12. Shana

12

SHANA

H e accepts me. Why was I so scared?

I know why. My mother. The way she acted when it happened, all of it, has left marks on me. I knew it, but I don't think knowing it and knowing it are the same thing. Somehow, I feel lighter for having confronted the past, to some degree, with him.

He knows the risk I and the baby are in, and he didn't hesitate. It wasn't a question for him. He is going to find a solution. I hope he does. I always wanted children, but I also had resigned myself to being what my mother had told me I was. Broken.

When his guster rears up, I jerk back on my own reins, pulling it to a stop. I lean forward as far as I can so I can pat its neck without getting stabbed by the multitude of spikes that protrude off the creature.

Kosh pulls his lochaber, crouches, and then works his way forward. It's all I can do to not laugh. He's waddling and it looks silly and fun but I'm also not an idiot. Something dangerous is close by, laughing right now would be the dumbest thing I could do.

He stops moving and then thrusts his lochaber, blade first, into the sand in front of him. I expect a shout or something to happen but the blade sinks in silently. My guster snorts and tosses its head. I move to try and calm it, then it happens. The sand explodes in two places behind and to either side of Kosh.

"Look out!" I shout realizing he doesn't see them.

Kosh leaps forward into a shoulder roll. Two new Zmaj land and their lochabers slam onto the ground where an instant before Kosh had been.

He stops in a crouch, facing the oncomers. He looks between them, eyes narrowing, and he growls. They move further apart, the blades of their long-handled lochabers pointing at him. His eyes dart back and forth between them.

This is bad. Really bad.

I cannot help, not directly. Me versus a Zmaj, even the smallest of them, would be the equivalent of my trying to stop a jet speeder with my bare hands. Stupid and futile.

But I have to do something.

Kosh isn't waiting. He bursts out of the crouch and rushes for the furthest one. As he swings his lochaber up and around, it whistles as it slices through the air.

The Zmaj closer to me rushes towards Kosh's unprotected back side. I do the only thing I possibly can.

I dig my heels into my mount and loosen my grip on the reins. Given its head with the impetus of my feet, it bounds ahead. I tug the reins guiding it towards the Zmaj. The creature's wide webbed feet pound across the loose sand, throwing it up high enough that it's getting into my eyes, nose, and mouth.

Kosh leaps into the air. His wings snap wide. The lochaber is held in two hands overhead, the blade aimed skyward. He glides like a draconic angel rushing to battle.

I jerk my attention back to the ground. The Zmaj I'm running down looks over his shoulder sensing or hearing my approach. His eyes widen as he tries to spin, but the loose sand pulls on his legs.

He makes a half-turn, his tail swinging wide, and then the guster lowers its head and hits him square in the chest. The guster lifts without slowing down.

There is a sickening crack as contact is made. The Zmaj lifts into the air, tumbling over and over. While he's mid-air, the guster rises onto its rear legs and slams its head into him again.

The Zmaj pinwheels off and away out of sight. I drag on the reins, pulling back with all I've got, but the guster doesn't want to come to heel. It's quite happy to run and wants to keep going.

"Ho! Ho! Ho!" I shout as I strain.

The damn thing doesn't even notice. I might as well not even be here for all the effect I seem to be having on the guster.

When we reach the top of a dune it abruptly stops. I can't claim any credit for it, though I am trying with all I've got, I'm pretty sure it decided of its own accord that it was done. It lowers its head, nuzzling the sand while I turn and strain to see Kosh.

The relief I feel when I see him further down and he smiles and then waves is immeasurable. I offer up a silent prayer to anyone or anything that might be listening. One never knows and the Zmaj certainly seem to think the planet has some kind of benevolent conscience.

Kosh gathers up the Zmaj who is lying at his feet seemingly unconscious. He tosses the large alien over one shoulder then turns away and stomps across the sands to his own larger guster.

I turn around and after several moments of tugging, kicking, and cursing get my mount to both turn and move. It slowly plods its way down the mound. I'm finally mastering the trick of swaying with its gait, which my thighs are very thankful for.

As I draw closer to Kosh he is finishing tying the Zmaj up with a length of leather he's taken out of one of the packs from his guster.

"You are okay?" he asks as soon as I'm in earshot.

"Yeah, are you?"

He smiles and shrugs but as he does, I see the blood trail on his left arm. I try to leap off my mount, but my foot hangs up in the stirrup. Instead of a cool dismount, I fall to the side and if not for Kosh I'd be faceplanting in the sand.

