Page 87 of Third

Tor’Vek’s voice was low, certain. “Override authorized.”

The ship jolted tolife.

Behind them, explosions rolled through the base like thunder.

They strapped in quickly, the cushions pristine and contoured, lined with dark leather and embedded tech, the air sharp with the clean scent of sterile polish and high-grade alloys. Anya’s fingers trembled against the harness. Tor’Vek’s hands were steady on the controls.

The rij glowed where it interfaced with the ship. Tor’Vek scanned the display, parsing the systems. Weapons. Navigation. Engines. Life support. The layout was foreign, but the logic behind it was familiar enough.

He tapped through the interface with brutal efficiency, confirming reactor stability and defensive shielding. The engines flared to readiness.

He stabbed the launch sequence button.

The ship tore from the hangar in a burst of acceleration. Below them, Selyr’s compound collapsed inward—swallowed by fire, shrapnel, and the fury of its own unraveling systems.

Tor’Vek spun the ship and set his jaw, activating the weapons array. “No remnants.”

He did not speak. Not yet. This was the final step, the only one that mattered. No more data. No more echoes of Selyr’s madness hiding in the walls. Just silence—andfire.

In his peripheral vision, he saw Anya staring out the viewport, unmoving. Her expression reflected what he felt deep in his core: not triumph. Just finality.

Missiles fired from the underbelly of the ship, their trajectories clean and cold. The shockwave rocked them backward. The compound vanished in a blossom of flame.

Only then did he allow the silence to settle as he gained altitude and put them in orbit around the planet.

Still without a word, he unsnapped her harness and pulled her into hisarms.

She came willingly. No words passed between them. None were needed.

The ship’s lights dimmed around them as Tor’Vek carried her to the rear compartment—arichly appointed guest suite. Clearly not Selyr’s, thank the gods. The door sealed behind them with a quiethiss.

The bond throbbed—hot and urgent. But the bracelets still glowed, and the timers had not stopped. They pulsed, slightly out of synch: his, then hers, hers, thenhis.

He glanced at his wrist.One point two solar unitsleft.

He studied the glowing countdown, then looked at her—not with dread, but wonder. “If this is all the time we have,” he said softly, “Iwant to spend it with you. Not running. Not fighting. Just this. Just us. Do you agree?”

Anya followed his gaze to her own wrist and her eyes shimmered.Her answer was immediate. “Yes. There’s no better way to spend my final breath than with the only person I’ve ever truly loved.”

A beat passed.

“Then I will make every moment count.”

He set her down beside the bed, but didn’t let go. For a moment, they stood there in silence, breath mingling, foreheads touching. The moment felt suspended, as if time itself bowed in deference. Her fingers traced his jaw—slow, reverent—and his hands mapped her body, memorizing her heat, her softness, her steady presence against his burningneed.

When he kissed her, it was not hurried. It was worship. Each movement unfastened something old and buried, stripped away more than just clothing. They undressed one another with devotion and aching slowness, letting their hands linger on every newly exposed line and curve. Not from hesitation. From wonder. From the kind of restraint that had become its own kind of ache. Every breath they shared whispered promises neither dared believe in until this moment.

By the time the last layers fell, the restraint had transformed—no longer the barrier between them, but the sacred prelude to surrender. Their bodies trembled with the weight of everything unspoken, everything promised. Hunger surged, yes—but it was braided with something richer, something vast and unrelenting.

It was love, but threaded through with veneration —that they had found each other in the ruin of stars, that they still had breath, and each other, and this. Even if it was only for a final moment.

Tor’Vek reached for her, and Anya met him halfway, their mouths finding each other not in desperation, but in aching surrender and need. Every inch of skin bared was an invitation. Every touch, adeclaration. They had burned through resistance. What remained now was truth—naked, raw, and utterly consuming.

His palms swept up her sides, fingers dragging slowly over the curve of her waist to the swell of her breasts, tracing every rise and dip with molten focus, savoring every inch. Anya’s head fell back as he dipped to kiss the hollow beneath her collarbone, his mouth trailing down to the soft swell of her breasts. She sighed his name like a prayer, her fingers knotting in hishair.

But when his fingers reached for what should have already been gone, his breath caught. She was still wearing one last scrap of lace—forgotten in their merging, or perhaps left on purpose, as one final choice. Her breath hitched as he grazed the elastic band at herhip.

He paused, giving her the moment.

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