Stolen - Nhys Glover Page 0,77

passing minute.

Rian hit me across the side of the head with his staff. “Pull it together, brother. You’re the one with the fangs and claws. Come on. Higher, flatter ground. We can do this!”

I stared at the Theran, whose eyes looked just like Rian’s. No, there were no starbursts. But it was Rian staring out at me through those strange eyes. And he was challenging me to be the warrior I was bred and trained to be. The warrior who had a podmate to protect.

I looked up and around, searching for a ledge or a small plateau big enough for us both. My eyes were better than his in the dark. It had been amazing he’d managed to climb in the dim light as well as he had.

That’s when I saw it. A jutting rock that reminded me of a tabletop poking out of the side of the mountain. It might do, if it was stable enough. Quickly, I began climbing towards it, expecting Rian to follow at a slower pace. If I was wrong, I could stop him climbing any further. He’d need all his strength and vitality to take on the approaching enemy. No use wasting it on a wild goose chase.

Funny how many human sayings I used, when I didn’t have the faintest understanding of their true meaning. What was a goose and why would anyone want to chase one?

The tabletop rock was the size of the floor-space in a small dome I quickly discovered. Plenty big enough for two of us to fight back-to-back. I walked the few strides in every direction from the center, testing the stability of the stone. It held and was reasonably smooth. It would do.

While I waited for Rian to arrive, I checked out the rest of the terrain nearby. Were there places for the Vargeez to land and rest while they waited their turn to take us on? Because, though the space was large, it wasn’t large enough for too many of them to come at us at once. They had wide wingspans and smallish bodies. If their wings hit another’s they would both be knocked off balance. Tight confined spaces worked in our favor. We knew this from our training.

“This looks good,” Rian puffed, as he came to stand at my side, checking the space as I’d been doing. Of course, he couldn’t see much more than the outline of the terrain in a night lit only by stars.

“It’ll do.”

I looked back at the shadow cloud, hoping against hope that it had disappeared, heading in a different direction. There was no way the Vargeez could know we were here.

But the shadow was much larger now, and I could differentiate dark bodies flying in close formation within it.

It was coming straight for us!

“Get ready. There’s maybe fifty of them. We can handle fifty.”

It was bravado, but I heard Rian chuckle, amused by me as I’d hoped he’d be.

“Only fifty? Easy. I’ll just leave them all for you, will I?” he joked, warming up with his staff.

I let my claws extend and my fangs elongate. This was what I was bred to do. This was what being a Danan warrior was all about!

The Vargeez couldn’t come at us from the direction of the mountain, so our best bet was to stand side-on to the mountain, facing two of the three directions they could approach us. The quarter facing away from the mountain would be our weakest point, but at least we only had one.

We heard them before they reached us. Their sickening screeches sent trickles of fear down my spine. We were too young to be engaging Vargeez on our own. My familial pod would never have allowed it if they’d been here. Yet we had the training and we had the strength. The only thing missing was experience, and that only came with experience after all, whether we were seven or seventy.

“If a human woman can kill these bastards then so can we,” Rian said through gritted teeth.

I knew it was a pep talk for himself more than me.

The Vargeez circled overhead, taking our measure. I didn’t bother craning my neck back to see. Time enough to look when they made the move and dove at us.

And dive they did. Three from the side.

“Mine!” Rian cried, exhilaration in his voice.

We pivoted so that he could bring his staff up and around. It only took knocking the first into the second for the third to go down as well. The screeching