“I’m not in love with you,” he said, cutting across her. Firm, certain, and, she thought, a tiny bit amused. “We’ve only just met.”
“Isn’t that how it’s supposed to work?” she said, her anger deflating a little.
“No. Attraction, yes, a feeling of knowing the person. Maybe even a sense that you could fall in love with them very easily. But not just magically in love straight away. You still have to get to know the other person. Figure them out.”
“So I’m supposed to come and live with you on the Station, figure things out?”
“That is generally the accepted pattern for these things, yes.”
“What about my job? My family?”
“It’s somewhere to live, Asha, not a prison. You can keep your job if you want to, or find something to do on the Station if you prefer. That’s what Angela did. And you can visit your family whenever you want. Every day, if you want.”
“And when you decide it’s time to go home? Back to your home planet. I just have to come with you? Leave my family behind? I won’t do that to them, not ever.”
Asha’s eyes burned, tears threatening to spill out as memories rode a little too close to the surface. Her and Nell waking up alone, a pan of porridge burning on the stove, the sweet burnt smell of it filling the kitchen. She’d always wondered about that porridge. What it meant. Why it was even there. She could almost smell it now, the memory visceral and strong, threatening to overwhelm her. If she let it play out… walked out of the house, her hand tucked in Nell’s, past the rusting motorhome to the garage door. The padlock unhooked. Pushing the door open to find…
Asha pinched her eyes shut, biting her tongue, willing herself back into the present.
When she opened her eyes, Cael was watching her, his expression carefully neutral, as if he could sense the precipice she was standing beside and didn’t want to push her.
“Can I show you something?” he asked.
The question took her enough by surprise that she just nodded. He reached into a pocket inside his jacket, pulling out what looked like a card. A slightly crumpled, worn at the edges card. He handed it to her, and Asha looked at the picture on the front of it. In it, a very beautiful woman with long, flowing green hair, had her arms around a little girl in her lap. The little girl had darker skin, darker hair, but the same luminous green eyes. The woman was smiling, joy evident in her expression. The little girl looked so stern Asha nearly laughed, her anger slowly draining away.
“That’s my older sister, Allendi,” Cael said. “The little girl is her daughter, Sassi. She’d be about three, three and a half in Earth years.”
Asha couldn’t help smiling a little. “Do you know what that means in English?”
“Yes,” he said, a small laugh escaping him. “Trust me, it’s appropriate - she’s a little madam. She’ll go far.” He looked down at the picture with fondness. “Allendi lives with her Match on a planet called Darstal. Terribly dreary place - rains all the time. But she’s very happy there.”
Asha handed him back the picture, and he tucked it away inside his jacket pocket.
“I haven’t seen them in person since we arrived here over a year ago. Very young children change so much in weeks, never mind months. I was hoping…” He sighed, eyes darting to the smashed remains of the side windows. “I was hoping things were calming down enough that they could come and visit soon.”
Asha felt a rush of sympathy for him. She couldn’t even imagine how hard it would be to not see Mikey for a year.
“I would never make you leave your family behind, Asha,” he said, catching her gaze and holding it, blue eyes serious. “Never.”
He shifted in his seat, turning so he was facing her as best as he could in the confined space.
“I know you don’t trust the test, and I know you’ve got no reason to trust me, either…”
Asha opened her mouth to speak, but he pressed a finger to her lips. Only gently, but his touch burned like a brand.
“Let me say this,” he said, taking his finger away after a moment.
She missed his touch with a sharpness that took her breath away.
“I know you think that you aren’t the right sort of person for me. That princes ought to be Matched with someone who ‘actually has their shit together’.” The small smile he gave her softened her embarrassment that he’d heard that comment. “But I felt you. Before I even knew you were there, I felt you in the very heart of me. Seeing you in the park… it was like time slowed down for a moment. Like you were someone I hadn’t seen for a very long time, but I could still recognise you. Like being around you was coming home.”
