Only a few days ago, they’d walked the streets of the Holster. They’d shared a memory of their mother and Caledonia had dared to think that for a moment, Donnally might come back to her. Now, as he tugged the pack onto his own shoulders, she didn’t know what to believe.

“Hoist your eyes, Nia,” Donnally said. “I know who I am.”

Nia. She hadn’t heard that name in so long.

“Go,” Lir commanded.

Panic spiked in Caledonia’s blood. Donnally turned to give her one last look, then he was gone, and Caledonia was alone with Lir.

Sweat made quick tracks down Caledonia’s back. It slicked her palms and made the ropes around her wrists bite into her skin. She adjusted her stance watching the way Lir spun that knife around and around, but to her surprise, he put it away, tucking the blade into his waistband.

For a moment, he stood across from her without saying a word. His eyes traveled from her hair to her lips to either side of her hips where her guns should have been. He took his time consuming the sight of her and then he took three slow steps forward.

It took every bit of willpower she possessed to stand as if planted in place. Her mind rang with the memory of Donnally calling her Nia. It was his name for her. Not even their parents had used the nickname. It had only ever existed between a brother and a sister and Caledonia couldn’t shake the terrifying hope that it had been a message: Sister, I am with you.

Maybe, just maybe, he wasn’t dropping her bombs in the ocean, but planting them as she’d meant to.

Doubt coated the thought. It could be another trap. Just a ruse to toy with her heart. But hope was all she had left.

“It took me a long time to understand that I needed you,” Lir said, as if they’d been in the middle of a conversation. “You are the reason I survived to take the Bullet Seas for myself. And you are the reason I’ll keep them now.”

The distant sounds of battle rushed to fill his silence. His confidence was a performance, or it was delusion. But most of all it was a sign that he believed Donnally would never betray him.

“I know because that is your purpose. You resist me, you stand against me, and every time you do, I gain a little bit more. Do you know what that makes us?”

Caledonia only glared in response.