by Pati Nagle
Savhoran reached for my bag.
“No!” Madóran and I said together.
“The sun is still up,” Madóran said, taking the bag from him.
Savhoran’s jaw tightened. I hugged him as Caeran and Len followed Madóran out.
Don’t forget me, OK?
Never. You are all I have.
That’s not true! You have the clan!
But they fear me, and rightly so. I cannot be close to my own kind any more.
And that grief overwhelmed all his other sorrows. I wiped at my face, not wanting to give him a weepy farewell.
They still love you. And so do I.
He hugged me so hard it almost hurt, then let me go and kissed me lightly.
They are waiting.
I didn’t want to go. Will you be able to talk to me like this?
Probably not over distance. That is a rare gift. And even if I could, I would not want to while we are hunting. It would be too distracting.
Oh. Yeah, I can see that.
Now go, Amanda. This is hard for me, too.
I went to the door and looked back. Call me, OK? When you’re not busy hunting?
All right.
I made myself go out into the sunlight that was now an enemy. Caeran nodded at me as we passed on the walk. His face looked strained.
A beige minivan sat at the curb, not looking like a limo. The driver who opened the door for me was an ordinary human, which meant we wouldn’t be able to talk about stuff in the car. I got in next to Len in the back seat and stared at the house.
Caeran was standing on the front porch. I looked toward the curtained living room window. Savhoran was there—I couldn’t see him but I knew it. I felt him watching as the van pulled away. I missed him already.
The drive was long and boring. Len apparently didn’t feel like talking any more than I did. I stared out the window and thought about Savhoran. We picked up Nathrin and Mirali at a hotel, stopped a couple of times for gas and bathroom breaks, and arrived in Guadalupita about an hour after dark.
My heart was aching, but I couldn’t help being glad to be back in that beautiful place. Crickets chirped and the stars glowed overhead while the driver put our bags on the portal. I stared up at the sky, thinking about Savhoran. The van drove away, its noise fading for a long time until all I could hear were the crickets.
The clan must be hunting now. I swallowed, wished them luck, then followed the others inside.
They were talking in the entryway. Madóran turned as I came in. “Dinner will be ready in a short while,” he said. “You will have your usual rooms.”
He headed toward the kitchen, leaving us to settle in on our own. Len picked up her bag and opened the door to the plazuela. I followed and went to my former room, which had been made up fresh. I put my bag on the floor and flopped onto the bed. I must have been tired, or maybe just stressed. I fell asleep.
A knocking on my door woke me. I sat up, slowly figuring out where I was.
“Hey, Man—you in there?” Len’s voice.
“Uh-huh,” I said, still groggy.
“Come on, dinner’s ready.”
The second I opened the door the smell of Madóran‘s cooking got me. My stomach growled as I followed Len across the courtyard.
Mirali and Nathrin were already at the table, talking in ælven with Madóran who was at the stove. They switched to English when we came in. I gathered they were going to stay at the house for now; Nathrin said something about going to get their clothes in the morning. They had been staying somewhere else nearby the first time I came, but now with the alben running around I guess they wanted more security.
Madóran had made steak, potatoes, and asparagus with lemon sauce. I forced myself not to gobble, to slow down and savor everything.
Len picked at her food. Missing Caeran, I figured. I didn’t want to get depressed, so I listened to the ælven as a distraction.
“I will take the first watch tonight,” Madóran said to Nathrin. “I will call you after midnight.”
“How can I help?” I asked. “I could take a turn.”
Nathrin looked at me. “You need to sleep.”
“Well, so do you guys, right?”
He looked amused and glanced at Madóran, who handed him the asparagus.
“We do not sleep, Amanda,” Madóran said. “Not as you do. Our bodies require rest, but not sleep.”
“It’s more like meditation,” Len put in.
I looked at her. “So Caeran meditates while you sleep? What does he do when you snore?”
She frowned at me, then cut a bite of her steak. “If I’m restless he goes somewhere else to rest. But he really only needs about four hours a day.”
“Jeez.”
I ate a bite of potato, feeling inferior. Why did the ælven bother with us at all? Probably they didn’t want to, but we were more populous so they had to deal with us or hide in the middle of nowhere.
It occurred to me to wonder if the ælven were approaching extinction. I looked at Madóran and he gave me a sad smile.
Crap. That shouldn’t happen. They were so amazing. And they were here before us—somebody’d said that, probably Caeran.
Deep inside me something stirred. If there was anything I could do to help the ælven, I wanted to. Trouble was, I didn’t know how. Following in Len’s footsteps didn’t feel like enough, and I was pretty sure I couldn’t improve on what she was doing.
I envied her a little. She had figured out what she could do. If she and Madóran really found a cure, then maybe all the alben could reunite with the ælven, and there’d be more of them, and they wouldn’t go extinct.
And if she found a cure, maybe Savhoran would get better. My heart clenched at that. It was almost enough to make me change my mind about studying medicine.
Nathrin and Mirali went to their room after dinner. Len and I did the dishes while Madóran put away leftovers. I continued to mull over what I could do to help.
“What are you good at?” Madóran asked.
