Published by Ye Olde
Dragon Books
Available now in
print and Kindle/Kindle Unlimited
Then M'kar caught her breath
and she knew. She held out her tattooed hand.
"Exactly," Dulit
whispered. He tugged down his collar, to reveal his matching tattoo, the flaming
wings spread to embrace the dip in his collar bone.
"You found …"
"Not exactly, but
it has to be close. Do you remember that incredible smell?" His throat worked.
M'kar nodded. After their
battle two years ago, her nostrils had been scorched so she couldn't smell anything
for nearly a lun. She had been grateful. The overbearing sweetness in the air from
the monstrosity they had fought would never fade from her memory.
"Well, I ran into
it again. What we found … makes it run away." He let out a snort. "Fly
away, anyway."
"Garion." M'kar
took a step closer.
He reached into his belt
pouch to extract a data wafer. The other hand he brought from behind his back.
It held a ti box, the wrapper faded but still clearly proclaiming it the genuine
ti grown on Le'anka for purifying the blood, stimulating the mind, and calming the
nervous system. With a delicate flavor and aroma that didn't need enhancing with
sweeteners.
M'kar doubted the box
held ti, either pressed in blocks or loose leaf. Whatever it held would fill both
her cupped hands.
"As soon as you're
back on your ship, put the box in stasis. All the others are in stasis. Best thing
we could think of. The last thing we need is to double the ship's population."
"Of what?" A
gentle brush of her mind didn’t reveal anything alive in the box. However, she had
been wrong before. Being one of the strongest animal-oriented psionic Talents ever
trained at the Academy didn't preclude mistakes or limits. She simply hadn't found
the wall hard enough and thick enough to make her brain bounce around like an old-fashioned
rubber ball.
That battle that had scarred their hearts, minds, and bodies had come close, though. She had slammed against something out of legend, terror-become-flesh. Her brain hadn't bounced that time.
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