by Pearl Tate
CHAPTER TWENTY
- Nitara
I’m roused from a deep sleep by fear, so intense that I know instantly it’s not mine. Mihile! He’s not in bed with me. I’ve no idea how long I’ve been out, but the side of bed he was on is cold.
The light in the room has faded as the day ended, and I glance around, wondering where my clothes are. The lump of fear is a knot sitting in the pit of my stomach. I don’t hear any commotion outside the door, so I know he isn’t out there.
Would he really have gone somewhere without me? I think back to the conversation with the men earlier. He wanted to go back to his home. If he had belongings there that were important to him— pictures or paraphernalia—I could totally understand. As it was, we did that trip the first time. The small bag of items he carried from there is still sitting in the corner behind the door.
Instead, he’s practically ready to sacrifice himself to help everyone discover what the Councilors, and it looks like the church here, are up to. Considering we’re planning on getting out of here—hopefully before the Marel show up—I don’t know why he cares so much. It’s definitely hard to relate to, but Mihile is clearly a more caring person than I am.
Letting the door slide open briefly, despite the fact that I’m not dressed yet, I yell, “April!” I’m still trying to get my legs into the jumpsuit I found on the floor when she comes to the door, the slab sliding into the wall silently.
When she sees I’m still sitting on the bed undressed, she steps in and to the side, so the door slides shut. “Please tell me there’s something important, and you’re not just yelling for me for fun.” Walking to the window, she stares out while I finish getting dressed.
“Have you seen Mihile?” I want to tell her why—tell her everything, but I’m too desperate to see if anyone was in on him leaving. Maybe some of the others went with him, and he’s not alone.
“No. Actually, I’m pretty sure everyone thought he was in here.” April turns around slowly, her eyes taking in the tangled blankets. “Did he hit it and run?” She’s laughing, but it dies on her lips when her gaze settles on my face.
Standing, I draw the sides of my fastener together. As soon as the closure ends meet, the garment begins the process of fastening itself, and I’m already heading into the bathroom, pulling my heavy hair into a quick braid. “I’m assuming he took off to go back to his place and access his mother’s private files the way he discussed earlier with Bren and Matthias. He seems pretty determined to single-handedly expose this bullshit himself.”
April moves behind me, meeting my eyes in the mirror with her hands on her hips. “Well, he is pretty self-sufficient. If anyone can do it, it’ll be him.”
“We need to go help him.” Splashing water on my face, I use the towel as I listen in April begin to psychoanalyze me.
“Are you sure you’re not just worried he won’t come back? You know how the mating works, right? Mihile may be a little different, but he seems really into you—”
“He may get himself killed!” Shoving by her, I have to wait for the door opener to engage before I can get out. Tapping my hand on the door frame, I try to keep it together. “I felt his fear. Something’s wrong.”
Even as I say it, I know it’s true. Sure, it’s not as bad as when I first woke up, but there’s an uneasy pit of dread in my gut, and for all intents and purposes, I should be great. I’m safe, with friends, and just had incredible sex, although I don’t really know how long ago that was. One of the most annoying parts of the whole Quasar experience is not having proper time. Some of the ladies have watches, but I don’t.
“How long has it been?” Spinning around when I almost reach the door to the kitchen area, I quiz April who I can hear following me. “I mean, since Mihile and I went back to our room?”
She shrugs. We’ve been playing this game for weeks. It’s easier to just kind of guesstimate about what the time of day is. “If I had to guess, I’d say you went down just around late afternoon and now it’s almost seven. Past dinner time…”
Her voice trails off as a commotion kicks up in the other room. “Okay, people. Listen up.” It’s Hannah’s take charge voice that’s yelling. Some kind of banging follows, and as we walk into the room, I see it’s more crowded than when I left earlier.
Another group of three males are sitting at the table watching the Accord, but Hannah is pounding on the table, and one by one they exit the viewer as everyone else in the room winds down with what they were doing. Conversations trail off, and Bren, who was across the room with a few other men, walks over, bending down to whisper in her ear.
Hannah pauses to talk to him, giving me time to reach them. “I don’t mean to interrupt,” even though I totally do. The fearful, uneasy feeling in the pit of my stomach demands that I make this a priority. “Have you seen or heard from Mihile?”
Who knows? Maybe he did work something out before he left. Maybe he just didn’t want to disturb me so he let everyone else know where he went? I’d be so relieved…
“No.” Bren pulls away from Hannah, a look of anticipation in his features. Rubbing his brows, he looks around the room. “If he left, he didn’t talk to me. Hannah, maybe you can ask as you’re winding down, but we need to get everyone in the loop. I’m not sure all of us should go to this, even if it is open to the public.”
Hannah nods to Bren while she grabs my elbow, pulling me a few steps away. “You should be able to tell if he’s nearby. Just relax and see what you sense by the time I’m done telling everyone the news here. Okay? Just don’t panic and go running off. If he left you here with us, he was counting on you being here when he came back.”
Gritting my teeth, it takes everything in me not to argue. I just want to go to him so badly, my whole body is shaking in anticipation. Taking a deep breath, I try to take her advice, letting my eyes drop to half mast, I sink further into myself as if I’m blocking out the world to meditate.
