A Big Shiny Blue Marble Ch. 27

Shaevre understood and before long, she was on her side with her long leg over Arrax shoulder and Selena lay with her leg over Shaevre's ribs so that they could kiss. When Arrax came and the two Xer were locked together, Selena stopped to look from one to the other in awe. After a moment, she moved to reach around and caress his scrotum in between his ejaculations.

They each made love with Selena again, and this time she bit them carefully, choosing her moment. Once her teeth had sunken in, she hung on, loving the way that she felt and how it drove each of them to their orgasm with her. When she felt that Shaevre was close as they writhed together, Selena begged for her bite as well, guiding her lover's head to the other side. The only thing that she didn't like was the taste of the blood in her mouth afterward. She didn't even mind the fur, but the blood, ...

She obviously didn't swallow, and there was a lot of careful spitting once the passion had passed.

They watched as she got to her feet and removed the mirror to hand it to Shaevre, "I am a long way from what I thought I was. Now I'm even more, and it's happened, Arrax, everything that you said, and I'm happy enough to cry over it. But this," she smiled, shaking her head in wonder and happiness, "this is the best. I've never been to where you both came from, but I just know that on the whole damn planet, there isn't a pack like ours." She held out the mirror and Shaevre reached for it first.

She hadn't even gotten it tilted so that she could see what Selena was talking about when she heard the gasp which came from their male.

"I -- I have --" she turned to Arrax and they stared at each other, and reached out with smiles.

"My mark," Selena said very quietly, happy that they looked as though they liked her gift, and very proud to see it on them.

"The quiet part of the legend is true, Arrax. The part that you didn't believe at all, so you never mentioned it. You can never go home again, unfortunately. They'd try to kill you just as fast as they'd try to kill me on Merr."

Her voice and inflection shifted as she unveiled the last surprise. The one that she knew that she had in the instant that everything had become clear to her as the first of Arrax' seed had come to her. The arrival of that seed was coincidental, it was the powerful and sweeping emotions which she'd felt during the instant when she knew it all. She could tell and show them all of this with a little pride, but that was here, among her family as it were. She said nothing of the sadness that she felt at the same time for herself, knowing that for all of this, she couldn't live with them as she wanted, other than visits, and she was back to having no one to hold herself against most of the time. But for now - for them, she put a good face on it.

They heard her voice and looked over. She wasn't the largest, certainly, but Selena had acquired a third shape, just as the others had acquired the small single curved horns which now stood proudly from their foreheads, sweeping back a little.

Just as Selena wasn't large for a Xer and she didn't have their second shape, their horns were only about two inches long, but that didn't matter. Their tears began a moment later and they all sat almost in a pile embracing as they wept in joy.

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Arrax and Shaevre were present at dinner that evening, but Selena wasn't. She had a lot to think about and a lot of other things on her mind, not the least of which was the sense of shame that she felt. She knew why it had happened and she knew why she'd needed the others - all of that. But it had happened, and no matter what, that just wasn't Selena.

She spent some time with Nahl'een, who wanted to know why her sister hid herself away, but Selena had no answers to give her. She'd see the others, but she always shied away from the conversations that they tried to draw her into.

Shaevre took her for a walk outside in the evening, but she insisted that Selena go as the Xer that she could be.

"You need to see things through other eyes for a while," she said, "No one here looks down at you. Azrael and Vadren have both come to me asking what is wrong, if you are alright, and saying that they have said nothing of it to anyone - other than it happened - that is all.

You have friends, Selena, and they worry."

"I know," Selena replied, "I want some time to think and also a little time to try to forget, or, maybe just a little distance so that it's not so fresh in my mind. I enjoyed it all, Shaevre, every second. But all of that was a need, Shaevre, and I'm not a need, I'm a person. You know me. Would I have ever done all of that?"

The tall Xer shook her head, "You have a rich mind and imagination, my friend, and it all runs from a warm heart. The one that I know might smile at me and talk of something like that in whispers, but she could never do something like that."

"That's part of my trouble right now," Selena said, "Now, I feel as though I can do anything. It's like being a child again and needing to know what is right and what is not to be done.

Anyway, what I'd like you to do for me now is point me to where Faith is buried. I wasn't there when she died, trying to keep my sister and I alive and safe from Ny'Zeille. I owe her so much that I can never repay. I owe you all, but I can't even thank Faith. All I can do is go and say the words."

