Chapter 67
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN
“Rask! RASK!”
His name seems to echo back at me, whispering under the howling wind that whips across the pink pearlescent sand. I trudge up the next dune, covering my eyes against the last of the setting suns, screaming louder.
“Rask!”
Cylus curls his hand around my shoulder, squeezing gently.
He’s been by my side the whole time, though we’ve stopped for several injured soldiers.
I’ve helped him patch males and females up before one of his medics flew them back to the zvorn.
I suspect, once we return, he will be very busy tending to the fallen.
I know he needs to go see to them, but I can’t leave until I know Rask isn’t here. We’ve been combing the wasteland for hours, dodging flaming pieces of their finest starcraft and freeing survivors from escape pods, but there’s been no sign of him.
Some indistinct seethe in my gut tells me he is farther out than the rest, though. He would not have come down with the first, second, or even the third wave. Because he would have waited until everyone else had evacuated to leave his ship.
I must walk another mile before the final sun kisses the horizon. Staggering to a stop, I shut my eyes, blocking out the view of the distant, winking sea. Trying to focus.
If he’s here, I would scent him, my Omega cries.
I swallow her whine, ignoring the chafe of my period pad and the soreness shooting up my calves. Instead, I turn my attention to sucking in as much air as I can. Tasting every sandy mouthful. Searching for any strand of—
Spice.
It tickles my tongue, wafting toward me in a weak thread. But it’s enough to follow, pivoting to my left and running through ankle-deep sand.
Cylus calls after me. I keep going, my eyes catching a distant speck of silver. I don’t feel the warm wind ripping my hair free or the sand burning my shins. I only feel relief.
It has to be him.
He has to be alive.
I race faster, my lungs burning. Filling with his delicious spice, practically vibrating with it.
Oh no. Wait.
That’s a purr.
I finally crest the final dune, half-sliding down the side to reach the heap of chrome and twisted pink limbs.
He isn’t moving. Why isn’t he moving?
“Cylus!” I cry, dropping to my knees. “Help!”
Oh God. Oh hell.
Rask.
There’s a large scrap of metal under him and another half-covering his legs. His nose is bleeding, his lips parted and scratched. His right arm hangs out of its socket, his thin wings punched full of holes. Big ones that gape, small pebble-like ones.
His chest doesn’t move, not even when I unstrap the metal breastplate locked around his torso. I clasp his hulking shoulders, too scared to shake him or shift him at all.
“Rask?”
For all my screaming, his name comes as a broken whimper, now. “R-Rask?” I try again. “P-please w-wake up.”
His head lolls, falling limply to the left. I hear Cylus approach, hurrying to Rask’s other side. He husks a low stream of Roktusian curses as he surveys the damage. My stomach twists.
“Rask, please,” I beg, dropping my face to his throat, breathing in the dark, dangerous musk that has always felt so safe to me. “I can still scent you. I know you‘re still here. Please. Please.”
That last plea comes out as a ruff.
And Rask jerks.
“Seven hells,” Cylus breathes, eyes wide behind his dusty glasses. He cuts me an urgent look. “Don’t stop.”
I feel dizzy, summoning the last dregs of my energy to produce another omega bark. “Wake up, Rask,” I call. “Come back to me.”
Our wounded General groans, hissing in pain that pulls at his scaled features. His silvery lashes flutter, those beaming eyes finding mine. Filling with pure light.
He tries to move, but his body fails him, slumping among the wreckage. “Little one,” he rasps. A faint trace of his devilish smirk curves his bloody lips. “I—I—”
He struggles, moaning again. Cylus sets to work, unclipping his belt and laying out supplies as I cup my mate’s face in my palms. “You what?”
“I knew it,” he finally croaks. Triumph joining the otherworldly gleam in his silver irises. “I knew you were mine.”