CHAPTER 25 #2
S’samph cursed the bitter feeling seated deep at the junction of his spine where his torn frill sat.
If he’d gotten here sooner. If he’d just gone to the clinic to see Eleri.
If he’d mated her properly when she arrived in Laurus.
None of this would have happened. She would be safe at his side.
K’kaen might be her brother, but he was wrong to entrust her safety to anyone else.
“She was gone by the time you returned?”
“By the time I got here, she was already gone,” K’kaen had come over to join the rest of the group and stood annoyingly close at S’samph’s elbow. S’samph let out a hiss of frustration.
“I don’t understand how this happened. What about the additional patrols?”
“I was called out to your plot of land.”
“There were no raviks anywhere near my territory.” S’samph snapped. “I would have handled them myself if there were.”
“Then who put out the call?” K’kaen’s tail thudded with irritation.
“I did,” Dynzol said, coming up alongside them. “Myla said one of the younger kyrot females had spotted some raviks in that area.”
“Why would there be kyrot anywhere near my territory? They never leave the residential neighborhood!” S’samph roared, losing the battle with his rising panic.
“Useless f’fret! Do you not realize what you have done?
” He tore away from Dynzol and the others, unable to look at the other male without wanting to punch him.
K’kaen followed him, tail thrashing with agitation.
“There were no raviks? I left her alone for nothing?”
S’samph’s frill raised higher than he thought possible. “There is no time to waste waiting around. We have to move now.”
“What are we going to do?” K’kaen asked.
S’samph’s frill flattened with annoyance at the obvious question. Surely, K’kaen knew what needed to be done. “Come back to my nest, and we will plan our invasion.”
“You want to invade the raviks’ settlement?” K’kaen’s frill lifted in alarm. “Are you out of your mind? You know as well as I do, Eleri’s as good as dead already if they have her. Unless they want her for a specific purpose.”
S’samph had already considered the possibility but banished the thought from his mind.
Eleri didn’t have anything the raviks wanted.
She carried nothing other than her medical kit around with her, and she wasn’t foolish enough not to relinquish it if her life was on the line.
Perhaps someone in their encampment needed medical attention.
Or perhaps this was meant as an act of war.
It mattered little to him. The only thing he cared about was getting her back if there was any possibility she was still alive.
He levelled K’kaen with his glare. “If you do not help me, I will go alone. She does not need another useless brother.”
“F’fret, S’samph. I don’t need to be convinced to join you, but I don’t want to give anyone false hope about what we might find there.”
“I will find whatever there is to find.” Seething, S’samph rushed toward his levibike.
There were plans to be made. He would need weapons, true weapons, not the IA-issued toys.
Luckily, his days as a soldier had left him with connections.
He would contact some people he knew in Abwele and see what they could find for him. S’samph turned back toward K’kaen.
“Are you coming or not?”
“I don’t have much of a choice.” The other male tugged on his helmet, and the two of them rode in silence back to S’samph’s nest. When they arrived, S’kasia was waiting for them with her tail and frill both raised high.
“Where is my human sister?”
“Taken.” S’samph pushed past his clutch sister. “I assume you will want to help us recover her."
"What’s left of her,” K’kaen muttered, inciting a swat of S’kasia’s tail. “This is my fault.”
“She is still alive. What purpose would the raviks have to take her only to kill her? If you are angry with yourself for leaving her, do not make the rest of us suffer in your misery.” S’kasia hurried to close the door behind them, preventing the winds from blowing dust inside.
“If she is gone, then I must give myself to the sands.” K’kaen’s voice was quiet and more deadly serious than S’samph had ever heard him.
It was a dramatic gesture, one only asked for after an utmost betrayal.
S’samph had been too caught up in fear and rage at the raviks to even consider K’kaen’s role.
A wave of unfamiliar rage crashed over him now.
Eleri was in danger, possibly dead, because K’kaen hadn’t been able to keep track of one small human.
“It is your fault. I asked you to watch over her in my stead. I was an idiot for trusting you with something so precious.” His tail lashed wildly from side to side. “I’ll kill you myself if anything has happened to her.”
“Aren’t you the head of security? Isn’t keeping residents safe your job?” K’kaen’s frill rose high above his auricles. “She’s your mate! It’s just as much your responsibility to keep her safe as mine!”
“Miserable f’fret. To think I called you my battle brother.”
K’kaen lunged toward him. “If anything has happened to her, I will bury myself in the sands, but you will be right beside me!”
“Enough!” S’kasia hissed at K’kaen, stepping forward to block his attack. “Keep your self-pity to yourself.”
“And you,” she snapped at S’samph, “division will give us no advantage. We will go and find Eleri, and you both will grovel for her forgiveness. For now, we will figure out why she was taken and what we must do to get her back.”
“Revenge. Myla wanted her gone.”
S’kasia’s frill rippled in uncertainty. “Raviks aren’t mercenaries. They have an honor code even if it is a bizarre one.”
“Could have fooled me,” K’kaen muttered.
“We need weaponry.” S’samph pulled the ancient datapad off one of the ledges overhead and tried to get into the communication center.
It was mostly useless, but it was risky to try to send a message to his contact through the holocom center, as it was monitored as an official IA correspondence channel.