There was nothing in his expression that suggested he was being anything less than completely earnest.
“Humanity has very strange ideas about what qualifies as ‘suitable’ for someone like me. So far as I can tell, a suitable partner would be someone very beautiful, but also someone bland, pliant. Someone inoffensive in every way. But that’s not what I want. I want someone interesting. Someone challenging. Someone who has their own ideas and won’t just agree with everything I say.”
He raised a hand to her face, cupped her cheek gently. Asha wondered if he was going to kiss her. Realised she wanted him to.
“You are beautiful,” he said. “But far more important than that you’re resourceful and determined and not afraid to speak your mind and, frankly, you’re a little bit terrifying.”
He grinned, startling a small laugh from her.
“Being Matched isn’t some instant thing,” he said. “You don’t just take one look at each other and fall madly in love and never have an argument or a disagreement. It’s still a relationship you have to build and work at. And that’s all I’m asking for, Asha. A chance to do that. A chance to prove to you that this can work. That it will work. So,” he paused, his expression caught somewhere between hope and bracing for pain, “come with me? Get on that shuttle with me and tomorrow, I promise, if things have calmed down enough I’ll send a driver straight round to collect your sister. And if things haven’t calmed down enough for that, we’ll figure something else out. Just… come with me.”
Asha sat for a long moment, head and heart both spinning. Her instinct was to say ‘no’, to shore up her walls and shut this whole sorry mess down before…
Before what?
Before she got in too deep. Before she handed him the power to hurt her.
Is that what she’d been doing to Daneel? To the various other guys she’d failed at dating?
Marta’s words drifted up from her subconscious.
I think maybe when a better guy comes along you’ll still be too scared to open your heart to him.
Through all her long silence, Cael didn’t move, didn’t shift. He had to be dying a little bit inside, having opened up to her like that and not getting any sort of response. He’d handed her the power to hurt him. Was she going to do to him what she’d always feared would be done to her?
Or was she going to be brave. Take a chance.
Practise defrosting.
She swallowed hard, clearing her throat.
“Okay,” she said, voice scratchy. “Okay, I’ll go with you.”
Chapter 10
IT TOOK JUST UNDER AN HOUR to drive to Heathrow. Asha drove in silence, putting the radio on instead of talking. Cael didn’t push her. She’d agreed to come with him, that was more than he’d hoped for.
Stars but she was difficult to get through to. People trusted Cael, it was why he was an excellent ambassador. There was something about his manner, his face, that people just seemed to believe in. Asha, however, seemed determined not to trust him. Which was even more impressively stubborn, considering she had to be feeling at least some of the same sense of yearning for him as he was her. The science of the Match test said that on an instinctive level, Asha would want to be near him, to form bonds with him. Why was she fighting it so hard?
It had to go beyond her apparent insecurity about being suitable fo
r him. Those were the objections she raised whenever he challenged her about it, but Cael had the feeling it went deeper than that. When she’d mentioned about leaving her family behind… Her eyes had gone so dark, almost empty. Something had happened to her, he thought. Something had hurt her. Badly.
But he couldn’t push her to tell him. She’d have to come to that in her own way, on her own time. Which was fine. Cael had waited this long to meet his Match. He could wait as long as it took for her to be comfortable with him.
There definitely weren’t as many cars on the roads as they drove through the city, though there were still plenty arriving at the airport, planes still taking off and landing overhead. It was like the riots hadn’t happened out here. Asha followed the signs to the shuttle bay, turning out of the main flow of traffic onto a new road, the tarmac pristine beneath the wheels of the van. The shuttle bay was tucked off to the side, away from the main flow of the air traffic, the shuttle itself glittering in the low afternoon sun.
When the car coming the other way drove past them, Cael tracked it with his gaze. Who else had reason to be down here? Airport staff, maybe. Or perhaps a sight seer, hoping to snap a few shots of the space ship.
Asha slowed the van up, easing off the accelerator. When Cael looked to her, she was frowning.
