Zorban's Destiny

by T. J. Quinn

  “What the hell…?” he mumbled, surprised.

  “Well, that went perfectly,” Leah mocked him.

  He sighed and pulled her into his arms. “I love my mother, sweetheart, but I love you more. She’ll have to accept that.”

  She wrapped her arms around his neck. “Are you sure? I hate the idea of causing more trouble between you and your family.”

  “Of course, I’m sure.”

  She kissed his cheek, absently. The Queen's question haunted her. Why would she ask if she was human?

  She still hadn’t told Zorban about her abilities with the ice and snow, a bit scared of what he might think about it. She never had, not even in her wildest dreams, suspected she wasn’t human. Though she had never been so arrogant to deny the existence of aliens, she had never expected to meet one on Earth, not to mention considering her talents as something out of this world.

  “What’s bothering you?” he asked, kissing her back.

  She shook her head; still not sure she should reveal her talents and tell him about the doubts the queen had raised in her mind. “Nothing,” she assured him.

  She could tell he wasn’t convinced, but he didn’t insist.

  That night they received a visit from Matthew and Joanne. The couple was really excited about their cruise around the world, and they even tried to convince Zorban and Leah to join them.

  “We’re not that fond of boats,” Zorban assured them.

  “That’s a shame. We would have a blast together,” Joanne said, with a smile. “So, what are your plans for tomorrow night? It’s New Year’s Eve.”

  “Yes… it is. I totally lost track of time. We don’t have anything planned,” Zorban confessed.

  “Why don’t you join us at my parents’ party? There will be great food and drinks and great company. My parents would love seeing you again,” Joanne invited them.

  Zorban looked at Leah. “What do you say?”

  She shrugged and smiled. “That sounds fun.”

  Joanne clapped her hands, excited. “Great. We’ll have a wonderful time, I’m sure. It’s a gala event, so put on your best suit,” she advised them.

  The couple left way past midnight. Zorban and Leah were heading up to their bedroom when a buzzing sound warned them of an incoming call from Thalia.

  “Go ahead, I’ll see you upstairs,” Leah said, with a faint smile, sure the queen wouldn’t want to see her.

  “No, please come with me. Something must have happened. Otherwise, my mother wouldn’t be calling at this hour,” he said, with a deep frown.

  Leah went with him to his office, and he quickly established the call.

  “Mother, what’s going on?” he asked, in a stern tone.

  “Good, you’re still up and so is Leah,” the woman said shakily. A woman was standing in the background, but they couldn’t see her face.

  “Why are you calling this late?” Zorban asked.

  “This can’t wait,” the queen assured him. “Tanulia is here. Do you remember Tanulia, Zorban?” she asked, pulling the woman out of the shadows.

  Zorban’s face turned somber and cold. Of course, he remembered Tanulia. What he didn’t know was what was going on in his mother’s head. Why would she bring Leena’s mother to talk to him? “Yes, Mother, of course, I remember her.”

  “I told her you had found a new mate and we thought it would be nice if you introduced Leah to her,” the queen explained.

  “Mother…” Zorban said in a threatening tone.

  “Please, indulge me, Zorban. You’ll thank me later.”

  Sure, he was going to regret it, he stretched his hand to invite Leah to participate in the call. She had stayed a few steps behind him.

  “What’s going on?” she asked him, in a low tone, meant only for his ears.

  “My mother would like you to meet Tanulia. She’s Leena’s mother,” he explained, wishing he had more privacy to prepare his encounter.

  “Leena’s mother?” Leah was startled. Why would his soul mate’s mother want to meet her? It didn’t make any sense unless this was the queen’s plan to make Zorban rethink his decision of being with Leah.

  The woman next to the queen was clearly shaking. She was staring at Leah as if she had seen a ghost and she was covering her lips as if to stop the wrong words from coming out.

  It was a very uncomfortable situation, one Leah wished she didn’t have to witness.

