Off Balance

by Aileen Erin

  Solan was interrogating Seri in Aunare. Subtitles translated for me and Roan, but Solan wasn’t getting anything out of her. Lorne was right about that, but I didn’t think he’d do any better. But if I went in there, I might be able to get a reaction from her.

  A small ding came from the door. Fynea got up from her chair and opened it.

  A kitchen maid was standing there with a bowl in her hands. She said a few words while she scanned the room and stopped on how Lorne and I were seated. Her eyes widened, and I could almost hear the gossip already. I started to straighten, but Lorne’s arm tightened around me.

  “Don’t be embarrassed. It’s good for them to see us together,” he whispered against my ear. “They need to get used to it, and so do you.”

  The door was already sliding closed, and Fynea placed the bowl on the table. “The sound of Seri’s voice is making me grind my teeth to bits. I’m going to have none left if I have to keep listening to her lies.”

  “Same.” Roan reached over to the bowl and grabbed a little square from the bowl. He smiled after popping one in his mouth. “These are good. Not exactly popcorn, but frosty. Love the salty-sweet thing going on.”

  “I’m glad you approve,” Lorne said, but he didn’t look away from the vidscreen.

  “Your ex is a conniving snake,” I said. “And I’m with Fynea on this. I can’t listen to much more.”

  Lorne brushed a kiss on the top of my head and then stood.

  I sat up straight. “You’re going in there?”

  Roan stopped crunching on his snack. “What’s your angle going to be? You gotta go in there with a game plan, or you’ll get about as much as Solan—exactly zip.”

  Lorne sighed. “I’ll talk to her. Pretend that this must be a mix-up and see if after being nice to her for a few minutes, I can change course and get her to admit her part in it.”

  “That’s not going to work, but go ahead.”

  “What would you do?” He didn’t sound annoyed, at least not with me, but I could almost feel his frustration.

  “She still wants a piece of you. She wants to be your queen. For you, she’ll keep her cool and lie her ass off. But she hates me enough to want me dead, which means she won’t be able to keep her emotions in check if I’m there. She’d give me what we need.” I shrugged. “But it won’t hurt to try your way first.”

  “I don’t know, Lorne. She might assume Amihanna is listening and that could get awkward,” Fynea said.

  Lorne scrunched up his face and took a breath. “I have to do it.” He came to stand in front of me and bent down until I was looking him in his eyes. “If she says something that upsets you while I’m in there, you have to give me a chance to explain before you go anywhere, okay?”

  “I’ll be fine, but you sound worried. If all that’s going to happen by you going in there is that it upsets everyone, why don’t we just skip to me going in there?” He helped me more than he knew by having my go-bags supplied with more than I ever could’ve scrounged by myself. If I could do this for him, then I wanted to.

  “Because I don’t want her near you. I don’t trust her.” From the way his breath hitched, he seemed a little scared.

  “I can take care of myself.” I’d proven at least that much.

  “I know you can.” He took a breath. “I know you can, but I need to face her. And if I can protect you from her even the tiniest bit, I have to try.”

  “You know I don’t need protection.”

  “She really doesn’t,” Roan said.

  I motioned to Roan with my head without looking away from Lorne. “You should listen to him. I’m actually pretty terrifying.”

  Lorne smiled, and I wondered if he’d kiss me again.

  I wanted him to kiss me.

  But he stood straight. “Hopefully, this won’t take long.”

  I tried to not be disappointed that he hadn’t given me one of those barely there kisses that he’d been teasing me with lately. “Good luck.” But if he didn’t get what he needed, I would be happy to handle this woman.

  Lorne strode out of the room, and I held my hand out to Roan. “Snack me.” He handed me a bunch, and I started crunching. They were little cubes of something lighter than air—not sure what they were made out of exactly—but they were so good that it had to be a carb. Slightly salty, slightly sweet, and totally addictive.

  I held out my hand again for more just as Solan walked in. “Didn’t go well, huh?”

