1
Ceredes
Commander Warverian comes at me again, his energy blade flashing. I jump back, but not far enough. He sees the opening and takes it, his metal arm gripping my throat as he lifts me from the ground and shakes me until I drop my weapon.
“You could have left with your pitiful life. All you had to do was give me my Omega.” His grip tightens.
I grin even as pain radiates along my spine. “She’s not yours.”
“She won’t be yours, either. Not when you’re dead.” His hold intensifies.
“Now!” I cry.
Jeren materializes behind Warverian and plunges dagger after dagger into his back.
The monster’s grip weakens, then fails, and I drop to the ground. I snatch up my energy blade right when Kyte’s voice rips through my mind. Just one word. “Lana.”
Jeren hears it, too, because we both race away from the Sentient commander and rush to Kyte. Lana is in his arms, the lower half of her body charred, eyes closed, lips blue.
“Heal her!” I yell as Academy ships appear overhead.
The Sentient craft takes off and jets away, several fleet ships on its tail. But I don’t care about any of it. My whole world is right here, her body battered and burned, her face pale.
“I’m out. Used up.” Kyte strokes her cheek. “Please, Lana, please stay.”
“Lana.” I bite back the wave of emotions that threaten to rip me apart from the inside out. She can’t die. Not here. Not like this.
“We have to seal the circle. Now.” Jeren meets my gaze. “If we don’t—”
“Seal it.” I don’t hesitate, putting my hand on Lana’s burned arm.
Jeren does the same, but the link doesn’t ignite. She’s not breathing.
“Kyte.” Jeren stares at him.
“Shh. I have to concentrate.” Kyte closes his eyes, and a tendril of gold wafts from his chest to Lana’s.
“Should we—” My words are burned away as the bond ignites, a blast of power exploding outward from our circle and lighting up the surface of Centari as the four of us are forged anew.
2
Lana
Have you ever stuck your finger into a light socket? Me neither. But there was that time I did it with a butter knife, instead. I was six, but I remember what it felt like to this day. A humming in my veins, white light bursting in my eyes, and a sense of paralysis that lingered long after the breaker blew, and I was left in a heap on the dingy living room carpet.
That sensation of being lit up like a Christmas tree—I feel it now. It’s bigger, though. Not the sensation of being stuck, my muscles seizing as the butter knife serves as a conduit for all the volts the wire could carry.
This time, the electricity stops inside me. It isn’t traveling somewhere else, not using me as a brief waypoint on its journey to freedom. I’m the light bulb, and I’m going to explode.
I scream so hard and loud, but the sound goes nowhere. Trapped, I feel as if my entire body is disintegrating at a cellular level, everything ripped apart. The agony is beyond anything I can even comprehend, and I want it to stop. I want to die. Then it would be over. I could go numb. Because this is something I can’t withstand. It has to end.
The screaming stops, the pain continues, and I take a hard breath.
Breathing. That’s something. I focus on it. Pushing out the burning sizzle of torment that races through me, I focus on pulling air into my lungs. The only thing I can control. The only thing that doesn’t send razors radiating through my veins.
In, then out.
In.
