Free Mirage by Jenn Reese Page B

a low pile of rugs and pillows. Calli’s wings seemed to radiate light in the growing darkness, as if they were made of glowfish instead of feathers. And maybe that’s why it took Aluna a moment to notice the dark figure sitting next to her.
    “Dash,” she whispered.
    Hoku looked at her from across the clearing. “Surprise!” he whispered back. “They’ve given him the night off from prison.”
    Aluna could barely hear Hoku over the thudding of her heart. When Dash saw her approach, he moved over so Aluna could sit between him and Calli. She sat on the far side of him instead. She wanted him surrounded. Physically inside their tiny group. Protected.
    “Hey,” she croaked. Stupid voice.
    “You look so clean,” Dash said. “I had no idea your hair was that color.”
    She grinned. Firelight danced in his dark eyes. The effect made her brave. Or weak. She wasn’t sure she could tell the difference tonight.
    “Did you do it?” she asked. “Did you do what Tayan said?”
    His lips pressed into a line. Just when she thought he wasn’t going to answer, he did.
    “The spies we captured,” he said, “they were a mother and her son.” He spoke so quietly that she could barely hear his voice amid the revelry surrounding them. “They had left the hidden Serpenti city in search of medicine. She had a young daughter, and the girl was ill. None of their own remedies had worked.”
    Dash looked up at the fire, his expression difficult to read.
    “The woman died that night, before the khan could get any answers.” He took a deep breath. “They had not realized how exhausted she was and how little food she had eaten. Her body could not survive even the smallest of tortures.”
    Aluna tore her eyes from his face and studied the Equians surrounding them. They spoke of honor. They fought like warriors. There was so much about them that she admired. And yet they treated Dash and Tal like mistakes, and they could torture a desperate woman to death. She could make no sense of them.
    She felt a hand on her arm and looked down. Dash’s warm fingers gripped her wrist. “Do not judge them too harshly. I can see it in your face. You do not understand the war. You do not know how many of us they killed.”
    Yes, yes. She understood, because she’d seen the war between her own people and the sharklike Deepfell. She’d seen firsthand how death multiplied when things like honor and justice were used as war cries.
    “So you helped the boy escape,” Aluna said. “And you gave him medicine for his sister.”
    “Yes.” Dash left his hand on her arm. Every second it stayed there, the heat intensified. “We were saving that medicine, and I chose to give it to him. I thought I was doing the right thing, that I was opening the way for peace between our people.”
    “You did do the right thing,” Aluna said. Once upon a time, she’d given her breathing necklace to a dying Deepfell they’d found wounded on the shore. The Kampii needed every necklace they had. And yet if she hadn’t done it, would Prince Eekikee have saved them later? Would they have become allies? Would Fathom have fallen? “It’s harder to stand against your own than to stand against an enemy. You were brave.”
    “I was naive. When I told the khan what I had done, a part of me thought he would understand. That perhaps he would see how the Serpenti were no longer our enemy.”
    “It didn’t go like that, did it?” she said.
    Dash grunted. “No.”
    “You still honor him. The khan.”
    He nodded. “He did what he felt was right for our people. I may have done the same in his place. I accepted his judgment and thanked him for condemning me to exile instead of death.”
    “But this time . . . ?” She couldn’t bring herself to finish the sentence.
    Dash squeezed her arm gently, then released it. She could still feel his heat even after his fingers were gone.
    “I broke exile,” he said simply.
    They sat quietly and listened to the crowd.
    Eventually