“I can’t imagine what you’re feeling right now,” Harper agreed kindly. She was a clever lady and was already steering me toward the officer quarters. Since I’d settled in on the ship, the doctor had upgraded my translator implants and given me eye implantsas well. Now the dark ship was no longer quite so dark, and the mystery of how everyone got around was also solved. The implants in my eyes allowed me to read all the alien scripts, and they also laid out colorful lines along the walls that acted as guides.
“I won’t pretend to like the guy—he’s a scary SOB—but I can see that he’s right for you. I’d also have to be blind not to notice that he’s got some serious communication issues.” That made me laugh, though the sound was wry, and perhaps a little sad. Yeah, communication issues, now there was a topic. I was fine with him not admitting in words that he loved me; I could sense how much he cared in every touch. It was the slow withdrawal and decline that I couldn’t handle. Why was he pulling away? And why did he look thin? I needed to know what was going on. Oh, who was I kidding? I was beyond worried, and I didn’t know how to reach him.
When we reached Sin’s quarters, I discovered that a portion of Val was waiting for me there. She was just a small Riho, the half-cat, half-otter creature, all fluffy and cute. She fluffed out a bushy tail and waved it at me in greeting, and the thin strands of silver that were part of her heated against my throat and wrists. “Oh,” Harper exclaimed in surprise at the sight. “I guess he can’t resist looking out for you, can he?”
That made me laugh. “He’d tie me to the bed for my safety if he thought he could get away with it.” I still sounded sad to my own ears, but Harper made a naughty joke, either not catching on or hoping to distract me. I watched her leave, a little envious, when a shadow detached from the wall ahead: tall shoulders and feathered wings. Her mate, waiting for her, eagerly cupped a wing around her shoulders and made her part of his world.
“See, why can’t Sin do that? What will it take for him to let me in?” I said to Val as the two of us slipped into the living area. I flicked on the light and stood for a moment, taking in the odd, museum-like quality of the room. Sin had so many things he’d collected in his life, and they were lined up on all these shelves to look at. Yet there was no space to sit, as if he’d rather rush through the room and not look at his memories—a metaphor for how he conducted his life. It had to change, but at the same time, I also didn’t really want to change him. I liked that he was so protective, I liked that he was bossy and gruff, and that he struggled to express how he felt unless it was with touch. I just wanted to know that he was okay, and he wasn’t acting like he was.
“I suppose you can’t tell me what the issue is either, can you?” I asked Val. My fingers trailed over a purple and pink seashell the size of a dinner plate, then touched the sinuous curves of a pale gray sculpture no bigger than my fist. Everything here was an odd, eclectic mix, but it was all sensual and pretty—like he couldn’t help but surround himself with beautiful things designed to induce warm, pleasurable feelings when viewing them. It was such a contradiction to the hard man he appeared to be.
Val made a mewling sound and danced out of my way, as if she didn’t want me to touch her. Her silver fur stood on end on her back, all spiked up in warning. She was this close to hissing at me, too, and I wanted to cry. Why? She’d been so sweet to me at first, and now? I was starting to think Val didn’t want me here, and that hurt. It hurt because it felt a bit like a rejection from Sin.
“Fine,” I said to her. Retreating to the bedroom, I kicked off my boots and curled up on the bed. Pulling out my tablet, I settled in for a long read. Perhaps I could go over what data I had on the Sons of Ragnar again. Maybe there was something in it that I’d missed the previous dozen times I’d gone over it. That was the one good thing that had come out of that weird attack from the Davidsonthingback on the planet. Apparently, he’d brought the tablet, it had been inside that disgusting, smelly pile he’d left behind in the shuttle. A courting gift, possibly—which was even more disgusting to consider than the muck itself.
Ysa had cleaned it up for me, and then Sin had the computer expert—Harper’s guy—go over it with a fine-toothed comb. It had come up clean, and I was beyond grateful to have my pictures and personal files. “If you’re going to sulk over there, can you at least pretend you like me?” I said to Val. She was watching me from the doorway, hackles raised and a glare on her face. At least her snout wasn’t pointed right at me but at some weird spot on the wall. That was very catlike, so I was going to pretend she wasn’t mad at me but at the dust specks floating in the air or something.
