“There’s no time for that. I’m Cadet Thalassas with the Trullwick Police, and the son of both Captains Thalassas with the Allied Peacekeepers; one of them retired. I’ve come with Shungdi of High House Leezu during a time of need. She needs medicine, which our sisters will be along shortly to deliver.”
“Unhand the princess at once. We cannot trust you with her, nor who you claim to be until we take her to safety. Leave now, and we will not report this.”
The man took a step closer and stopped. He raised a hand to one ear, as did the other two guards. The woman by the doors said something that Dasos could not hear. Then she nodded and opened one part of the main entrance.
Bolin stepped outside.
* * *
As Tong-Chang purchased the medicine she needed for her sister, Zoey checked her phone again for any messages. There was no word yet from Dasos. She looked up from her phone and saw the pharmacist retrieve the container. She was curious as to the fact that this medicine did not need a prescription, and that it was over the counter.
“So do you really not need a note from a laeknar?” Zoey said softly.
“For this?” said Tong-Chang. “No, we Ginserei handle this medicine the same way as most allergy medicines, or how Aelfs do the pill form of birth control. They look at my identification, check the system for any flags for abuse, and then sell accordingly. I’m glad that I was able to return the last dose I bought, or there would be a flag on my record with this transaction now.”
“I’m still getting used to that.”
“What?”
“Natt Grans is about six light-spans away, and yet we can communicate with the station from here as easily as two people on Earth can call one another from across the globe. What?”
Tong-Chang smiled. “You used ‘light-spans’ instead of ‘years.’ I think we might be starting to rub off on you.”
“Maybe a little.”
The pharmacist set the small box down upon the counter, and there was a visible label on this one instead of when Zoey had seen the container of the same size on Natt Grans. The words “Remedial Douche” appeared below the given name of the product, and below that was an image of a Ginserei woman’s silhouette frolicking in a field of flowery hills.
“Did you need any verbal instruction on its use?” the pharmacist asked.
“No, thank you,” said Tong-Chang. “I won’ t be needing any sort of concealment retainer, either.”
“Very good. Would you like a bag?”
Tong-Chang tapped on her book bag that she had brought from the condo unit, which happened to be located around one corner from the pharmacy. The pharmacist nodded and then wished the girls a good night before calling on the next customer in line.
Finally, Zoey’s phone buzzed. There was the message on it from Dasos. He was waiting for them inside the embassy, and gave her the address in case they needed it.
* * *
Dasos gave her a glass of water. Shungdi sat up against the pillows of her bed as she accepted the drink. Dasos was grateful that she was lucid now, if barely and also pouting toward the opposite wall instead of looking at him.
“I’m still waiting,” she said.
“They will be here any moment,” said Dasos.
“Not that; I mean about your accusation. I am not, in any way, experiencing my tangouchu. I simply refuse it.”
“It doesn’t work like that.”
“And what would you know of this?”
“Eight revolutions ago my best friend collapsed after saying for over two days that she was too hot. I thought I’d done something wrong, and I freaked out. In my panic I called for an ambulance, and my friend was taken to the laeknir, who had to separate us for a long while. One Laeknar explained to me all about these symptoms after I waited a good portion of that time, and what it means to experience this condition. Another one gave Tonny her first ever treatment. As far as I know, I saved her life that day, or else there would have been serious damage to her brain and heart functions.”
The blood pressure and feverish temperatures were too high for a Ginserei body to endure for long periods.
Shungdi turned her hard gaze on Dasos and replied, “It has been five revolutions since I underwent my first, and only, tangouchu. The royal laeknir treated me before it had advanced. I was fawning over a boy in one of our rival houses when it happened, and the same laeknar told me that the reason we experience such a thing because we wish to mate. My parents never once punished the laeknar for saying this, so it must be true.”
“No, I doubt that,” Dasos said. “Biology doesn’t care what we do or don’t want.”
“Maybe not Aelfen biology.”
* * *
The guards standing before the entrance to the embassy barely gave Zoey any sort of glance, but one looked in Tong-Chang’s direction for a brief moment, saying “Highness” before dipping his head her way and then averting his gaze.
The one word gave Tong-Chang pause. She tilted her head and inhaled deeply before stepping further into the grounds. Zoey followed her inside. Bolin waited for them. He bowed courteously before Tong-Chang walked to him and slapped the man.
“Did you know?” she said. “Did you know she came for me, and say nothing all this time?”
Bolin said “I apologize, Highness. I did what I could to hide your whereabouts from her. She must be craftier than I anticipated.”
“You still could have warned me.”
“That was my gravest error. I should have, and I beg your forgiveness.”
“You’ll have it if you lead us to her.”
