We woke the others shortly afterward, bringing an excitable Ginji with us. They were groggy, confused as to why they were being woken up in the middle of the night, but as soon as we explained what we were going to do, their faces morphed into masks of enthusiasm.

“You’re a genius, Ginji!” Angie yelled, pulling him into a tight hug, just the way I’d done.

“People keep saying that,” he murmured, half smothered by Angie’s ample bosom. “Your people seem to enjoy physical contact a lot more than we Draconians do,” he added, wriggling free.

Bashrik nodded. “That’s precisely what I tried to tell Angie the other evening, when we were in the hot springs, but she wouldn’t listen!”

Ginji looked up at Bashrik with confused eyes. “What happened to him?” he asked, looking to the rest of us for answers.

Lauren smiled. “It’s a long story, involving the virus.”

“I wouldn’t worry too much. The symptoms tend to fade after a while. I’ve seen it with the other coldbloods my father has cured,” Ginji said confidently. “It’s the initial weirdness that tends to be the problem, but once that goes away, victims’ memories slowly start coming back. Although, it didn’t do the other ones much good in the end—they went crazy and ran off into the jungle and got eaten by lycosa. They’d been encased for too long, I think.”

Despite that last part, Angie pulled Ginji in for another joyful hug, almost suffocating him the second time around, his head trapped between her cleavage.

“Angie, let go of the poor boy!” Bashrik said. She did, but she wore a renewed grin. I could understand why. Ginji’s words meant that the normal Bashrik would be returned to us soon enough.

“We should probably get started. Is there room to land the Vanquish on the crater of Mount Kusuburi?” Navan asked.

“There’s plenty of room, if you’re skilled enough,” Ginji replied, a hint of distaste still lingering when it came to the coldbloods of our group.

“Did the ring of Lunists leave?” Lauren asked, appeasing Ginji by distracting him.

“Yes, they left when the sun went down to attend to evening prayers,” he explained.

Navan frowned thoughtfully. “And how many other mining camps are there, like the one at the top of the crater? We need to be sure we get every single frozen coldblood. Otherwise, the corruption won’t reverse.”

“Two more, though they aren’t as big,” Ginji replied. “There are fewer than ten statues in each of those, and I’ll show you where they are. Both are visible from the top of the volcano.”

With a plan in motion, we set to work. All five of us, with Ginji in tow, headed away from the clearing, hurrying toward the Vanquish. We reached it in no time, amused to find that Ginji was already waiting by the closed bay doors when we arrived—we’d watched him sprint on ahead, but he was even quicker on his feet than we’d imagined. Evidently, speed was another attribute of the Draconians.

“Slowpokes!” He chuckled to himself, his amber eyes turned toward the ship, his whole demeanor excited, like a kid in a candy store.

Smiling, Navan opened the doors to the ship, and we all went inside. Ginji looked around the main chamber in awe, his mouth hanging open. I guessed the Draconian biremes weren’t as impressive as this, though I still hadn’t had the chance to see inside one. Vysanthean engineering was amazing. It was just a shame that most of the technology was stolen and amalgamated.

“Do you want to see the cockpit?” Navan asked Ginji.

The Draconian boy nodded so hard I thought his head was going to fall off. “Yes, please!”

Bashrik went with them, while the three of us girls stayed in the main space, sitting down on the bench where Pandora had spoken with us what felt like a lifetime ago. A moment later, the engines thrummed into life, the ship taking off and making its way toward the volcano.

It wouldn’t be an impossible task to bring the frozen statues onto the ship, but I was still worried there might not be enough space for everyone. From what Ginji had said, there had to be at least fifty or sixty coldbloods, frozen in time, between the three mining camps. Then again, this was a warship, designed to house a large number of people.

It was still dark when the ship landed on the crater. Navan set it down in stealth mode so as not to disturb the village that lay below. It was vital that we got the coldbloods into the ship without anybody noticing, though I didn’t think the Pyros would be too eager to help us out, even if we asked them. Plus, Cambien was likely still blackout drunk somewhere, sleeping it off.

With six able bodies, we made relatively quick work of the crater’s petrified village. Navan, Bashrik, and Ginji—to my amused shock—could carry a coldblood each, singlehandedly, while Angie, Lauren, and I could carry one between the three of us. The opaleine weighed the frozen figures down considerably. It was a comical sight, Ginji carrying a coldblood over his head, like watching an ant carry an enormous leaf back to the anthill.

