I know that fear and the horrid sense of doom, the one that saysthis is the end. I have felt death’s cold grip, faced myregrets, and known the void of empty thoughts. I am only here to remember it because of Zorin.
I look around the woods at the bodies and sigh in the silence. It takes me just minutes to crack open the ground, scavenge the useful items from the bodies, break the portal generators, and bury the evidence they were ever here.
I wash the blood and dirt from my body in a creek and catch my reflection in the water.
Zorin would tell me to report it. To let Lieutenant Vrasler know.
But I can’t bring myself to go into civilization again. If I hadn’t found this crew, they’d still be wandering the world, looking for someone’s child to steal.
If anyone hurts Rhysan…Fear for his safety churns in me. I get up, water draining from my body.
I drop to all fours and run. It takes me an hour at a full sprint to reach the camp. I pant as I circle the perimeter until I get a glimpse of Emarza’s house. She’s out back with Rhysan and Jorix.
You can’t be here.
I turn to greet the old, scarred Night Stalker, Mykram, one I still wouldn’t mess with.
I growl at him.
He sniffs the air, and I’m certain he’s picked up the wet fur scent and the acrid notes of Myndrous blood on my skin.
Where?
Lowlands. They were looking for a pup.
I will stay close. But you must go. It will only upset your son to see you and not get to be with you. Tension is high in the pack with all the portal sightings. Don’t give them a reason to hurt your only descendent. You know how they are.
I sulk out of the pack’s territory and scout the woods between camp and Zorin’s house. I search from a rocky protrusionfor signs of artificial light, while I struggle to fight through reemerging pain over losing Jezza.
They wanted a female and a pup.I wonder if they came here to take my family because of what she was—an anomaly among Lunas.
Her gentle kind of love was the one thing that held me together through the bloodiest of battles. I remember her showing me the silver moonlight she could create when she focused on it. She was my Moonshine, the light of my life, something that was supposed to be a myth.
She was real. A pure soul in a beautiful body with a coat as white as the moon’s glow.
They don’t know she’s dead.
I find myself wandering into a trade camp, following the scent of meat and alcohol. Pushing through the doors, I take a seat at the bar counter and order a Harvest Moon on the rocks and a badger burger.
The noise of a TV screen makes me look up.
Two other males chat about females, making fun of them for how weak they are as they throw a glittering ball in a game on hoverboots, floating inside a contained orb of glass. Then I see a familiar face.
Zorin laughs like I haven’t seen him do in years as the pink ball slams into him, puffing out clouds of sparkling smoke. The camera pans to a human female who opens herself up for a shot, and deliberately takes a hit just so she can drop to the floor with Zorin.
He picks her up and carries her out of the arena. The way she looks up at him reminds me of how Jezza used to look up at me.
The screen pans to other players, then shows clips of a tour of planets, dinner, and other events. But as my Harvest Moon catches up with me, making my head fuzzy, numbing the painand the emptiness, I focus on the memory of the happiness in Zorin’s eyes.
He found someone. Good for him.
Then I disagree with myself.He shouldn’t be with anyone. That’s just dangerous for her.
Whatever you do, don’t bring her here.
I eat and watch more of the games. I see a clip of Nytheralians fighting their way to the golden egg in the maze with their mates, several of which look like soldiers themselves. The camera pans to another group, this one of Ginarigons and females in another corner of the maze, most of which is blurred out. But the moans are enough to make most of the bar cheer.
And then I see a clip of Zorin mid-shift among a familiar M-pack that makes me sit up.