“What’s wrong?” Cael asked.
“I don’t know,” Asha said, her eyes locked on another car parked near the shuttle bay.
As Cael watched, three figures ran from the shuttle bay and got into the car, the driver starting the engine and wheel-spinning the vehicle as they pulled away, hurtling past them at far more than the 20mph speed limit.
Then, a bright flash, followed by a boom so loud, it made Cael’s ears ring. Asha slammed on the break, instinctively yanking the steering wheel to one side, the van’s wheels screeching against the tarmac before bumping off the road onto the grass verge. A blast of heat came through the smashed out windows, scorching against Cael’s skin as a fireball erupted where the shuttle had been stood a moment ago.
Cael pressed his hands to his ears, dizziness sweeping through him, along with shock. For a long moment he just stared at the burning wreckage of the shuttle, brain not quite comprehending what had just happened. Then he remembered Asha, turning to her. She, too, was staring vacantly out at the fire, her jaw slack.
Cael put his hands to her face, encouraging her to look at him.
“Are you okay?” he said, not hearing his own words above the screeching noise in his ears.
“Are you okay?” he said again, his voice finally resolving.
She nodded, pressing her hands over her ears a moment. He kept his hand against her face, her neck, his thumb tracing a path along her jawline, needing the reassurance of touching her. Perhaps more than she needed it.
“I’m okay,” she managed after a moment. She didn’t look okay, her tan skin gone pale, the fire reflecting in her grey eyes, turning them red. “What the hell?”
“I don’t know,” Cael said, drawing back. His pounding heart was slowing now he knew she was alright, but a different sort of fear replaced the immediate terror.
Whoever had been in that car… they weren’t rioters, or protesters. They were serious. Dangerous on a whole new level.
“Cael,” Asha said. It came out like a rasp, her voice catching in her dry throat. “I think we need to get you out of the city.”
Twenty minutes later, they were pulling the stolen van up on to a garage forecourt. How Asha had managed to drive, Cael wasn’t sure. Once she’d parked - or rather, haphazardly stopped - the van in the middle of the forecourt, she took her hand from the steering wheel, watching it tremble.
Cael reached across, closing his hand around hers and giving her a reassuring squeeze.
“I’m okay,” she said. “I’ll be okay. I just… give me a second. Just… talk to me about something.”
Cael actually managed a small laugh. “Talking. I’m good at talking. You’ve probably not got that impression, yet. I’ve been unnaturally tongue tied around you. Most of the time people are forever telling me to shut up, believe it or not.”
She gave a small burst of slightly hysterical laughter. “I suppose it’s a useful skill for a politician.”
“I prefer the term ‘ambassador’, it sounds more important.”
“Ambassador, then.” She glanced in his direction, some colour already returning to her face. “Why aren’t you freaking out?”
“I am,” he admitted. “I’m just better at hiding it. Blame a lifetime of royal training. On the outside I can look perfectly calm and together, even if my insides are quivering. And they are. Quivering, that is.”
“We’d have been on that shuttle… If I hadn’t, if we hadn’t stopped. Those five minutes…”
“Don’t,” Cael said, squeezing her hand a little tighter. “Don’t think about it. We weren’t on that shuttle. That’s all that matters.”
She nodded, taking a deep, slightly ragged, breath.
A thump sounded and they both jumped, Asha turning to look out of the driver’s side window.
“Asha,” a grizzled looking man said, nodding in greeting. Cael wasn’t sure whether this was friendly or not, but then the man spoke again. “What’s going on, kid?”
His tone was still gruff, but Cael could sense affection in it.
“Have you seen the news?” Asha said.
The man snarled a little. “Riots. Scumbags, starting that sort of thing. You alright?”
“A bit rattled, but I’m okay.” She gave a small shrug. “Had to steal a van.”
“I can see that.” He stepped back, surveying the damage. “Take it you didn’t smash the windows?”
“No, Mal, I didn’t smash the windows. I’m not a hooligan.”
