Chapter 19
The Sineater
Xio was a jungle planet, which made it hot and humid.
Nearly every part of the world was covered in dense forest, with the exception of a small ocean and the ice caps that covered the poles.
Only one city was worth mentioning, and it was always growing.
The inhabitants of Xio had managed to avoid annexation by one of their bigger neighbors—like the Kertinal—only because of the Shade Stalkers.
The very problem we were here to address.
As I sat in one of the jumpseats aboard one of the Varakartoom’s shuttles, I contemplated the Shade Stalkers rather than thinking about Frederique.
Shade Stalkers were highly evolved and extremely complicated creatures, deadly, dangerous, and so intelligent that it was truly a miracle the Xionians controlled the planet, not them.
Though the question could be asked: Who really controlled Xio?
The shuttle was packed to the brim with eager, battle-ready mercenaries.
The senior members were all familiar, but there were more faces on the crew than usual.
The Varakartoom had hired extra bodies for this mission, and not all the warriors present had worked with us before.
We’d need them if we were to take on a pair of Shade Stalkers.
This was a dangerous mission, and the mood was both grim and excited.
The looks shared said it all: they knew they might not come back from this alive.
For that reason, even Dravion had left the safety of the Varakartoom to be on standby near the shuttles for emergencies.
Dravion rarely left the ship, and I didn’t blame him, the fearful stares he got had to be tough on his empathic Aderian senses.
Solear and Aramon were at the front of this shuttle, flying in the lead of our little convoy.
Three Xio military craft had also joined us, providing an escort over the massive, sprawling city and its large gladiator arena.
I had no doubt they’d run scared the moment we hit the jungle where the Shade Stalkers had been sighted.
A Shade Stalker was large enough to take down a shuttle with a swipe of one of its claws.
I had full faith that Aramon could outfly a Shade Stalker’s claws, but far less confidence in the abilities of the Xionian pilots.
Raukesh was piloting the second shuttle, following in our slipstream at a careful distance.
I counted the men and appraised their state when I could no longer force my mind to focus on the shuttles and the path they were taking.
If I didn’t keep myself busy, my thoughts would return to Frederique, and that was a distraction I could not afford.
She was safe; I told myself that over and over.
She was on the Varakartoom, which was a fortress, and even on a skeleton crew, it was not without teeth.
The fact was, as long as Ysa was on that ship, nobody would be able to take it.
My eyes flicked to Thatcher then, our lone human male on the crew.
He was as restless and unpredictable as Solear once had been.
Unlike Solear, who was nearly entirely non-verbal, Thatcher could express his anger and frustration just fine.
Snide remarks, surly scowls, and a good swearing were his daily repertoire.
In that way, he and I were not very dissimilar either, but Thatcher’s rage all stemmed from serious trauma. Me, I was just born an asshole.
He was angry now—the human—because he had much preferred to stay a thorn in Ysa’s side.
He was too valuable a fighter not to take part in this mission, though: an ace shot, inhumanly fast, and armed with razor-sharp reflexes.
Despite his snarls and generally unfriendly attitude, he was loyal to the crew.
Once the fighting started, he’d be on the front line.
I drew some of his rage to me, just enough to ease the gnawing hunger in Val and settle his body into a calmer, more prepared pose.
Then I spent the next few moments doing the same to each of the other males on the ship: the Asrai twins at the front, piloting the shuttle with precision; Flack, who was camouflaging battle nerves by running checklists on his datapad; and the three Kertinal we’d hired for the mission, headed by our previous regular sniper, Thar’oc, whom we’d picked up just for this.
They were all males with notches in their horns, males who had seen death, been disgraced by it.
Males hardened by battle and life, and yet, even they were nervous.
Such was the reputation of a Shade Stalker.
The rest of the crew on this shuttle was made up of grunts from various other species—Rummicaron, Viridara, Sune, and more.
There was a Xurtal male on my left whose name I couldn’t recall but who’d been on the Varakartoom for the past three missions.
Everyone was fidgeting in their own way, preparing for what was to come once we reached the landing coordinates.
Even the doc was tense. Dravion sat in the corner, behind Aramon, his tentacles brushing over his crates of medical supplies again and again to assure himself that everything was there.
The half-Gnorlarnx, half-Aderian doctor was nervous about the coming battle.
Normally, he was always calm, always fully in control of his baser instincts, as flat and tasteless as a dumb herd animal.
Not that the doc was dumb—quite the opposite—but the taste of his nerves now was entirely new and foreign to me.
Val was the only one who seemed calm. Finally, after two weeks of starving again, she had emotions to feed on.
Not just that, but she was made for battle, made to protect, and she was completely in her element where she sat at my feet.
Of course, she’d also slicked part of herself all over my armor to provide an extra layer of protection, and she was able, as well, to heal any injury in the blink of an eye if I was hit.
She twisted her Gracka head, pointed snout and even more sharply pointed ears all turning toward me.
It was too liquid a twist, a real Gracka could never turn their head that far, but she did not care how creepy she looked, how it made Thar’oc swear and jab an elbow into the ribs of one of his buddies to point.
Thatcher cursed at the creepy move, but then he grinned, as if he rather appreciated it at the same time.
Val was eager for the fight, and she lolled out a long, silver tongue, lapping at her jowls as if she were already tasting blood.
“Soon, sweetheart,” I drawled, reaching out to stroke her along her spine.
It made her hackles rise into sharp spikes, but she pushed her body into the touch anyway.
“We’re almost at the landing coordinates, aren’t we, Aramon? ”
Aramon twisted in his seat to give me a wicked grin.
