“Of course,” I replied, fighting a smile.
Urgg and their strays. They seemed to find people who needed them most and latched on, not giving them a choice in receiving their friendship. I should know; I was one of them.
Chapter 3
Together again.
“I missed you so much,” Urgg blubbered, squeezing Seth. The human squeaked. Whether it was from being grabbed too suddenly or pain from the tight hold, I wasn’t sure. Seth didn’t love to be touched by many people. He’d never told me the exact reason behind his aversion, but I suspected people in his past hadn’t always been kind to him.
Or it could merely be that Urgg was hurting him. They were exceedingly strong—all barbarus were. Barbarus used to be enemies of the drakcol. We’d been warring on and off through most of our space-faring history, but a treaty had been struck when the Barusian government wanted to join the Coalition over a hundred cycles ago.
Still, some animosity remained between our species.
When Captain Talvax had sought the Crystal, it had revealed her soulmate as Urgg. At first, she’d been furious and had denied the call for years, making herself sick in the process, but now the two of them were deeply in love and well-matched, which was hardly surprising—the Crystal was never wrong.
I patted Urgg’s arm to have them release Seth, and they did. He took a huge gasp of air. Perhaps Urgg had restricted his access to air.
I curled my tail around Seth’s wrist, drawing him closer for inspection. Humans were exceedingly fragile. His pink-white skin was without trace of hard plates, scales, or natural armor of any kind. Seth was all softness and roundness, from his large stomach and backside to his brown hair to his plump cheeks. His round pupils that sat in his deep brown eyes couldn’t see as well as ours did, and his blunt white teeth couldn’t do significant damage, and he even had an unscaled pink tongue.
Still, I quite liked the look of him. I wouldn’t want a human to care for as my own, though.
“I missed you too, Urgg.” Seth pulled me into an abrupt hug before releasing me. “I missed you too, Wyn.”
“As did I.” It hadn’t been that long, and yet it felt like a lifetime. I wasn’t used to being alone anymore.
“We should eat,” Urgg said.
“No graugg or any other drinks,” I said. The maroon Barusian drink was a favorite of Seth and Urgg’s. I had nothing against it, but the alcohol was strong.
“Afraid another incident will happen?” Urgg asked.
“No,” I lied, tail thrashing.
“Liar.”
“I merely think we don’t always need to drink.”
“On Barus we always drink, no matter the time of day. Besides, I don’t know why you dislike having puked on Monqilcolnenas much as you do. It’s the sign of a strong bond,” Urgg commented.
We’d had this argument before, many times in fact. Barusians saw vomiting and shedding blood as bonding experiences—drakcol did not. Monqilcolnen wasn’t my friend, and I very much doubted he liked me in the slightest, though… There had been that odd moment on the grappling mat with his golden eyes burning into me.
My tail thrashed at the thought of his weight on me. I swallowed. I had to avoid him; that was the thing to do. But how was I to accomplish that when I would have to see him weekly for my blaster training?
Seth interrupted our good-natured fight. “Come on. I’ve missed you two and theAdmiral Ven. Let’s go.”
“Where’s Bobbinvoxlyn?” I asked, looking for Seth’s small kit.
“Kal has him,” Seth commented, heading toward the lift, and I wanted to beam in pride. Since Bobbinvoxlyn’s birth, Seth struggled to let his son out of his sight, but he was getting better. No doubt his therapist had assisted with that, or perhaps Vince had. Vince was Seth’s childhood friend from Earth, who’d been abducted by the xoi. Prince Dontilvynsan had saved him and many others, and now Vince and Dontilvynsan were Crystal-bound mates.
We headed to the promenade, which took up three floors and was filled with shops of all kinds. I smiled as we entered, seeing familiar faces among those who walked around. Most people aboard were drakcol, but there were also the humans we were returning to Earth, a handful of barbarus, some vveki in their floor length veils, blocking them from light, and many other people, all species I was familiar with.
TheAdmiral Venhad been my first long term assignment. I’d been assigned here for only a year before I’d transferred to Tamkolvanloknol, working on Edith’s independence project, butit was nice to be back. I loved and hated it here. Hopefully, since so much time had passed, the story of me vomiting on Monqilcolnen wouldn’t be resurrected.
Seth pressed into my side, and I forced myself to pay attention to my direct surroundings. The crowd wasn’t too numerous, even though everyone had boarded. This ship could hold ten thousand, but there were only close to three thousand right now because very few people wanted to journey to the outskirts of civilized space.
Besides, this was also going to be a long trip, nearly two years. Not many, unless this was their job, could come for the fun of it.
But the crowd was oppressive enough to bother Seth, who had an extreme aversion to large groups of people. I wound my tail around his wrist to keep him secure against my side and searched for any threat. Seeker soul I might be, but I could keep him safe.
