Page 28 of Silver Slayer
"They forgot to mention how hot they were." Erin’s voice filtered through from far away as my gaze remained locked with my silver slayer’s across the distance, that same inexplicable pull humming between us like a live wire. "Like, criminally hot.”
My silver slayer?I had thought the same earlier.
Mine. The word surfaced in my mind before I could stop it, unbidden and specific and entirely too possessive for someone who had known this male for less than two days. Vennox wasn't mine.
“What?”
“I said Tyrk and Vala didn’t mention they looked like pro-wrestlers crossed with male supermodels,” Erin repeated, but I wasn’t listening.
I was only aware of Vennox. The controlled power of his stance, the careful way he maintained his distance, the intensity of his focus. It should have been uncomfortable, but it wasn't.
"We should get inside," Vala said, breaking my trance. "We have repairs to make and supplies to gather.”
The group began moving toward the ship, conversation resuming as the females peppered Brooke and Mara with questions about our night in the crashed Moktian vessel. I hung back, suddenly reluctant to follow, to break whatever strange connection had formed between Vennox and me.
He remained exactly where he was, watching me with that unwavering focus, making no move to close the distance between us. Waiting, I realized. Always waiting, never demanding.
I looked away first, breaking the connection with an effort that left me strangely breathless. As I turned toward the ship, I couldn't shake the awareness of him at my back. The feeling followed me through the hatch and into the relative safety beyond, an anchor I hadn't asked for and couldn't seem to release.
Chapter Nine
VENNOX
The ship had settled into a hush so complete it pressed against my ears, heavier than exhaustion. I kept my vigil from the edge of the command deck, close enough to know Quin finally surrendered to the kind of sleep that only comes when the body gives out before the mind does.
Before our arrival, the human females had slept on makeshift pallets spread across the command deck. To make room for the additional males, they moved to the crew quarters tucked deeper within the ship, beyond a hatch at the rear of the compartment and down a short corridor. We claimed the deck for ourselves. Even separated by walls, I knew exactly where Quin slept. My senses tracked her as surely as if she lay within arm's reach.
I hadn't slept. Not since we'd boarded Vala's ship, and if I was being honest with myself, not truly since long before that. Since the rescue. Since Gorka.
Sleep had become a thing I rationed like a resource I couldn't afford to waste, because every time I closed my eyes for longer than a few mims, the dark filled with things I couldn't fight.
Uri's palace reassembled itself around me with the patience of something that knew it had all the time in the world. The stone floor. The collar's weight. The click of her jewels as she circled the cage, unhurried, certain of her dominion. I had learned to stay awake rather than face the Gorken queen again behind closed lids.
And then I had met Quin, and sleep had become impossible for an entirely different reason.
My muscles burned with fatigue, but rest felt like a betrayal when every instinct I possessed screamed at me to watch over her, to answer the bond that snapped taut between us with every breath she took.
My ancillary heart was relentless, hammering out its promise of protection and flooding my veins with adrenalyne, a hormone that existed for one purpose alone: to make me strong enough, fast enough, dangerous enough to keep her alive, drowning out hunger and weariness and everything that wasn't her.
The exhaustion was familiar. I had learned to move through it on Gorka, had learned that a body could endure far more than the mind believed possible.
I would endure this too. My spirit mate's safety depended on it.
Twin suns crested the horizon before I heard Vala move. Light pushed through the viewport in thin, pale strips, falling across the pallets, and he was already stepping between them, a hand on a shoulder here, a quiet word there, pulling everyone back to the weight of the light hurs ahead.
Mehr and Ruze flanked Elishbeth the way males do when the instinct to protect has already made the decision for them. Bodies angled inward, shoulders squared outward, a living wallbuilt for one. It spoke louder than any words could about what the three of them shared.
Mara crouched next to Brunnex as he refused her outstretched hand and fought to sit up on his own, the stubborn glint in his gaze dulled only by the bandage wrapped around his head. Across the room, Truxxet leaned into the shadows, arms crossed, attention fixed on the females, curiosity laid bare and unashamed.
"We need a junction conduit," Vala said, his silver gaze sweeping over us. "The primary power-transfer assembly was destroyed during the crash. Without it, the reactor can't feed the engine array, and this ship will never fly again. There's a crashed Troken freighter to the northeast, beyond Spore Valley. If the conduit assembly that is compatible with our systems survived the crash intact, it should be enough to get the engines operational again."
The Yulineon's eyes moved from face to face, pausing, measuring. "Without it, we're not leaving this planet."
Fatigue clung to my flesh and bones, but instinct made me stand taller. My spirit mate was stranded on a world determined to kill her, and this mission offered a chance to change that.
"I'll go," I said, purpose hardening my voice. "Whatever we need to get the ship operational. Describe the component, and I'll retrieve it."
Vala shook his head. "Stand down, Vennox. You will not be going alone." His luminous gaze settled on me. "The junction conduit is buried deep within the engine array. You would not know what you are looking for, and even if you found it, removing it without damaging it requires tech knowledge." He crossed hisarms over his chest. "I'll accompany you. You deal with any threats we encounter. I'll handle the salvage."
