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Too little, too late

—

I stand alone in the Ash Lord’s shuttle The griin the preflight procedures There’s a sound behindthe Gold prisoners we took froueless, Thraxa, and Rhonna follow hi pad They toss down several bags of gear, lock the prisoners in the cargo hold, and settle into the passenger compartment “Sevro says you’d need them,” Thraxa says

Colloway saunters up, a burner hanging between his lips “You’re in my seat”

I get up and find ure stands at the bottom of the ramp in bloodied armor “Apollonius,” I say

“The clock’s still ticking,” he says, tapping his head

Sevro and I in our despair forgot about the man entirely I look down at rao off “Are you a man of your word?” he asks

I look down at theI value Just a murderer who saved my life But all the evils that have befallen us today, all the mistakes I’ve made, have come from my pride and the duplicity I’ve sown

“Today I am” I deactivate the bomb “Venus is yours, if you can take her”

“And the hostages?” he asks “The Carthii and S

aud family members you promised me?”

“We need them more,” I say, and hammer my hand on the door control The ra at e

My er hold I settle into my chair as Colloway lifts off and we trail in the Nessus’s wake Thunder rolls outside as the frigate fires at the Society ripWings that pursue us Colloway says so off our escape as we breach orbit Over the co thees we had in the Nessus’s brig Just as planned Even as I hters of the Golds of Venus to escape The dark irony is not lost onus is the love of parents for their children They do not fire, and I wonder if I had rasp, would I have done the same?

I say no farewell over the com to Sevro and Pebble and Clown, friends who have been with me for half ular ind of nature I know I am not I was the concentrated force of the people around nar, Fitchner, Lorn, Eo Sevro

Now I sit a world apart, in silence as my friends lie dead and the rest return to my son while I race away from him toward the war Accompanied only by the tattered reirl of barely twenty years