“About… oh never mind.”
I swallowed. Suddenly, my heart was in my throat, and I almost couldn’t force the words past my lips. “There is nothing between me and them. Nor will there ever be.”
Silence. Then, “Well, that’s helpful. Because I want you to go with Xandros to that abandoned settlement, and see if you can salvage some metal to patch the starboard storage bay.”
My mouth opened, closed, and then opened again. “Can’t he handle that on his own?”
“You will need his dragon to lift it. Which means it would be easier if you did the cutting. His beast hands won’t be able to manipulate the device.”
Oh. It did make sense. But being out there alone in the swamp with a big, muscular, tattooed dragon who cooed at hedgegophers…
Dammit, I meant what I’d said. They are just a means to get free.
“If there is no other way,” I said.
She slid out from beneath the power core containment system, and regarded me with a strange look on her face.
“Are you going to be okay here alone?” I asked.
She waggled a brow. “I’m not alone. There’s Kurt. And a pissed off Tazier in the aft storage bay.”
“That’s worse than alone.” I insisted.
She shrugged and waved the spanner. “I’ll be fine. I’m not exactly helpless. And we need that metal.”
Alrighty then. I accepted the cutters and goggles from her—shegave me two sets, which immediately kyboshed the me-cutting—him-lifting scenario.
“Just in case you need both,” she said, before I could point that out.
I tossed them and a few extra power cells into the pack she handed me, along with two flashlights, before I headed out of the engineering bay with determination in my step.
“Wait,” she called.
I turned to see her pulling something from a cupboard, and she hurried over to hand it to me.
A wool hat. In a screaming mix of orange and purple.
“I crocheted this for you,” she admitted. “Missed your birthday. I had problems with the pattern. Just finished it before all this began.”
The colors pulsed before my eyes, and the cable effect running in a spiral had missed in several areas, but my throat suddenly closed as I dropped the pack and hugged her.
“It’s beautiful, Yani. Thanks so much.”
She cleared her throat as she backed out of the hug. “It’s cold out there. It’s real wool. It will keep your head warm and dry.”
I pulled it on, picked up the pack, and headed down the hall. If she could crochet me a hat, I could do this for her…
15
Jaz
My resolve lasted precisely the length of time it took me to grab a cloak out of the lockers. I hesitated—and then dug around. Most were far too small, but at the very back I found a bigger version, rolled it, and tied it onto the pack, before I walked to the ramp. I mused that if the Drakes had just looked a little harder, they could have avoided the entire unmaling-risk incident.
Somewhere above the heavy cloud cover, the sun was setting. The rain had diminished to a cold drizzle, and I pulled the hood of my cloak up over my hat.
Shadows lay long across theStardrifter—or rather, over the mound of trees and foliage that she lay beneath. Xandros had done a good job of hiding her.
The bright yellow lizard birds dived and swooped over where the red dragon stood not far from his handiwork, and he wasn’t alone. Rhodes’s beast stood with him, and as I descended the ramp, I met the eyes of the third dragon—his red-gold scaled brother. They gleamed emerald at me, before Zyair turned away.
