From the way he sounded, I got the impression there wasn’t a lot of mercy to be had.
To think just minutes ago I’d been worried about friendly Tovis.What I wouldn’t give for him to show up now.But as I watched the sytos loot my peaceful little spa, pack up all my hoarded food and the gifts Tovis had brought me, I realized I just wasn’t that lucky.
9 Tovis
Ilifted my pack higheron my shoulder and sped up as Jessa’s spa came into view.I’d told her the other females would visit tomorrow, but I couldn’t resist seeing her one more time on my own.
Once she met the others, I knew her attention would be divided.The females tended to flock together, and I wanted a little more of her time just to myself.Dust puffed up every time my hooves hit the sunbaked dirt, and I grinned as I reached the back door.
My smile fell when I saw that it was open.
“Jessa?”I called.Silence answered me and I dropped my pack and sprinted into the building.The tidy, clean space had been destroyed.Shelves and boxes were strewn over the floor, dirty boot prints covered the floor, the tread marks all too familiar.
Sytos.
I hurried through the quiet spa, hoping against all odds that my female would pop out of some hiding place as I called for her.The tracks led to the strange, open area near the big glass doors at the front of the spa.
Two chairs lay upended in the middle of the room, a smear of blood on the floor had been stepped on, the dried red tracked through and clotted with dirt.I sucked in a breath, the scent of syto blood, urine and fear still lingered in the warm air.
My stomach twisted.They’d taken my female.
I turned in a slow circle, reading the signs of a struggle.It was a small party, probably out looking for supplies.Jessa had fought back, the chairs and the blood told me that much.She’d injured at least one of them.But even one syto would have been enough to overpower a human female, and there had been at least six here, probably more.
My chest was tight with rage and fear as I followed the tracks through the building.They’d taken all her food, not that she needed it now.It took mere minutes for me to search the building for clues, and I came back to the blood smear.It was dry now, but there wasn’t much of it.The color told me it was only a few hours old.
Our hunting parties hadn’t come across the syto camp yet, but we’d seen enough signs of them to have an idea of where they weren’t.Adak was keeping a log of every report of their movements, every familiar boot mark we’d come across.
I’d never bothered to guess where their main camp was, but I’d reported back to him enough times to see the map he’d been building.They were somewhere in the human city, north was Adak’s best guess.
Sytos weren’t used to living on a planet, they were born in cruisers and lived their entire lives within the sterile, tech filled shells.But turochs were born on Oska, we spent our childhoods learning to track and hunt, spent our days running rough terrain.
I was stronger and faster than any syto, I could track them down, hopefully before they reached their camp.
I debated the wisdom of returning to camp to ask for help.I’d lose hours, maybe their trail.But I risked not being able to take on an entire armed patrol of sytos on my own.
My nostrils flared as I wrestled with the odds.In the end, I couldn’t risk the chance I lost the trail.If I caught up to them, I had a chance of freeing Jessa.If I lost the trail, no amount of help would save my female.
