Kahne helped Bruv defend our backs as we sought our escape route. Though Kahne was only eight and Bruv not even three years older, both were better with the traditional scythe than I was. The few spears and shorter-tipped arrows that reached for us were sliced in pieces by these two.
The female miner held back with them, firing from her own weaponry, a tool she held between both hands. Her voice carried over the din. “We’ve got to move faster, Ohre!”
“Keep your gasses tight, Adi!”
We continued to stumble madly through the forest. By now the sounds of the dying screams had faded in our ears. But we could only run so long and so far in a primeval wood before we collapsed. More than once I wondered if we were going in the right direction. The aliens had split up, a hunting party continuing to trail us until Adi and Ohre disposed of them. By this point we were farther in the interior than we’d ever been before and I was too burdened to care. Even if we’d had the endurance of the miners it would not have been enough. The mud grew thicker and we barely kept my brother from falling into another pit. And once the rains broke with a crackling warning above, I lost the will to go any farther.
Adi, the other miner, paced in constant circles around us muttering aloud her frustrations.
I let loose my first tears against Ohre’s chest. Once again he sheltered me while I grieved the loss of someone I loved. Tamn’s revelation was fresher and more acutely painful than the fact that we had just plummeted from the heavens on a scrap of home world ship. Curious how sometimes it is a simple thing that triggers our grief again.
I had no hope Tamn had made it through the wet alien world this time, could not help the feeling I had lost something irreplaceable once again. I may have desired Ohre, but Tamn was my best friend, the reason I had pushed us so desperately to find the Pioneer. And I realized then that a part of my soul had always and would always love him.
We fell asleep at the base of the closely knotted trees and did not notice the gaze of watchers from the canopy above.
VIII: FORGIVEN
I dreamed I was floating amid the stars, sinking into one of those black spaces where the heavens swirled together until they became the undersea lights of our ancient home world. Occasionally the blackness of the deep would give way to a softer, warm lantern light and I could see faces I knew better than my own. Min was there, and beside him was Qori with her little brother Gem tucked into her arms between them. Gem, who was only half a hunan now, because I hadn’t been strong enough.
“Fight the tide, Qeya,” Gem whispered the proper farewell for our kind. Their faces blurred and traded places with a strange fur-coated people whose hands were oddly similar to ours. They brought me comfort and sleep.
I thought perhaps I woke occasionally, but was no longer really able to tell the difference between dreams and the waking world. I saw flashes of home world and the smoke that burned half the city as we rushed for the lights of a crude mining vessel. I saw the past generations of rulers through my mother’s eyes and those of her mother before her and so on down our line. Because I was Royal and my parents were dead, I saw the world through ancient and young eyes and tried not to hate them for burdening me with the weight of their memories when they died.
I heard the screams of the children I had failed to save and Menai’s face as I set his soul free from his body.
It was a relief when I opened my eyes to something recognizable. In the glow of torchlight, two faces appeared above me, so familiar because I had never been long without them. My golden brother, the prince, was crying and laughing at once. Then I knew I must still be dreaming, because Hanea was no longer silent from shock as she had been for so long, but full of life and heavy concern as she smoothed my brow with her hand.
“She’s burning up again, Arvex,” she hissed and my brother’s laughter was traded in for quiet fear. I had not seen him look so fearful since the day we left home world as children, when he was too young to keep it hidden away.
He rushed to my side and clasped my cheeks in his hands. “Qeya? Qeya, can you hear me? If she’s awake, why won’t she say anything?” He turned and growled as if he expected Hanea to answer. Her pale hands rose to clasp his arm.
“Love, we should fetch the healer.”
Arvex brushed her hand aside and each word he spoke sounded farther and farther away. “I won’t have any of those savages touching my sister! She’s the bleeding Orona! She can heal herself, can’t you Qeya?”
