Page 75 of Cloverleaf Station

City officials came in a delegation to meet them, along with immigrations experts and several lawyers. After reviewing documentation with both Kieron and Captain Hu, they allowed the passengers to be released from the ships. The first person off a mercy fleet vessel was Xilinn, and the second Pol saw her, he dropped Kieron’s hand and ran with all his speed toward his mother. She cried out and opened her arms to him, and then …

It felt too personal to watch. That had to be the reason that Kieron’s eyes were tearing up. Or perhaps he was just too tired to do this right now, too tired to handle more questions and demands. He’d done so much already, more emotional lifting than he’d ever done before in his life. The physical was something he could handle, but this? And now it was almost over, and he was more exhausted than ever, and all he wanted was …

A warm hand on his shoulder made Kieron spin around, but his body knew who it was even as his mind briefly panicked. He immediately leaned into Elenus’s tall frame, burying his face against the other man’s chest. Elenus smelled like lightning and fresh rain and machine oil, like perhaps he’d been in his workshop right before flying here like some sort of angel. He held Kieron up with ease, which made it that much easier for Kieron to allow himself to sag, just a little bit.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

Elenus laughed. “I never thought I’d be reduced to monosyllables, but I suppose you’re always surprising to me.”

“Mmm.” Kieron’s hands tightened across the back of Elenus’s shirt.

“Mmm indeed.” Miraculously, Elenus shut up and just let Kieron hold onto him after that. This, this was what he needed, what he’d been missing. Someone who wasn’t a dependent, or a beloved child, or a fellow professional he needed to keep at a distance. He’d been missing his partner, the understanding and support that only that person could give him.

He had a partner. Not just someone he loved, but someone who made him feel like everything was going to be all right because they were together again.

“I’ve got you,” Elenus said at last, with the faintest tremor in his voice. “I’ve got you.”

Good.

Chapter thirty-one

“Shouldn’t I—”

“Nope.” Elenus’s hand was firm on Kieron’s shoulder as he turned him in the direction of a doorway not far from the landing platform.

Kieron briefly tried to resist. “But I have to take care of the—”

“It’s all taken care of.”

He huffed with exasperation. “You don’t even know what I was going to say.”

“You were going to say you needed to take care of something for Pol, or for Xilinn, or for the other refugees, or you needed to make sure Lizzie is all right, or reach out to Catie, or pack up your stuff.” The door opened automatically as Elenus got close, and he shepherded Kieron in briskly, never letting go of him. “Right?”

Actually … “Yes,” Kieron said, a little sullen about being so transparent. Elenus smirked at him, clearly seeing it. Stars, if he was this easily readable, then he had to be exhausted.

“It’s all taken care of. Hand to heart, it is.” The strange, cylindrical room they were standing in suddenly began to move down a see-through hallway. Kieron glanced down, and his eyes widened. They were … very, very far off the ground.

“Don’t worry, it’s safe,” Elenus added, and Kieron didn’t even have the energy to be properly annoyed at him this time around. He was just happy for the reassurance. “And Pol and Xilinn have to get a whole raft of medical checks before they’re allowed anywhere, not to mention Ganian IDs in their implants. Same for the rest of the refugees. Lizzie has instructions to fly back to my private hangar as soon as she can, and Catie is waiting for her there—she’s gotten into opera recently, so get ready for some truly incoherent music over the next few weeks. She has plans to drag Lizzie into it as well, so while they both love you and are happy you’re here, they’re set. It’s all right for you to take care of yourself for a while instead of putting everyone else first.”

“My things,” Kieron began, admittedly weakly, but it was all he had.

“As soon as Lizzie lands, they’ll be taken to your room. Which, coincidentally, is also my room; isn’t that convenient?” The platform shifted directions, moving toward an immense, slightly familiar-looking skyscraper in the distance. “So everything really is taken care of. Everything except for you, and that’s where I come in.”

When Elenus tugged Kieron into his arms this time, it was easy to go—easier yet because it gave him a good excuse not to glance over the side of the platform. Kieron had never been acrophobic before, but maybe spending all that time on Cloverleaf Station had changed that. After all, it was hard to be afraid of heights when there were none, whereas here it seemed like that was all there was.

A wave of vertigo almost knocked him over, and Kieron leaned harder into Elenus, who held on even tighter. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know.” Except he did. It was hitting him all at once, now that he was in a place where he could let go of responsibility and just exist without having to be on it, be competent, be alert.

Everything had changed. Everything had changed. The life Kieron had spent the last five years living on Cloverleaf Station, a life that had become laser focused ever since losing Zakari three years ago, was over now. Everything he’d become accustomed to, the rhythms and rituals of his day that he hadn’t recognized the importance of until now—it was all over.

The adventure he’d had with Lizzie, rescuing Pol and Xilinn, had staved off this harsh realization, giving him a new crisis to focus on. Now he was here, with the man he loved, in a beautiful city on a beautiful world, and he was suddenly falling apart. Kieron tried to slow his breathing, but his lungs seemed intent on disobeying him, fluttering fast and hard in his chest until he could barely get any air in at all. His heart raced, and tiny, swirling stars glimmered in front of his eyes, no matter how hard he squeezed them shut.

“Okay. Shit, okay.” Elenus held him up with one arm around his waist while the other rubbed circles between his shoulder blades. The lift stopped, and Kieron was suddenly swept off his feet, but he couldn’t even bring himself to care that someone might see it, might think him undignified, might wonder what was going on. He buried his head against Elenus’s chest and let himself be carried away, laid down on a soft bed in a quiet room, let his jacket and shoes be taken off without a fuss.

When he finally managed to open his eyes, all he could make out was Elenus beside him. It was almost—almost—like being back in Cloverleaf Station. Kieron’s heart began to slow, and his breathing finally calmed.