In the sea that was the many beings at the Exchange, the Niftrills walked as a singular unit. In the listening device in his ear, he could hear they were chattering about nothing in particular.
There were about twenty of them, and only one had the information he needed.
Getting that information, though…that was going to prove difficult. He doubted the one he needed was going to randomly blurt out what he was seeking to hear.
Niftrills were a pack species. They lived in large groups, worked in large groups, and were vicious when one of them was threatened.
He would have to be careful. Nothing could really break them apart, and that was a problem because he only needed to speak to one of them—a specific one.
Getting that Niftrill alone was going to test his skills.
A smile played at the corners of his lips.
He liked a challenge.
He had to be discreet, however. He couldn’t let them know he was watching them. It would make them alert.
They weren’t the smartest of species, that’s why they depended on their collective, but his reputation may have preceded him. He could never be sure about that though, so it was best to play it safe.
For that reason, he turned back to face the merchant before him.
The merchant was still standing before him, his antennae trembling with each passing second.
For phek’s sake, he wasn’t that terrible. It wasn’t like he was going to reach across the stall and grab the merchant by the neck. Not unless the merchant gave him reason to—
“Lehtt mee goh!” The sound cut through the audio feedback he was getting from the Niftrills.
Ka’Cit froze.
“Ahm nhot whit yoo! Lisss-cen too mee!”
He was no language expert, but…he knew those sounds. He’d heard a language like that before…but where?
He twisted in the direction the Niftrills had gone, his gaze finding them without much difficulty.
In their huge brown cloaks, they walked like a rigid block. No random shoppers could get between them or break up their group.
Ka’Cit’s eyes narrowed as he watched them move. He wasn’t sure exactly what he’d expected to see.
Maybe the sound had come from a passerby.
“Puleez!”
Ka’Cit stood, ignoring the merchant who jumped in surprise.
That voice; those words.
It came to him then.
He knew that language. Well, he didn’t understand it, but he’d heard it before many times.
His friends Riv and Sohut had human females on their Sanctuary, and they spoke exactly like that.
His gaze searched the moving throng.
He didn’t see Riv or Sohut’s females.
He could still hear the voice coming from the device in his ear, but she was talking so fast now, her sounds no longer sounded like words.
Ka’Cit turned to look down the street behind him, and that’s when he caught the blonde hair of Riv’s mate. She was far down the street at a stall with sleeping units for chids. Riv was standing behind her.
Riv’s mate turned then, to talk to someone who wasn’t there, and he saw the moment her eyes widened in panic as her gaze darted around.
Something was wrong.
Ka’Cit’s gaze flew back to the moving Niftrills.
The phekkers moved quickly because of how they walked together.
Other shoppers simply moved out of the way when an impenetrable block was travelling in the other direction.
Was he going mad?
He was sure he’d heard…
But the more he stared at the Niftrills, he noticed the Niftrill in the center didn’t seem to be walking with the others. As a matter of fact, he seemed to be trying to break the formation and head in the opposite direction, to no avail because the others had formed a wall around him.
“—noht whit yoo gahys!”
Phek.
The one in the center squirmed and fought. In the scuffle, and for only a second, he caught sight of something.
A face covering. One like Riv wore.
His entire body froze and only his life organ gave a huge thump.
It was one of the humans; he just knew it.
It wasn’t Riv’s mate, and it certainly wasn’t Sohut’s—Sohut’s Clee-yo was taller than that.
It had to be that other human female.
The one he’d seen only once.
She was a little thing, he remembered, almost the size of a Niftrill.
A glance back down the street to where Riv and his mate were standing, and he saw that Riv’s mate was frantic. She was shouting, her gaze searching, and her eyes were leaking fluid down her face.
He didn’t need to be the smartest Merssi to put together what must have happened, but he didn’t have time to go to Riv to tell him he’d seen where the human was—rather, it seemed, the direction in which she’d been taken.
Without so much of a second thought, Ka’Cit gripped the rail surrounding the stall and launched himself over it, extending his claws to slow himself down as he clung to the side of the building.
Niftrill worked on cargo ships and if they thought she was one of them, they were going to force the human into the ship to fulfill their work obligation. They might not even realize she wasn’t one of them till it was too late.
They weren’t so good in the eyesight department.
He’d have to go after her himself.
5
Ka’Cit cursed underneath his breath.
The Niftrills moved quickly.
He hadn’t intended to approach them, not until he’d seen an opening, but he also hadn’t planned for a human to get caught between them.
He was hoping that once they broke formation at the dock, he could snatch the human, return her to Riv and somehow get back to the ship before it took off.
He still needed to find and speak to that Niftrill.
But there was no catching up to them now.
There’d been no delay before they entered the ship.
No stopping to load crates or boxes, and he realized why that was. This was only the second group of Niftrills working for this ship. There was another group already there who’d done all the loading and unloading before this second group arrived.
Which cargo captain would need the
