{Enki}

Sagan Seamswalked to a thousand identical ocean platforms. Aimless. The majesty of the Dyson’s Sphere mocked her all the while. A silent witness to so many miseries in her life.

She hated it.

The tears burned. The shadow that followed her about twenty platforms ago unnerved her. It was no small shade. It followed with such velocity that she glimpsed it stretching from one platform to another.

That was impossible.

Well, Enki would need to try harder. Sagan wouldn’t stop until she found and rescued Rayne.

“This labyrinth will not stop me.”

Her residual weakness from the earlier blood dialysis might. Her accelerated heart rate threatened to squeeze the blood from her eyes. But how dare she stop when they stole Rayne?!

Did it matter that it was all a part of the King’s plan? No. Fuck that plan. Nothing went as they intended.

Sagan would know.

Exhausted from the last seventy-two hours, she hazarded a rest. Like all the other platforms, it was stone and surrounded by ocean. Boring, flat ocean—

Water sloshed. A shadow appeared over her own. Big. Tall.

With her heart racing for another reason, Sagan turned and shrank away. A giant serpentine leviathan loomed over her. A white dragon with six sets of long whiskers lining in a row back toward its ears. If it had ears. Teeth. So many sharpened quills in its mouth. Rows and rows like a shark.

It was peppered in nacres.

“His trophies.”

Too terrified to look completely away, Sagan tried to glance over her shoulder.

Remorse appeared from a conduit of his making. Hands clasped behind his back, he gazed up at the beast like assessing an obedient pet. “He’s always hungry.” She shrank back, and he continued, “Seamswalker, we’ve tolerated your uninvited presence in Enki as long as it kept engagements with Tameka civil. That is no longer a concern. Do not return. Or you’ll find there are many creatures in this Sphere with a taste for nacre.”

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Sagan swallowed the fear and faced him. Recalling his time undercover as Korac’s blockmate, she pleaded, “You and I became friends. I know I got through to you. Free Rayne. Remorse, give her back to me.”

Sadness cast over the Tritan’s round, black voids. “I care deeply for all the Progeny, but this was always meant to be. Rayne is safe. Do not seek her further, or you’ll meet an unwarranted and unpleasant captivity. We still need our broodmares, you see? Unless you’re here to volunteer?”

Sagan didn’t stifle that shudder.

“I thought not. If you linger after I depart, Squilly will collect your nacre. I’ll see you again soon, slayer of the last Ancient.”

Angry in her defeat, two things tempered Sagan’s massive disappointment.

One, she was needed elsewhere.

And two, Rayne wouldn’t want this.

Deflated, Sagan returned to the pit to find Caedes standing over Korac, punching her man stupid.

“Stop!”

With a hand, the silver-haired General held her aloft and laughed at the bald Icarus. “I always knew you hit like one of Umbra’s whores.”

More one-sided punching.

Right. Male grieving ritual. Sagan knew it was necessary, but there wasn’t time for this shit. She walked over to Caedes and whispered where only he could hear. “I’m sorry. But you know Tameka will come through that conduit any minute to help with the cleanup. Do you want her to see you like this?”

The look the bald Icarus gave her was devastating. He dropped Korac’s collar. Before he could turn away, Sagan pulled him in for a hug. “I’m so sorry. We’ll all miss him so very much.”

Caedes nodded against her and rumbled through his thickened voice, “I kill Abresson. No one else.”

“Granted.”

Korac wiped yellow blood on the back of his hand, and Sagan frowned at it. “Did you know your blood changed color?”

He sniffed. “I wouldn’t be surprised if I sprout butterfly wings and turned into a Monarch 3 Queen after today.”

Yeah. Yeah, good point.

“Korac.” Caedes’ voice sounded like he gargled with boulders. Rough and gutted. “Can you get him out of the ice?”

The General shook his head. “I’ve never seen the likes of it, but Tumu or Xelan will know. Trust me. They won’t leave him like that.”

Lamassau stumbled around the rubble, carrying Jack on his shoulder. He looked a little blue around his green features. He poured Jack onto a safe spot. “Let me try.” On the lake, opposite where they stood, the Chef blew flames along the ice.

No change. No melt.

Downtrodden and weakened, the Tritan fell to his knees, spent. “Shit. Sorry.”

Sagan assured all the men surrounding her, “Don’t worry. We’ll—”

“Where’s Rayne?”

Korac said aloud the curses that went off in Sagan’s head.

Jack stared out at the disaster. His voice hit a note that took her back to when they were all kids together. “Sagan. Sagan, where’s my sister?”

When would this day end?