Page 43 of Crash Landed with My Weredragon

"It sounds like a promise." Marina hugged her. Athena hugged back; briefly and fiercely, with the intensity of two women who'd been each other's only family for a long time and who were about to add an entire planet to the family tree.

When they separated, Auren was standing at the end of the corridor, trying very hard to look like he hadn't been watching. He was failing.

"She's staying," Marina told him.

Auren's grin could have powered the Colony's bioluminescent systems. "I know. She told me yesterday."

Marina looked at Athena. "You told him before you told me?"

"He asked first."

"Since when does Auren ask questions before exploding things?"

"He's growing," Athena said, and the way she said it, with a reluctant warmth that she probably wasn't aware of, told Marina everything she needed to know about where that particular story was heading.

It was heading exactly where Toren and Marina's story had already gone. Different characters, different timing, same destination. The universe, it seemed, had a pattern.

CHAPTER 14

*** MARINA ***

The Vulcana left on a Tuesday.

Marina stood at the Colony's surface entrance and watched the ship rise from Ceylara's red plain through the communication relay's visual feed. The image was grainy because the relay wasn't designed for video, but she could see the Vulcana lifting on its repaired thrusters, trailing heat shimmer and dust, climbing through the amber sky toward the darkness above.

Thirty-six crew members were on board. Rowan at the controls, Peter beside him in the copilot's seat with his arm still in the sling, Dr. Vasquez managing the medical bay, and thirty-three others heading home to a planet they'd been away from for months. They'd sent messages ahead through the relay. Their families were notified and debriefings were scheduled. It was the first diplomatic dispatch from Dobromia already en route to Earth's government with Khrelan's co-signed alliance proposal attached.

Marina was grateful for the eleven that stayed, but understood why the thirty-six had left.

She watched the Vulcana until it disappeared from the relay feed. There was a bright point climbing through brown sky until the atmosphere swallowed it and it was gone. The finality of it settled over her like a blanket. Not heavy; warm. The warmth of a decision fully made and fully owned.

Peter had been the last to board. He'd stood at the base of the loading ramp with his good arm extended, and Marina had taken his hand, and they'd stood like that for ten seconds without speaking. Everything that needed saying had already been said; in the medical bay, in the relay station, in a dozen small moments over three weeks where two people who cared about each other had navigated the complicated geography of love that wasn't mutual but was real.

"Write to me," Peter said. "Through the relay. Not just the official dispatches, but real letters. Tell me about the porridge and the scientists and the bioluminescent lighting. Tell me ordinary things."

"I will."

"And tell me about him. How he treats you. What makes you laugh. I want to know you're happy, Marina. Not from a diplomatic report. From you."

"I promise."

He'd squeezed her hand once, released it, and walked up the ramp without looking back. The discipline of his refusal to turn around and the commitment to moving forward, was the bravest thing Marina had ever seen him do. Braver than the Drog fights, braver than the earthquake. The courage to walk away from someone you loved and to do it with your head up and your shoulders straight.

Athena had said goodbye to the crew with handshakes and one-armed hugs and the brisk efficiency of a woman who processed emotion through action rather than words. She'd given Rowan a data chip with security protocols for the return voyage. She'd given Vasquez a list of human medical supplies the Colony needed. She'd given the security team a series of training recommendations that were technically suggestions but sounded like orders because Athena didn't know how to suggest things; she only knew how to command.

Through the bond, she felt Toren beside her before she turned. His hand found the small of her back. His rose-gold scales were warm through her jacket; through his jacket, actually, the Dobromian tunic she'd borrowed and hadn't returned.

"They'll make it," he said. "Rowan's coupling will hold."

"I know. I just needed to watch them go."

"You're allowed to be sad about it."

"I'm not sad. I'm…" She searched for the word. The bond offered her Toren's vocabulary, his emotional language, the Dobromian concepts that didn't translate directly into English. The closest she could find was a term that meant "the ache of a good choice that costs something." "There's a Dobromian word for what I'm feeling, isn't there?"

"Krev'ash. The grief inside a gift. The sadness that comes with something you chose and would choose again."

"Krev'ash," she repeated. The word felt right in her mouth. It was heavy at the beginning but, light at the end. "Yes, that."