Just under two hours later, we had the first batch on board, stowing them all safely in the large med-bay that took up much of the bottom deck, on the opposite side of the weapons pods. I’d been off in my initial estimation. There were actually forty-five coldbloods in total, from the crater, each of them securely strapped to a bed in the medical bay. To my delight, ten beds were still free, and we still had some space on the floor, giving us space for at least fifteen more. So there was plenty of room for the coldbloods we needed to collect from the other two camps.

Sweating and exhausted, we all padded back into the belly of the ship. Bashrik took over the controls as we flew to the next destination—a small mining camp cut into the side of a smaller volcano a short distance away from Mount Kusuburi. There were eight coldbloods here, and another six at the third site, which was tucked away at the base of a different mountain range on the opposite side of the valley. We made fast work of getting them all into the medical bay and strapped them down.

In the end, only four didn’t have a bed, though we created some makeshift roll-mats with the spare blankets we found in the med-bay cupboards and made extra certain that these particular coldbloods were tightly fastened to the floor.

“Is that the last one?” I gasped, sitting down on the ground, catching my breath.

Ginji nodded, barely even breaking a sweat. “That’s the last one!”

“Who knew hauling statues around could be so exhausting?” Angie said sarcastically, slumping against the far wall.

Navan grinned. “No time for rest, I’m afraid. We need to get back to the temple clearing. We’ve got a package to pick up, remember?”

“Just five more minutes?” Angie murmured, making a show of falling asleep. However, as the rest of us made our way out of the med-bay, Angie scrambled to her feet and hurried after us. “Don’t leave me with them!” she shrieked, clearly freaked out by the prospect of getting trapped in a room with fifty-nine frozen coldbloods.

Ten minutes later, we were setting down in the clearing again, just as the dawn began to come up over the horizon. Outside, I could hear the chorus of the exotic birds that inhabited the jungle and the whooping of the unusual creatures that ran through the treetops. Zai really was a beautiful planet, and part of me would be sad to say goodbye to it. Saying that, I was more than happy we’d managed to find a way to save their home world and prevent them from heading for mine.

“There’s only one more thing we need to do,” I said softly. The others turned to look at me. “We need to revive the coldbloods.”

Ginji clutched the jar of antivirus nano-insects to his chest as we made our way back down to the medical bay. Once there, Ginji began to unscrew the lid, his amber eyes wide with anticipation. We’d decided to just throw the jar inside and lock the door behind it, letting the insects do their work, while keeping the med-bay doors shut at all times. Ginji insisted he knew the sound that needed to be made to get the insects to do their work—he’d overheard his father using it several times before. We just had to trust him.

“I only need you to keep the door open for less than a minute,” he explained, his face determined.

Once the cure was set in motion and we were in space again, we had decided that a shift schedule should be drawn up so we could take turns feeding vials of blood to the strapped-down Vysantheans, though I recommended we did it in pairs. For now, however, they were going to have to stay hungry, as they shook off the stone casing of the sickness that had plagued them for decades.

With a grin, Ginji hurled the jar into the medical bay. The insects immediately flew out of the open lid. He began to whistle, making the same sound Cambien had made when he’d cured Bashrik. Navan left the door open for a moment, letting the whistle echo through to the insects, instructing them on what to do, before he punched in the numbers to bring the hatch back down. As it closed, he locked it in place with an emergency quarantine code that would only allow authorized individuals to enter and exit the med-bay. It was an extra precaution, but one I was glad we were taking. With fifty-nine awakening coldbloods on board our ship, there was no such thing as too careful.

Heading back up to the main space of the Vanquish, Navan opened the bay doors, letting in the sweet music of the morning and the warm breeze that came with the rising sun. Everything looked brighter, somehow. My eyes turned to the sparkling veins of opaleine that still lay at the temple entrance, those once-black seams glittering with a renewed vitality. As the sunlight streaked over the landscape, lighting up the world below, I saw that they were starting to return to their original shade of sapphire.

More worryingly, that meant our coldblood patients were all starting to heal, and would soon be awake, but I decided to focus on the positive, just this once. The opaleine really did look beautiful, now that it was returning to its former glory.

