Xandros froze. Rhodes’s eyebrows rose. “You understand Drakonian?”
Neither of them had been there when Zyair and I had used it. I decided to go for the stretch. “Yes.” And I could. Mostly. “Now get out of the pilot’s seat. Because the only way we are getting through that belt intact is if I get us there.”
Rhodes stared at me. Something glimmered deep in his dark eyes.
“I am fully capable of flying,” he stated in English.
“How do you define fully capable?” Xandros asked.
“Moving forward. Avoiding asteroids.” His gaze narrowed. “Keeping my mind on the task at hand.”
Okay, he had me at the last one.
Xandros snorted a laugh. “You pilot likeyou fly—in straight lines. Asteroids do not follow those rules. You will be too slow to avoid them.”
The dark eyes ignited. “Nothing about me is slow.”
My pulse did a funny little jump. But I sensed a brotherly debate brewing. “Up,” I repeated, gesturing emphatically. “Out.”
Rhodes’s chin lifted as he silently met my challenge.
He was the darkest brother in more than just coloring, and intimidating as hell. Or he should have been. But something inside me rose to it. “Stardrifteris my ship. And I plan to fly her.”
Rhodes held my gaze, but he spoke to his brother. “She is strong minded.”
“Bossy,” Xandros corrected with an upward twitch of his lips. “She is also accurate. You are not as good as Zyair, brother.”
“Depends on what you are referring to.” I’d never heard that tone in Rhodes’s voice. Almost a growly purr. But he rose, and with a dramatic gesture, offered me the seat.
“It is all yours, little Draka,” he stated.
I slid past him into the pilot’s seat, trying to ignore the waft of musky scent that drifted in his wake as I strapped myself in. “Everyone better hold onto something.”
Rhodes took the navigator’s seat, but Xandros merely extended his toe talons straight into the metal floor.
I looked down. “Hey, you’re leaving holes!”
He shrugged and did not look one bit repentant. “Consider them necessary modifications.”
I shot him a glare before opening a comm channel to Yani. “Are we set?”
“Depends,” she hedged, “on where we are going.”
“Givnia,” I stated.
I thought I heard a sigh. Then, “Let me get strapped in. Engines are a go. Please remember that our shields are barely functioning.”
Right. Damaged actuator. I began flicking switches, and a reassuring vibration ran through the hull.
“Stay lowover the trees to minimize detection by Dangos’s spaceport,” Rhodes stated.
“Then anyone out for a stroll will see us by just looking up,” Xandros countered.
“Not many strollers out here,” Rhodes growled.
I cut the argument off before it could get started. “I’ll stay low and fast. We’ll be past anyone on the ground so quickly they won’t get a good look.”
That stopped their discussion, but now Rhodes eyed me. “Flying fast over terrain requires precision as well as experience.”
