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But there was only one man I could think of who’d hurl his spear like a madman at a moving fucking shuttle. The same man who’d snap a bow in half, tie it back together, and hurl it at its target with truer aim than an arrow could ever hope to achieve.
“Dalk,” I whispered as Valeria stomped over to the shuttle’s doors and opened them.
“Yup,” she muttered as she jumped out. “Motherfucking Dalk.”
I tried to follow immediately behind her, my heart hammering at the inside of my throat, but Oxriel stopped me.
“Wait a moment, Fiona,” he said, his expression strangely sober. “Wait until we make sure he is alright. Throwing spears at the shuttle does not imply that he is of sound mind.”
“Ox,” I said, “I appreciate your concern. But I have just about gone out of my mind waiting to see that man and I’m not about to let you stand in my way now.”
“I will not move until I know he is of sound mind.”
“How about I just give you permission to hit him if he does something stupid?” I asked, hoping that would be enough. Dalk was somewhere out there and I couldn’t stand to stay here jabbering about whether he was in a right state of mind or not. I needed to see it for myself.
“I suppose that could work...” Oxriel murmured thoughtfully.
“Great!” I cried. I shouldered past him and ran right out the doors.
Only to find Dalk and Valeria facing off against each other.
“You do not ever throw a weapon at my ship!” Valeria was fuming, pointing accusatorily at the shuttle’s viewscreen. “You could have damaged it. You could have killed someone!”
“I was not about to let you take her back to Gahn Thaleo’s now,” Dalk snapped.
“You already told me that!” Valeria shouted. “And as I already told you, whether you have a mate or not, you do not get to throw a temper tantrum and compromise my ship and crew!”
It had been less than two weeks since I’d seen him. And yet... Something about him seemed different. For one thing, Dalk looked absolutely exhausted, his sight stars pulsing and spinning with delayed reactions, which I’d learned was basically the alien version of dark circles under your eyes. But despite his tiredness, he seemed fiercer than I’d ever seen him. Furious with some sort of unknown purpose. Nearly feral with it.
“Dalk!”
That feral gaze snapped to me, metal to a magnet. It nearly swallowed me whole.
“Oh for fuck’s sake... Fine,” Valeria cried, throwing up her hands. “I am not finished with you, Dalk. But I also need to get this flight underway. So you two sort out your shit, would you? We’ll be at Gahn Thaleo’s.”
I looked on with confusion as Valeria ordered Nasrin, Tilly, Oxriel, and Zoren back into the shuttle.
Everyone except for me.
“I don’t have to go?” I asked her, shading my eyes against the sun. I wanted more than anything to be left alone with Dalk right now. But I also didn’t want to cause any friction with Gahn Thaleo. Surely, despite Valeria’s anger over what Dalk had just done, he’d still be allowed to chaperone me into the other Gahn’s territory, like he’d done before.
But Valeria just blew out a harsh breath and said, “Nope!” Then, cryptically, “No more trips to Gahn Thaleo’s for you. You’re off the hook.”
Before I could ask her what she meant by that, she swung herself back up into the shuttle. Grim followed, the doors closed, and the engines started up. I might have stood there staring like a dumbass until they completely lifted off if Dalk hadn’t suddenly seized my hand.
“You are too close to it,” he shouted over the din of the engines. I nodded mutely and let him drag me out from the shuttle’s lift-off area. He pulled me into the shaded opening of a cave at the base of the Vrika’s peak.
“Dalk...” I said. “Why... What... How the hell are you here? Doesn’t it take thirteen or fourteen days to travel here without the shuttle?”
“Maybe for a weak man,” he scoffed. “The sort of man who needs a lot of sleep.”
“And that’s not you?’ I probed, concerned by the drawn look to his face, the intense but slow bursting of his sight stars. “You look so tired.”
“Much has happened,” he said tensely, the muscles bunching beneath his blades.
“Including you throwing a spear at the shuttle?” I asked dryly.
His lip pulled back in a snarl.
