He blinks, looks down at his hands, flexes his long elegant fingers. “Yes.” And then he turns to me, again watching me sideways, while individual strands of his golden hair float like cobwebs over his shoulder. “I will announce my beautiful Bride as soon as we arrive in Atlantis. What do you think about that, Lark?”
“I—” my breath stumbles, while my heart lurches painfully in my chest. “I wish you all happiness and all the best. Congratulations. . . . You must love each other very much. . . .”
“Oh, yes,” he replies, with a strange expression. “Lady Tirinea Fuorai and I . . . we are—” His words trail away.
“I think I saw you speaking to her once,” I interject softly, awkwardly. “She seems very beautiful, amazing.”
He smiles suddenly, a faint ghost smile. “Oh, she is.” He speaks each word with a measured, barely-leashed force, all the while looking at me with a strange hard gaze. “And I can’t wait to see her, as soon as we get back. . . . Even now, I want to hold her with my hands . . . feel her mouth against my teeth, and press her against the wall—”
My heart is beating so violently that I feel I’m about to have a heart attack. At the same time a bitter horrible lump is starting to build in my throat, and it’s about to burst. . . .
I am about to burst, and become a horrible pitiful thing of tears.
I continue to look at him, because it is all I can do. And I think he sees that actual change in me, the inevitability of what is happening inside me. . . .
And he stops.
“No,” he says suddenly, and his voice goes dark. “I don’t want any of it. I don’t want her—not with all her beauty and riches and genetic nobility and empty false smiles. But—I must. I must take her as my Consort, my Bride, and eventually my Wife, and I must breed her relentlessly until she produces fat litters of healthy children with perfect DNA for my Father to take comfort and pride in, to know that the divine Kassiopei bloodline continues well into the next generation. . . .”
He cuts off the avalanche of words, and stands up suddenly, and his hair billows around him in an angry golden halo.
He stands before me, Phoebos Apollo. . . .
I watch him with parted lips, stunned by what he just said, while vertigo comes to overtake me as I look up, seeing his face swim above me. . . .
“Gravity changing now. . . .”
This time the words of the Music Mage slither through the air as the music slows down completely, and the low gravity starts fading into perfect weightlessness.
“Enough bitter nonsense spoken for tonight,” he says in that moment, looking down at me, with a strange mix of pain and fierce intensity. “My apologies for spoiling your mood, Lark. Have a good night.”
And then he turns his back on me and starts to walk away.
But then he stops.
He turns around.
And like the force of the tide, inevitable, Aeson Kassiopei comes back, looking at me with an impossible to describe expression in his eyes.
“Oh, what’s the use . . .” he mutters softly, to himself, making a helpless gesture with his hand.
He stops again before me, and this time reaches out with his hand, palm up. “Come, Lark,” he says. “Dance with me—for the first and last time.”
I glance down at his outstretched hand, and then I look up into his eyes.
I stand up, while the winds seem to gather and stir around me, and the haunting song that plays from the walls of the spherical chamber is “Caribbean Blue” by the classic artist Enya.
And I take his hand, feeling with a shock, for the first time, the warm hard grasp of his fingers closing around mine, as he leads me onto the dance floor and into the aerial realm of awe. . . .
Aeson holds me by the hand—a gentle tug is all that’s required to launch us upwards over the honey lake of light below, while the floor sinks deeper down and falls away completely.
And then he pulls me closer, and suddenly I feel his other hand, strong and warm, come around my waist . . . and the mere touch sends shivers of electric charges throughout me, like concentric waves made by a stone cast into a lake.
His hands . . . touching me.
We start circling gently to the ethereal rhythm of the waltz, and he pulls me in closer and closer with each turn, so that now his golden hair is mingling with my dark locks, and his face is inches away from mine, as he stares directly into my eyes with his clear blue ones. We are enclosed in a cocoon of floating strands and melody, and I feel his breath wash softly over my lips until I tremble with sweet honey agony that I don’t even understand. . . .
