“I won’t,” I say, then lean closer so only she can hear. “Not in public.”
Her eyes narrow slightly. “Kael.”
I feel a faint warmth at the corner of my mouth. “Elara.”
We leave the hall under full security escort, but the atmosphere outside feels altered, as if the station itself has shifted its center of gravity. The corridor traffic is still tense, still cautious, but it moves with purpose now instead of fear.
Peace is official.
CHAPTER 39
ELARA
The first time I wake in Reaper territory without a security alert waiting in my peripheral vision, I don’t trust it.
Light filters through the viewport in a muted silver wash, reflecting off the pale mineral ridges that shape the outer hull of Kael’s primary station. The air smells faintly metallic, layered with something earthier—Reaper incense burned in lower corridors as part of their daily rites. It’s not unpleasant. It’s unfamiliar in a way that no longer feels hostile.
I lie still for a moment, palm resting lightly over the subtle curve of my abdomen, and listen.
No emergency channel chatter.
No encrypted distress pings.
Just the steady hum of life support systems and the distant rhythm of a shipyard shifting from night-cycle into activity.
I exhale slowly.
“This is real,” I murmur to myself.
Kael shifts beside me, already half awake, his hand sliding instinctively to rest over mine.
“You talk in your sleep,” he says quietly.
“I do not.”
“You just did.”
I turn my head to look at him. “That doesn’t count.”
His mouth curves faintly. “It does.”
He studies me for a moment, gaze dropping briefly to my abdomen before returning to my face.
“How do you feel?” he asks.
“Human,” I say dryly. “And mildly irritated that my back hurts.”
He exhales something that might almost be a laugh.
“I will instruct the medical team to redesign gravity distribution in this wing.”
“That’s not necessary,” I reply. “I’ll survive.”
“You do not get to ‘survive’ this,” he says quietly. “You get to be supported.”
There’s no argument in his tone. Just fact.
Reaper medical care is not what I expected when I first crossed into their space as an analyst months ago. It is less sterile than Alliance facilities, more tactile, more sensory. Healers place their hands on skin before consulting monitors, listening for subtle muscular tension shifts and circulatory irregularities with an intimacy that initially made me uncomfortable.
