Forever

by Pati Nagle

  Lomen hurried toward me. I shielded, trying to find the right words to say to him.

  He caught me in a tight hug.

  Forgive me. I should have been there.

  I froze. He held me at arm’s length.

  Are you injured?

  No, but—come in here.

  I stepped into my room and he came in after me. I closed the door, then took a couple of steps away, struggling for the right words.

  What’s wrong?

  He wasn’t pushing. I knew that if he wanted to, he could read what was wrong straight out of my head. Peel me open like the alben had.

  Don’t think about that.

  I turned to face him. His eyes were troubled, watching me.

  I owe you an apology.

  Why?

  I took a deep breath. No way to soften it.

  I slept with Madóran.

  He stared at me for a long moment, then a corner of his mouth curved upward.

  He’s marvelous, isn’t he?

  My jaw dropped. Lomen’s smile widened.

  You thought I would be angry.

  Well...yeah. I mean, after the fuss I made about wanting long-term...

  He gathered me into his arms and banished all my fretful fears. His warmth was different from Madóran’s, but every bit as potent. With a long sigh, I relaxed for the first time that day. He stroked my hair.

  When I heard the alben had attacked you, I was so afraid...

  I’m all right. Madóran was right there. And Caeran. They got her off me right away.

  I’m glad.

  He leaned back to look at me, brushed my hair back from my face.

  She did you harm, though.

  Madóran said there was no damage.

  No, but you were not frightened like this before.

  I’ll get over it. With your help.

  He pulled me close again and I basked in it. Just to stand there in his arms was wonderful.

  My gaze fell on the cooler by the door. I chuckled.

  I brought you something.

  I slid from his embrace and picked up the cooler, put it on the nightstand and opened it. The ice hadn’t melted much. I dug out the ice cream bar—package only slightly waterlogged—and presented it to him.

  Ice cream?

  That’s my favorite kind. I wanted you to have one.

  His smile held both amusement and affection. He accepted the bar with a little bow.

  I thank you.

  I was thinking I should offer you atonement. Stupid, I know.

  Not stupid at all. You honor me, though you owed me no atonement.

  I shrugged, embarrassed. Gestured to the bar.

  Well, anyway, I hope you like it.

  Will you share it with me?

  Um, sure.

  His eyes narrowed with glee. He unwrapped the bar, took a bite, chewed a couple of times, then reached for me.

  His kiss was an explosion of sensations: toffee, love, cold, himself, sweetness. We made short work of the ice cream and a fast mess of the bed. Still lying there glowing when a knock on the door made me jump.

  “Steve? Lunch is ready.” Len’s voice.

  “OK. Be right there.”

  My voice was about an octave higher than normal. I hoped she hadn’t noticed.

  We got dressed and tidied the bed, then Lomen led me out into the garden, crossing it diagonally and going in another door that turned out to be the kitchen. A little table by the window was already full: Len, Caeran, Manda, Faranin, and Bironan were crowded around it.

  Madóran looked up from the counter, glanced from Lomen to me, and smiled. “Settling in?”

  “Yeah,” I said, feeling a blush start up my neck.

  “There is tuna salad. Come and help yourselves.”

  We did, and took our plates out to the garden, where there were chairs and low tables spaced around the portal. Madóran joined us.

  We ate in silence at first. I felt embarrassed, though neither of them gave me any reason.

  I’d had sex with both of them in the past twenty-four hours. Apparently they both thought that was just fine.

  My expectations of how they would react had been based on human culture, and were completely bogus. Long lives made you more tolerant, I guessed. I would have expected the opposite, but again that was based on humans, who got more set in their ways the older they grew.

  The oldest humans were still little more than children to these guys, though. If the ælven went through that set-in-ways phase, they must grow out of it again.

  They really were an alien species. A beautiful, glorious, completely non-human species.

  I was getting full after the ice cream, and poked at the last of my salad. Tried to think of something to say.

