Aurora Burning (The Aurora Cycle #2)(122)

The same glyf my mother wore on her brow.

There is no love in violence, Kaliis, she would tell me.

I reach down to the floor beneath me. My fingers search the shattered crystal broken loose from the wall. I take hold of a shard—long and pointed, like a dagger. And I look at these poor wretches my father draws his power from. The crystal slicing into my palm as I clench it tight.

It would not take much to end them. Cut them loose from this life, and from him. Weakening him. Perhaps enough to topple him?

Mercy is the province of cowards, Kaliis.

But no. That is a choice he would make, not me. And if I am to step out from this shadow at last, I cannot do it by walking into darkness. I am not my past. I am not he who made me. I must stand in the light of the sun.

No matter what it will cost me.

I steal across the trembling floor, the crystal dagger in my hand, struggling through the storm of power building around them. My father and my be’shmai are locked together, the Weapon around us trembling now with tectonic violence. Blood drips from Aurora’s nose, her ears, her eyes. Her arms shake. Her knees buckle.

She cannot win this alone.

But the truth is?

She was never alone.

I loom up behind my father. Like a shadow. Like the past come back to haunt him. Like the voices of ten billion souls gone to the Void, my mother among them. And I wrap my arm around his throat and plunge the crystal blade toward the sweet spot between his fifth and sixth ribs.

The crystal pierces my father’s armor, and for a brief and beautiful moment, I feel the flesh parting beneath, the blade sinking toward the heart I can only assume he still owns.

But then it stops.

I feel his grip on my wrist, though he does not touch me. I feel his hand at my throat, though his own hands are still locked with Aurora’s. I struggle, powerless, gasping as his hold on me tightens. He glances over his shoulder at me, his eye burning like cold flame.

“Tsk, tsk,” he says.

With a toss of his head, he slams my be’shmai backward, sending her skidding across the floor, bleeding and gasping.

And then he turns to me.

I am held in place. Suspended three feet above the floor, utterly still.

He looks at me, the storm raging all around us. He is so changed now. Severed from the ties that once bound him. But I look deep into his eyes, and I think I see something left of what he was. Something of the man I feared and loved and hated.

“So,” he says, disappointed. “You are still your mother’s son.”

And though I cannot move to strike him, though I can barely muster the strength to breathe, still I draw enough to speak.

“I am n-not yours.”

His eyes narrow. The storm wind rises around us, the Waywalkers begin to scream, and I look to the girl who was my all and my everything, watching as she raises her head and looks at me.

“K-Kal …”

“Be’shmai,” I whisper.

And then I feel my father reach into my mind.

And he tears me apar—





39

TYLER

Auxiliary power has been restored to this section of the ship, and Saedii and I are charging toward the escape pods in the dim glow of the emergency lights. I presume the TDF marine squads are still looking for us back on the detention level, but the Unbroken attack seems to be occupying most of the crew’s attention. The decks are a hive of activity: marines, techs, repair crews, pilots all flooding to their battle stations, the ship shaking around us as the conflict rages through the Fold.

The reports we’re getting over the headsets in our stolen helmets aren’t so good. Turns out Saedii and I were both wrong—it’s not an Eidolon hitting us, but four Banshee-class Syldrathi cruisers. The ship we’re on, the Kusanagi, is a heavy carrier, but Banshees have cloaking tech that makes them almost invisible to conventional radar—probably how they snuck up on us in the first place. That means the Kusanagi’s gunners have to target visually, which is hard to do when your opponent is moving a couple of thousand klicks a second. All this is to say that even though the Syldrathi ships are smaller, it’s still gonna be a brawl.

I honestly have no idea who will come out on top.

Another blast rocks the Kusanagi, sending Saedii stumbling into me, and me stumbling into the wall. Half a dozen Terran techs dash past us, and the alarms continue to blare as I haul myself back to my feet.

“Just for future reference,” I ask, steadying myself, “if you’re falling and I catch you, are you going to knee me in the groin again?”

“Be silent, Tyler Jones,” Saedii sighs, staggering forward.

Maybe I should just let you fall right on your arrogant ass, I think to myself.

I heard that, comes her voice inside my head.

“FIRST ENEMY VESSEL DESTROYED,” the PA reports. “CRITICAL DAMAGE TO SECOND ENEMY VESSEL. KUSANAGI HULL BREACH ON LEVEL 4, PORT BATTERIES DISABLED. TECH CREWS REPORT TO LEVEL 6, CORRIDORS 6 BETA AND EPSILON, IMMEDIATELY.”

“The escape pods should be just ahead,” I report.

“I see them,” Saedii replies, charging on through the gloom.

A TDF carrier has escape pods on every level—one-person units, independently powered in the event of catastrophic reactor damage. I can make out a bunch at the T-junction ahead—a few dozen hatchways set into the wall. Their operating mechanisms are basically big red buttons behind panes of glass marked BREAKIN CASE OF EMERGENCY—they’re made to be easy to operate, even in a disaster scenario. If our luck holds, we can b— The disruptor blast hits Saedii right in her head. The tac helmet she’s wearing absorbs the brunt of the blow, but the shot still sends her spinning like a top.