“What the hells!” Tyler roars.
Aurora’s right iris burns with that same light, leaking through the cracks around her eye. I feel her tremble in my arms, and I turn to my father and roar over the rising pulse of that beautiful, awful song.
“Father, help her!”
The enemy swarms closer, ever closer. Hunger and want and death. The light within the World Ship flares again, a colorless tear opening in the universe’s skin. Blood spills over Aurora’s lips, and my heart twists as I see they are curled in a smile.
“Yes,” she whispers. “Oh yes.”
“That’s it!” Tyler shouts. “FoldGate is open! All units, retreat! Retreat!”
With one last vicious swipe of his hands, my father turns from the carnage outside and reaches to the ship around us. I hear the Neridaa’s tune change in pitch, feel the swell of vertigo as we begin to move, the black ablaze. I cling to Aurora, holding on to her as if to keep her from drowning as we drop through the shimmering FoldGate.
The rift hurls us across the vast gulf of space, screaming and blurring. I can taste ash in the air, feel my body stretching, the space around me folding, power singing at the tips of shaking, bloody fingers, rainbows running to black and white and then to full and glorious color again.
And then, in another flash of impossible light, it is over.
We are safe.
I hold Aurora in my arms, keeping her upright. Her eyelids are heavy, flickering as if she were dreaming. Her chin is sticky with blood.
“Aurora?” I ask. “Can you hear me?”
I press my hand to her cheek, pleading.
“Aurora!”
“Well done, Terran,” comes a hollow rasp. “I am almost impressed.”
I look over my shoulder, to the shadow at my back. My father sits upon his throne, cloak flowing down the stairs like a crimson waterfall. His eyes are bruised, chin smudged with faint violet where he is wiping away the blood. I can see the cracks in his face run a little deeper, his shoulders slumped—just the slightest signs of strain from his ordeal. But for him to show weakness at all tells me how badly this has hurt him.
How much it has cost them both.
“Are you well?” I ask.
He rubs his brow, wincing. “I did not think you cared, Kaliis.”
“Of course I care,” I growl. “Without you, we will never find our way home. We will never defeat the Ra’haam.”
“Victory at any cost.”
He looks at me, eyes glittering as he smiles.
“That’s my boy.”
“K-Kal?”
I turn as Aurora whispers, squeezing her tight. Her hair is draped over her face in curtains of black and white, soaked with sticky red. I smooth it back and press my lips to her brow, my breath catching at the blood smeared upon her lips, her chin, the shadowed hollows around her eyes.
“Aurora …”
“Are w-we … are we s-safe?”
“Yes.” I run my thumb across her lips, gently wiping away the blood. “We are safe, be’shmai. You did it. You did it.”
“Oh,” she sighs. “Good …”
Aurora blinks hard, looking to the glittering crystal around us.
A trickle of red spills from her ears.
And then she collapses in my arms.
21
TYLER
I admit this is a lot of trouble just to make a phone call.
It took me two days Folding without a break to reach the Aurora FoldGate in time for the Galactic Summit, and my brain is a little fried as a result. Not as bad as the members of Squad 303, who’ve spent the last forty-eight hours welded into a detention cell. But still, my headache isn’t playing around.
I tried to explain my side of things to Cohen and her squaddies as I slipped their rations through the tiny hatch in the door, but they weren’t really in the mood to listen. On the plus side, I’ve learned some choice new Syldrathi insults if I ever bump into Saedii’s lieutenant Erien again.
Security around the FoldGate into the Aurora system was just as heavy as I expected. With the galaxy on the brink of a dozen wars, and representatives from every sentient species in the milieu arriving for the summit, I honestly had no hope of sneaking in here undetected.
But now, thanks to Cohen, I don’t have to.
“Passcodes received, ident confirmed, 303,” comes the reply down comms. “You are cleared for landing in Bay Omega, Berth 7420.”
“Roger that, Aurora,” I reply. “7420. Out in the sticks, huh?”
“Yeah, apologies, 303. We’re slammed up here with the influx of civis. It’s gonna be a while before your ship gets a refit and refuel, too. Forty hours at least. Report to your deck commander for debrief.”