  Solan sat heavily in the chair next to Fynea and slouched down. “It took everything I had not to smash her face into the table. I doubt he’ll have much better luck than I did.”

  “Agree.” Fynea nodded. “But you did an admirable job. I think she needs something to really get under her skin for her to break.”

  “Like me?” I held my hand up.

  “Yes. I think you’d do the trick. Lorne knows it, too, but—”

  “He wants to protect me.” He was going to have to get it out of his head that I needed protection. “I figure we have a few before I go in.” I held out the bowl to Solan. “You want some of whatever these are?”

  He peeked into the bowl. “Oh. Ba’na. Delicious, but no, thank you. You should eat those. They’re high in calories, and after your workouts, you need all the calories you can get.”

  “Seriously?” Roan moaned. “I’ve had like a million of them already.”

  I laughed at his tone. “It’ll be okay. We’ve worked out a ton the past few weeks.”

  “I know.” Roan patted his stomach. “First time I’ve ever had an eight-pack. I’m a sexy beast these days.”

  We settled into silence as we watched Lorne talk to Seri. I stopped reading the translations because they were too frustrating. If anything, Lorne was getting less than Solan, but I couldn’t block out her tone.

  I couldn’t stand listening to her voice. She cooed to him, and I could almost see his fist punching her face, but he hadn’t moved. Still, the visual hit me so hard, and for some reason, it made me laugh.

  “Whatever she just said really fucking annoyed him. Lorne’s barely hanging in there.” I leaned over to Roan. “Pass the bowl over here. It’s about to get good.”

  There was the scratch of a chair against the stone floor, and I turned to see Fynea getting up.

  She looked really confused as she stepped so close to the vidscreen that she was nearly blocking my entire view of it.

  “Everything okay?”

  She was quiet for a moment, and then she turned to me. “I don’t see even a hint of a tell, and I grew up with Lorne. His skin is only the tiniest bit lit and his fao’ana aren’t present. I don’t understand. How do you know he’s annoyed?”

  I glanced back at the screen and studied Lorne. “I…” Damn it. She was right. Lorne and Seri looked like they were going to have a nice cup of tea. It was a simple, easy chit-chat. The flow of the conversation seemed to be moving at a slow and steady pace.

  So, how could I tell that he was annoyed? I wasn’t sure.

  Seri was touching his arm. I focused on her face and imagined that she was telling him this was all a big misunderstanding. That they were good together. He was smiling and nodding and I knew he had to be saying all the right things to make her comfortable, but there was something…

  I closed my eyes and tried to think of how I could tell. I breathed in for four, out for eight, and then I heard it.

  His frequency was rising fast and hot, and he was going to lose his shit if he didn’t leave that room.

  I stood without realizing I’d moved. “Solan. Do that buzzing thing to get him out of the room.” I couldn’t stop watching Lorne. “Do it now. Right fucking now!”

  “Done. It’s done.”

  Lorne quickly made some sort of an excuse that had her looking confused.

  I waited for a few seconds, but he didn’t come back into the viewing room.

  Fynea was asking me a question, and then Solan said something, but I didn’t hear their words.

  �
�One sec.” I put my hand on the panel next to the door, and it slid open.

  Lorne was leaning against the wall, with his head back. His eyes were closed, and he was mumbling something in Aunare. His skin was bright, and the fao’ana were flickering, which meant he was about to lose control.

  Fynea stood next to me for a second. “Oh no.” She retreated slowly before turning to press her back against the side wall, hiding herself from Lorne’s view.

  “Are you okay?” I asked Fynea.

  “We won’t be if he doesn’t get control.” She whispered the words. “You have to help him.”

  Okay, but how?

  I went back to the table, grabbed the bowl of ba’na, and went back to the hallway to stand in front of Lorne.

  I threw one cube at him, and it hit him right between the eyes. “Hey. Lorne. Did you know your ex is a total bitch?” I teased him, and then threw another piece. “Pretty obvious what you were thinking with when it came to her, huh? It was the boobs. Am I right?”

