I look down at her, letting the truth settle between us.
“Who dies first.”
She swallows hard, the silvery light of the moon washing the color from her face. She smiles, but her lips quiver, betraying the falsity of her bravado. I know as well as any that bravery is nothing but bravado backed by the strength to move ahead in spite of fear. I give her a smile and nod, then take the lead.
She stays close to my tail. I scan the sands, watching the predator’s pattern, judging when it will attack, but I find her distracting. She is unique among humans. I have not known many of them, but those I do have been noisy, blundering, and lacking courage. Lia has been anything but the same.
It is admirable. And her form is… pleasing. Not that I should be having such thoughts. I am on a mission. A mission from my Al’fa and the Urr’ki Queen—something I never would have considered possible. Me, doing anything for, or even with, an Urr’ki. I am acutely aware of Travnyk. What strange twists of fate Tajss has thrown at me.
Once, Urr’ki blood and mine would have soaked the sand side by side, each trying to kill the other. Now Travnyk walks behind me, quiet as breathing stone, and I do not mistrust him. Not entirely.
And walking ahead of him is Lia. A human. Small and breakable, but intensely determined.
A species I would once have dismissed as soft, short-lived creatures. Yet the humans endured a crash from the stars, the Urr’ki Shaman, the Paluga, and the desert on this side of the mountains—and still they endure. And she… she is different.
Her steps are steady, though she is tired. I sense it in her scent—edged with strain, threaded with fear she will not allow to own her. The moon paints her hair silver chased with gold. She glances back to be certain Tomas is not falling behind, and something warm and dangerous coils low in my belly.
I should not be noticing such things. I force my gaze forward, out into the desert. The predator’s scent has thinned… but not vanished. It circles wide, testing us. Waiting for a mistake. My claws flex against the sand. Lia must not make a mistake.
“Rakkh?” Her voice drifts back to me like a whisper caught in wind.
I step faster until I am beside her. “Yes.”
She watches the dune ahead, not me.
“Why is it following us? If it wanted to attack… it could have.”
“It is patient,” I murmur. “It studies our formation. Looking for the weak point.”
She swallows. “Me.”
A flare of fury snaps through me sharp enough that Tomas stumbles when my wings twitch open.
“No,” I hiss. “Not while I breathe.”
She blinks at me, startled—not by the vow, but by the sound of it. The way it scraped out of me like truth I had not meant to reveal. Travnyk makes a low, clicking hum. Approval, perhaps. Or warning. Hard to tell with Urr’ki.
I move closer to her. So close that her small shoulder brushes my forearm. So close that I hear her breath hitch ever so slightly. I should move away. I do not.
Her presence steadies and sharpens me more than danger does. Her determination burns hotter than fear, and that fire in her… it draws me like prey draws a ghost-stalker.
We crest another dune, this one steeper. She slips once—only a half-step—and I catch her elbow without thinking. My claws do not break her skin. I am careful. Too careful. Her breath shivers out.
“Thank you.”
Her gratitude does something to me. Something unwelcome and deep.
“We should stop soon,” Tomas says. “The moons are dropping.”
I taste the air. He is right. Night is thinning, the dunes cooling beneath our feet. Soon the cold will bite hard, but before I can answer, Travnyk stiffens, lips pulling taut around his tusks, baring more of the curved bones as tension ripples through his stance.
“Look,” he whispers.
The tone alone sends my claws digging into sand. Lia follows his gaze.
“Is that?—?”
At the base of the next dune lies a cluster of scrub plants. Alive, but wrong. Their leaves curl inward, blackened at the tips. The soil beneath them glitters faintly under moonlight in a way that is not sand. The air is heavy with the same scent from the sick hunters’ vomit. Lia steps toward it, but I block her path with my arm.