That one definitely wasn’t nervous. He and his twin simply didn’t have it in them to be scared of normal things, like powerful Shade Stalkers with keen intelligence and a thirst for the hunt.
“Landing in three,” Aramon agreed. “Sensor readings are clear, thermal heat vent reading as it should. It does not appear we have company.” Some grunts and moans went up in the shuttle.
The group was divided between wanting to fight as soon as our boots hit the ground or not fight at all.
We spotted the site not much later: a swath of earth already cleared of jungle vegetation.
Fences had gone up around it, but they’d been broken down on one side and were completely missing in another corner.
Abandoned construction vehicles, materials, and temporary buildings sat in clusters around the open area.
There was no sign of life, and no sign of any dead, either.
What the Shade Stalkers that had swept through the area hadn’t killed and eaten, the rest of the jungle had claimed.
I narrowed my eyes and focused on taking in each detail, big or small.
Were there any signs that the Shade Stalkers were nearby, lying in wait?
They were such smart predators that it was very likely they knew their prey would be back.
They were also smart enough to hide in the trees, their dense black bodies hidden from sight and from scanners—watching, learning, waiting for the best moment to strike.
That moment wouldn’t be today, and it probably would not be tomorrow, either.
That was too long, and it was unacceptable to be away from my Frederique that long.
I’d have to go off-script and get this problem sorted on my own time.
Aramon brought the shuttle in low to circle over the clearing, and with a hiss, our mobile control unit was detached from the bottom and dropped to the ground.
Raukash’s shuttle hauled the second wagon, but he did not come low enough to drop his load, not yet.
First, Aramon was swinging our shuttle around to land.
He expertly set it down by the four-wheel control unit, an armored part of a land train suited for nearly any terrain.
I rose as the hatch began to hiss open, because, as indestructible as Val made me, I was going to lead the charge.
My boots crunched on dry earth and leaves, the air hot and humid as it slapped around my body, thick enough to cut.
My symbiont slunk out ahead of me, nose to the ground, ears pointed, searching for any sign of danger.
I carried a rifle, pistols strapped to my belt, and, at the slightest hint of need, could draw Val’s shape into any kind of blade.
My senses were wide open, so I heard the males fan out behind me, quiet and wary.
There was no joking banter, no bold dares, they were all business.
It wasn’t until I’d given the all clear that Raukesh landed the second wagon of the control unit, followed by bringing down this shuttle next to ours.
Asmoded was first off the second shuttle, his long, flexible body coiling through the dirt to my side, his own weapons at the ready.
“Nothing?” he asked, and when I nodded, his expression turned grim rather than relieved.
Turning to the crew carefully circling the stretch of cleared jungle that had been designated as the building site, he began to bark out orders.
In moments, his son, Saisir, and Thar’oc were setting up a sniper’s nest on top of the control unit.
Mitnick was already inside, and drones were humming in the air, flying off to scout the jungle for us.
Jaxin was ordering men into groups for patrols, and others into groups to start bringing out the fence-building materials from the second wagon Raukesh had hauled.
Raukesh himself was leading the handful of winged grunts into the air to do an aerial patrol.
Everyone was doing their job, perfectly oiled cogs in a vast machine.
For a moment, I stood there and wondered what my job was in all of this.
Did they even need me? It was very tempting to commandeer one of the shuttles and race back to Frederique’s side.
She was safe, I told myself again. Nothing could get to her on the Varakartoom.
This wasn’t like when I’d left her behind on that waterworld on the edge of the Zeta Quadrant.
Not like that at all. Yet, I could not shake the feeling that something bad was going to happen if I did not get back to her soon.
“You look like you’d rather be anywhere than here,” Jaxin said with a grin, his sharkish mouth baring sharp teeth.
The humans were very much correct in that regard—Rummicaron had far too many similarities with the Earth predator.
Though I’d never seen Jaxin express much interest in swimming, I knew most Rummicaron cities were built with both roads and waterways to accommodate travel.
Just like sharks, the Rummicaron were perfect swimmers.
I gave the Weaponmaster a surly look that bordered on a glare.
Of course, he just grinned and bared more of his sharp teeth at me, his arms cradling his laser cannon, as always.
“What do you think?” I told him. I had a mate now; of course, I’d much rather be back on the ship and in her arms. Though the truth was, ever since Val had begun to struggle feeding from her, I’d been forced to spend less and less time with her.
It was untenable, desperate, and it made me feel utterly hopeless about the future.
“I think you’ve been avoiding her,” Jaxin said, and I hissed in fury at that sharply observant remark.
“You can’t change who you are,” he added coolly, not appearing impressed by my anger or by the way Val had returned to stand between us and growl.
Jaxin swept his hand toward where Asmoded was overseeing the proceedings in the clearing, but it was obvious that part of his attention kept drifting to where his son was atop the control wagon.
He was still not past the need to assure himself his son was safe, alive, and right there with him—a prime example of a male who couldn’t change.
But then again, was that true? I thought Asmoded had changed—softened—ever since he’d met Mandy.
I was still contemplating that when I settled on what my task was in all of this. Change… could it still happen? Was there a way to fix the bond between Val and me, help her consume not just darkness but light too? I’d never been more motivated to make a change like that happen.
First, though, I had to make sure that everyone was safe and that we could complete this mission as soon as possible.
I had a mate to return to, and I was not the only one.
That was my task—my part to play—to make sure everyone made it back home at the end of this mission.
My eyes flicked once to Dravion, who was setting up his temporary med bay inside one of the shuttles.
He looked back at me, our eyes meeting, and his seemed to say: I know what you are thinking, and you are not alone.
No, that was true, Dravion felt that same responsibility.