When we achieved orbit, Senaik gave us the destination.
We all stared at him without meeting his obsidian eyes.
“You have your orders. The slipstream will take us deep into Nirzk territory. They will escort us to Givnia.” He turned and left the bridge.
“Did he say Nirzk?” I asked when he’d passed out of earshot.
“He did,” Yani affirmed. She was in the navigator’s seat, and I couldn’t interpret the undercurrent to her words. But her hairless brow ridge had drawn down low. And I was going to have to make her a new hat, if just looking at the existing one continued to give me a headache.
“Why would Drakes be going there?” Kurt sounded both dismayed and alarmed.
For once, I was in full agreement with him.
“I have no idea,” Yani admitted, exchanging a long look with me.
Kurt abruptly left—I hoped he’d lock himself in his quarters for the remainder of the journey. My suddenly bounding pulse only added to my general state of dizziness as I set the coordinates for the closest slipstream gateway into the ship’s autopilot. It would take us most of the day to get there.
We had a problem. Givnia was not the best destination for Yani and me to jump ship and bolt. The Nirzks’s reputation as overlords made the Drakes look like hedgegophers.
The Taziers weren’t just visiting their mortal enemies on a whim. There was something in the aft cargo hold that they were planning to deliver.
To their mortal enemies? Nothing about this made any sense.
Activating the autopilot, I sat back to meet Yani’s concerned gaze. For the first time, I noticed tiny sunrays of gold amid the orange irises. I held up a finger—for all we knew, the Drakes hadplanted a bug in the bridge. I would have, if the situation were reversed.
Yani and I went to the small galley. Our supply crew was run by a guy who loved to eat, and he’d stocked the fridge with all kinds of goodies. We made ourselves tasty wraps, and we’d only just heated them and placed them on trays when two Drakes appeared at the entrance.
We regarded them in surprise, because neither of them was Senaik or my guard. How many Taziers were on the ship? We had no way to know for sure, they’d disabled the monitors in the bunkrooms too. They weren’t cloaked, but wore only their modified gladiator-style sandals and a wrap around their hips—a simple loincloth-style garment held on by a belt that could be released with a touch if they needed to shift. The fabric in front fell to their knees, and the back had accommodations for their tail. It left the sides of their hips completely exposed. And of course, everything above that was bare skin.
A lot of bare skin.Holy crap.There wasn’t a spare ounce of flesh anywhere on them.
I’d rarely seen Drakes uncloaked, and never so close. Again, I noticed the rainbow reflections in their black hair—it would be attractive if their other features weren’t so severe.
They entered the galley, where their size immediately caused issues. Yani and I edged around the table, eager to get away from their massive, half-naked bodies.
“If there is anything your lordships need, I can give you a hand with it.”
I looked past the Drakes, to where Kurt hovered in the hall, obviously eager to ingratiate himself. My gut clenched in disgust.
Then one Drake lifted his head, and inhaled. His wings unfolded along his back, bumping into the walls. Both ignored Kurt, and also looked straight past Yani as if she didn’t exist.
They were staring at me.
Their eyes glowed bronze from within the blackness. I glancedfast, and looked away. It made their sharp Tazier features look particularly alien.
“She is ripening,” one said.
“Yess,” hissed the other.
I had no idea what they were on about, but I shivered like a mouse cornered by a cat.
“Jaz was just recently registered,” Kurt stated, but he didn’t sound quite so friendly, now. “She hasn’t yet been evaluated.”
“Does not need to be,” one of them said. “We will tell Senaik.”
“He has a nose,” the other sniped. “He—he already should know.”
Was he saying I stank like—what? I wasripening? What the effing hell did that mean?
