CaressoftheStars

by Viola Grace

  "What is it, doctor?" Something in his tone put her on alert.

  "There is more than one set of clothing here. Two girls, two skirts, three men. The blood on this clothing is fresh."

  Yaedo scowled and leaned forward. "Damn it. How fresh?"

  "Last night."

  The priest looked confused. "How can you know so accurately?"

  Huana looked at him. "Degradation of semen. They degrade at a predictable pace."

  She could understand that he wouldn't know. Hashka rarely suffered sexual assault. They were fairly regulated in their towns and colonies. No man who forced a woman would live to tell the tale. In a society where sex provided their stars with power and worship, the priesthood was exceptionally attentive to reports of abuse.

  She, however, had done this kind of seeking before. Away from the social morels of her own people, she had discovered a number of strange and unusual behaviours. Some traditions were better, some were worse, but all gave her vital insight to the society she was dealing with.

  If she knew what the rules were, she could get what she needed to complete her assignments.

  "Can you identify the women?"

  The doctor nodded as he brought up medical records. His cursing did not bode well. He was shaking with fury when he gave her a printout with the young and hopeful face of Niera's eldest daughter, Willie.

  "Oh, no." It was woefully inadequate, but it was heartfelt.

  The other female was named Raheel and what sank into Huana's consciousness was that the woman bore a resemblance to the young lady who had approached her but was not the same one. Both girls were barely full citizens of the collective and neither of them was the female who had asked for help. As a seeker, she was conflicted.

  "Where are the men's reports?"

  The physician handed them over. Huana checked them against those she had identified off the monitors and was delighted to see that they matched.

  "Doctor, are you able to do reconstructions here?"

  He looked surprised. "I don't see why not. There is no regulation prohibiting it in cases such as these. The collective has been asked to help you, Seeker. A minor procedure is well within that scope."

  "Good. I will try to speak to the girls while I get the men sorted."

  Yaedo nodded. "I will assist." There was an implacable tone to his voice.

  Huana nodded and left the doctor's office with the clothing bundled and the reports in Yaedo's hands.

  "Please escort me to my quarters. I need to put these somewhere no one will stumble upon them and I don't trust that nosey nurse."

  "Is it acceptable? I thought you needed to have a chaperone at all times." His words were quiet.

  "I am supposed to, but let me just get a hold of Elder Nehatho. I need to speak with her."

  "Why, you know who did it."

  "As a seeker, I am restrained. I can only find the perpetrators in a crime, I have no right to arrest anyone or administer punishment."

  He nodded. "That must be frustrating."

  "It has its compensations. Being able to find a missing child alive is wonderful, dead is not, though it does give the families closure."

  Yaedo had nothing to say to that.

  Chapter Seven

  The grim face of the elder said it all. "You are sure?"

  They were sitting at the small table in Huana's quarters. "I am sure. There is no doubt in my mind that at least two young women have been drugged and raped by these men."

  "Show me the clothing."

  As an elder of the collective, Neha had a right to see it.

  "Will you swear to me that if you do recognize the clothing, you will take no action?"

  The woman's face contorted, but she nodded. "I will not take any action toward the women."

  Huana unravelled the bundle containing the clothing and watched as tears and fury came into Neha's eyes. The woman ran her hand over the embroidery of the blouse and on the hem of the two bloodied skirts.

  "Give me the names of the men."

  Shrugging, her duty discharged, Huana handed the files over.

  "The priest is willing to assist you in apprehending the men."

  "Thank you. I will take it under advisement." Rivulets of tears were flowing down Neha's cheeks. She took the files and left the room.

  Since she still had time on the main computers, she sought out the women involved in this disaster. They were working in the kitchens, cleaning up after the evening meal and preparing for the breakfast cooking.

  With the doctor on duty, it was the perfect time to have the girls head to medical.

  She mulled over how to get the girls to medical and finally settled on an acid burn. Fishing through the kit that had been prepared for her, she found a tooth polish, blended the paste with a Hashka-specific skin cream and mixed it with water. The light foaming told her it was working and while it would be painful, the girls would not suffer an actual injury.

  Huana took the cup with the mixture and palmed it. She wandered out of her room and toward the kitchen with a spring in her step. If the girls were amenable, they would be physically restored to virginity and no one would be the wiser.

  It was anticlimactic. Huana coated her hands with the substance and shook the hands of each of the girls in turn. By the time Willie shouted in pain, the third girl was backing away as her friends' hands began to smoke.

  Huana whisked the girls down the hall, talking quickly as she went. She apologized for the mild burn, but by the time they reached medical, it was a genuine blistering burn.

  "I apologize for my miscalculation. I keep forgetting that my skin is a little more durable than yours." She glared the nurse out of the room and when the doctor arrived, she explained the necessary grafting on the palms of the girls as well as any additional repairs they would like.

  Neutralizing the substance took her less than two minutes, but the blisters were already in place.

  "I am really very sorry, Willie." She sat in the outer room while Raheel received her repairs.

