by Tasha Black
To her credit, Marion simply nodded again at this salacious piece of gossip.
“A week ago, a delivery arrived at my office,” he went on. “It seems that I’m a father. And the mother apparently has better things to do than take care of a little one.”
“I see,” Marion said, eyebrows slightly lifted.
“My best people can’t find any trace of her,” he went on. “Of course, I was fully prepared to offer her a marriage option.”
Marion frowned.
“At any rate, you can see the situation I’m in,” he said.
“Mr. VynFleet, if you will forgive me,” Marion said gently. “It seems to me that a man in your station could hire a highly qualified nanny without complicating his life with romantic entanglements.”
“Opal has three nannies,” he said indignantly. “Each of them is extremely highly qualified.”
“Then I’m afraid I don’t understand the purpose of your visit,” Marion said.
He took a deep breath and let it out again slowly. She made a good point. He shouldn’t lose his temper. She was just doing her job.
“I grew up with a father who was away for work a lot,” he said. “My mother was everything to me. I want Opal to have a mother figure in her life, someone who knows her and loves her and has her back no matter what. She’s the most important thing in the world to me, and I want her to have a real family.”
Marion buttoned her lip and brushed a piece of imaginary lint off her skirt.
“Can you help?” Orion asked, trying not to sound desperate.
“Mr. VynFleet, I’m concerned about some of your reasons for being here,” she said at last. “But I’m going to help you. Not because of your daughter or your job, but because of the first thing you told me.”
“That my career keeps me too busy for dating?” he guessed.
“You said you were alone,” she told him firmly, letting the words hang in the air for a moment. “That is the problem, the only problem, we can help you with here. We are not interested in your career, or your expectations for what a new wife’s presence might mean to your daughter. But we can help you with companionship. We can help you not to be alone. Is that understood?”
He nodded, surprised to find he had a lump in his throat.
“Now we don’t typically allow visitors here, but I’ve made an exception for you,” she went on. “I’m happy to open your intake process today, but that could have been done remotely. I’m guessing there’s some reason you wanted to see our campus?”
“I need to find someone who can start today,” he told her.
“That’s impossible,” she said with a smile.
“Let’s make it possible,” he told her, using his most charming smile. “I think you can do it. My assistant tells me you have a very high success rate.”
“Our process is successful for a reason, Mr. VynFleet,” she said. “We take data from you and use a proprietary algorithm to match you with a potential mate. Then there is a period of formal exchange between both parties, ensuring that the match is good and that you feel at home with each other. Typically, the process for potential husbands is four to six months, minimum.”
It made sense - it really did.
But when Orion pictured baby Opal and how important the next four months were for her, he steeled his heart.
“Do you remember the red tape I cut through for you when you needed a permit for your building expansion?” he asked her, hating himself for bringing it up. “That process could have taken two years, but I fast-tracked to two weeks. I didn’t do it so that I could ask a favor later. I did it because I knew you needed help, that these women needed help.”
“I remember,” she said, nodding. “In fact, that’s precisely why I took this meeting with you.”
“I have never in my life failed at anything I set my mind to, Marion,” he told her calmly. “And I am determined that I will make it work with any woman you assign to me today. But I need your help to make it happen.”
“But Mr. VynFleet, you can’t just meet someone out of thin air and expect to fall in love,” Marion said, a smile threatening to pull up the corners of her mouth. “That’s only in fairy tales.”
“I met Opal one week ago today,” he replied. “And I would wipe out planets for her.”
Marion swallowed.
He supposed that wiping out planets wasn’t exactly the kind of thing a politician should casually mention. But it was true. That baby had her chubby little fist wrapped right around his central heart.
“Show me a kind-hearted woman in need of a husband,” he continued softly. “I will do anything to give her a happy and comfortable life, no matter what. You have my word.”
Marion frowned and looked down at her comm-board.
He waited. He had said all he could. Now it was up to her.
She swiped the board twice.
“Mr. VynFleet,” she said. “As a favor, I’m going to let you observe the women in their training session right now. Again, this is highly unusual. But I want you to understand what you are asking, and why I can’t help.”
“I promise to keep an open mind,” he told her, “if you’ll do the same.”
She smiled and gestured to the door, and Orion stepped back into the corridor, anxious to finalize the deal and get back to work.
7
Orion
Orion followed Marion past the dorm rooms and the cafeteria, listening as she described what the women’s lives were like here on campus. It seemed to him that they were generally well cared for.
“Many of our prospective brides are very young,” Marion was saying. “It’s good for them to have a chance to experience life away from their parents before they go straight into marriage. Once in a while, one of my girls is terribly homesick. I’m always glad she’s here with us, closer to home, to work through that before she leaves us. You can imagine how difficult that would be on a new marriage.”
He nodded grimly. The idea frankly broke his heart. But he had Opal to think of.
“Now, we’re going to head over to the gymnasium for one of their classes,” she said with a smile.
