“Of course not.”
“Thank you.” He unlaced his fingers from mine and sat up. I watched him walk to the shower room, that ineffable Vardeshi grace even more visible without clothing to hide it. He made no attempt to conceal his nakedness. I tried to etch the lines of his body in my memory. I had never understood before why people took illicit pictures of their lovers. Now I did. It was a hollow kind of possession, but possession nonetheless. All I had was my imperfect human memory: riddled with impurities, like the crystals of Rikasa. It was enough. It would have to be enough.
I rolled over into the warmth he had left behind and lay there until I heard the sound of the shower running. Then I got up and went to the alcove near the entryway, which housed a two-serving senek set of utilitarian brushed steel. I measured powdered senek leaves into the pot and filled it with steaming water from the tap provided. An inferior brew; by now I could tell from the fragrance. I sorted through the sugar pellets for the correct ones and laid them out in a saucer. That tiny domestic act, identical to making coffee in a hotel room back home, felt ludicrously poignant. I had brewed senek for Hathan a hundred times before. Never like this.
The shower was still running. I put on my clothes from the night before. I washed up in the sanitation room, which was separated by a door from the shower room. Then I wandered around the suite, taking in each small tangible proof of his presence. His boots by the door. His flexscreen on the shelf by the bed. I stood for a long time in front of the wardrobe, looking at his uniform hanging beside my own, distinguishable from it only by the khavi’s insignia on the sleeve. I brushed my fingers across the unfamiliar pattern of brass studs. Then I went out onto the balcony to watch the mountains brighten in the sunlight. I didn’t think he would leave without saying goodbye.
He didn’t. He came out onto the balcony to join me. I turned at the muted click of his boots on the synthetic wood floor. From an arm’s length apart we studied each other. He was a cautious-eyed stranger in his uniform. I was in my jeans and T-shirt, a little flushed still, my hair artfully mussed from our lovemaking. I knew what the mirror had told me. I had no idea what he saw.
“So,” I said.
He echoed softly, “So.”
“I guess this is it.”
“I guess so.” He glanced to the side, rubbed a hand along his jaw, then met my eyes again, his own as clear as ever. “This is difficult. I find myself wishing we had more time. I didn’t expect to feel that way. I enjoyed these two nights . . . Really, more than I ever thought I would.”
I had known he would be direct. I hadn’t expected him to be kind. I wasn’t ready for it. His words filled me with a delirious lightness that threatened to lift me entirely off my feet. I said unsteadily, “Yeah. Me too.”
“I took a risk in coming here last night. I hope you understand why that can’t happen again.”
“I do. It would be like . . .” I remembered a long-ago comment of Kylie’s and smiled. “Like sneaking around in a minivan.”
“As khavi, I’m vaguely insulted by that analogy, although I can’t say I fully understand it.”
“Give it a couple of months,” I said wryly. “You will.”
“We should agree on a pretext. In case anyone sees me leaving your room. I stopped by to drop off . . . What would you have asked me to carry for you yesterday? It should be something heavy.”
I thought about it. “My medical kit.”
“Good.” Hathan consulted his flexscreen. “I have to go.” The words were simply stated, an observation, with no emotion of any kind to color them.
I held up a hand. “Just . . . One more minute.”
He looked at me, mildly curious, as if I’d made an obscure cultural reference. The walls were in place again. Standing so close to him already felt like an intrusion. But I would never be able to touch him again. I stepped forward, put my arms around his neck, and hugged him tightly. Vardeshi senses be damned. If he smelled like me, so be it. He had an alibi already prepared. He must have had the same thought, because his arms closed around my waist. I breathed in his scent, which I recognized somewhat unromantically as being mostly the mild detergent we used in the Ascendant’s laundry room, and the neutral soap the Perch stocked in its showers. I noticed, for the last time, that his body against mine felt slightly too cool, like he’d just climbed out of a swimming pool. I pulled back a little, cradled his face in my hands, and kissed him gently on the lips. Then I laid my hands flat on his chest and pushed myself backward. “Okay. Go.”
“Okay,” he said, and went.
When the door had closed behind him, I went into the shower room and turned on the tap. I stripped off my clothes and stepped under the sheet of warm water. I didn’t cry. I couldn’t; there wasn’t time. I was due to meet my crewmates downstairs in thirty minutes. I washed off every incriminating hint of his scent, toweled my hair dry, and dressed in my uniform. Then I threw my scattered belongings into my overnight bag and left.
My crewmates had colonized two tables near the edge of the terrace. They had arranged themselves by rank. Observing that fact, I understood that the Outmarch, with its days of haphazard seating on the ground, was now unequivocally behind us. Hathan was next to Reyna, looking at something on her flexscreen. His eyes lifted briefly to mine as I passed him. The moment stirred a decade-old memory of sprinting upstairs from adolescent fumblings in a friend’s basement at the sound of my mother’s car horn in the driveway. I had feared, at the time, that I couldn’t possibly be those two people at once: the girl who knelt in front of her boyfriend on a dusty cement floor, the girl who talked inconsequentially on the ride home about the movie she’d supposedly been watching. If I tried to span both identities, I had thought, the effort would tear me in half. Now, abruptly, I was sixteen again. It wasn’t any easier the second time.
“You’re late,” Khiva said as I sat down.
