Page 137 of Bride of the Enemy Alien

Relief lasts about two seconds before the next fear arrives.

“Can it still control him?”

She hesitates. I already know I’m not going to like the answer.

“Not that I can see.”

“But you can’t promise that?”

“No.”

I hate her honesty, but I trust her because she gives it. Merra steps aside.

“He woke a few minutes ago. Try not to make him prove anything.”

“I never do that.” She stares, slowly arching one eyebrow. “Fine. I rarely do it on purpose.”

“Kessa.”

“Fine, I know.”

Merra sighs. “I know you know.”

I walk in.

Rhazek is awake on the low treatment bed, propped against folded blankets. Linen wraps crisscross his ribs and shoulder. The left wing is bound close to his back. Fresh salve darkens the burn along his forearm, and the old collar scar beneath his throat is swollen over the buried command anchor.

He looks terrible, but he’s alive. I have to stop in the doorway and get myself under control before I cross the room. He looks up with his one open eye and finds me.

“Kessa.”

My name is only my name. No accompanying green flare. No machine waiting for either of us to move. I set the tea down before the tremble in my hands causes me to drop it.

“You look awful.”

“Merra said worse.”

“Merra has higher standards.”

“She threatened to remove my spine if I tried to stand.”

“Don’t stress it. That means she likes you.”

“Hmm,” he says, coughing. “I had reached the opposite conclusion.”

I stop beside the bed. He doesn’t reach for me. So I hold out my hand. He looks at it, then at me.

“May I?”

“Please.” He takes my hand so carefully I look down at our joined fingers. “You don’t need permission to hold my hand every time.”

“I would rather ask too often than take once.”

That shuts me up. Annoying male.

I sit on the edge of the bed, careful of his wing and the wraps around his ribs. For a while neither of us speaks.

The City makes enough noise for both of us. Feet in the corridor. Someone calling for fresh water. A child crying and then stopping. Stone scraping somewhere farther down as a brace crew begins repairing whatever tried to fall in the night.