“What happened, Colm?” she asked quietly.
“My father…got sick. It made him angry, short tempered, dangerous.”
There was so much pain in his voice. She knew for a Markarian warrior, control was vital. Protecting people was vital.
“My father was violent, and my mother couldn’t handle it. She…provoked him even more, and would add fuel to his rages. But my father did the unthinkable…and used his strength against us.”
“He hit you?”
Colm nodded. “I spent as much time away from my home as possible. With Kavon. My mother escaped into her work. Eventually, they hated each other.” Final words.
She read between the lines. He’d been raised in a battle zone. There’d been no gentle hugs for him, either.
“What happened?”
“My father beat my mother to death and then killed himself.”
God. “I’m sorry.”
His jaw hardened. “I will never mate.”
A boom sound in the sky above them. Colm stopped and they both looked upward.
Bright flashes of light flickered through the thick clouds.
Honor struggled to see. God, she really hoped it was a rescue from the Drake. “I can’t make it out.” She frowned, straining to make out any details.
Then she got a glimpse of the craft…and the wild splashes of color on the side.
She shook her head, her hands clenching in the fur. “It’s not one of ours.”
“Then we best get out of sight,” Colm said.
He kept walking, with heavy, deliberate steps. The wind howled past them, tearing at the fur coat. The snow whipped into their faces. Even with Colm’s hot body beneath her and the fur around her, Honor was feeling the cold again. It was seeping in like an insidious intruder.
“I think we should be near the cave entrance.” She couldn’t see a damn thing. A lump the size of a rock lodged in her throat. What if they didn’t find the cave?
Colm stopped. “Be quiet.”
She went still. “What?”
“I heard something.”
Her heart tripped. “Wolves?” She fumbled under the fur for her laser pistols.
Colm was frowning. “I don’t think so.” He put her down and slowly scanned the area. Then he marched over to a spot and crouched on one knee.
Honor hurried after him and stared.
They were footprints. Humanoid footprints.
But they were huge.
When Colm started to follow them, she wasn’t sure it was the best idea. But soon, the prints just…stopped. Like whoever had made them had disappeared into thin air.
Colm brushed at the snow, and a second later she spotted the opening he’d uncovered. Beyond was a sloping tunnel entrance into the ice caves.
Honor didn’t know whether to be excited or worried. But she did know they couldn’t stay out here in the storm with pirates after them and wolves prowling around. She clumsily opened her backpack and pulled out a flashlight. She flicked it on.
Colm entered first and Honor followed, steadying herself as her boots slipped a little on the slick ice.
“God, it’s beautiful.” The walls were a deep, rich blue that looked almost like glass. It was still cold, but without the howling wind and driving snow, the air felt much warmer than above.
They walked deeper into the tunnels.
“We need to find somewhere to rest and tend your wound,” Colm said.
“I can make it.”
The tunnel snaked lower, and the temperature increased from cold to cool. Her shivering had stopped.
Soon, the tunnel opened into a small cavern. The walls were covered in a silver-blue moss that glowed with tiny pinpricks of light.
It looked like a fairy grotto in some ice queen’s castle. “Wow.”
“We have a similar plant on Markaria that grows in the north. It is infused with mites, an early version of the nanami.”
Honor studied the moss-like plant, touching it with her finger. “It’s bioluminescence.”
“Here.” Colm pointed to a large rock. “Let me see your leg.”
Honor moved over to him. Now that she was feeling warmer, the pain in her leg was much more noticeable. It was throbbing like hell. When she reached Colm, he gestured again, and she realized he wanted her to take her trousers off.
“Are you just trying to get me naked, warrior?”
“When I get you naked, you won’t need to ask me my intentions.” He looked at her. “Now let me look at your wound.”
She unfastened her enviro suit and pulled it off, then her cargo pants beneath. She tossed them over the rock. In just her shirt and panties, with goose bumps prickling her skin, she gingerly settled on her discarded trousers. Now she could see her wound, and she winced. The gouge across her thigh looked bad.