Blue light moves over his face, turning scarred dark scales into something carved from night and glow. The torn place near his wing still bleeds. He is enormous and impossible and hurt because he threw himself through breaking stone for me, because I told him to trust me and he did.
He trusted me. The thought opens somewhere under my ribs. It isn’t soft. Nothing on Tajss opens softly.
The far wall pulses again. Once. Pause. Again. And the black stripe cuts wider through the epis curtain. Kavor turns, breaking the moment.
Good. No. Yes, good.
“We move along the left ridge,” I say, because anything else would be dangerous. “High ground. Less fresh leavings. Better view of the structures. If the zemlja’s pressure changes, we need elevation.”
“And if the ridge collapses?”
“Then we improvise.”
“I dislike this plan.”
“You dislike most plans I make.”
“No. I dislike that they often work.”
That almost pulls a laugh from me. I let it out as breath. Small. Mine. And Kavor hears it. His expression changes, but he says nothing.
Good male.
Terrible thought. Again.
We start along the ridge.
The fresh zemlja leavings pull at our boots, soft in some places, slick in others. Mineral moss glows faintly under pressure, little blue sparks blooming where we step. I try not to think of all the times I’ve watched people count crumbs while this much life waited underneath us.
It’s not fair, but that thought is useless.
Fairness died on Tajss long before I was born. Probably long before we crashed here. Probably before the Zmaj burned their world over a plant that grows in worm waste and makes everyone stupid with wanting.
Still. My chest hurts with the size of it.
Kavor moves beside me, not ahead, though he should. His shoulder is bad. I see how he favors it despite trying not to. His wing stays tight. His claws flex toward the wall whenever the ridge narrows.
The cavern is enclosed, but vast. Too vast, maybe.
It opens above us in a way no tunnel is open. The ceiling glows, yes, but it is far overhead, veiled with hanging strands and shadowed cuts. I remember the little things I noticed earlier. His ease in tight places. His tension beneath open sky. How close stone steadies him. This place is underground, but still too large to read all at once.
“Kavor,” I say.
“Hm.”
A sound, not a word. Very him.
“Do big caverns bother you too?”
His steps slow, but he doesn’t stop. That’s answer enough.
I look ahead, not at him. Giving him the mercy of not staring while I pull truth from a place he probably prefers sealed.
“You don’t have to answer.”
“Yes, I do.”
“No, you don’t.”
