Chapter 10 #2
What are you doing here? one of the crew members had asked him, near the end of the journey. A grizzled human female with suspicious eyes and a plasma burn scar across her jaw. Your kind don’t leave home without a damn good reason. Most of your kind don’t leave home at all.
Most of my kind, he’d replied, have something worth staying for.
She’d looked at him for a long moment, then shrugged and moved on, leaving him alone with his bitterness and his regrets.
Cresca had turned out to be exactly what he’d expected. Sparsely populated outside of the spaceport, with a mixture of small human villages and scattered Vultor enclaves. Perfect for someone who wanted to disappear. He’d taken one look at the distant mountains and known exactly where he would go.
The first year had been the hardest. Not because of the physical challenges—he’d been trained for survival, and the Vultor were built to endure—but because of the silence, the endless, echoing silence of existing utterly alone.
He’d filled it with work: carving out his den, building furniture, establishing the routines that would keep him sane.
He’d told himself he preferred it. That solitude was what he’d wanted. What he’d deserved.
And slowly, painfully, he’d started to believe it.
The second year had been easier. The third, easier still. By the fourth year, he’d stopped counting the days between contact with other beings. By the fifth, he’d stopped caring.
Or so he’d told himself.
I came here to be alone, he thought now, staring at the medical text in his hands. I chose this. I wanted this.
But that was before a human female had looked at him without fear. Before her sister had trusted him to stay. Before his beast had started wanting something other than the hunt.
He set the book aside and rose to check the fire. It didn’t need checking, but he needed something to do with his hands. He needed some way to occupy the restless energy that was building inside him.
Through the archway, he could hear the soft sounds of breathing. Two heartbeats, slightly out of sync. Two lives that had stumbled into his territory and shattered the careful isolation he’d built.
They’ll leave, he told himself again. When the storm passes, when the danger is over, they’ll return to their village. To their lives. And I will be alone again.
It was the right outcome. The safe outcome. For them and for him.
So why did the thought leave him feeling so hollow?
He sank back into his chair and picked up the medical text again. He wouldn’t use the information, but reading it was better than pacing. Better than listening to the storm and thinking about tomorrow. Better than going into the sleeping chamber and watching over them like he had the right.
The words blurred before his eyes. He wasn’t reading anymore, just staring at the page while his thoughts spiraled.
You’re here now.
Dani’s voice, soft and trusting. As if he were something safe. Something good.
Thank you. For everything.
Jessa’s voice, roughened by exhaustion but sincere. Looking at him like he’d given her something precious instead of just basic shelter.
She’s strong. Fierce. A worthy m—
No. He wouldn’t finish that thought, not when every instinct was already straining towards her like a plant towards sunlight.
He closed the book and set it aside for good this time. He would not become involved. He would not let himself care. When the storm passed, he would show them the safe path back to their village and return to his solitary existence.
It was the right thing to do. The only thing to do.
He just had to survive the night first.
The hours crept towards dawn.
He dozed fitfully in his chair, never quite sleeping, always aware of every sound from the other room.
Twice more he rose to check on them, and twice more he found them sleeping peacefully.
Dani hadn’t kicked off her blanket again.
Jessa had curled onto her side, one hand reaching out to rest on her sister’s arm even in sleep.
Protector, his beast murmured. Like us.
The storm began to ease as the first grey light of dawn seeped through the shutters covering his windows.
The rain softened from a torrent to a steady patter, and the wind’s howl diminished to something almost gentle.
Soon the clouds would break and the sun would rise, and his guests would wake to a new day.
And then what?
He didn’t have an answer. He couldn’t see past the conversation he knew was coming. Jessa had fled her village for a reason. She’d brought her sick sister into the mountains during a storm because she was desperate. The problem wasn’t going to resolve itself overnight.
Not your problem, he told himself. Help them get back on their feet and send them on their way.
But even as he thought it, he knew it was a lie.
The bond wouldn’t let him walk away—not when his beast had already decided that these two females belonged under his protection.
The best he could hope for was to maintain some distance.
To help without getting entangled, protect without claiming, care without…
Without what? Without caring?
It was already too late for that.
He rose as the light grew stronger and began to prepare for the day. He would make breakfast, something more substantial than broth, and tend to his guests’ needs. He would ask Jessa about her situation, assess the threat, determine what assistance he could reasonably provide. And then…
Then he would figure out how to survive the storm he could feel building inside him. The one that had nothing to do with weather and everything to do with a dark-haired weaver and her blue-eyed sister.