Page 11 of Collision!
He set his bottle down, avoiding the hanks of yarn nearest him.“Why do you have so many threads?How can you possibly use them all?Why are they all”—he waggled his fingers—“scattered?What if they tangle?”
Sidetracked from his tongue by the stream of questions it rattled at her, Mariah sat back.“If you’re curious, you should have come to my knitting meditation circle the other night.”
“I listened.”
He was so unexpected.She felt like she was spinning in space, like a ship without a star chart.She tried to backtrack along his line of queries.“I’m using a fine weight because this is delicate work.”She showed him her fixed circular needles with their small but shining points.“I’m making bridal handkerchiefs.”
His pale eyes narrowed, but he did not reach out to the needles or thread.Which was odd.People usually loved to touch the soft yarns, and she thought he’d feel some affinity for the needles.“Who is getting married?”
She shrugged.“No one.Yet.But thatisthe promise of the Big Sky Intergalactic Dating Agency.”
With a grunt, he grabbed his bottle again, moving it away from her stash as if it might get infected by proximity.
“Bridal hankies are often white or maybe blue,” she explained, “but I’m doing rainbow because of the resonark.A reminder of what brought us together.”
Suvan rumbled under his breath.“It was Evens who gathered you all on this haunted ship of his.”
She lifted her eyebrows.“Us?You are here too.”
“As chief engineer.”
She knew that, but some obstinate part of her—maybe the same part that had decided as a beginner that her great-grandmother’s lace should be three colors—wanted more from him.
“I mean you said a Szauralithyn would never be part of the IDA,” she prodded.“But youarehere on the Love Boat I.With the rest of us.”
He stiffened.“It is not the same.Not at all.I stay with the engines while Evens mixes the rest of you like one of the bartender’s absurd cocktails.”
She frowned at him.“I like Ikaryo’s pretty drinks,” she said reprovingly.“As for Mr.Evens, I admit he seems a bit overzealous.But he’s promised a lot to his IDA hopefuls.”She hovered her hands over all the hanks and skeins.“Anyway, I can’t exactly criticize anyone else for their obsessions.Crafter acquisition syndrome is a real problem.”
Suvan’s unwavering stare fixed on her.“Did you not receive all the IDA inoculations?”He started to push out of the booth.“The med bay on this ship is limited but—”
“Oh no, Chief, it’s just a joke.”She reached across the table to touch her fingertips to his hand clenched around the pop bottle.“It’s not a real sickness.Well, according to some people who can’t abide a messy process, it might look like a disorder.But I like to see all my yarns at once.Maybe the randomness will give me a new idea.”
She made sure to avoid the spines on his biggest knuckles as she gave his fingers a little pat.“And no, I’ll never use them all.Because I’ll keep getting more, forever.That’s the joke.”
After a moment, his weight eased back to the seat.“It does not seem funny to be forever seeking what you need.”
She noticed he did not pull away from her touch.
Between the menacing spines, his skin was surprisingly smooth, like her best silk fibers.But her fingertips, sensitized to the tiniest knots in her thread, detected the repeating flat texture.Such delicate scales for such a brawny gargoyle.
“Maybe I haven’t found all the perfect threads yet,” she murmured.“But I hope I will.”
“Hope.”He finally pulled away from her to take another drink, his mouth twisting as if the sweet bubbles had transmogrified to stale acid.“What if this mess gets hopelessly tangled?”
She met his unblinking stare with her own.“Scissors.”
“Is that also a joke?”
Without breaking eye contact, she settled her hand unerringly on her grandmother’s pearl-handled scissors.The blades glinted.
So did Suvan’s pale glare.
Because the resonark was suddenly shining brighter.
Chapter 4
Suvan launched out of the booth, putting Mariah behind him as he squared off to the anomaly.
