by Rain Oxford
It took me a few minutes to realize why I had stopped writing. Luca was holding my hand still.
“What?” I asked.
“You’re writing monster fiction now?”
I read over what I had written, frowning. “I have no idea what I was writing.”
“Maybe you’re psychic or something.”
“I hope if that was the case, I’d be able to write something actually helpful.”
“Maybe we’re going to fight a spiky cat.”
“I don’t think it’s me that has to worry. If we run into anyone by the name Dylan, I’ll tell him to be wary of giant alien creatures.
“Lucky him. Speaking of which, get your shoes on.”
I did. “Why?”
“We’re going for a walk. I’m bored.”
I actually opened my mouth to remind him that we weren’t supposed to leave before I realized how silly it was. That was the main reason he wanted to get out. The obstacles, including the cats, rules, and wall, merely made it worthwhile. I was supposed to be the voice of reason, but I wanted to get out there as much as he did.
Surprisingly, Luca not only put his robe on, he also reminded me to wear my own.
We snuck through the halls. I was certain that if a priest did “catch” us, he wouldn’t be able to stop us, but he would insist on going with us. Thus, we made sure none of them saw us. While they were wandering the halls, they weren’t organized guards, so it was too easy to get around them.
By the time we got outside, we had some notes for the priests, because if it was that easy to break out of, they were just asking to be raided. Then again, fear of the gods probably kept most people away.
We made our way through the park and over the bridge just as easily. “No apprentice has ever snuck out, according to them. It doesn’t even occur to them to disobey. They’re all broken and repressed. None of them even have girlfriends. I tried to tell them about college chicks and they acted like I was talking about sexing up a carrot. They couldn’t have been less interested.”
“You can’t change thousands of years of tradition, especially overnight.”
“Any system that can’t be beat, can be broken. Everything that doesn’t bend will break. I’m teaching them Morse code so that they can communicate without the priests understanding it.”
“First of all, how do you do that without the English alphabet?”
“I’m teaching them that, too.”
“If they can write with the English alphabet, then the priests can’t read it. Second, the Reader can read anything.”
He didn’t have a response.
The city was beautiful at night. I hadn’t seen it during the day, but I imagined it would have been sunny and dry.
“We’ve been that way. Let’s go to the other side of the kingdom,” Luca insisted.
I didn’t see why not, so we followed the straight street until it turned at a ninety degree angle to the right. Eventually, we reached the north side of the city, which looked identical to the south side. “This square city will get old quick.”
“Look,” he said, pointing out into the distance. At first, I thought he was pointing to the wall. Since the higher-class streets were raised, we could see almost everything from the top of the steps. Right up against the north wall was a green field. “That must be the farming district.”
We made our way out of the rich part of the city and found the market to be fairly dead. There was, however, commotion and light down the street, so we followed it. Two black jaguars were circling a concrete hut, which was full of light and laughter. People were definitely celebrating something. As soon as we approached, both of the cats growled in warning and blocked the door.
Everyone inside the hut fell silent.
Luca and I hesitated. “Why do I feel like Hitler coming up on a bar mitzvah?” Luca asked.
“Because you still regret that ridiculous mustache you tried to grow last year.”
“It was not ridiculous,” he moped. “I bet it would look great this time. Can we get in?” he asked one of the cats.
Neither of the jaguars wore earrings. Slowly, both of them moved out of our way, so we went in. The floor was made of a reed mat. The walls were unpainted, but there were several canvas paintings in the same style as what was all over the walls of the temple. There were five round, concrete tables that each sat six people. To the far side of the room were three metal benches with cloth cushions.
The people here all wore robes over their clothes, but they were colorful and fitted. Although some of them were clearly less wealthy than others, they all got along together peacefully. Three dozen adults and more than twenty children packed the room full. My focus was instantly drawn to a woman sitting on one of the benches, comforting a child with a scraped knee. She was gorgeous. I guessed her to be around my age with long, straight, raven-black hair and emerald-green eyes. They were the kind of eyes I couldn’t miss over the crowd.
And she was staring right back at me.
Oh, right. Everyone was staring at me. “I think we should go,” I said.
Luca held up his hands and said, “We come in peace. Take us to your leader.”
Before I could tell him to shut it, people separated to stand against the walls. The one person who didn’t move was sitting at the table. Slowly, he stood and faced us. He was in his early fifties with medium brown hair and gray eyes. His face was weathered and his expression was stern, but I didn’t feel threatened because there was a hint of worry in his eyes. “Do you have a message from the gods?” he asked.
“No,” I said calmly. “We were just interested in the noise. We didn’t know it was a private party.”
“We are celebrating the birthdays of the children who have reached the age of ten in the past year.”
“Is ten special?”
He frowned, obviously confused how I didn’t know that. “Where are you from?”
“Earth.”
“What temple is that?”
Luca looked at me, trusting me to know whether to tell the strangers the truth or not. I didn’t think anyone was cool with aliens, but I figured they were more afraid of pissing off their gods than making nice with foreigners. “We’re not from a temple; we’re from another world.”