We were standing at the top of the gangplank, admiring our handiwork, when two shadowed figures emerged from the ruins of the temple entrance. Freya and Cambien were approaching, their expressions confused. As soon as they saw Ginji standing with us, they quickened their pace, coming to a halt at the bottom of the walkway.

“What have you done?” Freya asked, her tone anxious. Evidently, she thought we’d killed the coldbloods, as per our original plan.

“Did you kill them?” Cambien pressed, his voice raspy—the aftereffects of a heavy night of drinking.

“I’ll let Ginji answer this one, since it was his wise plan,” I said, nudging Ginji forward.

He grinned down at his parents. “We didn’t have to kill anyone. We gathered up the frozen coldbloods and stowed them away on board,” he said proudly. “I stole your antivirus insects, and we have revived them all. These five are going to take them away and make sure they never return!”

Freya and Cambien looked at each other for a moment, stunned into silence, before their gazes turned back toward their son. I could see in their eyes that they had accepted the compromise, an undercurrent of pride in their expressions. Their son had taken the best of both worlds and come up with a middle ground that appeased everyone—and that meant the Draconians got to stay on their home planet.

“I always knew you would turn out to be smart, just like your father.” Cambien chuckled.

“Ginji, you are wiser than your years, and your heart is purer than any I have known. Only you could have conjured up such a plan and seen with greater clarity what good could come from compromise,” Freya said, shocking everyone. She had spoken more than five consecutive words, and it was all for Ginji’s benefit. It made me happy to know that he was loved, and that he could evoke such feeling.

Cambien glanced at her. “You always did have a beautiful voice, when you bothered to speak more than a handful of words,” he teased.

“Only for our son,” she remarked, putting him in his place.

Ginji beamed. “I suppose you should give them their blood, now that they’ve truly fulfilled their promise.”

“Come inside,” Freya instructed, as she made her way toward the temple entrance.

After locking up the ship, we followed her, picking our way across the debris that still lay scattered across the former threshold of the holy site. I had no doubt that the Draconians would make easy work of the cleanup, given their superior strength, but it didn’t appear as though they’d made a start on it yet. I imagined the pain was still too raw, with many dead still to honor and much reparation to be made.

Freya led us to the prayer hall, where Pandora’s last stand had taken place. I felt a familiar shiver of fear and disgust bristle up my spine, my eyes instantly snapping to the spot on the floor where I’d killed her. The ashes of her body had been cleaned up, and there wasn’t a single hint of blood left on the stone, but I knew that was where it had happened. I felt it, deep in my bones, chilling me to the core.

Thankfully, the beginning of the blood extraction ceremony distracted my attention. Freya gestured for us to stand behind two large silk ensigns in front of the platform where she had been standing all throughout that aerial battle between Cambien and Pandora. The bars holding the flag-like rectangles of fabric in place only went as high as our chests, allowing us a clear view of the ceremony itself.

Even at such an early hour, the place was crowded with Lunists, their expressions somber, tears streaming down their faces. They gathered behind us, their mouths moving in silent prayer as they waited for their divine leader to speak.

“The gods have seen fit to smile upon us!” Freya began. It was still weird, hearing her say more than five words. I supposed it was different when she was speaking to her congregation—this was her job, after all.

They called back a word that evidently didn’t translate into something we could understand, though I guessed it was meant to be something close to "hallelujah” or “amen.”

“We have suffered great pain and loss, but the gods have rewarded our fortitude!” she went on, her voice booming out across the hall. “Our sacred stone has granted forgiveness for our sins. No longer must we leave our beloved home. The gods have offered it back to us, on the covenant that we do not defile our purity again!”

The Lunists roared the same word back to her, some beating their chests, some looking skyward, some clasping their hands together. There wasn’t a single dry eye in the house, Freya’s words provoking intense emotion in them all. After everything they’d suffered through, I understood their euphoria.

Glancing over my shoulder, I noticed Bashrik staring up at Freya, starry-eyed with awe. He had his hands clasped, tears running down his face, as overcome by emotion as the Lunists all around him.

“The sacred stone is calling to me!” he cried, out of the blue, beating a fist against his chest. The Lunists called back to him, repeating his words, the echo thundering off the walls. Navan was behind the same ensign, trying to get his brother to calm down, whispering something in his ear. Whatever it was, Bashrik wasn’t listening—he was too carried away in the rush of Freya’s words.

