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“Hey,” she says. “Look at me, Morales.”
I look over at her, locking eyes with her. She’s so tiny—shorter than me, skinny. And she’s not old by any means, but shelookslike she is and that scares me.
“I have some experience grappling with revenge and rage and recklessness, and I can tell you that it almost got Reza and myself killed once upon a time,” she says. “And Malix is not your enemy. He looks like the Separatists, sure, but so does Reza—and I learned to love him anyway.”
“I don’tlove him,” I say.
“We can talk about that when you’re back from this mission,” she snorts. “What I’m trying to say is that trust should come easily here. Your goals are aligned. You’re on the same side. And you know you can trust Taraven, even if he’s alien too.”
“What if things go sideways?” I ask. “If we’re separated. If feelings get…complicated.”
“I trust that you’ll handle it,” she says. She squeezes my shoulder again and gives me a muted—but encouraging—smile. “You’re our human emissary on this op. I wouldn’t send you if I didn’t trust you.”
“And what about Gus?” I ask.
Mai bites her lip, then shakes her head. “I don’t know if I’m necessarily entitled to speak on this,” she says, “but I don’t think Gus would have wanted you to be alone forever. Even if you think it’s a strength, it’s more of a weakness—and I would know.”
I close my eyes and sigh, willing the tears not to fall. Despite myself, a tear slips down my cheek, and I flick it away fast enough that I smack myself in the face. When I open my eyes, Mai is laughing.
“Hey,” I say, “was that talk friendly enough that I might actually get a hug for once?”
She shakes her head. “When you get back—thenyou’ll get your hug.”
I snort. “I’m gonna hold you to that.”
“You better,” she says. “I’m counting on seeing you back aboard Jaya in a couple weeks, once this weapon is neutralized. Understand?”
“Understood,” I say, raising my hand in a salute.
And as I head back toward Ikaray, I tell myself that must mean she believes we’ll succeed—and not that she thinks we’re going to our deaths.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
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TARAVEN
Our flight on this last hop is entirely manual, and it reminds me that we are, in fact, home. Riding inside azephtanis different when they aren’t traveling through transdimensional space; you feel the effects of zero-gravity more than usual, and there are more bumps along the way. Especially in a juvenilezephtan, those bumps are even more prominent.
Ikaray doesn’t know how to make her passengers comfortable, and I have a feeling Ravik doesn’t care to work on that.
I check on oxygen levels throughout the flight, distracted by the strange makeup of plants inside Ikaray. Whenzephtanare young, they eat whatever they can get their mouths on, and they have this habit of eating things that could prove toxic to crew. That means I’m busy ensuring our survival as we make the final trek to Liatra, swimming through the stars and bypassing the other Houses.
I break for a moment only in the front half of our short trip, to look out at the ruins of Zanpi. I have rarely seen my home planet since we were forced to flee decades ago, and even now I dread seeing what it looks like. I stand beside Ravik as we pass by, gazing at Zanpi through Ikaray’s eyes. Its green forests are razed to the ground, the planet’s surface brown and cracked where it once was blue. On one side, a massive scorch mark scores the earth where a horrible weapon was unleashed on our people, burning the planet’s largest city to ruins.
“This is what Dalphox will do to us if we don’t run,” Ravik murmurs.
“This is what he’ll do to the whole galaxy if we don’t stop him,” I reply.
??
Liatra is considered the jewel of the Five Houses, a planet of sands and oceans. Here, the warlords and generals of the Divine keep decadent homes on the coast, defended by large cohorts of select guards. Many of them keep their mates here on Liatra, pampered and protected in towers of ivory and gold.
The planet’s largest city is known as Oasis—our destination. Ravik flies us there, coasting through all of the scans we feared. Ikaray does some grumbling along the way, but she gets us there safely in the end, the ship shaking as we set down in port.
I head up to the cortex for the last time, the walk up the spine too short. Ravik is standing behind Ikaray’s eyes, staring out at the milling crowds of Skoropi and the sea beyond them. He doesn’t turn to face me, even though I’m certain he hears my footsteps as I go to meet Frankie and Malix beside the hatch.
“Don’t leave without us,” I murmur. “Please.”