I am nothing, a weightless thing of air and breath, and all he has to do is pull me in closer yet, to close the distance of just another microscopic space between us that’s separating us, and I will dissolve into him. . . . Because right now, while it still exists, that tiny distance is the equivalent of infinity.
My hand that’s held tightly in his is now on fire with the overwhelming flood of sensation and warmth coursing between us. And my other hand rests on his shoulder, trembling fingers tangled in his soft golden strands of hair. . . .
Oh, pull me in, my thoughts race in a fever, even as we soar toward the ceiling, where the honey flow of light has turned to rich deep amber—ripe, sweet light.
Closer, closer, please. . . .
I watch his face, mesmerized. It has grown soft and slack with a gentle intimate expression that’s intended only for me.
“Lark . . .” he whispers, his breath washing against my lips, just as we rise close enough to touch the ceiling with its orbs of champagne bubbles and vines of cascading grapes.
And still holding my waist tightly, he lets go of my hand and suddenly brushes his fingertips against the side of my cheek, making me tremble, while sweet fever rises, in dissonant tendrils of chills and heat, buzzing inside me.
I see him in that moment of strange fragmented time . . . a sweet golden-haired boy with wise old eyes, a young man with a burning gaze of a child, a cold prince of blue ice and immeasurable distance, a selfless silent hero with a black band worn only by the ancient dead. . . . He is all of them and more, because he looks at me now, indomitable like a mountain and yet so lost—looks inside me, and through me, and somehow he knows me in that instant, more than I know myself.
“This cannot end,” he whispers, following the trail of his fingers with his breath, as he speaks close into my ear, words like drops of rain, softly falling.
His eyes . . . they are perfectly desperate and perfectly clear.
In that moment at last I know him also.
My lungs expand raggedly with each inhalation. I shudder as I see the dying light in him, and I want to weep suddenly.
“Please . . .” I say. And I don’t even know what I’m asking.
Please don’t let go. . . .
In response, his hand tightens around my waist. Our mingling breath and the air between us, it is now my entire world.
“Lark . . .” he repeats again, and he is drowning. “I—”
“Gravity changing now!”
I’ve never hated a phrase so much as I hate this simple one now, because it cuts him off, and indicates the end.
The end of the song.
The end of the haunting music.
The end of our beginning and any possibilities.
At once gravity starts to bloom, and with a shudder we both grasp each other’s hands and begin the soft descent, at the same time as the floor starts rising up gently toward us.
All the meanwhile as we slow down our circling, he continues to watch me, with a raw, intimate, hopeless gaze.
At last we stand on the dance floor. Breathing, breathing. . . .
He still holds one of my hands, as he leads me back to the perimeter walkway.
Here he stops and looks at me again.
“Thank you for the dance, Lark,” he says.
“Thank you . . .” I echo him softly. My voice has lost all its resonance and is leached of energy. I feel his loss
already, the fading of the touch and the growing distance.
But then he says something that makes me pause and freeze in place.
“Whatever has happened between you and Sangre,” he says, “I hope it did not hurt you deeply. I am very sorry about it. You deserve to be happy. Whatever has happened, it is none of my business—”
“You happened,” I say suddenly, finding my voice.
He grows still. And his eyes are wide-open, startled, vulnerable things.
“You happened between us,” I repeat. “Logan and I broke up because of you.”
His lips part. He blinks.
I’m not sure if it is astonishment or some other insight.
And then he only shakes his head, and nods to me. The next instant, without saying another word, he turns away and begins walking swiftly through the crowd.
I remain standing, lost without him, while tears well up, blinding me, until everything in the world blurs. . . .
Chapter Forty-Four
I’m not sure what I am doing, still standing motionless and blurry-eyed, when Laronda and Chiyoko come upon me.
