Page 159 of Black to Light

Black and Angel looked over while Kiko and Cowboy rubbed my back.

I saw the anger fade from Black’s face.

He and Angel exchanged looks, then seemed to come to a silent understanding.

Black walked over to me. Cowboy and Kiko stepped out of the way as he wrapped his arm around me, rubbing his hand with the one not holding me up.

“We can figure this out tomorrow,” Black murmured. “We’ll stay here tonight, in Nice. I’ll get us a hotel. We don’t have to do this today…”

No one answered.

I stood there, hunched over, fighting to breathe. I slowly began to bring my heart and lungs under control. God, I didn’t know if I wanted to scream or burst into tears.

Nick. Jem. Zoe.

“Ace.” Black glanced over his shoulder at the tall soldier. He nodded towards the rock wall and the metal bridge above. “Can you get up there on your own?”

Ace stood next to his girlfriend, Mika.

The small seer gripped one of Ace’s large hands in both of hers. Mika was crying quietly, and I suspected it was for Jem. I forgot sometimes that most of the Old Earth seers had known Jem long before they even got here. They’d fought a different, much longer, and far more catastrophic war with Jem on that other world.

For all I knew, Mika had known Jem longer than I’d known Nick.

Given seers’ long lives, it wasn’t even that difficult to imagine.

The Texan glanced up the rock face and nodded, once.

He bent down, kissed Mika on the mouth, then extracted his hand.

He walked over to the wall, measuring it with his eyes as he went. He found his first hand-holds and hauled himself up the rock. He placed his booted feet next, then began to climb steadily. I watched as he made his way up to the metal bridge, moving like some kind of insect with his long limbs and deliberate but steady hand-holds.

He got to the level of the bridge a few minutes later.

A few of the humans and seers around us let out low gasps when he looked over his shoulder––then leapt for the metal platform. He managed to catch hold of the railing with both hands. Tendons strained in his neck, arms, hands, and shoulders as he climbed up and threw a leg over the top. Only then did the rest of us take a breath.

He was all the way up there now, and I looked away as he knelt down to unknot the rope from the balcony so he could pull people up faster. Once he had it untied, he wrapped a few lengths back around the balcony and called down.

“Whoever’s coming first, I’m ready,” he shouted.

His voice echoed strangely in the damp, suddenly very, very large-feeling cave.

Black nudged me. “You should go,” he murmured.

I shook my head. “Not yet.”

Black looked like he might want to argue.

In the end, he seemed to think better of it.

“Kiks,” Black said, his voice abrupt. “Go on, then.”

Kiko hesitated, too. I saw her glance at the swirl of mist and light on the cave wall. Her mouth and cheek twitched. Then she turned her back on it and walked over to where the rope and harness hung down from the walkway above.

A handful of seconds later, I heard her call up to Ace.

“Ready,” she said.

She began to rise up in the air, slowly and steadily.

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