An unexpected surge of grief hits me at the thought. I swallow hard to force down the lump in my throat. I’ve done enough mourning for my brother; I need to focus on what comes next. If Momma does give the ship to Corvus—Corvus the soldier, the killer, not the brother I loved—then he could be even harsher than her. Since he’s obviously so invested in Titan, he’ll probably want to use the family business to feed the war machine. Can I live with that? Can my siblings? They have an option, after all. Maybe it will be the final straw that drives them to leave Fortuna and return to their home-planets.

That fear always haunted me back on Nibiru. It was so much nicer than Gaia that I worried the twins would decide to stay when the rest of us went to live on the ship with Momma. Corvus was the one who assured me it would never happen. “They’re not really Nibiran. They’re Kaisers,” he told me. “Anyway, why would they want to leave? They’ll always have us to look after them.”

Momma told us that blood comes first, but Corvus made me believe it. Now I know it was all bullshit.

Then again, maybe he wouldn’t give our siblings the option to leave. Maybe he’ll immediately replace us with his own people, since he so clearly prefers them, and leave us stranded and freezing on Titan. Once, I never would’ve believed my brother would do that. He was always so adamant that he was planning a better future for all of us. But that was before he left.

I can’t live as an illegal off-worlder without a home again. Surviving off scraps, hiding whenever the law passed by, grappling with the constant terror that someone would notice I don’t belong… I barely survived it once. Even on Nibiru, with Momma supporting us financially and neighbors willing to spare some kindness for a bunch of kids, my anxiety drove me to start drinking. And now? I doubt even Nibirans would have much sympathy now that we’re adults, let alone the obsessively patriotic Titans. My little siblings were too young to understand back then, but now it’s laughable to imagine Lyre trying to stomach scavenged food, or the twins trying to be inconspicuous. It’d be a lot less funny when one screwup could get them jailed or killed.

But I’m not going to let any of that happen. Whatever Momma’s decided, or thinks she’s decided, I have one more chance to prove myself before we meet up with Corvus. This side job of mine is the perfect thing to prove to her and my siblings, once and for all, that I deserve to inherit Fortuna. When I sell the little treasure in my pocket and show Momma the profit, she’s going to be damn proud of me.