We Need To Talk

Since the human women had arrived at Laresi, it was fair to say that the male waheya had been... eager to greet their new tribesmembers. Of course, they'd had the little problem of the little grey men to sort out first. It had taken the attention of the men for a short time anyway. Although more than a few of them seemed to be interested in proving themselves in battle to the humans when the opportunity had presented itself. It was safe to say that it hadn't quite worked out in the waheyan's favour in some cases. Salma knew that at least a handful of the human women had found seeing the spider-monkey aliens in their full, eight-limbed glory, fighting against an alien spaceship shooting lasers, had been more than enough of a mood dampener. For Salma, it had been a reminder that they were aliens to each other. Perhaps the waheya were suddenly realising the same.
Since the defeat of the grey aliens' backup spaceship, which had taken out a fair chunk of the waheyan numbers, notably the previous matriarch and a large majority of her harem, her Voice, Nezon, had been distant. Although Salma had offered Nezon to begin her harem initially to save him from the attentions of the matriarch who wanted him to join her regardless of his wishes, she had thought they'd had something... more. Even if had only been a small thing. Perhaps he hadn't felt the same, and now that Kyarek was dead, he had no desire to be tied to Salma for the rest of his life.
She could have tied herself up in knots about it. Considering doing so for a short time. But she'd never been one to hold back when she thought communicating was the best option. The vast majority of the time, communicating was the best option. Particularly for people in relationships. Salma and Nezon might have an unconventional one, but he was her Voice. The waheya that served as her ability to communicate with the rest of the unmated tribe, which made up the majority of its members. Salma wasn't going to sit on her hands and wait, she was going to ask, and brave whatever answer he had to give.
When Salma said as much to Julieta and Isabel, their eyes widened. "You are a braver lady than I am," Julieta said. Neither Julieta nor Isabel had yet started their harem, although not for lack of trying on the male waheyan's part. They both said they taking their time to choose, not wanting to rush into anything. Of the ten of them that had crashed in the alien spaceship together, only three human women had so far started their harem. Kat with her three waheyan whom she'd chosen for her harem before she'd returned to rescue the rest of the humans with her harem's help, Sinead with her one Raiq, and Salma with Nezon.
"Nezon is so... broody," Isabel said, "Are you even sure he knows how to talk?"
Julieta raised a finger. "Pretty sure as a Voice he kinda has to."
Salma waved a hand in a casual dismissal. "I'm just going to ask where we stand now that everything is settling down. If he wants to just be friends, we can be friends. There's no saying you have to have sex with all of your harem." Although before the battle, Salma and Nezon had had a lot of really, really good sex. Since then, apart from one, incredible occasion just after the spaceship had been taken down, Nezon hadn't so much as touched her.
Isabel's grin was broad and wicked, "Kat does."
Julieta wrinkled her nose. "Yeah well, Kat's also crazy so."
"Kat's not crazy," Salma argued. Both Isabel and Julieta gave her a look. "Okay, maybe she's a little crazy," Salma corrected, grinning and they all laughed. Kat was fiery, and adventurous, with a mouth like a sailor and a joy for starting arguments with her harem even though they were all twice the size of her with twice the number of limbs. They'd all heard the incredible makeup sex one too many times, until they'd been moved into more permanent treehouse lodgings further away from Kat's own 'nest', as they called it.
Pushing aside the vines that hung around their communal nest, giving them some privacy from the rest of the tribe, Salma stepped outside as Isabel called, "Good luck with your man." Salma waved goodbye over her shoulder to the two women.
Laresi was beautiful. A village built into the dense canopy of the purple jungle, Salma couldn't even see the ground through the purple vegetation. Although the waheyan were skilled climbers, Laresi now had a series of rope bridges strung throughout most of the village. It had been one of the first installations that the unmated Hands of the tribe had designed to allow the human women to traverse more easily throughout Laresi, once they'd realised that human forms weren't designed to clamber through 50 foot high trees and walk along branches.