Kosh saves me from that fate, catching me in his arms. I look up into his warm eyes and his beautiful smile.

"Well, hello," he says.

"My hero," I say, suppressing laughter at the ridiculousness of the entire situation.

"Good," he says, helping me disentangle myself and getting me onto my own feet. "One moment."

He stalks across the sands, a length of leather rope in one hand and his lochaber in the other. He climbs over a small dune and is gone for long enough I begin to worry. There is no sound from over there though, only the blowing wind and the sounds the gusters make.

I'm working up the nerve to climb that dune myself when I see his head crest it. I wait while he works his way down the loose, sliding sand.

"What was that?" I ask but as soon as I say it, I know. "Where's the other one?"

Kosh frowns and shakes his head.

Oh. Shit. I… I killed him?

"No," Kosh says dropping his lochaber and the rope to take hold of both my shoulders. "No. Not you."

"Wha—how…"

He smiles tightly.

"You are my treasure, I know," he says. "If you had not acted, I would be dead. That is all. You saved me. Keep your thoughts on that, only. You understand? I speak true, you know?"

A creeping numbness and unreality settle over my mind as I nod in agreement. I don't know if I really understand it or not, but I do think he's right. He couldn't fight two warriors alone like that. The odds were not in his favor so I can have the idea that I saved him.

"Okay," I say.

He holds me a moment longer, staring into my eyes until he seems to see that I've accepted his words. At least enough for him to turn his attention to the Zmaj he has bound. He walks over to the unconscious warrior and crouches.

"Wake," he says. "No lie."

Nothing happens. He leans in closer and says something in his language. A wave of dizziness hits so hard that I sway in my saddle. It comes from nowhere causing me to gasp. Kosh looks over but the moment he does the bound Zmaj slams his head forward.

There is a loud crack, but I think my moment of weakness saved Kosh. If he hadn't turned then he would have been struck in the face, likely breaking his nose and doing who knows how much damage. Instead, the blow hits the side of his head along his horn on that side.

Kosh growls as his attention is jerked back. The bound guy has blood streaming down his face from a cut where he hit Kosh's horn. Kosh grabs him by his neck and pulls him up to a sitting position, yelling something in their language.

"Don't… don't… hurt…" I stumble over the words trying to get them out past the swirling in my head.

I grab onto the pommel of my saddle, gripping so tight my knuckles turn white. I clench my eyes shut while a wave of nausea passes over me. I try to keep it down but it's not working. Giving in I turn my head and lose it off to one side.

"Shana," Kosh is beside the guster, one hand on my back and one on my thigh.

I spit a couple of times then straighten up. I feel fine, now, apparently having expelled whatever the problem was.

"I'm fine," I say, taking slow easy breaths. He hands me his water skin and I take a tentative sip then a bigger one once I'm sure it won't set the unpleasantness in motion again. "Sorry."

He grunts and shakes his head.

"You are sure?" he asks in his low grumble.

I nod that I am then swing my leg over. He catches me easily, lowering me to the ground. For a moment there is only us and it feels so natural and right. I press my face to his chest. His cool scales bring welcome relief to my feverish skin.

He wraps his arms around and the moment drags, neither of us wanting to move, but we are on a mission. An important one for all our people, not to mention the best hope for our baby trying to grow in my broken womb. Kosh moves first, though I feel and share his reluctance.

He turns to the captive and though my thoughts dart towards the other one and what I did, I force that idea away, focusing on the one in front of us. Kosh kneels in front of the bound Zmaj, grabs him by his shoulders and pulls him upright.

"More?" he asks in Common.

The bound Zmaj hisses and says something in their language. Kosh shakes his head.

"Speak human," Kosh says. "Know you can."

"Yes, there are more," the bound one says.

"How many?"

"More than you can take," he says, growling as he slaps the sand with his tail.

"I bring information," Kosh says. "No fight."

"You know orders," the bound one says, shifting his gaze to me. "We must capture. So says the Eye."

"The Eye is wrong," Kosh says.

The look of shock and horror on the bound Zmaj's face leaves me caught between an urge to laugh at the comicalness of it and a deep sadness that he could be so brainwashed. I don't know anything about this Eye character except what the Zmaj and humans from the jungle have told us, but he sounds like a real piece of work. More of a cult leader than anything else.