  “So we’re staying through Evennight, right? Just one ceremony?”

  Madóran sighed. “Len still wants two.”

  “Kind of silly, now that we’re all here. Doesn’t she see that?”

  “She sees it. She is still unhappy with Mirali.”

  “Not like her to be so stubborn.”

  Madóran glanced at Lomen. “Len and Mirali have never gotten along well. Mirali once … I do not want to say she attacked Len, but that is what it amounts to.”

  I stared at him. “She attacked Len?”

  “It was defensive. She was ill, and unexpectedly encountered a human stranger. Her reaction was disproportionate, but understandable.”

  “Len did forgive her,” Lomen said.

  “Yes, but there has been unease between them ever since.”

  Wow. I wondered what this defensive attack had been like. If it was anything like what the alben had done to me, I didn’t blame Len for being touchy.

  “Want me to talk to her?” I offered.

  “What would you say?” Madóran asked.

  “That the clan needs to be united, and not squabble.”

  “She will point out that Mirali began the dispute.”

  “Mirali needs to be tolerant, too. She doesn’t have the right to say who can attend Evennight and who can’t, right?”

  “True.”

  “So it’s her choice. If she doesn’t want to be around Savhoran—and Pirian?”

  Madóran nodded.

  “—and Pirian, then she doesn’t have to attend the ceremony.” I took another bite of chicken and chewed it, thinking. “Does Pirian want to be there?”

  “I believe he is looking forward to it, yes.”

  “He said as much when they arrived this morning,” said Lomen.

  I looked at Madóran. “Are they staying here?”

  “Yes.”

  “And Mirali, too?”

  “No, she and her family are in the new house.”

  I remembered something about a house being built. Hadn’t paid much attention.

  I put down my plate, which still had a couple of bites of salad on it. “Sorry, I took too much. It’s wonderful, I’m just stuffed.”

  Lomen scraped my leftovers onto his plate and kept eating. Madóran smiled fondly at him, which gave me an unexpected twinge of jealousy.

  I clamped down on that fast. No way could I indulge in that kind of selfishness, not when they were both being so generous.

  I had a lot to learn.

  Bironan and Faranin came out of the kitchen on their way back to the library. Smiles and nods were exchanged. I couldn’t help wondering if those two were lovers. None of my business, really.

  Lomen picked up my plate and headed for the kitchen. Madóran was still eating, slowly savoring each bite as he gazed at his garden.

  “Good to be home?”

  He smiled at me. “Yes.”

  “You’ve been doing a lot for other people lately. Me included. Is there anything I can do for you?”

  He paused, chewing another bite, finally swallowing. “Yes. Do talk to Lenore about Evennight. I think she may listen to you more than to me, just now.”

  “Glad to,” I said.

  He ate the last bite of his salad
. I stood and offered to take his plate. He handed it to me with a look so fond I felt another blush starting. I smiled back and went into the kitchen.

  Lomen and Caeran were at the table, talking. Manda had disappeared somewhere, gone to hang with Savhoran, maybe. I joined Len at the double sink, one side of which was full of sudsy water and dishes.

  I handed her Madóran’s plate. “No dishwasher, eh?”

  “Madóran’s not much into gadgets. We only talked him into the microwave because I wanted something to heat up my tea.”

  She nodded toward a small microwave on the counter, its sleek black incongruous against the Spanish-style blue and white tiles.

  “Shall I rinse?” I offered.

  “Thanks.”

  We worked in silence for a while. The two at the table were talking in ælven. I wondered how much of it Len understood.

  “Don’t be surprised if you have nightmares,” Len said softly.

  “Already had one.”

  She paused and looked at me. “I’m really sorry she got to you. We were trying so hard to protect you.”

  That surprised me. “To protect all of us, you mean.”

  “Well, yeah. But Manda and I—we knew what might happen. Knew how to watch out, at least. I should have warned you not to go outside after dark, even in the back yard.”

  “You couldn’t have known she’d come in the yard.”

