I closed my eyes and reached. V’dim’s turquoise thread stretched farther with every passing minute, thinning but alive, his grief a low pulse that matched my heartbeat. Beside it, Z’fir’s thread sang quieter—steady, deep-rooted, the patience of a male who loved in silences and growing things. They’d cleared the atmosphere. Past the Lunkai now, heading for their fleet waiting for them within the sol system’s perimeter.
Still there. Still mine.
I opened my eyes and let the threads thin to their resting hum. My training had worked—the stretching exercises, the meditation with Ryzen, the deliberate, painful practice of holding bonds across distances that should have shredded them. The connections were thinner but they refused to break.
Now I have to forge my own path into darkness.
“It’s time.”
Kaede materialized at my side—absent one breath, present the next, visor down, hand resting on the hilt of his psydagger with the easy readiness of a male who hadn’t truly relaxed in years. His thread pulsed with controlled urgency. Ice over fire. The particular tension he carried when he’d accepted the danger ahead and was ready to walk straight into it.
I nodded. No more stalling. No more pretending we had time.
“How are you holding?”His mental voice was quieter than his spoken one—private, tucked into the space between our minds.
“They’re past Lunaki now.”I sent him the feel of the bonds—the stretched-silk quality, thinning but whole.“Still connected.”
“Good.”He nodded, his mental voice softer.“And you?”
I looked at him—past the visor, past the armor, past the lethal composure that had kept me alive more times than I could count. Beneath it all, his thread hummed with something fierce and tender and terrified. Not of the mission. Of what could happen to me during it.
“Scared,”I admitted. No point lying to the male who knew me so well.“But ready.”
His gloved hand found the small of my back. Brief. Grounding.
“Then let’s move.”
TheAbysswaitedon the far landing pad, dark-hulled and angular, engines cycling through pre-flight ignition. Kaede’s ship—his weapon, his sanctuary, the vessel that had carried us through my rescue mission and the desperate flight from Liskta when the galaxy cracked open beneath our feet. Vowels stood at the base of the ramp, his golden mental presence calm and immovable at the edge of my awareness.
My team spread across the pad.
Ryzen leaned against the vessel, emerald runes pulsing faintly along his forearms, his spirit daggers holstered within his skin. He’d been steadier since Zirene’s departure—still fighting whatever dark silence his brother left him, but fighting it with purpose now. With the focus of a male who’d been given a mission he believed in.
Zyxel stood apart, still adjusting to his demi-human form with careful, deliberate movements. His crimson thread pulsed at the edge of my web—brighter, carrying that particular intensity of a male still learning the shape of belonging. His chartreuse eyes tracked Kaede, then the ship, then me. Cataloging. Protecting. The scholar turned sentinel.
“The Abyss is prepped,”Zyxel pathed, his mental voice quiet and precise.“Kaede says we’re twenty minutes from launch window.”
“Twenty minutes.”I let the number settle. Twenty minutes to say goodbye to everyone I was leaving behind.
Eshe appeared at the top of the Abyss’s ramp, her burnt-orange fur catching the morning light, Royal Guard flanking her in formation. She met my gaze and gave a single, sharp nod. All clear.
These people would die for me.
The cubs came running.
Not running—marching. At least Neazzos was, his small jaw set in the expression he’d been wearing since I assigned him the role of Shield. He held Nocrez’s hand, guiding his forward with the serious authority of a cub who’d decided overnight that childhood was something he could no longer afford. Meti trailed behind them, barefoot on the warm stone, moving at her own pace with the quiet sureness that always made the back of my neck prickle.
I knelt.
The movement pulled at my belly—the pregnancy making itself known in the particular way it did when I bent or twisted or tried to pretend my body hadn’t become someone else’s home. I pressed my hand there instinctively. Settling her. Or maybe settling myself.
Neazzos reached me first. He stopped at arm’s length—not launching himself at me the way he would have months ago, before the war, before the weight of what we were settled on his small shoulders.
“We’ll guard the clanfathers, Mama.” His voice didn’t waver. His chin trembled, but he locked it in place with a force of will that was pure Zirene. “The Shield never breaks.”
My throat closed. I reached for him and pulled him into my arms, and for three seconds he let himself be a cub again—pressing his face into my neck, breathing me in, his small fingers gripping the fabric of my gown with the desperation he was trying so hard to outgrow. I kissed the top of his head. Memorized the weight of him.
“I know you will,” I whispered against his hair. “I’m so proud of you, Neazzos.”