  "It is nothing, Seeker. I thank you for your care in this matter. No one will think twice about you burning us. Everyone knows that Hashka do not frequently deal with others." Willie was old beyond her years. "It was a good subterfuge, but what did you do to Zeera? She is the most determined gossip on the ship."

  "I just caught her eavesdropping and told her it wouldn't be tolerated. She will remain outside until I tell her otherwise." Smiling, she patted Willie's leg. "No one is aware of the other matter. Not by name anyway."

  Willie paled and nodded. "I thank you for that as well."

  The door opened and Raheel walked cautiously out of the exam room. "Your turn, Willie."

  It appeared that though family ties separated them, the horror that they lived through had bonded them.

  Willie went into the doctor's exam room with a determined set to her shoulders.

  Raheel sat slowly as if afraid to dislodge whatever the doctor had put in place. Her hand was wrapped and it bore the marks of gel and a graft.

  "I am very sorry about the cream, but I needed to get you away and needed a logical reason to bring you to medical."

  Tears pricked Raheel's eyes. "Thank you. I am engaged and this will help matters tremendously. The scars on my hand will remind me that sometimes the eyes of a stranger will see what my own kind do not."

  "Do not give me that credit. I believe it was your sister who delivered the proof to me and with that, I have set events in motion that I cannot completely understand. The men are being dealt with, but I don't know how. You and Willie are being made physically whole, but the memories of what was done will remain."

  Raheel nodded. "But we know. And we will help each other to get through it. As long as it never comes to formal charges, everything will be fine."

  "Even if it does, your names are not involved. The doctor cannot give patient records out. All he did was confirm that the men on the monitor data were the same ones who left DNA on your clothing."


  She swallowed heavily. "I see. But my sister knows something happened."

  "That is my guess. She also knew where to find the clothing left behind by the other victim."

  They sat in silence for another ten minutes until Willie returned with a bandaged hand and a slow gait.

  "I apologize again for the effect my hand cream had on you." With the doctor there as a witness, she pretended that nothing else had gone on. "Ladies, I will escort you back to your rooms for the night."

  The young women nodded and as they passed the curious nurse in the hallway, their shoulders straight and walking proudly. They were recovering in their own way as best they could.

  Huana waved them off and returned to her own quarters with the knowledge that the information she had given the elder was about to spark an action. There was nothing else she could do.

  Three days later…

  "And so it is with regret that we hold this memorial for the three young men who lost their lives in the senseless accident when the oxygen in the storage compartment ran out." The elder looked sombre as he spoke over the three coffins.

  Huana tuned out the rest of the memorial and shifted in her formal clothing. The heavy silks were not what she was used to, but they were the only option offered by the priests who packed her bags.

  Black with heavy silver threads, the skirts were heavy, the breast band snug and the wrap that wound from her hip, around her back and over her hair to flow down her left side in a shimmering wave. It was the perfect outfit for a funeral. Her skin gleamed brightly in the framework of the black and silver.

  Yaedo was at her side in his silver and black formal robes. They looked like a matched set in the sea of N'staffin bodies. Families sobbed quietly as they looked at the caskets and Huana slowly cast her glance to the elders and their families.

  Nehatho and her family stood together, Willie tucked in next to her mother, the bandage on her hand glowing white against the dark clothing.

  The elders who were not speaking stood in their family groups, dispassionate looks at the caskets giving Huana the confirmation that the deaths were premeditated.

  The elder concluded his speech and each casket was loaded with an explosive. No one would have access to the dead of the collective. A beacon was prepped.

  Men loaded the caskets and beacons into the launch bay and the doors closed when the pallbearers were safe. A chime rang and the outer door opened, releasing the atmosphere and pulling the bodies and their explosives into space.

  The wave of power as the bodies were blasted to bits rocked the great ship. Sobs broke out as the families said goodbye to their loved ones and the rest of the witnesses separated into groups to attend the memorial service.

  Yaedo turned and glanced down at her. "May I say that formalwear suits you?"

  "You can say it, but unless we attend more funerals or weddings, you won't be seeing it again."

  Navigator Zali broke into whatever Yaedo was going to say next. "We are reaching the coordinates you gave me. I would love to say it had been a pleasure, but I am still a little unsure how I feel about you." He was speaking to her, ignoring Yaedo entirely.

  Huana kept her smirk under her hand as she noted the priest's irritation.

  "Thank you, Zali. We will be ready to leave the collective within the hour."

  He nodded. "I will inform the elders." A sharp salute and he turned to walk toward the clusters of elders.

  "Did he even see me standing there?" Yaedo was astonished.

  "He did, but I am going into heat and he is under whatever hex Dekkar put on me. He is so busy trying to figure out what the heck is going on, talking to another Hashka male is the last thing on his list."

  The sudden jerk of Yaedo's body combined with his flaring nostrils made her laugh. "Don't worry. I don't consider you a candidate. I will wait until I get home to find some luckless bastard to take it out on." She swallowed the lie as she spoke it.

  He gave her an unreadable look and nodded. "I suppose we had better pack up then."

