Page 145 of Cage of Starlight
“Oh, fine.” With a firm nod, she seizes Sena’s hand, mutters a quick, “Much more pleased to meet you this time than the last time we met, I think,” and retreats.
Sena splits his attention between Tory and the woman across from him with her ever-narrowing eyes. Tory’s words bounce around in his skull. No matter how he thinks about them . . . “That all sounds . . . unpleasant.”
“It’shorrible!” Tory agrees. “But I think—I’m pretty sure that means it’s important.You’reimportant. Because I also haven’t ever felt as alive as I do with you. I’ve never wanted to know someone as well as I want to know you. I’ve never—neverwanted—” He sucks in a breath, and Sena’s chest aches, and neither of them are looking at each other. “I think the best things are the ones that can ruin you. If that’s true, there’s no fucking way I’m letting you go again. I’m in this until the end, whatever that looks like.”
Sena’s mind blanks, an eternal drone of gray silence. “What does that mean?”
“I don’t know!”
Sena doesn’t miss the way the woman—Hasra, that’s theHasraTory talks about, which is a panic attack for another time—snorts at the way Tory’s voice goes shrill on the last syllable. He can’t miss the way Tory’s eyes are wide, his cheeks flushed, his pulse a frenetic thud in his neck that Sena could almost swear is echoed behind his own ribs. Sena must be smiling. It must be bigger thanany he’s ever worn before. His face hurts, his chest so full he’s surprised his ribs haven’t cracked.
“You have to tell me what you’re thinking,” Tory begs.
“I’m thinking you’re terrible at this.”
“You don’t get it, I reallyam!I’m so bad at feeling things. I’ve got no practice. It could be the worst thing that’s ever happened to you. You could hate me for it.”
“Never.” Sena sets his hands butterfly-light over the ones that still cup his face and feels the shiver that travels through Tory in response. His mouth is dry, head spinning. He waits for his heart to stop trying to break free of his bones.
It doesn’t. It just keeps pounding out an urgent tune that washes like waves against his eardrums. He’salive, and Tory is here, and Senahateswords. None of them in any language he’s ever studied are big enough for the things he wants to say. His hands against Tory’s say more than his mouth ever could, if only Tory knew how to translate it.
Awkwardly, Sena manages, “I think the common advice is that practice begets progress.”
Tory snorts, but he’s smiling, so Sena figures he didn’t do too bad.
“I suppose I should stick around, then.”
Sena’s eyes burn.Stay, he begged at the last minute he expected to be alive, and even then he barely dared to hope Tory would. “What if it takes a long time?”
“With the two of us as bad at this as we are? Might take forever.”
Before Sena can find words for the warmth that fills him, another voice breaks in.
“Is it finished? Am I allowed to stop pretending I can’t hear you?” Hasra turns around to give them very long looks, eyebrowsvanishing into her hair. “Tory, this is a story I need to hear immediately.”
“Soon,” Tory promises. “We have some things to finish up here, first.”
He’s not wrong. Sena holds out a hand. “Help me up?”
Tory takes it, skin warmer than sunlight, and it really is that easy.
Sena tests his balance and his breath when he’s on his feet. He feels good. “What’s the plan?”
Tory shrugs. “We have a lot of skill here. I’d rather not kill them, but . . .”
Helner wiggles red-slick fingers. “Ah, good, I was wondering when we’d get back to the topic at hand. If we’re taking votes . . .”
Iri, beside her, raises his voice. “I’d rather we waited. I’m in no great hurry to kill Seeds, regardless of their allegiance. Riese is gone, but it will take time for some of them to separate what they want from what he made them want. They should be allowed to do that, as I was.”
Helner scowls at him. “That’s no fun. Fine. We’ll give them time to decide that they themselves want to be assholes, andthenI’ll pull out their internal organs.”
Tory paces toward the dome of vines surrounding them. “Still, they brought the fight here. We need to stop them, and I’m not averse to using this guy to do it, if I can just . . .”
When he reaches the wall, it parts in front of him to create a wide opening, a window to the burning Compound.
“It’s connected to you.” Iri gestures at the shifting vines. “Think about what you want it to do or be, and it should respond.”
Tory squints, and the threatening braids of roots tear from the ground and coil back around themselves until the Legion unit,melon-sized, still pulsing blue, walks itself over on spindly legs and rolls up into his palm. “It needs a name,” Tory says, apropos of nothing.
