by Terry Spear
Practically bouncing on her toes, Lauriston, a violet-eyed girl whose hair was the most unusual white-blond color, met Eloria in the corridor outside the commander’s door, then hurried with her in silence as Eloria took the elevator to her quarters two flights up. Lauriston wanted to know just what had transpired between Eloria and the commander, and then she would spread the word like a fire raced across an oxygen fed-ship.
As soon as they walked the distance to Eloria’s quarters, Lauriston asked, “What does he want you to do?” Her eyes sparkled with inquisitiveness, and she could barely stand still.
“Return Persephonice to the ship.”
Lauriston gave a haughty, little laugh. “We knew it! It shouldn’t be difficult to do. She’s probably sitting on the very spot where we dropped her off, wishing she hadn’t so foolishly lost her transporter bracelet in the ocean. Though I must say when that vicious redheaded half-fish creature landed in the transporter room wearing Persephonice’s bracelet, I don’t think I’ve ever seen the commander’s face that red before.”
Eloria smiled, loving that Persephonice had the nerve to do such a thing. Eloria wasn’t certain if she would have done that to defy her own father had he still been alive. Which was the reason she was here, working on this ship as a warrior, special class. Once she had no other prospects, no credits to support her, she’d needed this job and her friendship with Persephonice had made all the difference in her life.
Many steered clear of Eloria because she was such a gifted motivational inspirer, afraid she could convince them to do what she wanted and they wouldn’t have the ability to thwart her. But that wasn’t what she was all about.
“She’s probably regretting every moment she’s been there,” Lauriston continued, acting as though she truly hoped so.
Eloria knew the girl was envious that Persephonice’s father was the commander and probably wished she had that role instead. But Eloria didn’t think any child of his would be happy. Not as cold and unfeeling as he was, using his position as the reason he had to treat everyone like he did. Now that Persephonice was gone, and if Eloria couldn’t convince her to return to the ship, if she could return, Eloria was seriously considering a transfer to another ship. Only this time, if she could get someone to hack into her records, she wanted the note about her being a motivational inspirer erased. And, if the commander had any idea she could use magic, that was not good. She couldn't decide if he was threatening her with the knowledge—bring my daughter home or else—or telling her that was another reason he had chosen her. She might be able to use her natural abilities to work in her favor in this unknown world though.
“When are you going?” Lauriston asked.
Eloria waved her hand in front of a red light. It turned green and her door slid open to her quarters. “Now.” She walked into her room.
“Now?” Lauriston joined her.
Suddenly Verona knocked at the doorframe. "Can I come in? I want to hear the news firsthand."
Like Persephonice and her, Verona was a redhead also. Though Eloria was more of a red-red, Persephonice had blonder tones to her red hair, and Verona’s hair was browner with a reddish cast to it.
"I want to go the planet's surface," Verona said, peering out Eloria's window. "I would love to view the waters close up. We don't have half the waterways on our planet that we can see from the spaceship, and that creature that was transported to the transporter room was incredibly fascinating."
Verona was an aquamarine scientist, who studied water sources on the various planets, in the event that someday they needed to use them for their own purposes. But like many of the scientists aboard, they didn't study primitive planets unless they had a formal military contingent, and for now, it wasn't authorized for some of the planets—like this one. The overall command didn't want to upset the primitive worlds as much as they could avoid it.
"That creature was beautiful but also looked like she wanted to bite anyone who got within her reach," Lauriston reminded her.
"Still, I would love to see what the male of the species looks like," Verona said.
Smiling, Eloria shook her head. Verona's chosen lifemate was on another ship and in two years' time, they were to meet and bond.
"Do you think Persephonice has taken one of the elves for a lifemate?" Lauriston asked, attempting to look wide-eyed and innocent, when they knew very well that's exactly what she thought.
"Eloria, you won't really try to take her away from an elf, if she's bonded with one, will you?" Verona asked.
Verona was always bringing out ancient books and reading snippets about courtly romance and then she had all these notions that true love could exist. Which it didn't. It was a waste of time. The computers told them who their perfect mate was. Emotions made people choose the wrong mates. That had been learned and relearned over the centuries.
"I will have to see what I will see when I get there," Eloria said, vaguely.
She crossed her quarters, which consisted of a small room with a couch that folded out into a bed for one. A wash sink and mirror sat in a corner. A desk for correspondence was built into the opposite wall. A computer sat on top. And that was about it for her quarters. Until she held a higher rank or had a lifemate, which she would never have, she would continue to have a room this small with few amenities. She could watch movies, read books, and play games on her computer, the only source of entertainment she had here. She couldn’t decorate, couldn’t hang pictures or change the color of the gray walls or the bedcover that was the same drab gray, only in a darker color, or anything. Everything that was personal had to be tucked away in drawers that slid into the wall.
She didn’t even have a personal bathroom, but had to share a communal shower and privy arrangement down the hall with others of her rank. Well, women only. The men’s communal unit was on the floor below her. In fact, only women without lifemates lived on this floor. Men were not allowed to visit the floor. Unless in an official capacity.
