Page 51 of Bride of the Enemy Alien

“Value,” I say.

“That is not an answer.”

“It is the only answer that matters.” I turn toward the broken basin and force myself to look at all of them instead of only her. “Hunters do not begin by attacking walls. Walls are loud. Walls gather defenders. A bad hunter strikes walls first and dies proud. A good one marks what a place cannot afford to lose.”

Renn’s young face hardens. “Children.”

“Yes.”

The humans pale. I keep going because fear that remains vague becomes panic, and panic opens doors faster than blades.

“Leaders. Healers. Bonded pairs. Anyone who can sense the signal. Anyone who can tell others where to run. Anyone whose blood, memory, or body proves Tajss is not ash.”

Kessa’s mouth presses flat. “You’re describing people.”

“Yes.”

“Like inventory.”

“Yes.”

She glares at me. “Do you always answer like someone carved the soft parts out of you?”

The question strikes harder than it should. The soft parts were not carved out. They were measured, named, priced, and used until keeping them became a liability. That is not a thing I will explain in red sand while the second tracker calls through my blood.

“I answer in ways that keep people alive,” I say.

“No,” she says. “You answer in ways that keep people distant.”

Silence lands around us. Even the dying core seems to quiet for it. Sharp little human. She should not see that much.

Syin’s growl saves me from choosing between truth and cruelty.

“The longer we stand here, the more time the second tracker has.”

“The direct route is what it wants,” I say.

Kessa drags her attention off me and looks toward the south ridge. Her expression changes, anger folding under function. I watch it happen and recognize command without title. She is afraid. She is angry. She moves anyway, turning fear into path, path into instruction.

“There’s another way,” she says.

Syin looks at her. “How much longer?”

“Longer enough to make you scowl, shorter than dying,” Kessa says.

“Kessa.”

“Fifteen minutes if the old spillway hasn’t collapsed. Thirty if it has. Forever if a zemlja decides we look interesting.”

“That is not reassuring.”

“I didn’t say it to comfort you.”

Renn coughs into his fist. Syin ignores him with discipline I nearly respect.

Kessa crouches and draws in the sand with the tip of her small knife. The knife is still ridiculous. Small and practical. Not made for fighting or war. At best it is good for cutting cord and scraping ration seals and doing desperate things to eyes if necessary. She sketches a basin curve, three stones in a broken line under the ridge.

“Direct route takes us over hardpan with hollow spots beneath it. If the fragment attracts zemlja the way the ship did, it will pulse when we’re halfway across open ground. No cover. No side cut. Bad ending, educational for nobody because we’ll all be dead.”