Venus City 1

by Tabitha Vale

  “Asher, be grateful,” Ness said reproachfully. “We've been in this God forsaken city for nearly six months. This has been long overdue. In a few days, everything will fall into place.”

  “What's he talking about?” Braya asked more urgently. She was getting impatient and hated the way they talked about their plans with just the right amount of detail as to keep her clueless.

  Asher titled his head so that she could see his eyes, his eyes that were no longer twin shades of a beautiful, pearly blue, but of mismatched eyes the color of splintered ice and molten gold. He was angry. There were more traces of his souring composure—his furled fists held tightly at his sides; his clenched jaw; his fiery expression. Braya sighed, as if to forgive him for not answering her question.

  “He's here,” Ness announced.

  Three floating rigs of metal were zooming over the Petti platforms in their direction. A man strapped in a floating suit was dragging them by a cord, and brought them to a graceless stop in front of Braya, Asher, and Ness. They clattered loudly against the platform, and Ness immediately moved from where he stood to check the contents of the rigs. They were square-shaped pieces of metal large enough for a car to park on that had seemed to be installed with the same magic material as the floating suit that the man was wearing. When Ness pulled the tarps away from the rigs, Braya could see that they were piled in Moon Tamer gear. So they were definitely the reason all of the gear was missing, Braya thought bemusedly. What they would need all of that for, she had no clue.

  Asher was being peculiar now. He seemed intent on blocking her from view with his body.

  “You didn't have any problems?” Ness was asking the delivering man, who was masked.

  “No, everything went smoothly,” replied a familiar voice. Braya caught a motion out of the corner of her eye and around the bulge of Asher's shoulder, and assumed the man was taking his mask off. Why was Asher trying to hide her from him? And why was his voice so familiar?

  Braya made a decision. She snaked her arms around Asher's middle and allowed her hands to rove over his stomach. Her fingers dipped under his shirt and grazed the muscled skin of his stomach. He jerked in surprise—while she had to force down the forbidden aches of desire that rose up at the skin contact—and gave Braya the opening to step around him.

  When she did, she came face-to-face with Latham. Latham with brown eyes. No, that couldn't be right. Latham didn't have brown eyes...his were magenta, Braya could distinctly remember. For him to have any other color would mean he was...

  A Locer.

  She stared at him, a frown seeping into her features as she considered this new turn of events. Was this surreal? Was it really happening? That was her first reaction. Then she moved onto considering it was just a practical joke. Asher hated that she would marry Latham, so maybe she'd put him up to this. Maybe they had some Ephraim seedling that could erase his memory afterward...

  But even that was more far-fetched than him actually being a Locer. Because in fact, it wasn't all that far-fetched if she thought about it. He'd been different ever since she'd met him in the gardens. He was sophisticated, intelligent. He could become jealous. He'd kissed her, initiated intimacy. He'd been able to capture her attention while none of the others had. We all have our own jobs to do. Asher had told her Ness wasn't the one who collected the flowers that were in the chapel—was it Latham? It would make sense with his extensive knowledge and access to flowers.

  Why hadn't she seen it before? This made perfect sense. This made more sense than anything else, and it came as more of a slap in the face than finding out Channing was Page's father. She had...enjoyed his company. Enjoyed him. Considered him somewhat of a tiny slice of sunshine in her gray, storm of a life.

  Latham watched her, apprehensive. If possible, the brown eyes of his made him appear even more handsome, more intelligent than before. He advanced a step closer, and that's when Braya snapped—snapped from whatever trance his appearance had forced onto her.

  She frantically backed up, shaking. “I can't believe it,” she choked out. Her voice was raw, broken. “All this time...you've been working for these assholes.” She was stupid, so stupid. If it weren't for all those effing flowers...

  “Braya,” he pleaded, taking another step closer. “Please, let me explain...”

  “NO!” She yelled shrilly. “GET AWAY FROM ME!”

  He continued to move closer, but Asher stepped forward, blocked his path.

