“No,” Perry said. “I’m going to need some clothes.” He wanted his own clothes. The reassuring weight and toughness of leather and wool. But he’d settle for anything that would keep the bruises Sable had given him out of sight.

Hess nodded. “Of course.”

Emergency lights flickered on, a deep crimson color washing over the small room.

“Hurry!” Hess said. “We’re out of time. Back to your chamber!”

Perry pulled Aria to his chest, wrapping his aching arms around her. He caught Roar’s eye. “Keep her safe.”

Roar nodded. “Of course. With my life.”

Perry pressed a kiss to the top of Aria’s head; then he plunged back through the corridors until he was imprisoned again.

29. Aria

29

ARIA

How much time is left, Soren?” Roar asked.

“When you asked me that five minutes ago, I guessed three hours.”

“What’s your guess now, Soren?”

“Two hours and fifty-five minutes, Roar.”

Roar dropped his head, peering at Aria through a fringe of brown hair. “I knew he was going to say that.”

She forced a smile, feeling restless too. Three more hours until she was free of this room and back with Perry.

The Komodo was moving again, but at a slower pace. She imagined what the caravan would look like from outside: uncoiled, stretched out like a centipede under a sky full of Aether funnels. Every few minutes, the room shifted without warning and she braced, expecting it to stop, but the Komodo kept grinding along.

“You know what I want to know?” Soren said from the other bunk. “Why neither one of you is talking about Perry. Is torture normal out here? Is it like, ‘Yeah, I was brutalized today. Kind of boring. What about you—what did you do?’”

“I told Roar about it earlier,” Aria admitted.

“Did you keep it from me because of my father? Was he part of it?”

“No, Sable did it. I didn’t tell you because I didn’t think you’d care. You always act like you hate Perry.”

Soren nodded. “True. I do hate him.” He leaned over his legs and shoved his hands into his hair. “What am I thinking? What are any of us thinking?”

“I’m thinking about getting out of this room,” Aria said.

Roar pointed between them. “Our thoughts are in harmony.”

“I’m thinking this,” Soren said. “Sable killed Perry’s sister. Perry killed his own brother. My father and Sable both left thousands of their people to die. I’m dependent on drugs to keep me sane. And we’re the ones who are trying to start over? How are we the best hope for a new world?”

“Because we’re the only ones left,” Aria said. Then she realized she could do better. “We all have the potential to do terrible things, Soren. But we also have the potential to overcome our mistakes. I need to believe that. What point is there otherwise?”