Aurora Burning (The Aurora Cycle #2)(20)

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I do not know how Scarlett keeps acquiring these clothes.

Her ability to summon new outfits seemingly at will is almost supernatural. She was gone for a total of eighty-seven minutes with only a handful of credits in her pocket, and she returned with a new wardrobe for each of us, suited to the mission at hand. She does not steal—she waved receipts in Zila’s and Aurora’s faces and regaled them with tales of retail prowess, using arcane words like twofer and cleav discount. Aurora expressed an inordinate amount of joy over the shoes Scarlett found for her. I was concerned her squeals might attract neighborhood security.

I make a mental note of that.

She likes shoes.

Scarlett tossed a shopping bag at my chest, and I peered suspiciously at the contents, one eyebrow rising to my hairline.

“Really?”

The oldest Jones twin only smiled. “Trust me.”

Now the mission awaits, and so we retire to various rooms in our dingy flat to change. Aurora, Scarlett, and Zila take to the bedroom; Finian heads off to the bathroom for some privacy. I note that his exosuit hisses as he walks, that he is favoring his left leg heavily. I suspect he requires assistance to change his clothes but is declining it in an attempt to assert independence. I do not know enough about his condition to be worried, but I worry all the same.

With nowhere left to use, Tyler and I get changed together in the tiny living area. It is the first time we have been alone since a certain kiss in a certain computer maintenance room on the World Ship. I haul off my maintenance uniform and struggle into the pants Scarlett gave me. Tyler slips off his coveralls, drags his undershirt off, stripping down to his shorts and the silver chain he wears around his neck, his father’s ring looped through the links. As he reaches for the pants his sister bought him, I find myself studying him from the corner of my eye.

Our Alpha looks weary. Shoulders slumped. Bruises from my sister’s beating laid in stripes across the muscles of his back, the lines of his torso. He pulls a tunic over the damage, drags his hand through his shaggy blond hair, and sighs.

I can feel his mind at work. The uncertainty he keeps hidden behind a wall of optimism. His uniglass quietly beeps upon the table—a reminder from its internal calendar. I see the words MY BIRTHDAYYYY—2 DAYS! light up the screen.

“I did not know it was your and Scarlett’s birthday soon,” I say.

Sorrow fills Tyler’s eyes, turning bright blue to steel gray.

“It’s not,” he says quietly, motioning to the uniglass. “I threw my uni at the ultrasaur on the World Ship. That one belonged to …”

I realize who he means without him having to say her name. He must have taken the device from her on Octavia III. I can see the pain in Tyler’s eyes as he looks at that message—one more reminder of all she will never have, will never be.

“I grieve for Zero,” I tell him softly. “I know what she meant to you.”

He looks up at that. I see her face reflected in his eyes—the ink on her skin, the fire in her stare. Then he looks at the ceiling, blinking rapidly.

“Yeah.”

“You are doing the right thing, Tyler Jones.”

He glances toward the muffled laughter in the bedroom. The voices of the ones we care for. There is such a fragile web between us all; he and I both know it. Perhaps better than any of them. I catch a glimpse behind those walls of his for a moment. Just a sliver of uncertainty glinting through the cracks.

“I hope so,” he sighs.

“We have the whole galaxy arrayed against us,” I tell him. “But this is where we are meant to be. We are part of something greater now; I feel it in my bones. You will lead us through this. And I will follow you, Brother.”

Syldrathi do not touch, save in moments of intimacy or ritual. But Tyler Jones and I have brawled in the belly of Terran destroyers, butted heads across the Fold, looked into the eyes of death side by side. Human he might be. Weary and bruised and flawed as the rest of them. But in battle, everyone bleeds the same.

I offer him my hand.

“I know my friends, and they are few. But those few I have, I would die for.”

He looks into my eyes again. Muscle flexing along the line of his jaw as he slaps his hand into mine.

“Thanks, Kal. It means a lot, knowing you’ve got my back.”

“Del’nai,” I reply.

A puzzled frown creases his brow to hear me speak in my own tongue. “I think Scar explained what that means, but I don’t …”

“Always,” I say. “Ever and always.”

He looks me up and down with a wry grin.

“Quite an outfit she picked for you.”

I look down at my new clothes in dismay. The pants are made of glossy black plastic, a row of silver buckles running from my ankles to my hips. My shirt is transparent mesh, also black, stretched tight over my torso and leaving very little to the imagination. I would normally only wear boots of this kind if I were planning an extended land war on the surface of a hostile planet.

“Wow,” I hear a voice say.

I look up and see Aurora at the bedroom door. She is wearing a white dress-suit that would probably be described by others as chic. But to me she is clothed in light, radiant as the sun.

Her eyes run from my boots to my face. “You look …”

“Do I have good taste?” Scarlett asks behind her. “Or do I have good taste?”