  “Stay away from her,” Asher commanded in a halting tone, the flash of his golden eye sending a shudder down Braya's back. Latham seemed to hesitate—he cast Braya another pleading look, one that she sneered at—before obliging. He retreated, and Asher turned back to look at Braya.

  She didn't know why, but his mismatched gaze of blue and gold softened her in an instant. Even though that gaze was coated in sympathy and regret, it didn't matter—it was enough to slice through the fiery rampage that had been building up inside her, and send her spiraling into a chilling reprieve. A light can never remove every spot of darkness. Or a secret could not smother every ounce of sanity. When she looked at Asher, she found an odd calmness there. Even after her moment with Channing, after he'd uttered the same phrase that Page always repeated, when she'd seen Asher, the mere sight of him had been like a warm blanket over her cold, over-worked mind. Now, when Latham stood there, as Locer as they came, Asher's presence coaxed her into a silent reverie with little preamble, a warm blanket around her once more. As consuming as the hurt and surprise was, as satisfying as the anger came, there was still a small sliver of something that kept her from coming completely undone, and she had never been more grateful for Asher's presence than she was in that moment.

  Braya didn't know when Latham left, but he was gone when she glanced back at where he'd last stood. Ness was dragging the rigs toward the elevator and shouting at Asher to help him. Asher stood beside Braya, staring down at her with eyes chilled over in blue. He was concerned for her, she could see it in his tightened expression. He wrapped a comforting arm around her before he moved to assist Ness. Instead of making her lug her share, Asher dragged two of the rigs while Braya floated along behind them, lost to her thoughts.

  Asher was beautiful. The thought would not release her, and Braya accepted it, continued on with it. Facts like that made her hate Asher, made her hate him because she'd acknowledged it, saw it in him somehow. But as she examined that claim, she couldn't find any other reasons to hate him. Should she hate him? Mother had told her to hate all men and expect nothing from them. But then...her mother was making contact with Channing even though he was clearly a man and clearly a foreigner. Did that make her claim about men void? Did that make her claim to everything else void? If she didn't believe the principles her mother had taught her, what did she have? If she decided to follow a different set of principles she might end up with the same trail of consequences as if she continued on with what she'd been raised to believe. It was like…no matter what she did she would end up losing. She found herself careening in between those two less-than-tempting choices, and she feared that if she didn’t stake a claim in either of those cavernous options promptly, she’d become empty, drained of anything in which she could use in making the choice later on. Like a cracked vase full of water…she’d be empty soon if she couldn’t transfer her contents into a new container.

  Besides…it had to go against every rule of logic to find someone so beautiful and hate them at the same time.

  ~Chapter 16: Beautiful Nothing~

  “Miss Braya,” Brielle said gently, her brows knitted in worry. “Are you all right?”

  Braya shook herself, and gave the girl a slight smile. “Fine. Just worried about the wedding,” she lied.

  Brielle accepted that, and squeezed Braya's shoulder affectionately. “Don't worry! You're marrying Latham. I'm sure he'll be a great husband for you. I think you worry about things too much.”

  Braya wanted to laugh. Latham, a good husband? He may be able to fake it
, but there was nothing good about him. Braya couldn't say that to Brielle, but she was hit by the sudden desire to have Brielle in her confidence, to have Brielle listen to her problems and shower her with her empty—though comforting—promises that everything would be fine. Because Braya wasn't sure that things would be so fine anymore. As it were, Braya had never had a close friend, a friend to whom she could confide in everything and know that they would never repeat it to anyone else. She had no idea what that felt like to hold another person’s opinion as equal as hers. She'd only ever looked up to her mother, trusted her mother... And now that she was wishing a mere Finch to be her best friend...Braya shook the thought away. Maybe there wasn't anything so bad in these girls. Maybe...maybe her mother had been wrong about them?

  “Perhaps you're right,” Braya allowed for another small smile. It seemed to be enough to ease the redhead's concern. She jumped up from her perch at the end of Braya's bed and motioned to the door.

  “Then let's go meet Emma and Maydessa for lunch.”

  “Let me just use the bathroom real fast, okay?”

