“After that reaction, I’m kinda glad I didn’t.”
He gave her a flat look.
“Are you sure you don’t hate me?” she asked.
“Not possible, I’m afraid,” he rumbled. “But, can we put a moratorium on secrets?”
“Copy that. No more secrets,” she agreed, but the last words caught in her throat. Her brow creased and she looked down.
“Shit,” he sighed. “I get the distinct feeling you have more secrets?”
“Not a secret.” She glanced over at the humming diagnostic machine nearby. “Just, this seizure you had…”
He followed her gaze, then looked back at her, taking a deep breath before letting it back out slowly. “Let me guess. Ripping the Tempus free of the Divide was a bad idea?”
“You saved the crew, Griffith,” she said firmly. “They’d all have died if you hadn’t.”
“But?”
“But … left in the cockpit, you were exposed.”
“To what?”
“We’re not entirely sure. You met Cavalon?”
He tilted his chin toward the doorway across the room. “The doctor kid? Yeah.”
“He ran some tests on your tissue. Your cells appear to be … aging at an accelerated rate. Something to do with how you broke free of the Divide.”
“Aging?” he croaked. “Okay. How accelerated? At the same rate as the Divide? Twelve times?”
She shook her head. “I’d hoped that was the case, but no. If your cells continue at the rate they have been…” She trailed off, unable to find the words. It wasn’t right, wasn’t natural. He shouldn’t have to deal with this, and she shouldn’t have to tell him.
“Mo’acair,” he said softly. “Just tell me, I can handle it.”
She looked down and a single tear escaped the corner of her eye. He wiped it away with his thumb.
“Twenty-four hours,” she managed. “Maybe a little more.”
He didn’t react at first, simply staring at her and continuing to breathe evenly. After a few long moments of silence, his voice returned, steady as ever. “You know why I picked Myrdin before? Over Sobrius-II?”
She looked up at him, surprised at his casual turn of topic. “Why?”
“Because they have great thunderstorms.”
She scoffed a laugh. “Thunderstorms?”
“Yeah. I miss that about being groundside. Wind and rain and thunder and lightning. Tangible nature. Not this space shit with its time ripples and relativity and radiative flux, or what-the-fuck-ever.”
“Void,” she breathed, her lips turning into a pained grin. “You don’t know shit about space, do you?”
He laughed, stilted and pained, but sincere. She took comfort in the soft rumble. “No. Certainly not.” He rubbed his weathered face with a pale hand and sighed. “I know enough at this point to consider it bullshit, though.”
She laid her head onto his chest, and he wrapped both arms around her, his beard scratching her forehead as he nestled his face into her.
“Myrdin, it is,” she whispered.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Cavalon sat across from Griffith at the circular table aboard the SGL, drawing the Titan’s blood. Again. He wasn’t entirely sure why. Well, he knew why: because Rake had told him to. But he didn’t know what she meant for him to accomplish.