The Only One

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    He had a good deal of respect and affection for the five men he'd sent out, and he prayed that any damage suffered was to brick and mortar rather than flesh and bone. But perhaps he ought to leave the prayers to Taj. Though he'd turned around his life, his relationship with the Great Mother remained patchy. He held few grudges, but the one he had with Her ran deep.
    Through the long, steep climb to the surface, Romjha kept a brutal pace. He knew that only Taj's grit and long strides kept her from falling behind. "You never do anything halfway," she'd once remarked to him.
    No, he didn't. Not anymore. He'd learned what apathy could do to a man. Unknowingly, Taj was the one responsible. She'd pulled him back from his state of oblivion. The night Pasha died would remain forever in his memory; it had changed the course of his life. It had also been the moment he first noticed Taj as a woman— a woman who affected him on a level several rungs deeper than sexual.
    When she began a relationship with Aleq not long after the night he'd had that epiphany, he'd chosen not to interfere, though thoughts of their coupling stole rest from many a night's sleep. Yet from the beginning his gut told him that Taj and Aleq were poorly matched, that it was only a matter of time before she would be free. He wanted her, but he'd waited. When she at last came to him, it would be without reservation, without regret. And while he hadn't wished either Taj or Aleq heartache, he saw tonight in Taj's luminous eyes that the relationship had run its course. He would have her, body and soul. She would be his mate, and he her protector, though she professed not to need one.
    His mouth twisted. With the risks that woman took, she needed a hundred protectors.
    Romjha lifted his head, testing the air, warmer and drier here near the surface. He caught a faint, oily odor of burning fuel as his group emerged into the moonlight.
    The night air was hot and still; it took an effort to pull air into his lungs. Fighting had left the cities in ruins, worldwide, and had turned the forests to ash. The once-fertile soil was glassy in patches where it had been bombed molten. The rest had powdered into desert as the climate deteriorated. Now the twin suns'
    blistering heat reached the surface almost unimpeded. Anything left moving had long since run, limped, or crawled underground.
    With Taj and Petro walking alongside him, Romjha hiked toward a lookout atop a ridge, his pace slowing to allow Taj to catch her breath—-gallantry she'd surely resent if she suspected.
    The woman was passionate, proud, and sometimes unpredictable. But when she was scared, she became downright volatile. After all the years working with her, he'd decided that Taj used anger to override fear.
    He had no proof, other than having spent entirely too much time thinking about the prickly little beauty. But, after their confrontation in the cave, he was damn certain she'd deny his theory.
    Rifle at the ready, Romjha climbed to the top of the rise. A pockmarked moon glowed sullenly from behind a screen of smoke and mist, as barren as the landscape it illuminated. Two other moons would rise, likely after dawn, when they'd be invisible in the glare of Sienna's mismatched twin suns.
    On the eastern horizon was an orange glow.
    "The fuel reservoirs did blow," Taj muttered. "They're going to burn for days."
    A spark of triumph sputtered to life in Romjha's gut, then flared. Silent, he observed the conflagration. For generations, the old skyport had served as a hated reminder that the warlord's army would someday return.
    Long ago, the Siennans had found out the hard way that robotic defense installations scattered and hidden within the skyport activated upon sensing intruders. For years, Romjha's people left them alone because the casualties were too high to do anything else. But when he rose to the rank of commander, Romjha had launched a campaign to methodically locate and map out the defense machinery, so there would be no more surprises. When that was complete, they'd even disarmed and dismantled several of the smaller guns and carried them back to the caves, but no one could figure out how to make them work. Still, Romjha had refused to give up. If he couldn't use the technology, then by the heavens, no one could! At night, the raiders had been destroying the landing pad and its defenses. They did so a little at a time, so they wouldn't attract the local warlord's notice—they had little