"You liked her didn't you?" Shaevre asked quietly as they walked down the long corridor to the outer doors.

"I did," Selena said in a quiet and firm voice, "I suppose that I might have felt a little, I don't know, a little dislike for her for the way that she just scooped up Dahlgren like she did, but that would be being really low and catty.

Besides," she said as she looked up, "I liked her. I couldn't help but like her from the first minute." she said as they reached the last set of doors.

"Then it is my honor to lead you to where she rests," Shaevre said, "but I wish for you to keep your grief inside as the Xer that you are now. Save it for when you are there.

For now, you must learn to be a Xer - to feel like a Xer, see like a Xer, smell what is on the wind as a Xer does. See how you walk. You bounce because you walk like a human in a Xer suit."

Selena took the lesson to heart, since it was important and it took her mind out of the pit where it had been. She saw that Shaevre was right, and she found that once she had the motions of walking down, she was amazed at how she could cover ground with her long legs.

With a thought, the panorama of scents and smells came to her mind from all around her. She was astounded. She felt as though she could almost close her eyes and see with her nose. What her eyes brought to her mind was ever so slightly grainy compared to her vision before, but it was sharp and bore no room for interpretation. What she saw was what was there, though she noticed that the range of colors was from a slightly shallower palette.

Something else which astounded her about her vision was the way that she noticed motion. A dry leaf still stuck on a tree and wiggling a little in the breeze would cause her to snap her head in that direction. She saw every chickadee as it sat in a tree and re-fluffed its feathers to stay warm and she also saw the fox in the snow as it watched the same birds.

Shaevre asked her if she thought that she had the ability to hide herself, and Selena saw that she did, but that it didn't come from this shape - it came from the wide range of demonic abilities that she possessed. When she tried to demonstrate it, Shaevre instantly lost even the ability to sense the presence of a hidden Xer.

But perhaps the greatest gift of it all was the way that she could now run like her friend easily. Those long legs just moved her like the wind over even rough ground, and she wouldn't tire.

They came to the rise which overlooked the draw where the fight had been. The recent snowfalls had obscured the torn landscape and hidden the bodies of the other Xer and the twisted corpse of Ny'Zeille Runei- or, that was what it looked like at first to Selena, but she saw that it wasn't so.

"Dahlgren carries much pain in his breast," Shaevre said in a whisper as she pointed. "For all that was done, he is still the dutiful son and he dug his mother's grave alone, until I found him here a few days ago and helped him with the rest. His mother was insane or, perhaps she suffered some other ailment, but it changes nothing for him. He had to take his own mother's head and watch his female die less than a minute later."

They stepped back into the woods and faded from view as they looked at Dahlgren and Nahl'een Runei standing together at Faith's grave.

After a few minutes, the grieving father and his little girl mounted his horse and rode slowly to the top of the draw, over the crest and away on their way back to the mountain.

"Spend a little of your time with Faith," Shaevre said, "and then come home where everyone loves you. Seek what you must find in yourself, but do not punish those who hold you dear over it, especially your sister and Dahlgren. He understood your request of him through me, but Selena - he was the first to stand, and without his words, I could never have made the others understand. You feel shame and everyone sees it and they talk of ways to make it better, him most of all. He carries much pain, but he does not see you in any other way than as the rogue that he once knew.

I leave it to you as a test to remember the way back. If you have doubt, remember with your nose."

She kissed Selena softly and stepped back a little before turning to walk quickly away.

Selena turned and walked down the draw to say her words and make her peace with Faith.

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Selena came alone every day after that. The walk helped her as did her one-sided conversations with Faith, and it got her out of the mountain and away from the shame that she still felt a little.

Arrax also helped as she listened to them teach her quietly, and not only in the ways of the Xer. He was still her male and he made love to her if she asked him for it because he was aware of how she felt. He hid it well, but they both knew that he would lose her and never lose her at the same time.

But it was the walks to visit Faith which helped her the most.

She saw Dahlgren coming a few times and faded into the woods to stride away quietly.

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*I use a popular program when I write, and it has an autocorrect feature that is often incorrect in what it assumes that I meant to type. Sometimes this happens when I'm not looking at the screen, since I'm a lousy but quick typist. When I went back to read this over, I came to this one line, and what I read was "She felt his nads everywhere on her."

I laughed til I cried. 0_•