#fem lizardfolk

Now, though, it’s nighttime, and something definitely seems wrong.   You should be able to see the big and little dipper at this time of year, but they don’t seem to be anywhere in the sky?  None of the constellations you can name seem to be anywhere actually.  You don’t want to dwell on it, chalking it up to ignorance, but it leaves a niggling in the back of your brain.  You wish you’d paid more attention to a lot of things, now.  Were these forest sounds familiar?  You want to say you’ve heard these bugs before, and birds, and frogs, but really would you notice if they were different?  You think you would, hope you would.  Something feels off though, but you put it off to deal with it in the morning.

That lump of lead hasn’t gone away by morning, and even though you’re meant to spend another night here you decide to cut the trip short and trek back to your car.  It’s a ten mile hike from where you are to where you parked, a straight shot once you make the mile back to the main trail.  You take care to clean, making yourself a thermos of coffee for the road before putting out the fire, and leaving the campsite behind with nothing to signify your presence other than a small ring of rocks surrounding cold, damp ash.

The first few minutes of your hike, you keep telling yourself you’re cutting you trip short due to paranoia.  But you promise yourself a treat to make up for it, maybe some pastries and a gourmet coffee to make up for the freeze dried instant stuff you’re currently drinking, with enough powdered non dairy creamer to choke an actual cow.  You don’t notice how long you’ve been walking, until you’re pretty sure you’ve walked well over a mile on this dinky little pathway through the underbrush, and you really should have come across the main trail now.   Sitting on a downed log you pull out your map and your phone.  You curse the lack of bars, regretting not bringing your little handheld satellite GPS receiver, but you’d thought it would be overkill for a short and straightforward hike like this.  That will show you to never do that again, you suppose.  Still, your compass says you’ve been walking the right direction, and you wonder if maybe you just haven’t gone quite far enough.  Still, you keep your phone out, knowing that you should at least get a bar or two on the main trail, considering you were using it on the hike in.

By the time lunch rolls around, you haven’t made it anywhere it seems like.  Sure you’ve made progress, but you know you’ve walked at least half a dozen miles, and you still have no cell site, you’ve seen no main road, no other travelers.  You sit, resting against a tree, and study your map while you eat a protein bar.  You’re scrutinizing, trying to figure out where you might be if you’ve gotten turned around.  You wonder briefly if you should head back for the clearing you came from and wait it out another night, but what would that do really?  You left at the only trailhead leading out of the clearing, that leads onto the same straightforward little trodden path that should have hit the main trail hours ago.  There are no paths branching off of that one, and you haven’t stepped foot off the path since you began walking.  You finish your protein bar with a grimace and have a few sips of water before angrily folding your map and continuing to follow the path.

The sun is just touching the tops of the trees when the little path you’ve been walking down all day finally intersects with a trail.  You say a trail and not the trail, because this road that you’re now standing on looks completely unfamiliar to you.  It looks like an old through road, unpaved and with two well worn ruts for what look like cart wheels running along it.  You don’t see any sort of civilization either direction, and you’re contemplating climbing a tree to see what you can make out from up that high, but you really don’t want to be stuck in the middle of nowhere in need of an ambulance and you aren’t exactly a spry young child anymore, capable of climbing trees on a whim.

You wrack your brain, trying to figure something, anything out.  You know that when you left the main trail onto what had been a small path to your campsite you’d turned right, so you should turn left down the trail to get back to your car.  You head that way, despite all contrary evidence you keep hoping that if you just push through it you’ll reach your car and be headed back home.  Maybe you’d go see a doctor, or maybe you’d just sleep off this experience, but it would be over and you could go back to the regular world.  

When it’s well and truly night, and you still haven’t seen hide nor hair of another person, you let yourself settle down for a good cry.   The moon is full, and you can at least see where you’re going, but all that does is illuminate everything that’s wrong.  You should be able to see some sort of light pollution nearby, the sky shouldn’t be this full of stars, why is there no noisy civilization.  You should be close enough to hear cars on the road, so where are they?  You know you should settle down and wait for morning, but you know your brain just won’t let you sleep.  So why rest?  You keep pushing forward, and by the time the sun is rising you just want to collapse into another sobbing heap as the road continues ever on in front of you.

