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The prison guards began to get up from their positions dotted about the monster, most unaware of where they were and what they were doing there.
“Get up,” Agatha said. “We have to leave before they realize you’re here.”
She reached out a hand to me but was too weak to heave me up by herself.
I rose by myself and, still a little shaken, she helped lead me from the fiery blue pit of the Desert Flower Monarch’s dwelling and final resting place.
We slipped into the darkness, hoping never to be found again.
13
AGATHA
We staggered through the darkness, letting our feet find the way.
What little moonlight there was waxed and waned through the sporadic cloud cover.
I hoped we wouldn’t run into another Desert Flower before the night was done.
I stood no chance of protecting us from it alone.
Although Egara’s arm pressed heavily on me, I timed my movements with him so we could keep slogging on.
I didn’t know how we were going to survive the night, never mind escape the planet but I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with Egara.
No matter how long or short that was.
Egara panted, struggling to breathe the same way I had until our first kiss.
He clutched a hand to his chest with an expression of intense pain and a thin film of sweat popped across his brow.
It had to be something serious.
Of course it was.
It wasn’t exactly normal everyday practice to throw yourself out of a moving shuttlecraft while it was still in midair.
“Wait,” he said. “I need to rest.”
He slumped to the ground and focused on his breathing.
He sucked air in deeply through his nostrils and out through his mouth in very slow deliberate gasps.
I’d never seen him so hurt before—even after fighting a vicious battle in the pits.
“I should go back and get the prison guards,” I said. “Maybe they can help you.”
“They can’t help me. I just need a little time.”
But we don’t have any time.
I couldn’t bring myself to say the words.
The moons crested the horizon, passing over it and disappearing from view.
On the opposite horizon, the first signs of the twin suns and their ceaseless dance filtered through the dense cloud cover, exposing us to the prison guards any time they picked themselves up and came across our tracks.
I took a seat beside him and wrapped my arm around his broad back.
