“I meant a kinda metaphorical sunset.”
“I expect to make a hash of it,” I said. “The datastore can’t teach me how to use a horse.”
This time I knew it was a joke. I knew it would make Elián laugh, and it did. Something else to cup inside the still place of my heart. Elián’s laughter.
If you knew what to look for—and we did—you could see the crater from where we stood. You could see the graves.
“You’re one of them now,” said Elián. “An AI?”
Xie sighed. “Really, Elián? You’re going to frame that as a question?”
“I only meant—they rule the world.”
They did. I looked at Elián looking at the crater. At the graves.
Xie followed our gaze. “And they might rule it differently.”
“So they might,” I said.
“Uh-huh,” said Talis. “We’ll see about that.”
“Live first,” said Xie, softly. “Hang on to yourself. Live.” Her hand tightened on mine. Every callus and curve.
To hold love in one’s hands, and then let it go—that was the cruelest thing anyone had ever done to me, and I had done it to myself. I held Elián’s hand. I held Xie’s. I could see the three Riders now, at the base of the plume, their silhouettes bump-bumping in the golden light. It was a very long moment, watching the Riders, a very still one: so still that a bird might have nested on the surface of the sea. Halcyon.
When the Riders were close, when their hoofbeats sounded like drums under the vast sky, Elián’s hand tightened and Xie turned to me. “Greta,” she said. And nothing more.
I wanted to never let them go, but in a moment I would have to.
Elián’s strength was at my back, and Xie’s face was before me. Tears were making her eyes shine darkly. I looked at her, and looked at her, and looked at her, as the men with wings crashed in around us.
“I love you,” I said.
And then I let go.