by Kate Rudolph
She didn't get normal at home. That's what the NaZades were for.
Every weekend she headed over there for family dinner. Her parents had tried to be involved a couple of years ago. But it had been awkward and eventually they decided it was best to just let Manda go on her own.
"You could stay with us tonight," her mother said from where she was sitting on the couch as Manda had her hand on the doorknob.
Manda clenched her hand so hard that she feared she would dent the metal and squeezed her eyes shut. "It's our weekly dinner, I always go. I'm not going to change my plans now." It came out harsher than she intended. But her mom knew this.
"They're just--"
Manda left before she could say something she couldn't take back. Her parents couldn't quite forgive the NaZades for rescuing Manda. It was a strange situation. They were thankful she was free. Thankful that she wasn't lost in space somewhere.
But the fact that it had been random chance that saved Manda galled them. They had spent almost all the credits they had to hire mercenaries and bounty hunters and investigators to find her. And none of them had.
Not until Braxtyn and Vita came across her on a completely accidental trip.
Manda passed by her car and kept walking. Her mother would have wanted her to drive, but the NaZade house was close. There was no use. She knew how to use her knife very well. And she was in screaming distance of plenty of help if anything went wrong. To make things even easier for her parents, she stuck to the sidewalk, rather than taking the path through the woods that would get her there a few minutes faster.
She was ready for a nice, normal dinner. But when she got to the NaZades', everyone was acting strangely. She had just taken her jacket off when she noticed that Braxtyn was looking at her like she had dirt on her face or something. Manda wiped at it, but there wasn't anything there.
It was strange how it didn't hurt to look at Braxtyn, despite the fact that he was Deke's identical twin. She felt nothing for him except friendship, and--at the moment--a bit of apprehension.
Naomi was sitting on the couch, and she wouldn't look at Manda at all. She was human, just like Manda, and her dark brown skin was warmed by the overhead lights.
Naomi was psychic. Had she experienced a vision about Manda?
It was a little strange to think that a woman as normal as Naomi had psychic visions, but she did. Sometimes she told the others about them. But no one asked. It would be very easy to get into the habit of having her divine the future. But she was a person before she was a psychic. And she deserved to have as much of a normal life as anyone else.
So Manda didn't ask if Naomi had had a vision about her. Naomi would share if she wanted to.
"Okay, what's going on?" Naomi and Braxtyn were acting like someone had died.
"Food is ready," Shayn called from the kitchen. He had found a love of cooking over the past several years and was training to be a chef.
Manda stared at Braxtyn, one eyebrow raised, just waiting to see what he would say.
"It's, um, it's..." he stuttered.
Wonderful. Manda turned to Vita. "Care to translate?" she asked. Out of everyone at the dinner, Vita was most likely to give Manda a straight answer. Vita had once been a bounty hunter, and Manda imagined that the bloodred of her hair had been used as some kind of warning for the baddies of the galaxy so they knew that vengeance was coming. She didn't pull her punches. Doryan, another Detyen, and Amy, his mate and her boss, weren't there, but they would also be allies if they were.
Still, Vita seemed to hesitate. Then she finally said, "Deke sent a message."
"And?" That wasn't anything new. Deke had sent his family messages before. Never to her. And she was getting tired of hoping. She might have succumbed to girlish dreams in the comforting darkness of her own room, but she wasn't going to admit to those at the NaZade house. Here, she had to put on a strong front. If they started to pity her, she wouldn't be able to stay. She couldn't live with that. She had survived so much. Come so far. She wasn't going to let Deke ruin this thing too.
"He left a note for you as well," Vita said. She picked up a tablet from the table and handed it over to Manda.
Manda stared down at the blank screen. All she would have to do was wake up the tablet and she could read the words that Deke had sent her. The first words she had gotten directly from him in years. She didn't want to do it, but she couldn't resist.
She pressed the button to wake up the tablet.
Dear Manda,
How are you doing? It's hard to believe that four years have gone by so fast, and I'm sorry that I have not communicated better. I'm trying to change that. I want to change that.
For the next month or so I will be sticking in one place. I have attached the coordinates to the message, so if you would like to send me communications I can guarantee that I'll read them. If you would like to do some sort of video chat or something like that, I could be convinced. I've never stopped thinking of you. I hope to hear from you soon.
Yours,
Deke
Manda read it. Then she read it again. And then she got pissed. It was a whole lot of nothing. It was something that a stranger could have sent her. How is she doing? He hoped she would chat with him? He was supposed to be her mate, not some stranger pretending at being a penpal!
She would have thrown the tablet if it was her own property, but it was Vita's and Vita was scary, so she wasn't going to do that.
Shayn called from the kitchen again, threatening to throw out all the food if they didn't get to the table in the next thirty seconds. He'd done it before, so they all scrambled to the table. Manda was thankful for the temporary distraction. How was she supposed to process what she had just read?
The others were looking at her. They had all clearly read that message. Manda was trying to figure out what to do next.