  “Yeah, I could. Manda saw an alben drop right into the plazuela there.” She gestured toward the window.

  That was unnerving. A wave of fear went through me, leaving me tingling.

  “That one knew about this place, right? I mean, the two in Albuquerque don’t, so ...”

  “They probably do. From Pirian. And they’re hunting him. They can track him by his khi.”

  Crap.

  “Does Mirali know that?”

  “Oh, yeah. She’s apoplectic.”

  I finished rinsing a plate and set it in the dish rack to dry. “You still mad at her?”

  “I still think she’s wrong.”

  “Yeah, but I can see her point of view.”

  Len glared at me. “You agree with her?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  I wasn’t doing a very good job at peacemaking.

  “Look, we should just have one Evennight ceremony. Mirali doesn’t have to be there if she’s uncomfortable.”

  “Well, Savhoran shouldn’t have to worry about her comfort.”

  “I agree. One ceremony, everyone’s invited. No one has to come.”

  She gave me a long look. “Yeah, OK. Madóran shouldn’t have to do it twice.”

  “Yeah.”

  “But she’ll be pissed.”

  I was about to say that was her problem, but it was really the clan’s problem. As long as there was conflict between the protective mother and the sufferers of the disease-without-a-name, the clan would be in danger of breaking up. Technically it was two clans, but kin-clans, whatever that meant. And a clan with two members wasn’t much more than an idea.

  I tried to think of a way to make them all happy. I couldn’t figure one out. It seemed like an impasse, but I wasn’t ready to give up.

  What did they each need?

  Mirali needed to know her child was safe.

  Savhoran needed acceptance, respect.

  Pirian . . . I wasn’t sure what Pirian needed. He wanted vengeance, but that had nothing to do with Mirali.

  There should be a way to find a compromise. Maybe that was something humans actually did better than ælven. We were more contentious, and naturally more impatient. Maybe we were better at making deals that everyone could live with and getting on with things.

  I set the last dish in the drain, then asked Len where to find a glass and filled it with water. The garden drew me, despite the image Len had given me of an alben violating its peacefulness. I told myself that couldn’t happen in the daytime, and went out to find a chair in the shade.

  Madóran was still there, sitting with eyes closed. Not wanting to disturb him, I chose a seat that was shaded by trees, and sat down to ponder the problem some more.

  Mirali was afraid. Maybe she didn’t understand how the curse was transmitted.

  Of course, they didn’t know for sure. That’s one of the things we’d be looking for as we studied the disease-without-a-name.

  Dammit, it needed a damn name.

  It was the disease that was really the problem. The source of all our woes.

  I wondered, if we could offer the two alben back in Albuquerque a cure, would they take it? Or were they too addicted to their perverse pleasures?

  Ugh.

  Didn’t matter anyway; a cure was years if not decades away, and the clan wouldn’t tolerate the alben’s activities that long.

  A raucous squabble in the fountain drew my attention. Some scrub jays had gotten into it, splashing with great vigor and arguing with great volume. I saw Madóran lean forward to watch them, and since he wasn’t meditating I decided to ask him a question.

  “Lunch was great,” I said as I joined him. “Did you make it?”

  “With Amanda’s help. Just leftovers, but thank you.”

  “I’ll take your leftovers any day.”

  He chuckled.

  “Mind if I pick your brain?”

  He gazed at me. “That is an odd expression.”

  “Sorry—I just want to ask you a couple of questions.”

  “Of course.”

  “What can you tell me about the curse? The nature of the disease, I mean. I want to figure out a name for it.”

  “We have always just called it the curse.”

  “Yeah, but that won’t look so good on a grant application. Can you tell me about what it does in the body? Is it blood-borne?”

  “It alters the blood.”

  “Alters it?”

  “Weakens it. The hunger is a result of that. The blood no longer sustains the body as it should. As if it were hollow, suddenly.”

