Chapter 7

Dakkan

Itried to sit up but she pressed me firmly back down. "Lie still, Dakkan."

My body felt warm all over, but not the worrisome, feverish type of warm. This was the warmth one felt when waking up after a wonderful night's sleep, or sitting in a high branch with a perfect cup of bako while watching Skrah's first rays light the forest. These were not things I should be feeling. I'd been attacked by some forest creature. It had poisoned me with its venom and by some miracle, I'd managed to return to Sabine.

"I'll ask you again. What did you do to me?" My forehead was particularly warm. I reached up and felt a device stuck to the skin there. With a shiver of revulsion, I pulled it off. It came off easily, without pain. It was made of a thin metal and blinked a dim red light. "What is this?"

"Give me that before you break it," she said, plucking it from my fingers. "It's just a device that monitors your body's functions. There's another one here." She pulled another one off my chest. "See? Not harmful."

Not harmful, she said. But these devices did not belong on a Mitran warlord. "Explain yourself."

She stared at me for a moment. "Explain myself? I saved your life. You were dying when you crashed against the hull. I had to practically haul you inside."

"I did not give you permission to treat me," I said, knowing very well that my words were irrational. "A warlord of Thrail Sakra does not submit to modern medicine."

Her brows rose. "If I didn't treat you, you would be dead. Do you understand that?"

That last question stung. She asked it as if she were speaking to a toddler, which I supposed was what I sounded like. I closed my eyes and got my rational mind in order. "Yes. I…am not accustomed to this." I gestured to the devices in her hand. "I should thank you for saving me."

"Yes, you should," she muttered.

"I was raised to distrust most forms of technology." I slowly sat up. "Our elders believe it makes us soft, weak."

Sabine slanted me a look. "And alive?"

"In this case, yes." I nodded, conceding the point. "But there is a belief among our warriors that we deserve to suffer from injuries caused by poor judgment. It's about the balance of things. I have made several bad decisions recently, so I don't deserve to feel this…good."

"I see." She looked thoroughly unimpressed with me. "If it's pain you want, I can inject you with a nerve irritant. It will have you writhing in agony for hours."

I glowered at her. "No more injections."

"Fine." She shrugged. "Doesn't matter to me either way."

"I'm sure it doesn't. But I'm less useful to you incapacitated."

She was putting her equipment away, packing it fastidiously away into cases and compartments. "True, but I also try to follow patients' wishes. I won't let you die on me, however. Your beliefs are what they are, but I will use everything I have to keep you living, no matter how much pain Mitran warriors are supposed to endure."

"You think we are backwards." I folded my arms. "That we are primitive."

Her eyes flashed. "No, but it doesn't matter what I think. That's the truth. My only objective is to get through this together. You may need to subject yourself to modern medicine again in the future in order for that to happen." She crossed her arms and looked at me sternly. "But I need to tell you, your aversion to medical treatment is the least of our problems."

I ran my fingers over the skin of my shoulder, which now had only the slightest raised scar. It was the only evidence that I had been bitten by something. I wasn't sure how I felt about that. A warrior's scars were marks of battle and bravery. "Why is that?"

"I ran the ooze from the snake that bit you through an analysis," she said. "It isn't venom at all."

"What is it?"

"A synthetic neurotoxin not derived from an organic animal." Her brows furrowed. "It's pure, manufactured chemicals."

"How is that possible?" It was hard to believe such a thing. "I saw the viper. It was a creature."

"Or it appeared to be," she said. "You have to admit, considering the unknown environment here, it's possible the wildlife isn't natural like the rest of Mitra."

I didn't want to consider that, but she could be right. The viper had looked and acted like an organism—not like a machine. I rose to my feet and moved towards the hatch.

"Where are you going?" she asked.

"To take a second look at the creature who attacked you when I first came upon your shuttle. Perhaps the carcass will yield some clues about the nature of the wildlife in this place."

"Good idea." She pulled a vial from her medical kit. "I'm coming with you. I'm going to take a sample for analysis."

I set my jaw. "For the last time, you are staying—"

She moved in on me with ferocity. "Now you listen here," she said in a low, deadly voice. "I will do what you say when it makes sense, and right now, it does not. I need to take a sample from the creature you killed and compare it to the snake that bit you. It's not that far. Unless you intend to tie me up—and I would not advise that—we are going together."

I resisted the urge to grin, and that urge was strong indeed. She was gorgeous when she got fired up. "While the idea of tying you up has merit," I said, with just enough innuendo to make her eyes flash dangerously at me, "I will allow you to accompany me."

"How gracious of you." Her voice was thick with sarcasm. She brushed past me and paused before opening the hatch. "Let me make something clear." Her eyes slashed at me over her shoulder. "You do not give me orders, Mitran. I do not answer to you and I do not belong to you. We are partners."

I drew a deep breath. "Let me make something clear, human. You are small and fragile and you clearly have no survival skills whatsoever. You would be dead if not for me, so when I tell you something is unsafe for you, you will listen." I aimed a finger right at her cute nose. "I will not be responsible for the death of a highly respected human physician. I will get you free of this place and in one piece if it kills me."

She pushed my finger away. "You're a difficult patient."

"I'm not your patient." I stepped closer and the air between us crackled to life. Her energy was pride and fury and defiance, but in an instant, there was something else, too.

Her full, pretty lips parted. Her eyes widened and a shiver went through her that was neither from fear nor being cold.

Awareness raged through me like a storm. I took in the rapid rise and fall of her chest. Her breathing went erratic. The tip of her tongue touched her upper lip and the urge to kiss her hit me like a surprise blow. Yes, she was beautiful. I had acknowledged that to both her and myself. But beauty alone did not move a warrior's heart, and certainly not a warlord's. No, there was something else. Something underneath all of it that made me want to reach for her. Made me want to move the ground itself to shift the expression on her face from defiance to pleasure.

"No." She stepped back suddenly, as if knocked from a trance. "No," she said more firmly. "What are you standing there for?" Her voice was hoarse. "Let's go find that carcass."