Fire leapt into the night, orange flames licking into the darkness, tongues that lapped at the stars above. Shadows ringed the bonfire, mere shapes in the flickering light. John’s head buzzed from the dense smoke rising off the fire; his mouth tingled from whatever had been in the cup he’d sipped from before he passed it along to the person beside him. His hands felt swollen and unwieldy, his whole body off-kilter. He swore he could hear the fire laugh at him, a cackling, rippling sound that eclipsed the world.

The man on his left side was a fellow soldier in the American army and, like himself, had been captured by the rampaging Sioux warriors currently performing for their benefit. Others from John’s regiment sat scattered around the fire, their white faces pale through the grime and dust of the trail. Their skin shone in the firelight, luminous, incongruous with the dark flesh of the Indians who held them prisoner. None of the soldiers understood the meaning for this display—a prelude to death, perhaps? Or an initiation into the tribe? Something more? Something less?

Somewhere beyond the flames, a drum began to beat.

A solo note, over and over again, pounding back the night and taking up residence in John’s left temple. When he pressed his hand to his forehead, another drum picked up the beat, and another. Within minutes, the bonfire shook to the rhythm of human palms on taut animal skins, and foreign throats picked up the thread of song in a wordless, primal sound. All around him, voices mingled with the flames, rising to the heavens above. John felt his own mouth open and close, but he heard no sound escape his lips.

Oh ay ay ay oh ay ay ai oh ay ay ay oh ay ay ai

Then came the dancer.

A man stepped into the firelight, and suddenly John’s skin felt a size too small for his frame. His clothing itched hyper-sensitive skin. Tugging at his collar, fingers unconsciously unbuttoning his shirt, John gazed, riveted, at the strong male warrior whose body moved in time with the drums. Lithe limbs found a fast, furious pace; bare feet struck the ground, rapid-fire, and the jingle of clay and bones clattered with the man’s motions.

Sweet Lord. No civilized man could move like that—this was something beyond humanity, beyond comprehension. The first rain that fell on the earth danced in this pattern, and the last flame that would flicker, long after Man was gone, would have this same rhythm. There was no reason in it, no rhyme, but John felt his body responding in ways he’d never imagined it would, not to a man labeled an enemy, a savage living on the plains in the middle of nowhere.

Another button on John’s shirt slipped free, and his hand trailed down his chest to fall into his lap, where a sweet ache pulsed in time with the drums. As he watched the dancer, his hand worked between the ties in his breeches to cup the erection that throbbed at the center of his being. His fingers massaged his thick length, squeezing in time with the drums, the chants, the fire and its wild patron whose movements matched the dancing flames.

John raised his knees before him, leaned back a little, and let his fingers slide under his balls. The moan that escaped him disappeared in the warriors’ chants. The tip of his dick protruded from his breeches now, and his hand fisted along his shaft, kneading it, working it hard.

As the dancer’s rhythm increased, John’s ministrations quickened with an almost frantic air. His blood raced through him, his skin crawled, every nerve seemed to sizzle with lust. Now, he thought, squeezing his cockhead in his palm. He felt a bit of come in his hand, but nothing much. Nothing that released the energies in him. He squeezed again. Now.And again—now.

There was one final beat of the drum, and then silence pressed in around him, so complete he thought he’d been struck deaf. He glanced up to find the dancer swaying above him, so close that John could smell the animalistic scent of sweat and power radiating from the man. In a guttural voice, the warrior said something to John, but the white man did not understand the Indian’s language. He was so damn close. His head felt foggy, his body incomplete. “What?”

Stepping around him, the warrior grabbed John’s arm in passing and dragged him a few feet, away from the bonfire and the crowd. John scrambled to stand, one hand tucking his dick into his breeches while the other tried in vain to find release. “I don’t,” he started—his tongue felt thick in his mouth, unused. “I don’t know what you want.”

Taking him by the elbow, the warrior led John to a teepee on the edge of the Sioux camp. John’s feet were clumsy in the darkness and he stumbled several times, landing heavily against the native’s side. His heart throbbed in his cock, and the second time he tripped, he found himself thrusting his hips against his companion. “Please,” he sobbed, weary and worn out and so goddamn closeto orgasm that he just wanted to cry. “I need to stop…please—”

He found himself shoved into the teepee. He fell to the ground and, on hands and knees, crawled onto a luscious carpet of fur. Pressing his face to the musty pelt, he breathed in the rich scent of cured leather and sleepiness stole over him—here was where he wanted to stay.

Strong hands tugged at his hips, raising his ass in the air. With quick tugs, his pants were stripped away, and the night felt balmy against his suddenly bare skin. Something cool and damp touched the crack between his buttocks—with a gasp, John arched his back, pushing against fingers that coated his anus with animal fat. “Yes,” he sighed, hands fisting in the fur beneath him. Released from the confines of his pants, his balls hung low, his cock angled to rub against the worsted fabric of his shirt. Eager fingers rimmed his asshole, then slid lower over trembling skin to massage his balls before they grasped his hard dick. John thrust into that palm, hungry for the friction that rubbed him toward release. “Yes, yes, God yes. Just like that. Right there. Right…”

The arrowhead shape of a thick cock butted against him. “Yes,” John cried, burying his face in the fur. One hard thrust and John felt his insides fill with a flame that burned brighter than the bonfire outside the teepee. His cry rose out into the night, one glorious affirmation like a psalm flung out to the heavens. “Yes.”

Their coupling came heated and quick, like the beat of the drums and the warrior’s dance had been. John spread his legs, letting the native dive between his buttocks again and again. Sure hands held his ass in place, and his own hands released the fur to stray to his crotch. He teased his dick with his fingers, pinching and pulling his erection until he came in a hot spurt that tore another cry from him, this one triumphant. “Yes, God yes,” he sighed. Wriggling his hips, he urged the warrior to climax. The man’s primitive grunts matched John’s own. Despite the language barrier, they spoke in the same ancient tongue—sexual release.

John felt his warrior lover come deep within him, a splash of fire that raced through his core like lava. Then a heavy weight collapsed upon him—the native dancer, his energy spent. Arms encircled John, holding him close, and he savored the man above him, the wilting dick still in him, the soft furs beneath his body.

For long moments, they lay like that, quiet. John didn’t know what had just happened between them, but he didn’t want to ruin it with words the native wouldn’t understand. But if the Sioux offered his regiment freedom? He wouldn’t take it. He wanted to stay here, in these arms, with this man.

When the warrior’s breathing evened out, deepening into sleep, John opened his eyes and blinked in the darkness. At first, nothing registered—the black night was so complete around them that nothing else might have existed but the two of them still meshed together.

Then he felt someone watching him. There, in the corner, two black eyes like twin pools of spilt ink bored into him. A chill trickled down his spine. Who…?

A low, harsh whisper rasped through the night. Though the words were foreign, John could hear the hatred in them. Mine,they said, insidious. He was mine.

John fought the urge to reply, Not anymore.