“Gwen!” Laronda says, immediately noticing my state. “Hey, girl, are you all right? What happened?” And she puts her hand gently on my shoulder, leaning in close to my ear.
I pull in a deep shuddering breath, and smile forcibly while carefully wiping parts of my face with my fingertips, so as not to smear the fabulous makeup that is now soaking up my tears.
“Oh, I’m, fine!” I lie blatantly, mostly for Chiyoko’s sake, since I’m certain Laronda has a very good idea of what’s really going on. “Sorry, I was just having a crazy moment there—heard a song that reminded me of Earth and home, and you know how it is—instant tear gusher!” And I snort and shake my head.
Laronda nods wisely, continuing to hold her hand on my shoulder, and then rubs it gently in circles. “Oh yeah, I know what you mean—happens to me all the time. I hear songs, snatches of dialogue that Cadets quote from holo-movies, even tiny little stupid things set me off. So, yeah, no problem. Take your time, girl. . . .”
“Thanks.” I smile, then grin widely. “Okay, enough of me being a mush-ball. . . .”
“Yeah, well, you know, we were just hanging out with your Atlantean buddies Gennio and Vazara,” Laronda says, picking up the conversation with great skill. “And also with that awful little prick Anu—my gawd! He’s like—what is wrong with him?”
Chiyoko snorts and shakes her head. “Oh, yes. This Anu guy is really crazy!”
I shake my head and laugh with them, regaining my breath, forcing myself to be in the here and now, to push away all traces of what had happened between me and Kassiopei. With superhuman effort, I contain all thoughts of him deep inside, to be processed later.
“Anu is an acquired taste,” I say lightly.
Laronda widens her eyes and rolls them. “Sweet lord, yes! Roadkill with horseradish! Seriously, why does your Command Pilot tolerate him?”
My Command Pilot. . . .
No, don’t think.
“Well,” I muse. “To be honest, I think on some level Anu is very smart and skilled at his job, believe it or not. But also, secretly, I think Anu kind of entertains him.”
“He’s a koo-koo clown, that’s for sure,” Laronda mutters. “That boy is messed up!”
“Okay, enough about Anu,” I exclaim, as an out-of-control churning wave of emotion passes through me, and I must do something, anything to put it down. “Let’s dance, guys! I think that’s my song they’re playing!”
And off we go, back onto the dance floor.
We dance for close to two hours, taking minor breaks. At some point during a zero gravity dance, Gracie and Blayne join us, and we all spin around the great honey-colored dome ceiling, holding hands, touching fingertips, and reaching to feel the glowing orbs attached to the panels, just because we can. What a strange glorious sensation, to fly through the air with friends!
“Gravity changing now!” the Music Mage whispers mischievously, and as gravity returns, we descend.
Blayne gets back on the hoverboard and Gracie fusses around him to make sure he is settled properly, while he glances at her with one raised brow. “Seriously, Lark Two, you may chill, I got this,” he says at last, but his mouth quivers with amusement.
“Im nefira . . . Gwen!”
I turn around and there’s Xelio. He is dressed in his sharp white Fleet uniform, and his long midnight hair is loose tonight, gorgeously unrestrained. Looks like he’s just arrived late.
Better late than never. . . .
“So, did you save me a dance, golden goddess?” he says, stepping closer and giving me a long appreciative perusal.
I smile, while an energizing pleasant charge of energy comes to me—something I always feel around Xelio. “Of course, Xel!” I respond, with an almost flirty tone in my voice—and why the hell not? I no longer have anything to lose.
But. . . . Just for a moment, the deeply suppressed wave of despair comes overflowing upward inside me. However, I control it. . . .
And I smile at Xelio Vekahat and take his hand, allowing him to lead me in the swaying rhythm and beat of the music pulsing around us.
I leave the Yellow Dance close to midnight, with Laronda and Gracie following me to my cabin to get their things before boarding the shuttles for their own ark-ships.
