Ignoring her heart, which felt like it was turning to stone in her chest, Jaya said, “We come from different worlds, Grey. I was foolish to forget that. I lost my head a bit this morning, but…” She blinked a few times, hoping he’d think she’d stopped talking to gather her thoughts and not because she was as dangerously close to tears as she really was. When she had a hold on herself again, she continued. “I’ve had a bit of family news from home. And it made me realize that—that what we were doing was childish. It was selfish. You’re an Emerson. I’m a Rao. It couldn’t ever work.”

“That’s it?” Grey said quietly. His blue eyes were searing, flaying her open, but she held steady. “You’re just going to give up on this because we’re from different worlds? Don’t you think we’re worth it, Jaya?”

Though his words were said with his characteristic detachment, Jaya detected a tremor just underneath. She knew he was masking his pain just as she was masking hers, and it took every ounce of strength she had to not run over to him and bury her face in his chest. She looked out over the edge of the mountain at the town of St. Rosetta, metal and glass glinting in the sunlight. “I’m sorry,” she said. “My first duty is to my family and my people.”

There was a long pause.

“Right,” Grey said finally. When she looked at him, he was looking down at the town too, his jaw hard, his posture tense and stiff. He was shielding himself, she realized. He was shielding himself from her because she was hurting him. The thought made her want to scream. “Okay, then.” He turned back to her after another moment. “Well, thanks for the courtesy of letting me know.”

Without waiting for a response, he began to make his way back down the path to the bottom of the mountain, away from her.

“I’m sorry,” she said softly to his retreating back. But the wind snatched her words from her mouth and flung them over the edge of the mountain and into the empty sky.

Jaya called in sick to the rest of her classes that day. When she got back to her room on legs that felt like pillars of cement, she called her father.

“Jaya,” Appa said, alert even though it was the middle of the night for him. He likely wasn’t sleeping much either. “Did you get my message?”