Page 81 of Fly to Fury
Before that spot could be filled, the voice he’d been waiting to hear all morning filtered from somewhere outside of the truck. “Wait!”
There was a brief discussion outside the vehicle. Then Pip appeared at the back and climbed inside, toting herleather bag along with her. She glanced around before her gaze caught on Fieran.
Making her way to the front of the truck, she sat with her back to the cab and carefully set her bag in front of her so that she didn’t bump the injured man on the other side.
“You came.” Fieran clenched his fingers around his swords to keep from reaching for her. To do what, he didn’t know. Touch her hair. Make sure she was real.
A few of the others sent her glances. Those who were awake and not drugged out of their minds, anyway. But none of them spoke.
“I did.” Pip hugged one arm around her knees, gripping her pack with the other. Her shoulders hunched, as if she wasn’t sure exactly what to say or do. “I got new orders just this morning. I’m being sent to Aldon to assist at the AMPC.”
She was going with him. All the way to Aldon. It could be no coincidence, and yet who would have known to send her with him?
Fieran peered past her, past the canvas flaps at the end of the truck’s bed, and toward the small knot of his family at the front of the gathered crowd.
Despite the distance, Dacha seemed to be looking right at him, a hint of something almost like a smile tipping his mouth.
No. Surely not. How would his dacha have figured out how Fieran felt about Pip? Except…there was that vague dream he’d had. But that hadn’t been real, had it?
This was Dacha. He didn’t meddle like that. At least, Fieran hadn’t thought so.
Yet there Pip was, sitting next to him looking rather small and uncertain, as if she wasn’t sure how Fieran would take the news.
Fieran smiled—a true genuine smile despite the pain throbbing through his body and the deeper ache in his heart—and held out his hand to her. He wasn’t sure if she’d take it. But he’d done entirely too much clinging to his dacha’s hand like a child lately. Right now, he’d much rather hold someone else’s hand. “I’m glad you’re coming.”
A smile broke onto her face, easing some of the tension in her shoulders and uncertainty in her eyes. Releasing her death grip on her knees, she took his hand, sliding her fingers between his as the truck gave a lurch and rumbled forward, carrying them toward the train to Aldon.
Carrying them toward home.