Darkness claimed me once more and I had the faintest irrational concern before the stars and memories of home world took me. I remembered the forbidden undersea palace and how much Tamn and I had spoken of wanting to live there one day. His silver-shaded eyes danced as he listened to me spout off the adventures to be had below the waves and the treasures just waiting to be reclaimed. This had been before we left home world, when Tamn was simply my friend, before I was told he would one day be bonded to me. Thoughts of Tamn made me ache inside deeply, for a reason I could not remember.
When I opened my eyes the third time, it was dark. I could see only the golden glow of large eyes set into three small and again familiar faces. Bruv, Kahne and Jymee whispered together and struggled to find the best positions beside my bed.
“Shh! They’ll hear you, stupid,” Bruv said to Jymee, who was still much smaller and energetic than Bruv, Kahne and Gem combined. Bruv then grunted when Kahne whacked his head with her palm and hissed, “Leave him alone. We’re all scared without you making more noise.”
Bruv made a sour face. “But if Ohre or those Nuki hear us—”
“We’ll manage,” Kahne interrupted with a heated whisper. “Jymee was going crazy and so am I. They shouldn’t have kept us in the dark.”
“She’s so still.” Jymee reached over the edge to rest his fingertips on my cheek and I shivered at the feeling, at the tears that filled his glowing eyes. I felt the twinge of his pain in the instant he touched me, and much as I wanted to comfort him, I wanted to escape even more.
I did not fight it when the darkness claimed me again. And for some time I drifted, weightless among the heavens. This kind of peace was something I had not known since Arvex and I were children. I might never know that peace again if I woke. I might have floated there forever, until I heard him call me back.
“You don’t have to wake if you don’t want to, Navigator,” a rough and almost gravelly voice spoke against my ear and pulled me from oblivion.
I wanted to open my eyes and see past the darkness, but couldn’t find the strength. Anger filled me with this realization, a flicker of my old inner fire. I was strong, just as Arvex had said. I was the Orona and I should have been able to heal myself. Why, then, did Ohre speak in fear, for the first time since I had known him? And how long had he been sitting here by my side, wherever here was?
“I wouldn’t blame you for sailing away to join the rest of the ship in the afterlife, you see. But I wouldn’t forgive you for leaving me, either.” He paused to take in an unsteady breath.
I willed my body to move and comfort him. Once again, the light I had always felt inside of me was impossible to reach, the flame extinguished. Only dying coals glowed faintly amid the ashes.
“We’ve come too far, worked too hard keeping those whelps alive. Don’t you dare expect me to look after them once you’re gone. I—I would have let them all die if it meant keeping you here with me.”
My heart raced and I would have cried had I been able. I felt something soft brush against the gills along my neck and felt as if I were falling, or flying. It was enough to bring the essence of me back to my body. At the same moment, it brought back the reality of our situation and the lingering ache in my being from having used so much to try and save Menai. Was I doomed to spend the rest of my life constantly hunted and trying to save the dying around me? It might have been easier to simply let my light go out and join the others, as he said, but I had never backed down from a challenge in my life.
And though I was afraid of his words
and what his touch could mean, I forced myself to wake to a pair of slanted dark eyes set in a tattooed face. “Ohre?” The air seemed stolen from his chest as the gills along his neck flared wide with surprise, and then his smile broke through the dim light.
“You made it through, Navigator,” he finally said, roughly, as his demeanor shifted back to his usual stoic humor.
But he hadn’t been quick enough. I had seen the joy and overwhelming need fill those strange dark eyes. And much as I wanted to cover his hand with mine, to find some irrational comfort from the reason for my living, recent memories numbed me. I remembered screams and shouts as we fought a mysterious and ruthless enemy in the forest. I remembered Menai and Gem and Qori’s terror when he slipped away from us. I remembered Tamn’s lips on mine before he and the others stayed back, so we could escape, so we could live.
Stretching out stiff limbs I looked past my protector and frowned. My gaze met the roof of a wooden hut. Light poured in from the door, brighter than the forest floor I’d remembered falling asleep upon. Everything after was a blur. I could only assume I had used much more energy than I should have in trying to save a dying child, a friend.
