Chapter 4
Chapter Four
QUIN
"You're warriors from Valose," I stated, fighting to keep my voice steady despite the weapons pointed at us.
The male in the kilt fixed me with eyes like liquid mercury.
Those molten silver pools hardened as his pupils contracted to predatory pinpoints.
A muscle twitched along his jaw. Surprise flickered across his face, chased quickly by suspicion, and then his features composed themselves into a careful mask that couldn't quite hide the tension radiating off his powerful frame.
His hand tightened around the hilt of his sword, knuckles whitening against the grip, but the blade stayed angled toward the ground.
"Yes," he said, his deep voice strained as if each word cost him effort. "I am Vennox of Clan Huren, and this is Truxxet of Clan Trisess."
Something strange fluttered in my chest. I pushed it aside. "I'm Quin." I gestured behind me without breaking eye contact. "This is Brooke and Mara. We're with Vala, the one approaching your ship."
"Quin." He exhaled my name with a strange reverence, low and intimate, almost a caress. An unexpected warmth cascaded through me, pooling low in my belly. My skin prickled with sudden awareness.
Mara's breath tickled my ear. "That alien highlander is looking at you like he wants to eat you," she whispered, "and not the bad kind of eat. The world-shattering kind."
My face flushed hot enough to set the forest on fire. I ignored her.
His eyes stayed trained on me, tracking my every micro-movement like a predator marking prey.
My fingers twitched toward the scanner resting in my lap.
The urge to document him like I had every other species on this planet was instinctive.
But Vennox was not some mindless predator lurking in the jungle shadows.
He was dangerous in an entirely different way, and that made him far more unsettling.
His scales shifted in silver and blue patterns, like armor made of living metal, catching every ray of light filtering through the canopy.
His pointed ears perked and twitched at sounds I couldn't hear.
A scabbed-over gash cut across his temple, dark blue against the silver.
It was the kind of wound left to close on its own.
The sword in his grip gleamed with the same liquid silver as his gaze, its edge honed for battles I couldn't imagine.
Standing there in nothing but that low-slung kilt, he was an alien enigma, and the scientist in me wanted to catalog every detail.
"You're human," he stated, as though he already knew the answer.
"Last time I checked," I replied. I was still settled on my knees, and I casually pressed my thighs together to help extinguish the unwelcome lick of heat blooming in my core as his silver gaze held mine.
Granted, the alien highlander was the most striking male I'd ever laid eyes on. Gorgeous face, covered in muscle. But my reaction to him was unnerving. I wasn't one to fawn over anyone, but no man I'd known on Earth had ever looked like him.
"Your companion," Truxxet interjected, gesturing toward Vala. "What is he?"
"Yulineon," I answered, my gaze flicking briefly to Truxxet, who wore nothing more than a breechcloth. "Do you know of him? He was on Valose for a time."
"I was in the Trisess Forest when the Yulineons attacked the city of Huren," Truxxet said, scales rippling a deep blue. "When Clan Trisess joined Clan Huren under the dome, I was told the Yulineons were there to kill all the humans."
"He told me the same, and about Universeval Rule," I said, letting my gaze flick between the two of them. Never fix on one threat when there are two. “But he was injured during that strike on your world, and a human named Layla saved his life. Now he fights on the side of the humans.”
Truxxet was quiet for a long moment. "I know Layla. And the story of the Yulineon she saved from the Nuttaki."
"Good." I exhaled a breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding. "Look. Vala was taking us to Valose when we crashed here. We need help repairing our ship so we can leave."
"Your companion is in danger," Vennox said, his deep voice vibrating through me like a struck chord. "Our people won't know his intentions."
My expression hardened. "Then we need to stop this before it starts." I wiggled my wrist. "This is a communication device. I need to warn him."
Vennox gave a single nod.
"Vala," I said into the comm. "We have company. Two Valosians. Non-hostile, for now."
"You are not in danger from them," Vala replied, calm but firm. "Valosian males are driven to protect females. But if you keep those nutrone blasters raised, they will react."
"Our weapons are already on the ground. I'm not looking for a fight."
"Good," Vala breathed. "With any luck, the Nomadicans they traveled with know Mehr."
"Did he say Mehr?" Truxxet's pointed ears perked sharply as he tilted his head toward me.
