Page 35

Quinn

I’d been back at the camp for only one night when I got the call about Rylan.

It came across my communicator not long after I’d eaten my first meal and was on my second cup of strong Lycan tea.

I hated the stuff, but it helped keep me awake to do the paperwork I needed to finish.

I was trying to feel less guilty about how I’d treated my new mate before I left.

I hadn’t called him yet, because I was still angry, and now I felt foolish about that.

After all, I’d accused him of being immature and yet here I was, acting the same way.

When I got notice of the call, I thought it must be him and wondered why he hadn’t called me directly.

When I answered, I saw my mistake. The call was from the home number and not Rylan’s communicator.

The cook’s name was Madal and she’d been my cook for years, and my family’s before that.

I had absolutely no idea why she would be calling me, but my mind went instantly to Rylan and something being wrong.

I got a bad feeling and had to take a deep breath.

“What’s wrong, Madal?” I barked into the communicator as soon as I heard her voice. She obviously wasn’t putting the communicator she was using up to her mouth, so I had to strain to hear her.

“Madal, what’s the matter? Is it Rylan?”

“Sir, he left here last evening with his dragon and when I got here this morning I saw he hadn’t returned. I knew you’d want to know.”

“Of course I do. Where was he headed?” I was trying to keep calm, but I was already on my feet and pacing up and down in my tent.

There was no way I could stand still, because the first thought that came to my mind was that he’d left me.

I’d been way too hard on him, and he’d gone back home.

I realized almost immediately that the thought was foolish.

He couldn’t have taken his dragon with him if he was going home.

How would that work? I took a deep breath and willed myself to calm down.

I needed to talk to him. Surely, he knew I had no real regrets about marrying him.

I was obsessed with him far too much, that was all, and I was very afraid that he knew it and tried to control me with that obsession.

I’d said things I hadn’t meant—not really.

I was trying to look out for him, but all he did was fight me.

He was at once the major source of all the annoyance, distress, and inconvenience in my life, the damn bane of my existence, and the fact that he was also the object of all my desires was just plain irritating.

I feared he was well aware of that fact, though, and he used it to his advantage.

“Did he say where he was going when he left?”

“The men in the stables said that he and his dragon were talking about going swimming in the lake they like to go to. The one just south of here. They said that your mate went back in the house and came back out wearing his coat you gave him to keep off the rain. That was not too long after you left to go back to camp.”

“Has someone been to the lake to check on them?”

“Not yesterday, they didn’t, sir. The men went home at the usual time.

When the night guards got here, they were a little late, but all looked quiet, so they didn’t check on him.

When I discovered he’d never come home, I sent the men out looking.

But there was no sign of them there at that lake this morning. Or anywhere along the way.”

“Tell them to keep looking, Madal. Call in help if they need to. I’m on my way.”

It would take me a little over two hours to fly home and then if he still wasn’t at home…I wasn’t sure what to do next. I simply had to find him.

I was hoping that Rylan would be home when I arrived, but when I saw he wasn’t, I went back out to the enclosure and began to berate the men standing around out there.

“If you haven’t found him yet, then why the fuck are you even here?” I shouted at them.

“Sir, we just came back to check and see if he was home. We’re going out again.”

“Damn right you are! Those are communicators in your pocket, so use them! Communicate with each other to make sure you’re covering all the lakes and ponds!

Look in the forest too, in case they decided to land on a trail or even a cliffside with an overlook.

One of them could be injured, or they could be lost. Call me immediately if you locate any sign of them. ”

“Yes, sir, right away!”

They scrambled to climb back in their hovercrafts and be on their way before I pulled out my disruptor and started shooting every last one of them.

It was what I felt like doing. I’d already warned them not to let Rylan go flying without a guard with him.

It had begun to drizzle rain, so I pulled out my rain gear along with my heavier cape from my packs while Sulamon ate his dinner and drank water to refresh himself.

I paced up and down impatiently as I waited for my dragon to rest a few minutes before we left again.

