The lake is smaller than I remember, shrunken and eaten like everything in the wastes. The banks are a dark ring around the lake itself, which is blue in its center, white with alkaline along the shallows. People must live here again—the bread I ate at Bedrock was tinged green, a sign that the soda is still harvested here—but even if they see us sailing past, we will reach Bedrock before word of our fleet can. The only thing that might hinder us is a trained Bedrock falcon with a pouch of tiles in its claws. The Reaper has sent her best archers into the crow’s nest of each wagon—a small platform high up the mast that Harlie suggested adding during construction. From these lookouts, the archers scan the sky, ready to shoot down any such messenger that might soar past.

“It looks different, doesn’t it?” Asher says behind me.

I startle, shocked. “Where did you come from?”

“Told Harlie to bring us close enough to your wagon so I could jump over. We’ll be turning north soon. Wanted to say goodbye while I could.”

“Don’t do that. Saying goodbye means you think we won’t make it through this.”

“We might not.”

“Asher.”

He sighs, rubs his mouth. Over his shoulder I can see the Prime scowling at us. “The heart is unpredictable, especially in battle,” she’d warned me just before we left Powder Town. “We can’t risk temptation—the opportunity to put one person above the whole. This is why Luce does not sail with me. It is why Asher will not sail with you. I’m putting him on the second wagon, with Harlie. It is best for us all.”

The Prime is already calling Harlie’s wagon back, ordering Asher to return to his vessel. I hold up a finger, telling her just a moment.

“We should have spent every second together these last days,” Asher says, taking my hands. “I should have demanded to change pillars, should have helped with construction. I didn’t even ask. I accepted that all we’d get is stolen moments on the rooftop, and I never said what I should have. I think I’ve been afraid to, because if I say it, it will hurt that much more to lose you.”

I nod, understanding.

The unknowns that lie ahead, the wind against my cheeks as we sail into battle—it makes everything sharp and clear. I can’t predict the future, and I can’t always protect the people who matter most. But keeping everyone at bay and locking up my heart and refusing to say what I feel won’t diminish the hurt if the worst comes to pass. It will hurt anyway. It will always hurt to lose the people we love, so we might as well love them fiercely with whatever time we’re given.