Only when I heard the whispering whoosh of the hatch did I turn and sit up, making sure he’d gone. Throwing back the covers, I jumped out of bed, put on slippers and a robe, and hurried after him, careful to keep a stealthy distance.
Hanging back, I watched him head all the way up into the main space, where the lights had since been fixed, before moving down the left-hand hallway. He kept going until he reached one of the doors in the middle of the corridor, where I knew nobody was staying. To my knowledge, it was just a spare function room that had more recently been used as a storage unit, full of boxes and disused furniture.
He entered the room alone, closing the door behind him. I waited a couple of minutes before creeping up the corridor after him, pausing beside the same door. My heart beating faster, terrified of what I might discover, I leaned in and pressed my ear to the hatch.
Inside, Navan coughed and spluttered, the wrenching noises rasping from his chest.
So, that’s his secret, I thought miserably, tears pricking my eyes. He’s sick… really sick. He must not want me to know; otherwise, he’d have said something.
I wondered if something awful had happened to him during the fight with Ezra and Stone. I’d seen him on the floor, totally knocked out, but maybe there had been more to it than met the eye. Maybe Ezra had done something else when he’d jabbed Navan between the shoulder blades with an Aksavdo move. Had he poisoned him? Navan hadn’t been himself since that day. We’d been through almost everything together, so it had to be something really, really bad for him not to breathe a word of it to me. I guessed he didn’t want me to worry, but now I was worrying more than ever.
I lingered by the door, not knowing what to do. Every fiber of my being wanted to storm across the threshold and put my arms around him, and yet I couldn’t do it. He’d sought to keep this from me—what right did I have to burst into his private haven and disturb him? I was his girlfriend, but he’d evidently wanted to keep this a secret from me for a reason. Until he was ready to tell me what was wrong, I’d have to resign myself to ignorance.
Reluctantly, I made my way back to the bedroom, making a mental note to check that room in the morning, to make sure there was nothing strange inside. If he was hiding something terrible from me, that room would hold the secrets.
As I lay back down in my bed, feeling the absence of Navan more intensely than ever before, I pulled the blanket around me, snuggling in as best as I could without him. Even so, it took hours before sleep finally claimed me. I was only aware that I’d even managed to drift off when something roused me around five o’clock in the morning, making me blink awake for a moment. Navan had come back at last, though he looked worse than he had when he’d left.
“Where did you go?” I murmured wearily, turning to face him.
“Just needed something to drink. Go back to sleep,” he whispered, scooching in beside me and slipping his arm around my waist.
“Are you okay?”
He nuzzled my neck, kissing me gently. “I’m fine, just thirsty. Come on, go back to sleep, beautiful. I’m sorry I woke you.”
“I had a bad dream,” I said, feeling him pull me closer.
“I’m here now. There’s nothing to worry about.”
“I dreamed you were sick.”
“I’m fine, Riley. We’ve all had a tiring day, that’s all,” he murmured, his voice growing sleepier. “Cuddle up and close your eyes. Pretend you never woke up.”
I stared at the wall, listening to his breathing. I could feel his chest moving against my back and hear every snuffle as he sank into an exhausted sleep. The thing was, I was terrified that he would never wake up. Perhaps he’d been keeping his illness to himself so he didn’t lower morale. After all, none of us would have the spirit to continue if we lost him… least of all me.
I’d only lingered by the door for a handful of minutes, but it had been enough to scare the living daylights out of me. I had no idea what was happening to him, but truthfully, it had sounded like he was slowly dying.
Chapter Thirty-One
The following morning, I slipped out of bed early and sprinted through the ship, wanting to see what was inside the room where Navan had holed himself up for most of the night. Opening the hatch, I was disappointed to find nothing amiss at all. I searched high and low, scouring the old furniture and endless towers of boxes, but I couldn’t find anything that would give me a scrap of insight into what Navan had been doing in here for so many hours.
