I should have one of the females sew it for me. I drop to one knee and insert it into one foot then another, her hand on my head keeping her balanced.
“Thank you, Datu.”
“You act like nobody has done a nice thing for you.”
She just blinks and doesn't respond. We are at the heart of my forest, I know this place like the back of my hand. Wordlessly, I take her hand and tug her.
“Nothing’s gonna eat or violate me there again, right?”
“Just me.”
Xiaoyu
I find out that Datu is very talkative. I learn a lot. From invincible planaria worms to the “starflies” that follow himaround, everything here serves a purpose. His knowledge of Esoterra is profound. Given that it’s his land, it makes sense, but it hits different. Teva had never talked about Esoterra with ownership and possessiveness. Like everything and everyone in Esoterra is…hisand his alone.
“I can guess how upset you were when my species invaded.”
His bright eyes darken to a shadowy purple, becoming distant.“I could have stopped them any time.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“There’s a vow we take. We are not allowed to interfere with what happens naturally.”
“An invasion isn’t natural,” I point out.
Nodding, he agrees with me.“I am ashamed to say I might have been far more lenient, lax back then.”His tone changes, and I know he regrets this.“I was indifferent, arrogant. I believed meddling with mortals below me.”
Mortals. “Golly gee, what are you, some kind of apathetic Lovecraftian monster?”
He gives me a strange look.“Lovecraftian?”
“H.P. Lovecraft. He used to write weird cosmic horror.” I shrug.
He tries to hide it, but I see his curiosity.“Cosmic horror—what is this?”
I wrack my brain for any information I remember about this. The monster had been obsessed with Eldritch, and Lovecraftian books, art, even relics.
“I had not read cosmic horror books in a while, but they’re so popular that it just sticks. Usually, it’s outer space gods who don’treally care about humanity. Well, life, in general. They look down on other god-monsters who associate with what they deem lesser species.”
