Gasping, desperate, Lae and I drag Tyler down through the tunnel leading to the throne room. The walls pulse in tune around us, the screams of the dying and the thrum of power washing over me like rain. Again I feel that warmth, but again I feel the wrongness between us, the shadow.
Aurora floats in the room’s heart, head back, eye burning with the light of a million suns. I grimace, lower Tyler gently, my hands covered in his blood.
Lae’s face is twisted, eyes filled with tears. “No …”
“Aurora!” I roar. “HURRY!”
My father has followed us into the throne room, backing away reluctantly, step by bloody step. The Ra’haam follows, and in final, bitter desperation, he roars, arms outstretched.
The crystal walls splinter, and the Neridaa seems to cry out in pain as the tunnel collapses, sealing us inside.
But they are already battering on the barrier, and I know for all it cost him, he has only bought us a few minutes.
“It is not broken,” my father growls.
“… Father?”
“Weakling girl!”
The walls around us shiver, Aurora’s cheeks shining with tears.
Tyler takes Lae’s hand and squeezes, his breath now swift and shallow.
“She was p-proud of you.”
The light in him fading.
“I am t-too… .”
Tears spill from Lae’s shattered eyes. And I see it then. Focusing on her face—the pride, the ferocity, those features so odd and yet so familiar. Her hair that curious alloy of silver and gold.
Tyler’s words ring in my skull over the sound of the approaching enemy.
“I actually teamed up with her and her old crew to fight the Ra’haam.”
“She was a hell of a woman, your sister.”
“I always thought Saedii hated our mother,” I say, looking between them. “But her name …”
“… was Laeleth,” Tyler whispers, smiling sadly.
“Brother … ?” I whisper.
The last of him fades. The light in him extinguished.
Lae bows her head, silver-gold braids drenched bloodred hanging over her face as she opens her mouth. Her scream rings on the walls, echoed by Aurora, by the Neridaa herself, the power crashing against the growing cracks like waves upon a stony shore. I reach out to my friend, tears in my eyes.
“Brother …”
“Get up,” a voice spits.
I turn toward him, as ever looming above me like a shadow.
“Get on your feet!” my father roars, glowering at the pair of us. “We are Syldrathi! Our ancestors walked the stars when his were slime in the ocean! There is a war to be won, and still you weep for this Terran cur?”
Lae turns, teeth bared in a snarl.
“Do not dare,” she spits. “Do not dare to name my father cur.”
The walls thunder again, the things in the collapsed tunnel digging closer, the ceiling shaking, broken crystal falling like rain.
“Father?” The Starslayer’s eyes flash, and he spits blood on the floor as the Neridaa shakes. “A Terran? Disgusting. What kind of honorless wretch would lie with the likes of him and still name herself Syldrathi?”
I shake my head, almost laughing.
“You are such a fool.”
“And you are a child,” he snarls. “Ever your mother’s son.”
“And proud of it!” I roar, rising. “And if you had given me but one drop of the ocean of love she did, I might still say the same of you! But all you are is hate!” I spread my arms, taking in the shaking ship, the broken rainbow light. “And this is what comes of it! The end of a galaxy! And for what?”
“For the honor of our people, boy!”
“You killed our world! You killed our people! What honor lies in that?”
“They were traitors!” he roars. “They sought peace with the Terrans! No true child of Syldra would abase themselves by lying with our enemies!”
“Tell that to your daughter!”
He falls still, burning eyes gone wide. “What—”
“Look at her!” I shout, pointing to Lae.
The walls around us tremble. The rainbow light darkens. Aurora’s mouth opens and closes, as if she would speak.
He breathes soft, staring bewildered at Lae. “My …”
“You taught us war,” I tell him. “You taught us fear. You taught us blood and rage and enemy. And yet even Saedii found it in herself to love a human. To bear his child. To die defending all you left broken in your wake.”
Tears burn on my cheeks as I look to my niece.
“Your children have stood in the shadow of your hatred all their lives. And still, Saedii made something this beautiful.” I turn to my father, shaking my head. “Imagine what we could have made, if only you had loved us.”
“Fix this… .”
I turn, see Aurora floating in the center of the room. The power wells within her, enveloping me, us, refracting from the broken crystal around us. Tears brim in her eyes as she looks to my father.
“It is not broken!” he snarls.
“Caersan, I can’t do this alone.”
She reaches toward him, all the galaxy in the balance.
“Fix this.”
32
THREE ONE TWO
Scarlett—fourteen minutes remaining
Zila’s in my arms, all sharp angles to my softness, and I wish this wasn’t the first and last time I’ll ever hold her. I’m a snotty mess, and even though I know she’s right, I don’t know if I can take one more loss. I can do what I have to do, but what will be left of me on the other side?
But she gives me this moment, doesn’t pull away, just stays in my arms, real and whole and a part of my life for a few seconds more. And then … then something unwinds inside her, and she relaxes against me, head on my shoulder for a single heartbeat.
And I know she’s ready. She’s become who she needs to be to do this. And the parts of that transformation that don’t come straight from her, they were gifts from us.
I look up, eyes still swimming with tears, and Nari’s gaze is waiting.
I promise I have her, those solemn eyes say.
I squeeze Zila one more time, still looking across at the girl who’ll guard her for us. She’s everything, my own gaze tells her in reply. And, She needs someone to care for her.
Lieutenant Nari Kim simply nods. She already knows. She sees.
I draw back, let Zila go, and Finian slips a hand into mine. There’s nothing more to say, and no time to say it anyway. So the two of us turn, and we run.
Zila—twelve minutes remaining
It is strange to be following Nari instead of guiding her through comms, but I know every step as if I have run it myself a hundred times. Nari and I take a corner, flatten ourselves against a doorway, counting precious seconds as the patrol passes by at the end of the hall.
Finian and Scarlett will divert them in a moment. And so Nari and I will reach the core forty-five seconds sooner than she has before.
It would not be enough for her on her own. But it will give her time to defend me.
Together, we can do this.
Finian—ten minutes remaining
“Maker’s hairy—”
“Less talk, more run!” Scar gasps.
The sec patrol pounds down the hallway behind us, radioing for backup and probably immediate missile drops on our current location. There’s a Betraskan aboard their station, and now they know it.
So the good news is, we’ve distracted them. The bad news is that we’re nearly at the docking bays, and if we don’t lose the goons on our tail, stealing a ship is going to be preeeeeetty tricky.
Then I see it, up ahead at the intersection, mounted on a wall bracket. If it comes out easy, we live. If it sticks, we die.
“Scar,” I gasp. “Bank left.”
She doesn’t question—throwing herself around the corner just as I’m grabbing the fire extinguisher and yanking it free. And with a prayer to the Maker, I hurl it back at the goons chasing us.
They try to shoot me—one of them comes so close I almost get a haircut. But their shots also hit the extinguisher, blasting it apart. In a moment, the whole corridor is filled with fine white powder, and I’m blinded by it, inhaling a sharp chemical mouthful and feeling my way through the pale cloud to the door Scarlett’s holding open.
I slip inside, both hands clapped over my mouth to muffle my gasping coughs. The door hums closed, and we listen as the patrol reaches the intersection, curses up a storm, and divides four ways, pounding away from our hiding place.
Suckers.
Zila—eight minutes remaining