“Where are we? Did you build this? How long have I been asleep?” I demanded my answers with the same authority my mother had once used on top deck. It sounded weaker now and Ohre’s eyes crinkled with amusement.
“A few days and nights is all, but most of you royals have slept like this since we arrived. You haven’t missed much.” His smile split his face nearly in two. The expression came easily to him yet seemed so new. I wanted him to smile more often.
“I’ve been sleeping that long?” Raking my eyes over his clean and oddly well-groomed appearance, I grew suspicious. I remembered flickers of my crew, the other survivors, but those images too were blurred to me now. “You haven’t been with me this whole time have you?”
Something shifted in his gaze, his smile tensing somewhere between acceptance and a frown. “Not exactly. We searched for the missing and then had to fetch the others back at camp.”
“How is Gem?” I whispered and nearly choked just thinking about those we had lost. Tamn’s first and lass kiss burned on my conscience.
“He spends most of his time with his sister, the dark-headed one you call Qori.”
With a flash of sudden clarity, I remembered Gem speaking over this same bed, bidding me farewell. And at once, I knew how close to death I had been. If I looked close enough, I could see the truth written in Ohre’s careworn features.
Again I thought of Tamn and misplaced farewells. How could I not have seen his feelings for me sooner? How much time had been wasted? I was young, but old enough to bond, if that was what we both wanted. Our families would have rejoiced.
Yet looking into the face of the miner who had fascinated me so, I felt conflicted all over again. Things were different now, complicated and yet less so. Ohre could never have become so close to me were we still on Datura 3, yet I couldn’t say whether I could choose him now if I wanted to. I hadn’t even begun to grieve for my best friend just yet. Only after he was gone could I admit I had loved Tamn with a different, tempered passion than what I felt for Ohre.
Realizing the miner was watching me with sad eyes, I wondered why he didn’t feel triumph. He could claim me now if I agreed to his suit and eventually I might accept. Ohre’s love was as wild, and raw as his roughly hewn people. Once I had thought them barbarians, and us the elite. Now I knew they were the true hunans. We were faulty because we pushed our feelings into some deep repressed part of our souls. The miners relished in their ability to feel. I wanted that.
Again, I remembered his words as he thought I slept, as he called me back to him and to the living. I saw what he wouldn’t tell me in his eyes. Timidly, I reached for his hand and said, “How long before you go?”
“Soon as you’re well enough to get on, we’re leaving. We can’t stay here in the trees, Navigator. It’s unnatural for a miner. We’re going back to the cave, back to the ship to salvage what’s left. See if we can make a new start…” His eyes were already lost among the heavens, I realized, where his kind had finally discovered a kind of freedom.
“Wait, trees? What do you mean?”
His mouth slashed into a tilted smirk. “You’ll see soon enough.”
“Just tell me where we are, Ohre, before I shove my scythe up your gears!”
His chuckle brightened the room, evaporating the muted tension between us. When his eyes softened and fingertips pressed against mine I could feel the peace and joy and deeper hidden emotions that he had kept buried under years of hard labor in the black bowels of a ship. Only recently had I learned the things he kept nearest to his heart, these feelings were for me. “The place is called Nukvar Valley.”
“Nukvar?” I tested the alien name on my tongue. “You come up with that all on your own?”
Shaking his head, his eyes gleamed with secrets I was yet to discover. “No. You’ll have to ask them how they got the leaking name,” he teased.
“Them?” I asked, vaguely remembering small furred people with strange alien eyes, and Hanea asking for a healer while Arvex refused to let them near. If this was my brother’s attitude toward our saviors, it was a miracle we were still breathing. With this in mind, I made my decision. Arvex needed me. Whether we led an entire world or a small band of younglings, I was his other half. I couldn’t take that away from him, like Menai was taken from Gem.
In the same moment, looking into the miner’s open expression, I knew he was my destiny. On Datura, we could have never been more than strangers. But now, here, we were bound together. I woke up grieving for everything I had lost. Now I had hope.
