Chapter 64
It’s the day of the Sundial’s launch, and Hela is dreaming about a conversation that already happened.
She’s sitting in a teahouse. Its support beams are painted bright red and the walls are lined with low benches, each one upholstered in colorful patterns.
The room is packed with couples leaning over small tables, their feet and hands brushing.
Hela and Parin look out of place only because they aren’t gazing lovingly at each other.
“You ever take a date here?” Hela says.
“No. Too cheesy.”
“Some people like a little cheesiness,” Hela points out.
“Some people like you?” He picks up the glass teapot on the table between them. Inside it is a single orange goldfish swimming around. Dream logic.
“I wish you’d come with us on the Sundial,” she says.
“I would, but my uncle . . .” Parin shrugs. Parin’s uncle has what he likes to call a “delicate constitution.” “Besides, there’s no room for me anyway. Tight crew.”
“I know.”
“Be safe, okay?” he says, and she understands, just for a moment, how he manages to win over so many paramours. Soulful eyes. Soft voice.
“Yeah,” she says, and both of them look toward the door, where Rava Vidar is charging in with her sword held high.
“Time to go, I think,” Parin says, and Hela nods. And wakes.
When she opens her eyes, her blankets are bunched up at the foot of her slim cot on the Sundial.
The ship is already launching, and has been for at least twenty--four hours—-a vessel large enough to sustain a journey this long takes a long time to get moving. The only sign that anything’s changed is a faint hum in the walls and the urgent feet of the engineering staff in the hallways.
She checked the news pavilion before she spoke to Parin yesterday.
There are still no hints anywhere about Elegy’s coup with the Sundial.
No one has reported that the ship was cleared for launch by two generals and the Quorum instead of the Sword herself.
Larke seems content to pretend that it was her plan all along—-to announce that the Sundial would be converted into a museum as a cover for finally launching it with her sister on board—-which is just fine, as far as Hela is concerned.
A tapping sound makes Hela straighten. She drops the blanket and looks up to see Forint in her doorway, looking even more worn than the last time she saw him.
“She’s asking for you,” he says.
Hela gets to her feet and follows him into the hallway.
She’s been hearing about the Sundial all her life.
A little ship that would seek out strangers in another solar system—-Elegy spoke of it like a beautiful dream.
The reality, though, is a tight space built with ruthless efficiency.
She’s in the women’s barracks, in a five--high stack of beds.
“Arias’s with her now?” Hela says, as she falls into step beside him.
He walks like a soldier, she notices, with his hands clasped behind him and his shoulders back.
“He just left, had to report in for the launch,” he says. “Did you check in with the security team about Nyx?”
“She’s fine. They’re giving her a wide berth.”
Rava is imprisoned across the ship, locked in a storage room converted to a cell, with a rotating security detail.
Nyx is right beside her. General Thompson was kind enough to start drafting the contract guaranteeing her protected status as soon as they arrived.
Not that a Cedrae contract means much to a Talusar soldier, but it will mean something to the people on the Sundial.
They turn the corner and step into the Priory—-the quiet part of the Sundial where the essential crew live. She walks back and forth down this hallway twenty times a day now.
Theren, Arias, and Hela have been taking turns staying with Elegy as the Fever progresses.
There were some arguments in the beginning about whether she should eat—-Theren said no, Hela said yes—-and how they should handle the flow of information outside of this hallway—-Arias advocated for informing the ship’s commander that she was sick, Hela said absolutely not—-but they’ve ironed most of those things out.
Now all that’s left to do is wait for her to die.
She’s right outside Elegy’s door when Theren stops her with a gentle touch to the elbow. He’s gentle in general, Hela has realized. Quiet and careful. She isn’t sure what to do with someone like that. She can’t needle him like she does everyone else.
“You should know,” Theren says, “she’s seeing things.”
“Seeing things.”
“People.” Theren tilts his head a little. “Shir, mostly.”
She finds herself wishing, as she has a few times the last few days, that he was easier to read.
“Is that normal?” she says.
“Happened to me.”
She thinks of asking him who he saw. But then she thinks better of it, and opens the door to Elegy’s room.
It’s one of the bigger living spaces on the Sundial, which isn’t saying much.
The walls are gray, but warm light seems to emanate from them, so she feels like she’s standing inside a lantern.
A screen along one wall—-made to look like a window, just like the ones that are so common on Cedre Station—-shows footage of a forest during a rainstorm.
The sound of the droplets against the leaves plays gently in the background.
Elegy sits on a cushion, her knees bent and her arms wrapped loosely around them, staring up at the trees.
Hela goes to sit next to her. This close to the screen, the trees are the only thing she can see.
Elegy looks like she’s dying. There’s no other way for Hela to think of it. She’s paler than she’s ever been, and sweaty. The skin under her eyes is purple. Her lips are almost colorless. She blinks at Hela for a few seconds before recognizing her.
“Hela,” she says, and she smiles. “You came.”
“Of course I came, El,” Hela says. “I heard you wanted to see me.”
“Shir wanted to meet you,” Elegy says, and she bumps her shoulder to the right, like there’s someone sitting on her other side. “He wants to hear all the embarrassing childhood stories.”
Hela’s chest aches.
“Oh boy,” Hela says. “Buckle up, Shir, you’re in for quite a ride.”
Elegy laughs, and Hela begins.