CHAPTER 24

Hon covers me while my weapon cools down.

A goon leans out, and the pirate captain takes him in the head. His face chars black in the center, the damage raying outward as he falls forward. From around the corner, his mates pull him back out of sight, like we’re going to keep shooting his corpse.

I can hear the hushed discussion of what to do. I guess Hon got their leader. Nobody is surprised when they all pop out at once, slamming shots into the floor near us. I scramble back and take cover while Evelyn shoots. She nails one in the shoulder, and his scream echoes down the hallway. If they don’t get him help soon, he’ll die of shock.

They fall back and regroup. More whispering. The dying man groans his agony, wordless now. Laser pistols aren’t as cruel as disruptors, but they’re no less lethal. My weapon hums, telling me it’s ready to discharge again. I use the sight and ease onto my stomach, waiting. Movement draws my fire. I miss, but this won’t end until we kill them.

I didn’t start this, but we’ll finish it.

The fight turns into a slaughter. By the time we’re done, Hon has killed four, I dropped two, and Evelyn accounted for the one she took in the shoulder. Though I’d have expected her to be troubled by it, she seems to want off this station too much to let shock take hold of her. Since she’s been trapped here for a while, I don’t blame her.

As it turns out, Hon wasn’t bluffing about having alerted the crew, but they come in a little too late to join the battle. Instead, they work cleanup. We’ll take the corpses with us, disperse their molecules, and space the dust. Harsh, I know, but it’s better than leaving a trail this wide to follow. Better for their employers, whoever they are, to wonder what became of their thugs. We can’t allow the wrong parties to follow us back to Emry before we’re ready for battle.

Dina has wiped the cameras down, offering looped footage instead of a record of what actually happened. If we’re lucky, nobody will have been watching the feed live, so we don’t have to worry about security heading our way. But that’s a hope, not a surety. We need to move fast now.

Doubtless they’ll wonder about all the scorch marks, but we can’t do anything about them. Dina leads the way back to the ship, and I don’t relax fully until we’re on board. She takes Evelyn to a vacant berth where she can settle; Loras goes with them.

That leaves Hon and me to make our way to the cockpit. My nerves flutter at the idea of doing this again. It hurt so damn much the first time that my whole body has tensed in anticipation of pain. Letting the phase drive use my body as a conduit isn’t one of my more prudent notions, though I’m not exactly known for caution in any case.

Hon offers me a canny look. “You sure you can do this again? March’ll kill me if I deliver you as an empty shell. Now we got Evelyn, we can afford to go back slow. Maybe.”

I know what he means: mind gone, flesh intact. That’s the worst part of burnout—it leaves your loved ones to clean up the mess. And to be honest, no, I’m not sure, but despite his attempt at kindness, we don’t have the time for a long haul in straight space from the nearest beacon. We’d be sitting ducks the whole time, fair game for any Morgut ship able to come through wherever they choose. Unlike human ships, slow and limited in comparison.

Except for me, except for mine.

I tell myself again, There’s no distance in grimspace. It’s all relative; therefore, I can jump from anywhere.

Just because you can, it doesn’t mean you should. I can almost hear March, saying the words. When did he become the voice inside my head?

“We don’t have a lot of choice,” I say gravely. “I’m not indispensable. Doc has my samples. In time, he can probably make more like me—and use Evelyn’s nanites to do so. It’s vital to get Evie to Emry, quick and safe; we can’t afford another attempt on her.”

This is more than me chasing adrenaline, more than me dancing on the razor’s edge for the thrill of it. For the first time, it’s not that I want to risk being sucked through the door on the far horizon. I want to live. I have people who care whether I come out sane and whole on the other side. For the first time, I’m frightened of what I’m about to do. At last, I have something too dear to lose.

He studies me for a long moment, dark eyes full of shadow. It’s just as well March isn’t here because he wouldn’t let me do this again, knowing how much it hurt me before. There’s no guarantee I’ll survive it, but that’s sort of the human condition, isn’t it?

In the end, nobody gets out alive.

At last, Hon calls the docking officer. “We’re ready for departure.”