“There’s better signal at S’kasia’s home.” K’kaen reached for the datapad. “Anywhere nearer the magtrack has better connection.”
“The connection here is fine.” He smacked his hand against the device as if encouraging it to maintain a strong link to the network.
“Says the stubborn f’fret who refused to get a datapad until I gave you my used one.” K’kaen started for the door with the datapad under his arm. “If you’re trying to contact who I think you’re trying to contact, then you’re going to need a stronger signal.”
“And how do you know who I’m trying to contact?
” S’samph followed after him, while a grim S’kasia stayed behind to put together an AI-generated map of the ravik’s encampment and surrounding areas.
They wanted to make sure they wouldn’t bring too much firepower in the vicinity of Indras, or they risked expanding the scope of the conflict.
The last thing they needed was to make trouble for their neighbors.
“There’s only one reliable weaponsmith on Brasnia Prime who isn’t going to charge you an entire hectare of stellite for what you’re trying to order.”
“The teosian.”
“Who else?”
“He’s cagey. And you know he’s tied to their government agenda, be careful doing business with him.”
“I need quality weapons quickly. There aren’t other options.
” S’samph began to jab furiously at the datapad.
He’d never learned to type properly on the accursed thing, but he could begrudgingly admit that the signal was better out near the magtracks.
He sent a quick missive to the teosian known as Arex and waited with growing impatience for a reply.
The response came back a few moments later with a dull ‘ping’.
“Three standard months!” S’samph roared and threw the datapad to the other side of the room, where it landed with a crack as the screen spiderwebbed.
He was uninterested in the status of his datapad.
There was no use for it if Arex couldn’t offer him a better timeline than three standard months on weapons to rescue Eleri.
They couldn’t afford to wait three standard days, let alone three months.
No, they would use a few productive hours to create a plan and gather supplies and then go immediately.
He wasn’t a hatchling na?ve enough to march into hostile territory unprepared, but he also recognized that every moment was of the essence when it came to rescuing a hostage.
“We must go speak with S’kasia. If she knows anything or can help us find why Myla would do such a thing.
” He stormed out of his nest with K’kaen close on his heels.
When they arrived back at S'kasia's nest, she was hunched over her datapad with projection holos of the local terrain casting an eerie light on her face.
Her frill remained flat against her spine as they entered.
"Is it that grim?" K'kaen asked, settling beside her to examine the display.
"It will be no small task." S'kasia gestured to the holos. "The ravik settlement is much larger than we anticipated. But beyond the size, it is hard to gain any insight into what goes on within."
S'samph peered at the projection, his tail lashing with growing frustration.
The raviks were warlike, but also immature in their technology compared to other species.
Imaging showed the perimeter of the settlement, but when they tried to gain insight into the inside, the projection was blurred.
His nostrils flared with a deep breath. This would not be like Latilla again.
He would not leave Eleri behind to die, regardless of the cost to himself.
“The three of us will not be able to fight that many raviks alone. Not to mention whatever is happening inside here.” He traced the blurred area with a clawtip. “This will require stealth. When the second sun rises, we go to stake out the perimeter and search for weaknesses.”
“We don’t have enough firepower,” K’kaen glowered. “I’d rather not get my tail blasted off by a bunch of f’fret raviks.”
“I still don’t understand why they would take Eleri. She is a human, and she poses no threat to them or their autonomy. Even with Myla’s meddling, if they wanted her out of the way, they would just kill her outright.” K’kaen’s tail lashed, matching S’samph’s obvious frustration and anxiety.
“Eleri is a healer,” S’kasia said. “Healers are valuable.”
"It matters little,” S’samph interjected.
“We retrieve Eleri and deal with Myla’s scheming as soon as she is safely returned.
" He turned toward the door. “I will speak to Pyo about taking supplies from the town’s armory. K’kaen, speak to the other patrols and see if they will be willing to create a distraction to help us breach the raviks’ camp. ”
“I’ll go now.” K’kaen hurried past him out of the nest, leaving S’samph alone with S’kasia.
In the silence with his clutch-sister most of his stoic bravery dissolved.
His shoulders slumped as he passed a hand over the datapad, making the projection vanish.
The weight of planning for an invasion was so much heavier than it had ever felt before.
“I should hurry,” he started toward the door. “We are wasting moments of Eleri’s life.”
“This is not Latilla.” S’kasia’s voice was gentle as she followed him out of the nest. “We will get her back. She will be well.”
"She is my mate." S’samph’s voice trailed into silence. “And I have failed her.”
"Then let us get her back with haste."
"If she is dead—" he began.
"She is not dead," S'kasia interrupted. "They would not have taken her alive only to kill her immediately. She has value to them. Or perhaps Myla promised them something in return for removing Eleri from Laurus."
S’samph’s frill raised in a warning. If Myla had truly orchestrated this, he would see her answer for it. But first, Eleri. Everything else could wait.
The night air carried the scent of approaching rain. Within days, the flooding season would begin, trapping them all inside until the waters receded. If they were going to act, it had to be now.
"We will get her back," S'kasia said quietly.
"Yes," he said. "We must."