You aren’t hungry, anxiety eating at your stomach as much as it is your head.  You do make sure to choke something down though, knowing that if you’re going to keep walking you need to keep calories in you.   You’re thankful that the road runs near to a running source of water, you can hear that at least sometimes in the background and it’s easy enough to find once you go looking.  Filling up your large canteen, you drop a water purification tablet in and continue out on your trek.   Running on fear and anxiety, you stagger on for what could have been hours, or maybe only minutes, or maybe even days (okay that’s a bit of an exaggeration) until you reach a fork in the road.

Now, do you go the Robert Frost take the road less traveled with its overgrown footpath and dark canopy, or do you listen to the horror trope screaming at you in the face and take the well maintained and nicely lit pathway?  Your desire to not wind up murdered wins out, and you take the brightly lit road with its well worn ruts.  Robert Frost will have to wait until you aren’t in an actual life or death situation to come in with his wisdom.  Although when you trip in one of those well worn ruts and sprain your ankle two miles later you’re rethinking your decision. So, you break down, and I mean who can blame you?

-------

Two days ago, and a handful of hours, Rha’ss felt her chaining for the first time.  Usually sometime around reaching maturity one’s chaining would make itself known.  Some bloomed slightly earlier, some later, but most who made it into their thirtieth year without it knew that they would not find themselves being called by their other half.   It wasn’t unheard of at all for these unfated pairs to still love and live together, but the connection of a chained couple was known to be unrivaled, such that even high born nobles would take their fated regardless of status.  

At thirty-eight Rha’ss had resigned herself to life without a chain, becoming a sellsword content with the knowledge that there would be none to truly mourn her when the time came.  So imagine her surprise when she woke in the middle of the night to feel that gentle pull in the center of her chest, a yearning wrapped ‘round her heart that would not be fixed until the subject of her desires was with her.  Between contracts as she was, it didn’t take long for her to be fixed on her horse and following the gentle pull in her chest.  

She wondered then what had happened to have brought the bond to life so suddenly.  Were you just coming of age?  How would she handle that, and the differential that comes with such a difference in life experiences?  Was there something else that had kept the bond dormant for so long?  Were you merely far from her, and only now in close enough proximity for it to kindle?  She hopes you won’t be disappointed by her, a hardened and jaded mercenary.  She long buried her love and affection beneath a tough veneer of indifference, necessary for the blood she traded in.  How would you handle holding hands that had dealt death?

Rha’ss isn’t sure what to make of you when she first comes across you.  You’re curled in the middle of the road, sobbing, with your hands pressed against your face.  From what she can see you’re too tall to be a gnome, but your ears are round so you can’t be an elf.  Maybe half elf half gnome?  You’re dressed so oddly too.  In bright colors and materials she’s never seen before.  Your shoes are odd to her, your coat, your bag.  Everything is so strange.  But when you look up, and your watery eyes sparkle against the sun as you stare up at her, she can’t find it in her to be upset.  

“What’s the matter sweetling?”

-------

You find yourself staring up at an imposing creature astride a rather large dapple grey horse.  They look like a lizardfolk out of a fantasy game, their reptilian face gleaming like jade in the bright sun.  Their head is crested with pink and teal moving down their spine in impressive pointed frills almost like a mohawk.  Their slitted eyes are a bright yellow, matching some of the scales that look almost like freckles across their shoulders and down their arms.  Their throat leading down into their shirt is a pale cream, and the whole look is rather impressive.  You wonder briefly at the edge of your consciousness if you should be scared, but something in your chest that’s been tight since two mornings ago seems to have relaxed now that you’re thinking of it.

Still, this...person?  Person.  This person is definitely not a human.  And isn’t that something to think about?  You wonder briefly if you’re in shock, did you actually break your ankle?  Is this some weird fantasy your brain has stirred up to keep you from passing out and dying?  Is all of this some weird fever dream where you’ll wake up in your campsite after a bout of food poisoning vowing to never eat rations again?

“What’s the matter sweetling?”  Their voice is rough and feminine, low and rasping but with a lilt and timbre that makes you think of your grandmother in some odd way.  They’re off their horse now, kneeling over you and looking down at you with such tenderness that all you can do is start sobbing anew and throw yourself at them.  They shush you with quiet murmurs of nothing, taloned hands gently sifting through your hair to scratch at your scalp soothingly.  Somehow, you choke out everything.  From the changed pathway, to the different stars, to the different bugs, even to themselves.

