Page 190 of The Space Between Stars

“Good. Get in.”

CALVEROUS

Calver had always preferred the temperate coolness of Chira’na to the heat of Nelfindar’s northern tropics. The late-winter waters of the Casowhatan were pleasantly cool, albeit in a bone-hollow sort of way. Survivor present, he hardly registered the icy spray splashing his face as he sailed their sloop through a rough patch of sea while Dex huddled, clinging to his elbows against the wind.

It had been years since Calver had used the Survivor as a cloak against Cul’Mon. He’d nearly forgotten the strain—like treading water with stones in his pockets. He’d nearly forgotten the way he’d spent his days in Fankalo’s quarters, capable of little more than sitting still as he restrained it. How quickly the memories flooded back once he opened that gate.

{You don’t have to fight me. We share the same goal.}

You’ve been using me for my powers.

{You can’t control them without me.}

I can.

{Not as I can. You don’t understand what you are. What you’re capable of. Such sweet destruction.}

Calver’s grip tightened over the lip of the bow, and he stared adamantly into the blue moving beneath him. He couldn’t void it. He had to withstand it. With a full year between now and the coronation, he didn’t want to imagine what the Survivor would be capable of if he didn’t cling to his limited control. With Dex so close, he needed to stay especially mindful. He released a slow, shuddering breath.

The Survivor clouded his every thought: Cul’Mon would capture him and force him to endure every torture, Fankalo would betray him, Dex would turn on him, Raimee wouldn’t show. There was no point to any of it. He’d forgotten how desperately, for years, he’d wished for all of this to be over. So different from the week prior: a week spent wondering what it would be like if he didn’t press the activator in the Tera’thian sewer systems on the night of Ani’s coronation. A week spent wondering if he could be worth more if he just stayed alive.

Somewhere in his mind’s eye, Raimee beamed at him. And they were alone together. Not in a cave or a palace. Certainly not in the desert. In a small adobe dwelling. Something on the hearth. Rain outside. A book in her hand. Her head on his shoulder. Nobody sucked anyone’s life away. The weight lessened.

{This future you seek cannot manifest. It’s not in your nature.}

What is my nature?

{Destruction.}

Calver flinched as it pressed down again. He nearly slipped, but rose enough to tread water. For now. For Raimee. For Dex. But he couldn’t void the truth forever. He’d charted this course long ago, alighted upon this island, and burned his boat behind him. There was only one future for him.

But, perhaps, many small destinies still lay before it.

Calver and Dex docked the boat in a cove on the fringe of the cliffs of Thaligan. In the days since Calver had let the Survivor take hold, his conversations with Dex had diminished. Where they had once spent hours signaling about the mundane—fighting, Dex’s homelife, the terrain—only simple questions and commands remained. He answered when he could, but he often ignored Dex’s queries without meaning to.

Only ten miles separated them from Steila. They spent a night and a day fishing along the shoreline. Then, the night before the Red Wing’s expected arrival, they smothered their fire and sojourned two miles inland. The grasses and sands that led to Steila’s eastern limits would give them far better cover than coming in from the coast.

Long hours passed in silence before Calver and Dex encroached upon a bluff. A rippling breeze carried the scent of salty sea and acrid smoke from beyond its rise. They dropped to their stomachs, bodies pressed against the night-cooled sand, and wriggled their way towards the crest. Calver peered down the basin at the port of Steila, sprawled beneath the moonlight.

Even at a distance and through the dark, the invasion was unmistakable. Columns of smoke rose into the night sky. Brilliant pinpricks of fires shone like smoldering rubies in the ruins of what must have been the town’s central square. Perhaps a hundred flat-roofed, adobe homes lined the even streets that descended towards the port. Their windows held no candles, and no lamps shone in the street. A single blue Tera’thian banner flapped along the shoreline.

Beneath the light of the moon, soldiers in dark uniforms marched methodically in pairs through the empty streets. Many stood watch upon the rooftops. Calver searched for indicators of a scourge, expecting to spot a misshaped heap somewhere near the center.

{You don’t have to remember.}

His jaw tightened, fingers clenching the sand as he fought to stay present. This attack was not like what had happened in Kaidech. The architecture had been left intact. The Tera’thians were maintaining a peaceful front, so that when the Red Wing arrived from the east they would suspect nothing.

“Where are the civilians?” Dex whispered.

He dared not reveal how many similar operations he’d once taken part in on Cul’Mon’s behalf.

“Somewhere in Steila?”

Dex didn’t ask how he knew, which was good. With the Survivor bearing down on him, Calver wouldn’t have been able to answer.

At the town’s heart, a tower stood like a sentinel, two stories taller than any of the low buildings. It made sense that an activator would be kept in the best possible vantage point, but it would also be an easy place to get trapped.

He hoped his protesting nerves were very, very wrong.