Page 49 of Hunting the Warlord's Daughter

She gripped the armrests, observing the blinding orange blaze. The burning stink. The shaking. She was sure they would burst into flame when suddenly the flare of heat subsided, and the nose of the ship pitched downward.

Wren saw the ground rushing up to meet them—the high peaks, shreds of mist, then trees racing past. Too close, too close—

Fates.She braced herself as theResiliencecame down hard.

CHAPTERTWENTY-SEVEN

TheResiliencecareenedin for a landing, sheering off treetops, its warning alarms blaring. It was a shrieking, jolting ride. It went on and on and on. How they stopped in one piece, Wren had no idea.

Aral’s hand landed on her thigh. “Are you all right?”

A little shaky, she opened one eye then the other. “Couldn’t be better.”

Unexpectedly, he leaned close, his forehead pressed to hers. “Thank the fates,” he mumbled, very low, his voice suspiciously husky. “I couldn’t bear it if something happened to you.”

That he perceived as his fault, she was certain he was thinking.

She wrapped her arms over his shoulders, feeling the tension in his body, knowing the tenderness of the man inside and not how that gentle soul managed to survive what had been done to it. “I’m not leaving you anytime soon, Aral Mawndarr. I love you too much.” Saying the words came as no surprise. She did indeed love him, and feared it. Bad things happened to those who tried to protect her. Yet for better or for worse, they were fated to be together. She’d always known it, and she knew he did too.

Aral crushed his lips to her forehead, holding her close, his breath shuddering. “I’ll see us to safety, I swear it,” he whispered back. “We won’t have to run forever, my love. You have my word.”

A sense of unease lingered as he spun away. He checked his dozer and various devices on his weapons belt, then popped the hatch. Fresh air flooded the bridge, carrying a fragrance of plants and rich, fertile soil. She shuddered. It was a shot of pure pleasure after being cooped up for so long. Then the stink of scorched metal invaded.

She followed Aral and Kaz down the gangway. Smoking hot and smelling of burnt luranium, theResilience’s hull made rhythmic pinging noises as it cooled. Long grass lashed at her legs. Green, green, so much green, all around them. The temperature was mild, the air humid. Wildlife buzzed and chirped.

Wren shielded her eyes and peered across the meadow—more like a bog—and saw the scar left from their approach. Snapped trees and gouged mud in a wide swath as far as she could see.

“So much for not leaving any footprints behind,” Kaz said.

Aral aimed a withering look at his second-in-command, one softened by a wry grin. “There’ll be no criticizing my landing, Kaan.”

“Never. If by pure definition a good landing is one you walk away from, then this was the best of your career. We’re alive, eh?Andour way off this planet is intact. Excellent work.” Kaz propped her hands on her slim hips and observed the nose of the craft. “But one heat shield completely detached—we heard that one go. Rivets are missing all across the thermal protection shield area. These other plates are ready to come off too. If we’d lost them, we wouldn’t have made it. We’d have burned up on entry.” She spoke with her usual stoicism, but she lifted a hand to her earlobe as if to twist an earring that was no longer there. Then she fisted her hand and dropped it. “We were in a rush to leave Issenda. I didn’t do a thorough check of the exterior before we departed—as procedure dictates. This is on me. I could have prevented this.”

Aral corrected her. “We share responsibility. You’re not to blame. We’ll revise our plan and move forward with the mission.” He walked briskly up the gangway and ducked through the hatch.

Back on the flight deck, Kaz slid into her pilot station and paged through lines of data. “I can get us back in the air, but we’ll need real mechanics at an orbital depot before we can even think of another atmospheric entry. I’ll get started smart-patching the damage. But it won’t be pretty.”

“With the Triad hot on our asses, I don’t need pretty,” Aral said. “How long?”

“Optimistically, a day. Maybe two. If there are no surprises.”

“If we’ve learned nothing else, there’ll be surprises.” Aral thumbed his chin as he paced. “Kaz, you’ll stay behind and work on the ship. Wren, you and I will start hiking to the sanctum while we still have daylight. We’ll take control of it, secure it, and hold it until the ship is repaired.” He called up a map on the nav display, his finger tracing the route from their crash site to the location the pendant had provided—an area of what seemed to be ruins. Hilly, boulder-strewn woods and some boggy meadows stood between them and their goal. It would be a strenuous hike. “Well, we aren’t exactly parked at the front door, but it could be worse. At a moderate pace, we should make it in a few hours. Kaz, as soon as the ship is flyable, you’ll fly her to our original planned landing zone, and we’ll meet you.”

From a storage closet, he pulled out their trackers. He’d already trained Wren on the operation of the devices, worn on the wrist to keep track of each other’s locations. Next he grabbed two go-packs and sorted through them, as if he hadn’t checked them a hundred times already on their way here—“In case we ever need to abandon ship in a hurry,”he’d once explained. He inventoried their food, water, portable shelter, and various supplies. Then he inspected their dozers, cleaning them of invisible dust. He was so thorough that Wren was tempted to submit herself for inspection.Make sure all my parts are in working order,she wanted to say.

She fastened the tracker cuff around her left wrist. “I wish you could come with us, Kaz.”

Kaz’s serious expression softened. Her sleeves were rolled up. A few tools lay on the console in front of her. A tangle of graphics and figures filled a display that she scrutinized. She didn’t appear to be disappointed about staying behind. On the contrary, she looked eager to get started on fixing the ship. “I’ll meet you there soon enough. Have fun. In the meantime, I’ll make us flyable.”

“If anyone can, it’s you.”

Kaz accepted her vote of confidence with quiet fortitude. “If anyone can unlock the sanctum, it’syou.”

“That’s the plan.” Wren reached for her friend’s shoulder and squeezed it. Nothing more needed to be said.

She and Aral checked their dozers one more time, shouldered their go-packs, and headed into the unknown.

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