"What is it?" Auren asked.
"Your Star—it’s glowing, too."
Auren reached up to touch his cheek, feeling the pleasant warmth there; he saw the faintest glow in his periphery.
"Oh my god," came Lucien’s shocked, frightened voice.
They both broke from their reverie, though she still held his scythe. Together, they walked over to where Lucien stood near the blackboard. Auren shortened his steps, mindful of Vesperin’s smaller legs.
Auren gently forced Vesperin’s hand out with his, to allow the scythe’s glow to illuminate the wall Lucien stared at.
Papers were pinned to it. Architectural designs and mathematical equations. Similar scrawl was done on the blackboard next to it, etched with chalk.
Vesperin stepped away, arm stretched out to keep hold of the scythe. "What is this, Lucien?"
Lucien’s hands flattened on a large piece of paper—one that detailed a strange shape, arching high above some drawn building, with numbers, symbols, and arrows pointed to various pieces of the design. "I have seen this before."
"Where?" came Vesperin’s worried voice.
"I do not know when"—Lucien turned to face them, palm still on the paper, and the glow of the scythe caught the lens of his glasses—"but sometime on Tarz, in that life with you, I saw this." He licked his lips. "I feel it. The memory is so faint, but it is there. A knowing in my Soul that this is not the first time I have seen it." His fingers traced the papers like a man starved of knowledge. "Something about it is different. It is like the memory I had was a crude, rudimentary design. The kinks, the errors—they’ve all been smoothed out." His forehead fell to the board, eyes squeezed shut. His lips moved, but even Auren’s enhanced senses struggled to make sense of what he said.
Vesperin placed a hesitant hand on his back as she pressed her cheek to his coat. "Come back to me. Please?"
Lucien shook his head, pushing away from the board. He gripped Vesperin’s cheeks, forgetting Auren was there. The scythe tugged as Lucien pulled her further from him, into his chest, then pressed his lips to hers.
It did not evoke feelings of jealousy.
Auren felt peace, watching Lucien kiss her.
When Lucien pulled away, Vesperin shot Auren a sheepish look, but Auren just smiled at her, hoping she’d seen every bit of adoration that he felt within him. For her. The girl with Stars in her eyes.
Lucien briefly met his eyes, and they were filled with shadows.
"What haunts you, Lucien Quenlan?" Auren could not help but ask.
Lucien raked a hand through his hair. "Nightmares of a future I’m afraid to face." He gave them both his back, fingers skimming over desks, searching for clues.
Vesperin and Auren were tethered by the scythe. He let her lead, following her as she began to move toward the other side of the room, picking over empty notebooks and folders, stacked on dust-free desks.
They found their way back to the board, as if it were a magnet drawing them all.
Vesperin lifted the pinned papers at the bottom, the edges rustling as she searched beneath them. Auren stared at the top of her head as she crouched to do so, tracing the shape of her form.
She made a soft sound, then stood so quickly she bumped into Auren, who had bent over her, entranced. Her head bumped into his chin.
"Ow." She rubbed her skull with her free hand.
Auren barely felt it. He could not look away from her, even as shadows coiled around her shoulders, as if the light that metthe darkness from the glow of the scythe had turned sentient, sticking to her. "Sorry."
"It’s fine," she said distractedly, then turned back to the papers. "There’s something here. It looks older, though. The words are worn from age."
Lucien moved closer. "Let me see."
Vesperin lifted the pinned papers, showing a yellowed page at the bottom, as if forgotten by how many other, newer pages had been stuck over top of it.
Auren held the scythe down so they could see better.
"This says a…planetary-scale atmospheric dispersal engine," she read. "What does that mean? It doesn’t—sound good."
