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“Are you okay?” he demanded, his eyes flashing with passion.
10
KIAN
Kian searched his mate’s sweet face for any signs of a breakdown.
Many beings were overcome by the sight of a battle, and he had sensed her eyes on him as he fought, though he had left her deliberately with her back to the wall.
It was entirely possible that the very sight of him would frighten her for a long time. Hand fighting was an area where Kian excelled, much to the detriment of those scrawny Terrans tonight. Seeing him lay waste to her own kind might have been too much for her, though he had been careful only to beat and not maim, allowing his opponents to run away mostly undamaged.
He waited for her to burst into tears and try to hide herself from him.
But her eyes were sparkling, and she had that look on her face like she was going to start another of her endless cheerful interrogations.
“I have a million questions,” she said, the words exploding from her, as if a dam had burst inside her.
“I’m not sure I can answer them,” he told her honestly, without thinking.
“They fought like they had nothing to lose,” she said. “What were they?”
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“I mean, they looked almost Terran,” she said. “What were they?”
“They were Terran,” he said, narrowing his eyes.
She nodded, appearing to take that in.
“And there are a lot of reasons someone might fight like they have nothing to lose,” he went on. “Addiction, which could be a possibility given how thin they were - they could be hooked on nano-dust and stealing for the funds to buy more.”
“Can you even get that here?” Kinsley asked dubiously.
“You can get anything anywhere,” Kian said. “But it costs.”
“Why else would they fight like that?” Kinsley asked him.
“They could be in a brainwashed cult of some kind,” Kian said. “I’ve seen that all too many times. Or maybe they’re in hock to someone really bad. Whatever the reason, they didn’t scare off as quickly as they should have.”
“Were you pulling your punches?” she asked. “Why didn’t you use a weapon, or really hit anyone?”
She clearly wasn’t bothered by the fact that they were Terrans, like her.
“They were no soldiers,” he explained. “I was only interested in stopping them and scaring them off.”
“Why didn’t they just retreat right away?” she asked. “They definitely weren’t prepared to fight you.”
“No idea,” he told her, shaking his head.
And that really was a good question.
“Why didn’t you capture them?” she asked. “Shouldn’t they go to jail?”
“This frontier is half-empty,” he told her. “And the nearest jail is far from here. Capturing bandits means feeding and caring for them until we get to a larger settlement. We don’t have enough supplies with us for all that. And more importantly, there’s no room on the sleds. And they know it. This is why the frontier is dangerous, and why we travel in a convoy. The stakes are low for bandits way out here, though the pickings are slim.”
“If you wanted to scare the bandits without hurting them, why didn’t you just shift?” she asked.
“This isn’t my homeland,” he told her simply.