“How long do you think it’ll take? An hour? Less time? I so want to go to the Barra Fashion Gallery on Laborite, which was where we were headed until her father decided to return for her. It’s so irritating that he would make all of us suffer so. Leave her down there, I say. Then we could pick her up afterward.” Then Lauriston smiled. “Or, come to think of it, we could go, then return for the two of you in a few days. You don’t shop anyway. And it could very well take you that long to locate her and convince her to come home with you.”
“I would think your closet, as small as they are on board the ship, could not hold any more clothes for you,” Eloria said dryly, grabbing a backpack from her small closet filled with uniforms—no dresses—as she was never required to wear anything that fancy anywhere, and began filling the bag with essentials.
“The airless vacuum bags flatten clothes into virtually nothing at all, and I can fit twenty times as many garments in there. Besides, if I don’t wear it in six months, it’s out of here.” Lauriston studied Eloria as she packed. “What are you going to wear? Something that blends in with the scenery? Or all of your weapons to intimidate the primitive peoples? Or maybe something sexy to sway them to do your bidding?”
Eloria rolled her eyes. In truth, she wasn’t sure what to wear. If she had more time, and they had more data about the people and the creatures on the planet, she’d know just what to wear.
She considered the uniform she wore on board the ship. White, sterile. It wouldn’t do. She’d wear green to blend in with the forests that they’d seen on their last approach. And a silky material that dried well if it got wet, but was comfortable in both warm and cold weather depending on the temperature. The pants were full and gave the appearance of a skirt, in case the primitives were offended by women wearing men’s trousers as they were on some planets. But it also gave her the freedom to fight if she needed to.
She changed clothes. The leafy green blouse with full sleeves also would help her blend in with a forest. Hidden under her long skirt-like brown pants
, she wore knee-high brushed brown leather boots, waterproofed for inclement weather. She sheathed a dagger at her waist, a sword at her back, and planned to slip her stun gun in her blouse, if she could do so without the other girls catching her doing it. She braided her thick red hair and pulled a dark green cloak out of her wardrobe that, when flipped to the other side, was pure white. It would serve to help hide her in the forest or in a snowy environment, if the landscape had snowy environments, and was perfect to wrap herself in to sleep on the ground.
She put on her rose-gold necklace that held an emerald-green stone. She couldn’t wear it with her uniform, but she always wore it when she left the ship on leave or on duty when she was on a mission to blend in with the populace. Her father said it had been her mother's and was imbued with magic to protect Eloria and to use to focus her magic. Her mother had passed on her magic genes to Eloria, according to her father, because he didn’t have a magical bone in his body.
She shoved packages of dried food and water tablets to purify the elves’ water to keep her well- fed and hydrated in the event she couldn’t rendezvous with the ship right away.
She covered her drawer with the cloak and wrapped her stun gun in it. Then she returned to the closet and kept the others from seeing what she was doing as she slipped the stun gun in her blouse. The belt she wore would keep it from slipping out of her blouse. She’d move the stun gun to her belt once she was on the planet and the ship was gone from her sight. She was afraid someone might check her bag before she left the ship. But they might wand her clothes too, looking for anything that was forbidden to take down to the surface of the planet.
“You don’t think she’s fallen madly in love with one of those primitive elves, do you?” Lauriston asked, a devilish gleam in her eye, her hands over her heart, her eyes casting upward, still pushing the issue.
“You ought to be an actress,” Verona said.
Lauriston gave her an annoyed look, then said to Eloria, “You know her father will keep her under quarters arrest when you return her here.”
Eloria suspected as much. At least until he could reprogram her and attempt to break her will. She looked over her stuff one more time, trying to determine if she’d packed everything she needed.
"I so wish I could go there with you," Verona said.
Eloria frowned at her. "You would not want to have to do what I have to do." She could imagine Verona stopping every few minutes to examine a water source. They'd never get anywhere.
Verona smiled at her, then sighed. "You have all the luck."
Eloria didn’t think she did at all. She thought this could be the end of her friendship with Persephonice, and she could break her heart. Or, worse-case scenario, she wouldn’t be able to return her and the commander would punish Eloria by leaving her behind too. If Persephonice had fallen in love with an elf, it didn’t mean Eloria would be welcome on the planet to live there until the end of her days.
Satisfied she had all that she would require, Eloria said, "Well, I'm ready." She brushed past Lauriston, ready to transport to the primitive elf world, hoping it wasn’t as dangerous a place as others had warned her.
Not that she feared for her own safety. She was a warrior, special class. But for Persephonice, who, as an overseer who only recorded information for the data logs, nothing more, how could she survive? Maybe that’s why her father wanted Persephonice back. He truly was worried about her.
Invisibly, the ship hovered over the elves’ planet and Eloria was set down near where the ship had landed to block the river before, but she was on a white sandy beach only a few feet from the deep aqua ocean. She wondered if her friends could see her now before the ship departed the area.