The man was silent, his eyes narrowed with distrust.
“Do your people know about other worlds?”
“Yes. People from other worlds don’t come here, but we have heard of them. We celebrate children that turn ten because their tenth birthday is the last day the priests check them for magic, so when our children pass that birthday, we know they will be free. Everyone is invited to join in the celebration, but we are wary of priests.”
“Well, we’re not huge fans of them right now, either. They would have killed my brother for not having magic and me for refusing to do what they wanted. Isis stepped in and stopped them, saying I was supposed to retrieve something for them.” There was also the attempt on my life, but I couldn’t be certain it was a priest who set Meto up to it.
The man nodded. “Then you are welcome here.”
The group had a band playing some wind instruments and a harp-like string instrument. The children danced while the adults chatted. Some of them talked about marriage plans for their children, which I tuned out.
We were offered sweets, as no one was eating actual food. There were squares of what tasted like dried vanilla yogurt, cakes, and fruit pies. Luca’s favorite was some kind of berry and mint cake. I didn’t like anything too sweet, so I was more interested in getting to know the people.
I asked them what they did for fun. I hadn’t seen any sign of electricity, which meant television, video games, and social media was out. Surely they don’t just work all day, every day.
It turned out that while Syndrial had sports, they were based on the trials. They didn’t have team sports like football and basketball, but they had Olympic sports like archery and jumping. There were books like Earth had, yet fiction consisted of poetry an
d adventures. Fantasy and science fiction was lost on them.
That was not something I could let slide without some friendly teasing. “I write crime fiction,” I explained to a carpenter and his baker wife.
“What is that?”
“I write about murder.” I explained one of the stories I wanted to write, particularly one with a private detective who solved the murder of the owners of an orphanage.
“Did you get an award?” the man asked.
“No, it wasn’t me. I write about detectives, I don’t solve cases myself.”
“So you record the heroism of others. That’s a great job. People should know the names of heroes.”
“Okay, I need to go over what fiction is again.”
“They’re not going to understand no matter how many times you tell them,” said a warm voice behind me. I turned and saw the black-haired woman. She lightly touched my arm. “Come sit with me over in the corner. It’s quieter and I want to hear your stories.”
My brain told me that was a bad idea for the same reason I wanted to; she was beautiful. If I liked her at all, she would get hurt. Her robe was sapphire blue with a gold cat clasp at the nape. Other than a gold ring on her right index finger, she wasn’t wearing any jewelry, which was rare, as most everyone was.
“That’s not a good idea.”
“What my brother is saying is that he’ll meet you there in a minute.” Luca said, leaning over the table.
She smiled and shrugged. “I hope you do.” She walked away.
“You know I shouldn’t,” I said.
After the fire, I told him about Meto’s attack and that Keeper said I wasn’t cursed. Luca was pissed about Meto until I showed him the staff and explained that I was pretty sure he had been under the control of someone else. Luca said he would look into it. He wasn’t worried at all about the possibility that the misfortunes of everyone close to me were the fault of my magic. He suggested that things would get better when I learned to control it.
“I’m not saying you should marry her. That girl wants to let you in her chamber of secrets and you’re a moron if you don’t at least talk to her. She’s been eye-stripping you all night.”
“Why? We may not be here tomorrow.”
“Then tell her that. Let her decide if she wants to know more about you. Who knows? Maybe she just wants her cave of wonders breached. Go see if she wants a magic carpet ride and show her the world, bro.”
“You’re a dick.”
“And if that’s what she wanted, she’d be all over me, but she’s not, so go be you.”
I sighed and stood. It was only fair to explain why I couldn’t return her interest. I had already resigned myself to being alone forever. When I sat on the bench beside her, she smiled. She looked like the cat that got the canary and I wondered if I had just put myself in a situation I wasn’t going to be able to escape. “My first girlfriend killed herself,” I said.
Across the room, Luca’s eyes bugged and he slowly shook his head, as if he couldn’t believe what an idiot I was.
Her smile dropped and she lightly touched my arm. “I’m sorry for your loss.”
She didn’t get up and walk away or find some excuse, though. “It was a long time ago. The reason I’m bringing it up is that my brother made it sound like you were interested in talking… regularly with me.”
She smiled again. “He’s right; I would like to talk regularly with you. We call it being friends here. Do you not have friends on your world?”
“People do have friends on Earth. I don’t. Everyone I care about gets hurt, and that includes friends.”
She shrugged. “Your brother seems to be in one piece.”
“He sticks by me even when he shouldn’t.”
“It sounds like he thinks you’re worth the trouble. I’d like the opportunity to see if you’re worth the trouble. I’m a lot tougher than I look. My name is Keira.”
“I’m Nathan.”
“So, tell me some of these stories of yours.”
“I’m really more of a writer. I’m terrible at explaining them out loud.”
She frowned. “Well, maybe we can meet again and you can show them to me.”
