Danielle Gunderson, Planet Everis, Outskirts of Feris 5

      The cold seeped into my bones through the hard ground where I settled. The thin sheets of silver and black thermal blankets kept me from freezing to death. The food I’d managed to steal before leaving the Touchstone was running low. Me? I could survive on less. If I had to, I could build traps and survive in the wild. I’d done it before. But I had no idea what condition my mate would be in. He’d been blocking me, refusing to let me into his dreams, ordering me to stay away from him.

      “As if,” I huffed.

      I didn’t dare take off my boots, just shoved them into the bottom of the thin sleeping bag. If I took them off, I’d never get them back on because of all the hiking I’d done. The swelling was so bad in my injured ankle that I could feel my toes turning blue. I propped my feet up on a large rock and sighed. “I will find you, Gage. And when I do, you’ve got some explaining to do.”

      Yes, I was talking to myself, something I often did in the woods. But if my mate learned anything about me, he would need to understand that I was no princess content to sit around in silk and perfume at the Touchstone as Hunter after Hunter tried to woo me. Even my friends, Lexi and Katie, underestimated me. Yes, I was smallish. Five-two with shoes on. No, I didn’t weigh a lot. But small didn’t mean weak, didn’t mean clueless. My dad taught me that. He’d only been five-nine, but he’d been a Navy SEAL. When he’d retired, he’d taught me to love the land like he did. We’d spent hours exploring the Florida wetlands and