So, he was going to see some of the women at last. His heart began to pound, though of course this wasn’t really about him.
“Why do they take classes?” he asked. “Lower Arkadia has public schools, and they are all of age.”
“Indeed,” Marion said proudly. “All of my girls have completed their public-school education. But culturally, Upper Arkadia is very… different from what they’re used to. We work with them on speech, table manners, dancing, housekeeping, fashion, and proper behavior in a variety of social situations. This way, they can feel confident that they know the rules of their new home, and won’t humiliate themselves or strain their relationships with their new husbands.”
“You work very hard,” Orion acknowledged.
“It takes time,” she reminded him.
He clenched his jaw and stayed quiet.
She pressed her open palm to a sensor, and a wall panel slid open to reveal a very familiar museum gallery.
Two dozen or so young women walked around the space, admiring the pieces.
“This is a simulation of a museum on Upper Arkadia,” Marion told him unnecessarily.
“The City Fair,” he said fondly. “I know it well.”
“Indeed,” Marion said with a smile. “We’re learning museum etiquette today.”
They stood quietly in the corner as the women looked around, a droid rolling smoothly through the light crowd, giving gentle hints to the women who were moving too quickly, and suggesting things for them to notice about each piece.
“We’ll have a discussion together after this,” Marion said proudly. “I want to be sure this beauty is not lost on them. Most of them have worked since a very young age. Art has been completely out of their reach. I hope that leisure time and access to the arts will bring them pleasure and comfort in their new lives.”
“That’s really nice,” Orion sa
id sincerely.
He looked out over the crowd, wondering if one of these women would be Opal’s new mother.
Some of them were terribly thin, while others had curves that made them look more like the women of Upper Arkadia. He knew most of the women in Lower Arkadia were descended from Terran refugees, but he’d never stopped to think much about the physical differences between them and his own people of the upper sector. If he was being completely honest, until he took office, he never thought much about Lower Arcadia at all.
It was an unspoken but true fact of life in Upper Arkadia. A fact he was doing his best to change, in himself and his fellow politicians.
The horrible thought occurred to him that the thinner women were probably new to campus, and this might be the first time in their lives that they really had enough to eat.
Marion glanced over at him, seeming to notice his expression.
“They all seem so sophisticated,” he said quickly.
“Many of these young women are nearly finished with their training,” Marion agreed. “But those who are nearly ready to leave all had their matches assigned months ago. They have already begun forming a correspondence connection with their future mates.”
He turned back to the room just in time to see a pretty woman with a head of bouncy curls smile broadly at a painting on the wall. She stepped back to look at it more fully without looking behind her, and backed right into a display of ancient pottery.
She turned and watched in horror as one vase hit another, which hit the next and the next, until every piece in the collection was in shards on the ground.
Marion whipped around at the sound.
The curly-haired girl gaped awkwardly, but no sound came from her mouth.
“I’m so sorry,” another girl cried out suddenly.
He hadn’t even noticed the slender girl next to the curly-haired beauty. She was still and serious.
Then she looked up at Marion and he saw her eyes.
They were brave and fiery, and an unusual lavender color he had never seen before, one that contrasted quite pleasantly with her dark hair.
“You did this, Hailey?” Marion asked, looking back and forth between the lavender-eyed girl and the woman with the curls.
“Yes,” the one called Hailey replied quickly.
“Come see me, please, dear,” Marion said. “Everyone else, enjoy.”
“Is she assigned to anyone yet?” Orion heard himself ask as the girl approached.
“She’s brand new to us,” Marion said. “This is her first day of classes.”
“She’s perfect,” he told her. “Please introduce us. See if she would agree to come with me.”
“Mr. VynFleet,” Marion said, sounding shocked.
“Or I’ll ask her myself,” he said firmly. “She’s not an indentured servant. She can decide.”
“I’m so sorry, Marion,” the girl said, crossing her arms and executing a perfect Upper Arkadian bow.
Marion smiled in spite of herself.
The girl turned to bow to Orion, but stopped before she could bend her knees.
“Councilman VynFleet,” she said breathlessly.
“Pleased to meet you,” he told her, surprised that she knew who he was.
“You’re fixing the roadways,” she said, her eyes lighting up.
“Well, not personally,” he told her. “But yes, it was my first major project to go through.”
“My mother says it will change transport for our whole prefecture,” Hailey said. “We think it’s wonderful.”
He had the sudden urge to stick his hands in his pockets and kick the ground, like a small child who had pleased his teacher.
“I’m glad it will make life a little better,” he said, forcing himself to meet her eyes.
“Mr. VynFleet has a rather unusual proposal for you,” Marion said, with a look on her face like she had just taken a bite of a zurrfruit.
Hailey looked up at him, curiosity dancing in her lovely eyes.
He couldn’t believe he was about to ask her to marry him. He hadn’t exactly grown up fantasizing about marriage proposals, but he definitely hadn’t thought his would happen in front of two dozen strangers.
