Breath of Life

by Christine Pope

  Really, I didn’t even know which place I could call home. I had spent every waking moment of the last three months in Sarzhin’s house, but it still didn’t feel quite mine. I had been a given place to stay in it, no more. However, the thought of the homestead where I had grown to adulthood seemed curiously remote, like something I once read about in a story but could no longer recall with any distinctness.

  My things had already been packed in the small satchel I’d brought from home; no need for a bigger case when I only needed to take with me clothing for three days. The garage was located on the east side of the mansion and housed both transports, along with piles of equipment and machinery, only some of which I was able to identify. Ever since he’d told me of the spare vehicle, I’d wondered why he needed two of them when he lived here alone. I knew better than to ask, however.

  “By noon of the third day,” he told me. “No later.”

  “I know,” I said. Really, did he think I could possibly forget that? If I didn’t return on time, would he use the other transport to come and get me? Somehow I doubted it, although I did almost smile at the thought of Sarzhin showing up on my parents’ doorstep to fetch me back like some sort of black-robed truant officer.

  “Go, then. You can reach me by comm if necessary.” He paused and added, “Enjoy your time with your family.”

  “I will.” Since there didn’t seem to be much else for me to do, I gave him an awkward little wave, and climbed up into the transport and closed the door behind me. The familiar whistling sound of the cabin pressurizing surrounded me. Of course I carried my breather on the passenger seat, just in case—no inhabitant of Lathvin went anywhere without the apparatus within arm’s length—but the transport was, unlike the one my father had crashed, new and in good repair.

  I waited until I saw Sarzhin go out the airlock door that connected the house to the garage, and then pressed the remote to open the pressure door to the outside. At once a blast of wind and rain swept in. With a sigh, I activated the windshield wipers and hoped Libba’s fiancé was an indoor person. There wasn’t much in the way of outdoor recreation on Lathvin IV, that was for sure.

  A smoothly paved drive connected the garage to the road and cut through one of the fields of moonflowers that surrounded Sarzhin’s house. The road itself wasn’t in nearly as good repair, but the all-terrain treads on the transport didn’t seem to care one way or another, and I moved along at a decent clip. Almost before I knew it, I had reached the turnoff for the homestead, and I pointed the vehicle down a drive that seemed far narrower than it had only a few months ago. Through the driving rain I saw another transport parked off to one side of the house. I didn’t recognize it but guessed it was the replacement for the one my father had crashed. It actually looked newish and bigger than the old one, and I wondered how my father had been able to wrangle enough replacement funds out of the insurance company to get something so nice.

  I supposed I would learn soon enough. Slowing to a crawl, I eased Sarzhin’s transport into the space next to the other vehicle, and then picked up the breather and set it over my mouth and nose. I stowed the remote in my pocket and secured the rain flaps of my poncho around my neck. Not that it really mattered—somehow Lathvin’s freezing, needle-sharp raindrops always managed to find their way inside any protective garment you put on.

  Satchel in one hand, I opened the door with my other hand and slid out, gasping a little as the cold, thin air hit my face. I realized that I hadn’t actually been outside since I had arrived in the Zhore’s home. I also realized I hadn’t missed the fresh air one bit—the interior of the greenhouse had far “fresher” air, when you got right down to it, considering all the plants exhaling in that one spot.

  Head bent down, I hurried over to the airlock and hit the button. The door slid upward and I stepped inside, then did the customary shake to get as much moisture off me as possible. Airlocks never had security locks on them—you never knew when someone might need some last-minute shelter from the planet’s unbreathable air. The actual lock was on the door that separated the interior of the house from the airlock, but of course even a place as modest as my family’s homestead had an intercom.

  I pressed the “talk” switch. “Hey, it’s me—I mean, it’s Anika. Somebody open the door—I’m freezing out here.”

  Almost at once the door into the house opened, and I emerged into a hubbub of voices and exclamations. I saw my father and mother first, and then Libba, who somehow looked much more grown-up in person, even though I’d seen vids of her just three months ago. Just behind her was a tall, fair-haired young man I didn’t recognize but knew had to be her fiancé. No purple skin or antennas. Not that I’d really expected her to get engaged to an Eridani; she was too conventional for that, and besides, the planet had a sizable Gaian expat community because of the universities that dotted its surface.

  After the quiet elegance of Sarzhin’s home, the overall effect of all those voices at once was a little overwhelming. I blinked, and managed a smile, even as my father came forward and said, “Let’s get that poncho before it drips on everything.”