“The sacred stone calls to all who treasure it!” Freya bellowed, raising her hands to the sky. “And now we pay the price for our gift—a small token of sacrifice, to appease the gods!” A deafening boom of voices rippled through the prayer hall. The ceremony was beginning. A moment later, another Draconian came forward, brandishing a silver dish and a nasty-looking ceremonial blade.

“It seems your friend is a little too involved in our faith,” Cambien mused, stepping up to stand beside me. His eyes were fixed on Freya, who had tilted her neck to the side, offering her skin to the sharp edge of the ceremonial blade.

“Freya is a charismatic woman. I imagine she snatches up most people’s attention,” I replied.

He nodded, but he didn’t turn to acknowledge me. He only had eyes for her. Even now, it was clear that Cambien was still smitten by the striking Draconian who was allowing her blood to trickle down into the silver dish. Of course it was her blood. She would never have permitted it to come from another Draconian; that went against all her beliefs.

I wondered what had happened between Cambien and Freya. Evidently, they had loved one another once and still held a flame in their hearts for each other. I’d seen the way Freya looked at him, and the way he looked at her, and yet they weren’t together. They’d had a son, and it wasn’t enough to bind them in an eternal, unfailing love. Perhaps decay and rebirth were just a natural part of relationships, especially ones that stretched into the realm of long term, and even forever. Sometimes, I realized, loving someone wasn’t enough. Other things got in the way, causing even the most stable foundations to crumble.

My heart clenched. Would that ever happen to me and Navan? Right now, it didn’t feel as though it ever could. But what if Cambien and Freya had thought that way, once upon a time? Nobody made a commitment thinking it was going to fall apart. Everyone hoped for forever, but very few got it.

“I have an offer to make you,” Cambien said quietly, pulling me from my worried reverie.

“An offer?”

He nodded. “As soon as you killed Pandora in my stead, I owed you a life debt, and I want to pay that back.”

“You’re not in my debt, Cambien. Let’s just—”

He cut me off. “I have spoken with the other Pyros, and we have all agreed to become your allies. However, there is one caveat.”

I smiled. “There always is.”

“We will not get involved in your quarrel until a certain moment presents itself,” he explained. “If you and the others manage to gain the upper hand in the battle against the queens, we will deliver the final blow for you.”

I gaped at him. He had no idea how happy those words made me—they were precisely the sliver of hope I’d been looking for.

“How will you know when that moment comes?” I asked. “If that moment comes,” I added, correcting myself. There was a lot to be done before we could consider that eventuality, but I prayed that day would come.

“Here,” he said, offering me a small stone of opaleine. “It is twinned with this one,” he went on, pulling down the edge of his tunic to reveal the hollow where he’d placed the opaleine before, to transform into his dragon-self. To my surprise, there was another one just below it. The stone was embedded in his flesh, the skin having melded with the stone, the lines blurred.

I grimaced. “I don’t have to do that, do I?” I asked. A climpet to show my love for Navan was the only thing I was willing to embed into my skin.

He chuckled. “No, you just have to hold the stone,” he assured me. “As soon as you’re sure you will win the fight, you hold this tightly in your hand, call out my name, and we will be there to land that final blow.”

“Won’t that destroy the opaleine?” I asked, concerned.

“It is not my own hand which will land the final blow,” he explained. “I have allies of my own, who will perform the act for me.” A dark glint flickered across his amber eyes.

“Why didn’t you ask these allies to fix your frozen coldblood problem for you?” I wondered.

He grimaced. “They are not that kind of ally—they are very proud, and would have been insulted had I called them to deal with a group of frozen coldbloods. They respond only to challenge and chaos, and will only come for a cause that is worthy of their fighting spirit.”

I frowned, still unconvinced. Who were these strange allies he was speaking of? There was something unnerving in the way he mentioned them, as though they weren’t really something that should be mentioned. Then again, who was I to complain? Right now, any help was good enough for me.

“Will our cause be worthy of them, whoever they are?”

He nodded. “Oh yes, I think your fight may be the one they have been waiting for, though they will only involve themselves when your victory is more-or-less certain. They do not like to back a losing side.”