Puzzled, I padded out of the room and headed for the kitchen, fixing myself and Navan some breakfast before heading back to the bedroom. However, when I reached the doorway and punched the entry pad with my elbow, while trying to balance two dishes, it opened to reveal an empty bed. Navan was already gone, though he could only have had a couple of hours of sleep.
Still holding the two dishes, I moved back through the ship toward the cockpit, knowing there’d be someone in there who might have seen where Navan had gone. To my surprise, he was already sitting in the copilot’s chair, chatting with Ronad. They fell silent as I entered, making me wonder if I’d grown another head in the night and simply hadn’t realized.
“I was just looking for you,” I said, trying to smile. “I thought you could do with some breakfast.”
Navan took the bowl from me and placed a kiss on my forehead. “Thanks, Riley, I’m starving. I might go eat this in the kitchen, save me leaving bowls around the place.”
Every time I walked into a room, it seemed like he was eager to leave it. I didn’t know what I’d done wrong. Even if he was sick and trying to hide it from me, that didn’t mean he could treat me this way, making me feel like I was on the outside, looking in.
“You secretly trying to get Ronad to plot a course for Earth?” I joked.
Navan’s face morphed into a mask of seriousness. “I would never do such a thing, not when we know about Stone’s horde,” he said, his eyes flitting nervously around the room, as though he were following some unseen bug. “Anyway, we have to tackle one problem at a time. Yes, the threat of Gianne reaching Earth is horrible, but we have nothing if we don’t have Stone’s help and his cargo full of ship parts. So, we need to do as he asks for our plan to destroy the rebels to work. I’ve come to terms with it.”
“I was just teasing,” I murmured, my cheeks getting hot with embarrassment.
Hell, I knew the severity of the situation better than anyone. My nerves were still shot after finding a spy in our midst and discovering that Gianne was headed for my home planet. If anyone had the right to be anxious about Earth’s future, it was me, not him—I was well aware of what was at stake, and the prioritizing we needed to do to get there.
“I know, but these aren’t laughing matters,” he replied anxiously, before planting another kiss on my forehead and leaving the room. I felt like I’d been scolded by a schoolteacher, aside from the cursory kiss he’d granted me.
Mortified tears pricked my tired eyes. Navan was acting even weirder than before. He seemed nervous and jumpy, his mind constantly elsewhere. It was almost like he couldn’t even see me anymore. I wanted to storm down the corridor after him and ask him outright about the state of his health so we could all get over this and start figuring out a solution, but I was almost too afraid of what the answer might be. It seemed easier to deal with the backlash of his behavior, rather than know the truth, in case that truth took him away from me for good.
“Ronad… have you noticed Navan acting strange at all?” I asked, plopping down in the seat next to him.
He glanced at me, flashing a smile. “No, not at all. I think he’s just a bit tired, same as the rest of us.”
“You don’t think there might be anything wrong with him?”
“Nope, seems to be the same old Navan to me,” Ronad replied, his tone annoyingly chipper.
“Really?”
He nodded. “Really. I promise you, he seems fine. Are you okay? After what you went through the other day, I wouldn’t be surprised if you felt
a little paranoid about things,” he said, instantly making me doubt every thought I’d had that day.
“Maybe you’re right. It has been weird.”
“Well, here’s something to take your mind off everything.” He grinned, gesturing up at the windshield. A planet was appearing in the distance, glowing a peculiar shade of blue in the impenetrable blackness of space.
I frowned. “What is it?”
“Welcome to Glossa.”
“I thought it was supposed to take us three days.”
“Two and a half, thanks to some friendly neighborhood pockets of solar wind. Bashrik and I have been pinballing us between stars to harness the plasma streams,” Ronad said, with a cheeky grin.
“Sounds intense,” I replied, flashing a smile.
I sat up a little straighter in my seat and gazed out at the approaching planet, squinting to get a better look. I wasn’t sure if it was my eyes playing tricks on me, but Glossa definitely seemed to be glowing brightly, almost like one of the nearby stars. I would have mistaken it for a sun of some kind, had it not been for the unique blue color.