Seabirds flew over the water, diving in and soaring out, fish wriggling in their beaks as the birds sailed on the breeze to the cliffs nearby. Beautiful clear blue water, clear blue sky, white sandy beach. It looked like a paradise. And Eloria did think it would be a great place for Verona to explore all the water sources. For the moment, Eloria soaked in the beauty of the salty air and fresh sea breeze. It reminded her of her home world of Tazia where some of the ruling class were shapeshifters. They even had a couple aboard the ship. She wondered what the elves would think of the jaguar, Caitlin, or the wolf, Lenora. Maybe they had shapeshifters in this world too. What did she know?
She thought of the mermaid that had landed in their transporter room and wondered if she was again here, swimming around in the ocean’s depths after they had quickly returned her to this world. Was she still wearing the transporter bracelet? It wouldn't work now as the commander had ordered a crewman to remotely deactivate the device as soon as the mermaid was returned to her world.
Eloria turned to study the steep cliffs, the red and gray earthy tones. She observed pockets in the rocks that she could use for hand and foot holds. But it was a long way up there. They looked to be climbable and because of her job, she was always physically fit, but still… if the commander wanted her to be quick about it, why hadn’t he deposited her at the top of the cliffs?
With resolve, she trudged across the silky, white sand toward the cliffs and what looked to be the easiest path up, where more rocks jutted out for her to grab ahold of. Pockets in the rocks should enable her to use them as footholds when she heard someone calling from the direction of the ocean. A watery, intriguing, deep voice.
She turned abruptly, thinking she would see a boat and somebody riding in it. A male somebody.
A head was bobbing in the water, long red hair floating on the surface. Tanned broad shoulders appeared as the man elevated himself a bit, his arms moving to keep his body afloat and… She squinted. She thought his eyes were green, gazing at her, almost with… longing. A sudden frown hinted at confusion.
Did he know Persephonice? The two of them looked similarly, same build, same size, red hair—different shade of red, but still red—and green eyes.
He swam closer and she watched with fascination, but gasped when a shimmering bronze tail rose and fell through the water, propelling the creature toward the beach.
Oh my goddess! It was the male equivalent of the female that had been transported to their ship! A merman! Verona would have loved to have seen him. Not that Eloria wasn't just as fascinated with him.
She had only read of such a creature, until the female landed on their transporter deck, and Eloria had seen one for real. She was intrigued with this male's handsomely rugged appearance and she was completely spellbound that he could know Persephonice.
“You are not…,“ he started to say, frowning.
“Persephonice,” she said, hopeful that he knew where she might be, although Eloria didn’t see how he could know, living in the ocean as he did. But he seemed to know Persephonice and appeared to care for her. Eloria was absolutely amazed that he would have knowledge of her. “Do you know where—”
The sound of footfalls on the sand made her twist around to see what was headed for her.
She’d forgotten the basic rule of survival when visiting any primitive planet. Always, always watch your surroundings for potential hostiles. And the way the elves dressed in blue tunics and britches ran toward her, there hair and eyes just as blue, their expressions dark with anger, she knew they were hostiles. Which reminded her she should have pulled her stun gun from her blouse and attached it to her belt already.
“Get her!” one of the men shouted, his tone of voice threatening.
“She’s… she’s not the one.”
“Get her anyway! We’re being invaded. Grab her!”
Eloria quickly cast a bubble shield that protected against lightweight projectiles—arrows, poison darts, hand thrown rocks. Perfect for a primitive people. She was glad the commander wasn't monitoring her progress or she'd be in deep space without a ship for using her magic if he'd caught her at it. She had her stun gun too, but only because she was defying the commander’s orders, and thankfully no one checked to see what she was carrying when she left. There were way too many of the e
lves racing to reach her to effectively use the stun gun on them though. Still, she pulled it out of her blouse and fastened it to her belt and noticed her amulet was glowing a bright green, something she’d never seen it do, as if the blue elves had triggered its reaction.
She studied the blue-haired creatures ranting and raving as they jumped and rallied around the outside of her protective bubble. The merman was watching her, not saying a word, appearing somewhat stunned. She imagined he was rethinking wanting to befriend her like he must have Persephonice, if she’d created so much havoc with these elves. Maybe the bubble was a total put-off too.
Then the merman screeched in warning. And a wave bashed against the shore, breaking her concentration, and the bubble protection shielding her vanished. Her heart nearly quit beating, and she quickly pulled out her sword, despite knowing she wasn’t supposed to, but a sword was an ancient weapon, so she reasoned it would be fine on a primitive planet. But then she saw men running toward her with long poles, and she guessed what they were. Blow-dart guns. She sheathed her sword and pulled out her stun gun.
She had no intention of attempting to use her motivational inspiring talent on these people. They were too hostile, and she suspected they had every intention of taking her hostage, or killing her.
3
The high elf Prince Zorak had been training a new dragon when he heard all the commotion with the blue elves and flew his dragon closer to see what all the fuss was about, thinking he might need to rescue another kind of elf. That’s when he saw Persephonice on the beach in the middle of real trouble, the blue elves shooting darts at her, but they bounced off what appeared to be an invisible barrier. And what was more, she didn’t look like Persephonice exactly, her red hair darker, though she was about the same build. But her clothes—they were like what Persephonice had worn when she had first arrived in their world.
