ANDERS

The moon shone down on us, and the wind ruffled my wings. I paid no attention because Gwen was staring at me in shock.

It wasn’t the reaction I thought I would get. I waited for Gwen to say something but she seemed frozen.

“Gwen?” I touched her hands. Her tattered princess dress fluttered in the breeze. Calling her name seemed to bring her out from a dark place. She looked up at me with questioning eyes.

My heart fell to my feet, and I could tell my wings were sagging. I pulled them in abruptly, unable to stifle the yell as I did so. I breathed deeply because someone once told me it was supposed to help dull the pain.

It never helped. I lost myself in agony, glad of something to take my mind off the torment in my heart. If I had thought that loving Gwen from afar hurt, it was nothing compared to her rejection.

I shouldn’t have said anything. It was stupid and selfish. I had crossed the line.

Who was I kidding? I had crossed that line way back when I kissed her.

The pain emanating from my wing pockets spread through my body until it felt as though every single cell was on fire. What was weird about it was that it hurt so much one second and the next it didn’t hurt at all. I reminded myself that the pain was worth having the ability to fly and I stood up, feeling like nothing had happened.

Gwen sat on the ground. She had her knees pulled up to her chest, and her arms were wrapped around them. Her head rested on her forearms. She was sobbing.

I watched her silently. Her sorrow nearly made me lose control. I had never been so close to going crazy as I was right then.

I hoped she was crying for me. I thought she cared about me. We were friends. She didn’t want me to hurt. Maybe she was crying about her husband because she still loved him and missed him. I thought I should probably just ask her. I would, as soon as I pulled myself together.

“What’s wrong?” I knelt beside her and put my hand on her back. “Why are you crying?”

She lifted her face to me, and her eyes were red. She looked like a miserable princess, sitting there on the ground in Lyzette’s gown. Our run through the castle greenery had ruined it.

Undone by her sorrow, I wrapped my arms around her, holding her tightly as she cried. I tried to enjoy the feeling of having her in my arms because I was sure I wouldn’t have the chance again.

After what seemed like forever but was probably only an instant, she pulled away. I sat on the ground, making sure not to touch her. I shivered. The sweat from running and flying was still on my body, and I was freezing. Or maybe it was the look in Gwen’s eyes.

She kept staring at her hands. “I don’t want to lead you on. I shouldn’t have slept with you. I knew it was a mistake at the time, but I was lonely and confused.”

“Just stop now. I don’t want to hear you apologize for the best nights of my life.” I held up my hand.

“They were good for me too.” I didn’t believe her. I was too agitated to sit down. I got to my feet and she followed me.

“We went too far, Anders.”

I stayed silent. I wasn’t sure my throat would have let me say anything anyway.

“I shouldn’t have let anything happen. When one person cares more than the other, it’s bad news.” She looked away as she finished.

“You should have said something earlier. I didn’t realize that you didn’t care about me.”

Gwen took a step toward me, and I moved away. I didn’t want to feel her touch. Why bother tormenting myself? She flinched as if I had hit her, but she didn’t move in my direction again.

“Of course I care about you, Anders.” There was a tremor in her voice. “I care about you a lot.”

“But you don’t love me. I get it. You don’t need to tell me twice. Are we done now?”

She blinked at me. Her face was the picture of anguish. “I guess we are,” she whispered in a quiet, sad voice.

“Good. Let’s go before those pirates catch us. Mikael’s fighters will arrive at the rendezvous point near the transport in less than twenty-four hours. We need to be there to meet them.”

I turned away from her and felt like someone was ripping my heart out of my chest. I heard her crying behind me again. What was she so sad about? I didn’t bother going back to her. I had to distance myself and keep her at arm’s length.

I always knew she would go eventually. I was a fool to think that the good times with her would make up for the pain when she left. The truth of the matter was that the happiness only made me more aware of what I had lost.

The thought of taking away her pain was absurd. I was the one who needed comfort. All my dreams were lying shattered at my feet, but there was no one to hold me. There hadn’t been since I was a boy and lost my mother.