Every time I’ve been able to talk to him or see him, whether it was falling asleep or whatever, I’ve used the breathing and relaxation techniques I’ve used all my life. Emptying my thoughts, I ignore Hannah as she turns away to talk to Bren again.
Moving behind her, I put my back against the wall and allow myself to slide down the hard surface until I’m cross-legged on the floor. Concentrate, damn it! This is important. Where is he?
Part of my frustration and aggravation is Mihile and I talked about this… I thought? Didn’t we? I supposed he didn’t actually agree to anything.
Hannah’s voice rises, cutting into my concentration, as she begins to recap on her conversations with the Council and Church Leaders at their Sanctuary. Because they’re celebrating The Presentation Holiday, they’ve been slow to set up any kind of meetings and really give them a proper audience.
Instead, the Council has been quick to tell the public that they had no idea the Discovery was on its way back. They claim it was against orders, and they’ve declared the entire crew treasonous due to their “dereliction of their duties.”
Fortunately, they didn’t immediately throw them in jail or anything, and Bren believes this may have a lot to do with the fact that they’d have a hard time doing that. So far, the Discovery hasn’t seen any of the other Quasar spacecrafts like the Explorer. The Explorer had a broadcast shortly after Vekel tried to sabotage the Discovery, immediately going silent afterward. Everyone is fairly certain that the entire ship and it’s crew no longer exists.
“… But they have agreed to meet with us. Immediately.” Hannah smooths back her hair, swiveling her head from one side to the next, trying to address everyone. She even glances behind herself, giving me a tense smile when her eyes land on me.
“Because of the way they’ve handled everything up until this point, I think we should have all the members of the Discovery and their mates, along with any other crew here on Quasar go with us. Then, it’s up to the rest of the men in The Proscribe Movement if they want to come to stand with us, or watch the procee
dings, or skip it all together. If you align yourself with us, you’ll be putting yourself in danger. We’ve only mentioned briefly to the Council why we went silent to travel back to Quasar. We’ve also told them the Marel stopped one of our shuttles and held us up. So… they don’t know we have the Accord. They don’t know that we know about the females’ agreement and their involvement to stop the matings. That’s one thing at least, but there’s no way to know if we should get into all those specifics until we see what they try to say to us. Right now, we’re just exposing the Marel and their potential tie into the involvement to sabotage all our Quasar ships. We need to find out if the Council has petitioned the Coalition, notifying them of the Marel being in our zone. Unfortunately, since we aren’t part of the Council, it’s hard to say. Does this all make sense?”
Hannah pauses, turning in a full circle this time to make sure no one catches her eye to ask her anything, but the room is silent. “We just don’t need to start running at the mouth about the Accord at this point. Let’s wait until we know for sure that we can somehow get the information out to everyone. Otherwise, we put even more of a target on our backs because they’ll want to get their hands on the Accord. Only if we all end up in their version of confinement—which will probably be the Mating Re-emergence Study, then Barek can drop the bomb, utilizing all his expert witnesses that have viewed the Accord and going public with their testimony. Make sense?”
There’s a murmur of agreement as everyone nods. I guess I get it. At this point, they’re just dealing with the fact that someone tried to sabotage the Discovery, and now that the Marel are here in orbit around Quasar. It’s looking more and more like that someone is not only working with the Marel from the planet Quasar but selling out their own species in the process.
At this point, it doesn’t look like there’s any way this could be happening without the Council’s knowledge. Especially if they haven’t heard from other crafts like the Discovery. Obviously, they’re hoping to kill off all their wayward, space traveling males out on their crafts.
Is it a last ditch effort to stop the matings from continuing to happen? By killing everyone? It seems a little extreme to me, but people in power have a tendency to do whatever it takes to maintain that power, despite the consequences to anyone else.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
- Mihile
Backing up from my mother, I consider running, but what would be the point? She’s an old, frail woman whose only strength is the Contingent she commands with the Council. Plus, what could she possibly want from me?
Throwing out my senses, I realize that right now, she’s alone. Sure, there are others coming, but they won’t be here for some time. Maybe she only stopped here for something before heading back out. She wasn’t expecting me to be here, just as I assumed previously. Her, along with all the Councilors are probably convinced that I’m running off with my tail between my legs, but I just can’t do that.
There are too many other Quasars who need to know the truth. Not only about the females’ treaty in the past with the Ashen that stopped the matings, but also how they’ve manipulated our religion we all assumed was God-given, and twisted everything to suit their own purposes. Plus, there’s also the Marel. How long have they been peddling the poor and orphans? Who's profiting? I have so many questions for my mother.
“Mihile, please. Don’t look at me like that. Surely, you understand why I didn’t tell you what was happening to your body? We wanted to reverse it and fix you to be as good as new—”
“Fix me!” My voice echoes as I walk closer to her, moving into the outer room where the large, tree-like statue fills the space. “I’m not broken.”
