“Hmmm indeed. So what’ll it be, Mothman? Are me and my fellow lackeys in danger from you or could we work something out?”
The morning light speared directly at them through the canopies of the trees. His headache vanished when one delectable bolt washed him in gold.
He had cause to harm these valos but the longer he stayed in their presence and the more he was able to interpret their electric language, he began to have doubts. Doubts that valos, even within their many races, may not be alone in the world. Nothing around him was familiar.
“I won’t harm you,” he hissed out, shifting against the stiff bonds that contained him.
The female released a long, stale puff of air. “Great. So what happened to the crew that went foraging two nights back?”
Crew? Team. Group. Party. He and his brothers comprised a crew.
“I don’t know,” he answered honestly.
“You don’t do you?” The rod was raised to point at his arm below his shoulder wound. “You sure about that?”
He eyed the weapon with frustration, scissoring his feathers to cut his bonds, but they were stronger than mere rope and he still didn’t have enough light to power him.
“Yes. I saw your temple first. The smell, its smell drew me. And the girl...”
She pressed her rod into his arm and dug it in. He waited for a burst of pain but none came. “What temple? And what girl? We’re missing more than one.”
Galan bared his teeth, hating the patience he didn’t have. “This temple. Your Creator’s house. It smells like rot,” he spat, muscles bulging, feathers hardening. “The scent carried to my city and I followed it here to find your people, and you off in the woods being punished. Let me go.”
“I don’t think so, Mothman.”
“I’m not a Mothman.” An image of a fuzzy, shivering creature came to mind. One that was clearly of her world and not his. “I’m a valos.”
The female snickered but it came out with fear.She’s afraid. She should be.
“Will others like you smell us? And what did the girl look like?”
He flexed his fingers behind his back, ignoring the pain that sliced up his arm. “If they notice it.”
She pressed the rod harder against him. “That doesn’t help.”
“Then do something about it!”
The female shot to her feet and he finally caught her features as the light bled across her contours. They were small, dirty, strained, and immensely tired like the raven-haired girl’s, but not alluring. Galan almost felt bad for her again. Almost. The pain in his shoulder was warning enough. His feathers made headway.
“You look nothing like her...”
She turned back to him. “The girl you saw? She have curly hair and freckles or a plain-jane brown?”
“Black,” he said. “Black and long. And eyes that... held shadows within them. Pale skin.”
His ears filled with shrill laughter, long and self-deprecating, mixed with glee and disbelief. Galan knew that laughter well. Lusheenn laughed like that. Even Sundamar laughed like that on the rare occasion.
“Psycho bitch! You saw psycho bitch? Of course she’d live, she’s so fucking good at staying under the radar, even the damned guards...” the female trailed off.
Psycho. Crazy. Insane. Unstable. An unstablemind. Galan repeated the words in his head, unsure how he felt about their translation. He asked, “What’s a bitch?”
That same horrible, odd laughter filled his ears. He gritted his teeth, deciding any like for this girl was quickly fading. When she caught her breath, heaving into herself, she faced him and snickered. “A female dog. Yahiro. One and the same.”
Dog. Canine. Domestic four-legged animal. Animal. His feathers snapped one of the bands. He should’ve never left her trail. Somehow he knew that the female was insulting his female but at least he learned one thing: her name. Yahiro. It was unlike any he had ever heard before.
“Is she safe? Is she here?” he asked, hopeful. He hadn’t seen her from up in the tree but maybe she had been away or inside the ship temple? Although, judging from the rising sun, he hadn’t been out for longer than a full evening and night. She could’ve returned to this very spot. But that meant...
Quist would be here as well. And his brother was not in his head. They weren’t here. Yahiro wasn’t here.
