I smiled. “I like that.”

It was a small thing. A huge thing. All my life, other people had made decisions for me: who could touch me, when, for what purposes. I’d been permitted to kiss a few people—only those Mother deemed acceptable—and later instructed how to break off relationships before they could take root. But even on an island that touted freedom, control over my own body had only ever been an illusion.

And here, across the room from me, was a boy from Idris—a place where girls and women had historically been stripped of their choices, control over their own lives—and he, better than anyone I’d grown up with, understood the value of those simple words: we decide together; we decide for us.

Not society. Not expectations. Not friends. Not family.

Us.

The knot of nervous energy faded from inside my body. I stood and tapped off the last light sigil, and when I slipped between the cool sheets, I reached across the space between our beds and found him already reaching back for me.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

OVER THE NEXT FEW DAYS, WE MOVED PRIMARILY between our cabins, the mess hall, and the library. We took our meals quickly, eating the strangely spiced food without comment, and tried to ignore the curious stares of the crew. One of Nine’s many rules had been to limit our interaction with the people on board this ship—for our protection, she’d insisted—and for the most part, the guards she’d assigned discouraged confrontation.

Once, though, a wiry old man stalked toward us wearing a scowl, and carrying a knife taken from his table. “You’re the islanders, aren’t you? You think you’re everything because of those gods of yours. Well, where are they now?”

I’d barely had time to comprehend his words before Gerel and Hristo—who’d just stopped wearing his sling—were on their feet, standing between the man and the rest of us. The whole mess grew quiet, turning to watch. Hundreds of eyes, like ours, but not, just staring and waiting to see if we’d fight with one of their men. How we’d fight.

But it didn’t come to that. Our guards stepped in, and the wiry man stepped back. They didn’t even need to say anything. With some sort of gesture with his fist and little finger—probably meant to be rude—he slinked back to his friends.

Otherwise, we went about our days unhindered.

On our fifth day aboard the skimmer den, the seven of us sat around the table in the library, surrounded by piles of books, when one of the guards spoke up.

“We’ve just started to move,” he said from the doorway where the trio always positioned themselves. “We’ll reach Sunder in three days.”

I glanced at my friends, but if they’d felt the ship begin to move, they said nothing. There’d been no jerk, no strange sway. Even as it was, I could barely feel the motion of the ship—as though we’d been living aboard a small island the last five days, rather than a ship. It was eerie, the way I could barely feel the ocean beneath us.