WOLF DAWN: Science Fiction Thriller/ Romance (Forsaken Worlds) Read Online Free PDF Page B

an elegant off-white blouse and tan pant-skirt, her concession for being in space. As always with his mother, nothing appeared out of place. Had she intentionally lain down? Still on his knees, Ash bent over her and shook her with mounting fear.
    “Mother!” he shouted.
    Sartha’s bright blue eyes opened, first with a look of confusion and then with pain. They focused on her son.
    “I thought you were dead,” Ash whispered. The din of the alarm intruded and Ash’s relief vanished. “That sound … will the illness come again?”
    His mother sat up and her hands gripped his shoulders. “You felt it?”
    “Of course.”
    Her face flared with surprise and her hands tightened upon him. Eyes wild with anxiety she said, “Did you lose consciousness?”
    “Yes.”
    She came to her knees then, her desperate hands feeling all over his body for injuries. “Are you sick? Are you injured?” Her tone was frantic.
    Ash’s mother’s concern over his physical health was so frequent an occurrence that this severe reaction on her part neither disturbed nor surprised him. Ash shrugged, minimizing any illness, as he had done all his life. “I’m okay. Don’t worry about me, mother. You don’t look so good yourself.”
    She expelled a relieved breath. “Thank Jana you’re all right.” She stood up, bringing him to his feet, one arm clutching him above the elbow. Ash’s heart jumped in alarm and shock. What Sartha’s distracted grip communicated was almost as disconcerting as the feel of his wolfhound’s paw. His mother
needed
to hold him. It was as if she would be utterly lost and alone without that contact. Why should she feel this way? His mother was strong and independent. She didn’t need him. It was he that needed her.
    A gridded holovid map was projected at eye level. A transparent bluish screen, it projected the known galaxy and
Assurance’s
position within it. Sartha leaned over
Assurance’s
instruments. Her complexion, already white, paled further. She dropped both hands to the console and exclaimed in a shaky voice, “Forsaken Worlds, we’ve entered normal space, Ash. I must have hit emergency purge when — ” she paused and licked dry lips “ — when the illness came.” An expression came over his mother’s face, a blank, long-distance stare. Ash couldn’t recall ever seeing her look that way before. She wasn’t here; she appeared to be somewhere else altogether.
    Ash touched her hand, wanting her back. Sartha took a deep breath and shut her eyes. She opened them once more. “I’ve work to do, son,” she said. “Get us a hot drink and something sweet to settle our stomachs.”
    Ash left and soon returned with two large mugs of sweetened herbal tisanes and a plate of honey cakes. The ship’s small bot had already cleaned where he had been sick. “Mother, what’s going on?”
    She gave him a graceful shrug.
    “But why …”
    Sartha pressed a finger to his lips, preventing the flood of questions that were forming. “I can’t tell you more,” she said, with just a hint of warning in her voice.
    Ash thought his mother looked sad and lost. He felt a bit that way, too. He wanted to tell her about Tynan, the feel of his tongue, and the sensation of his large paw on his chest, but he couldn’t speak of it. The memory was too raw. Instead he asked, “What was that terrible feeling?”
    “I don’t know, Ash,” she replied, her eyes sliding away from his own.
    Astonished, Ash stared at his mother.
She was lying. Why would she lie?
Ash wanted to confront her and demand the truth but the words wouldn’t come. The knowledge burned inside him, but he said nothing. He knew now that they were in terrible danger and that in leaving Delian they had been running away. He recalled the red dawn, that ominous portent. It still made no sense, but Ash knew his mother. She would say nothing more unless she chose to.
    “Patience, son.” Sartha took a long drink of hot, sweet tea, and studied the holovid.