"Eat," she snaps. "Drink. Rest."
I nod, throat thick with something I can't name.
Gratitude.
Fear.
Hope.
All tangled up so tight I can barely breathe.
Before she leaves, she pauses in the doorway.
"You tell no one," she says. "Not a word. Not a whisper."
I meet her eyes, fierce and sure even as my body shakes.
"I won’t."
She studies me a second longer, something unreadable flashing across her face.
Then she slips away into the dark.
I’m alone.
But not abandoned.
And maybe that spark in my chest isn’t so small after all.
CHAPTER 10
TRAZ
Gur stinks of blood and desperation.
Always has.
I stalk through the slum streets, boots crunching over broken glass and old bones, my pulse hammering in time with the low hum of the city’s dying lights.
The contract’s fresh in my ear.
High-value target. No questions asked. Double bonus for making it messy.
Just how I like it lately.
The weight of my sidearm is solid against my thigh. Comforting. Familiar.
Violence doesn’t ask for explanations. Doesn’t demand you dig up parts of yourself you’d rather keep buried.
Violence just is.
I turn a corner and shoulder through a crowd of junk peddlers. They scatter fast. Nobody wants to be in a merc’s way, not on Gur, not when the streets run red before the suns even set.
A kid looks up at me—too skinny, too scared. I keep walking. I don’t stop. I don’t look back.
Mercy’s a luxury I burned out of myself a long time ago.
Or so I tell myself.
