“Yes,” he chokes out. “But not just help — liberation. Resistance. Hope.”
I take a breath so deep I feel the grit scrape against the back of my throat. The air tastes like hot dirt and desperation and the metallic edge of fear.
“Marj didn’t just execute your people,” I say, not even sure who I’m convincing — him, the crowd, or myself. “She made it a spectacle. She wanted you broken before you could organize. She wanted you afraid.”
“It worked,” someone mutters from behind.
I turn and see faces — men and women with eyes like kindling, lit by something fierce and brittle.
I meet their gaze.
“We’re not here to be a legend,” I say. “We’re here to be athreat.And if you want to resist Marj, you’ll need more than murmurs and fear.”
The mayor nods, swallowing. “We do.”
I glance at Vrok. He doesn’t interrupt. He doesn’t step forward. He simply watches — measured, quiet, like he’s still seeing me with new eyes.
“I’ll help,” I say.
Damn the risk. Damn the shadows in my own mind whispering in old panic tongues. Because right now, this place… these people… they need something Icanbe.
“Yes,” I repeat. “I’ll help you resist.”
A collective exhale ripples through the gathered townsfolk — sagging shoulders, nodding heads, eyes bright with something that feels dangerously close to hope.
The mayor reaches out, gripping my forearm — just once — and it’s enough to make my breath stutter.
“You don’t need to be her,” he says. “Just be enough.”
I force a smile.
I think about Vrok, watching us both, unblinking and unreadable.
And I realize something:
He isn’t calculatingwho I’m pretending to be.
He’s calculatingwho I’ve actually become.
And that, maybe more than any legend ever whispered into being… is the part that changes everything.
CHAPTER 21
VROK
The meeting room in Kluzderfuvv might have been intended for council deliberations or festival planning at some point in its history, but years of conflict have scarred it into something harsher: steel-plated walls, deep gouges from blade strikes, scorch marks from missing shots, and one cracked table that looks like it absorbed a grenade blast once and lived to tell the tale.
The room smells of dust, old coffee, and the heavy tang of anticipation — like every breath is weighed before it’s exhaled. I can hear the hum of the ship idling outside, a soft mechanical heartbeat beneath our words, but inside, the tension is kinetic and immediate.
The mayor stands at the head of the table, face drawn and earnest, wearing worry like a second uniform. Around him sit the town elders — rough-hewn faces, hard eyes, and scarred hands gripping chipped mugs of synth-coffee that steam in the cold, recycled air.
None of them are armed here. That isn’t bravery. That’s desperation.
I let my coat fall open, unbuckling the utility belt of weapons but keeping my stance square, solid, like I’m offering steadiness even if I don’t quite feel it.
“Thank you for assembling on short notice,” the mayor says. His voice is ragged, but steady. “Your presence here speaks to the gravity of what we face.”
“We don’t have time for ceremonies,” I reply. “We weren’t spared for luck. We were spared for purpose.”
