Page 50 of Bought By the Void Walker
"That's insane."
"That's sophisticated."
We work together for the next hour, which mostly consists of her making logical categories while I protest and my tendrils sneak books back to their original positions when she's notlooking. She reaches for a text on a high shelf, and instead of standing, a thread of void flows from her marked hand, wrapping around the spine and tugging it gently into her grasp.
"You're getting better at that," I observe.
"It's becoming natural." She looks at the thin line of darkness connecting her to the book before releasing it. "Easier than getting up."
She catches my tendrils eventually, grabbing one and giving it a mock-stern look.
"Stop that."
"They're not mine," I lie. "Wild shadow tendrils. Very common in void realms."
"Nezavek."
"Can't control them. Tragic, really."
She tugs on the tendril, pulling me closer. "Liar."
"Prove it."
Instead of answering, she kisses me. The tendril immediately wraps around her waist, pulling her against me. The other shadows abandon their book-stealing mission to join in, running down her arms, curling around her thighs.
"Thought you couldn't control them," she murmurs against my lips.
"I've been miraculously cured."
A knock interrupts us, the specific grinding rhythm that means Mikaere. We separate, though one tendril remains in her hair because I can't quite help myself.
"Enter," I call.
Mikaere fills the doorway, all four arms crossed in what I've learned is his version of amusement.
The realm itself has been healing. Where our combined energies, void and light, have settled into the architecture, everything grows stronger. Including Mikaere, whose severedshoulder has regenerated a new stone arm, silver veins running through it like the ones that now trace Nezavek's form.
"The eastern border needs inspection," he announces. "There have been fluctuations."
"Dangerous?" Yorika asks.
"Unknown. But worth investigating. The realm boundaries are... thinning in places." He pauses. "Also, Päivi wishes to inform you that the new organizational system in the library is, and I quote, 'adequate.'"
Yorika grins. "From her, that's basically a declaration of love."
"She also called you 'tolerably intelligent' yesterday," Mikaere notes. "She's growing fond of you."
We walk through the realm together to check the border. The paths are the same stone and shadow they've always been, though I notice Yorika looking at corners and crevices with an odd expression.
"What?" I ask.
"Nothing. Just... for a moment I thought I saw something green."
"Green?"
"Probably just the light."
There's no light that could make anything green here, but I don't argue. Since the gallery, since she poured that mark into me to save my life, strange things happen. Small impossibilities. The other day, I swear I heard birds, though we have no birds.