Did she want to send Deke a message?
Possibly. It would just be a picture of her middle finger.
It would be satisfying for a moment, but it would be childish. And the last thing she wanted was for Deke to think of her like a child. He'd run away because she was young. She didn't believe for a second that he would come back, but she didn't want him to think she was still a kid.
But a message felt like nothing after all these years. Just a few bytes of data sent across light years, words that could mean anything and nothing. She was owed more than that after all this time. She had waited and waited and waited.
She was sick of waiting.
She barely tasted any of the food that Shayn put in front of her. Thankfully, no one tried to talk to her. She didn't know what she would say if they did.
But as she ate, the first trickle of a plan was starting to form. She knew where Deke was for the first time in four years.
She could go to him.
That thought had her sitting up straighter. She hadn't left the planet since she'd been rescued. The thought of getting on some kind of shuttle and willingly leaving the solar system was terrifying.
At the age of eleven she'd been abducted by aliens and sold to the highest bidder. Things had been done to her during her abduction that she still couldn't think about. Things she hadn't been able to tell her therapist, or Doryan, or anyone else. She didn't want to relive those memories. And as safe as the technical aspect of space flight was, there were still pirates and slavers and other evildoers out there lurking, waiting to nab unsuspecting victims.
But that was a rare occurrence. It had already happened to her once. She didn't have any reason to think it would happen a second time. After all, what were the chances of encountering evil aliens twice in a lifetime?
And she knew where Deke was. The thought kept echoing around her head.
They finished dinner and dispersed. Vita had gone to the backyard to enjoy the sunset. She was alone, which made it the perfect time to approach her. If anyone in the NaZade family was going to help her, it would be Vita.
"So what do you think?" Vita asked. She wa
s sitting on a stool that had been carved out of a tree stump. Braxtyn had greatly improved in his woodworking skills over the years and his pieces were all around the property.
It was clear what she was talking about. Deke. "He's probably lucky that I can't murder him with my thoughts from halfway across the galaxy," Manda admitted. Even as her plan was forming, she was still steaming angry.
Vita smiled. "I'm not going to make any excuses for him. I'm mated to his boneheaded twin brother. They can both be difficult at times." She didn't sound too upset about that.
Manda didn't know if she could ever look as contented as Vita did in that moment. "I know where he is now. I want to go there." The words came out in a rush. But now that they were said they couldn't be unsaid. "I'm tired of dancing around this thing. He needs to talk to me for real. And he's only going to do that face-to-face."
Vita seemed to consider it. Manda took it as a good sign that she didn't dismiss it out of hand. "It'll take some planning. Braxtyn and I can be ready by the end of the week."
"That's not what I meant," said Manda. This was the hardest part. But she knew it was the right path. "I don't want you and Braxtyn to come with me. Or any of you. I need to do this on my own. If I show up with his family, he's going to ignore me. I can't give him that chance."
"I think you're underestimating yourself," Vita countered. She was perched on the edge of saying no, Manda could sense it.
But she had to do this. She had to make Vita see reason. If Vita was on her side, the others would come around. "Dekon is afraid of me for some reason. He'll find any reason to avoid me." It was probably a terrible thing to say about her destined mate, but she could feel it in her bones that it was true.
"Manda..."
"Please, Vita." She would get on her knees and beg if she had to. Vita had contacts from her time as a mercenary. If there was anyone in the NaZade family who could help her, it was Vita.
Vita sighed. "I have a favor I can call in. It'll get you passage on a ship. A safe trip. But you're the one who has to tell everybody else. Amy, Doryan, Braxtyn and Shayn and Naomi and your parents. All of them. No sneaking away in the night."
It was kind of scary how well Vita knew her. But even if the temptation was there, Manda would sneak away. Not after all the trauma that would cause. "It's a deal."
It was time to go find her mate.
***
Four years ago, Deke would have scoffed at the idea of staying at the Temple of Peace. It was a space station in the middle of nowhere, far from any planet and outside the reach of any Empire. It was dedicated to peace, tranquility, and healing.
Four years ago, he hadn't needed it. Now he wasn't sure he would survive without it.
He had arrived the day before and settled into a small room. He didn't sleep peacefully. He never did. Not anymore, not when dreams of the things he'd done and the things that had been done to him hounded him like rabid animals. But no one had bothered him when he woke with a scream.
He would need to sign up for meditation sessions to help center himself, but he was still getting used to the station. He decided to walk around and enjoyed the greenery that seemed to grow everywhere. It was possible to forget for a second that he was inside of a space station. But there were plenty of windows that looked out into the endless black of space and reminded him that he was far from home.
He wondered if he would still be allowed in the Temple if they knew what he had done. If they knew how he had spent the last four years.
His hands were covered in blood. When he closed his eyes, he could imagine the viscera.
He flexed his fingers and could feel his claws shifting under his skin. He had used those for violence. If he unsheathed them, they would drip with blood. Of course, he was the only one who could see it. His last mission had been months ago. He was putting that life behind him. He had never chosen it in the first place. But one accidental mission led to another, until he found himself with a specific set of skills that were in high demand in far-off spaceports.
