Chapter Twenty-Four

Darq

 

After a fitful sleep, morning came. The bed had never felt so empty as it did without Sunny. Grief and despair gnawed at hope. Nobody could survive an entire night in the wilderness without shelter. She was Terran. Did she know how to pack the snow into a tunnel? How to light a fire and find dead wood that would burn? When I got her back, I would be sure to teach her survival skills. When I get her back, I will take care she never needs to use them.

I will find her. I will. She’d gotten lost once before, and I’d located her. Of course, she hadn’t gone far. She’d still been at the meeting place. Our camp and the others nearby had been scoured repeatedly by many people. Today, I would venture farther out.

I flung the kel back and yanked on my clothes. Hurriedly, I shoved some supplies into a pack. I would not come back until I had found Sunny.

“Darq!”

At the sound of my name spoken in a Terran accent, I spun around. A camera bobbed in the air. Ice coated the orb-like body and wings. Its eye flickered from red to black, and it started to fall. Before it hit the ground, the light came back on and it rose, but the wings labored. The camera had trouble staying aloft; it lifted and fell, lifted and fell. “Ro…ook…nee.” The producer’s voice broke up.

The garbled words made no sense, and I had no time to chat. “I can’t talk now. Sunny is missing. I have to find her.”

“Rom…nee.”

I strapped a sheath onto my thigh and slipped a knife into it. I tugged on my kel coat.

“Romando took…nee.”

The sound broke up, but my brain pieced it together. “Romando has Sunny?”

“Yes!” the producer said.

She was alive! Relief and joy rolled through me—and anger—at Romando for stealing my mate, and at myself for not figuring it out.

“He took her to—” The red light went out, the wings froze, and the camera hit the stone floor.

No! I grabbed it and shook it. I held it to my ear but couldn’t detect so much as a faint hum. The camera was dead. I threw it and dashed into the passage.

Torg, fully dressed and ready to go, entered from his private room.

“Romando took Sunny!” I said.

“How do you know?”

“The camera told me.”

“What is a camera?”

“One of the flying insects.”

“An insect told you?” He peered at me as if I’d lost my grip on sanity.

“It’s not an insect. It’s a long story. I can’t explain now. I’m going to Romando’s camp.”

“I’ll get Enoki and meet you there.”

“Thanks.” By myself, a lone tribe member of a different clan, I would have no sway over Polonio, who would side with Romando.

Starr, wrapped in her robe, appeared next to Torg. “What’s going on? Any news on Sunny?”

I bounced impatiently. “Yes…”

“I’ll fill her in. Go!” Torg ordered.

As I bounded to the snow skimmer shed, the sun peeked over the horizon, painting the sky with a rosy glow, the color of optimism. I would find my mate, and Romando would pay.

* * * *

I peeled into the camp in a spray of powder. “Romando!” I shouted. “Romando, show yourself!”

Polonio emerged from a hut with a kel slung over his shoulders. “What do you want? Why are you here? Why aren’t you in the ward as Torg promised?”

“Where is Romando? He stole my mate!”

I started to draw a crowd. More people came out of their huts.

“That’s a serious accusation. What proof do you have?”

“Which hut is his?”

The tribe leader didn’t answer, but men glanced at a small deserted-looking Terran prefab. Snow piled in front of the entrance. I stalked to it and pushed open the door. Vacant. “Where is he?”

Polonio shrugged. “Perhaps he is hunting, or he has gone to the meeting place on business or is visiting another tribe.”

“Or he left to hide Sunny after abducting her.”

“Sunny? You mean Sunny Weathers? She’s your mate?” said a Terran female I recognized from the selection at the meeting place.

“Yes. I want her back,” I replied.

“You are not required to tell him anything.” Polonio scowled, revealing if he hadn’t colluded with the kidnapping, he would abet Romando after the fact.

“Sunny and I were friends on the SS Deception,” the female said. “I want to help, if I can. I don’t know where Romando is, but for a week he has been moving supplies out of camp on a skimmer.”

“What kind of supplies?”

“Illuvian heaters and lamps, rolls of kel hide, food. Housing construction panels.”

“What direction did he go?”

“He came and went that way.” She pointed into the trees opposite the sunrise.

“Thank you,” I said, and then addressed Polonio. “Obviously, Romando has been planning to abduct Sunny for a while.”

“The mate who should have been his in the first place? It hasn’t been proven he has taken her,” Polonio said. “All we know is he left with supplies. He could have been trading with another camp.” He folded his arms, and his tribesmen nodded, their loyalty and sympathy with Romando. If they had any information, they wouldn’t tell me.

I turned to my only ally, the Terran woman. “Do you have any idea how long he was gone each time he left?” From the time lapse, I could gauge distance and figure out how much area to search.

She shook her head. “I didn’t pay that much attention. If I had to guess, I’d say once he departed and returned in half an hour?”

He’d had to unload supplies during that time, too. So, he wasn’t far away. “Are there any clearings near water?” It would be the best place to set up a camp.

I got shrugs and blank stares.

The Terran female jabbed an elbow into her mate’s side. “Do you know of such a place, Calian?” she asked.

“Romando is my tribesman,” Calian fidgeted. “We are brothers in spirit.”

She straightened and jutted out her chin. “On Terra, we have a saying: when the mate is happy, everybody is happy,” she said. “Do you understand what that means?”

He glanced at his mate then at me. He sighed. “Follow the natural break in the trees for about three tripta. When you get to a tree growing out of a large boulder, veer to the right. When you get to the creek, go upstream for another tripta. A fire burned many trees, leaving a clearing.”

“Thank you for that,” I said, and then looked at the woman. “My brother Torg, chief of my tribe, and Enoki will arrive shortly. Will you relay to them what you told me and point them in the right direction?” I didn’t trust Polonio or his tribe.

“Of course! Good luck. When you find her, tell her Gretchen said hello.”

“I will.”

Morning was almost in full glow as I rode away from Romando’s camp.