“Stay inside,” her mate warned as he turned to face her. “Kratok are unpredictable.” He had procured a set of kratok-hide armor and a war-spear from somewhere, and his glorious hair was bound in a high topknot.

Framed by the doorway of the Medusa’s airlock, he cut a dramatic figure as the morning light highlighted his powerful form. Promises of lush greenery and blue skies beckoned from beyond the threshold, but Ares stood between her and the wilds of Khira, a stern expression on his face.

An ear-splitting roar shattered the tense silence, making Calexa reach for her gun. She’d hastily swapped her cabin-robe for fitted combat blacks, picking up a small arsenal of weapons as they rushed through the lower decks.

There hadn’t been time to change into boots, though. She still wore her cabin-slippers.

A shadow fell across them, bringing with it a sense of impending danger. Calexa glanced over her shoulder. The rest of the Vradhu had assembled in the airlock, spilling over into the corridor. There was a sense of pent-up restlessness about them, as if they all wanted to be the first to take down the kratok.

“You’re going out there alone?” Worry for Ares rose up in her with such fury and urgency that a sharp pang of pain actually shot through her chest.

“I will lure it toward us,” he declared. “The rest of the pack will have their chance to take it down, but only one of us will succeed. You will soon understand why.” He curled his tail around her waist and drew her close. The delicious gesture made her insides melt all over again. She couldn’t care less if the whole fucking Vradhu pack was staring at them.

Let them stare.

Ares didn’t seem to be worried in the slightest, and after the torture he’d endured on the Hythra… after she’d come so close to losing him, she wanted to cherish every moment they spent together. Part of her still didn’t believe this was real, and now Ares was about to step right back into the jaws of danger.

“We could try and shoot it down,” she offered, wondering if she could somehow prevent him from having to go out there.

Ares smiled, his fingers tenderly grazing her cheek. “Believe me, you would not kill it, even with all of your human magrel weapons. Do not worry, my makivari. This is what we do. There is no way I will fail to return to you.”

His tail uncoiled from her waist, returning to its resting position around his left leg. His fingers withdrew. Obsidian eyes hardened.

Ares was every inch the fierce Vradhu warrior, and he made her pulse quicken like nothing else. He turned and raised his spear, a deep battle-cry erupting from his throat. The assembled Vradhu responded with a series of guttural grunts and shouts.

Suddenly, the cavernous, ilverium-lined halls of the Hythra seemed very far away. Calexa’s heart thundered like a war-drum, responding to the innate battle-lust of the Vradhu.

“Time to hunt,” Ares grinned, his sharp silver teeth glinting in the morning light. Warm lips pressed against hers in a devastating kiss, and then he sprinted out into the brave new morning, leaving her slightly breathless and wanting.

How the tables had turned. She’d gone from protector to protected, and she didn’t mind one bit.

“Hey, Cal, have you seen that thing?” Her comm crackled to life. Zahra sounded unusually panicked.

“You mean the, uh, kratok?”

“I’m not talking about the giant flying snake. I mean the massive alien craft that’s plummeting to a fiery doom over yonder.”

She stepped forward, sticking her head outside the airlock. “What are you talking about, Zar?” She shielded her eyes as she stared up at the sky. “Oh.”

“See what I mean?”

A falling black dagger split the cheerful morning sky, dragging a fiery plume of smoke and brimstone behind it.

“Must have been a brutal atmospheric entry.”

“I…” Calexa’s mind raced as she struggled to process what she was seeing. “I think that’s the Hythra.” If that was the case, then the falling ship was very far away—perhaps thousands of kilometers—considering how small it appeared.

A sharp whistle split the chaos, causing her gaze to snap to her right.

Ares stared up at the beast in the sky, tightly clutching his spear. Calexa followed his gaze. The kratok roared and dived.

Its black scale-covered body glistened in the sunlight. Sixteen short, leathery grey wings—eight either side—flapped in unison, like oars out of a rowboat. Small arms tipped with deadly claws extended from its chest, and its large head—reptilian and terrifying—angled toward Ares.

The Kratok’s open maw revealed two pairs of long ivory fangs, extending from top and bottom. A person could easily get impaled on those vicious teeth.

“Ares, watch ou—” Her breath caught as the beast dropped from the sky.

It snatched him up in its jaws.

She screamed and raised her gun.

“Wait.” A soft voice made her turn. Maki stood behind her, a hint of a smile curving his lips. “This is just the beginning. You’ll see. He will survive. He always does.”

He glanced at the falling Hythra in the distance and shrugged, completely unfazed that a massive alien destroyer was crashing onto the surface of his home planet. Calexa was starting to recognize that as a very Vradhu reaction.

When terrifying things happened, they just went with the flow.

“Our world is on the cusp of change,” he murmured cryptically as the kratok soared into the air. It flew erratically, weaving up-and-down as if it were drunk.

Then it dropped like a stone, plummeting into the water with a dramatic splash.

Whooping and ululating, the Vradhu warriors ran out from the ship, streaming past Maki and Calexa. The warrior-chief raised his eyebrows. “That was surprisingly quick, but then again, it’s Ares, so I’m not entirely surprised. I told you so. We will eat well tonight.” His serious expression broke into a sunny grin. “Welcome to Khira, human.”