One more moment.
One more chance to see her.
To say goodbye properly… or maybe to not say goodbye at all.
With a single beat of his wings, he turned sharply, the wind roaring in his ears.
Let’s go back, he murmured to his dragon. Back to the Manticore village.
His dragon looked over his shoulder, seeing Bálint watching them with concern. With a low, mourning series of coughs, his dragon rose higher, soaring toward the place where they had left part of their hearts behind.
Bálint stood on the edge of the balcony, one hand gripping the railing as he watched Jabir disappear into the sky, a glint of sapphire and silver swallowed by clouds. The wind tugged at his dark, messy curls. His heart tugged harder.
That wasn’t a joy-flight.
That was escape.
And Jabir—his Jabir, the goofball who could identify every ship model in the galaxy by silhouette and had a snack stash so big, it needed its own drawer in the treehouse—had flown away with pain carved into every wingbeat.
“I’m not letting you go like that,” Bálint murmured.
He pivoted, nearly colliding with a hovering hexer-goblin. “Oh, sorry. I—Would it be possible to get a breakfast cart delivered to Zohar’s room?”
“Of course, your Majesty. Right away,” the goblin replied with a cheerful smile.
Bálint shook his head as the creature disappeared with a click of its thin, greenish fingers. A bemused smile tugged at his lips before he shook his head and focused back on the task at hand—figuring out what to do about Jabir.
He crossed through the living room area of his and Jabir’s chambers and exited. At the end of the hall, he started knocking loudly on doors, calling for everyone to wake up. Doors flung open, and voices rose in confusion.
Ten minutes later, Zohar’s room was a tangle of limbs and crumbs, the gang all crammed in. Zohar lounged shirtless in a pile of cushions, licking chocolate off his fingers with an expression of reverence on his face. Roam sat in the loveseat with one leg thrown over the side, munching on a fresh-baked biscuit the size of his hand filled with egg, meat, and cheese. Spring sat next to Roam, her long legs draped over Roam’s other leg, nibbling on a fruit tart. Amber and Jade sat on the floor, munching and playing with a demented symbiot. Alice and Adaline sat in matching chairs near the snack cart, their faces still soft with sleep. Phoenix stood near the window, lost in thought.
“Guys…” Bálint said, his heart hammering, “Jabir’s thinking about staying here.”
That snapped them to attention.
Phoenix blinked as if coming out of a daze, turned, and stared at him.
“What?” she asked.
Zohar straightened. “Wait—what are you talking about?”
Roam lifted his head with a growl-like sound. “Staying? Like, not going back to Valdier?”
“Exactly.” Bálint’s voice was grim. “He told me this morning. Said he doesn’t think he wants to go back. That he feels like he fits here. That if it weren’t for his parents… there’d be nothing waiting for him.”
The room fell into stunned silence.
“Is it something we did?” Alice asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
“I don’t know,” Bálint admitted. “Maybe. I mean… Roam, Zohar, me—we’ve been teasing him a lot lately. About the way he eats like a vacuum, how he doesn’t take training seriously.”
Roam grimaced and looked back at him with a worried expression. “It wasn’t meant to hurt. We were just teasing.”
“No, but maybe it did,” Bálint said. He glanced around at them. “And it’s not like he’s lazy. You know he can name every speck on the warships. All the weapons. The modifications. Things I didn’t even know had names.”
Phoenix wrapped her arms around her waist and bit her lip, her eyes troubled. “He tutored me last semester on the biomechanics of engine propulsion integration. He basically saved my butt. I was having a horrible time with the concept until he explained it.”
Spring’s voice was gentle. “I don’t think it’s the studying that bothers him. It’s his heart.”