Chapter 19
The Sineater
Xio was a jungle planet, which made it hot and humid. Nearly every part of the world was covered in dense forest, with the exception of a small ocean and the ice caps that covered the poles. Only one city was worth mentioning, and it was always growing. The inhabitants of Xio had managed to avoid annexation by one of their bigger neighbors—like the Kertinal—only because of the Shade Stalkers. The very problem we were here to address.
As I sat in one of the jumpseats aboard one of theVarakartoom’s shuttles, I contemplated the Shade Stalkers rather than thinking about Frederique. Shade Stalkers were highly evolved and extremely complicated creatures, deadly, dangerous, and so intelligent that it was truly a miracle the Xionians controlled the planet, not them. Though the question could be asked: Who really controlled Xio?
The shuttle was packed to the brim with eager, battle-ready mercenaries. The senior members were all familiar, but there were more faces on the crew than usual. TheVarakartoomhad hired extra bodies for this mission, and not all the warriors present had worked with us before. We’d need them if we were to take on a pair of Shade Stalkers. This was a dangerous mission, and the mood was both grim and excited. The looks shared said it all: they knew they might not come back from this alive. For that reason, even Dravion had left the safety of theVarakartoomto be on standby near the shuttles for emergencies. Dravion rarely left the ship, and I didn’t blamehim, the fearful stares he got had to be tough on his empathic Aderian senses.
Solear and Aramon were at the front of this shuttle, flying in the lead of our little convoy. Three Xio military craft had also joined us, providing an escort over the massive, sprawling city and its large gladiator arena. I had no doubt they’d run scared the moment we hit the jungle where the Shade Stalkers had been sighted. A Shade Stalker was large enough to take down a shuttle with a swipe of one of its claws. I had full faith that Aramon could outfly a Shade Stalker’s claws, but far less confidence in the abilities of the Xionian pilots. Raukesh was piloting the second shuttle, following in our slipstream at a careful distance.
I counted the men and appraised their state when I could no longer force my mind to focus on the shuttles and the path they were taking. If I didn’t keep myself busy, my thoughts would return to Frederique, and that was a distraction I could not afford. She was safe; I told myself that over and over. She was on theVarakartoom, which was a fortress, and even on a skeleton crew, it was not without teeth. The fact was, as long as Ysa was on that ship, nobody would be able to take it.
My eyes flicked to Thatcher then, our lone human male on the crew. He was as restless and unpredictable as Solear once had been. Unlike Solear, who was nearly entirely non-verbal, Thatcher could express his anger and frustration just fine. Snide remarks, surly scowls, and a good swearing were his daily repertoire. In that way, he and I were not very dissimilar either, but Thatcher’s rage all stemmed from serious trauma. Me, I was just born an asshole.
He was angry now—the human—because he had much preferred to stay a thorn in Ysa’s side. He was too valuable a fighter not to take part in this mission, though: an ace shot, inhumanly fast, and armed with razor-sharp reflexes. Despite his snarls and generally unfriendly attitude, he was loyal to the crew. Once the fighting started, he’d be on the front line. I drew some of his rage to me, just enough to ease the gnawing hunger in Val and settle his body into a calmer, more prepared pose.
Then I spent the next few moments doing the same to each of the other males on the ship: the Asrai twins at the front, piloting the shuttle with precision; Flack, who was camouflaging battle nerves by running checklists on his datapad; and the three Kertinal we’d hired for the mission, headed by our previous regular sniper, Thar’oc, whom we’d picked up just for this. They were all males with notches in their horns, males who had seen death, been disgraced by it. Males hardened by battle and life, and yet, even they were nervous. Such was the reputation of a Shade Stalker.
The rest of the crew on this shuttle was made up of grunts from various other species—Rummicaron, Viridara, Sune, and more. There was a Xurtal male on my left whose name I couldn’t recall but who’d been on theVarakartoomfor the past three missions. Everyone was fidgeting in their own way, preparing for what was to come once we reached the landing coordinates.
