Page 48 of Planet Zero
Turning her head, Addie saw them.
Two men stood a good distance away on top of a rocky plateau that rose from the tall thicket. Legs spread, each held a spear propped on the ground. As obvious as a monument on a central square, they certainly weren’t hiding.
Self-conscious, she smoothed her tangled hair.
One of the men was Zoark. She recognized the telltale stance, with one leg slightly bent.
She hated that he, of all the possible scout combinations, came across this valley and had a chance to observe her making silly with the girls. Granted, it wasn’t nearly as embarrassing as Jat sand bath, but she’d still rather not have him catch her unguarded. He must think her a real dolt.
Let him,she decided. She didn’t care.
The men exchanged words and started downhill toward Addie and the girls. The pathway was treacherous, littered with loose rocks and gnarly roots that stuck out like traps, but none of those things presented any obstacle for Zoark. He navigated his way around the natural obstructions with graceful ease, and at times like this his flowing, dance-like gait made it easy to forget his physical limitations.
The second man, the red-haired Oh’nil, moved no less gracefully but failed to catch and hold Addie’s attention. He simply didn’t possess what she had come to identify as Zoark’s special brand of attractiveness.
Oh’na waved at them and Melmie shouted a greeting. Oh’nil smiled back as the men drew closer. They stopped at the edge of the blue-green moss patch on which Addie remained seated, covered in sparkling fairy dust and staring openly at Zoark, searching his face for what it was she had found so attractive. He wasn’t attractive. His face with its rough animal features was too For for Addie’s human sensibilities. His disposition veered toward moroseness. And the attitude he had displayed to her was openly hostile.
“We were spinning,” Oh’na informed them.
“We saw,” Oh’nil said, and there was amusement in his reply. His eyes flickered to Addie.
Zoark expressed no emotion.
Addie rose to her feet and walked out of the moss patch. The girls had come out ahead of her, and Melmie flipped her hair upside down trying to shake the pollen out of it.
“They should go home,” Oh’nil told Addie, and his tone brooked no argument.
Addie glanced at him, then at Zoark. The latter one wasn’t listening but watched Addie’s Yuux hover high above their heads, ears pricked, eyes wide open, vigilant.
“They’ve been doing it for days now,” Addie shared with the men.
Oh’nil grunted in reply to her remark, shifting his raw-meat gaze to Addie, and she quickly remembered why she had never liked being close to Hoban. Too much alien animal. Not enough man.
“Where are your Yuux?” she asked to maintain a civil conversation.
“We don’t have any.”
“Yuux don’t bond with men?”
“Yuux bond with anyone. We kill them.”
Addie blinked. “Why?”
Oh’nil sneered. “Why do you think? We’re scouts. No scout wants a Yuux to give away his location.”
“I see… Here, Oh’na, let me dust you off.” She reached for the girl to conceal her unease and began patting Oh’na’s dress with her hands. The pollen poofed out and enveloped them both in a fresh cloud of sparkles.
Oh’na giggled. “You have sparkled on your nose, Addie.”
“I do?” She swiped, but her hands were covered with more of it, and she made matters worse by touching her face.
The girls were laughing out loud now, finding the idiotic scene hilarious. Addie might have laughed, too, if not for the stern warriors who definitely didnotlook amused.
She gave up and left her glittery face alone. “Let’s just go. I’ll walk with you.”
They walked in silence interrupted by Oh’na’s periodic attempt to say something mature and witty. She failed, of course, but regardless of how silly she sounded, Addie’s heart was full. She, who had never before been awed by children, not even remotely curious about their exploits nor really interested in having one of her own, was fascinated by the inner workings of Oh’na.
With her boundless energy and manners of a bear cub, Oh’na possessed an uncanny ability to grasp things on the fly.