  One side of Lorne’s mouth twitched for a second, and I wasn’t sure if it was an itch or if he was trying not to smile. I was going to assume the latter. I wasn’t sure what I was doing, but he needed to calm down. Distraction and humor was the best idea I had.

  I threw another piece. “But seriously, what are you doing hiding in the hallway?”

  I threw another piece, and with his eyes still closed, he held out his hand. There was a pop and the piece turned into a ball of flame. The fire quickly burned out before it touched him and rained dust onto the floor.

  “Neat trick.” I wasn’t sure how he’d done it, but it was impressive. “I’m guessing that’s your secret Aunare weapon.”

  I threw another piece. Another poof of fire and then quickly dust.

  I threw a few, and he finally opened his eyes before he turned those into dust.

  I threw one more. Then another. Lorne stood there looking annoyed but burning them all to dust.

  By the time I was halfway through the bowl, he was officially smiling, and the glow of his skin faded to nothing.

  I threw one last piece. He caught it and popped it into his mouth.

  “Better?” I asked.

  “Much.” He took the bowl from me and walked back into the observation room.

  I followed him inside, but the room was quiet. Fynea and Solan looked at me like I’d grown another head. “What? Is there soot on my face or something?”

  “Your face is as beautiful as always.” He set the bowl on the table. “Usually, when I get that angry and frustrated, I have a tendency to burn whatever’s around me to dust.”

  “Like the walls, curtains, beds, sparring weapons, the gardens, a ship—” Fynea was listing off items, and Lorne sent her a quick look to stop her.

  “But it’s been a long time since I’ve been that angry.”

  Lorne took one cube of ba’na and tossed it in the air before catching it. “You used to eat these after your workouts when you were little. We had to make sure you were eating enough calories to keep up with the intense exercise and training sessions, but sometimes, we used them as target practice. It annoyed your father, but he wouldn’t stop us.”

  I tried to think back. Did I know that? But I didn’t think so. I didn’t remember the ba’na. When I’d eaten it just now, it was like it felt new. “I don’t remember.”

  “You do remember.”

  Lorne was smiling again, and I didn’t want to hurt him, so I kept my mouth shut. But I didn’t remember.

  “You might not ever get your full memory back, but pieces are hiding. It feels like I’m finding buried treasure whenever one pops up.”

  I looked at Roan for help, but there was a crease between his eyes that only showed up when he was really thinking about something.

  Roan stared at the bowl of ba’na and then back to me. “It could be a coincidence, but it’s really eerie that you did the same thing to calm him down that you did when you were kids. Maybe Lorne’s right. It could all be there, Am.”

  Roan was officially no help. “Jesmesha said my memory probably isn’t coming back, but I’m still me. I still think like me, and I’ll probably come up with the same solutions to problems. If I liked doing something back then, chances are, I’ll probably still like it. But I won’t remember having done it before. Hoping for more than what I know right now will only lead to disappointment.” Fynea was still staring at me, and it was weirding me out. “What’s her deal?”

  “You’re his shalshasa.”

  I nodded. “Yeah. I mean, that’s what everyone says, but didn’t you already know that?”

  “She knew it.” Lorne leaned back against the table. “But there’s a huge leap between them believing that you might be my shalshasa and actually knowing that you really are.”

  I turned to Fynea for confirmation.

  She nodded. “I’ve trained with Lorne for a very long time. Both of us have.” She motioned between her and Solan. “When he gets like that, you run. That’s the safest thing for everyone. To stay far away. But you settled him down.”

  This was ridiculous. “I just distracted him from being angry. Roan has done the same thing for me a million times. Right?”

  “Course. I wasn’t about to let you lose your shit on Earth and get caught. We handled it.”

  “It wasn’t that you distracted him and pulled him back from blowing up. Or not just that, because if that was the trick, we’d have learned it years ago.” Solan’s eyes were wide as he stared at me. “I think what’s surprising to both of us is that you knew he was heading toward losing control before he’d given any outward sign. His skin wasn’t glowing. Not really. How’d you know?”

