Page 70 of The Garnet Daughter
A sense of dread fills me up all the way to the ringing in my ears, and I slam my fist into the partition. “Wait.”
He steps back and takes a calming exhale, bracing himself for the fight about to spill into the room.
The buttons flash around me, coming to life and preparing for something, a whirling sound increasing like the pressure is building.
A stiff voice cautions me to buckle, beeping and flashing red. I obey and watch out the windows as August cracks his neck, turning it from one side to the next and then adjusting himself into a deadly stance, aiming his weapon at the door of the cockpit and waiting.
He glances over at me, his throat bobbing as if he wants to speak, his calm expression turning into something else.
A countdown begins in my pod.
“Callia.” He pauses, his expression trying to convey so much, brow furrowing, bright green eyes piercing through me and lined with water. “Callia, I love you.”
The door to the cockpit blows open in a flashing explosion.
He shoots from guns held in both his hands into the smoke as my pod descends into the floor of the ship.
Figures walk into view, coming forward in a cloud of violence and blue, streaking light.
I scream for August, hitting the glass so hard I drop the spell book and it falls to the floor.
Everything around me is a blur as the countdown reaches its end and the pressure gives way, freeing my pod into the open sky of the birthlands.
Chapter
Twenty-Two
Icatch a brief shadow of the Viathan ship’s exterior as I’m ejected from its surface. Then nothing but the purple hues of the sky and blackness of the ground below.
My stomach sinks as my vessel spins, the world a blur around me. The pressure inside the pod pushes hard against the backrest and forces me forward, the straps digging into my skin with each flip.
The panel flashes red and a warning alarm blares so loud, it is all I hear over the deafening wind against the metal vessel. Every nerve in my body fries as everything happens all at once, my mind sucking itself away from rational thinking, leaving only survival instincts behind.
I force my eyes open, the buttons all around me blinking in nonsensical patterns.
I’m not familiar with escape pods, my only information from passing conversations with August about Viathan ships, but I’m almost certain this thing is malfunctioning. I’m shook with more turbulence than any time I have flown with August.
Something must be wrong.
August sent me to safely land while he kills the intruders on the ship and will retrieve me after, but there will be nothing to retrieve if I crash into the ground.
And then all at once, I am forced into an upright position, the pod correcting itself so fast the muscles in my neck strain and threaten to tear.
The alarm and lights shut off so abruptly, my ears ring in the same pitch, replacing the rhythm.
The spinning world is now a cloudy mauve horizon, and when I lean to view my landing spot, I can see my pod’s lights reflecting off the fast-approaching sand below.
I brace myself, tucking my arms close to my body, hoping the pod slows and I am not ripped apart in a fiery crash.
Cosima’s pull is sucking me back down and refusing to let go with so much pressure, I am not sure if I have taken a single breath since disconnecting from the ship.
The pod slams hard into the sand, the sound all around me so earsplitting, it leaves a pounding in my head.
I am alive and I am unharmed.
Dusted-up sand and dirt spiral around my landing spot, whirling in dancing coils.
I stare, forcing myself to realize I am no longer moving. I did not explode or break apart on impact like I assumed I would. The pod in all its crude departure at least held together during the harsh touchdown.