Choking back my anger, I try to focus. My vision is tinged with red as I think about how they planned to tinker with my genetic code and cut off the first and best thing that’s ever happened to me. Breathing deeply, I brace my hands on the surface of one of the branches of the statue. It’s warmer than I expect, sending a low tickle through my hands. I watch with fascination as the shimmering aura around it expands down over me.
“Not fix you. Just make sure that you’re given every advantage possible. Eventually, you’d want to join with a promised, but you have a long life ahead of you, and you never mentioned any interest in joining.” The Sacred Mother—my mother—moves closer, dropping her voice slightly. “I always wanted you by my side… in everything.”
I can’t help the snort that escapes as I shake my head. “Since when? You shared nothing with me. I’ve always been treated as a pariah due to my vision. It’s as if others are afraid I’m contagious.”
“But Helper Tracala… she so enjoyed her time with you and was entertaining the idea of offering me a promise commitment for her harem. It’s why she took the assignment… to get to know you better.” I watch the lies she spews change her aura as the energy and light around her spins uncontrollably. She’s nervous and lying, but I can tell she honestly does care. She loves me. She just has a horrible way of showing it.
“If all that’s true… if you planned to have me be a part of your life, then why did you hide so much from me? My entire existence is a fabrication. When were you going to start sharing the truth?” Throwing out my arms in frustration, my voice rises, echoing around us.
“Oh, Mihile… I’ve always known you’re special, but you were an anomaly we’d never had before. A shaman that was born completely blind. You fit the description of multiple prophecies, but they never implied or spoke of your handicap or that you wouldn’t be able to see. I was waiting to see if you would develop sight.” My mother’s face spreads into a smile, something I’ve never had the pleasure to see before. “And look… now you have!”
As if it’s all her doing, she crosses the floor to move closer, throwing her arms around me. “This is a miracle, don’t you think?”
Pulling her arms from my shoulders, I step back out of her embrace, watching her expression fall. “Maybe it is. But don’t you realize, if you’d succeeded at stopping the mating in me, you might have made my sight disappear again. How could you do that to me?”
“No, no! I wouldn’t have let that happen.” Moving closer again, she smooths her hands down the front of my robe, and I watch, nauseated, as the dark gray tunnels of spinning matter between us enlarge, drowning out the colors in my aura. “You have to believe that—”
“If you’re telling me the truth and you planned to make sure I was with you here forever, what’s this prophesy that you were telling Vina Likana that I was supposed to fulfill? You know… the one that you changed?”
Her face morphs to concern at my words before a resolute expression shores up her features. “Yes, I heard you… mother.” I can’t help the venom that colors my tone.
Pointing to my ears, I shrug. “I’ve always had incredible hearing due to my lack of sight, but since my mating marks started and my vision began, my hearing has improved exponentially, as well.” She doesn’t need to know anything besides that. They already know too much as far as I’m concerned.
Crossing her arms in front of her, she waves me to a seating area a few steps away. Not waiting, she walks over and sinks into one of the large, plush seats. “We didn’t send someone in your place. We just didn’t send you with Remus when he left to find his brother. Travek left the Discovery and disappeared traveling to Earth when the matings started. I believe he had his own personal reasons to look, but he ended up finding a mate I hear—”
Cutting her off because she acts like we’re going to socialize about the event, I ask what really interests me. “What’s Initiative Two?” I already have a suspicion about this, but it isn’t until I watch her aura shrink tight to her body that I think I may be right. I now know that even though I may get some partial truths, she’s still hiding things from me.
“Oh, Mihile. You’re going to judge me so harshly for this. You can’t understand the tough decisions that leaders have to make for the good of the people as a whole—”
“What’s Init
iative Two?” I repeat. For the first time, I look hard at my mother. She looks old… and tired… maybe this does wear on her.
“It’s the decision to purge our crews in orbit—”
“Purge?” Her mouth hangs open as she looks at me, stuttering slightly on how to answer. “Do you mean kill? Blow them up?” Despite how I’ve told myself I can remain calm, my voice rises in anger and disgust.
Instead of answering, she nods as her face falls slightly before she straightens. “Yes, it’s horrible, but it’s a very normal and necessary back up plan for contamination. There are a lot of reasons why it might be used. Invasion… if our crews were taken over by another species with the intent to come back to the planet and utilize the crafts as a way to gain access to harm or kill our citizens, the captains have fail-safes they’d employ on their end. That’d be an “Initiative One”. Initiative Two is when we take action from our end because we believe that they’ve been infected.”
Shaking my head, slightly, I finally sink into the chair across from her. “What was the contamination? Are you referring to the matings?”
“It isn’t just the matings! It’s a whole new species that has invaded our families and our government. We have an Earth female with as many rights as a Quasar female. They haven’t even developed long-range space flight yet! They’re babies in the universe compared to us, and now they’re taking our men. And she’s pregnant… so they’re polluting our bloodlines. I don’t begrudge the Council’s petition to keep any more of them from coming to the planet…”
My stomach rolls at the realization of what they intend to do. Or already have. How many ships did they roll out “Initiative Two” on? I don’t even want to know. All of this because of racism and bigotry? Fear of those who are different. I think about my mate and her kind and gentle ways. “Does this mean you don’t want to meet my mate?”
