Page 124 of Star Bringer
“A force?” Rain asks, her voice rising.
“There’s been a lot of unrest the last several years,” he explains. “Ever since the sun started dying. Our followers were in danger, so we’ve had to put a small fighting force on each planet to protect them.”
“Protect them?” Ian asks. “Or act as mercenaries?”
“Protection only,” Merrick tells him, his voice firm.
Ian narrows his eyes. “You sure about that?”
“I am, yes.” Merrick sounds very confident.
“So now we’ve got proof that the Corporation tried to take us out, a hunch that the Empire was next, and we round it out with the Sisterhood. Fucking fantastic,” Ian says. “It’s not just someone on our ass anymore. It’severyone.”
Right then, my stomach growls again, even more loudly this time, and I can see the second he decides to table this problem.
“I’ll be back with food in a few,” he tells me as he heads through the door.
Everyone else files out behind him, except Rain, who bustles around for a couple of minutes, cleaning up the last of the supplies the crew used to fix up my leg. I watch her with my eyes half closed, which is the best I can do.
Part of me wants to just roll over and go to sleep, but it seems rude. Also, I’m exhausted but restless, my brain going over and over the fact that Ian, Gage, and I almost died today. My mind is too fuzzy to put much more than that together, but the echoes of the fear—and regret—are definitely floating around in there. So much so that I’m having a really hard time just closing my eyes and letting go.
“You’re okay, Kali.” Rain’s soothing voice washes over me as she moves the room’s only chair over to sit next to my bed. “You’re safe now.”
“I know,” I whisper to her through dry lips.
“Oh!” She jumps back up and rushes over to the sink. “Let me get you some water. You must be so thirsty.”
I take the cup she offers me and drain it before she even sits back down. She takes it from me with a soft smile and fills it up again. This time, while I drink it more slowly, she wets a clean cloth and brings it over to me.
“I thought you might want to wash your face and hands,” she tells me, holding out the cloth. “Or I can do it for you—”
“I think I’ve got it,” I answer. I take the cloth and wipe my face and neck, then my hands and wrists. It’s such a simple thing, but I can’t believe how much better it makes me feel.
“Thank you,” I say again, after she’s disposed of the cloth and is sitting down.
She smiles sweetly—typical Rain. “You don’t have to keep thanking me. You know we’re in this together.”
“A princess and a high priestess careening through space on an ancient ship filled with people who don’t believe in law or order?” I ask. And though I’m slurring my words so badly that even I can barely understand what I’m saying, Rain laughs.
“It’s wild, isn’t it? I’ve never done anything in my whole life, and now—”
“Now you’ve got a girlfriend.”
“I do.” Her smile fades. “And a friend who’s been shot. Two friends, really.”
“Is that what we all are?” Normally I’d never ask such a blunt question, but the painkillers are firmly in control of my tongue now. “Friends?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never had a real friend before. But I think that’s what this is. Isn’t it?”
Sadness settles over me as her question makes me think of Lara. “I’ve only ever had one friend before. She died on theCaelestis.”
“I’m sorry.” Rain squeezes my hand.
“Me too. But I like the idea of being friends, Rain. I like you, even if you do have shit taste in women.”
“I like you, too, Kali. And Beckett’s actually pretty great when you get to know her.”
“I’m going to have to take your word on that.” My eyelids keep getting heavier, until it becomes a real struggle to keep them open. “You don’t have to stay. I’ll be okay by myself.”