  I reached up to undo the rain flaps and the fasteners of my damp outer garment and lifted it away. Even from across the room I could see Libba’s eyebrows shoot up. The wine-colored tunic and pants I wore were just as elegant as her own off-world outfit. I guessed she hadn’t been expecting that.

  Then came the introductions—Libba’s fiancé was named Cole Mikkels, and he was a junior professor of astrophysics, which I had to admit sounded terribly impressive. They had met at the university, but not because she’d been in any of his classes. No, she’d been earning some money on the side by tending bar at school functions, and they’d struck up a conversation at the astrophysics department’s mixer. If someone had asked me, I would have told them my sister didn’t know the difference between a martini and a Centauri pile driver, but obviously she’d been learning a bit more during the past five years than differential equations and Stacian declensions.

  “But you,” she said, running a practiced gaze over my elegant ensemble, “you look quite different, Anika. Dad told me you were actually staying with that Zhore down the road. What’s going on with that?”

  I shot a glare at my father, who gave a little shrug, as if to say, I had to tell her something to explain where you were.

  “Yes,” I said, trying to ignore my mother’s look of sharpened interest, “he’s…well, he’s an expert botanist, and I’m sort of studying with him in addition to my university coursework. Kind of an apprenticeship, I guess.” That seemed the best explanation, since Sarzhin really was an expert, and I’d learned enough from working with him over the past few weeks that I thought I could do a reasonably good job of faking it if someone really wanted to start asking questions about what I’d learned so far.

  Libba’s eyebrows got another workout. “I didn’t know you were that into botany.”

  “Oh, yes. It’s really fascinating. And Sar—that is, the Zhore says it’s a good field to go into. You know, he sold one of his Azar lilies to the CEO of the Gaian Relocation Corporation for ten thousand units.”

  At that remark everyone started talking at once, asking me about what other sorts of plants he raised, and how much they sold for, and saying it was no wonder he had gotten such nice clothes for me. That is, my mother and father and Libba were the ones peppering me with questions and comments, and Cole sort of stood off to one wide and watched the commotion. I deflected the questions as best I could and gave them the few bits of information I deemed safe.

  Finally things calmed down enough for my mother to say she needed to get back into the kitchen, and would Anika lend her a hand?

  I went without protest, mostly because I’d always been the one to help my mother out with the cooking. Libba had never been very domestic. Also, my mother was less likely to continue the inquisition.

  The hope that she wouldn’t ask any more questions died, however, after she handed me a spoon and instruct
ed me to stir the contents of the pot, which looked like her famous goulash. I couldn’t remember the last time she’d made it, though. Obviously she was breaking out the big guns for Cole, the junior professor of astrophysics.

  “I suppose he has you help out with the cooking.”

  “He who?” I asked innocently.

  “You know very well who. The Zhore.”

  I shook my head and inhaled the wonderful paprika-laced steam that rose from the pot. “No, I’ve never even been in the kitchen. He has a mech for that.”

  She turned away from the tomatoes she was slicing. From the looks of it, my parents had donated the bulk of their current hydroponic crop for this one meal. “A mech?”

  “Yes,” I replied, feeling somehow uneasy, although I couldn’t really say why. “The mech takes care of all the household stuff.”

  “So he really is rich.”

  “I guess so.”

  “We thought so, after he sent the transport, but—”

  “What transport?”

  “Why, the one sitting outside. Surely you saw it. You didn’t think your father and I could have afforded that, did you?”

  No, I hadn’t, but I also hadn’t thought Sarzhin would be the reason why they had such a fine replacement vehicle. My tone flat, I said, “Dad never told me anything about that.”

  “Of course he didn’t. The Zhore specifically said we weren’t supposed to say anything to you. At least, that’s what your father explained to me.”

  Now, why Sarzhin didn’t see fit to tell me he had paid for my parents’ replacement transport, I had no idea. I also didn’t know why he’d done it in the first place. It wasn’t his fault my father had lost control in that freakish storm and wrecked the thing. Did the Zhore feel some sort of remorse for blackmailing me away from my family? That didn’t make any sense, though. He could have sent me home at any time if he were really racked with guilt over the whole thing, but that sure hadn’t happened.

  I shrugged and said as noncommittally as I could, “That was nice of him.”

  “Indeed it was.” She set down the knife and began sprinkling greenhouse basil over the tops of the tomatoes. “It seems he’s taking good care of you—and us. Has he never said why he wanted you there?”

