“Jövian submersible,” I repeat, trying to divert his attention. “It was like they were waiting for us. Like they expected us. Do you think it’s the Order?”

“Could be,” he groans. “Or just your average Jövian. Normals or Pathfinders, it doesn’t matter. All Jövians are bloody combative and almost entirely unreasonable.”

“Wait a minute…Akuji…you said she was Jövian.”

“Exactly.”

I look at the door, feeling light-headed. I’m beyond exhausted, I’m shattered. Every bone and muscle in my bewildered body aches. “There was a city out there,” I say. “In the water. It was incredible. They live like that, down there?”

“They do and they don’t. Two moons hang in the sky above the Earth in Jöve. The moons pull the tides back and forth, like nothin you’ve seen before. They change everything. Jövian cities are underwater one day and stuck in a swamp the next.”

“How do they deal with that?”

Vidhan snorts. “Dealing is easy. Not letting it get to you and make you bitter, that’s the hard part.”

I look at him. Brush his damp hair away from his eyes. “Malik told me you had it rough as a kid,” I say, unsure if I’m overstepping the line. “He said…once, your foster parents dumped you in an asylum. That true?”

Vidhan laughs and coughs. “Who’s to blame ’em? Tell someone who ain’t your blood you’re seeing creatures like Reapers and…well, shit happens.”

“They sound like world-class jackasses to me.”

He smiles. “Hell, they were OK. Least I got to spend my time doing two things I loved. Surfing and getting lost in the corner bookshop. Guess I liked to escape.”

“Yeah. Me too.”

“You surf?”

“No. I escape.”

“There’s this beach,” Vidhan says, nodding. “Back in Oz. Locals only, coz of the riptide. But we used the rip, let it take us out to the swells and rode the waves back. I’d steal my foster dad’s board and I’d surf all day and go home to the strap. It was worth it though. Ah, mate, ya should see that water. Clear to the bottom and warm as blood. Didn’t even need a suit. I’ll take ya there one day. Teach ya how to drop into a barrel and come out the other side laughin. Nothin better in the seven worlds.” He snatches my wrist. “Promise you’ll go, when all this is done.”

“All right. All right. I promise.”

“Nah, like ya bloody mean it.”

“I promise, Vidhan. I will. I’ll go to that beach.”

He smiles and lets go my arm.

“That’s the seventh, I reckon,” he murmurs. “Miles and miles of perfect swell. An endless yellow beach to the moon and back.”

Before I can respond, hydraulics whine. The door hisses and slides open. I stand up off my haunches, hand at my sword.