“Acknowledged, Dauntless. Did you enjoy your stay?”

Hon glances at me. “It was . . . memorable.”

The docking officer offers the usual litany of questions. Are we departing with any new goods? Did we purchase livestock on station? We’re able to answer no to the security questions. Stations like this don’t much care about the hiring of new crew, so they only inquire about goods and services.

In all, it takes five minutes for the port authority to clear us. Thanks to Dina, they don’t know anything about the gunplay in the docking corridors. Then Hon maneuvers us out of the bay in a smooth swoop. I remember when I flew the ship, leaving his kingdom; there was never a worse pilot in the history of starfaring.

He takes us a fair distance from the station. It’s important that we get clear of the gravitational pull, if nothing else. I need a clean slate to work with—a standing jump is hard enough without detracting factors.

I take a deep breath and exhale slowly, knowing I’ll need the fortification. Oxygen floods my bloodstream as I jack in. Blind now, shades of black and gray. My hearing sharpens. I can tell the instant Hon touches his shunt, then the phase drive starts to hum. He’s letting me do this.

Then he’s with me. This time it’s different, and he’s not guarding himself so tightly. I see him flooded with concern, edged in worry-red. If it was fear, I don’t know how I’d gather my resolve to do what must be done, but he’s not afraid.

He’s raw and rough, full of hubris and ready laughter. Oh, he knows the danger of believing his own legend, and most times, he only pretends he does. I see a white-hot love of his sister, Shan, and a sad blue longing for what he’s lost. For the first time, Hon seems wholly human to me, not a larger-than-life figure.

You set?

Yes.

The phase drive hits its height, seeking that connection, and it comes harder this time because there’s more resistance in me. Oh, Mary, it’s worse this time, a thousand times worse, as if my body boils from the inside out. A scream dies in my throat as the engine turns me inside out, twists through me, to carry the ship into a horrific birth in grimspace that blazes through every cell.

Moisture runs down my face once more. I can’t tell if I’m still breathing, but I must be, because we’re only halfway there. The pain prevents me from focusing for a moment. I’m still blind, even though I’m in grimspace—and that terrifies me more than anything ever has. It takes precious, precarious seconds for the colors to flare to life in my mind, for my brain to detect the pulses echoing through distance that is not distance and translate them into something more than agony.

From far away I hear something moaning pitiably, like an animal in pain, but I have to ignore the noise. Screen it out. Emry Station. Emry Station. Emry Station—

For endless moments, I’m lost. The damage is too great. I cannot do this. We are lost—grimspace will take us.

No. Fight through, Sirantha. We’re counting on you. Hon, in my head. Can he feel how much this burns? My blood and bones are evaporating within me. I’m blazing like a chunk of cosmic rock hurtling through the atmosphere.

Not yet, he orders. Where, Sirantha? Tell me where.

There.

I am the beacon through which I must pass—and then another twist. I am the ship. I am the stars. There is no barrier between the building blocks of existence and me. Pure torment this time. There’s no pleasure, no euphoria, only unceasing misery. Hon works furiously at the ship’s controls. He’s followed my insane directives once more, done his part to bring us safely through.

But I have nothing left to give.

My whole body locks in a rictus, but it’s a blessing. I can’t feel anything now.

“Sirantha?” I hear the voice, but it’s too far, too far. Now there’s pressure on me that might be hands, but there’s no sensation of heat or warmth.

To my surprise, I realize I can see them all now: Hon, Dina, Evelyn. They’re all in the cockpit, but their distress seems trivial. I have no connection with the broken thing in the nav chair, and I want none.

“Get Doc! Right now. I don’t care if he’s sleeping. Get him on board.” Dina has her arms around my body.

On some level, I realize that means I did it. We reached Emry Station. Did Edaine—the jumper who gave her life to liberate me from Perlas—watch while they wept over her final jump? Did she whisper a farewell, unseen, unheard?

“There’s no wound,” Evelyn says. “These readings . . . the instruments must be off. How can she have lost so much blood if there’s no wound.”

Words tumble end over end, becoming sounds that make no sense, then even that goes quiet.

Peace. Peace, at last.