M: Did another ship dock on the space station?
A: Confirmed. Draic starship, Identification: B320IL. Arrival logged at 15:13.
M: Why didn’t youalert me?
A: Life support is not essential to exterior—
I disconnected. It was like talking to a very stupid plant—which I was doing a lot of, lately.
A draic starship had docked. I quickly slid into my archives, sifting past memories ofhimto find useful intelligence on the draic species. Unfortunately, all of my records were from centuries ago, and any recent mention of draics + humans yielded one consistent result:
Hostile.
Desperately, I slid back into my spores. Grow. Growfaster.
CHAPTER 9
Of course.Of course, Torian couldn’t keep the one thing she’d saved for years to buy. A starship like that? Humans might not know its worth, but aliens absolutely would. It was brimming with impressive technology—Moss alone must be worth a fortune.
And that thought stuck in her mind like a blade in skin. Thehellthis alien would kidnap Moss, after everything it had gone through. Before this week, Torian would die for two people: Celise, and Amelia. Today, she added a third.
This draic would never steal her new ship, her new friend.
“It’s mine,” she said firmly, almost angrily. “I bought it, fair and square.”
The draic seemed amused now—he didn’t have lips, but his mouth curled over sharp teeth in what had to be a smile. In the darkness of the coniferous trees, dappled with blue light, the amber around his dark pupils seemed to glow. “Mmm. That ship wasn’t yours to purchase.”
“It was abandoned for over a hundred years.” Torian knew theDestitute’s last owner wasn’t a draic, so his stake in this couldn’t be personal. “Is someone paying you to find it? I can pay, too. More than they’re offering. Double?”
It was a lie—she had literally nothing to her name—but she’d try anything to avoid a fight with a draic. And if he agreed… well, she’d take care of Celise, then work another lifetime to protect Moss, too.
But the draic seemed exasperated now. “Wait. Ahundred years?”
“Yes?” Torian’s voice tilted into a question. “Closer to one hundred and thirty-three, based on the ship’s records.”
“A hundred andthirty-three years,” the draic repeated, deadpan. “That ship has been misplaced for a century?”
For a long-lived species like the nylarians, that was probably a blink. But most alien races lived three hundred years on the lower end, more than five hundred on the high. According to what Torian knew of them, draics were around that range.
A hundred years might seem as ludicrous to this draic as it was to Moss or Torian.
That could work in her favor.
The draic grumbled something that her translator equated to “Damn it, Dutch,” and spun on his clawed feet. He wore clothes, but not shoes—clearly, his soles were tough enough without them. As an afterthought, he called over his shoulder, “Follow me, if you please. We’ll get this sorted.”
That was the most optimistic thing she’d heard today. Torian hesitated, carefully retrieving the crumpled mass of her gun. It was completely destroyed, but at least she could dispose of it properly, rather than littering this wild space.
Carrying it carefully, she followed the draic past the woods, beyond the clearing where she’d shot him, then through the stone tunnel to the residential ring. As they entered an overgrown park, the draic cupped his mouth and shouted, “Sequelta vel Dutch-Ath!We need to talk.”
A pause.
A long pause.
Then a voice filtered overhead, singsongy: “Uh-oh!”
Torian glanced around the empty space, half expecting another draic to land from above. But this new voice was smooth and sultry, higher-pitched than the draic’s, with none of the grumbly undertones. It continued: “Am I in trouble, Zen?”
Those words were nearly a sensual purr.
