Page 232 of Starside

His face twists into a mask of cold, cruel amusement. It’s as if the worst of himself has taken over. All the tenderness, all the understanding, has vanished. It’s been replaced with the callous, heartless warrior I encountered in the rain. “You never did have great survival instincts,” he spits. “But me—you won’t survive me.”

I have a feeling he’s right. But still, still, I stay.

He can tell, even with his eyes closed. He shakes his head. “You are a fool, Aris. Searching for shreds of humanity in a broken world. Searching for care that has never existed. Looking for beauty”—he spits the word—“in monsters.”

His blade is still battling that invisible beast. His eyes are still firmly shut. I take a step forward and duck, barely missed by the metal again. “You’re right,” I say, my voice just a rasp in the whirl of sand. “I see beauty in dark places. If that makes me a fool, then so be it.”

I reach for his hood, to pull it down completely, but he shoots back, then raises his sword right in front of him, a barrier between us.

“You ask why I hide? Why I wear the hood? The mask? The helmet?” he yells, face twisted. “I hide because I can’t even look at myself, Aris,” he says. “The things I’ve done … you have no idea.”

“I can imagine,” I say, inching closer. I just need him to open his eyes. Maybe if I touch him—

He senses me immediately and turns, raising his blade again. “You can’t,” he spits. “If you knew all the blood on my blade, you would run, Aris. You would cower. You wouldn’t look at me the way you do. You would never call me beautiful.” He laughs cruelly. He’s trying to scare me off.

“I’m not leaving,” I say steadily.

“Then you will die.” He says it like a promise.

I shake my head. My voice is unyielding. “I’m not afraid of you.”

His is pitying. “You really should be.”

He lashes out again—and this time, his blade meets mine.

The ringing of their joining echoes through the desert, muting the roaring winds for just a moment. The force of it spirals down my veins.

The one blade he can’t break. He pushes, growling as if he’s trying. He’s trying.

I push back, teeth grinding together, feet sliding. I put every shred of energy and rage and feeling into that one motion. Slowly, in a high-pitched wail, our blades begin to slide together as I get closer. Closer to him.

“Open your eyes, Raker,” I say. My arms are shaking with effort. We’re too close now. One sudden move, and he’ll skewer me on his metal. My voice is a whisper. “Please.”

He shakes his head, then shoves against my sword, hard. I stumble back, and I should take this chance to escape. To survive him. But instead, I hurl myself forward, and my blade meets his again with bone-splintering force.

I press down, trying to get closer, but he blocks his face with his sword, using it like another mask to hide behind, just another sheet of metal to use as a wall between him and the rest of the world. Between us. But in these last few weeks, those walls have slipped. I’ve seen beneath the mask, beneath the warrior, beneath the deadly reputation, and that’s why I won’t let him succumb to this. I won’t let the worst of him win. We break apart for a second, and then my weapon slams against his again.

“Raker,” I say.

But it’s like he’s lost.

Whatever he’s remembering, whatever he’s fighting, I know he’s trapped in his darkest moments, just as I was. The darkest parts of himself.

He was a stranger before this quest, but now … he knows me better than anyone else.

And I know him.

I know him.

I will be a map through the darkness. I will be a hand, pulling him out of it.

Our metals scrape together. He makes to move, but I move first. And instead of striking—I release my sword. It thuds against the sand.

What a stupid thing to do.

But sucking the poison from my blood was stupid. Summoning an ancient immortal to save him was stupid. What’s one more stupid thing.

He lunges to attack me again. And instead of reaching down for my blade—