Nezon's nest, one that she was supposed to share with him, although if he ever slept in it with her, he only arrived after she had fallen asleep and left before she awoke the next day, was on the opposite side of the village to the unmated Centre's nests. Salma was pretty sure it was on purpose, given that it was also far away from where the old matriarch had dwelled with her harem.
The last distance to the nest had not yet been closed by a ropebridge or a walkway, so she walked along a branch, her arms held out to her side to keep her balance, and hugged the final trunk as she swung herself around it to another, wider branch that she could use to jump down into the nest. To her surprise, Nezon was there. Salma had thought she'd need to wait him out, to stay awake until he arrived and she could catch him. When her arrival vibrated along the web of vines and plant matter that served as their floor, Nezon stilled, turned away from her and crouched in front of a basket of supplies in one corner.
Salma didn't bother to announce herself, merely closed the distance to wait behind him as he unfroze and continued to dig around in the basket until he found what he needed. Nezon stood and turned, rising to the height of his relaxed posture, which was still around six feet tall. His two sets of legs stayed on the ground, the latter half of his torso horizontal, while the upper stayed vertical and human-like.
"Salma," Nezon said, nodding his head once in greeting. He moved as if to walk past her and out of the nest.
"Wait! Nezon." He paused, facing away from her, his shoulders tense. Salma steeled her nerves. "I need to speak with you."
"I am about to meet with Zed," Nezon said, only just turning his head to speak in her general direction. Zed was the Hands of Kat's harem. Salma hesitated.
"Well, if it's important it can wait. I can wait for this evening when you're less busy."
Nezon didn't answer for a moment, and Salma was sure he would take the opportunity to sneak away again. Eventually, however, he turned fully towards her, his dark eyes meeting hers, looking... resigned? For all that his jaw was tense. "It's not important. What do you wish to speak of?" He said.
"Have I done something wrong, Nezon?" Salma asked, not wanting to squander this time now that he'd agreed to not avoid this. "Do you wish to dissolve your place in my harem, now that the threat of Kyarek is gone?"
Nezon blinked at her. And he looked surprised, utterly bewildered. "You think I wish to stop being your Et'war?" Nezon asked, his tone shocked.
Salma rolled her eyes but softened it with a small smile. "Considering you've been avoiding me, I wasn't really sure what else to think. I know I'm not an expert, but I'm pretty sure to be my Voice you have to... be around to ask me what I want you to say."
Nezon grimaced. "I know you offered to me to protect me from Kyarek," he said. Salma waited to see if he would continue, and when he didn't she sighed.
"It was part of the reason, yes. The other part was that I thought we... could be good together," she said. She'd told him as much when he'd demanded she not offer to him out of pity. Salma gave him a sad smile. "And I thought that we were being good together, before you suddenly decided to avoid me."
"I did not want you to regret your offer," Nezon said quietly.
"Will you believe me if I say I don't? I'm happy you're my Voice, Nezon." She took a step closer to him, placing a hand in the centre of his chest, where his heart thumped. That had been a strange thing to discover. "I have enjoyed being your Centre and... spending time with you. I would like to keep doing that, if the only reason why you're avoiding me is because you're afraid that I want to put you aside. I don't, Nezon. I want you."
Nezon's chest stilled, his heart thumping hard under his skin. Salma didn't recognise that he was holding his breath until it hissed through his teeth on a long exhale. "I am sorry, Salma. I allowed my fear of losing you to make me a poor Et'war." He bent his head towards hers to press their foreheads together. "I had not hoped anyone would ever ask me to join their harem," Nezon said quietly. Salma knew that was because Kyarek had held ownership of him, even though he had never allowed her to complete the ahuite ceremony. None of the waheyan women would have ever risked the matriarch's wrath for him. "And I had not dreamed when you offered that you would be everything I had ever wanted."
Salma grinned, "There's the Voice I was waiting for. They do say you guys are good with words." Sliding up her hips, along her sides, Nezon's second set of hands settled in the small of her back and pulled her flush against him. "I thought you were supposed to be meeting Zed," Salma said, even as she looped her arms around Nezon's neck and pulled him towards her.
Nezon paused inches from her mouth, "Zed can wait. My La'mya needs me."