“I don’t know what’s going on.  Everything is all wrong, none of this makes sense!  I can’t - I don’t know where I am, I can’t figure out how to get home.  What do I do?”  The being surrounding you gives a low, soothing hum, and their cool skin helps ground you.  

“Well, sweetling, I can tell you that you’re at the border between the riverlands and dragon’s spire.”  They give a thoughtful hum when your face remains as confused as ever.  “In Xanthalan?”  Your brows knit together further, and she huffs a little.  “Why don’t we start with where you’re from, sweetling, and maybe your name at that.  I am Rha’ss, daughter of Sharath, protector of the dragon’s spire.”

When you introduce yourself, with much less pomp, she finds herself confused.  “I’ve never heard of that land before, and I have traveled across the great East sea to the basin of the world, and across the great North sea to the kingdoms of ice.”  She frowns in thought, staring down at you heavily.  “Where is your map?”  When you fumble your map out of your bag and hand it to her she frowns again as she unfolds it.   “This doesn’t make much sense…”  She studies the map with you caged in against her chest, her arms still wrapped around you.  “I think we need to pay a friend of mine a visit.”

Rha’ss moves to stand and pull you up with her, and you go with it completely forgetting your ankle.  Until, of course, it decides to give under you when you try to put your weight on it.  You’re pleasantly surprised by Rha’ss’ strength, as she catches you easily without stumbling.  You mumble a shy apology, but she just gives you a warm look and caresses your cheek with her thumb lovingly.   She helps you onto her horse, mounting behind you and wrapping her arms around your waist to take the reins.  You feel small in front of her, she must be at least seven feet tall the way the top of your head doesn’t even graze her chin.  You don’t have much riding experience, and it shows, but she’s patient with you, and the way she guides your hips into the rhythm of riding is surprisingly sensual.  

It’s only a two hour ride at a moderate pace before you come across a small town built alongside the road.  There’s an inn, and what looks like a general store, but that’s all you can make out before Rha’ss is pulling you bodily from the horse’s back and carrying you into the inn like a bride over a threshold.  After settling you gently in a chair by the fire she greets the innkeeper and barkeep like old friends, complete with embraces that make you suddenly and unexpectedly jealous, all in a hissing sort of language you don’t understand.  They’re both lizardfolk like she is, so you’re guessing it’s their own language.  

You take a few moments to look around.  There are a few others in here, not lizardfolk so this isn’t a planet purely populated by reptilian people.  It looks like some orcs, and something furry with round ears - maybe a gnoll?  And then a pair of short but intimidating looking...you’d have guessed humans but who knows at this point, both with impressive beards.  So dwarves?  You’re brought out of your reverie when Rha’ss walks back over to you carrying two frothy mugs and a roll of what looks like linen.  “Let me bind your ankle sweetling, and then we can talk more.”  The care with which she handles you makes you feel secure down to your bones, but you’re dreading trying to come to terms with whatever it is that’s happened to bring you here.

Under Rha’ss’ watchful stare you take a long sip of the drink she’s brought you, thankful that at least honey mead is honey mead regardless of whatever else is going on around you.  “I don’t even know where to start…”  You sound exhausted even to your own ears, the kind of weary that extends past physical tiredness and into the realm of a soul deep exhaustion.  “I was camping, having a fine few days in the woods, but the other night I noticed the stars didn’t look quite right.  I couldn’t find any of my landmarks.  And then my trail disappeared, and I don’t know where I am.  I don’t know how I got here.  None of this makes sense.  I’m just a normal human, from a normal family, lizard folk and orcs and stuff, none of this should be real.  I can feel you’re real like I am though, and I’m starting to think I’m not hallucinating all of this…”  You take another deep drink of your honey mead before placing your tankard down on the table and resting your face in your hands tiredly.

When you look back at Rha’ss she’s staring with a confused look on her face.  “What’s ‘human?’  Is that your clan?”

You give her an equally confused glance.  “No?  It’s my species?  My race?”  