“Right away.”
He guided them up two sets of stairs where the already ornate building achieved a fancier and more intricate design than it had previously. There was more art depicting the Ginserei flag—red and yellow separated with a waved line that was white—as well as landscapes that beheld a massive planet in the sky.
They turned into a hallway in which all of the doors were on one side, and two more guards stood outside of one of them. The guards looked their way.
One guard said, “It . . . ? Lady Tong-Chang! You honor us.”
Both guards kneeled as the trio approached the room. Zoey had known by now that her girlfriend descended from a High House of Ginserei, but that much meant that she was a noble from a family that lorded over their land and honored their respective deity. This, though? Now she suspected that the High House Leezu was a bigger deal than most on their planet.
“Rise, both of you,” she said. “I am here for my sister.”
“At once, Your Highness,” said one guard when both of them got up. The guard who spoke opened the door.
“You can go now, Bolin. Thank you.” She didn’t even look back at the Ginserei man who was bowing her way before Tong-Chang entered the room.
Zoey braced herself for something extravagant before stepping into the doorway, given how the third floor of the embassy looked. However, the appearance toned down to that of an expensive, but small and cozy, hotel room.
Dasos and Shungdi both said, “Good, you’re here!”
“Do I even want to know?” Zoey said, looking between the two of them.
“I’m not in my tangouchu, sister,” said Shungdi. “This is stupid. Why would I be when there’s no desire for it?”
Tong-Chang said, “Desire has nothing to do with it.”
“Oh, and did you fall for some laeknar’s lies as well?”
“They never lied to me. I should know.” Tong-Chang dropped the box upon the mattress. She wasted no time pulling up her dress shirt and sweater, revealing the bulge from over two months of being pregnant. She said, “I didn’t want this, but here we are. It was my choice to lay with that man, but this child’s father is dead to me. I don’t even know what to do with my baby. So don’t you dare sit there and tell me that a tangouchu comes down to desire.”
Her display left Shungdi stunned. Shungdi gaped at her. She lifted an arm and reached out to Tong-Chang.
; “You’re pregnant?” Shungdi said.
“I am,” Tong-Chang said, drawing closer. Her sister was able to touch her belly now. In fact she caressed it with a gentle, trembling hand.
“And you didn’t love the father?”
“He, and his wife, were the biggest mistakes of my adult life. This child doesn’t have to be. At the same time, you do not have to die; not out of stubbornness for what is happening to you right now.”
Shungdi lifted the shirt and sweater higher, revealing the hair on Tong-Chang’s chest. Shungdi gasped. The emblem that the hair had made was full, more triangular than a thin line. There also were short arms curving down from the top, one on either side of the shape.
“You should be leading our High House,” Shungdi said.
“Get someone else to do it,” Tong-Chang said.
“There is no one else! You are the only one of us with the full emblem growing on your chest; the only one of Father’s children. Tong-Chang, why do you hate us all so?”
“I don’t hate you.” She pulled down her shirt with sudden force and winced. “I hated the lifestyle that came with being there. I hate what our family represented to me when I was a little girl, young and more foolish than you can imagine. I hate that this emblem grows on me instead of my brothers or sisters; I thought it was a mistake.”
“Our goddess, the lady of the plum orchard, would never make such a mistake, sister.”
Tong-Chang leaned in and kissed her on the forehead. “No, she wouldn’t. The mistakes are our own. Please don’t make one you won’t even have the chance to regret. I will hate you for it if you do.”
“Yes. Yes, you might be right. Please leave me. I need to speak with Das’ithrios before I do this.”
“Thank you, Shungdi. Dasos, take good care of her. Zoey?”
Zoey nodded, hoping she understood what had occurred. She bound an arm of hers to another of Tong-Chang’s, and they walked out of the room. Zoey rested a head on her shoulder once they were in the hallway and the door was closed.
“What now?” Zoey asked.
“That is a really good question,” Tong-Chang said. “I’m remembering the time I told you that life is a series of mistakes. Do you remember that?”
“Vaguely. I don’t remember when, or what brought it up.”
“Neither do I, not in great detail, but I’m beginning to rethink that. It’s hard for me to say, thanks to Dasos and Shungdi. Maybe I have a lot to think about.”
“I do remember one thing, though.”
“What’s that?”
“I suggested that we make the best kind of mistakes. Maybe those mistakes are actually our triumphs. Right now, I’m feeling triumphant enough to eat a frozen yogurt or two on a cold winter night.”
“Perhaps, but let’s wait for your brother to get done talking to my sister. Then I’ll be happy to treat you.”
* * *
Dasos sat on the bed next to Shungdi. He said, “You hurt me, you know.”
“Did I?” said Shungdi.