“Tell me everything,” I said, placing a hand on his arm. He stared at the place our skins touched, lost until I pressed more firmly and asked him again. I wondered why, instead of sharing in my hope, he looked back at me with sad eyes.
“We thought we were done for. The rest of Pioneer held off the Var, but they were gaining on us. You were…lost to us,” he said with some difficulty and looked away as he continued. “And the little ones were not far behind. Adi and me thought we were gonna have to fight them off alone. Until the Nuki came.
They appeared like ghosts, throwing spears and other crude weapons from the trees. I think we hadn’t really even looked up until that moment. We ran straight under their village and they chased the Var off. The others climbed down ropes and ladders to snatch us. They brought us to this corner of the village and we’ve been here since.”
“I want to see it,” I told him, determined to get out of this bed even if it killed me. Some of my miner came back into his face, then. He smirked and eyed me.
“Sure that’s a wise maneuver, Navigator?”
I rolled my eyes and refused his aid to climb off the bed. Gingerly, still in some pain, I stepped out of the hut so I could see for myself. I had never seen a village built in the trees, could never have imagined the network of bridges and ropes and hopes carved into the trees themselves.
Ohre showed me that my people’s new home was connected to the main village, but set apart too. This area had been abandoned ever since the families who had lived here previously had been killed by those who dwell below. My brother and extended family were faced now with a life far different from the one we left behind.
“All of this for us? We can stay?” I stared at the huts teeming with the curious faces of the diminutive Nuki people.
Ohre nodded. “These are just temporary. Something been brewing further up the west end, so I’ve heard. Arvex says that’s where you’ll stay soon. The little ones have adjusted well.”
“I expected as much.” I paused, noticing the way his lips kept tugging into an infuriating grin as he glanced at me from the corner of his eye. “Don’t look at me like that.”
“Like what?” he asked, feigning shock. I knew better.
“No doubt you and the other miner find it hilarious we’ve adapted so well in the tr
ees.”
“Your people have always set your sights high,” he teased. I watched as he caught a stray flower hanging from its vine off a nearby branch and tucked it into my hair. His smile was sad. “Qeya, there’s something else you should know.”
Frowning at the flowers and ignoring the flutter his touch made me feel in my chest, I said, “What?”
“Miner!” Arvex’s voice boomed over the bridge and I moved in front of Ohre to better see him. Arvex’s eyes were murderous as he stalked up to the miner, Hanea fast on his trail. “What were you thinking, letting her out here!” His eyes blazed and Hanea pleaded with him.
“Arvex, love, please…”
Ignoring her, he did his best to reach around me to Ohre, but the miner easily caught Arvex’s fist in his larger hand. A tense moment passed between the two, the Royal and the miner glaring at one another with different shades of fury. But Arvex made the mistake of glancing at me. Our connection flared to life again when I reached out to cover their fists with my hand.
“At ease, your highness,” I teased my golden boy.
Arvex sputtered. “But you’re… How did you heal when we thought…” He looked back and forth between me and the miner, then shook his head. Unclenching his fist, he turned to face me and laughed. “You cold-gilled wirm!” Then I was caught up in his arms and facing Hanea over his shoulder.
She smiled shyly up at me and her resemblance to Tamn was so strong, a cold chill settled like a scythe to my gut.
Arvex was speaking over me, meanwhile, in his usual over-excited manner. I wanted to shut him up and remind him I was not Hanea. I was his sister and therefore had every right to tell him when he sounded like an arrogant know-it-all. But according to Arvex—and if his open concern was anything to go by, Ohre—I had almost died.
Ohre stepped back from us, that unnamed sadness back in his eyes. I couldn’t understand why he would look so defeated when he must have already felt I had chosen him. I would not give up, simply because my brother was meant to be king. Did any of it matter, now that we were lost to this backwater world for good?
Qeya (Heaven's Edge Novellas Book 1) Page 9
