Page 43 of The Last Hope
“Human cigarettes.” He hoists the pack at my eyes. “Not too strong, but they do the job all right.”
Franny motions to the cabinetry. “Mykal found them in a cabinet drawer. We were joking earlier how theLucretzia’s sick bay looks like a Bartholo cigar parlor.”
They have been here for a while. I comb another hand through my dark hair. Kicking myself for fainting and risking their health.
I go rigid. “Did either of you faint after me?” I should’ve asked this first.
“No.” Mykal shakes his head, but a sort of brawling tormentfesters and scalds his eyes. He sucks deeply on a newly lit cigarette. Smoke glides down my lungs, feeling Mykal, and aggravation swirls angrily inside him.
I don’t understand the source of his emotion. “It feels like a yes.”
“Well it’s not,” he retorts.
He’s not lying.
I’m sorry.I must’ve put him in a position that hurt him somehow—
“You don’t need to be apologizing.” Mykal points at me with the cig between his fingers.
“I didn’t say anything,” I tell him smoothly.
He jabs at his chest. “I felt it in my soul.”
I roll my eyes and let them land on Franny. “Did Stork seem suspicious about us?”
“No.” She picks at a frayed hole in her slacks, ripped at her knee. “He didn’t seem to know about our link.”
I nod. “Good. Let’s keep it that way.” The less he knows about us, the better, and our link may be our last well-kept secret.
TEN
Franny
I whip up a plan: find someone else on this starcraft who speaks Saltarian.
So far, no one we’ve met except Stork has spoken our native tongue. Not being able to communicate with anyone else is a bothersome fact. Stork may have carried Court to the sick bay and helped us escape theRomulusbrig, but I can’t forget that he needs us for the fleet’s retrieval operation. Without that, he may not even care whether we live or die.
I search for a handle or knob to the sick bay’s door.Gods.I should’ve paid sharper attention to how the nurses exited. The metal door sparkles metallic silver, and four diamond pegs slide along crisscrossing tracks.
I shift one peg and wait for the door to open.
Nothing.
Nothing happens. Who’d think to transform a door into an elaborate puzzle? Albeit I only spot four pieces, but a four-piece puzzle is more than any door should have.
It is a beauty, though. Just like the rest of the doors on theLucretzia.Midnight-blue drapes frame the arched entryway, drawn and pinned on either wall.
I reach out to attempt the puzzle again, and the pegs suddenly slither rapidly. All on their own.
I fast lose sight of which pegs end where, but as soon as the door whooshes open vertically, I step forward—holy hells.
I bump into a hard chest, and I quickly catch the door frameto stop from stumbling backward. He must’ve opened the door on his side.
He being…
Oh.
No.
