Samaria kept her gaze to the sky, mortified at the position she had gotten herself into. She shouldn’t have agreed to dance with him- what was she thinking? She had been worried about being disrespectful to him at his manhood ceremony. But traditions be damned. Why didn’t she lie? She could have said she was sick from the drink.

Samaria’s face was only growing redder by the minute, as she felt the growing hardness of Kaipo against her backside. He was completely oblivious to her discomfort, apparently. But he was so drunk, she would be surprised if he was even conscious enough to know his own name. His tongue slid up the side of her neck and she shivered. Did he not care at all that everyone was watching? Or perhaps that was just more incentive to him. He took the lobe of her ear between his teeth and bit down. Hard.

“Ai!” Samaria hissed, jerking her head away from his mouth. His fingers gripped her stomach tighter in protest, almost bruising in their strength. That was enough. Before she could push herself out of his arms, a massive body came barreling towards them.

Samaria shrieked as Kaipo’s arms were wrenched from her, nearly dragging her down with him as he was wrestled to the ground. Stumbling to catch her balance, she whipped her head around to see Lagi and Kaipo locked arm in arm.

The crowd cheered. Mean shouted roudy warrior calls at the two, encouraging the chaos, and Kaipo laughed as he fought back, locking Lagi’s head in his elbow and ruffling his hair.

Samaria rolled her eyes. Of course. It wouldn’t be a manhood ceremony without a brawl. Men. However, it did give her a chance to sneak away. Which she gladly took. It was almost too easy to avoid everyone’s notice as they cheered for whoever they wanted to win, and she slipped out of the fire’s glow and into the leafy jungle.