“How will you—or these allies—get there so fast? Surely, with your ships, it would be too late by the time you arrived,” I mused doubtfully.

He flashed a wolfish grin. “Just trust that they will come, and they will assist. I will send them, and they will be with you when the axe finally falls on Vysanthe.”

“Thank you, Cambien,” I murmured, though his words chilled me somewhat. “You have no idea what this means to me.” I looked up at him, clutching the stone to my chest.

He grinned. “I knew you would warm up to me. Although, I never thought I would be jealous of a stone,” he said with a wink, ruining the sweet moment.

“Just when I thought I’d misjudged you.” I sighed.

“By the way, I meant what I said before, when you and I were in the bar,” he said, ensuring I couldn’t walk away from him. “You really should try to contact the Titans. They thrive on war, they are always game for a fight, and they could be powerful allies, if you can get them on your side.”

“I’ll think about it,” I promised, though his previous notes on them still concerned me. If they tried to kill us before we managed to get them to listen, was it really worth the risk?

“As for the Feds I mentioned, I do not think you need protection anymore—you are not the sort of people to hide from conflict. Indeed, I think the path you are on is the one you must stay on.” He sighed. “If you ever do find yourselves needing a place to hide, however, feel free to swing back around this way and I’ll give you the coordinates.”

I realized that the Feds he was talking about couldn’t be the ones we were heading for. The outpost Navan had mentioned wasn’t one that held sanctuary for universal runaways. It wasn’t somewhere we were seeking out, in order to find safety. Instead, we hoped to find strong allies there, to rally to our cause, and join our fight. Cambien was right—hiding wasn’t an option. Not yet, anyway.

“The sacrifice is freely given. May the gods continue to smile down upon us!” Freya cried, bringing the ceremony to a close.

The Lunists bellowed their sacred word back to her before dispersing with alarming uniformity. Many of them drifted to the sides of the walkways, resuming whatever worship they’d been doing before the ceremony began, while others headed for the exits. Freya, meanwhile, made a beeline for Navan, the rest of us joining her in a small semicircle. With a low bow, she offered him the blood, which had been transferred from the dish to a vial while I’d been busy chatting.

“May our gift be worthy,” she said graciously.

“Thank you, Freya. We’re just glad we could help out, in the end,” Navan replied, his expression apologetic. “As for the damage done, I’m eternally sorry.”

Freya smiled. “From chaos springs new life.”

With that, she strode toward the main entrance, letting us know our time on Zai was over. Cambien darted forward, offering out his arm for her to hold as she made her way across the floor.

“In case you feel woozy after giving blood,” he reasoned, though I was pretty sure Freya knew the truth. Her eyes locked with his, the two of them gazing at each other for a moment. It was sweet to see them that way, though I had no idea what the future might hold. Perhaps they had already tried to fix what was broken, never able to make it work. Or, maybe, they had one chance left.

Now, the only thing left for us to do was get on board our ship and set a course for the quarantine facility, before heading for the Fed outpost. We had the blood, we’d fixed the opaleine, and though we had a million things left to contend with—Orion being one of them—I felt a sense of happiness wash over me. Looking at the others, I could see that they felt it, too.

Our high energy remained as we headed back out into the temple clearing, knowing we were almost on the homestretch. Angie was teasing Bashrik about his outburst during the ceremony, but he shrugged her jibes off with ease.

“You’re just envious because you couldn’t possibly understand a divine connection like that. I felt something, deep inside me,” he insisted.

Angie snorted. “I’m sure you did.”

Only Lauren seemed to be in poor spirits. She was holding the vial of blood up to the light, after taking it from Navan. He’d given it to her so she could examine it. However, from the look on her face, things didn’t seem good.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

Lauren sank to the ground, clutching the vial, shaking her head slowly.

“Lauren, what’s the matter?” Angie pressed as we came to the ground beside her. I reached out to touch her leg, but the gesture only made her more upset.

“The blood won’t work,” she wheezed, tears glittering in her eyes. “The texture is all wrong—it’s already starting to clot in the vial. If it isn’t soluble, it isn’t viable. This stuff would probably poison a coldblood instead of giving them eternal life. It’s no good.”

My stomach lurched as I understood why she was so upset. After everything we’d been through, and knowing what lay ahead of us, we were going to have to return to Brisha emptyhanded.