Epilogue
EPILOGUE
PART ONE
Sie
“Get dressed.” Tezya burst into my pod. We’d been on the spacecraft for months now.
“Ever heard of knocking?” I snapped at him as I grabbed onto the waistband of my towel. Not that the fabric was going to come undone, but more out of habit.
“I had my senses locked on your pod, and I knew you finished showering.” He shrugged.
“What’s so important that couldn’t wait until I was dressed then?”
“We’re about to land.”
I whipped my head toward the circular window in my pod. To be honest, I hadn’t paid attention to anything outside the craft. It all looked the same after the first month.
But now I could glimpse the planet. It was small, barely visible, and I couldn’t make out anything but a blur of colors, but it was there.
I knew we were supposed to be landing soon, but I thought it’d take a couple more days.
“Shit,” I blew out a breath, running my fingers through my wet hair as adrenaline coursed through me. I wanted nothing more than to get off the ship.
“So get dressed,” Tezya repeated. “We should be landing in an hour, and there’s a lot we have to do.”
I was about to respond when Scotlind entered my pod the next second. Her cheeks instantly flushed as she took me in. “Sorry, Sie. I didn’t know you were…”
“It’s nothing you haven’t seen before.” I smirked as the Fire Prince momentarily frowned.
“Like I said, get dressed. Meet us outside your door in two minutes.” His voice was calm, but his stance was anything but.
As soon as the door to my pod closed, purple hair flashed in my vision. I was seconds away from dropping my towel… “Shit, Savannah. I told you to stop doing that.”
“Doing what?” She smiled as she plopped onto my bed. Well, I guess it was her bed. She made it part of her deal that she got access to my pod, which left me with the uncomfortable as shit floor. And if I thought Tennebris was cold, it was nothing compared to being in space in a craft made entirely of steel.
“You know this would be a perfect time to tell them I’m here,” she said as she braided her hair down her back. It was starting to grow past her shoulders from the six months we’d been here.
“No, it’s not. No one can know I brought you yet.”
Her bottom lip puckered out. “Are we still on that? Tezya just said we’re landing in an hour. I highly doubt we have enough fuel for him to turn around and take me back to Earth.”
“This craft is run off of electric users like Rainer. We don’t need fuel, so yeah, he could.”
“Whatever. He wouldn’t do that.”
“You really want to risk it now?” I asked. “If Tezya decides to send you back, I don’t care what deal you and I made, I won’t stop him.”
She slumped further onto my bed as she crossed her arms. “I’m sick of sneaking around. I wanted to explore the ship without having to hide for once.”
Something told me she’d already explored every inch of it. I made it very clear that I wasn’t catering to her, and she’d have to fend for herself, which she took seriously.
The fact that she even managed to wander the halls of this place without being seen was beyond me, and she was gone almost every day, only turning up at night to sleep or to piss me off like she was now. And since coming onto The Miles , it seemed we weren’t going to shy away from technology now that we were attempting to merge both kingdoms, so there were cameras everywhere.
“Turn around,” I snapped. “I’m changing.”
She shrugged but kept staring, so I entered her mind, which was something I found myself doing often since she became my unwanted roommate. Fine, don’t turn around. I dropped my towel before walking slowly over to my dresser to get a matching onyx set of sweatpants. She gave Tezya a bunch of mortal clothes from Brighta before we took off, and I was surprised by how much I fucking loved them.
I cursed as I went to open the drawer with my right hand out of habit, and the stupid thing wouldn’t work. It was temperamental, and so far I could only manage touching my pointer finger to my thumb. Even with Brock’s help there was little to no improvement in the stupid appendage. I spent hours doing pointless physical exercises every damn day, but nothing worked.
I grabbed the clothes with my left hand and forced the hoodie over my wet hair. “Stay here. I mean it,” I snapped before I opened the door to my pod to meet Scotlind and Tezya outside.
Peter was with them, his green eyes blazing into mine. How’s the no bread thing going? I teased as he bit into what we were told was beef jerky.
Freaking horrible. I’m dying inside, and I can’t wait to get off this spacecraft so we can have real food again. I need a dozen warm croissants, no, make that hundreds. I’d eat hundreds of them right now.
I laughed.
“If we aren’t landing for another hour, what’s so important that you needed me now?”
“We need to make an announcement,” Tezya said. “Let everyone know the process when we land. We don’t want—”
“Fuck,” I cursed as the circular door to my pod slid open, and I knew without looking that Savannah came out into the hall.
Everyone stilled like they were looking at a ghost, and I guess to them they were.
Peter smirked as he looked between me, Savannah, and the door she just came out of. Don’t even think about fucking saying anything.
“What is she doing here?” Tezya was fuming, looking directly at me.
“She wanted to come.” I shrugged, trying to play it off, but I was going to murder the girl later.
“So you just let her?” he seethed.
“Wow. Nice to see you too, Tezya. I missed you so much.” She crossed her arms over her chest, and the movement drew my attention to her. She had one of my sweatshirts on, and even though I yelled at her every time she stole my clothes, I was starting to like seeing her in them. I knew she only did it because it was cold as shit in the halls for an Advenian, so being mortal, I couldn’t even fathom how she wasn’t freezing from the inside out. The sleeves went well past her hands, which she had rolled four times so she could use them.
“Sav, do you realize what you just did by coming here? I told you to stay on Earth, not because I didn’t want you to come, but because I wanted you to live. ”
“What do you mean?” I asked, whipping my head to the Fire Prince.
“Allium was tested to be habitable for Advenian life, and while our anatomies are similar, they aren’t the same. There’s no way to know if she’ll survive the moment she steps off the craft.”
I turned to look at Savannah, wondering if she knew what she was risking by coming with us.
“Well, there’s one way to find out, right?” She attempted to smile.
“Sav, you can die. This isn’t just some hike to see something new, and now you’re surrounded by Advenians forever. You can’t just go back to Earth whenever you’re homesick. You can’t see Ichi or have ramen. It means no more coffee…”
I didn’t bother adding that she snuck a boatload of instant coffee into my pod. She’d been rationing it, and I had no desire to be around her whenever she finally ran out. She already was putting up a hissy fit when she could only have one cup a day instead of her usual three.
“It’s not like we aren’t used to it, Tez,” she said as the sleeve of my sweatshirt rolled down, making it hard to take her seriously. “We’ve grown up around more Advenians than humans our entire lives.”
“ We …” Tezya growled, and I stilled.
She bit her lip as my gaze turned toward her again. “I may have snuck Wells into the craft too. I couldn’t just leave him, and he felt the same way I did.”
“You WHAT?” Tezya snapped. “How could you be so stupid, Sav?”
“What did you want us to do? Go join a mortal college and try to blend in with our kind when we’re so far from it? You guys are the only family we’ve ever known, and Wells and I didn’t want to lose anyone else.”
Tezya glared at me and somehow I knew what he wanted. What? I snapped as I opened my mind to him.
You’re in charge of them. If she dies, it’s on you, and she better not fucking die.