  She went her way and he went his. They reconvened at the shuttle with the elders to see them off.

  Neha held her hands lightly, "Thank you for your gift, Seeker. It may not be pleasant, but it shows what needed to be done."

  Huana leaned forward and pressed a kiss to the older woman's forehead. "I am sorry for what was revealed but not sorry for the discovery itself."

  A grim look overtook the elder. "I am not sorry as well, only that we didn't discover it sooner. Be well and enjoy your journey."

  "May the path you travel be wide and clear." She waved farewell to the rest of the elders and joined Yaedo inside their shuttle.

  With the door sealed and her body harnessed into the navigator station, Huana braced for the next part of their adventure.

  Chapter Eight

  "You knew they would die, didn't you?"

  Those were the first words that Yaedo had spoken since she had entered in their destination.

  Huana checked their trajectory before she answered. "There was a very good chance of that happening, yes."

  "And yet you did it anyway." He turned to face her and his dark eyes were worried. "How do you deal with that?"

  She turned and faced him. The stars were shifting in the view screen, giving the shuttle interior an eerie light. "I deal with it the way I must. I focus on the victims and ignore the suffering of the guilty. My job is to find the guilty, what happens after that is not for me to determine. It has taken me years to get this calm about the process."

  "But you knew that their sentence would be death and you told the elder anyway."

  "I did. I did not tell her who the girls were though."

  "The elder knew somehow, didn't she?"

  He was staring into her eyes as if that would tell him the truth.

  "She saw the clothing from the attacks. The embroidery was most likely either something she had done for her kin or something she had watched in process."

  "And knowing that, you let her leave your room."

  "I did."

  He exhaled heavily and sat back. "That took guts."

  "I did my job. No more, no less. They wanted me on duty, so I was on duty as payment for our transit, the same way you were teaching the young men to fight."

  "Is this why you don't socialize back home?"

  She blinked in surprise. "How did you…"

  "I got your file before I was sent to collect you. You don't socialize beyond your family, have no hobbies and live alone."

  She inclined her head. "All very true. Would you want to be near a woman whose senses put her in touch with the star for the purpose of examining everything around her in detail? Dekkar gave me a curiosity for life and how it worked, that does not lead to easy relationships."

  Yaedo extended his hand and she put hers in it. The small contact of skin on skin sent a shiver down her spine.

  "You put your hand in mine without hesitation, but claim to be averse to relationships. That isn't right." His clearly chiselled lips twitched in a smile.

  Huana jerked her hand back. "Don't tease. Dekkar tinkered with my reflexes and we both know it."

  "Perhaps he did it to get around your normal instincts. They appear designed to keep people away." In an unexpected move, he leaned forward and stroked her hair from her face.

  Her heart started pounding in a heady beat, her skin tingled and she fought for control.

  "You see? Even a light touch and you are fighting it."

  Huana closed her eyes and let the reactions come. She didn't seek his touch, but when it came, brushing back the golden swath of her hair and stroking down her neck, she sucked in a breath of surprise.

  His fingers trailed lightly over her skin, waking nerves that had never had to process this kind of sensation. Her tunic blocked access below her collarbone, so he cupped her neck in both palms and stroked her jaw line with his thumbs.

  Her senses told her of his approach and she didn't dodge the kiss. The first press of his li
ps on hers was so light, she wasn't even sure that it had happened until its companion skated along her skin.

  When he withdrew, she opened her eyes in surprise. Her nerves were humming and his face was very close. She drew in a deep breath and mentally kicked herself as the scent of aroused male struck her. Heat was coming off him in waves and when he made a noise low in his throat, she winced as her body responded with an internal spasm that resulted in moisture.

  His voice was a low purr. "That settles that." His fingers stroked down her neck once again and then he turned back to the controls.

  It took her three tries to ask, "Settles what?"

  "That Dekkar intended us for each other. I had my doubts when he told me I would be travelling with a seeker. Now, I see that our star has much more wisdom than I do."

  She smiled and turned back to the nav station, double-checking their trajectory. "Dekkar is full of surprises. I have spoken to Hashka who are in the colonies of other stars and they don't have nearly the sense of humour that ours does."

  His grin was visible out of the corner of her eye.

  They flew in silence until he breeched it. "What are we looking for?"

  She bit her lip and rubbed her forehead. "From what I have been able to determine, H'skar has been used as a party zone. A new race of Hashka is said to be on the planet, but none of the stars have reported being patrons to them. Whatever is going on there is not being recorded or viewed by our stars."

  "How is that possible?"

  "I believe that the answer lies in the report of a series of asteroids that never left this system. I don't know if it is possible to move a planet by pounding it with rocks, but if it is, that might be the problem."

  You have done well, seeker. Yaedo's eyes were glowing and his smile was slight. The voice that had come from him was a modulated tone of rich, rolling notes. Dekkar was speaking through him.

  "Thank you, dearest star, but we are not there yet. Is the priest aware of you?"

  He is, though he is wondering why you are referring to him as the priest. You have been calling him by his name.