“If we aren’t landing for another hour, what’s so important that you needed me now?”
“We need to make an announcement,” Tezya said. “Let everyone know the process when we land. We don’t want—”
“Fuck,” I cursed as the circular door to my pod slid open, and I knew without looking that Savannah came out into the hall.
Everyone stilled like they were looking at a ghost, and I guess to them they were.
Peter smirked as he looked between me, Savannah, and the door she just came out of.Don’t even think about fucking saying anything.
“What is she doing here?” Tezya was fuming, looking directly at me.
“She wanted to come.” I shrugged, trying to play it off, but I was going to murder the girl later.
“So you justlether?” he seethed.
“Wow. Nice to see you too, Tezya. I missed you so much.” She crossed her arms over her chest, and the movement drew my attention to her. She had one of my sweatshirts on, and even though I yelled at her every time she stole my clothes, I was starting to like seeing her in them. I knew she only did it because it was cold as shit in the halls for an Advenian, so being mortal, I couldn’t even fathom how she wasn’t freezing from the inside out. The sleeves went well past her hands, which she had rolled four times so she could use them.
“Sav, do you realize what you just did by coming here? I toldyou to stay on Earth, not because I didn’t want you to come, but because I wanted you tolive.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, whipping my head to the Fire Prince.
“Allium was tested to be habitable forAdvenianlife, and while our anatomies are similar, they aren’t the same. There’s no way to know if she’ll survive the moment she steps off the craft.”
I turned to look at Savannah, wondering if she knew what she was risking by coming with us.
“Well, there’s one way to find out, right?” She attempted to smile.
“Sav, you can die. This isn’t just some hike to see something new, and now you’re surrounded by Advenians forever. You can’t just go back to Earth whenever you’re homesick. You can’t see Ichi or have ramen. It means no more coffee…”
I didn’t bother adding that she snuck a boatload of instant coffee into my pod. She’d been rationing it, and I had no desire to be around her whenever she finally ran out. She already was putting up a hissy fit when she could only have one cup a day instead of her usual three.
“It’s not like we aren’t used to it, Tez,” she said as the sleeve of my sweatshirt rolled down, making it hard to take her seriously. “We’ve grown up around more Advenians than humans our entire lives.”
“We…” Tezya growled, and I stilled.
She bit her lip as my gaze turned toward her again. “I may have snuck Wells into the craft too. I couldn’t just leave him, and he felt the same way I did.”
“You WHAT?” Tezya snapped. “How could you be so stupid, Sav?”
“What did you want us to do? Go join a mortal college and try to blend in with our kind when we’re so far from it? Youguys are the only family we’ve ever known, and Wells and I didn’t want to lose anyone else.”
Tezya glared at me and somehow I knew what he wanted.What?I snapped as I opened my mind to him.
You’re in charge of them. If she dies, it’s on you, and she better not fucking die.
EPILOGUE
PART TWO
Vallie
I hadno idea why I kept coming down here. Some part of me hated myself for it, another part of me didn’t care. Maybe I just couldn’t stand to be around everybody else. Maybe I was sick of pretending I was okay.
Kole was in a cell by himself—I was told all the prisoners had their own in the belly of the spacecraft, but I’d only ever visited him. He was leaning against his cage, his head resting against the back wall as he stared up at the ceiling. I was sitting crossed-legged—outside his cage—by the door.
“Why did you do it?” I asked him.
“I’ve done a lot of things, Vallie. You’re going to have to be more specific.”
