Chapter 24
Chapter Twenty-Four
VENNOX
The twin suns were just breaking the horizon, their first pale light bleeding across the stone pathway, when I finally turned toward my hut.
My body carried the pleasant exhaustion of the previous suns-fall, every muscle in my shoulders and arms ached from the unfamiliar effort of piloting.
Vallon had been relentless, drilling me through maneuver after maneuver until every movement became instinct instead of thought, until my palm knew exactly how to guide the smooth control sphere and the craft responded as though it were an extension of my own body.
I flexed my fingers, working out the lingering feel of the Gretolic controls.
They’d felt strange at first, too light and responsive under my sword hand.
But Vallon hadn’t been wrong. That craft slid through the jungle canopy like a spirit, silent and unseen, even to the wetlocks.
I’d held us suspended just above a floratrap as it bloomed, those massive petals unfurling right beneath our hull. It never knew we were there.
The path curved. My hut came into view at the far end, the single solaris orb beside the doorway casting its steady light across the pale stone. And there—
Quin was asleep at my door.
Her back against the stone, her legs stretched out in front of her, her chin tipped slightly toward her shoulder.
The kiltus-dress she wore looked right on her in a way I had not anticipated, and her dark hair had dried in waves that fell across her face, one strand caught at the corner of her mouth.
The silver shawl she wore was pulled carefully across her chest, the fabric tucked neatly at her neckline where I knew the shawra glowed beneath it.
Her hands rested in her lap, loose and open, and her breath came in the deep, even rhythm of true sleep.
After everything, on her first suns-fall on Valose, she had walked across the city and sat down at my door.
I crouched beside her and stayed there for a long moment, doing nothing, simply committing her face to memory.
She did not stir. Her breath remained deep and even, her face turned slightly toward the warmth of the solaris orb as though it had been keeping watch over her.
I hesitated. Part of me wanted to let her sleep.
The selfish part. The part that had carried her through a hyper-jump with her hand locked in mine and had not forgotten the weight of her.
To sit beside her in the quiet and watch the rise and fall of her chest and pretend, for just a little while, that this was how every suns-fall ended.
I reached out and brushed the strand of hair away from the corner of her mouth. Her breathing shifted, and then she opened her eyes.
The smile came before she was fully awake. Before she'd remembered where she was or gathered her composure or decided how much of herself to offer. Just a smile, wide and unguarded and aimed at me, and for one undefended moment I felt the full weight of what I was going to lose when she left.
She would return to Earth. She had said so, and meant it, and I had promised myself I would not make her carry my grief alongside her own conflict.
Whatever time we had, I was going to hold it carefully.
Savor it the way you savor the last of a fire before the wood runs out. Let it be enough, because it had to be.
She pushed herself upright against the stone, brushing her hair back from her face with both hands, blinking the last of sleep away.
"I was waiting for you. Elise showed me where you live.
" She looked around, taking in the pathway, the dome's soft glow against the jungle beyond.
"I didn't mean to fall asleep on your doorstep. "
"I am glad you did." I grinned. “You saved me a walk to the palace, as I was headed there to find you. I have a surprise for you.”
“For me?”
I pushed to my feet in a single smooth motion and extended my hand down to her. “Come with me.”
She looked at my hand, and then took it. “Where?”
“If I tell you, it will ruin the surprise.”
She huffed in exaggerated surrender, though the corners of her mouth betrayed her amusement.
"Fine," she said. "Keep your secrets."
"I intend to."
Still holding her hand, I led her through the awakening city.
The pathways were beginning to fill as males headed toward their duties, and the few females who lived in the city emerged from their homes, speaking with neighbors in the soft luminescence of solaris rocks that had not yet surrendered completely to the growing light of the twin suns.
Greetings followed us wherever we walked.
The training field came into view beyond the last row of huts. We followed the path as it straightened, a row of solaris orbs set apart at even, regular intervals leading toward the field's northern edge.
Rovers rested in a neat row near one end, the familiar silhouettes small and low against the ground, the broader, heavier frame of a hauler beside them.
