“Okay, Pythorus. Let’s do this.”
“Great,” he said. “Now, tell me more about what he knows so we can get our stories straight and strategize.”
Yup, she really was going to do this.
Chapter 9
Hektor
Another desert.
Dry heat, cracked horizon, and a sky that looked like it had forgotten rain existed. Solkaris. Basilisk territory. He’d been here before, twice, but the welcome was always the same: Scorching air, dust that clung to skin, and a stillness that felt like the land itself was holding its breath.
Twelve hours on the road. Even for a Drakkon, too long. His muscles pulled tight when he stepped out of the vehicle, spine popping in protest as he stretched. The Stonestare Suites loomed in front of him: Sandstone walls, obsidian accents, runes carved into pillars so old even the elders no longer remembered who first etched them. It was a fortress disguised as hospitality.
He barely blinked before a voice sliced through the lobby?—
“Hektor!”
He knew that voice immediately.
Too bright, too eager for this wasteland of stone and silence.
Zara.
He controlled the instinctive softening of his expression, forcing the neutrality back into place before turning. But shewas already on him, fast, small, warm, half-hugging his side like she’d been waiting hours just to pounce.
“There you are,” she said, breathless with familiarity.
He gave a restrained nod, one arm moving stiffly to return the greeting. A pat, technically. Neutral. Very professional. Somehow, even that felt too intimate with her pressed so close.
“Zara,” he said, voice even.
She beamed up at him, all sun and unapologetic welcome. “We’ve been waiting for you to get here! Liora and Elian are already in the lounge doing what they call ‘social reconnaissance.’ I think that just means ordering the strongest drinks they can find.”
He grunted. That sounded like them.
But his attention, traitorously, remained on her.
Her cheeks were pink from the heat, curls loose around her shoulders, eyes bright with excitement instead of exhaustion. Whoever was on the road working and then greeted someone likethat?
Not normal.
Not human.
Not safe.
“Long drive?” she asked, tilting her head.
“Tolerable,” he replied. Which, in Drakkon terms, meant unbearable.
She nudged him with her elbow, light, quick, too familiar. “I missed your enthusiasm. Truly.”
He exhaled through his nose. “I’m here to work, Zara.”
“And I’m here to make that work very difficult,” she said sweetly, already looping her arm through his as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
He stared down at the point of contact, at her fingers against his sleeve, small and sure and extremely not-regulation.
