Page 8 of Needed in the Night
“No.” I couldn’t pretend otherwise. “But it’s worth it.”
“Damn the Erotovo.” She trembled. “If he finds you…”
“He won’t. It’s a big galaxy.” I’d keep telling myself that until I believed it. “He’ll lose interest after a while. People like him always find a new obsession. This is like a furlough, or a vacation.” I took a breath that was shakier than I wanted it to be. “Maybe it’s for the best. This was my fifth mission in a row. I’m tired.”
“Then you are due for a rest.” She squeezed my fingers. “Halena, how do I live knowing Ergin died so I could be free?”
This wasn’t the first time someone had asked me such a question. My own extraction had gone smoothly, so I couldn’t claim I knew how Novee felt. Time and experience had granted me insight, though, and I’d come to understand what survivors needed was honesty—and never to offer empty platitudes. As such, I had a better answer now than I’d had in my early days as an agent.
“Every day you live as a free woman, you honor her,” I said. “Every happy moment you experience, every milestone you reach, even every perfectly ordinary day you have in whatever life you choose to live after this—they’re all a blessing on her memory.” I swallowed hard around the lump in my throat and said the hard part. “You won’t get to the point that you accept and believe that for a while, and you’ll have hard days.Darkdays. Sleepless nights. But there will be happiness, Novee. I promise.”
“I think you were once in my place.” When I didn’t deny it, she asked, “Are you happy?”
“Not at the moment,” I admitted. “My heart hurts. But overall—yes, I am happy. Because I’m free. And now so are you. Give yourself time to adjust and be kind to yourself. You’ve been through a lot.”
She nestled her head closer to mine. “I will try.”
Her natural scent was sweet. I hoped my own wasn’t too off-putting. The ship only had sonic cleansers and neither of us had any scented toiletries. At least we no longer smelled of smoke and our own burned skin.
“After tomorrow, I will never see you again?” she asked.
We both already knew the answer, but she’d phrased it as a question, so I replied, “No. It wouldn’t be safe for either of us, especially you.”
“All right.” Her voice wobbled. “Where will you go? What will you do?”
For better or worse, I’d made those decisions after a talk with Brae and three big gulps from our bottle of moonshine.
I couldn’t tell Novee exactly what my plans were since that would undermine the security of my hiding place, but I could answer in broad terms so she knew I had something good to look forward to—something more than months or years of hiding from the Erotovo.
“I’m going someplace beautiful,” I said. “It’s a planet I’ve always wanted to visit. And I think I might try to be a singer there.”
“A singer?” She’d started to reach over me for the bottle of moonshine, but paused to look down at my face. Her eyes lit up with real interest and excitement for the first time since we’d met. “Oh, Halena, do you sing?”
Despite my heavy heart, I smiled, at least for a moment. “I do.”
“I did not know.” She took a drink from the bottle and offered it to me. When I shook my head, she returned it to the table and settled back in beside me. “Will you please sing for me?”
I thought of how beautifully Novee danced and grimaced. “I haven’t warmed up, and my throat is scratchy?—”
Her cool fingertips caressed my arm in a very pleasant way. “Please.”
I relented. “What would you like to hear?”
“Anything you like.”
I sifted through the list of songs I knew and settled on a simple tune from Havel Prime that was wistful but not sad, and not particularly vocally demanding.
Thanks to my injuries and smoke inhalation, my voice was rough and shaky, my vocal range was limited, and my lungs were unable to get the full breath I needed for long notes, but I sang for her anyway. Novee stroked my arm and listened.
My voice had once been the reason for my captivity and had belonged to my owners. Now my voice was my own. When I sang, it was my way of being free. And if Novee danced in her new life, I hoped it would be for herself, on her terms. It was the very least she deserved.
When I finished the song, Novee kissed my bare shoulder very lightly. “Thank you,” she said, and pulled the covers over us. “Gods grant, your beautiful voice is what I will remember of this day and the rest will fade from memory,” she murmured, and tucked herself against my arm.
I leaned my head against hers, closed my eyes, and listened to her breathe and the engines hum until sleep claimed me.
CHAPTER 3
MIKAS