I nodded, expecting her to get up and leave. I was looking for her motive. If she was after intimacy, she would have run as soon as I told her I wasn’t open to that. It had occurred to me that she could simply want to be entertained by my foreign stories, but it sounded more like an excuse to see me more. I hadn’t given her anything to like about me, so there had to be an ulterior motive for her wanting to talk to me.
Or I was being ridiculous and antisocial.
“Other than writing, what do you do?” she asked.
“Videogames, puzzles, and homework mostly. To pay the bills and tuition, Luca and I work at a bookstore, but ebooks are starting to crash the book market. Not that I mind, really. Luca and I both have ereaders and we love the convenience. And you don’t have a clue what I’m talking about. I’m sorry.”
She smiled. “I don’t, but that’s okay. I understand that you like some kind of games, puzzles, and work. You have a shop that sells books, but there’s another type of book that people prefer because it’s cheaper, although you need something special to read them. How close am I?”
“You’re spot on. Ebooks are electronic books, and with an ereader, you can hold thousands of books in your hand like this,” I said, my hands mimicking holding my kindle. “You can choose which book you want to read with one swipe of your finger. I do get all my favorite books in paperback as well, though, because I like the feel of a book.”
“You’re very passionate about reading.”
“I am. What are you passionate about?”
Her steady gaze swept the room. “I wish I knew. I haven’t found anything I really enjoy doing yet.”
“You’ve still got plenty of time. You can’t be older than me.”
She smiled again. “I’m older than I look. By the way, you shouldn’t blindly trust the priests.”
“Who should I trust?”
She pursed her lips. “The cats are trustworthy. I don’t care much for the dogs, though. Anyway, I have somewhere I need to be, so I will be off, but I hope to see you again soon.”
“I do, too.” If only to discover what her motive was. Women normally got away from me fast when I showed any disinterest. If I don’t really care about her, maybe we can be friends without her getting hurt.
That just seemed cold, though.
Before I could figure out whether or not I should ever see her again, there was a loud crash outside, immediately followed by the ringing of bells and roaring of big cats. Parents grabbed their children and fled. I managed to be heard over the crowd as I asked what was going on and the best answer was that the wall was under attack.”
“By what, zombies?” Luca asked. “What is everyone so afraid of? If it’s zombies, I’m getting a gun. I’m not going to be the stupid loser with a bat when the stupid zombies attack.”
“You haven’t got a bat, or a gun.”
“And who was the idiot who dropped our banana? But seriously, though. If a zombie bites me, I want you to shoot me in the face.”
“It’s not a zombie army.”
“Five bucks.”
“Done.” Unfortunately, that required going outside to see what it was we were facing. The citizens had already disappeared and the market was being raided by people wearing sand-colored robes. Unlike the citizens, these people were covered up head-to-toe, even going so far as to wearing gloves. They had cloth masks to cover their mouths and noses. “Sand people,” I whispered. While I didn’t think it was a respectful title, it was better than the name the priests gave them. “They’re the outsiders I told you about.”
Luca sighed and handed me a five. I closed the door and started looking for a hiding spot. The only thing I could find was an old blanket, so I shoved one of the tables into the corner, pushed Luca under it, and threw the blanket over him.
“Hide
with me,” he insisted.
“There isn’t enough room.” The blanket wasn’t large enough and if I was hiding with him, they would be a lot more likely to notice me. Instead, I gathered all the knives I found that were used to serve the sweets. I ended up with a pitiful collection of five knives, none of which were sharper than a butter knife.
Then again, eyeballs were softer than butter.
“I don’t know what you just thought,” Luca said, “but gross.”
The door burst open and three people entered. One was a middle-aged man, one was a woman in her twenties, and one was a boy who couldn’t have been more than sixteen. “We’re not going to hurt you if you stay back,” the boy said to me. “We’re just after food.”
“If you call sugar food, then go for it,” I said, backing up to the wall. I wouldn’t look in Luca’s direction in case they were lying.
They gathered up the food, shoving unwrapped cakes into cloth sacks. Clearly, they were after food, not flavor. Nevertheless, it didn’t make me relax; people with nothing to lose were the most dangerous.
As soon as they were done, they started to leave, but then the older man stopped and stared at me. “Doesn’t the silver robe mean you’re a steward of the gods?”
“I’m new here,” I said evasively. “I just grabbed what was lying around.”
“He’s probably lying,” the woman said. “We should take him with us and ransom him to the priests.”
“What’s your name?” the man asked.
Whether I told them the truth or lied didn’t really matter. Luca would tear the temple apart if they didn’t go after me. Fighting them was an option, but reasoning with them seemed more plausible. They would die without food, they wouldn’t die without money.
“Taking me for ransom would be a bad idea. You have food and no one got hurt. No one is going to retaliate. If you start taking hostages or hurting people, even one, then there will be some consequences.” I kept my posture relaxed, not confrontational, and at a slight angle rather than squaring off. While I did look him in the eyes, I made sure my expression conveyed calm.