I had my line ready. I delivered it with deadpan sincerity. “Sorry. There was an Echelon officer in my bed, and he didn’t want to leave.”
Zey said, “I’ve heard three versions of that joke in the last day.”
“And told one yourself,” Sohra observed.
He gave me his overblown stagey wink. “What makes you think I was joking?”
I laughed and reached past him for the carafe of kina juice, a thoughtful touch by the Perch staff, as kina had been cleared for human consumption last month.
And that was it. There were no more comments about my tardiness. Nor were there any questions about my absence from whatever post-reception festivities had taken place last night. Vethna, arriving practically on my heels, was teased in precisely the same way. It appeared that we had been careful enough, or lucky enough, to escape suspicion.
I assembled a pleasingly intercultural breakfast—kina juice and coffee, granola topped with powdered milk and a Vardeshi seed and nut mixture—and dug into it with enthusiasm. Even factoring in the shortened day, dinner felt like a very long time ago. I didn’t look over at the higher-ranking table until Reyna rose to announce that our shuttle would be lifting off in twenty minutes. That was nothing new for me; I’d spent a significant portion of the last year trying not to look at Hathan. I didn’t think he’d been conscious of that fact before. He’d be conscious of it now.
We gathered on the landing platform behind the Perch to await the arrival of Ziral in the Ascendant’s landing craft. I turned my back on the others and stood at the edge of the platform with my eyes closed, my face tilted up to the sun. These last moments of warmth and natural light would have to sustain me for the two dark months that lay between Rikasa and Earth. I heard the sounds of the shuttle touching down and deploying its ramp, the soft scuffs of my crewmates’ boots as they boarded. Someone came over to stand beside me. Even before he spoke, I knew it was Hathan.
“Come on,” he said. “Let’s go home.”
Let’s. It was remarkable how such a little word could say so much. He wasn’t talking about Earth. He was talking about the ship.
It was the only thing he could have said to soften the blow of leaving Rikasa. I pictured my inukshuk, my little stone statue, standing sentinel on its tiny island somewhere far below. Possibly no one would ever find it. But it would always be there, proof that I had crossed these mountains, had breathed this air, had slept under these stars. A sign of human passage. I smiled. “Yeah. Let’s.”
Hathan wasn’t immediately behind me when I went up the ramp. It was a few moments before he joined me and the others in the shuttle’s cabin. I wondered what he had been thinking as he stood there alone on the edge of the platform. Had he looked at the Perch, angular and glittering in the morning sun, or at the mountains rising in serried blue ranks beyond it? Had he thought of me? He had told me yesterday morning that he felt no regret. I hoped it was still true. Whatever his thoughts had been, his voice was steady as he gave Ziral the order to launch. I watched on the main display screen as the shuttle vaulted upward, punching through Rikasa’s atmosphere like a needle through cobweb, and burst out into the darkness beyond. A sleek bronze shape hung before us: the Ascendant, poised in orbit, awaiting our return. My heart lifted at the sight.
I was going home.
Glossary of Vardeshi and Translated Terms
ahtziri: a foxlike animal
azdreth: the Flare; a malady affecting deep-space travelers which causes temporary madness
Blank: one who lacks even latent telepathic abilities
Echelon: the governing body of Vardesh Prime
eyvrith: elusive desert predator resembling a leopard
hadazi: ship’s mentor
ivri avanshekh: the longing for permanence; homesickness
ivri khedai: the longing for another sky; wanderlust
kevet: eating utensil
khanat: boarlike animal with long sharp bristles similar to porcupine quills
khavi: commander of a ship
Listening: a telepathic exchange
nivakh: a large, slow-witted bearlike animal
novi: the lowest rank in the Fleet hierarchy
rana: a drug that temporarily unlocks the abilities of latent telepaths
ranshai: a martial art
rhevi: lower rank analogous to lieutenant
senek: tealike beverage with mild tranquilizing qualities
starhaven: space station
suvi: second-in-command
Vox: telepath whose abilities are under conscious command at all times
Acknowledgments
Since BRIGHT SHARDS began life as the second half of ASCENDING, I am still deeply indebted to the people I acknowledged in that volume. To those names I would like to add: Laura Flavin, who provided critical marketing expertise at a crucial moment; Beverly Bambury, who organized my blog tour; and all the readers who gave me encouraging feedback on ASCENDING. Lastly, I am grateful to Lord Huron, whose music captures the spirit of these books so beautifully I'm not sure why I’m still writing them.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Meg Pechenick is a lifelong lover of fantasy and science fiction. Her experiences studying anthropology in college and linguistics in graduate school informed the writing of this series. She enjoys running, swimming, and planning out imaginary backpacking trips. She lives with her family in New Hampshire.
Still want to keep reading? Awesome! I’m currently writing CELESTIAL NAVIGATION, the third Vardeshi Saga novel. To be notified when it becomes available, please visit my website, www.megpechenick.com, and send me a message on the "Contact" page. If you’re already on my mailing list, I’ll keep you updated. I will be uploading Chapter One to my website soon, so stay tuned!
The reader response to ASCENDING has been incredible. If you’re enjoying the series, I’d love to hear from you. Please share your thoughts with me in a review on Amazon or Goodreads. Alternatively, you can email me directly at [email protected].
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