“When you believed so adamantly that desire was the cause of what your body is going through right now, and you said there was no reason, no desire, I felt the short end of that like the time that I was shot by one of the Hulda’fi. I felt it like the moments before when I had killed two of them.”
“Oh, I see.” She gave him a kiss on the lips. “Perhaps my sister and I were both right after all.”
“Shungdi, please.”
“What? I want you. I don’t know if I want to bear any children right now, but I do want you.” She leered at the box that Tong-Chang had brought in and left on the bed out of Shungdi’s reach. “I trust you more than you know, too.”
“It’s complicated.”
“It really is. Please stay with me tonight? I don’t want to be alone for this.”
Dasos reached for the box and pulled it closer to where Shungdi sat. He was sure that there were directions on how to use this medicine. Then he felt her warm hand on his. Then her lips on his.
* * *
The sound of Shungdi crying out pierced through the door. The guards looked at one another with raised brows.
Tong-Chang exclaimed, “Oh, stars beyond. There’s no hope for those two. You two stay posted. Zoey, let’s see if the frozen yogurt place is still open at this hour.”
“Yes, let’s,” Zoey said.
Some talk that turned out to be, but this one sound coming through the door was something she wasn’t going to stick around for. Both Zoey and Tong-Chang left the embassy to the night, and also Dasos to his choices.
[ 44]
Her black hair had always been soft when Dasos ran a hand through it. Shungdi had dozed off within moments after the medicine was applied in the bathroom, and her fever was coming down as she slept on the bed in his arms. He tried not to think about the medicine, or what exactly the fluid was doing, but he knew it was working.
Shungdi groaned after a time had passed. She said, “What time is it?”
“I think it’s past one in the morning,” Dasos said.
“I wish most contraceptives weren’t so toxic to us Ginserei. Maybe I could have saved you the trouble, and you’d be home.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
She huffed. “So you and Tong-Chang were friends for so many revolutions. I’m amazed the two of you never hooked up.”
“We did. It didn’t end well. When she was assigned to the Marslou, and I wasn’t, I heard ‘long-distance’ and freaked out. My first girlfriend had to move away to another planet, and she was taken by the Hulda’fi. Then there was my twin sister, who we lost two revolutions ago. I couldn’t handle it. Tong-Chang and I argued far worse than we should have. Then it was over.”
By now Shungdi’s eyes were on him. He swore he could see sympathy in her eyes in the night lighting.
“You’re still friends now, though, right?” she said.
“We made up a bit, yes,” said Dasos. “Then she entered her current relationship with Zoi’ne. There’s no telling how long that’s going to last, much like I have no idea how long we are going to last.”
“The two of us? Das’ithrios Thalassas, you are a clever Aelf, but you couldn’t piece together that I was Tong-Chang’s sister based on certain clues.”
“In hindsight? You might be right. You have the same eyebrows, and you share this tiny spot inside the tip of your right ear. It’s so subtle, but I see it.”
“Hey, don’t go spilling all of my secrets.” She brought a hand up to rub the tip of her ear, and a smile formed on her face as Dasos went on.
“There’s that fragrance you like to use, too. Sure, putting it together as a remote possibility was something I could have done, but I chose to get to know you the longer we spent time together. Now I know of your love for debates, as well as your enjoyment of tabletop games that you barely got to play with other people back on Ginserei. Now I know that you are Shungdi, one of the three daughters of High House Leezu that isn’t Tong-Chang.”
“Third; I am the third daughter. Perhaps you know too much about me, come to think of it.”
“I’d be honored to know more than this. The time we spend together is proving to be wonderful.”
“Oh, you’re right. Yet I will have to return home eventually.”
“Yeah.”
“Let’s agree to enjoy the time we have remaining. I plan to be around at least for another game session of yours, or two. If being in a long-distance relationship doesn’t work for you, then we don’t have to commit past the here and now. I may have to come back for you one day.”
“What about your taboos, or the growing unrest between our peoples? That’s what I want to know.”
“One complication at a time, lover. If our sisters can tell all caution to fornicate with the nearest star, then maybe the two of us can make this work with the time I’m here.”
* * *
Zoey stretched and began her routine for the earlier mornings that she had to get up. She grumbled over th
e hour, and again at her phone’s reminder about midterms being this week.
At least this means I have next week off for the holiday.
She grabbed her hoody and her cereal. The apartment was dark since the light outside was mere moments past the first light of dawn. Behind her, Tong-Chang had also gotten out of bed, except she didn’t need to so early this morning, as far as Zoey was aware.
“I’m going to make the call,” Tong-Chang said. “I’ll need to use the wall monitor for this, if you don’t mind.”
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