  Braya went into the bathroom and pulled her curtain of hair away from her neck. The thought had struck her while she was speaking to Brielle a moment ago. She'd never gotten the chance to see it before, but when she looked closer—there it was, the master-slave link, identical to Asher's. It was faded into her skin and almost undetectable. She figured that must have been why she’d never noticed it when she’d been applying the boosters to her back.

  She sighed, letting her hair fall back over her neck. Would she ever be free of it? Even after the Locers were done with whatever they were really doing in Venus City, would they be so kind as to remove it? She doubted it.

  Braya exited the bathroom and, with Brielle, headed downstairs.

  Below on the ground level, Braya noticed Leraphone at the end of the corridor, on the opposite end of where the Great Hall was. She hadn't seen or heard from the woman in days and she'd grown more anxious about the cure because of it. She couldn't let the blue frizz slip away this time, so she quickly apologized to Brielle and ran to the corner she'd seen Leraphone turn.

  Leraphone had paused at a door and was about to open it, but Braya shouted at her. “Leraphone! Hey! Wait!”

  Leraphone's head turned in Braya's direction, and her eyes bulged behind her magnified lenses. She fumbled with the key she was holding and frantically tried to open the door before Braya reached her. Braya thought this odd, and assumed the woman didn't recognize her.

  When Braya was at her side, the woman sagged against the door, breathing hard. Her forehead was pressed against the doorjamb, so Braya couldn't see her expression, but her slender shoulders were shaking and her posture was hunched. Braya couldn't decide if she looked more like she was frightened or over exerted.

  “Um,” Braya cautioned, frowning. “Leraphone, it's me, Braya. I was wondering if you had the cure yet...I haven't talked to you in a couple days and...”

  Leraphone gave a violent quiver, and then turned slowly. Her face caught the light, and Braya was confused by the look of fear contorting her expression.

  “Are you okay?”

  “There is no cure,” she rasped, her hand shaking on the door handle. She had somehow managed to open the door, and was leaning heavily against it, panting. “There is no cure,” she repeated, closing her eyes gravely. “Be careful, young child. Be careful.”

  And then she was through the door, her warning still hanging in the air as Braya stared at the spot where Leraphone had just been.

  “Braya.”

  Aspen was walking toward her. Braya straightened, her heart racing. “Aspen,” she said urgently, moving to meet him. “I just saw Leraphone. She's told me there's no cure for Bellamine. What does she mean? Do you know what's going on? She told me just a few days ago she'd get it for me!”

  Aspen frowned. “I don't know what could have changed her mind like that...”

  “You need to talk to her,” Braya implored, clutching at his arm.

  He nodded. “All right. It seems I'll have to this time. But Braya...I needed to tell you something. Charlotte contacted me today. She wants the two of us over today for lunch. The driver is outside waiting for us.”

  Braya stared at him in disbelief. “Seriously? Why'd she change her mind? This is so sudden...”

  “Trust me, I feel the same,” he heaved a sigh. “I have a bad feeling about this, Braya.”

  “Yeah,” her stomach clenched uneasily. Maybe her mother deserved the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps Braya's warning yesterday had rattled her more than she'd let on, and she wanted to apologize to her and Aspen. “Do you think we should go?”

  “I'm going,” Aspen confirmed. “But apparently you have other plans.” He pointed behind him, and Braya saw Asher leaning against a statue off to the side of the corridor. He wasn't looking at them; his eyes were on the ground in front of him and his arms were crossed over his chest.

  “What do you mean?”

  “He told me the two of you have something important to take care of today,” Aspen explained, his delicate magenta eyes fluttering shut, concealing away whatever emotion she might detect in his expression. It turned out not to matter. She’d seen it, just a fleeting bit of it, that spark of knowledge, of intuition. “I'll go see what Charlotte wants. I think it's better this way anyway. It could be dangerous.”

  “Dangerous?” She was appalled. “What in the world do you think Mother would do to us?”

  “A real mother would have never outcast us in the first place,” Aspen said, his words thrumming against the weakening faith she had in Mother like heavy rainfall pelting the cement. “Charlotte, on the other hand, could be capable of anything.”