“Do you like children?” he heard himself ask her instead.
“Of course,” she said, with a smile. “My favorite day of the week is - was - delivering donations to the Children’s Home.”
There was a faraway look in her eyes that made him a little sad to see.
“I have a baby,” he told her quickly. “A daughter. Her name is Opal. She needs a mother, and I need a wife.”
She focused on him, tilting her head slightly as if trying to figure him out.
“Mr. VynFleet would like to take home a wife today,” Marion said curtly. “I’ve told him you only just arrived, and you haven’t had time to adjust.”
“Yes,” the girl said quickly. “Yes, I’ll go with you.”
“This is not an official match,” Marion warned her. “You haven’t been deemed compatible. You don’t even know each other. Anything could happen.”
“When do we leave?” Hailey asked Orion.
8
Hailey
After a whirlwind of paperwork, Hailey was seating herself on the luxurious bench of the transport-lift, with Councilman VynFleet climbing in beside her.
Nothing about the situation felt real.
Less than a day ago, she had stood, mud-covered and desperate, outside the agency.
And now she was sitting beside six and a half feet of brawny, well-dressed man.
She snuck a glance at him out of the corner of her eye.
He had the big, muscular form of an Upper Arkadian, and the traditional long, pale hair. But in the artificial light of the transport, she could see blues and purples lighting up in his lush mane, telling her it had been genetically modified in the womb.
The cost of such a modification was unthinkable to Hailey, especially since there was no point to it except pleasure for those who looked at it.
Function almost always trumped form in Lower Arkadia.
Beauty is important in Upper Arkadia, the culture droids had coached them before the museum simulation. It can be found in the arts, but also in everyday things. Practice finding beauty in your surroundings, even while you are here on campus. This will make it easier to adjust to the beauty of your new home.
Councilman VynFleet was certainly beautiful. She had always found him handsome on the newsfeeds, but in person there was a depth to the attraction that took her breath away. His dark eyes were so intense. He even smelled good.
He glanced over and she realized she had been feasting her senses on him.
Blood rushed to her cheeks, and she gazed down at her hands.
Why are you ogling him? she scolded herself.
It occurred to her suddenly that this man was about to be her husband. Ogling him was the least of what she was going to be doing.
“Are you all right, Hailey?” he asked gently.
She nodded, afraid to speak for fear he wouldn’t like her voice.
If only he had arrived at the agency a week later, she might have known how to properly address him, and how to behave on a transport.
“Prepare for take-off,” a disembodied voice announced.
With only that as a warning, a silicone arm slid out of the seat, wrapping tightly over her hips. When it locked tight, she could feel a core of something tougher inside.
She managed not to gasp, and hoped Marion would have been proud.
Hailey knew technically that the transport-lift would rise from a pad on Lower Arkadia, straight up into a shaft that went through Upper Arkadia and emerged on its surface.
But how it actually worked was beyond her imagination.
A second later, accelerators began to roar loudly, causing the whole transport to vibrate.
She couldn’t help herself, and cried out as they shot upward.
Councilman VynFleet’s hand slid around hers. It was la
rge, warm and comforting.
She glanced over gratefully and then they were instantly plunged into darkness.
Between the darkness, the movement, and not knowing what was coming next, Hailey felt herself start to panic. She clung to the councilman’s big hand as if it were a life raft on a stormy sea.
“Just another minute,” he murmured to her, his voice a rumble even deeper than the engine. “Stay with me, Hailey.”
She focused on his solid presence, willing herself to remain calm.
In a few more seconds that felt like hours, light filled the cabin and the transport stopped as suddenly as it had started.
Hailey took a deep breath and looked up at Councilman VynFleet to thank him.
In this bright light, she could see every detail of his beautiful face, the strong planes of his jaw, the hazel highlights in his brown eyes, and the spectrum of secret colors revealing themselves in his pale hair.
He was almost godlike - like something right out of one of the museum simulation’s paintings. It took her breath away, leaving her speechless once more.
“Come, Hailey,” he told her with an encouraging smile. “Let’s go home.”
Home…
He didn’t let go of her hand.
The arms released them from their seats, and he led her out of the cabin and onto a small staircase that lowered to the ground.
Pale green vegetation with tiny purple flowers burst up through the basketweave concrete blocks that made up the landing strip, so that the field ahead of them looked like a meadow, though cars and roll-crafts could drive on it.
It was beautiful and functional, but as soon as she stepped out from under the overhang of the transport, all she could see was the sky.
In Lower Arkadia, when the clouds parted, she saw only the underside of Upper Arkadia, its dark soil and twisted tree roots six hundred meters up providing the upper barrier of her entire existence. The sky she knew was just the tiny ribbon of open space visible around the edges of the hovering landmass.
Now, for the first time in her life, Hailey found herself standing below an open expanse of endless blue sky. It reached down to touch the ground in every direction, leaving her feeling exposed and small.