“Huh?”
“Do you have skills, or pastimes you enjoy?”
“Um. Poker. Playing video games and watching movies. That’s probably not what you meant.”
“You never know when something may be of use. What are the video games that you enjoy like?”
“Puzzles, mostly. I’m not much into shoot-em-ups.”
Madóran looked confused.
“Violent stuff,” I added.
“Ah.”
I was tired, and Len looked sleepy. When the kitchen was squared away we called it a night. Madóran came with us to the courtyard and said goodnight there. I went to my room, and glanced back at the door.
Madóran was sitting in a chair near the fountain, staring up at the sky. It didn’t look like he was keeping watch, but I knew he was, and that was really reassuring. I went to bed and slept like a log.
The next morning I had to look at my phone to remember what day it was. Friday, right. I had to call in sick. I decided I needed breakfast before facing that.
I got dressed and headed across the courtyard, drawn by the smell of cinnamon. Madóran had made sticky buns and they were heaven. He smiled at me from the counter where he was cutting up oranges.
Len was at the table ahead of me; no sign of Nathrin or Mirali. I sat across from Len and poured myself some tea.
“Did you call in?” Len asked.
“I will. You?”
“Yeah. Alice wasn’t pleased when I said I was taking a week off.”
“Did you tell her it was an emergency?”
“I said family business. Didn’t impress her.”
She seemed a little down, so I changed the subject. “Have you talked to Caeran?”
“Yeah. You were right. They found where the alben had been camping in the bosque. She wasn’t there, though. They staked it out all night, but she didn’t come back.”
Now I was depressed. I ate three sticky buns, drank some tea, and ate a couple of orange sli
ces for virtue’s sake, then went out to the plazuela to call the library.
Dave was in. I took a deep breath and told him I was taking the next week off. He was usually a jerk about changes to the schedule, but Poppy must have given him a full dramatic reenactment of my adventure in the ladies’ room, because he didn’t say a thing except that he hoped I would feel better soon.
I said goodbye and then stared at my phone a while, wondering whether to call Savhoran. He had said he would call, and if he was resting after hunting all night I didn’t want to bother him. I decided to wait and if he didn’t call by the next morning, I’d call him.
I stared at the courtyard. Bees and butterflies were visiting the flowers. A robin was taking a bath in the fountain, splashing water everywhere, having a grand time.
Len came out and sat in the chair next to mine. “So, here we are.”
“Yeah.”
I looked up at the sky—deep blue up here away from city smog. Oddly, that made me homesick for Albuquerque.
“Wish we could do something to help,” I said.
“We’re helping by staying out of the way.” She didn’t sound so happy about it.
“I mean something constructive. I wish I’d taken martial arts.”
Len shook her head. “Wouldn’t work. She can control you.”
I shivered, remembering. “She can’t do that to ælven, can she? Just to us?”
“Right. We’re weaker, easier to control. She can do it to ælven, but not as well, and only one at a time.”
“Pepper spray! I meant to say they should all carry it, but I forgot. I couldn’t use mine, but if Lomen had had one—will you tell Caeran?”
“Yeah. Good idea.”
Movement caught my eye: Nathrin came out of a door on the west side of the house and walked along the portal to the kitchen. He nodded when he saw me watching, but didn’t stop. When he’d gone inside I turned to Len.
“Is Caeran afraid of Savhoran?”
“Afraid? No. He’s sad for him.”
“Savhoran thinks they’re all afraid of him.”
“They’re afraid of the disease. Mirali most of all, I think. Can’t blame her.”
“No … but he misses them.” I sighed. “I wish there was something I could do.”
Len grinned. “I could think of a few things.”
“Yeah, great. Except I’m two hundred miles away.”
Nathrin came out of the kitchen with a tray of food and tea, and went back down the portal. Mirali was getting breakfast in bed, I guessed.
“Mirali doesn’t like me,” I said.
“She’s not that wild about humans in general, especially when they hook up with members of her clan.”
“So she’s a bigot?”
Len shrugged. “She’s seen her friends break their hearts over humans more than once. She tried to talk me out of being with Caeran. Told me about the last time he got involved with a human. It was pretty sad; I almost gave him up.”
“Crap! No!”
“Yeah. But Caeran had other ideas.” She smiled softly. “We’re lucky, you know, you and I.”
“I know.”
Even though Savhoran suffered this disease—or maybe because of it—I was lucky. He wanted me, even needed me. It still amazed me when I thought about it that he should care about me at all. I mean, we must seem like fruit flies to them. Here today, gone tomorrow. Not even worth remembering a name.
I sat up, trying to shake myself out of moping. “Guess I’ll get my book.”
Len got hers, too—a fat medical book that she’d borrowed from the library—and we spent the morning reading. Madóran called us in for lunch. I asked if he needed help in the garden.
“I am done for today, but thank you. Please enjoy yourself.”
“Well, I’m available for chores.”
“I will bear that in mind.”
He sent us back to the courtyard with a pitcher of iced lemonade. I finished the book I’d brought and bought another one on my phone. Read until I was cross-eyed, then wandered around the hacienda looking for a television. I suffered a pang of withdrawal when I realized Madóran didn’t have one.
