He nods. “You realize it will take turns.”

“I know. But it’s worth doing.”

“Agreed. And your credits make it possible.”

Outside the clinic, on the platform, waiting for the hover cab to take us back to the spaceport, Vel says, “There have been two more requests for settlements, Sirantha.”

Not unexpected, after I agreed on the first. “Pay them both.”

“I have an offer for Dobrinya, but I believe you can do better.”

“Then decline. Accept whatever you think is fair.” I don’t know enough about this shit to manage my mother’s fortune, and really, Vel is just the trustee, until the bereaved families take it, bit by bit.

“Very well.”

Every meter this aircar flies takes me closer to the end of my obligations. As yet, I have two quests to complete, and I don’t kid myself—they’ll each require a lot of time and effort, but my conscience won’t let me rest until I keep my promises, both to myself and to Loras. Only then can I live the life I’ve always dreamed of, devoid of duty or obligation. Just me, my crew, and the silent stars, free to leap anytime I want and follow the beacons anywhere at all. That is my paradise, and a dream I must defer. For now. Where March fits into this future, I can’t say. He made his choice when he went after his nephew.

Though I couldn’t have admitted it, a kernel of bitterness lodges in my heart. It’s always him leaving me, isn’t it? First, it was Keri, and Lachion. Now it’s for the nephew who needs him. His reasons are sound, and he’s a good man who loves me, but I just don’t know if he’s the one with whom I can spend my life. I won’t change my dreams to fit his needs, nor do I think he should do so for me. If we can’t find a median that makes us both happy, then—

Well. Until I hear from him, it will keep. He left. And even in his good-bye letter, he offered his comm code, not an invitation. I’ve been long enough dirtside. I need to travel. Joining his quest on Nicuan would be just as bad as my time on New Terra, training endless waves of jumpers.

I sleep on the ship. As Vel warned, the quarters on the Big Bad Sue are miniscule, but Baby-Z and I don’t need much room. I lie on my back, feeling his tiny movements under my shirt. This time, I’m not full of horrified amusement as I was when the hatchling imprinted on March.

After the span Carvati prescribed, I head to the cockpit, where Hit is already waiting. She grins at the tiny lizard- baby lump on my chest, and I brace myself.

“You and Vel, huh? I’d have thought it would be more insect than reptile, but love works in mysterious ways. But you gotta tell me, how—”

“Okay, seriously.”

I just lost Adele, not that she knows, and I’m feeling oddly sensitive about any mockery directed at Vel, particularly in that way. No, looking at him doesn’t get me hot because he’s so far beyond my type as to be absurd—and yet . . . I love him. I do. It’s a thing beyond explaining, beyond sex, and beyond all customary definitions. Not the way I love March, but I don’t love March the same as I love Vel, either. The human heart defies such boundaries sometimes. It just does what it’s meant to do, and gives love where it receives it. Sometimes it can be blind in the best of ways.

Hit stops smiling when she sees my expression. Nobody ever said she wasn’t sensitive . . . for a killer. “Marakeq, then?”

“Get us above the dome and out of the atmosphere, please. I’ll take it from there.”

CHAPTER 20

Hit handles the departure with the docking authority and receives our clearance to depart. Smoothly, she powers up the ship, and the Sue responds with a little hum. That smoothness is Dina’s handiwork. From the exterior, you’d never guess how well this ship runs—in that, she’s like the Folly, the first ship I flew on with her.

And March.

But I’m not thinking about him.

That way, this ache I feel won’t get worse. I won’t wonder whether he’s safe or if Nicuan is driving him nuts. At this point, I have to trust he knows what he’s doing, and he won’t make any terrible decisions on world, but the truth of the matter is, he’d do anything for Svetlana’s son, no matter the cost to himself. So I put him from my mind; he’s beyond my reach for now. Choices were made; paths diverged, and only Mary knows if they’ll ever intersect again. I hope so. I’m not ready to say good-bye to him, not with Vel’s story about Adele so fresh in my mind.

But he chose his course, as I have. I have no business on Nicuan. Maybe it’s cold, but I cherish no attachment to his sister’s child. I would never ask him to pick between his family and me, but he must realize I’m not the settling- down type. Ever since I heard about the kid, I’ve had a bitter, stark feeling, and it’s not getting better. During the war, it didn’t matter as much. None of us could do as we wished.

It matters now.

Gas streaks the world red behind us, blood-tears to mark the loss of a beloved soul. The rest of Gehenna burns orange inside the dome, reflections cast in glastique that protects the city from the killing air. There was a breach, once, in the early days; I saw pictures in school of the bodies, asphyxiated where they fell. That was before they installed all the locks and seals. Even inside the dome, the idea of absolute safety is more illusion than reality. Death hovers just outside the glimmering barrier, swirling at the edges.