"Yes," Brooke answered. "Mehr was held captive with us on the Xegnot ship along with his shoulsis, Elizabeth."
Truxxet visibly relaxed. "We traveled here with Ruze and Tyrk. Ruze has been searching the stars for them."
Vennox raised his own comm to his mouth. "Ruze—"
"I know," came the reply, tight and clipped. "I have the Yulineon targeted."
"Do not kill him," Vennox said. "He travels with Mehr and his mate."
A long silence crackled over the comm. "What… What did you say?"
"The male you seek is here," Vennox said, then looked at me. "How far away is your ship?"
"About two miles—" I started to answer when the bio-analyzer in my lap buzzed violently. I lifted it and watched the calm screen flash to urgent. "We need to go. Now."
"What is it?" Truxxet demanded.
"We call them void weavers." I was already on my feet. "Giant spiders, but nothing like anything on Earth. Five of them, heading straight for us. If we don't take shelter, we're dead."
Before any of us could retreat, the forest split with a sickening crack, trees folding aside like stalks of grass beneath a boot. A massive undulating form burst through the vegetation, its translucent body bending light around it in nauseating waves.
Brooke grabbed Mara's arm and yanked her backward. Too late. Before any of us could move, the void weaver spat a stream of black webbing that expanded midair, covering twenty feet in an instant. Brooke screamed as the edge caught her leg, hardening immediately into unbreakable restraints.
"Get down!" Vennox roared, tackling me sideways as another spray of webbing shot over our heads. We hit the ground hard, his body covering mine as the webbing struck the tree trunk behind us and sealed itself to the bark. The analyzer slipped from my grip and skidded across the soil.
"Let me up!" I struggled beneath his weight. "We can't stay here!"
His silver eyes locked on mine for one heart-stopping moment. "Stay behind me," he growled, then rolled off me in a fluid motion that put him squarely between me and the creature.
Mara fired her nutrone blaster, blue bolts striking the void weaver's translucent hide with little effect. The creature emitted a high-pitched shriek that set my teeth on edge, then lunged with terrifying speed.
Truxxet was already moving toward Brooke, his spear cleanly slicing through the webbing binding her leg. She stumbled as she was freed, but he caught her arm and hauled her upright.
Two more materialized from the treeline, their bodies warping the light around them as they spread to cut off our retreat.
Vennox moved like nothing I had ever seen. His blade was a silver blur as he intercepted a strike aimed at me. Cleaved from its body, the creature's limb fell, twitching to the ground, leaking phosphorescent fluid that sizzled against the soil. The void weaver recoiled, its body contorting.
"Get to the ship!" Vala's voice crackled through my comm. “We’re outnumbered.”
"This way," I shouted to Brooke and Mara, pointing toward the crashed vessel. "Run!"
The forest floor erupted again as a fourth void weaver burst through, blocking our escape. The fifth emerged from the shadows to our left, cutting off the only remaining angle. Trapped in the middle of all five, we backed into a tight circle, weapons raised.
"Any other ideas?" Brooke's voice shook as she lifted her blaster.
"Back-to-back!" Vennox ordered.
In an instant, we were pressed together, Vennox and Truxxet forming a perimeter around us as all five void weavers closed in, their translucent bodies folding the light around them as they came.
"Aim for the cluster of eyes!" I shouted, raising my blaster as one lunged forward. The bolt struck its pulsating core, making it screech and recoil. Then another shot a spray of webbing that narrowly missed my shoulder.
Vennox didn't fight like a male trying to survive.
He fought like he had never considered the alternative.
His blade found the void weavers' joints, their seams, the places where their bodies hadn't thought to be defended.
Strike. Recover. Hold the line. Every move deliberate, nothing wasted, and never, not once, did he give the creatures an angle on us.
Truxxet was no less formidable. Where Vennox was raw power, Truxxet was precision, reading each creature's movement a beat before it committed, his spear already driving into the soft junction behind a void weaver's mandibles before the lunge had fully extended.
He fought with the economy of a male who had learned long ago that a spear had one killing end and one chance, and he never wasted either.
Between blaster shots, I couldn't help watching him. Vennox fought with such controlled savagery it was as terrifying as it was mesmerizing. His silver eyes blazed as he intercepted a spider's lunge that would have impaled Brooke, his blade cleaving through its midsection in one devastating swing.