Page 207 of The Space Between Stars

Exhausted as Niklaus might be, he could stand to hang on to this ladder a little while longer.

CALVEROUS

As Niklaus disappeared over the roof’s ledge, Calver unhitched the dowaga from his back and steadied himself. He’d battled with the Survivor for nearly a ten-day. Now a new battle awaited him, but this one he’d trained for eight years to meet.

Calver pushed back the Survivor’s veil with a void mantra. Be gone.

{Do you recall nothing?}

VOID.

The creature rippled. {I’ll wait for your plea, when he has you on the brink of defeat.}

With its descent came a rushing return of sensory stimuli. Salty wind against his skin. The sting of sweat in his eyes. The world was brighter, louder, and thrumming with the rapid beat of his heart. Calver waited: watching smoke spill into the blood-red sky, hoping he hadn’t been wrong in the belief that Cul’Mon would come for him here, wishing he’d given more of himself to Dex, to Niklaus. To Fankalo.

A minute passed. Then another. With every creeping second, a stone grew in Calver’s gut. He might have gotten it all wrong. Perhaps Cul’Mon hadn’t put a priority on his capture with the battle imminent. And perhaps Raimee had changed her mind. He’d asked her to do a reckless, stupid thing. She’d probably come to her senses.

Or she might have been killed in the blast. Or by Thyatira before he turned her over to the Tohatu. It was just as likely she’d died in her sleep from the slow energy drain he inflicted on her.

Calver’s insides shriveled. Kretch, was he a fool.

There were few things dumber than conspiring to topple an empire, but surely pivoting plans on how to topple that empire on a whim—and all because he had fucking butterflies for someone he had no future with—was one of those things.

A sudden scraping sound raised the hairs on his arms. His grip tightened on his weapon, and he let his consciousness seep into the void.

Death.

Destruction.

Failure at every turn.

In his mind’s eye, an indigo-uniformed body flipped over the lip of the western wall and onto the roof. Moments later, the vision came to fruition. A Tera’thian soldier joined Calver on the roof, unhitched his steel, and fell into a fighter’s stance. Then another. And then one larger than the others by half. Familiar in the worst kind of way, the sight set Calver rigid. Cul’Mon, Tera’thian Tohatu, master of legions, murderer of slaves, rose before him.

Their eyes locked, like serpents intertwined.

“My boy,” Cul’Mon rumbled in the invaders’ tongue. “How you have grown.”

Calver lifted his dowaga. Cul’Mon’s attendants fanned out to either side, shining dowagas raised.

“I wouldn’t have guessed you’d see through my decoy. And I wouldn’t have believed the Red Wing would anticipate our interruption. But your victory ends here. I have reinforcements.”

He still expected Tera’thian victory. And if everything Calver sensed was true, he was right. No. No no no. Not today. Not after everything he’d risked.

“There is no other resolution. You know what we’ve planned. You will return with me now.”

Calver searched his memories from the void: the Tera’thians’ plan to take Nelfindar, following the change in Tera’thian regime. Their overwhelming odds. The weaknesses they’d sown in Nelfindar’s governance. Despair wormed its way around the gleaming ball of hope Calver had held onto since Raimee first said she needed him. With it, the mind-djinn returned.

{You have no destiny beyond the one we’ve forged, Calverous. I’ve told you again and again. Release, and let me finish this.}

It wanted him to go with them. Willingly. If anything could have been Calver’s guiding light, it was doing whatever the Survivor did not want.

No.

The creature clenched harder with each passing moment. The world unfocused as Calver turned to the battle inward. The suck of water lapping against the cliff face below became so loud it was nauseating. Darkness saturated the corners of his vision as the pressure compounded. His hold began to slip.

{Answer to me.}

No.