[i]”But it’s not like I’m going to die.”

Redana’s leg is the color of dying nebulas. The pillow underneath is the color of the night sky at dusk. The musty, ornate sheets are the color of deadly orchids blooming in the heart of a far-off jungle. Hades pauses his shuffling and raises an expressive eyebrow.

“You know what I mean,” Redana huffs, leaning her head back against the headboard, arms crossed, precious Paragon pill[1] in one loose fist. “It’s stopping me from healing, but... it’s not like it’s permanent, and I’m not going to die. Once we reach a planet with a medical suite, or even a doctor, we can do a reading. But nobody else on board is like me. Dolce is so soft, and Vasilia’s so reckless, and Galnius wouldn’t complain if we ordered her to march into a dragon’s mouth, and Bella...”

There’s a table in the lavishly appointed[2] cabin. There’s always empty chairs pulled up, and a bottle of something sweet on hand, in case the gods wish to have a word with the ship’s champion. Dolce might be in charge of placating them, but Redana is, in some ways, their lightning rod. When those so, so white cards are rapped against the table, the sound is that of knucklebones scattered on dry earth.

“I’ll be fine. I’ll be fine, I really will.” She doesn’t get up. But she does take that pill (as precious as the heart of a star) and slip it back into her belt. “Even one might be the difference between life and death for a member of my crew, and doesn’t a princess know her responsibilities to her subjects? Besides, it’s not like I can go home and ask Mom for more.”[/i]

***

“Bella, no, stop, don’t you [i]dare—!![/i]”

Redana fights back like a wildcat, throwing her head back and forth, forcing Bella to exert more and more strength to hold her still. Maybe, maybe if she wrenched her head away and spat the pills out, they’d be salvageable, and both pills (both pills Bella what are you [i]doing[/i]) wouldn’t be [i]wasted[/i] on her leg, pills that could cheat Thanatos, literal miracles of technology primed and ready to burn through her and shine light in a dark place, she could save them for her friends, her crew, even her...

Bella’s hand is almost feverishly warm clamped over her face, fingers digging into her cheek, and the world smells like rotting grapes and the tang of sweat that wrestling oil was designed to hide. Every time she thinks she has leverage Bella rips it away, pushes her down harder, and she can’t do everything, she can’t fight back and stop herself from— there. It’s done. She swallowed them.

Then she arches, and buttons come undone in a shower.

The nanites spark in her blood. It starts in her heart and travels through her, electric, furious, almost too much (two pills, she shouldn’t have used both), hot and [i]wet[/i]. She begins to sweat, uncontrollably, eyes shut as tight as she can manage. It drips from her leg, and hisses where it meets the marble tile. It pools beneath her, steaming, purple so dark it might as well be black, as Redana shakes and moans into Bella’s crushing grip, until she melts into whimpers, quick and high, through her nose. Shivers run through her like aftershocks, goosebumps rising on her clammy skin.

Light rises from her breastbone and passes through Bella. Above the servitor’s shoulderbones (it passed like a cool breeze on a balmy day and left shivers behind) the light unfolds into a perfect lotus. Then it fades until there is nothing left.

When Redana opens her eyes again, there is a surfacing fury there alien to the both of them. Redana has rarely been prompted to this sort of anger[3], and Bella...

Bella has never had this kind of anger directed at [i]her.[/i]

Not even when they fought on Tellus and Bella was left behind. Not even when she killed Jas’o. Not even then.

[Princess Redana Claudius rolls a [b]6[/b] trying to Overcome this peril.]

***

[1]: [i]Paragon comes in a little grey pill
(a little grey pill? a little grey pill?)
and the little grey pill goes into your mouth like an offering
(offering~)
Then the little grey pill melts in your mouth without suffering
(suffering~)
and when the nanites spark, Apollo is ready to heal you, heal you.
(paragon, paragon)[/i]

[2]: by the standards of spacers. By Redana’s standards, this was Roughing It. The lamps were blackened with age, the bed was only large enough for two, and there was only one wardrobe!

[3]: barring the occasional argument-turned-screaming-match with her mother.