I close my eyes and let my head drop back, a muffled gurgle filling my ears. Distantly I hear the sloshing of Gal’s footsteps as he wades into the river. Then a crash as he trips over a rock and goes down hard.
I sit upright in time to catch the sight of a disgruntled Umber prince sputtering and gasping as he flounders for his footing. “It’s cold,” he says, his voice so indignant that it’s almost a shriek. “How the rut did you…flop in like that?”
I shrug. “You adjust fast.”
“You have a death wish, Ettian Nassun.”
“A little river’s not going to kill you, Gal.”
He glances around, shrugging. “The plants look healthy enough. Probably no weird chemicals in this water.” Gal wanders over to my side and sinks gingerly into the water, as if it’s finally deigned to meet his standards. “Okay, fine, this is nice,” he concedes, stretching out his legs.
I give him about three seconds to enjoy it, then splash him.
“Ettian!” he chokes, shielding his face before another wave hits him. I scuttle back as he swings his arm around and lets a volley of water fly. I try to duck behind my elbow, but Gal grabs my arm and twists, cackling as he manages to get another handful of water in my face. My attempt to retaliate is blocked by him grabbing my other wrist, and I lose my balance to complete the indignity of it all, collapsing back into the shallows.
And of course, because he has an uncanny knack for putting me in the worst possible situation, Gal comes down on top of me. One of his elbows digs hard into my stomach, and his weight crushes my chest, driving the breath out of my lungs. I inhale water as my head goes under, then come up choking to find Gal bent over me. He’s breathless, his mop of unruly hair dripping into his eyes, down his nose, onto my collarbone.
I try to clear my throat, but it comes out as a weak noise, halfway to a whimper. I don’t know what to do with the way he looks at me. With the way he’s got one arm braced in the water over my shoulder. With his other hand hovering over my chest.
There’s a dangerous instinct that kicks in sometimes when you’re flying. The adrenaline pushes you into doing the most reckless thing you can think of the second the option appears. Recognizing that instinct is hard.
Stopping it is harder.
My hand curves up over his waist, running along the line between his skin and his soaking pants as I push myself up. Push closer. His eyes go half-closed, his gaze dropping to my lips. Ten inches. Two.
His hand presses against my chest, stopping me short. I jolt backward as the haze around my brain clears in a horrible instant. “Gal—”
“I—”
“I’m so sorry.”
He rockets to his feet and steps over me, rubbing his hands over his face. Without a backward glance, he wades out of the shallows and up onto the riverbank. I watch him tramp back toward the ship with his boots in one hand and shirt in the other, contemplating the option of slipping under the surface of the river, never to be heard from again.
My mind sputters with excuses—I was playing, it wasn’t serious, I didn’t mean—but all of them fizzle out. Gal knows me too well to believe any lie I spin. He knows exactly what that was, and now I know exactly how all of my questions get answered. Now we’re stuck with knowing.
Any illusions I had about lingering in the wild drain from my head. Better to hit Isla as quickly as possible, before I have a chance to rut this up even more.
* * *
—
When I return to the Ruttin’ Hell, Gal’s already up on a precariously balanced ladder, scraping furiously at the paint. His datapad sticks out of his waistband, blasting a chipper pop tune that drowns out the grating noise of metal against metal. He’s changed into dry clothes, but his hair is still damp, and if he notices my approach, he’s choosing to ignore it.
I duck into the Beamer to change and reemerge to discover that he’s cleared nearly two feet of paint. Deep down, I know it’s better to let him wear himself out rather than say something, but I need to make sure he doesn’t hurt himself in the process. So I take up my position at the base of the ladder, bracing against it as I stare down into the sand and ferns that surround our landing site. Scorched patches mark where the Beamer’s rotary thrusters fired to stabilize our landing, wreathed by the curled and blackened stems of the plants I destroyed when I dropped the ship here.
I close my eyes.
I knew it would go like this. I don’t know why I thought it would turn out any differently. I’ve watched Gal and romance from afar, and they’re not a good pair. He’ll flirt and flit, but he dances around anything serious, leaving a trail of frustrated people in his wake. In retrospect, his reasons are clear. He knows the responsibility on his shoulders. For his future empire’s sake, he’s learned to guard his heart.
I wish I could have done the same. I got caught up in the river, in the moment of escape, in the way this place made me forget everything we carry with us. There’s no taking back what I tried. We’re trapped in the aftermath.
But maybe it’s better this way. There’s absolutely no future for anything between us—not when he’s going to be the ruler of the galaxy and I’ll only ever be an orphan who crawled out of the ruins of Trost. We’d never stand as equals, and I can’t believe I let myself think otherwise.
He was smart to reject me. Right to reject me. If he knew anything about what I’ve survived—and I’ve made damn sure he doesn’t—he wouldn’t want anything to do with me. There’s nothing about me that deserves the love of an Umber prince, especially not the love of one who might actually do some good in this rutted-up universe.
Gal can’t afford the distraction, and neither can I. I need to get my head on straight and start thinking like the loyal soldier he needs. Gal doesn’t need a lover. He needs a pilot. The best thing I can do for him isn’t kissing him—it’s bringing him home.
I keep my post at the base of the ladder, waiting for Gal to offer a switch, but he only comes down, kicks it a few feet over, and then climbs right back up. The afternoon drags on into evening, the paint chips keep falling, and by the time the sun’s disappeared into the tree line, he’s cleared the last of his family’s colors from the ship. As he descends the ladder for the last time, I retreat to the cargo bay ramp and lean against the edge of the hull there, stuffing my hands in my pockets and trying to ignore the rattle of Gal’s footsteps.
The setting sun paints the sky above us a hazy, soft purple. Unfamiliar stars peek out between the sparse clouds, and the distant lights of air traffic trace vectors toward Isla in the north. I tip my head back, knocking my skull against the Ruttin’ Hell. The dusk is lovely, and the freedom of the wilderness is intoxicating, but it’s all an illusion. Our lives are no less in danger, and we can’t afford to get swept away.