[ASC 923.7.15]

  193 cycles since the Xolarii Purge.

  Mayweather keened as Xaryk wrapped a makeshift bandage around her leg with careful hands.

  “I’m being as gentle as I can,” he chided, wincing as the quadral bumped him roughly, paws shifting anxiously in the dirt.

  “You’re being dramatic now, girl,” Xaryk hissed through grit teeth.

  Mayweather whinnied her displeasure in return.

  “What’s the hold-up?” Drakkan called, reining his mount alongside the bickering pair.

  “She took an injury from that khethriss,” Xaryk explained, not looking up.

  “We won’t get far if this isn’t tended to,” he added—more to Mayweather than to the takalan.

  Drakkan dismounted with a sigh, reaching for a vial at his hip. His rough leather belt was crowded with vials, satchels, and flasks: each filled with shifting tinctures and glimmering liquids that caught the fading sunlight.

  Drakkan took a handful of clipped yellow grass and pressed it gently to Mayweather’s bucking snout.

  She went still almost instantly.

  Her slit pupils dilated, swallowing the verdant iris as she chirped giddily, then melted into Drakkan’s touch, collapsing into the dirt with a heavy sigh.

  “Gilla grass,” Drakkan explained. “A fast-acting, fast-fading sedative.”

  She lay panting softly, unmoving, as the takalan knelt beside her and applied a dark ointment with practiced hands.

  Xaryk watched, arms folded, and eyes cool, but inwardly impressed.

  Killing’s easy, he thought. Healing is another matter.

  On closer inspection, it was clear the takalan was no novice at either.

  His heavy boots and jacket were fashioned from tough hide, cured by hand, and worn smooth by howling desert winds. A bandolier, slung across his chest, held rifle rounds and slim medical tubes. Its lining was made from opaque scales that shimmered subtly in the sunlight.

  Bone-like ribbing curled along the shoulders of his jacket, and a thick leather necklace, adorned with a large fang, framed the stiff collar that rose to his jaw.

  This man was a survivor. A hunter of the desert. As much a part of the ecosystem as khethris or quadral.

  It wasn’t long until Drakkan had Mayweather bandaged.

  She soon found her feet, experimentally placing weight on the affected leg. Encountering no pain, she pranced in an excited circle around the pair before gracing Drakkan with a rough tongue across the cheek.

  Drakkan wiped away the trail of saliva with rueful disdain.

  “I believe that means thank you,” Xaryk chuckled. “Much appreciated.”

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  “Thank me by picking up the pace,” Drakkan replied, equal parts irritated and amused.

  He swung back into the saddle with practiced ease.

  “Captain,” Xaryk muttered, giving a lazy salute before following suit.

  At his signal, Mayweather trotted after the trio, tossing her feathered mane with what could only be described as delight.

  True to Drakkan’s word, the twin suns soon slipped beneath the horizon, hiding away from the nocturnal desert predators.

  The seasoned troop led Xaryk to a rocky outcrop beneath a sloping ridge, where they began setting up camp.

  “Best to bed down with cover come nightfall,” Drakkan said, as the others moved quickly to follow his lead.

  “Or a rudkhala will swoop down and getcha!” Tu’rak barked, giving a guttural laugh as he pantomimed a pair of talons reaching from the heavens.

  Though Xaryk had volunteered to keep watch, one of the three remained awake at all times, none yet trusting their newest companion.

  He shared a silent dawn with Zhella.

  Despite a few attempts at conversation, she met his words with nothing more than grunts or shrugs.

  The more he talked, the more her frustration simmered until, finally, she stood up abruptly and stormed off.

  Flustered, she shook Tu’rak awake.

  He blinked at her, clearly annoyed, until he caught the look in her eyes. His irritation vanished with a sigh.

  Wordlessly, the large takalan took his place across from Xaryk.

  He hauled a rough woollen blanket over his shoulders and stared at the rising suns through gritty eyes.

  “My apologies,” the xolus called. Despite being only a few feet away, the distance felt enormous. “I’m not sure how I offended her.”

  “It’s not you,” Tu’rak grunted. “Zhella ain’t got no tongue.”

  “I’m sorry…” he replied, not sure what else to say.

  “Not your fault,” he shrugged. “It frustrates her. Not bein’ able to communicate. Drakkan an’ I know her well enough to get by—but talkin’ to strangers?” He shook his head sadly. “Must feel like livin’ in a bubble. No matter how hard she shouts, no one can hear her.”

  Xaryk frowned, heart tightening. He winced, fighting back the surge of emotion.

  You’re a professional, he reminded himself, though even he felt the mantra was beginning to feel tired.

  “She doesn’t speak Core Sign?” Xaryk asked hopefully. He wasn’t fluent, but he knew a few words.

  Wander long enough, he thought, and you pick up a bit of everything. Good and bad.

  “Naw,” Tu’rak slurred to the morning haze. “We’re true natives. Stay away from anything Core if we can help it.”

  Xaryk knew better than to press about the Core. Too many had been left jaded when the Arcanonian Expansion Project collapsed during the rise of the Xolarii Empire.

  Instead, tentatively, he said, “Can I ask?”

  “I wouldn’t,” Tu’rak snapped.

  Xaryk obliged, hands raised in quiet surrender.

  They sat in unresolved silence as the sky shifted from deep black to the softest hues of purple. But the xolus didn’t press. In his youth, he’d never known when silence carried more weight than a clever word or a well-placed phrase.

  He was no longer young.

  Finally, Tu’rak broke the silence with a heavy sigh.

  “Redmark’s a bastard, through and through,” he growled. “But he’s got one rule. Villains like him always do, don’t they? Some random act of kindness. Some noble line they swear never to cross. Something to convince themselves they ain’t totally evil. So they can sleep at night.”

  A chill traced its way up Xaryk’s spine.

  He’d known men like that—men who committed small mercies as if one life spared could balance out a hundred ruined.

  And he’d be lying to himself if he claimed he’d never been one of them.

  His brow furrowed with guilt, the weight of old ghosts clawing at the edges of his mind. He forced them back, anchoring himself in Tu’rak’s voice, harsh and unrelenting.

  “Redmark’s got one,” Tu’rak continued, picking up an errant rock. He dragged it through the sand with gliding strokes, punctuated by sudden, violent stabs. “He doesn’t kill kids. That’s his line.” A grim chuckle escaped him. “But he ain’t above hurting them.”

  He shook his head at the absurdity of it, the macabre logic that somehow passed for morality. “Redmark’s got a rule. But a rule? That’s a weakness. Something that can be used against you.”

  He paused.

  “Better if the survivors can’t speak of it. So he makes sure they can’t…” he trailed off.

  The rock sailed off into darkness, skipping several times before vanishing into the fading twilight.

  “Understand?”

  Xaryk clenched his fist.

  Redmark’s bounty had been impersonal before—a paycheck, a way off this sun-bleached prison.

  Now?

  Now, Redmark would be lucky if the bounty hunter’s professionalism outweighed his thirst for justice.

  He’d be luckier still if Xaryk reached him before Zhella did…