Page 25 of The Garnet Daughter (The Viridian Priestess #3)

Chapter

Nineteen

“ G one?” I scan the cargo hull for a solid answer. “To where?”

“It doesn’t matter. He isn’t coming back.” His jaw is set harshly as he presses a combination on the exterior door to lock it again.

“He left?” I step in front of him as he tries to pass. “August, stop. What do you mean he is not coming back? What happened!”

His exhale is so powerful, I feel the air against my cheek. “He is staying behind, convinced he knows the prisoner the First Son soldiers brought through here. The Viathan woman abducted weeks ago.”

I shake my head in disbelief. It doesn’t make sense.

“We need to leave.” He walks toward the cockpit so fast I have to jog to keep pace.

“No, we can’t just leave him here.”

“We are not leaving him here. He took a hover bike and supplies. He is tracking the soldiers down,” he replies with anger I am not used to.

“August, wait!” I shout, following him into the cockpit and standing in front of his chair so he has to face me.

“We need to go, Callia.” He glances out the front windows.

“Are we . . . in trouble?” I look in the same direction.

“Not yet, but I would like to not raise any alarms to our somewhat hostile hosts when they notice a commander investigating the area when we gave our word we would leave.”

“How could he do this?” My head is spinning, a mix of disbelief and hurt slowing my processing of the situation.

He reaches out to take my hand but stops. “It changes nothing. We will find the temple without him.”

“99 trusted him as my guard.”

“I wanted to kill the bastard for leaving us so vulnerable. I couldn’t stop him.” He clenches his fist. “Now, please strap in. I will take you wherever we need to go next, but keeping you safe is my priority.”

His expression is so impatient as he waits for me to step aside so he can do his job, one he takes so seriously that I’m certain with all my heart he would never abandon it.

“Alright.” I sit behind him and watch him go into a flurry of button pushing and double-checking screens on his command station.

The expedited version of his normal takeoff protocols complete, he thrusts us into the air faster than I can fully strap in.

The ship feels it too. It groans, slower to rise even though the lever he pulls is held upright with white knuckles.

Finally, the engine catches up to his commands and the speed increases before he levels us out.

We zip across the desert, far away from the village, as if being pursued. Our jarring pace doesn’t allow for viewing the scenery, so I’m only able to catch a mix of colors as everything zooms by from my seat behind him.

When August is satisfied with the distance put between us and the village, he lands roughly on the sandy ground, sheltered by a small rocky area.

He glances at me over his shoulder. “Doing alright?”

“Yes. Just still so confused about Commander Wesley. He knows the prisoner they moved through the town, the one that started the fire?” It’s a relief to leave this place but odd to be down a crew member, especially when he seemed so focused on our mission until now.

“He thinks he knows the woman, said it was a matter of the three worlds, but I’m not so sure.”

“I did not expect him to leave his post.” I shake my head because I guess I don’t really know him at all beyond his obligations.

“Kind of sounds like something I would do actually.” August looks back again and wiggles his eyebrows in a ridiculous way.

He’s right. He would leave his post to go after someone he cared about, and he did. He snuck onto this ship and made sure he was here to help and protect me. I was so mad at him for forcing his way in and not trusting me, but now I realize how grateful I am that he came.

“We can map the terrain,” August suggests, busy opening lockers and totes in the cargo hull with rambling haste. “I can program the drones to look for specifics, following rocky areas, hoping that will lead us to the formation.”

I’m standing in the blank spot where the hover bike Commander Wesley took stood, the straps that held it down in the cargo hull loose and free on either side.

“Hand it here,” I say.

He looks down at me. “It’s heavy.”

“Hand it over!”

“No, your arm. Just . . . just move,” he argues with a smile.

“My arm is fine now, thank you.” I hold the other side of the tote but barely help in dispersing the heavy load.

He opens it with a smirk when my side drops a little too roughly on the metal floor. “I’m glad your arm is fine,” he says a little more seriously.

I narrow my eyes at him, but he is unfazed, immediately reaching into the tote and removing the soft black padding on the top. Four spheres are tightly nestled into perfectly fitting positions like a snug nest.

“They look like eggs,” I point out.

