Later that day, Lucian went to Vera’s cabin and knocked. Eventually, the door slid open, revealing her sitting on the corner of the bed. It was as if she had sat there the entire time over the past few days without even moving. For all Lucian knew, she might have.
She stared out the viewport, where Volsung hung a few million kilometers away, a bright orb of blue.
“Enter.”
Somehow, Lucian felt as if she knew his decision already. Her manner was colder than usual, and she did not look at him directly.
“You’ve decided on Volsung, then?”
She said it with careful neutrality, without a hint of animosity. When she turned to look at him, her expression seemed more appraising than judgmental.
“It’s the right choice,” he said. “Though I can't tell you why.”
“Do you know it to your core? Is this the direction the Manifold is leading you?”
“I don’t know about that. But I’m at peace with the decision.”
“It’s like that, sometimes,” Vera said. “The Academy will challenge you. In some ways it's expected, in other ways not.”
“Cryptic as always.”
She ignored that. “You must discover what those challenges are on your own. I will not be able to help you.”
“Do you think me incapable?”
“Far from it. The Manifold is one step ahead of us. Always. Its plans are simply different from what I surmised. But it is almost always that way.”
“I see the value of your training, but for whatever reason, Volsung is where I need to be.”
“You see the value in my training?” She chuckled. “There, we disagree, but I understand your perspective, limited as it is.” She gave that ghost of a smile again, which made Lucian’s skin crawl. “Similarly, you don’t see the value of what the Transcends are offering, and you’re going anyway.”
“They have a tradition,” Lucian said, somewhat lamely. "Over a century of teaching mages.”
“That they do. Whether they teach magic well is another conversation entirely. But again, you will learn. If my senses are correct, your journey will not end in that place. However, I’ve been wrong before.”
A silence lingered, which Lucian finally broke. “Well . . . thank you. I’ve learned a lot. I’m grateful for that.”
She gave a regal nod. With that single movement, Lucian thought she had a curious sense of majesty. A quality he couldn’t put into words. Once again, he found himself wondering about her past with the Starsea Mages and what he was missing by not going with her. He’d only scratched the surface of her knowledge, after all.
“Who are you, exactly? I know you were one of the Mages of Starsea. Did you know Xara Mallis? How have you eluded capture for so long?”
She was quiet for a moment, seeming to consider those questions as she looked out the viewport. “Go, Lucian. You’ve made your choice. Now, you must learn to live with it. My only parting advice: never allow yourself to regret your decisions.”
Lucian didn’t believe he would regret this decision in the least, but of course, only time would tell. He nodded his thanks to her all the same, leaving her there as he found her, deep in meditation.
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She seemed to mutter some words before he left her behind. It was hard to say what they were, but they almost sounded like, “I wonder how she’s doing.”
He almost stopped himself to ask her to repeat herself, but her posture remained closed, and she was speaking to herself. It wasn’t his place to ask.
Lucian left and did not look back.
The Burung was minutes away from docking at Volsung Orbital. The oceanic planet dominated the ship’s starboard viewports. Everyone waited in the galley, even Dirk, standing alone and friendless against the wall. Paul and Kasim stood off on their own in sullen silence. Now that their leader had shown weakness, he was no longer worthy of being followed.
A crewman stood next to Dirk to assist him. But Dirk’s face wore a scowl while his arms were crossed, and his bandage was still wrapped around his eyes. In a few minutes, Lucian wouldn’t have to worry about him anymore.
“Almost there,” Emma said. “Are you ready?”
He’d never been more ready in his life. “Sure am.”
Outside the viewports, there wasn’t a hint of land on the planet’s surface below—only boundless blue ocean and white cloud cover. Volsung’s surface was over ninety percent water, and in the Godsdeep, the ocean went down to a depth of over twenty kilometers. As the planet rotated, a band of gray clouds obscuring the planet’s tropics flashed with lightning. Probably one of the planet’s famous super cyclones.
Every passing minute, Volsung loomed ever larger. Lucian had his wheeled luggage ready while Emma only had a backpack, which she seemed to have no trouble toting around. He wondered how she’d handle it in Volsung’s higher gravity. Grav-lag was a real concern, especially for lifelong spacers who had never felt the pull of a world as large as Volsung or Earth. It could take weeks to adjust.
Emma looked at an incoming message on her slate. “That’s Talent Khairu. She says she’s docked the boat.”
Emma swiped out a reply in under two seconds. Once done, she pointed out the viewports. “Look.”
The clouds now gone, green islands and archipelagos dotted the cerulean surface below. On the horizon, a new, larger landmass was slipping into view.
“Looks like the Ostkontinent,” she said. “And if I don’t miss my guess, all those thousands of tiny islands are the Pillars of Poseidon.”
“The Eighth Wonder of the Galaxy,” Lucian said. They’d all seen the commercials.
“Volsung also rotates in the opposite direction of Earth,” Emma said. "The sun rises in the west and sets in the east.”
Lucian knew that, too, but he let Emma chirp the facts at him since she seemed excited about them.
“Karendas is also on an island, almost right in the center of the Ocean of Storms, right in between the Ostkontinent and the Vestkontinent. It’ll probably be a bit balmy. Probably not too different from Miami.” Emma watched him to see if this fact had any impact on him.
Lucian took in the news without a word. He was feeling anxious now, especially when a new shape materialized against the planet’s surface.
“There it is,” Emma said. “Volsung-O.”
The orbital was not the size of Sol Citadel—nowhere even close—but Lucian knew it was quite impressive in its own right. A two-kilometer-long O’Neill cylinder, it was basically a giant can spinning in orbit, if far more technically advanced. From what he’d read, Volsung-O was home to ten thousand people. It was also the waypoint for any ships in the system, as well as the hub for shuttles down to the surface. Smaller spaceships capable of both interstellar travel and landing on high-gravity planetary surfaces were rare, but becoming more common. The majority of vessels still had to dock in space first and take a shuttle down.
The orbital looked tiny, indeed, against the backdrop of the blue planet.
“We need to get to the shuttle fast,” Emma said. “It leaves in an hour.”
Emma adjusted her backpack as the Burung closed in on the station. Lucian could now discern individual ports and bays at the cylinder’s end. Various ships and shuttles zoomed about, docking and departing. Even if it wasn’t as impressive as Sol Citadel, he still watched in awe.
Noticing his reaction, Emma smiled. “One day, I’ll show you L5. Your jaw will hit the deck.”
“Prepare for docking,” came the captain’s voice from the intercom.
The passengers clamored for the door. Even as they crowded each other, they left a sizable space around Lucian and Emma. For once, he was thankful for his status as a mage.
Lucian scanned the crowd for Vera, but there was no sign of her. There was a final sliver of doubt as he questioned his decision. But there was no time to think about it, as the ship had come to a stop. Lucian felt a light vibration through the deck, followed by the click of the airlock.
For the first time in four weeks, that lock opened, letting in a rush of cold air. People surged through like the breaking of a dam. Lucian joined the flow.
After one month, the long journey was over.