She doesn’t look appeased by that.  “I’ve never heard of ‘human’ before.”  She hums thoughtfully.  “You’re softer than an elf, but bigger than a halfling or a gnome.  You’ve got the rounded ears too.”  She jerks her chin in your direction and you touch the rounded top of your ear a little self-consciously.  She drinks from her own tankard and stares away in thought, you can almost hear the gears working in her head as she tries to puzzle things out.  “That map you showed me earlier, you said that was from your home?”  You nod at her and she hums again.  “But you were camping just along the dragon’s spire, I know that land better than almost any and your map is fully foreign to me.”   She frowns in contemplation, mumbling to herself before pinning you with a serious look.  “Tell me what you know of heart’s calls and chaining.”  You stare at her as confused as ever, you aren’t sure what you’ve done wrong as her face falls while you look on.  Her sigh is weary and resigned, but she gives a grimace of a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes.  “Worry not sweetling, all will be revealed in time.  Qruz has told me that the Wizard Gorux has made himself comfortable in the inn as of yesterday.  It seems we were expected, we’re to meet tomorrow.”  

You just nod your head tiredly at this point, too overwhelmed to even question it any longer.  You can’t lift your head again though, crashing hard after the stressful past days.  You’re already half asleep when Rha’ss picks you up again and settles you on a rather comfortable straw mattress in an upstairs room, and you’re out completely with barely enough time to mumble your thanks.  

-------

When you wake the next morning, the first thing you notice is that you aren’t alone.  While you’re alone in your little bed, you can see the lizard person, Rha’ss, from the day before, along with a somehow even taller and broader orc sitting across from her at a small table.   They’re conversing lowly, and you can’t understand them over the crackling of the fire.  The orc is dressed in ornately embroidered robes, and has a plethora of feathers and glass beads woven through his black hair.  He looks wizened but not old, his hair lacking even a single streak of silver but his eyes carrying the weight of centuries.

You don’t really pay attention as he comes over and asks you a few questions, you can tell from them that Rha’ss has shared your story.  He smudges you with some fragrant herbs, although you can’t place what any of them are and that sends a pang of sadness through your heart.   Whatever he sees though makes his face go grim and he settles the lizard woman in the chair with a heavy look.  “Aye, lass, it’s as ye thought. It isn’t the first time a bond has made it across time and space, but this is something I’ve only read about.  It hasn’t happened in a millenia at the least.  Do not take this gift lightly.”  He turns to fix you with an inscrutable stare, dark eyes searching your face.  His eyes soften though, and with an exhaled puff of air he places one large hand on the crown of your head and mumbles something in a language you’ve never heard before.  “Blessings on you little one, I do not envy your position, but I know Rha’ss, I know she will love you and cherish you until the end of days if you let her.  Do not ignore your chaining, the both of you will suffer for it.”  

He’s gone before you can ask him about it, and Rha’ss is staring at you guardedly.  “I guess it’s time for me to explain that eh?”  She pulls a small leather pouch out of her pack, removing a pipe and what smells like it might be tobacco.  You watch as she packs the leaf into the bowl of the pipe, soothing herself with the practiced repetitive motion.  “Never thought I’d find myself doing this.  See, sweetling, from the time we’re babes we hear about our calling.  Our heart’s calling, or we call it the chaining.  Because it’s said to feel like a chain pulling us together.  I’d never felt it, my whole life.  I dedicated myself to my sword, to battle.  But I woke three nights ago to a feeling in my chest I knew with certainty was it.”  She stands from the table then, leaving her pipe abandoned and unsmoked as she moves to kneel before you.  “I was trying to fathom who might be waiting for me at the other end of my chain, and sweetling, it was you.  Please, tell me you feel it.”  Her hands are on your knees, and her yellow eyes are full of open affection and fear it won’t be reciprocated.  

You reach up to stroke over her reptilian snout, soft little fingers skating up the butt of her jaw.  “I know that I was panicking until I met you.  That as soon as you held me I knew I’d never been safer in my whole life.  I can’t promise this will always be easy for me, and that I won’t make mistakes, but I can promise to try.”  Rha’ss relaxes against you burying her head against your stomach and gripping tightly at the back of your shirt.  You lean down to kiss the top of her head between her eyes, and she curiously nuzzles up against your breasts when they crowd in against her.  Your soft giggle at the action makes her face light up, and she begins rubbing against you with her jaw trying to make you laugh again.  

Once she has you laughing you tug her face up to your own, kissing along the top of her nose.  Her scales are cool and smooth against your lips, and she lets out an affectionate chittering noise when she feels your soft mouth on her.  She strokes her tongue over your cheek and throat, letting out a high, throaty sigh at your taste.  The gentle prick of her talons at your hips barely keeps you grounded as she laves over your skin with her dark, forked tongue in repeated strokes.  You can’t help letting out a sigh of pleasure when that curiously dextrous appendage presses down the front of your shirt and skates over the cup of your bra.  She seems intrigued by the garment, and with questioning eyes she tugs at the hem of your shirt.  