Deke breathed deep of the green air all around him. He had to find a way to get past these thoughts.
He sat on a bench under a drooping tree and pulled out his communicator. He hoped that Manda would call him back. For the first time in years, he'd reached out to her, even if he wasn't sure what to say. It had seemed smartest to just lead with an innocuous message. But more than a week had gone by and she hadn't called him back. He tried not to feel disappointed. After that dream of her trying to pull him from the darkness, he had been moved to talk to her. She deserved the message. Even if he didn't deserve her.
It wasn't fair how he'd kept her waiting. Even if she could never accept him, she deserved to at least talk to him.
But if she didn't message him back, there was no hope. Had he waited too long? Had he missed his shot?
There was a message from Braxtyn. That was a relief. He missed his brother almost more than anything. They hadn't been able to communicate as much as he would have liked. There were long stretches of time where Deke would be unable to send anyone a message. At those times, the only thing that kept him sane were the saved messages he had memorized from his brother and the dreams of Manda.
Deke read the message. It didn't say much. He told Dekon about family dinner and the case that Vita was considering taking on. It was a whole load of nothing. And something seemed to be missing from the report. Yes. There was no mention of Manda.
Maybe that was for the best. It was probably unfair to ask his brother to give him reports about his denya.
Dekon slumped in his seat. Maybe it had been a mistake to give them his coordinates. He couldn't remember the last time he had dared to tell his family where he was. At first he had been concerned that Shayn and Braxtyn would chase him down and drag him home. He had figured they would give him a little time to sulk, but not as much as he needed.
Then one thing led to another, one blood-soaked night led to the next. And now he couldn't go home. Sure, he could hop on a shuttle the next day and no one would stop him. But if he headed back to Earth, a place that had been his home for only a matter of months before he left, he knew he wouldn't find it the same. And he couldn't risk drawing any of the enemies he had made in the past few years down on his family.
Maybe it would be better to just leave the station. Sure, he just got there and it was one of the nicest places he had been in a long time. Sure, he hoped that the meditation sessions would help him deal with all of the darkness in his mind. Sure, this was the break that he needed. But how long would his brothers give him before they came chasing him down?
He didn't know.
Did he want to be caught?
If that was the case, it was some want that was buried very deep.
And whatever he was going to do, he wasn't going to do it today. He decided to find the schedule of meditation sessions. He was on the station for a reason. It was time to take advantage. And if he was going to leave, he could decide that tomorrow.
Chapter Six
The Temple of Peace was too nice to abandon out of fear and doubt. That was the decision Deke had come to after sleeping on it for a couple of days. He could already feel the meditation sessions and therapy helping. His sleep wasn't much easier, but his mind felt... quieter. Maybe the therapists and practitioners knew what they were doing.
He didn't know if he would ever be better. He didn't know if there was any coming back from all of the things that he had done. But he had managed to banish a nightmare or two. That might have had something to do with the calming tea they had given him. But he would gladly take anything that could help.
But just because he was starting to feel a little better, it didn't mean that everything was all right. He still had no messages from Manda, and nothing from his family either. It had been more than a week since he'd sent his letter. He didn't want to insist. He didn't want to be too eager and push her away.
But he couldn't ignore her anymore. How long could he wait? Another day? Two
? He would wait and then he would try again. There had to be some combination of words that would make her speak to him. She was his denya. Or she was supposed to be. If he hadn't waited too long. If he hadn't lost her already.
He couldn't undo the last four years. He couldn't undo the things that he had done, the violence he had witnessed and committed, and he couldn't undo abandoning his mate rather than dealing with a complicated situation.
But he could do better now. He had to do better now.
The station had several predefined walking paths that were designed to offer tranquility to visitors. At first Deke had been skeptical, but now he was enjoying one of them, breathing deep of the green air and trying to center himself. It was easy to forget all of the violence and gore of the outside world when surrounded by greenery and animal sounds. There were even actual birds flying around, but they were shy of visitors and kept to the high ceilings and treetops.
Maybe he could stay at the Temple of Peace for the rest of his life. If Manda wouldn't talk to him, that wouldn't be very long. Two more years, assuming his Detyen ancestry held true.
He'd wasted so much time.
That thought soured the walk and he headed back to his room.
It wasn't much to look at: a bed, a viewscreen he could program to look out on any vista, a small bathroom, and a little machine that let him order small meals. Not much, but more than he'd had in years. Mercenary ships didn't exactly have the best accommodations. But he knew that luxury space stations and resorts would look down on this room as some sort of pauper's quarters.
He didn't need luxury.
He needed peace.
He sat in the chair in front of the viewscreen and was contemplating whether he wanted to look out over a silver ocean or a far-off galaxy when someone knocked at the door.
Deke stiffened. He wasn't scheduled for any more appointments for the day and there was no reason for someone to bother him.