As we neared, I immediately understood why Stone had called it the safest planet in the universe. The entire surface was shrouded in a blue shield of energy, similar to the one that appeared when Stone used the power of the weird bracelet that he always wore around his wrist. I’d been meaning to ask what it actually was, but something else constantly seemed to get in the way.
“She’s a beauty, ain’t she?” Stone’s voice came from the cockpit entrance.
I turned to see him standing in the doorway with Lauren coming up after him, a smile playing on his lips, his manner just as calm and easy as always. Xiphio followed close behind, carrying plates of food—presumably for himself and Lauren, as part of some romantic breakfast. The sight of it irked me a bit, knowing my actual boyfriend had run off with the dish I’d brought him, with no hope of a romantic meal together.
“How come the planet glows like that?” I asked, focusing on Stone.
“Same reason this does.” He lifted his arm, showing off the bracelet.
I frowned at his vagueness. “So, all the inhabitants of Glossa use the same technology your bracelet uses?”
He shook his head, chuckling. “Nah, Ri, the inhabitants are the technology.”
“I don’t follow.”
“This bracelet on me wrist ain’t a piece of jewelry, like ye all presumed,” he explained, moving over to the windshield to get a better view. “It’s a livin’, breathin’ critter called a nudus, and I’m mighty grateful to ‘ave found it.”
“That thing is alive?” I gasped, glancing at the glowing blue accessory. It didn’t look alive. Then again, the universe was full of surprises—sentience seemed to take a million different forms out here. Why should I be shocked that one could be worn?
Stone nodded, flashing me a disapproving look. “It is, but ye shouldn’t call it a ‘thing.’ How’d ye like it if I called you a thing?” he chided playfully. “I bought this ‘ere nudus on the darkstar market in exchange for some love bugs I’d managed to get me hands on—make ye stay all night, if ye catch me drift.”
I blushed. “I catch your drift.”
“No idea how this fella managed to get his mitts on this nudus, since ye can’t land on Glossa without one,” he went on, amused with himself. “Anyway, I don’t usually go in fer the trafficking of critters, but this seller couldn’t wear it himself, and I had me a bit of knowledge over what it could do, so we struck us a deal. I didn’t have to offer many of me love bugs for it, neither.”
“How come the seller couldn’t wear it? Surely, you just strap it on your wrist and off you go?”
It was Lauren who answered. “Nudus are, basically, parasites that bond to a host in a symbiotic fashion. They let the host use their shielding powers in exchange for extracting necessary nutrients from the host’s body,” she explained. “The thing is, they’re pretty picky creatures—they choose their hosts carefully, so not everyone can wear one.”
These things were getting more interesting by the second, though I wasn’t sure I liked the idea of something clinging to my wrist, sucking the nutrients out of me. Stone clearly had a much stronger stomach than I did; he barely seemed to notice his.
“What do you mean they ‘choose’ their hosts?” These nudus didn’t seem very sentient to me.
“The nudus live to protect. It’s the core value that drives their existence,” Lauren replied, her eyes twinkling with the thrill of getting to talk about them. “It’s why they prefer to choose hosts who don’t have violence in their hearts. They stick to the purest of souls.”
I flashed a dubious look at Stone. “So, how did he end up with one?”
“Stone is one of the most honorable and kind-hearted people I’ve ever known. Everyone who knows him properly says the same thing,” she said, without missing a beat. “It’s no wonder the nudus trusted him enough to latch on.”
Stone glanced at her, a grin spreading across his face. “I was gonna say it were just blind luck,” he murmured bashfully while Xiphio looked on with obvious jealousy, still holding the plates of food in his hands.
“Perhaps, Miss Lauren, we ought to sit down and eat before our breakfast gets cold,” he said.
Lauren turned to him as though she’d only just remembered he was there. “Sorry, Xiphio, of course. My mind’s all over the place today.”