You let Rha’ss strip it from you wordlessly, lifting your arms over your head until you’re left in your bra and hiking pants on the bed.   Her talons gently trace the cup of your bra and up the straps to your shoulders.  “This looks much nicer than a corset sweetling, not that I’d know much about that either way.”  She leans down to lick a hot stripe down between your breasts before sneakily pushing her tongue underneath the front busk between the cups.  You’re thankful to be wearing a front closing bra, and with only a little bit of experimentation she’s used her hands to pop it open, letting it fall aside to bare your chest to her.  Her taloned hands have been smoothing and stroking up your sides, from your hips over the side of your chest and back down, gently massaging at your hips at they sit there momentarily before repeating their journey.

When you cry out Rha’ss’ name in frustration as she merely gazes down at you, she repeats yours back to you in a smitten sigh.  Her knuckles gently graze over the peaks of your nipples, and she watches your face to learn what you like and how to touch you.  She gently pinches them between two fingers, giving an experimental tug before fondling your breasts in earnest, her tongue licking stripes along your shoulders and throat.  She has one firm thigh lodged between yours, and you can feel her cool skin heating beneath the languid thrusts your hips make up searching for friction.

Her head soon replaces her hands, that prehensile tongue coiling around one breast before giving a firm lick up the center to rasp over your nipple.  You barely notice her hands as they skate down your stomach, talons dipping into the waist of your pants before she tugs at them softly, looking up at you with hopeful eyes.  You lift your hips in assent, feeling bereft for a moment as she moves away only long enough to tug your pants and panties down in one fell swoop.  She tugs her own garments off then too, a simple tunic and linen pants that whisper to the floor as she tosses them carelessly aside.  

Rha’ss is on you again then, and over you.  Her face is tucked into your neck, tongue scenting and tasting your skin as she presses your soft breasts against her cool, firm torso.  The give of them against her is enticing, and she relishes in the way that you arch up into her when her thigh finally makes contact with your bare core.  The heat is so intense against her cool skin, and she presses up against you harder in an attempt to feel more of it.  You’re burning hot and so slick.  She grips your hips, just careful enough not to prick you with her talons, although you may be sporting bruises later.  She uses this leverage to move you up and down against her, drawing your slick heat over her flesh and painting her with your essence.  

Your head is thrown back, baring your neck up submissively.  One of your hands is caressing down over her head and neck, skating along the base of her frills.  They had been tucked down against her back, but as she loses herself to pleasure you find them occasionally flaring unconsciously.  Your other hand is at her back, at the base of her tail.  You hadn’t really noticed it until now.  Reaching down for a handful of her buttocks you instead catch the base of her tail, although the way it makes her stutter and cry out against your throat has you abandon your original goal in favor of stroking over where her tail meets her back with your soft hands and blunt nails.

Your orgasm sneaks up on you, one moment you’re lost in your partner and the next you’re almost whiting out as the heat licks down your spine and your back arches.  You cry out Rha’ss’ name, toes curling and thighs cramping as you reach your ecstasy.  She spreads you out before her, and as you’re fuzzy from your pleasure you watch as she teases something from a slit at the apex of her thighs.  It’s not quite as large as a penis, although it’s much thicker at the base and tapers to an odd blunt, angled tip.  “When you’re ready, sweetling, I’ll fill you with my brood, but this will do for now.”  She sighs happily when she slips the cool organ between your labia to rut against you.  The oddly cool and slick sensation against your clit has you clenching again, and you cry out loudly when the tip prods at your hole only to just barely slip inside.

Rha’ss lets out a guttural noise when your hot body surrounds her, and you can feel the organ lengthen inside you even as it gets thinner. One of her hands comes down to stroke at your clit, touching you in just the right way that has you clenching harder.  You’re still so tight around her, gripping her in all the right places.  You’re surprised by her orgasm, a cool fluid gushing from the tip inside of you and flowing out to coat your inner thighs.  It smells strangely sweet and heady, and the feeling of her coming inside of you along with her incessant fingers on your clit has you reaching your peak again.