  “Leah, darling, she is Tanulia, Leena’s mother. I’m sure Zorban has talked to you about her, hasn’t he?” the queen asked.

  “Yes, he has,” Leah managed to utter an answer. “It’s a pleasure knowing you, Mrs. Tanulia.”

  The woman finally seemed to get a hold of herself, and after taking a couple of deep breaths, she even managed to smile. “It’s my pleasure, sweetheart,” she took another deep breath as if gathering strength before she continued. “Do you mind if I ask you something?”

  “No, not at all,” she said, though she was sure she was going to regret it.

  “You look a lot like someone I used to know. Do you happen to have a birthmark on your left shoulder? Something like this?” the woman asked, pulling up the picture of a birthmark with the shape of a cloud that looked a lot like the one Leah had on her shoulder.

  Startled, Leah looked at Zorban. He too had recognized the mark.

  “What the hell is going on here, mother?” he asked, in a cold tone.

  “Please, Leah, just answer the question, it’s vital,” the queen, asked, ignoring her son’s question.

  “Yes… I do have one like that…” Leah admitted, and she intended to go on, but the other woman’s reaction stopped her from continuing.

  Tanulia let out a loud cry and ran from the room. The queen jumped to her feet and seemed unsure of what to do.

  “Mother!” Zorban called her, furious. “What’s going on over there? What’s the meaning of all this?”

  “I can’t explain… you wouldn’t believe me. Zorban, I need you to come home.” She raised her hand to stop him from interrupting her. “We have a… situation here that needs to be clarified, and we’ll only get that with you here.”

  “Mother, whatever it is, I’m sure you can solve it yourself.”

  “Zorban, I’m not asking you to abandon your life over there, believe me. But your presence is essential. And you have to bring Leah with you,” she added.

  “I’m not going anywhere, mother, unless you explain what’s going on.”

  “It’s a short trip, Zorban, that’s all I’m asking,” she insisted before she ended the call abruptly.

  They stayed in silence for a few minutes.

  “Do you have any idea what’s going on?” Leah asked Zorban with a deep frown.

  “I’m not sure,” He turned to look at her. “Are you sure you’re not adopted?”

  “Yes… I mean… I think so… now you have me doubting. Why are you asking me this?” she asked, upset.

  “You told me yourself that you were very different from your parents. And your birth circumstances are irregular, to say the least,” he pointed out.

  She looked at him not sure what to think. “I have my mother’s diary here.” She had brought it with her when she had left her house in Alaska. “Perhaps, we can find some answers there.”

  “Let’s take a look at it,” he suggested, getting up and following her into their room.

  “Do you really think I might be part alien?” she asked, with a frown.

  “I don’t know. You do look a lot like my people. You resist the low temperatures as we do, you’re extraordinary working with ice…” he pointed out.

  “About that…” she interrupted him. “It’s a natural thing to me,” she revealed, conjuring a snowflake the size of her hand, from thin air.

  Zorban gasped. “You must be at least, part Thalian,” he said, convinced, as he too conjured snowflakes to fall down on her. “You’re obviously more talented than me, but this is one of our people’s abilities.”

  Heaving
and very nervous, she pulled her mother’s diary from the drawer on her nightstand. “I’ve always felt it was wrong to read my mother’s diary, but right now, she wouldn’t be able to stop me if she showed up in front of me,” she assured him.

  Her diary was quite thick, but Leah was only interested in the years near her birth. But to her surprise, there was nothing written about the pregnancy or even her birth. The pages regarding those days were filled with notes from her work.

  “This is weird. She should have mentioned she was pregnant,” she mumbled.

  “She couldn’t mention something that never happened, sweetheart,” he pointed out.

  “You can’t know that for sure,” she said, with a deep frown.

  They continued checking the pages, and for almost two years, there was no mention of her or the pregnancy.