I should have known I would lose Gwen too.

* * *

GWEN

I couldn’t seem to stop crying.

Anders’ declaration of love had taken me by surprise. I didn’t know what to do or how to react. I wasn’t living in a fairy tale. All I could think about was that Jake had said he loved me a million times, but he had never really meant it.

I knew I cared about Anders. He was my friend, and he had been my lover. But I didn’t think I wanted him to be anything else. It was too messy and would probably end badly.

All my relationships, including my marriage, had closed on a sour note. That’s why I had wanted to keep thinking of Anders as a friend. Friends couldn’t break up. But I had let things drift out of the friendship zone. Now here we were, ending badly with a broken relationship.

I didn’t want to lose Anders, but I didn’t think our friendship could survive him being in love with me. Life didn’t work that way.

I broke out sobbing again. It was happening, and there was nothing I could do about it. Finally, I collected myself enough to go into the starship where Anders lay on the couch. For a second, I remembered what we had done there and how good he had made me feel. I almost started crying again. He stood up when I came in and went to the starboard console.

I noticed that his eyes were red. I didn’t bother saying anything. I sat down on the left side and tucked in my stupid princess dress. Anders got the ship ready to launch.

“Are you going to do flight preparation?” It was time to get back to business.

“Fuck it. I’m feeling lucky today.”

The bitter sarcasm in his voice cut me to the bone, and I didn’t insist he follow the book. Honestly, at that moment I didn’t care much either.

After a minute, he glanced over at me. I rolled my eyes. Neither of us was going to take this ship off the ground without following the proper procedures. We were too good for that.

I climbed out in my dress to do the exterior checks. Anders crawled underneath the ship so I wouldn’t have to get myself dirty.

I didn’t thank him.

We performed our jobs in silence, then prepared for launch, speaking only to give commands and answer questions. It was the most awkward take-off we had ever done together. Usually, we had plenty of things to talk about, but there was nothing this time. There might not be anything ever again.

I knew in my heart that Anders would ask for a new partner. I hated the thought of it, but part of me would be grateful at the same time. How could I possibly be near him when I knew how much I had hurt him?

Our final mission together was going to be torture. But I would treasure it nonetheless, knowing it would be my last opportunity to spend time with my best friend.

* * *

It had only been three days since we left but it could have been three years. So much had happened between us. We stared at our old home on the viewscreen. It was still minuscule in the distance.

I had changed out of the shredded dress and into some standard-issue clothes. I had found beige pants and a beige long-sleeved shirt that almost fit me. It wasn’t pretty, but I had to get out of that dress.

“Do you think they’ve taken the women yet?” My stomach was in knots.

“I doubt it. We’ve only been away seventy-two hours.” Hearing someone say it out loud made me realize how much had changed. I had gained the most amazing lover I could have imagined but lost my friend too.

“What do you think we should do first?” It was his idea to bring back help. The Markan ships would be here soon. We needed a plan.

“I don’t know. There are too many things to do at the same time.” He sounded flustered, but I knew he probably wasn’t thinking clearly.

“Okay.” I tried to stay calm. “Should we get the pirates off the transport, or get our people?”

Anders looked off into the distance. “It would be better if we could keep the ship, but the most important thing is everyone’s safety.”

“We need more information. Do you have anyone you could contact to find out the situation inside the ship?”

He shook his head. “Ayrie would have sealed the door to the panic room after Avren and Allex arrived. Once it is closed, nothing comes in or goes out.”

“What about someone outside of your family? Maybe a pilot?”

Anders snapped his fingers. “Jassan. He’s got illegal equipment, and he’s always searching the deepest parts of the network. I could contact him that way.”

“If you say so.” I waved my hands. “While you’re doing your thing, I’m going to curl up for a nap before we play secret agent.”

He nodded. He already had his computer out and was typing.

* * *

“You have to get up.” I woke from my nap to the sound of Anders saying my name. I was groggy and extremely thirsty. I sat up on the couch in the change room, trying to shake the sleepiness out of my head.

