Still, Nyk had fought to save his life when no one else could be bothered, and then, wounded himself, he’d lifted Hauk up and carried him to safety right before the craft had exploded and sent debris raining down all over the two of them.

Out of a crowd of people and Andarions, it’d been Nyk who’d jerked his jacket off and used it to put out the flames on Hauk’s back.

To this day, Hauk didn’t understand Nykyrian’s mercy.

And every time he saw one of those scars on Nyk’s body caused by that crash, he knew the debt he owed to a boy who should have let him burn for his part in making Nyk feel unwelcome at their school.

But that was a long time ago. And it was something he’d never spoken of to anyone.

Not even Nykyrian.

Clearing his throat, he picked through the fruit in his bag until he found a friggle. “It was a training exercise when I was a boy. My pod crashed and I was trapped in the burning wreckage.” He offered her the fruit.

She declined it with a shake of her head. “It must have been awful.”

He ate the friggle before he spoke again. “It isn’t one of my happier memories. Sadly, it’s not one of my worst, either.”

“Were you scared?”

He wiped his hand on his pants. “No.”

“Really?” she asked incredulously.

He gave her a pointed stare. “Really.”

Sumi couldn’t fathom what he was telling her. Not given the wealth and brutality of the scars on his back. He’d been burned severely enough that she was sure it’d taken him years of physical therapy to be whole again. And probably a number of skin grafts. “How old were you?”

“Thirteen Andarion years.”

She gaped at his answer. “You were a baby.”

“I was bigger than most.”

Typical Andarion answer, and it was one that brought to her mind that image of him as an adorable child with bright eyes who’d been holding on to his older brothers. She bit her lip as she tried to imagine the nightmare it must have been for him to be so young and so close to death. “How is it possible that at that age, you weren’t scared even a little?”

“I was too pissed.”

“At?”

He cut a feral look in her direction. “Acting like a bunch of scared human schoolgirls, Andarions I thought were friends had run out to save their own asses without trying to help me save mine.”

“Then how did you escape?”

“Thia’s father. Even though he was just a kid, too, he ran in and dragged my bleeding hide out.”

She didn’t miss the fact that he had yet to mention Nykyrian by name. “Is that why you’re so loyal to him?”