The bound Zmaj talks fast but it's in his language so I can't follow it. Kosh fires back every bit as fast. The series of hisses and dragged-out ‘s' sounds cause the entire thing to sound like a leaking steam pipe.

Kosh stands quickly, clearly angry. He makes a slashing motion with his hand towards the bound Zmaj. The bound guy hisses and squirms. Kosh moves to kick him, but I shout, stopping him before he does. He looks over his shoulder shaking his head.

"He will not cooperate," he says.

"I know, but we're better than this," I say.

Kosh frowns then takes a deep breath and holds it before letting it out in a rush. He shakes his head and growls, all the while his tail taps the sand, sending puffs of red into the air.

"Yes," he says, dragging out the ‘s' in displeasure.

He gives the bound guy a look of absolute disdain while speaking to him.

"What did you say?" I ask.

"I told him how fortunate he is that my treasure is a better being than I am," he says.

A smile spreads over my face as my heart swells and I'm sure it's going to burst out of my chest.

"I love you," I say.

He was walking away when I said it. He stops and I see a shiver race down his spine and through his tail. His tail quivers as it passes through. He looks over his shoulder but the look on his face I can only interpret as disbelief or uncertainty.

It takes a moment for me to realize it but when it hits it's like a thunderbolt. I've never said it to him. I've thought about it. Told myself I do. But not once have I told him. He blinks, slowly closing then opening his eyes.

"You are… you know?" he asks, pausing as he stumbles over the words.

Tears well in my eyes. The question says everything about him. All that I could ever need to know is bound up in not only the words he says, but how he says them. The choice of them and the emotions that they carry with them.

He doesn't rush to me. Doesn't lay a claim or grab me and kiss me. He verifies that I am certain. That I know what he has probably known all along. I bite my lip, throat tight with impending tears as my vision blurs and I nod.

"Whoo-hah!" he screams, and I jerk back in surprise as he balls a fist and thrusts it up as he leaps into the air.

His shadow covers me as he snaps his wings open and glides the short distance between us. He sinks into the sand and he lands hard. His hands are on my waist, and he lifts me into the air, spinning me around in joy.

We've kissed so many times before but this time it's different. His lips are softer? More insistent? Demanding? Electric?

I don't know what it is, but it feels unique. New. As if there is some new connection being made inside of me, deep inside, my heart or my soul. More than I have ever experienced before. Though I never want it to end, breathing becomes necessary. When we part, gasping, I don't see the bound Zmaj.

"Kosh!" I yell.

He looks where I am and I'm sure whatever the word that comes out of his mouth in his language is, it's a curse of some kind. He sets me down and runs after our captive. The sand leaves a clear trail of where he went.

I won't be any good in the coming fight, so I go over to our mounts and take up the reins of both then follow Kosh on foot. When I make it to the top of the dune the two Zmaj are at the bottom. Kosh is on top, clearly having tackled the running one whose arms and wings are still bound.

I make my way down the dune slowly, leading the two gusters. The loose sand slides. Suddenly my foot slips with the sand. I yelp as I fall onto my ass. The sand becomes a landslide, pulling me down with it. The guster dig their wide-webbed feet in, stopping themselves, but I have no such capacity.

The reins rip the palms of my hands as they are torn free. I kick and scrabble trying to stop myself but to no avail. Arms flailing, sand covers my face. I clench my eyes and mouth shut, but not before I have a mouthful of it.

Pressure builds on my chest as the sand pulls me in like a lover's warm embrace, but this love offers only death. In a moment of stunning clarity, it feels as if I separate from myself. I am calm, fully aware of the fear and struggle for life, yet detached.

This is it. How I meet my end. On this gods' forsaken shit-hole of a burning rock, who knows how far from where my people started, and nowhere near where I was meant to be.

I'm going to die. I can't breathe.

No. I'm not going to end like this. A stupid death, buried alive in loose sand? Not like this.

As soon as I think about it, I am resolved. I am not going to meet my maker after a death this incredibly stupid. And with resolve comes the will to fight. Flailing harder, I claw my way towards what I can only hope is up.

"Shana!"

It's Kosh. I hear him shouting my name, then I'm ripped free of the sand. The blinding light of the suns assaults my eyes as I cough and sputter, blowing sand out of my mouth and nose. He lifts me high into the air and gently shakes me. Sand pours out of everywhere. I rub my eyes free of sand before opening them.

"Kosh," I mumble, then the world is rocked by an explosion.