  Braya cast another glance over Aspen's shoulder to Asher. “He didn't say anything else?” She wanted to go with her brother to see their mother, but she knew it would be better to go along with Asher than fight him, lest he use his control over her to force her. Aspen could tell her what happened later, and Braya hoped she would get to see Page this time.

  “No,” Aspen shook his head.

  “Okay,” Braya relented. “Go, but tell me what happens after you get back.”

  He nodded, and they parted. Braya remained rooted to the spot in front of the door that Leraphone had disappeared into before she walked over to Asher. She observed him from afar, somewhat unsettled by the conclusion she'd come to last night. If she couldn't hate him anymore, what could she feel for him? He liked her, but did that mean that she had to like him? She didn't want to trust the pleasant thrill she got every time they touched—it was generated by the link, right?—but was it possible to feel nothing? She decided it was the best she had.

  When Braya finally met Asher at the end of the hall, it took a moment before he spoke.

  “We're meeting Page outside,” he said lowly. “We have a lot of catching up to do with the de-hazing.”

  “Because it's coming?”

  He looked up in surprise. “Bray, don't start this. You already know I’m not going to tell you what you want to hear, so why wrestle me over it?”

  Braya shrugged. “Fine. Answer me this, then. Why didn't you tell me Latham was a Locer?”

  Asher gazed at her incredulously. “Why would I mention that?”

  “Because I have to marry him! I thought you of all people would have the consideration to warn me,” she said scornfully. They were walking around the corner and toward the Entrance Hall now, so they kept their voices lowered in order to prevent the other Brides or Grooms passing by from overhearing them.

  “I'm sorry,” he said wretchedly. “Things are getting out of hand, I never even thought about it. If I had known Latham was going to be there last night, I certainly wouldn't have brought you along.”

  “Why? Because I don't deserve to know the truth?”

  “No, but you don't react very well to the truth, do you?” He pointed out. They were stepping out into the sunlight. The birds were chirping in the distance, t
he water from the fountain ahead trickled loudly, and the freshly mowed grass was a bright, cheery green. It was such a contrast to Braya's mood that it made her want to go back inside where it was cool and dark.

  “How would you feel if you were constantly manipulated and lied to?”

  “I would kindly thank whoever it was who brought me into the knowing and leave it at that,” Asher replied, flicking off an imaginary speck of dust from his shoulder. “Life isn't about getting back at those who've wronged you, you know.”

  “I don't want to get back at anyone,” she said haughtily. “I just want more answers. I feel like I'm trying to put a puzzle together but the pieces I've been given are for five different puzzles. What am I supposed to do with that?” Not to mention it was tearing her family, her life apart. But she wouldn't say that to him.

  “Why are you trying to puzzle it all out now? When I first met you, you told me you didn't believe me. I was sure you just didn't care after I'd refused to answer your questions after so many times,” Asher said levelly. They were passing the fountain and Braya could see Page waiting for them on the bridge up ahead. His white-blond hair was glowing in the sunlight like the white light of the tree she'd seen last night.

  “I have no choice,” Braya insisted. “I'm a part of this mess, so I want to know what's going on.” She’d more said that to herself than to him.

  “Ready?” Asher asked as they approached Page. The silent boy appraised the two of them without a word. Braya could see the resemblance he bore to Channing now that she knew their relation. Similar eyes, though Braya didn't know if Channing's real color was the same hazel as Page's. Similar mouths and similar jaw shape.

  “I met your father,” she said casually, crossing the bridge with the two of them on either side of her. “He bailed me out of jail after you two ditched me by the stadium.”

  Page didn't respond.

  Braya continued. “At first I never would have guessed he was your father. I knew nothing about him, and nothing about you. But that one phrase that you always say, the one about the darkness and the light...he said the same exact thing. It couldn't be a coincidence. So what I want to ask you is this; what's your father up to? Why does he have such a close relationship with Mother Ophelia? How does he know Leraphone, my mother, and all the other people he seems to have connections with?” She was talking so fast, so loud that her words were starting to run together, and she had to take a deep breath at the end. Asher placed a warning hand on her back, but she shrugged him off.