Her voice is faint. The words cut. I lift her. This time she does not fight. Her head leans against my shoulder for one breath before she catches herself and straightens.
“I can walk,” she says.
“Yes.”
“You’re carrying me anyway?”
“Yes.”
“Because I agreed?”
“Because you are shaking.”
“Rude.”
“Yes.”
Her mouth touches something like a smile. Tiny. Exhausted. Mine to witness, not to own.
I carry her through the parted curtain. The epis brushes my shoulders, my horns, my wings. Light runs over both of us, blueand purple and painfully alive. The sample pulses. Her bandage pulses. My burned hand pulses where the anchor marked me.
The system watches through the pool behind us. I feel it. A vast attention turning.
The passage beyond angles upward, narrow and rough, formed by an old structure split under zemlja pressure. It is better than the open cavern. Walls close around us. Stone answers. Air moves from above, dry and hot compared to the reservoir’s mineral damp.
Toward the City. Or near it. Good. Perhaps.
Sera’s voice comes near my throat. “Kavor.”
“Yes.”
“The source. We cannot let them rush it.”
“I know.”
“If the Council sees that much epis…”
“I know.”
“If Adran knows…”
Her voice cuts off. Politics. Hunger. Power. Hope. All the old poisons with new names.
“I know,” I say again.
She turns her face slightly against my shoulder. I pretend not to feel the movement everywhere.
“You can put me down soon.”
“Yes.”
“You are not putting me down.”
“No.”
“Why?”
Because I do not know how much time remains before the City takes you back. Because underground you chose me, and aboveground you may choose duty. Because I want to carry you while you allow it.
