“It is honest.”
“I didn’t say it wasn’t.”
The black stripe widens by a finger’s width. The epis around it flares bright blue-white, then dims at the edges. My breath catches, because I understand the shape. The City has looked like this for years.
Bright in places where people still work. Dark in corners where there is no spare strength. Everyone pretending the line between the two is natural. It’s not. Not at all. Something has been feeding on the epis.
“We need to know how much is corrupted,” I say.
“We need to leave.”
I turn on him. “No.”
The word echoes wrong in the cavern, bouncing off old stone and glowing curtains. Kavor’s jaw tightens. Good, let his jaw suffer.
“We fell into the answer,” I say. “We are not leaving without looking at it.”
“The zemlja is moving this way,” he says, holding up one finger. “The signal anchor found this source. The corruption is active. Your arm is bleeding again.”
He adds a finger for each thing he names. He holds them up as if his logic will override the truth, but it only reinforces my resolve.
“All true.”
“That was not agreement.”
“It’s an acknowledgment. We can do both,” I say.
“We cannot do everything.”
“No. But we can do enough.”
The word hits me again. Enough. I hate it. I want it. Kavor sees that too. The sample pouch pulses between us. I press my good hand to it before I can decide not to. It’s a bad idea.
The glow answers through the cloth, blue and warm and startlingly alive. It moves into my palm, then up my wrist, not pain, not heat, something like drinking water after forgetting the body has a throat.
I yank my hand back.
“Sera,” Kavor says, his voice sharpening along with his eyes.
“I’m fine,” I say, staring at my hand.
“No.”
“Don’t start,” I say, shaking my head.
“What did it do?”
“Nothing.” He stares at my hand. The skin across my palm glows faintly, blue under dust. I close my fist. “That’s new.”
“Yes.”
“Useful new or panic new?” His silence is spectacularly unhelpful. “Kavor.”
“I do not know.”
“Still less charming than before.”
“I know.”
