Kurt visibly recoiled from seven-plus naked feet of pissed off behemoth. But he did manage, “Where is Senaik?”
“Where he belongs,” Rhodes stated calmly. “In a cage.”
Kurt’s eyes widened. Then they moved to me, and narrowed again. “What have you done?”
“Fuck off,” I swore, as Zyair pushed past him. Natural that Kurt would blame me. However, this time, he was right. But I didn’t owe him an answer—only my contempt.
“She seems to like profanity,” Rhodes rumbled.
“It kind of suits her.” Xandros’s lips curled in a smirk.
With a muttered curse of his own, Kurt vanished back into his quarters. As we continued down the hall, I heard the door swish shut.
Xandros said something else, this time in Drakonian. I think it was, “Is he going to be a problem?”
“If he is, we will handle it.” Zyair replied calmly.
I didn’t think they expected that I understood them. Most humans did not know any Drakonian. I’d learned some of it while ferrying them across the cosmos.
“I think Kurt was making friends with Senaik,” I said.
“Senaik has no friends,” Xandros growled in English.
Yani led us to the medical bay, where they rather ridiculously insisted I get stitched up first.
It was not a spacious compartment. Three naked Drakes filled it to capacity. Zyair lowered me to sit in the center of the cot. Yani filled a pan with hot water and numbed my arm with a quick injection above the injury.
The three Drakes continued to hover over me as she washed it, and she waved at them. “I’m not touching any of you while you are like that. Go wash off that blood and find something to wear. The access hatch has coveralls in the lockers, firstroom on the left off the ramp. Senaik had the quarters just off of there, you can use his shower.”
I’d always assumed the Drolgoks to be subservient to the Drakes, but her tone bordered on an order. The three brothers looked at each other, and then Zyair turned to Rhodes.
He lifted his chin. “Stay with her.”
“With who?” I asked.
“You,” he answered.
“What am I, chopped liver?” Yani demanded.
“No, you are a Drolgok.” For a moment, Zyair seemed genuinely puzzled.
She planted hands on her stout hips.
His brows rose and fell. “You are formidable,” Zyair stated, his lips twitching. “You do not need defending.”
“Neither do I!” I shouted after him as he and Xandros headed off down the hall. Damn it. Just who had rescued who, here?
Rhodes took up his station near the door, and crossed his arms. He’d fared much better than his brothers—the only noticeable fresh damage were parallel talon slices across one arm, and shallower ones along his ribs. But as I met his gaze, and he raised a brow, I placed him rather high on the pure arrogance scale.
“I do not need a large bleeding hovering guardian,” I insisted.
His brow twitched. “The bleeding has almost stopped.”
My mind groped and came up with, “You arenaked.”
“Yes.” He didn’t sound the least bit repentant.
“It is disconcerting.” Yani was nothing if not supportive.