Hit flies with the same grace that marks her combat style, and soon we’re through the locks and chambers, rising into the atmosphere. Even now, the knowledge I’m about to jump sends a thrill of pleasure through me. Deep down, I’m still a junkie. The rush still calls to me more than anything else in this life; for me, being trapped dirtside would be the worst punishment imaginable, so I’m glad as hell that Nola got me out of prison.

Wonder how Pandora’s doing.

While I’m thinking about it, I bounce a message to New Terra, asking for a status update. I figure since I’m footing the bill, I’m entitled to that much information. Hit glances at me as I record and send, but she doesn’t ask.

Instead, she says, “We’re out of range of the planet’s gravitational pull.”

Which means I’m on.

Sheer joy as I plug in. Blackout comes on cue, then Hit joins me in the nav com, contained as always. On a ship this size, the phase drive shakes all the way into your bones, a unique vibration that says I’m getting ready to take you into the unknown. The cations in my veins seem to rub against those flowing through the modified phase drive, throwing sparks in my mind. Neural blockers take any associated pain, then Hit pushes us through the corridor spiraling before us.

Then I’m home. Grimspace rushes in my head as if I’ve flown into a cyclone, spinning me in all directions, and yet it’s perfect, inexpressibly right. I open myself to the shimmering colors and the echo of the beacons. So strange to have fragments of me reflected in each pulse. I imagine this is what it’s like to have children you haven’t seen in turns; they resemble you in ways you’ve almost forgotten because you aren’t that person anymore.

And that’s just about the perfect analogy, for these beacons I’ve attuned to my DNA signature are the closest I’ll ever come to offspring of my own. This is my genetic legacy, my message to future jumpers. Hello, they say with each pulse. Sirantha Jax was here. And maybe that’s all that needs to be said.

Without further luxuriation, though I take great pleasure in being here, I cast out for the Marakeq beacon. They all feel different to me now in minute gradations, and so it takes a little longer to find it. There.

Hit follows my directions, and the phase drive pulls through me. It’s a peculiar symbiosis, using the beacons themselves to jump, but I think this is what the ancients intended all along. I suspect we’ve only unlocked a portion of their capabilities. In a thousand turns, jumpers may be traveling in ways that I can’t conceive right now.

The ship responds with an eager leap, pushing through to straight space, and I unplug. Next, I check on Baby-Z2. There’s no gear small enough to protect him, and I examine him to see if he’s taken any harm from the jump. His vitals are good, and he doesn’t appear changed in any fashion I can see, still alert, still interested in lights and sounds, with his neck craning around so he can peer out of my shirt.

“The Mareq okay?” she asks.

“Seems to be.”

I assess our location on the star charts. “Not bad. Four thousand klicks off.”

Direct jumps aren’t foolproof, I haven’t done enough of them to guarantee my accuracy, and I’m a little out of practice, what with my trial and incarceration. So I’ll take this.

“Won’t be a long haul,” Hit says. “I was meaning to ask . . . do you want us to come with you?”

“The better question is, do you want to?”

The small bundle beneath my shirt twitches. It’s time to bathe him, clean my chest, and freshen the protein gel. But I can wrap up this conversation first. Baby-Z2 clings to life as fiercely as his sibling did, determined to take his place among his people. And I’m doing my damnedest to get it done.

Her strong face turns thoughtful. “While it’d be fascinating to be part of a first-contact encounter, I’m afraid too large a party might spook the natives.”

I consider that. “There’s that chance. We might also need you and Dina as backup if the mission goes bad.”

“My thoughts exactly.”

The Big Bad Sue is too small to have a shuttle, so we’ll all go down on planet.

That’s not optional. But we don’t all have to hike out to the settlement. I’m running scans as we speak, pinpointing the place where we put down here. I have the eerie feeling of retracing my steps, but I’m so fragging different now that it’s like seeing the same things through new eyes. And I’ve lost so many people that I care about. The old Jax thought she knew pain, but the universe had an ocean of lessons to teach her about grief. I guess it’s made me stronger, or at least more dogged, because I don’t think about how I’m going to die so much anymore. I mostly think about how to keep my promises, one step at a time, one minute at a time.

“Then why don’t you remain on the ship. Can you take us down without crashing?” I ask, remembering the last time.

March is a good pilot, and between the atmosphere, the utter lack of ground support, the jungle, and the deceptive readings, we were lucky to get the Folly down in one piece. As I recall, that was when everything changed between us. I see his face now, so dark and ugly-beautiful with his broken nose and too-strong jaw, smeared with mud, rain spiking his lashes. There’s that damn ache again.

Oh, Mary, keep him safe. Watch over him until I see him again.

Hit glares. “I can’t even believe you just asked me that. Damn. Do you think this is my first low-tech landing?”

Despite my fear about things to come, I grin. “Sorry. Put us down right here.”

I slide the coordinates her way, and she studies the terrain, weather conditions, and the trajectory before giving a sharp nod. “This is gonna be fun.”