I push upright, knees protesting, muscles cramping. I walk out of the room without sparing him another glance.
Lilac’s waiting outside in a long corridor lined with broad windows. It must be night, ship’s time, because the lights are dimmed, and she’s lit largely by the light of the planet beyond the windows. She’s wrapped up in some sort of robe, but it could be a ball gown, the way she stands in it. Navy blue, the same color she was wearing the night we met. Straight and poised, skin clear and hair caught up in one of those fancy knots I’ll never understand; all that’s missing is her entourage. They must have attacked her face with some sort of treatment, because her freckles are already fading. It’s as though the past few weeks never happened.
I’ve played my part. Has she played hers? Could she play hers, after having a glimpse of her own world again? I remember what I said to her once, about returning to the real world. Best not to make promises. It’s not as simple as either of us would like it to be.
For an endless moment she simply stares at me, eyes raking over me, taking in my exhaustion. There’s no hint of the Lilac I came to know on the planet.
My heart wants to stop, and I want to let it.
She’s the one to break the silence. “Tarver, are you—”
I move toward her before I can stop myself, and halt half a pace away. “I’m fine. Are you…?”
“My father came.” She’s still gazing at me, blue eyes intent. I must look like hell. “What did you tell them? Is it over?”
I drag my eyes away from her mouth, swallowing. We’re alone in this corridor and yet I can feel the weight of the reporters waiting to photograph us, the incredulous people in Lilac’s circles, and the soldiers too, the shadow of her father over us. Is it too much for her?
Is it too much for me?
“What could I tell them?” I say lightly, trying to ignore how badly I want to reach out, close the gap between us. “I’m just a big, dumb soldier. What do I know?”
Her lips curve a little, amused, and for the first time my heart flickers with hope. There are her dimples again. I scan her face, looking for traces of the black eye she used to have, for her fading freckles, for anything to make her mine, not theirs. “What about you, Miss LaRoux?”
“Me?” She takes a deep breath, and with a jolt I realize she’s as fearful as I am. “I’m just a spoiled heiress, too traumatized to remember anything.”
And then she smiles, for real, and just like on the Icarus the first night we met, it’s all over. It’s nothing like a smile she would have given then; it’s lopsided and true, and full of anxious hope. I reach for her, on fire. For a moment I feel the curve of her mouth against mine, smiling before the hunger takes over. Then I move forward into her, and she grabs handfuls of my shirt, pulling me with her as we crash into the wall of the hallway. She’s holding me in close and my hands are at her hips, her sides, framing her face as her lips part and I kiss her, my mind spinning with all the moments I thought she was gone.
But she’s here, she’s mine. I’m hers.
My heart’s thumping when we break apart, and I lean in to rest my forehead against hers. “You want to get out of here?”
She wraps her arms around my neck, lips tugging up in a smile once more. “Think we can outrun the cameras?”
“I do have extensive training in the art of stealth and camouflage.” I find I’m smiling in return, helpless.
She opens her mouth to speak, but a blinding flash from beyond the windows interrupts her and sends her reeling backward with a cry. I turn, half blinded myself despite having my back to the windows. The light sweeps on past the ship, rippling outward from the planet in a wave. Blinking away afterimages, I’m left staring at the planet itself, struggling to understand what I’m seeing.
Lines of fire are spreading over the surface of the planet like cracks in an eggshell, as if some massive creature is hatching from the planet’s depths. Lilac makes a low sound in her throat and grabs for my hand. The chasms widen, whole chunks of landmass vanishing into fire.
There’s no sound across the vacuum of space, and for a long moment we stand there in eerie, utter silence, witnessing the destruction of the planet before us.
Lilac is the first to move, the first to speak. “Now no one will ever know what happened here.” She swallows, gaze still fixed on the window as a series of soundless explosions eject streams of molten rock out toward the mirror-moon.
In the darkened corridor, the red-gold fire consuming the planet is reflected in Lilac’s eyes, transforming them. In her face I can see the echo of the planet’s destruction, the loss of the last shred of proof of everything she went through.