Both sat dwarfed by what waited beyond. Dozens of oval, seamless Gretolic craft arranged in neat lines, floating silent and motionless above the hard-packed earth.
Quin's eyes widened. "Are those the rovers you promised to teach me to ride?"
"They are." I smiled at the curiosity already brightening her face. "To the right are the rovers, and next to them are Gretolic craft salvaged after the invasion."
She slowly turned back toward me.
"So..." She folded her arms with playful suspicion. "Am I learning to drive a rover or a salvaged Gretolic craft?"
I chuckled. "Neither."
Her brow furrowed. "Then what exactly is this mysterious surprise?"
Instead of answering, I guided her past the rows of craft toward what appeared to be an empty stretch of training field marked by two white stones.
"Vennox..." She looked down at the stones before sweeping her gaze across the empty ground beyond. “The view of the city?”
“No.”
"But… there isn't anything here."
"There is."
She frowned harder. "I don't..."
I reached out and pressed my palm against what appeared to be empty air. Cool, smooth hull met my touch, exactly where my eyes insisted nothing existed. A seam split beneath my palm, and the hatch slid open, the craft's cloaked surface parting to reveal the cabin within.
Quin yelped and stumbled backward so quickly I barely caught her elbow before she lost her balance.
"What the hell!"
The hatch slid open to reveal a compact, spherical cabin that hadn’t been there a moment before.
At the front, a single console held a smooth control sphere beneath where the pilot’s hand would rest. Lights glimmered like scattered stars across nearly every surface.
The hull was transparent, so clear it seemed to vanish, leaving the city laid out around us as though we were standing in open air.
Quin stared from the open hatch to the empty air surrounding it, then back again. "What... is... that?"
“Vallon said the females call it a bubble craft,” I said, offering her my hand once more. “Come on, this is only the beginning of what I have planned.”
Quin accepted my hand and stepped through the narrow opening.
Her grip tightened the moment both feet crossed the threshold, and the city remained visible around her through the transparent hull.
She turned slowly, taking in the curved walls and the thousands of tiny lights scattered across nearly every surface.
“This is incredible,” she breathed. “So we are invisible while inside the craft?”
“Yes. That is part of what makes the craft useful.” I released her hand and moved toward the command console. “The cloaking field hides it from anything outside, while those within can still see their surroundings.”
She followed closely, her gaze shifting to the smooth sphere embedded in the console. I hovered my palm over it and mock-demonstrated the slight movements Vallon had drilled into me through the dark hurs.
“This controls the direction of the craft. Push forward, and we move forward. Draw it back to slow or reverse. The slightest movement to either side changes our course, so you must keep your hand steady. Lifting or lowering your hand against the curve changes our height.”
Quin leaned closer, studying the control sphere with the same concentration she gave unfamiliar plant life. “That’s it? No steering wheel, pedals, or flight stick?”
“I do not know what any of those things are, but this is the primary control.” I pointed out several of the illuminated switches surrounding it. “These activate the power source.”
“There is only one seat,” I admitted, gesturing toward the narrow Gretolic chair positioned behind the console. “It was designed for a much smaller species.”
Quin glanced between the seat and me. “You fit in that?”
“Fit is perhaps too generous a word.”
From the compartments in the back of the craft, I stowed my sword and retrieved the thick cushion I had placed there before leaving the craft on the field, taken from one of the palace storage rooms. It went down where Quin would have an unobstructed view through the hull.
“Vallon says passengers ride seated on the floor, but I thought this would be more comfortable.”
Her expression softened as she looked from the cushion to me. “You planned all of this before you came looking for me?”
“I promised you a tour of the Huren jungle. This craft is much safer than the rovers.”
The answering warmth through our shared essence strengthened. Quin lowered herself onto the cushion and tucked her legs to one side, close enough that her shoulder nearly brushed my knee once I took the pilot’s seat.
I turned sideways and forced my hips between the narrow arms of the chair.
The hard edges bit into my thighs, and the backrest ended well below my shoulders.
Vallon had laughed until he could barely breathe the first time I attempted to sit in it.
After several hurs inside the cursed thing, I had learned there was no dignified way for a Valosian warrior to fit into a seat built for a Gretolic.