“Perfect for finding a rock shaped like a bird beak.”

“You think this will work?” I run my finger across the top of one of them.

He nods and retrieves another tote, revealing four more spheres.

“I do. If they map this area and find nothing, we will at least know the direction that is more densely bedrock, move the ship, and map the next terrain until we find it. We can watch the drones recording the area on the map in the cockpit.”

“That sounds . . . like a good idea.”

“Good.” He clears his throat, hiding the way his face lit up from my small praise. “I need to program the mother and they will all sync.”

He removes one of the drones from its resting spot in the storage tote and places it on the cargo hull floor.

Then proceeds to lay out his tools and other mechanical objects I can’t even guess the names of.

Hunched over it on his knees, he uses a twisting tool to open a small panel on the drone’s surface.

He tinkers with the wires inside, reminding me of all the time he spent working on the beacon receiver to get us off Frith.

Eventually, he grabs a data pad and connects it with the drone’s interior and makes himself comfortable, sitting with his back against the wall of lockers. When I join him, he tilts the screen slightly, allowing me to observe.

“Is that your stomach?” I ask as an angry rumble comes from his torso.

He laughs to himself and points to a small tool. “I miss Ruth’s bread. Probably the best I’ve ever had.”

I hand the tool to him. “I thought your father was a baker.”

“He is. But we rarely ate the good stuff. With 9 kids to feed, we got the stale and over-proofed batches.” He lines the pointy end of the tool into the small opening on the drone’s panel and delicately rolls it between his thumb and pointer finger, the tendons in his wrist flexing as he does.

August has briefly spoken of his parents’ occupations, his father the village baker and his mother, a grain farmer.

“That is a lot of children,” I say, taking the tool back and watching him inspect the work.

“Yes, and each one of my sisters is very different, so it might as well have been 100 children.”

“Is that why you get along with most people?”

“I don’t. I just know how different people operate because of it. Makes it easier in my line of work.” He laughs. “I am friendly to get people to bring their guard down so I can assess if they are a threat.”

“Oh, is that what you did to me?” I tease.

“No.” He thinks for a moment. “Our first night in your village when we spoke at the bonfire, I was so nervous, I drained my flask and had to go back to the guest tent.”

I can’t stop the giggle that escapes me. “What about Ferren? She said you were always kind to her.”

“That is much more complicated.” He makes wide eyes at the memory. “And I knew 99 had his sights on her from the very start, so he did a lot of the . . . investigating.”

He reaches across me to grab the next tool, so close I pull back so my chest does not bump into his arm.

It’s silent for a moment as he clips a wire and twists the tiny gold threads inside. “I can’t picture you as a baker, if the ship stew is any indication of your skills.”

He laughs hard, the kind where he throws his head back and his Adam’s apple bobs in his throat. Normally, it’s enough to make me join, but this time I find it . . . distracting.

“Or a farmer for that matter,” I quickly add.

“I fixed my mother’s equipment but knew it wasn’t for me, too many people, easy to get lost in all the noise as much as I love them.”

August adores his family. That is apparent with how much he speaks of them, even in the times it is not in a flattering light.

“We are opposites in that way.”

“How so?” he asks, furrowing his brow and leaning in.

“There were so many people in your family that you felt unseen.”

August lights up when it is just the four of us and he can talk for hours about anything at all, our undivided focus on him. I love hearing him open up, when he becomes so comfortable that he pushes past his need to charm and both sides of him are on full display, weaving in tandem.

“And you?” he asks me to finish my theory, and for some reason my heart skips.

“It was just Selene and me, too much attention turned into smothering protection.”

“Yeah, I don’t envy 99 when she finds out where you went and how he helped.” He stretches out his legs and presses his back to the wall. “But we both wanted to leave our homes as soon as we could, so . . . not opposites, I would say.”

I shake my head because he knows what I mean, even if he doesn’t like the sound of it. “Is it done?”

He holds the drone in both hands, the panel still open but the screen on the front now lit up. “Hopefully.”

“Do they roll around on the ground?”

He smiles and leans his head to the side with a dreamy stare that immediately makes me turn away, back to the screen.

“They hover above it and scan from the bottom, here.” He pats the underside.