  “Something strange happened today,” she read out loud. “We found a baby almost buried in the snow. She is around eighteen months old, and looks healthy though it was clear she had been in the snow for hours, she was still alive and well.”

  “Ah, I knew it. She didn’t give birth to you,” he shouted victoriously.

  She shushed him. “I told my husband we should call the authorities, but he said this was our chance to become parents. I’m not sure this is a good idea. Becoming parents was never part of our plans and a baby is certainly too much work,” she continued reading.

  “I guess she changed her mind,” he said, with sarcasm.

  “Yes… but it also explains why my mother was never close to me,” she said with a sad tone.

  “She was not your mother.”

  Leah sighed. “Yes, I can see that.” She continued reading. “This part happened a few days later,” she told him. “We decided to keep the baby. We haven’t been to town in a couple of years now so no one will doubt our story. We still have no idea where she came from and how she survived the extreme temperatures of the North Pole, but she’s a lovely girl, and I’m sure she will make us very happy.”

  “So, they just pretended you were their daughter,” Zorban said.

  “Yes, and no one doubted their story,” she sighed, as many things from her past started to make sense. “But this doesn’t prove I’m an alien.”

  “No, but it makes it a lot more possible.”

  “Perhaps my mother was an Inuit that got pregnant by a handsome alien. She could have died when I was born,” she said, trying to fill the gaps in her story.

  “You were eighteen months old when you were found, remember?” he said, as an idea started crawling into his mind. Could it be possible…? He dismissed the idea before it fully formed. His instinct had never shown him he was in the presence of Leena, so there was no way she and Leah were the same person.

  But Tanulia had recognized the birthmark Leah had on her shoulder and the woman’s reaction when seeing Leah for the first time had been quite compelling.

  “We have to go to Thalia. We’ll only get the answers we need there,” he decided.

  “Do you think that’s a good idea?” she asked, not sure about it.

  “Do you want to know who your parents really are?”

  “Yes, I guess…”

  “Then, we have to go there.” He didn’t mention any of his suspicions because he was having trouble believing them himself. “We’ll get to the bottom of this when we get there.”

  She sighed. “When do we leave?”

  “I’ll have to call Krad and ask him to come back for us. He’ll be here in a few days.”

  “Do it.”

  The queen had already notified Krad that Zorban was going home. “I’ll be there in a couple of days. Meet me at the moon’s orbit,” he said when Zorban contacted him.

  “Very well, I’ll see you then.”

  They would arrange for a pet sitter for the dogs, because there were procedures to follow if they were ever to go to Thalia.

  Though they tried to have fun at the New Year’s Eve party, they were too aware of the trip ahead of them. Zorban told Matthew they were going to visit his parents, and that they had no idea how long they were going to be away.

  “Don’t worry about it. I’ll be back in a month, and meanwhile Joshua and Marcus can handle things perfectly,” he said, mentioning two of the company’s directors.

  “Thank you, I knew I could count on you.”

  By the time Krad reached the planet’s moon, they were already there waiting for him.

  “What convinced you to come?” Krad asked him.

  “Long story. I’ll explain it to you later.”

  Krad nodded. “You might want to take your woman to your chambers. She looks a bit distraught,” he suggested.

  “Yes… these days haven’t been easy for her,” Zorban said.

  Worry and concern were written all over her face. He had tried to convince her nothing would change, no matter what they found out, but she wasn’t convinced.

  The days their trip took back to Thalia only increased her anguish, and by the time they arrived at his planet, she was a nervous wreck.

  “Where are you going to take me?” she asked Zorban as they exited the vessel that had brought them there.

  “To my house. You need some time to adjust to Thalia before you meet anyone,” he said, with a smile.

  The white landscape of the planet could be a bit overwhelming for first-time visitors.

  “This place always looks like this? The snow never melts?” she asked, taking a deep breath, strangely feeling as if she were home.

  “Yes, it’s always like this,” he replied, cupping her cheek and kissing her. “Remember, we don’t have to stay long,” he said, trying to calm her.

