“The first to draw blood wins,” Andi said. “No weapons. Only fists and feet.”
Gilly flashed her teeth and glanced up at Breck, who stood with her hands raised, fists already in place to protect her face. “You’re so going down, ladies.”
In a flash, the girls all sprang into action. It was a flurry of fists, Andi’s wet clothing helping her to slip between Breck’s fingers, Lira’s graceful leaps keeping her out of Gilly’s range.
As they moved, Andi’s distracting thoughts tried to worm their way into the fight. Another opponent for her to face, and no matter how hard she swung her fists, no matter how effortlessly she landed each jab and punch or made a successful dodge, the thoughts attacked harder.
Fiercer than Breck and Gilly’s hits could ever be.
As Breck leveled a kick to Andi’s thigh, Andi swiftly returned it with a kick of her own. The giantess chuckled as Andi dropped to the floor, rolling away from another attack. Lira was there to back her up, swiftly dealing blows to Breck’s left arm. Gilly retorted with a flurry of curses and a rock thrown at Lira’s face.
As the girls moved and spun, Andi thought of what she had yet to face.
Valen, upon waking, had looked at her like he knew that her soul was black. Andi supposed it was. A soul that had taken so many lives must be tainted.
Breck’s fist clipped her jaw.
“Yes!” Gilly howled.
Pain screamed at Andi, but she willed it away. She would not go down that easily.
And yet, as she and Lira backed up, taking a few paces away to regain their composure, thoughts of Valen came back stronger.
Of course he wouldn’t want to see you, Andi. Why would he ever, in a million years, want to see his sister’s murderer?
In more ways than one, Andi blamed herself for his pain and his capture. Everyone—reporters and gossips galaxy-wide—had spoken of how the young general’s son wasn’t the same after Kalee died. If Andi hadn’t crashed that ship...then maybe Valen wouldn’t have been out in the night, walking alone in Kalee’s memorial garden.
He wouldn’t have been captured by Xen Pterran forces. And then all of this—Adhira, the crash landing, the tidal wave of emotions Lira was suffering through...
None of it would have ever happened.
Andi knew she was the beginning of the spiral that bent Valen’s life—and many others—out of control.
“Your left!” Lira yelped.
Andi narrowly dodged another rock thrown by Gilly. The young gunner would always find ammunition, even in the belly of Rhymore.
Gilly twirled past, hissing taunts and laughing as Breck and Lira went head-to-head.
“Come on, Cap,” Gilly said, waggling a finger at Andi.
With a quick bend, Andi splashed frigid water into Gilly’s face.
They tumbled back into the fight.
Andi’s thoughts followed right behind.
After the transport wagon had dropped them off, and the remains of the Marauder were carted deeper into the mountain, Andi and Dex had patched in a call to General Cortas.
That had gone very poorly. Andi still had a headache from the conversation, in which the general had been so upset that Alfie had suggested he “consume a bottle of his calming tonics and resume the conversation at a later time.”
At one point, General Cortas had called Andi and her crew a waste of his time. Dex had vehemently disagreed with him, to which Andi promptly reminded Dex that she could stand up for herself, and a flurry of bitter retorts had gone back and forth between them at once.
The general had then chewed them both out and ended the call.
“It could have gone worse,” Dex had said before they parted ways. Things had gone as well as they probably could have with the general, at least.
It was Queen Alara whom Andi had yet to have a full conversation with.
She knew a reprimand was coming—likely more marks on her record—but she guessed that Lira would get the brunt of the scolding from the Adhiran queen.
And speaking of Lira...
She was currently fighting off Breck at the center of the bridge. The glowing blue water below lit up Lira’s face, making her eyes stand out boldly as she tracked Breck’s motions and mirrored them when it was Breck’s turn to go on the defensive.
Workers scattered, gasping as the two girls moved so swiftly, and with such ease.
“Come on!” Gilly yelled.
She grabbed Andi’s hand, abandoning the attack for a moment as captain and gunner headed to join the other two members of their crew.
As they ran, more thoughts poured in.
Complete this job, and you’ll be pardoned from your death sentence. Arcardius will be open to you again. What will you do, then, with your crew?
Opening herself up to each of the girls had been difficult. A captain needed a crew, loyal and true, but a crew had to trust their captain in return. It had been an uphill battle to let the girls enter her heart, especially after the pain of losing Kalee and then Dex. Andi was wary of becoming emotionally attached to anyone.
But her crew had won her over, and Andi couldn’t beg the Godstars enough to keep them safe.
“I’m going back in,” Gilly said.
She sprinted across the bridge and leaped onto Breck’s back, where she placed her tiny hands over Breck’s eyes to block out her vision.
“Gilly!” Breck yelled, and Lira stopped fighting long enough to give in to laughter again.
Andi stopped walking. She stood at the base of the bridge, watching them. Realizing, suddenly, that her heart physically ached.
She loved these girls. They were the strongest women she’d ever known, and all she had in this galaxy now. If anything ever happened to them... If she were ever faced with a decision like the one Dex had had to make, to trade a single one of them in exchange for the life of another...
Andi’s vision blurred as she watched the girls laugh, all of them doubling over as if they hadn’t a care in the world.
She could hardly see them now as she stood a few paces away on the bridge, and though she was still wet from her fall in the lake, she realized, as she felt warmth spill onto her cheeks, that she was crying.
Godstars.
What in the hell was happening to her?
Andi tried to swallow them away. But the tears, almost as if they were spurred on by her noticing them, began to fall harder. Faster, until she thought they would never run dry.
Until Andi realized that the girls had fallen silent.
“Andi?” Lira asked.
They all turned to face her on the bridge.
Andi heard footsteps, and then the girls were suddenly surrounding her, taking her by the arms and herding her away. Back down the bridge, past the edge of the great lake, into the shadows of the cavern. They settled down beneath an overhang of sharp rock.
The girls closed in tighter around her, waiting in silence until Andi’s tears finally ceased.
The workers, now no longer disturbed by the queen’s niece and her fighting friends, went back to what they were doing. A calmness washed over the cavern.