Page 13 of Storm of Stars
He lifted her hands to his lips, kissed them. His gaze flicked, for a fraction of a second, to where Zaffir stood off to the side, camera still rolling, as if his words were meant for him too. Zaffir’s jaw twitched, his face straining to stay neutral, but I saw the sheen in his eyes, the tremble he was fighting. But there were eyes everywhere, and he couldn’t show them how much he cared. Not unless he wanted another trip to Archon’s torture chamber.
“I love you, I love you,” Bex whispered, over and over like a desperate prayer she could use to barter with.
“God, Bex. I love you too,” Ezra breathed, a tear slipping down his cheek. “But you’re gonna go out there, and you’re gonna win this.”
We all knew he wasn’t talking about the Reclamation Run anymore. The war was already moving in the background, gathering like a storm on the horizon. And Ezra, even now, was still making sure Bex would be part of it.
“I can’t,” she sobbed, shaking her head.
“You can,” he vowed, pressing her hands to his heart. “And you won’t do it alone. You’ve got them.” He motioned to me, to Briar, even broadly toward Zaffir. “Let them help you, baby. Please.”
Bex nodded, barely.
Ezra leaned forward, pressing a kiss to her lips through the cold, unyielding bars. Both of them were crying now, and I felt the burn of my own tears sliding down my face, unstoppable.
A piece of me that had begun to heal these last weeks was being torn open again, raw and bleeding.
Bex finally collapsed fully, sliding to the floor. I moved fast, dropping beside her, pulling her into my arms as she clung to me like the world might tear her away next.
“Keep her safe,” Ezra told me, his voice steady but his eyes betraying everything.
I nodded. “You know I will,” I said. And I meant it.
Briar crouched, reaching for our girl, and Bex shifted toward her, letting herself fall into Briar’s open arms.
I stood, pacing a few steps away because the walls felt too close, the air too thin. My lungs couldn’t find enough to fill them. I ran a hand through my hair, trying to pull myself together before I shattered too.
“I’m so sorry,” a voice said, soft and hesitant.
I turned. Fenly Nots. His face was blotchy, eyes rimmed with red. I felt a sharp burst of rage, white-hot, an instinct to lash out at the easy target. But I swallowed it down.
It wasn’t his fault. He didn’t set the rules. Praxis did.
I took a breath, forced my voice steady. “Yeah,” I said quietly. “So am I.”
Fenly’s gaze drifted, his eyes distant, fixed on the display across the room where Bex clung to Ezra in their tear-soaked goodbye. Cameras circled them like vultures, every eye in the chamber drawn to the heartbreak on full display. His voice came so softly it barely reached me.
“I didn’t know it was him,” Fenly murmured.
I turned, watching him. His face didn’t move, but I could feel his mind working, his thoughts roaring. His eyes stayed locked on the scene, as if by looking away it might make the weight of what he’d done real.
“I didn’t want to separate your team.”
The words lodged in my chest. There was so much I wanted to say, or scream, but even though the cameras might not have been on us, I didn’t want to chance my ire being broadcast.
“You didn’t,” I said quietly, though the words tasted bitter. I bit my tongue before I added anything else. As furious as I was, as much as my heart ached knowing we were one down and might never get them back, I couldn’t risk what was left of our goal.
I watched him carefully. There was something so… contemplative about the haunted tilt of Fenly’s shoulders, the way his fingers toyed with the edge of his sleeve like a man stalling before his last move.
He finally turned to me, and for the first time, I really met his eyes. There was something there I recognized. A quiet finality. The same look my mother had worn the night she pressed a card into my hand and told me my fight hadn’t started yet.
“Yeah,” Fenly said, his voice low, almost a sigh. “It was them.”
A flicker of shock crossed my face before I could stop it, the breath stalling in my lungs. Something unspoken passed between us, a wordless understanding only people marked by their anger could ever truly share.
“You’ve all done a lot of good for us,” Fenly murmured after a moment. “You’re brave. Braver than most I’ve seen in years.” He smiled faintly, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “You’ve given a lot of people out there something to hold onto.”
I opened my mouth to thank him, but he wasn’t finished.
