The others eventually drifted away. Ella and Nadine were talking excitedly about timelines and digs. Zapharos shadowed his mate like a golden sentinel. Ashley and Xandros murmured about security protocols. The ship’s lights had already begun their slow dimming, the AI subtly adjusting the artificial day-night rhythm to match the needs of its mixed crew. Anothernighton a Pandraxian vessel. Another reminder that even time itself bent to someone else’s design.
I turned down a side corridor, intending to find solitude, when shadows rippled across the wall beside me. Dravok.
He fell into step without asking, his aura brushed against mine like a warning. “You’re shielding harder than usual.”
I grunted. “Not in the mood for conversation.”
“Too bad.” He didn’t slow. “If she’s your Aelyth, we need to know how to protect her. And you.”
I stopped walking. The corridor was quiet; only the low hum of the ship’s systems filled the space between us. I met his gaze, keeping my jaw tight. “It’s not that simple.”
Dravok studied me for a long moment, shadows curled lazily around his shoulders. “I know what it feels like to fight the bond,” he said quietly. “To feel unworthy of it. I nearly killed Nadine because of that fight. So believe me when I say, it’s okay to feel that way. It doesn’t make you weak. It just means you’re not ready to break yet.”
I almost laughed. The sound came out rough and bitter.Easy for you to say.Dravok had his shadows, his control, his calculated precision. He didn’t carry the flaw I did. The Abyssdidn’t whisper to him the way it whispered to me, constant, patient, hungry, like it recognized its own imperfect child. He didn’t wake up every cycle wondering if today would be the one where the wound inside him finally won.
I appreciated the effort, though. I really did.
Instead of saying any of that, I shrugged, gruff as ever. “By the Dark, I’ve always had a chip on my shoulder. What else is new?” I rolled my neck, feeling the old scars pull. “As long as I can keep my secrets from the rest of you, I’m content. And now I’ll have to shield her too.”
Dravok’s eyes narrowed, sensing the wall I’d slammed down. He didn’t push. Instead, he changed the subject. “What do you make of all this? A large part of the universe that has never been explored… we've been around for eons and eons, and yet here we are, stumbling across entire civilizations no one has ever heard of.”
I considered it. The universewasvast. Endless. We had absorbed the memories and histories of a gazillion worlds, a trillion lives, and not once had the Sythari appeared. Not a whisper. Not a rumor. Not even a footnote in some dying empire’s archive.
“Yeah,” I muttered. “But none of them bore a trace of Earth either.”
We both stopped walking. The implication settled heavy between us.
Dravok tilted his head. “You think the Dark Abyss has been… withholding information from us?”
I stared at the floor plating for a long moment. “It’s possible.”
The thought sent a cold ripple through my aura. The Abyss had always felt more alive to me than it did to my brothers. It traveled. It remembered. During its millions of years of existence, it must have crossed most of the universe’s expanse. So how had both the Sythari and Earth remained hidden? Howhad an entire gifted human bloodline and their captors stayed outside our awareness until now?
Zapharos had only found Ella because the Abyss itself spat her out. Humans had been a complete mystery to us before her. And now this?
Dravok exhaled slowly. “We’ll need to come back to this question.”
I nodded once, sharp. “Later. After we figure out what Naeris knows.”
We stood in silence for another heartbeat, two ancient weapons forged in the same fire, both carrying secrets we weren’t ready to share even with each other.
Then Dravok clapped a hand on my shoulder, brief, almost brotherly. “Try to rest, Thyros. Even executioners need sleep.”
He melted into the shadows and was gone. Guess we were staying aboard too, which was fine with me. I wasn't going back to our vessel as long as Naeris was here. I remained in the corridor a while longer, staring at nothing.
I felt her presence. Breathing. Thinking. Fighting the same invisible thread I was. Every instinct I possessed screamed at me to find her. Instead, I clenched my jaw and turned toward the next empty quarters I could find, the flaw in my chest burning hotter than it had in centuries.
The next morning,I woke with my heart already hammering. My crew—Jax, Marek, Rylan—they’d been with me for three years of running, fighting, and burning every bridge the Luminous Order ever built. I needed to see them. Needed to know they were alive and whole.
I dressed quickly in the clean black clothes left for me and stepped into the corridor. Two Pandraxian guards stood outside. I informed them that I wanted to see my crew, and they fell in behind me, giving short directions on where to go. I guess Xandros was true to his word, and we were guests with shadows. Fine.
They led me to a decent-sized breakroom. Earth hung in the viewport like a blue-and-white promise. Two of my men were already there.
Jax Harlan looked up first, and relief flashed across his scarred face. Marek Voss leaned back in his chair, arms crossed, ever the quiet observer. Rylan Kane stepped in a moment later, all easy swagger and bright eyes.
“Commander,” Jax greeted, standing. “You’re okay.”
“I am.” I moved to the table, keeping my voice low. “We’re being treated as guests for now. The Pandraxians and… the others… aren’t our enemies. At least not yet.”