  I mused about that. “So the curse might be doing something to the digestive system, too. Well, it must—because they can’t eat normal food any more, right?”

  “They can eat it, but it doesn’t satisfy them. They don’t really digest it. Mainly it just makes them uncomfortable.”

  “Except for the greens.”

  “Yes, they do need greens, but they only want them after feeding.”

  Greens contained a lot of iron. Something to do with blood-iron levels? Iron absorption?

  Hollow blood.

  Blood was “hemo” in Greek, as in hemoglobin.

  I pulled out my phone to surf up the Greek for “hollow.” I heard a door close and glanced up to see Manda coming across the plazuela.

  “I hope you brought your charger,” she said, flopping into a chair next to Madóran.

  “I did. You don’t happen to know Greek, do you?”

  “Not me. I’m the business kid, remember?”

  Len and Caeran came out of the kitchen, hand in hand, reminding me that I hadn’t told Madóran that Len had agreed to one Evennight ceremony.

  “What do you need Greek for?” Manda asked.

  “We need a scientific name for the curse.”

  “Cursus albenius.”

  “Mmmm . . . not quite.”

  Len looked at Caeran. “You know Greek?”

  “No. I’d have thought Madóran would.”

  Madóran turned his head to look at me. “What do you wish to say?”

  “‘Hollow’, for ‘hollow blood’.”

  “‘Koilos’.”

  I frowned, trying to extrapolate structure rules from other medical terms. “Hemo-koilos.”

  “It would be koilohaemia,” said Madóran.

  “That’s a mouthful,” Manda said. “How about ‘Steve’s anemia’?”

  “Harrison’s anemia,” Len said. “You use the last name.”

  “No, I like koilohaemia,” I said.

  “It can be both.”

  “As long
as I can pronounce one of them,” Manda said. She got up and went into the kitchen.

  Madóran looked at me. “So. Now it has a name.”

  “Name it, then you can defeat it.” I looked at Caeran. “Good thing we’re getting started on the lab. We don’t want to do any of the research at UNM, or they’ll want control of our results.”

  His eyes widened slightly. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

  “We can use them to learn technique—how to use the equipment, how to do the research—but we shouldn’t actually do it there.”

  “Get me that list of the equipment you’ll need.”

  “I will.”

  “A man of many ideas,” Madóran murmured, smiling.

  Caeran and Len continued down the portal and went through a door in the west wall, and I saw that Lomen had been behind them, leaning against the wall. My heart did a little happy bounce at seeing him. He smiled.

  “You talked to Len,” Madóran said.

  “Yeah. She’s OK with just having one ceremony.” I had a thought and sat up straighter. “Hey, would you mind introducing me to Mirali?”

  “You will meet her at the celebration.”

  “What if she doesn’t come? I’d like to meet her ahead of time, if you don’t mind. I bet the prospect of a human stranger at the party just adds to her discomfort.”

  “We could walk over to the new house, certainly. I cannot promise that Mirali will agree to see you. She is . . . somewhat prejudiced against humans, I fear.”

  Given what we were doing to the planet, I could hardly blame her.

  “Well, I’d like to meet her and admire the baby. Is now a good time?”

  Madóran shrugged. “As good as any.”

  “May I come along?” Lomen asked.

  “Fine by me,” I said.

  “Of course,” Madóran said, rising.

  We went along the south portal to a utility room from which a side door opened onto a lush vegetable garden. It was half an acre at least, and well-tended.

  “Wow. Nice!”

  Madóran smiled. “I enjoy gardening, and of course food one grows oneself always tastes best.”

  He led the way past the garden and through a large orchard—mostly apples, from what I could tell. We walked through dappled shade, with the smell of the fruit rising around us.

  “Don’t tell me you come close to eating this many apples.”

  He laughed. “Oh, no. I let neighbors pick the fruit and keep most of the harvest as their payment.”

  It was peaceful, walking with these two men I admired—no, loved. I loved them both. I didn’t care if they picked up on that thought. It was true.