  Now that they were in Thalia, for some reason, he was more and more sure she was Leena. It was as if his instincts had awakened to her, and now they were shouting the truth he should have known from the beginning.

  She nodded with a smile, breathing hard as if she were being assaulted by all kinds of emotions she wasn’t quite able to understand or even name.

  “You know I love you, right?” He nodded. “But right now, I’m getting the feeling I’ve known that all my life. As if we had been meant for each other all this time,” she said.

  “I believe there’s an explanation for that, but we have time to explore that.”

  She shook her head. “No… I’ve waited long enough, Zorban. I need to know the truth.”

  He nodded and leaned over to kiss her again. Looking deep into his eyes conjured a flashback of her as a little girl, lost in his eyes. She gasped, startled.

  “Are you sure you’re ready for this?” he asked, with a slight frown.

  But before she could answer, the decision was taken out of their hands. Two vehicles pulled over to the docking bay and Tanulia came out of one of them, followed by the queen.

  “It is you… I knew it was you…” the woman mumbled as she closed the distance between them. “My sweet Leena… my baby is home.”

  And then, she knew. When her mother took her in her arms, she knew. She knew she was Leena, Zorban’s soul mate, the one Jharb had ripped away from his life.

  “Mamma…” she cried out, hugging her mother back, allowing herself to melt into her mother’s arms.

  For the next minutes, a bit of chaos ensued, as the women hugged each other and the men watched, a bit overwhelmed. Wyn was still astounded at the revelation of this meeting. He seemed to have trouble believing his long-lost daughter had finally been found.

  After a while, they finally calmed down, and Tanulia reintroduced Leena to her father.

  Queen Mayala smiled as if she had been given the best gift of her life and when she turned to her son, he knew why. “You do realize what this means, right? You’ve found your soul mate against all the odds, and now you have no reason to stay away,” she said with a pleased smile.

  Zorban smiled and shook his head. Of course, he had realized what this meant. But he wasn’t sure he wanted to be a part of a family that would only take him under certain circu
mstances. “As far as I’m concerned, mother, nothing has changed.”

  The queen snorted. “You can’t be serious. There’s no reason for you to stay away now.”

  “If I’m only of value because I found my soul mate, then, I want nothing to do with the throne, mother. The law is obsolete and unfair, but my father refused to change it or even admit it.”

  “Zorban, please… your father has been through a lot…” Queen Mayala tried to defend her husband.

  “So, have I mother, and I believe I deserve to be accepted for who I am and not for the fact that I have finally found my soul mate,” he insisted.

  The queen opened her mouth to protest, but she knew her son was right. The king had always refused to see the great man his son was and now he had lost him.

  “How come you didn’t recognize each other when you met back on Earth?” she asked, changing the subject as she watched Leena still with her parents.

  “Our souls recognized each other, it was just our minds that refused to see the truth,” he explained with a smile, knowing he had felt attracted by Leena since the first time he had laid eyes on her.

  “Now, I understand Jharb’s rage. His plan to keep you and Leena apart had failed miserably,” the queen said, with a smile.

  “Yes, he was astounded that I hadn’t recognized her. But he died before he confessed who she was and what he had done to her.”

  “The good thing is you’re together, despite all he did.”

  “I know.”

  A few minutes later, they finally left the docking bay and headed to Zorban’s house. He had no intention of going to the palace, and after a few protests, his mother finally gave up trying to convince him to change his mind.

  Their visitors stayed until after the night meal, and by the time they were finally left alone, Leena was exhausted.

  “Are you happy with how things turned out?” she asked him when they were in bed, in each other’s arms.

  “Yes, of course, but nothing has really changed for me. You’re still the woman that I love, and nothing could ever change that. However, I have to admit it makes me happy you’re that little girl I met all those years ago. Even then, I knew she was special and not just because she was mine.”