Chiyoko says bye to us and heads to her own Cadet Barracks in the Green Quadrant.
As I hug Gracie, Laronda gives me a meaningful glance and promises to call me so that we can talk about things later. I nod at her, barely having the energy to maintain my happy front for Gracie’s sake.
I need to be alone right now.
They leave, and I sit down on my bunk. I sit without moving for long minutes, and eventually the cabin lights go out, because the sensors no longer detect living motion.
They are correct.
I am dead inside. And the tears streaming down my face, they are just running water. . . .
But it gets worse.
Because I remember suddenly that today, based on the Earth calendar, is my birthday.
I just turned eighteen.
And no one, including myself, knew or cared about it.
The next morning, after a mostly sleepless night—made worse by the fact that I was plagued by thoughts of coming of age and everything that goes with it—I resolve to hold myself together for the remaining days on this journey to Atlantis.
I go in to work at the CCO at 8:00 AM, steeling myself for that initial moment of seeing Aeson Kassiopei after what had happened last night.
But he comes in wearing his own full suit of emotional armor—composed, cool, remote. He barely acknowledges me with an icy glance that is unreadable, and then works at his desk for half an hour, ignoring me and the other two aides. Eventually he gets up and leaves to do ship inspections, and is gone for the rest of the day.
Around dinner, I get a brief one-sentence email from Kassiopei that my voice lesson for that night is cancelled. Not a word of explanation or apology.
But somehow, it acts as the closest thing to what I might hope to have from him as a living human reaction—he can’t deal with me right now, I get it.
I can’t deal with him either.
And so I spend another numb evening alone in my cabin—thinking, planning I don’t know what for myself and my siblings here in the Fleet and my family back on Earth—our vaporous future, maybe?—and constantly imagining what would happen only a few days from now when we land on the surface of the planet Atlantis.
In the morning, just before shipboard dawn, around 5:41 AM, I am awakened from a feverish shallow sleep by the voice of the computer.
“Ten second warning. . . . Interstellar space ends. . . . Now entering Helios solar system heliosphere. . . .”
I bolt awake and sit up, almost hitting my head against the bulkhead.
Oh, wow! I think. We are now in the solar system of Helios, also known as Hel, the sun of Atlantis!
Which means that approximately five days remain until we reach the orbit of our new home planet.
It’s pretty much impossible to go back to sleep after that, and so I’m up early, feverishly recalling what I’ve been told about the structure of Hel’s system.
In a nutshell, Helios is a radiant white star, about 10% larger and 25% brighter than Earth’s Sol, and it’s orbited by five rocky planets including Atlantis (unlike Sol which has four—Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars), and two gas giants (again, unlike Sol which has four—Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune).
Hel’s rocky planets in order of proximity to it are: Rah, Septu, Tammuz, Ishtar, Atlantis. And then come the two gas giants, Olympos and Atlas.
At the rate of our deceleration approach, we will likely be in the vicinity of Atlas’s orbital region some time tomorrow.
On that same first day of our entry into Hel’s solar system, the Fleet goes on general alert and all the ark-ships begin implementing the early stages of the arrival procedures.
Today is our last day of classes, after which we are going to be having interviews with our commanding officers and receiving our various placement instructions.
All class sessions are brief, and are mostly summaries and final thoughts given us by our Instructors. In Pilot Training, Chiyoko and I listen nervously as Instructor Mithrat Okoi tells us that all Cadets will receive specific Fleet assignment options during their career interview.
“I will be putting in my personal recommendations in your files which will then be reviewed by your commanding officers,” Instructor Okoi says, pacing the classroom. “My recommendations carry fifty percent weight, and the rest will be up to your commanding officers. If you have any questions, you may see me after class today, or any time up to your interviews which happen starting tomorrow. Good luck, Cadets! You have come a long way since our first class many months ago. Many of you will make excellent, first rate Pilots, officers and crew. And now, dismissed!”
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