Savhoran called me that evening, a little before sundown. We had just finished supper and Len and I were lazing around on the plazuela. Len looked at me when my phone rang, and grinned when I headed for my room. I was blushing.
“Hi!” I said when I’d reached the portal. “I’m so glad you called!”
“Hello, Amanda. I wish I had good news, but I do not. We have not caught the alben.”
“It’s great just to hear your voice.”
We talked for a while about pretty trivial stuff. It was the contact that mattered.
Over the next few days we got in the habit of talking every day, usually after suppertime.
The alben-hunting wasn’t going so well. I had thought at first that the clan guys just weren’t trying that hard, but after listening to Savhoran describe what they were doing at night, I changed my mind.
They combed the campus and the bosque every night. Everyone but Savhoran was hunting in the daytime as well. They watched where the alben had camped—near where the ælven’s first camp had been; Len told me she’d seen it and described to me where it was, south of the nature center. That kind of creeped me out, because a lot of people use the paths along the river for biking, walking, or jogging. Easy pickings.
After three nights of staking out the bosque without success, the ælven decided to pretend that Len and I were back and they were guarding us again. It meant that two of them, Caeran and one other, had to spend days outside the lab and the library. Really tedious, and frustrating for Savhoran because he couldn’t help.
We talked a little about his condition, about how hard it was for him, especially the drinking blood part. I told him it was OK if he wanted to talk to me about it some more, that I wouldn’t be freaked out. But he seemed to want to avoid the subject.
My phone call with Savhoran was the best part of every day. Madóran was a considerate and generous host, and I fell in love with his house, but it wasn’t home. I felt like my life was on hold.
July arrived, but the monsoons hadn’t started yet. It was the time of year when New Mexicans hoped and prayed for the summer rains to come.
Madóran’s garden was now bursting with squash and beans and tomatoes. I helped him work there in the mornings, sat on my lazy ass and read in the afternoons, and in the evenings we all hung out in the living room and played games or made music. If it was music I let the others do the making. Every artist needs an audience.
We saw Mirali occasionally at meals, Nathrin more often. Sometimes they’d join us in the evening, but mostly it was just us three.
By Friday the clan still hadn’t caught the alben, and Len and I had to call in and tell our bosses we needed another week off. Dave wasn’t in (yes, I called ten minutes before he usually arrived) so I left a message.
Len didn’t get off so easy. Her boss kind of raked her over the coals. She was bummed about it, and predicted that she would lose the job.
That evening I taught Madóran how to play poker. He liked games, and had taught us some ælven games played with polished stones on a decorated cloth. Card games were fairly new for him—he’d never played until Christmastime, when Len had brought a deck up with her and taught him and Caeran to play spades.
We used Madóran’s polished stones for poker chips. He caught on scary fast, and after moving from draw to stud, I suggested we play Texas Hold’em.
“That’s not fair,” Len said. “The odds are all different.”
“You watch. He’ll be beating us in less than an hour.”
He did. He took all our stones in probably less than half an hour.
“I like this game,” Madóran said. “Let us play again!”
Len glared at him. “OK, fine, but I need caffeine.”
“I will make some tea—”
“No, I’ll get it,” she said, standing up. “You guys r
elax.”
Left alone with Madóran, I gave him a smile. “I can’t believe you never played poker before. I mean, this was the wild west, and you were here.”
“I have always been rather isolated. Entirely by choice, of course. I believe I may have been invited to play poker, but did not accept.” He gathered the stones and began sorting them by color: green, blue, and white.
I shuffled the cards. “Well if you ever needed money, you could probably win at a casino.”
He smiled, but didn’t answer. I suspected he had no need for extra money, or if he did he had ways of getting it that he preferred to going out amidst throngs of gambling humans. He was a genuine recluse, and I reminded myself that he was honoring us by letting us stay with him.
I pondered that. The ælven seemed to have no shortage of money. What they needed, as Len had said, was access to a lab for research. And the skills to use it, which was why Len was in med school.
Could they create their own private lab? Or would that cost too much even for them? I suspected there were fancy, expensive machines involved. Electron microscopes and things. Even Madóran might not be able to afford that.
I looked out the window and saw someone standing outside. Caught my breath in fear, then the next moment I felt a rush of attraction to the man standing in front of the house.
It was late, but there was moonlight, enough to gleam off of snow white hair.
= 9 =
I stood and went over to the window. Was it Savhoran? That question should have mattered more than it did.
Whoever it was, he was gorgeous. I knew it, even though I only saw glimpses of his face: the line of a cheekbone, the pale brow. I wanted to go out to him, because he was already making me feel wonderful and I knew it would only get better.
A tiny part of my mind protested this. That small part was loyal to Savhoran, and made me feel something was wrong.
I drew a sharp breath. “Madóran!”
It was a whisper, but he came over at once, and when he looked out the window he hissed. He pulled the curtain across the window in front of me, then put his hand on my shoulder. I felt the warmth of it melt through me, and my mind cleared. Suddenly I was afraid.