I didn’t want to push him too hard, but I was worried, and the later it got, and the more I worried I was, and the more my feelings turned to anger.

Not against Sulamon, but against Rylan. I told myself he was willful and spoiled and used to having his own way.

He might even have done this on purpose, and if I found out he had, I’d put a stop to it.

It occurred to me that he might have gotten in touch with some of his relatives and told them to come for him to take him back home.

They had met him somewhere, so he could leave me.

I almost called his omak, but I managed to calm down enough to realize that kind of thinking was alarmist and crazy.

It was far more likely that he’d gone too far afield, and he’s simply gotten lost. He might have lost his communicator too, and that’s why he hadn’t called for help.

I told myself a lot of things, but none of them were helpful or comforting in the least. As soon as Sulamon was ready, I climbed up into my harness, and we soared up into the sky.

I told him we were looking for Rylan and Talon and to keep an eye out for them, but of course, he made no reply.

I couldn’t tell if he’d heard me or understood me at all.

I began to call out to Talon in my mind, hoping that he might somehow hear me if we got close enough.

And of course, I obsessively called Rylan on his communicator, trying to will him to answer my calls.

When I found him, I wasn’t going to go easy on him this time, I promised myself.

I’d been far too lenient with him. I imagined myself dragging Rylan to his feet, my hands fastened in his shirt because I wanted to shake some sense into him.

I imagined myself leaning over him, shouting down at him.

“Just so we’re clear,” I’d say, “If you ever run away from me like this again, I’ll lock you in your room.

” It didn’t sound like much of a threat, come to think of it. 7

Then the next moment I was imagining myself taking him in my arms to kiss him and hold him close and never let him go. I’d locate him soon, because I had to. Did he really imagine there was any corner of the galaxy he could travel to where I couldn’t find him?

He’d told me once that his omak had taught him to always look up at the stars and if he were ever lucky enough to see a “shooting star” then he should make a wish on it, because it might come true.

I’d laughed and told him it was a silly idea and only for children.

His so-called shooting stars were meteoroids, merely chunks of rock or metal from space that burned up as they entered an atmosphere.

But I looked up in the sky now, hoping to see one, like it was some kind of talisman or sign that I’d find him, and he’d be all right.

All the stars remained stubbornly still in the night sky, however, looking down at me without sympathy or movement, as Sulamon and I sailed through the night, all alone and growing more and more desperate.

****

Rylan

It had been about mid-afternoon the day before, when we started back home, but almost at once, Talon started complaining about being hungry.

“I think I may actually be starving, Rylie,” he told me, trying his best to sound weak and pitiful. “It’s been sooo long since I had my first meal this morning.”

“All that fish you ate at the lake should have filled you up!”

“Maybe so, but it didn’t. There must be something you can feed me. I’ll land so you can look in your packs.”

Before I could stop him, he’d swooped under a large tree and landed on the ground. It was shady there and beginning to get a little cool. Right away, I started to worry about how late it must be getting.

“Talon, I told you I didn’t have any extra food in my packs, and I’ve already given you all I had. There isn’t anything until we make it back home. Are you sure we even came this way? Because I don’t remember passing that big canyon with the river at the bottom a little while ago.”

“I don’t know. I can’t remember because I’m so hungry. I think I’m getting too weak to fly. Maybe I have a brain fog.”

“Talon!” I shouted at him. “Don’t you dare try to pretend.

You ate a ton of fish. And I don’t know where we could find you any extra food, so if we stop now, then it will be even longer before you eat again.

It’s better to just keep flying and find our way home.

Then when we get back, I’ll get the handlers to give you a sheep. ”

“Tell them to give me a big one, then! Not what they usually give me. Sulamon gets all the big ones. Every time.”

“Sulamon’s not home, so you can have the biggest one they have.”

“Very well, but Rylie, I have a question.”

“Okay, what is it?”

“What would happen—not saying I am—but what would happen if I said I was lost and have no idea how to get back home?”

“What? You don’t know the way home?”