  “His frequencies were shifting and…” I shrugged. I wasn’t sure how to put it into words. It had been instinct and something else. “Maybe I’m really good at reading him, but I’m good at reading everyone. It was part of surviving. It’s as simple as that.” I needed to shift the focus off of me. I grabbed a handful of ba’na. “But this might be my favorite snack ever. Totally worth the calories.”

  They all watched me while I chomped, and it was getting awkward. I brushed my hands together to get the crumbs of ba’na off. “So, is it my turn with her or what?”

  Lorne sighed. “Unfortunately, yes. I think you should go in there, but be careful.”

  “I always am. Ask Roan.” I gave him a shrug. “Any specifics you want me to hit? Any tips?”

  “No. Having you in the room will set Seri off. Push any buttons you can find to get her talking.”

  That wasn’t much to go on, but I liked improvising. At the very least, it would feel more natural.

  “All right then. I’ll be back.” I left the room still a little confused about how I’d felt his frequencies shift and how I used the same target practice thing that I did when we were kids to distract him.

  I didn’t think I remembered, but it was still weird.

  But I didn’t really need to understand everything. Not right now. All I cared about was that Lorne was calm, and I got my turn with the woman who’d placed a bomb in my room.

  I pressed my hand to the wall next to the interrogation room. When the door slid open, I stepped through with a grin on my face.

  “Hey! It’s so nice to finally meet you.” I spoke to her in overly cheery English. I was pretty sure she spoke it, otherwise Lorne would’ve said something.

  “No, don’t get up,” I said, even though she was still sitting and looking at me like I was garbage.

  I pulled out the chair across from her and sat down. “This might be awkward as hell, but you know what, I think we’re mature enough to handle this.” I leaned back. “You don’t have to say anything. I know you can understand me just fine.”

  She stared at the wall behind me, a little off to my right.

  I moved over a little bit so that she’d be forced to stare at me, but she started smoothing down her pants instead.

  Fine. At least one of us could be an adult. “You know, I dat
ed a guy once.” That had her eyes darting to me. “Haden. He was actually really nice, but I knew something was missing. Something vital. I had my mind wiped when I was a kid, just before Liberation Week ended. Apparently, I kept talking in Aunare—”

  “Where are you going with this?” Her voice was smokier when she spoke in her perfect, unaccented English.

  I grinned. “I’m getting there. So, I kept talking in Aunare, and it was dangerous. So, ffffpt—” I slashed a finger across my forehead. “Gone. Lots of things gone with it. And people, like Lorne. Oh sure, I’d seen him on the news, but nothing much other than that. I had no clue I was betrothed to anyone, so that was a big shock.”

  I leaned back in the chair. “Anyway, I’d been with Haden for a bit, but ended things. It just didn’t feel right. Something was missing. And if I understand things correctly now, I’ll always feel that way with anyone other than Lorne.” I wasn’t entirely sold on the whole mirror thing, but I couldn’t deny what I felt around him. “I know that you probably loved Lorne, but you can’t compete with me. Killing me won’t change that. And since you’re Aunare, you have to know what this whole mirror thing is about. You’d have to understand that this is how it is. I understand being jealous, but someone as beautiful as you can’t have too much trouble finding someone else. So, it can’t really just be about Lorne, can it? It’s me. Right? You hate me.”

  She looked at me then. I’d seen that look before. I’d seen it so many times, so many places, on so many faces.

  Hatred. Hatred in its purest form. The kind of hatred that makes you do crazy stupid things. Like placing a bomb in someone’s room.

  I leaned forward over the table. “The boys were playing nice, but let’s cut the shit. We both know you did it. What I want to know is how the bomb got through the gate. You tell me that, and maybe I can convince Lorne not to kill you.”

  A grin crossed her face, and I froze. That was a look I’d only seen one time before. Jason Murtagh gave me a similar grin in the diner—confidence, arrogance, and the look of pure evil right before they were about to get what they want.