“I chose it.”
Something changes between us. Small. Blue-lit. No time to name it.
The passage settles again. Dust slides along the broken seam. Not much. Enough to remind us that the opening may close orwiden without caring which would kill us faster. I move first toward it, slowly.
Sera shifts as if to follow, but I lift one hand, and she stops. Her eyes flash. I speak before her anger sharpens.
“I will test the lip. Then you decide if the route can be survived.”
The anger pauses. Not gone, but paused.
“You decide beneath,” she says.
“Yes.”
“I decide route,” she says.
“You do.”
She studies me. “Both are needed.”
“Yes.”
Her gaze flicks away. Good. The words matter.
I press my claws to the broken lip of fused stone. Sharp edge. Heat on the outer surface, coolness beneath. The passage descends into a low channel where old zemlja pressure cracked the fused shelf from below. Not a full zemlja tunnel. Too small. A side fracture. A breathway, formed when larger tunnels shifted deep under the basin. Wide enough after the first narrow turn. Maybe.
I scrape dust from the lip. No black vein. No ash-gray residue. No scentless wrongness. Good. The blue strand pulses again, alive.
I angle one shoulder through the opening. Stone catches the upper edge of my wing. Pain flashes. Small. Useful. I withdraw and adjust. Wings tighter. Tail low. Claws braced. Again.
This time I pass far enough beyond the lip to see below.
The passage opens into a low chamber beneath the glassed shelf. Not large, but larger than the shelter.
Stone curves down in smooth bands where heat above and tunnel pressure below have worked against each other for years. Old zemlja leavings darken the lower wall. Mineral veins run through them. Blue-purple strands cling in thin clusters along the upper curve, hanging down in delicate threads.
Epis. Real. Living. Small. Unstable. Beautiful.
I forget to breathe. Not from the glow.
Because behind me, Sera whispers, “Oh.”
The sound is not humor. Not defense. Not calculation. Awe. Pure enough to hurt. I look back.
She is on her knees close behind, blue light across her face, lips parted, eyes wide as if the world has given her something she does not know how to hold.
This is what I wanted. And it is worse than wanting her body. I want to see her fed by light. I want to see what she becomes when survival stops taking its pieces first.
The need is so sharp I have to grip the stone. Sera notices because she notices everything. Her expression closes slightly. Not completely. Enough.
“What?” she asks.
“Nothing.”
“Insulting answer.”
“Yes.”