They wandered over to one of the tables by the front window, with Stone watching as subtly as he could. I felt bad for him, especially as he’d been visibly thrilled a moment ago. That kind of compliment didn’t come easily from anyone, but to hear it from Lauren must have meant the world to him.
As I leveled my gaze toward Glossa, a thought came to me. If these nudus were responsible for forging a shield around Glossa, then perhaps they could do the same thing for another planet.
“Could we use these nudus as a shield for Earth?”
Stone inhaled sharply, as though he was about to tell me my repairs would cost a fortune. “That’d be tough, Ri. It’s like Ren says—these critters don’t just join themselves with anyone,” he replied. “They’re proper picky about whom they want fer a host. Plus, fer a job like that, the wearers would have to wear a bunch of nudus at once. It’d suck the life outta them, more o’ less.”
“It’d kill them?”
“Nah, but they’d feel like they wanted to be dead. It’d suck all the juice outta them.”
Lauren nodded, distracted once again from her food. “Not to mention the fact that it would only be a temporary solution,” she said. “If the shield is blue and hazy like this one, which I presume it would be, it might block or filter out some of the wavelengths of light that come from the sun, which might cause some problems on the surface. There’d be no way of knowing how it would affect Earth until the shield was actually up, but you can bet it won’t be a permanent fix—our atmosphere could never adapt in time.”
Stone smiled at her. “She can’t get enough o’ learning about critters and things, can she? I think she read every book I had on ‘em within a couple hours.”
“Knowledge is power,” she fired back, grinning.
“Well, the temporary thing shouldn’t be too much of a problem,” I interjected. “All we really need to do is prevent Gianne from landing on Earth’s soil so we can destroy her fleet in the safety of space, without having to worry about human casualties. So, that means we only need to keep the shield up while we stop her from landing on the planet’s surface. After that, we can take it down, or put some up here and there if debris becomes a problem.”
Lauren gave a tentative shrug. “I guess that could work.”
I nodded eagerly. “I say the nudus are worth a try.”
“I say ye use whatever ye can get yer mitts on, if you’re wantin’ to defeat that coldblood queen,” Stone added, a contented smirk curving up the corners of his mouth. He could see that Xiphio was annoyed by the attention he’d managed to divert, and the t
wo of them stared at one another in a silent standoff while Lauren remained blissfully unaware. Soon enough, I knew she was going to have to make a choice, even if she didn’t realize it yet.
“Hey, isn’t that your ship?” I announced, pointing through the windshield at a vessel floating beyond the atmosphere of Glossa. It looked pretty beat up, even more so than the last time, but whether that was general wear and tear or the sign of more dangerous troubles, I didn’t know. Stone didn’t seem too bothered by the way it looked, though I guessed beauty was in the eye of the beholder.
“Ah, there she is!” he cooed. “I’ve missed the old bird.”
Ronad looked up at him. “You want me to patch a message through?”
“If ye could, pal.”
Ronad’s hands moved across the controls, and a screen flickered to life on top of the dashboard as the speakers crackled. A moment later, Alfa’s face appeared on the monitor, his feline eyes peering into the camera, clearly trying to pick out a friendly face. As soon as he saw Stone, a fanged grin lit up his panther-like features.
“Stone, my man!” he cried. “Swish ship you got there! Who’d you nick that naughty little number off?”
“Never you mind who I nabbed it off. A good thief never kisses an’ tells. Ye weren’t gettin’ worried about me, were ye?” Stone teased.
“No way, man. Just wondering what was taking you so long! You’re getting slow in your advancing years.”
“Advancing years my ass! Yer just jealous, Alfa, ‘cause you know no matter how old we get, I’ll always be the better lookin’ one.” The pair of them cackled, and Lauren smirked at the exchange.
“Is Ren with you?” Alfa asked, turning serious for a second.
“Aye, she’s over there. Safe and sound.”
“Glad to hear it, pal. We want everyone to come home to roost, you know?”