Page 89 of Sunastara & the Venusian
After dinner, Sai—who must have been both exhausted and starving, yet hadn’t complained once—fell asleep with his head in my lap. Leaning back against the unforgivinglyhard rock wall, I pretended to do the same, keeping my eyes mostly closed. I waited for Tano and Marisia to drift off, sleeping on opposite sides of the cave tonight, while I listened for Axel’s inevitable snoring after he passed out by the fire. Eventually, only Reya remained conscious, sitting at the entrance of the cave, taking her turn to keep watch. Just like we’d planned.
Not daring to wait much longer, I ran my fingers over Sai’s soft hair. When he opened his eyes and turned his head to look up at me, I nodded, took a deep breath, and carefully unclasped my Orion’s Tooth necklace. Slipping the tooth into Sai’s hand, I mouthed, “Be careful. Don’t break it.”
Rolling his eyes, he mouthed back, “Yes, Mom.”
The pain attempting to pierce my heart at the term, teasing as it was, would have to wait. The only thing that mattered now was making sure we didn’t die in the next few minutes.
I didn’t know how he did it, but with a press of the tooth’s tip, a tiny jiggle, and a firm twist, the cuffs on my wrists, then my ankles, unlinked. After slipping off my heels, I tried to unlink his, but all I managed to do was break the tooth in half, which—while earning me another eyeroll—at least didn’t wake the other Kravaxians.
They’d never bothered to cuff Sai’s ankles, so even though his hands were still bound, we tiptoed through the cave. Past Axel, still snoring. Between Tano and Marisia, both sleeping with their backs turned to each other, conveniently facing opposite sides of the cave wall.
When we reached Reya’s spot as lookout, she placed a finger to her lips, then drew several landmarks and three arrows in the dirt, reminders of the directions she’d told me to run earlier in the day. Directions that would hopefully lead us to a village where we’d be able to find comms. NotviewChips, but hopefully the low-tech, surface-to-orbit radios Reya said were prevalent in the villages in this region of Kravax.
It was a risk, trusting Reya, running through an unfamiliar forest in the dark, hoping the twins or the captain had been able to follow us through the jump and now orbited above us close enough that we’d be able to contact them. But neither of us thought we’d get a better chance than this one. Ushering Sai through the cavemouth, watching him run to the tree line where he’d wait for me, I turned back.
“Come with us,” I whispered, extending my hand toward Reya.
She shook her head, whispering back, “I can’t.” Sorrow lanced through her expression. “Tell Tig I’m sorry. Please.”
I nodded, squeezed her shoulder, and watched as she shoved a paresis dart into her thigh. Helping to lower her carefully to the ground, I brushed her hair off her cheek, wishing there had been another way. But it had to look like we’d snuck past her. Like we’d stolen a dart and tricked her. It was the only way we could think of to keep her safe.
I ducked out of the cave, and after a single glance up to the clear night sky, making a silent wish on the stars that they were up there—or maybe that they were down here with us already—I put my head down, and I ran for the trees like my life depended on it.
34
In the dimlight of Kravax’s two moons, I ran behind Sai, trying to keep up as he weaved around trees and ducked under branches, the silk of my jumpsuit snagging on a never-ending string of pine needles. I had never wheezed so hard in my life, my lungs burning, my eyes watering, my heart thundering. After another five minutes spent wondering if my chance of death by sudden cardiac arrest outweighed my chance of death by Kravaxian, I said, “I think we can slow down?—”
An explosion lit the sky, a deafeningboomshaking the trees, cutting me off.
“What the hell was that?” I cried, spinning around, grabbing Sai by his shoulder, and shoving him behind me. “Is it them? Did they wake up?” I squinted up at the sky, seeing nothing but stars, moons, and then?—
“It’s not them!” Sai shouted, sprinting out from behind me as a massive flaming dragon burst into the night sky. “Sunny, it’s not them!”
“Wait!” I took off after him as he raced back the way we’d come. “Sai, wait.”
“It’s magic,” he called over his shoulder. “It’s Makenna. They’ve found us. Our friends are here!”
Catching up with him, I reached for his bound hands, urging him to slow. “We still…need to…be careful,” I said urgently, gasping for air. “We can’t just”—I paused, placing my hands on my knees to catch my breath before I passed out—“run out there.”
“Yeah, okay.” He winced, patting my shoulder. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine.” Standing up straight again, I waved him off. “I’ve just done more running in the last two days than I’ve done in my entire life.” When he laughed at me, I pointed a finger at him. “Hey, did you know Makenna was one of your mom’s SOs?”
He scoffed. “Of course I knew. She’s like my aunt.” When another dragon made of light roared above our heads, Sai leapt into the air. “The FFKs must be freaking out.” His laughter was manic. “I don’t think they have magic on Kravax. Or dragons. It’s brilliant. This is allsoMakenna. She’s hysterical.”
“Wait, Sai,” I said as a sudden surge of adrenaline rattled me. “What about Reya? If Makenna is here, Rax and Morgath must be here too. What if they try to hurt Reya? They won’t know she helped us.”
Grasping one of my hands in his, he yanked me along. “Then we need to move faster. Come on.”
He led the way again as we followed the light show back toward the cave, hearing nothing but the snapping of twigs beneath our feet between the occasional deafening explosions of magic. And then, once we were closer, Tano’s and Axel’s panicked cries.
When we reached the tree line, it was pure chaos. Magical oorthorses, dragons, and even a flaming,stampeding kurot assaulted the silence of the woods. In the clearing, Tano and Axel huddled in their cave, ducking out occasionally to cower in fear at the fire in the sky. I couldn’t see Reya, which made sense, since she was likely only now waking up. No Marisia either. Probably hiding in the cave. What was more distressing, when I looked around the clearing, was that there was no sign of Makenna or my crew.
“Where are they?” I turned to Sai. “Do you see them?”
With a brow furrowed in deep concentration, he shook his head.
The biggest magic dragon hovered outside the Kravaxian’s cave, flapping its massive wings and slashing at the air with its glowing talons. “Let them go at once!” it roared. “Or perish in eternal hellsfire.”
