The whirling stopped abruptly. Lexi fought down a wave of nausea. Her head felt like someone had embedded an axe in it. She stretched her arm out and gave a sigh of relief when it came in contact with a solid surface.
Her fingers scrabbled, clutched something gritty and crumbling, like sand or dirt. She shifted and became aware of a hard surface beneath her, studded with lumps digging into her back. Rocks?
She waved a hand in the area over front of her face and felt nothing. Her mind processed the information. She was lying on her back, on a patch of very real, very hard ground. Lexi wiggled fingers and toes, arms and legs, moved her head from side to side, then stopped when another wave of nausea threatened to overcome her.
She took a few deep breaths and cautiously opened her eyes. A double glare pierced her brain, making her head ache even more. Of course. The twin suns. Phalyx and Zalyx. She turned her head to the side and narrowed her eyes to slits, staring straight ahead.
A reddish-brown substance the texture of coarse sand stretched out as far as she could see. Here and there, huge rocks protruded from the surface, coal black and drab brown. She reached behind her head and felt a jagged surface. That explained the crippling pain. She’d apparently slammed down onto a rock when she landed.
Struggling to a sitting position, she took in her surroundings. More sand. More rocks. And she was seeing everything through an odd reddish haze. She rubbed a hand over the clear visor in her headgear, thinking maybe it was coated with a fine film of dust, but the haze remained.
Slowly, she pushed herself to her full six-foot-one height and turned in a complete circle. No sign of her team. In fact, there didn’t seem to be any evidence of human habitation. Apparently she’d missed the mark and ended up outside the portal’s landing zone.
Tamping down a rising surge of panic, she forced herself to make another slow circle. Not only were her teammates nowhere in sight, there was also no sign of the crystal-blue mountain range that crisscrossed the planet of Neodyma. No sparkling lakes or rivers. No trees. Not even a cactus or a patch of gray-green desert sage. And everywhere, all around her, the weird reddish haze covering a landscape straight from Hell.
Something was very wrong. The strange greenish glow she’d seen just before she entered the portal must have been due to a glitch, an anomaly.
Gradually, the truth sank in. With an anguished howl, Lexi fell to her knees. She was alone. And this was not Neodyma. Somehow, she’d been transported to its sister planet, the desolate wasteland known as Iridia.
Chapter Three
Exhausted, Ayron forced his legs to keep going. They had only a few precious hours of twilight, and his Tryb needed fresh meat. He heard a shout from Nazery up ahead and doubled his pace.
Their quarry came into sight. The enormous white tusk protruding from its head stood out against the dark landscape. It was rare to see one this size alone in the Outlands. Lumbering along ponderously on all eight legs, the narliphant was likely an old alpha driven from his herd by a younger male. His enormous snout constantly waved back and forth as he moved, sniffing out the bits of lichen hidden under the surface that made up his diet.
Using moves they’d spent years perfecting, the hunters surrounded their quarry. Eli and Khan approached from the left flank, Nazery and Balek from the right. That left Ayron free to circle around to the front. He’d have the kill shot.
Silently, Khan raised his sword in the air then made a sharp downward slashing motion. With a wild whoop, the four men attacked as one, slicing through the back tendons on all eight legs. The beast raised its snout and bellowed a cry of distress, exposing its underbelly.
Ayron struck, hurling the spear with enough force to pierce the thick leathery skin, straight into the heart of the beast. The ground shook as the huge creature bellowed once more then collapsed.
Nazery let out a triumphant cry, and the runners appeared, coming out from behind the rocks where they’d been crouching, out of sight of the creature.
“Summon everyone. We need to butcher the kill and get every usable part of it home before dawn.”
Grinning, the four young boys took off at a dead run. They were hunters in training. One day, they’d be the ones attacking a beast, and Ayron and the others would await their summons safely at home. Then they’d be expected to do their part — skinning and eviscerating the creature, harvesting nearly every part of it and hauling it home.
Rarely did hunters get close enough to bring down a creature that size. Narliphants traveled in small herds, with the young, aggressive males venturing out ahead. Their defenses were formidable. Over the years, hunters from Ayron’s Tryb had been trampled and killed by charging narliphants.
Exhaustion overtook him. He longed to find a place where he could sink down and rest. Ayron was older than the other hunters, nearly fifty, and found it difficult to keep up with the pace they set. But pride wouldn’t allow him to show any weakness. He wandered off, seeking a place where he could snatch a few moments of peace before the flurry of activity began that would last till dawn.
He moved silently through the harsh landscape, circling around a huge outcropping of thorium. A flash of white in the distance caught his eye. For an instant, he found himself hoping it wasn’t another narliphant. He didn’t think he could sustain the pace necessary to bring down a second enormous beast, let alone helping to haul away another ton of meat and skin and bone.
But he was born a hunter. The greatest in his Tryb, if the legends were true. It was in his blood. He could no more ignore an opportunity to snag another kill than he could decide to live without air.
Cautiously, he peered around the jagged rocks. He’d never seen a creature like it. All white, with only four limbs, the beast was small and slight, standing upright like a man. It looked as tall as a man too. Whatever it was, the beast was coming closer, plodding along at a steady pace.
Ayron let it draw nearer. Circling the outcropping, he waited till it had passed. Then, with a fierce cry, he charged, bringing the creature down.
The beast struggled, writhing under him, making muffled wailing sounds. The texture of its coat was strange — slick and smooth, without the leathery armor-like protection nearly every creature in the Outlands had developed to survive in the harsh environment. It lacked bulk too. The skin collapsed when he pressed on it, like an air bladder with a hole in it.
He flipped it over. Two terrified brown eyes met his, covered by a wide transparent panel in the white covering. The creature’s arms flailed, beating on his chest. He got his hand under an edge of the panel and yanked. A hunk of it came off in his hand.
Under it lay a human-looking face, mouth open in a silent scream. Ayron bit off a shocked cry. Shouts rang out, drawing nearer. The other hunters had been drawn by his whoop when he felled the creature. They ran toward him then stopped in their tracks.
“What is it?” Nazery asked.
The creature had stopped struggling when the others appeared and lay beneath him, silent and limp.
