“No. Unless we are in immense agony and near death. That is why some of us mastermasking.” Onidus shrugs. “It’s not like Mindor would ever like us riding them like beasts of burden. So consider it an honor.”
“I do.” I find another scar. They are everywhere. The ache that forms in my chest makes me press my lips to the closest.How can someone so good get so abused?
But I know it’s because he sacrifices, he doesn’t ask for help, and he no doubt has trusted others when he shouldn’t have.
Zorin and his pack circle the complex building toward the males’ hangars. I catch our reflection in the glass windows. Racers inside turn to look. Aliens of all kinds gape at us.
Doors open and four more Mindorans, including one female, step outside. They shift and join our pack. Rorsar gave me a quick introduction to their M-pack as we rode out to find Zorin, and seeing them all together behind us fills me with invigorating energy. Zorin might try to take on the world alone, like Rorsar said, but it’s clear he has an entire family right here with him.
ABR is definitely going to have something to say about this. A pack of huge wolf shifters stalking through the race grounds like they’re on a hunt…
But when I notice Ohni inside the main hallway outside the creatures’ facility, she gives me a covert thumbs up. The way her wide eyes and open smile track us, I don’t think she’s seen anything like it either.
I sit up and smooth Zorin’s fur back into place. As I do, I notice more racers walking to the windows, including several Mindorans with eyes a deeper blue than the Shifters behind me.
Must be Lunas.
Carielle flicks a glossy curl of hair over her shoulder then crosses her arms, looking thoroughly disgusted.
I can’t help but smile.Eat your heart out, bitch.
“Ooh,she’s pissed,” Onidus sings out. “But she looks like a karat, so who gives a fuck?”
“A carrot?” I ask. “Like the vegetable?”
He laughs. “No, akaratis what we call the entitled civilians born into power that think gold flake on their breakfast and diamond encrusted halos around their irises are necessities they can’t live without.”
“Both sound painful.”
“What is it your people say?” he asks. “Beauty is pain?”
Zorin shifts upright and catches my legs, holding me up. “If that’s what someone thinks is beautiful.”
Onidus holds the door to the hangar wing open for us as the rest of Zorin’s pack stands and follows us inside. “I don’t care what she wears. Rot on the inside will still make her ugly in my eyes. And I can always see through the fakeness to the soul underneath.”
He darts his gaze at me as Zorin takes my hand and guides me toward a glowing ramp.
My chest tightens. “What do you see in me?”
Zorin draws me protectively close and stares him down.
Onidus lifts his hands in innocence. “Just a good heart trying to survive and avoid more pain. Please don’t eat me, Zorin.”
Zorin sucks on an elongated tooth and scrutinizes him, then continues to the ship, keeping me under his arm.
“Stars, he’s moody,” Onidus remarks.
“It’s just his rut,” Kren mutters. “It always makes us a bit grouchy. It’s worse that he can’t do anything about it.”
A shiny gold man stands at the top of the ramp in a vibrant ship of polished white metal.
“Tessi?”
Zorin encourages me up to him.
“I am General Viriden. We spoke on the com.”
I don’t know why, but I wish I could hug him, maybe because he’s a friend of my mother’s, and he feels like the last thread I’ve got let of my old life, of the home I was supposed to have. But he’s an officer, and I can’t break protocol.
