Free Starfinder: A Novel of the Skylords by John Marco

When he turned to look at her, her eyes were closed.
    “What are you doing?” Moth asked.
    Fiona’s fingers tightened around his hand. “Thinking about good things,” she said, and kept on walking, eyes shut, lips whispering.
    “Huh?”
    “It’s a game my mother taught me,” Fiona explained. “Whenever you’re scared you just close your eyes and try to remember the best times of your life. You call up the memories real clear, and it’s just like you’re there again.”
    “Don’t be scared,” said Moth. “We’re not lost. We just gotta keep on walking.”
    “Hush up,” said Fiona. Quickly she fell back into her trance, rifling through her treasure chest of memories. Moth led her on through the fog.
    “What are you thinking about right now?” he asked.
    A smile lit Fiona’s face. “Once when my parents were alive they took me on a train ride to Rivena. There was a man on the train doing card tricks with a monkey, and when we got to Rivena we all went on a balloon ride over the river.” Fiona gave a tiny moan, like she was tasting something delicious. “I was eight years old. I remember ’cause it was my birthday.” Fiona opened her eyes. “Now you try.”
    “Fiona, I’m not scared,” Moth lied.
    “Go on, toughie,” she goaded. “Close your eyes. What was the very best time of your life?”
    Moth didn’t want to play her game. “Orphans don’t have memories like that.”
    “Don’t be stupid. Everyone has good memories. You’ll see ’em when you close your eyes.”
    So Moth did as Fiona asked, holding her hand and letting her guide him through the mists. Instantly his mother’s face popped up. Sometimes it was hard to remember her face, but not today. Today she came alive, so real Moth could smell her perfume.
    “What are you remembering?” Fiona asked him.
    Moth didn’t answer right away. To play the game right, he needed a great memory. He searched his brain, recalling the first time he’d seen an airship and the day he discovered a treehouse some of the squires had built. He’d spent the whole day in that tree pretending to be a Skyknight until the older boys chased him away.
    “I remember one time a few years ago,” he began, “back when my mother was sick. We were in our old house on the square. I had just gotten my job at the aerodrome . . .” Moth took a deep breath, remembering the smell of that morning. “It was early and I was still in bed, and then I smelled my mother cooking breakfast. She’d gone out and bought us bacon from one of the farms. She walked all the way down there even though she was sick. When I asked her why, she said . . .”
    Suddenly Moth opened his eyes. Fiona looked at him, eager for the rest of his story.
    “Well?” she pressed. “What’d she say to you?”
    The memory had taken Moth to a place he didn’t want to go. “She said it was because I had gotten a job,” he told her. “She said it was because she was proud of me. I guess that was the best time of my life.”
    Fiona squeezed his hand. “You win.”
     
    For hours they followed Lady Esme deeper and deeper into the mists, sometimes barely able to detect her in the thick fog. Moth’s feet hurt badly, roughed up by the oversized boots. He held Fiona’s hand tighter than ever. After a while they had both stopped speaking, until Fiona spoke the truly dreadful words.
    “We’re lost,” she whispered. “We’re really lost.”
    “No, we’re not,” Moth insisted. “Esme knows where she’s going.”
    “She’s a bird, Moth!”
    “She’s not a bird! She’s a person! And we’re not lost!” Fiona let go of his hand. “Stop. Just stop.”
    Moth and Esme both halted, turning to look at her. “Fiona, listen, we have to keep going . . .”
    “It’s getting dark,” said Fiona. She looked up where the sky belonged. “It’s almost night! We’ve been walking all day.”
    “I know,” Moth admitted. “But we have to keep going. We have to believe , Fiona.”
    She nodded