The man - Mal - rubbed his chin. “Pull it up into the workshop. I’ll give the owner a call, tell him I recovered the vehicle after a local called me out. Police will be so swamped, it’s not like they’ll be dealing with it. I’ll give it a good clean down so no copper’ll get any fingerprints off it from you or your friend.”
He gave Asha a questioning look. Asha kept her mouth shut.
“Do I need to get my shotgun?” Mal said.
“No!” Asha said, and Cael might have been alarmed if she hadn’t sounded like a despairing parent when she said it. “Would you stop it with the shotgun. You need to get rid of that damn thing.”
“Not while I’ve got my girls to look out for. Is your sister okay?”
“She’s fine. At home. I’m going to check in with her in a minute.”
Mal nodded. “Tell her to lock all her doors and stay inside. She shouldn’t go anywhere tonight, but if she wants to head out here in the morning, she can. I can always make room for her and the little one, if she doesn’t want to be on her own.”
“Thanks, Mal,” Asha said, her voice cracking just a little.
Mal, apparently uncomfortable with this minor display of emotion, just grunted and stepped back, tapping the roof of the van. “Bring her in.”
He ambled off in the direction of the workshop.
Asha rooted round in her pockets a moment, presenting Cael with a key attached to a bunch of others.
“It’s for that motorhome over there,” she said, pointing it out. “I’m just going to drive the van up. I’ll be back in a minute.”
Cael watched a moment as she manoeuvred the van towards the workshop. Standing by the entrance, Mal had his arms crossed, also watching her. His gaze flicked up to meet Cael’s, narrowing into a glare, and Cael figured it was probably time to get inside the motorhome.
He unlocked the side door, stepping up into the little kitchen-diner. Even smaller than Marta’s basement apartment, the motorhome was barely big enough to walk through. But the discarded dish in the sink, the jacket tossed over the back of one of the chairs, said that this was where Asha was living. A tiny little space no bigger than the smallest of the Station bedrooms.
Cael looked around. The furnishing
s looked old, tired. One of the kitchen cupboard doors was barely hanging on and the chair cushions were thinning, worn through in places. Above the window next to the dining area, a small shelf was crammed with well thumbed books, the spines cracked by many read-throughs, the text on them difficult to read. He picked one out at random - a globetrotting thriller about a young woman on the trail of some ancient artefact. He returned it to the shelf.
The whole motorhome rocked as Asha bounded up the steps behind him, her cheeks a little flushed. Her eyes darted round, as if assessing the space. Apparently satisfied, she pushed past him, grabbing the keys from the table where he’d left them. She rotated the chairs that made up the dining room so they faced the front of the vehicle, slipping in to the driver’s seat and putting the key in the ignition.
“She gonna run?” Mal said, appearing by the driver’s side door.
“She better,” Asha said, turning the key.
The motorhome engine strained and wailed a moment, before something took and the engine settled into a rattling rumble. Asha let out a small whoop of triumph. Or perhaps relief.
“You know where you’re going?” Mal asked, handing her up a bag. Asha rolled down the window, accepting it.
“I’ve got an idea,” she said. “I’ll be back in a day or two.”
“Okay,” Mal said, a question in his tone.
Asha just waved, then started pulling the motorhome away.
Cael wobbled on his feet as she bumped down the forecourt onto the road. He staggered forwards, taking the seat beside her, buckling himself in.
“There’s a campsite I know of not far from here,” Asha said. “This time of year it ought to be quiet. We’ll head there, if that’s okay with you?”
“It’s fine,” Cael said. “Who was…”
“Mal?” she said, shooting him a grin. “He’s my boss, but I’ve known him since I was a kid. He was friends with my Dad before…” She hesitated a moment. “Before. He’s gruff, but he’s got a heart of gold.”
“And a shotgun, apparently.”
She laughed. A brief, but bright laugh. It heartened Cael to hear it. The tremble seemed to have gone from her hands and she steered the motorhome straight.
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