Even the doc was tense. Dravion sat in the corner, behind Aramon, his tentacles brushing over his crates of medical supplies again and again to assure himself that everything was there. The half-Gnorlarnx, half-Aderian doctor was nervous about the coming battle. Normally, he was always calm, always fully in control of his baser instincts, as flat and tasteless asa dumb herd animal. Not that the doc was dumb—quite the opposite—but the taste of his nerves now was entirely new and foreign to me.
Val was the only one who seemed calm. Finally, after two weeks of starving again, she had emotions to feed on. Not just that, but she was made for battle, made to protect, and she was completely in her element where she sat at my feet. Of course, she’d also slicked part of herself all over my armor to provide an extra layer of protection, and she was able, as well, to heal any injury in the blink of an eye if I was hit.
She twisted her Gracka head, pointed snout and even more sharply pointed ears all turning toward me. It was too liquid a twist, a real Gracka could never turn their head that far, but she did not care how creepy she looked, how it made Thar’oc swear and jab an elbow into the ribs of one of his buddies to point. Thatcher cursed at the creepy move, but then he grinned, as if he rather appreciated it at the same time.
Val was eager for the fight, and she lolled out a long, silver tongue, lapping at her jowls as if she were already tasting blood. “Soon, sweetheart,” I drawled, reaching out to stroke her along her spine. It made her hackles rise into sharp spikes, but she pushed her body into the touch anyway. “We’re almost at the landing coordinates, aren’t we, Aramon?”
Aramon twisted in his seat to give me a wicked grin. That one definitely wasn’t nervous. He and his twin simply didn’t have it in them to be scared of normal things, like powerful Shade Stalkers with keen intelligence and a thirst for the hunt. “Landing in three,” Aramon agreed. “Sensor readings are clear, thermal heat vent reading as it should. It does not appear wehave company.” Some grunts and moans went up in the shuttle. The group was divided between wanting to fight as soon as our boots hit the ground or not fight at all.
We spotted the site not much later: a swath of earth already cleared of jungle vegetation. Fences had gone up around it, but they’d been broken down on one side and were completely missing in another corner. Abandoned construction vehicles, materials, and temporary buildings sat in clusters around the open area. There was no sign of life, and no sign of any dead, either. What the Shade Stalkers that had swept through the area hadn’t killed and eaten, the rest of the jungle had claimed.
I narrowed my eyes and focused on taking in each detail, big or small. Were there any signs that the Shade Stalkers were nearby, lying in wait? They were such smart predators that it was very likely they knew their prey would be back. They were also smart enough to hide in the trees, their dense black bodies hidden from sight and from scanners—watching, learning, waiting for the best moment to strike. That moment wouldn’t be today, and it probably would not be tomorrow, either. That was too long, and it was unacceptable to be away from my Frederique that long. I’d have to go off-script and get this problem sorted on my own time.
Aramon brought the shuttle in low to circle over the clearing, and with a hiss, our mobile control unit was detached from the bottom and dropped to the ground. Raukash’s shuttle hauled the second wagon, but he did not come low enough to drop his load, not yet. First, Aramon was swinging our shuttle around to land. He expertly set it down by the four-wheel control unit, an armored part of a land train suited for nearly any terrain. I roseas the hatch began to hiss open, because, as indestructible as Val made me, I was going to lead the charge.
My boots crunched on dry earth and leaves, the air hot and humid as it slapped around my body, thick enough to cut. My symbiont slunk out ahead of me, nose to the ground, ears pointed, searching for any sign of danger. I carried a rifle, pistols strapped to my belt, and, at the slightest hint of need, could draw Val’s shape into any kind of blade. My senses were wide open, so I heard the males fan out behind me, quiet and wary. There was no joking banter, no bold dares, they were all business.
It wasn’t until I’d given the all clear that Raukesh landed the second wagon of the control unit, followed by bringing down this shuttle next to ours. Asmoded was first off the second shuttle, his long, flexible body coiling through the dirt to my side, his own weapons at the ready. “Nothing?” he asked, and when I nodded, his expression turned grim rather than relieved.