“Jassan says they’re going to transport the women in the morning. If we’re going to make a move, we have to do it tonight, or we’ll be too late.”

That was enough to get me wide awake. Soon our friendship would be over because Anders would get himself reassigned. I tried not to think about how much that would hurt me. I might never see him again.

“There’s a complication, too. Allex didn’t make it to the panic room in time. Jassan says that he saw him. He must be hiding somewhere.” His jaw looked tense, and he frowned.

I knew this probably bothered Anders more than anything else. The Madellan brothers were close.

They had all made sacrifices for each other. Ayrie hadn’t finished his degree because he didn’t want to split the family up. Arnon had given his adolescent years to his brothers to raise and encourage them when their father couldn’t be there. Anders had been in many fights defending Allex and Avren, his younger brothers.

Hearing that no one knew the location of his littlest brother must be horrible news. I wished I could comfort him, but that wasn’t my responsibility. I wasn’t his friend or lover. I wasn’t much of anything. He wouldn’t appreciate my interference any more than he had appreciated my apology for hurting him. Sometimes it wasn’t enough to be sorry.

“Maybe he’s safe somewhere else.” I tried to offer what I could. “You only know that he’s not in the hideout. He could be walking around in the tunnels still.”

“I guess so.” Anders frowned. “He could be hiding in there, or the maintenance rooms or greenhouses. When we were little, and we first moved onto the ship, we played all over the place. He knows it like the back of his hand.”

“It sounds like you do too.”

He gave a quick nod. “I might.”

“Can’t we can use that knowledge to move around the ship without the pirates knowing where we are?”

“Maybe.” His face lit up but fell again when he looked at me. “That’s a good idea.”

It was only small praise, but I would take it. “What if the Markan ships can draw out their fighters? They can move a lot of the pirates out of our way. And if we sneak in and hide in the tunnels, we might find an ally.”

“Do you think Allex can help us do anything?”

“Maybe. Does the ship have mass transporting capability? Like a transporter that could lock on to all the pirates simultaneously?”

Anders thought for a minute. “I’ve never used it, but I believe we can do that.”

“Is there a way for us to only transport a particular group of people? We can’t take everyone off the ship together. Then we still have the problem of being threatened by pirates, just in a different place.”

Anders was studying something on his computer. In a moment, he made a sound of triumph.

“According to the transport specifications, there might be something we can do. They have mass transport capability for emergency purposes. The operator can specify which wings of the ship participate in the transport.”

I was starting to get excited. “If we can get all of our people into one area, we can transport the pirates away.”

“It’s not going to be that easy. First, we’ll have to disable the tractor beam, both to get in and to transport people out. And we have to do it all without anyone discovering what we’re doing.”

Idea followed idea as we bounced our thoughts off each other. It felt like we were partners again. The feeling made me happy and sad at the same time.

“You could knock out the tractor beam like you did before. Hopefully, the pirates haven’t figured out how you did it.” My brain synapses were in rapid-fire mode. “We go in, find Allex, and secretly get all our people together away from the pirates. There’s a bit of magic happening here, but we’ll figure it out as we go along. But how do we prevent them from coming back?”

“That’s one part I managed to figure out. We’ll send them to a police ship.” Anders grinned.

“Sounds brilliant. Are you sure you can do it?”

“I think I can,” he said. “Do you remember that I know the guy in charge of the poor security in this region? I went to flight school with him. He’ll send ships as long as he knows it’s a sure thing.”

I thought that it wouldn’t hurt if the request came from one of the princes of Auxem.

“That’s it, then.” In our enthusiasm, we bumped fists like there were no problems between us. He got a strange expression on his face and looked away again.

“I’ll start setting everything up.” He moved to the cockpit. “If we get lucky, we can move the people through the secret tunnels without the pirates knowing about it.”

“We’re always lucky.” As I watched him get busy on the console, my heart ached for him and for what we had lost.