Page 38 of Last of Her Name

A hand slaps a sleep patch against my neck. It’s almost a relief, to feel darkness overtake me and silence the inferno inside my head. I cling to Pol as I slump onto the floor beside him.

I wake facedown on a spongy surface and, with a groan, try to roll onto my back. Instead, I drop onto a hard floor. For a moment I lie there, blinking away the sudden pain, taking in the room.

White walls, stone floor, harsh lights in the ceiling. A white metal box in the upper corner that I’m sure is a camera. A panel to my left is a fold-out lavatory. The bed I awoke on is really no more than a soft pad on a metal frame.

It’s a cell.

The door is diamantglass, unbreakable but transparent. I scramble toward it, finding nothing but a dim white corridor outside, lined with closed doors like this one. I bang on it for a while, but no one comes.

“I want to see my friend!” I shout. “Where is Pol? Where is he?”

With a cry of rage, I beat on the door harder and longer. I yell and scream and curse, until my already raw throat feels like I’ve been swallowing knives.

Exhausted, I sink to my knees, hands still pressed against the glass. I breathe in and out, trying to stop the trembling that overtakes me.

My throat is thick and scratchy from the sleep patch. I find the papery thin square still on my neck and rip it off savagely, then begin shredding it into fragments, breathing hard.

I’m still dressed in my tensor tunic and leggings, but my feet are bare and my pockets are empty. They even took my multicuff. Without it, I feel naked.

When the patch is shredded to nothing, I fold my feet, one atop the other, and wrap my arms around my knees. The air in here smells stale, like it’s been filtered too many times; this is air that’s never blown through a forest of leaves or rustled fresh grass. It’s manufactured and sterile, and it burns my throat.

“He can’t be dead,” I whisper. “He can’t be.”

I think back, hoping it was all a nightmare, or at least that the sleep patch somehow altered the memory, making it seem worse than it truly was. But it comes back clearly: Pol falling at Zhar’s feet, the weight of his head in my hands, the absolute stillness of his eyes.

All because he stood up for me. All because, in the end, he chose Stacia over Anya.

Guilt squeezes my lungs. I did this. I pushed him to choose a side. I begged him to chooseme. And he paid for it with his life. I as good as shot him myself.

Rocking in place, I hold down sobs but can’t stop the tears. A part of my brain works, nonsensically, to figure out how to reverse time, how to go back and stop it all from happening. It’s like watching a rat in a maze with no exits. I know how it will end, but I can’t convince the creature to stop trying.

Hours seem to pass, but it’s probably only twenty minutes or so before a muted tap catches my ear. I track the sound to the fold-out lavatory, which I practically rip out of the wall in my frustration, thinking it’s just a water drip.

But there’s no water in the little white bowl, and I can still hear the tapping.

“Hello?” I say, then I shake my head and lean back.

Stars, Stacia, you’ve really lost it. You’re talking to a toilet.

But then I hear a soft “There you are,” and I clutch the little lav harder.

“Riyan?”

“I’m next door. I think our lav pipes are connected.”

“Are you hurt?”

A pause, then he says, “I’m alive for now, so that’s what counts.”

I rub my forehead, sighing as guilt overwhelms me. “I’m sorry, Riyan. I’m sorry we got you into this.”

A dry chuckle comes echoing through the pipes. “It’s no worse than what I’d have gottenyouinto, if Pol hadn’t hijacked my ship.”

“Is he—did you see what happened to him?”

“They knocked me out right after they got you. But … he took a hit to the chest, with a nano gun. Nobody survives that, Stacia. I’m so sorry.”

I can’t reply. My throat’s too choked. If I say it, there’s no going back. There’s no fixing things.