  “No, never,” I lied. Maybe the Zhores disliked dishonesty, but it was common currency for the human race, and besides, I’d promised Sarzhin I wouldn’t tell the truth about my situation to my family. I wasn’t about to start poking at my reasons for why I considered my loyalty to Sarzhin to be more important than loyalty to my family.

  “Hmm.” Apparently finished with the basil, she put it back in its self-sealing container and returned it to the food storage unit. Then she cocked her head to one side and said in musing tones, “He is very rich, though.”

  “I—I suppose so.”

  “Is he old?”

  “What?” I turned away from the goulash and frowned at her. “What has that got to do with anything?”

  She echoed my shrug of a minute earlier. Who knows—I could have picked up the gesture from her, even though I tended to favor my father in terms of coloring and facial features. “It’s just that, if he’s elderly, maybe he wants someone to, I don’t know, be his heir.”

  Her casual greed surprised me more than I really wanted to admit. No wonder she hadn’t communicated much with me, or asked much about Sarzhin. In her mind she’d probably already been calculating how much I stood to inherit from the alien who had taken me in.

  I said, “No, he’s not old. At least, he doesn’t act or sound like he’s elderly.”

  Not that that meant much, when it came to aliens. The humanoid race from Tau Ceti had the astonishing ability to appear in the prime of life right up until the minute they dropped dead. Nice trick, I always thought. But I remembered the strength of Sarzhin’s hands as they had held mine, and the muscles in his arm when I had laid my hand there. Nothing about him spoke of age or infirmity.

  “Oh,” she replied, without making any effort to hide the disappointment in her voice. “But he is teaching you something about botany, right?”

  “Yes,” I said. I knew she needed to pin her hopes on something for me, as there didn’t seem to be much chance of me getting off-world the way Libba had. “He’s teaching me a great deal.”

  Dinner wasn’t quite as awkward as I thought it would be, since Libba and Cole carried a good deal of the conversation by recounting more stories about their life at the university and their circle of friends. As I listened to them talk, I almost felt as if I had somehow become alien myself, my life with Sarzhin so very different from what she described. Even if I had stayed at home, we had very little social activity here on Lathvin to speak of. The homesteads were spread just far enough apart so the sort of casual socializing that went on in more heavily populated worlds didn’t really occur here. True, Port Natchez was something of a gathering place, but the pub there wasn’t exactly the sort of venue my parents would have wanted me to frequent, and beyond that the little spaceport town didn’t have much to offer.

  It turned out the engaged couple was staying in the small bedroom Libba and I had once shared, and so I ended up on the couch. I didn’t bother to protest. They were the guests of honor, not I, and I supposed I could put up with the lumpy old sofa for a few days, even though I couldn’t help contrasting it with my luxurious bed back at Sarzhin’s home.

  That first night it took me a long time to fall asleep. The bumpy couch had something to do with it, I knew, and maybe it was also that the sound of the weather seemed so much more omnipresent here than it was in Sarzhin’s house. There, the thick walls and triple-sealed windows shut out all but the faintest whisper of the raindrops, while here it sounded as if I had the entire percussion session of the Gaian Grand Philharmonic beating on the roof directly over my head. And behind that was the convulsive chugging of the atmospheric generator, adding its dull thumps to the cacophony.

  Still, eventually I did fall asleep, and was chased in and out of slumber by a series of disquieting dreams whose content I forgot almost as soon as I opened my eyes to the darkness.

  Except one.

  It seemed I was back in the house I shared with Sarzhin, but it was only a shell of the graceful home I remembered. The windows were all gone, the elegant wall fountains and their attendant greenery dry and barren. A cold wind whistled through the empty rooms. Even in my dream I knew I shouldn’t have been able to breathe, not with the building unsealed and Lathvin’s unbreathable air flowing all around me, but somehow I was able to keep walking, arms wrapped around me to keep out the chill.

  I saw no sign of Sarzhin, not in the library, or the dining room, or even the greenhouse, which was filled with the husks of dead plants, the leaves and flowers he had once so lovingly tended now brittle and brown, shriveled from their exposure to the planet’s unforgiving atmosphere. My dream-self wanted to weep at the loss of all those beautiful plants. Somehow, though, I kept walking, my feet taking me up the stairs to the one section of the house where I had never been…Sarzhin’s room.

  The door stood open, and I hesitated on the threshold, even in the dream nervous about crossing over into such interdicted territory. A cold wind blew through the open windows here as well, and inside everything was bare. No furniture, no bed, nothing but an expanse of dark, polished stone floor, and some shredded curtains of heavy black fabric fluttering at the window.

  Only they weren’t fabric. They moved, and came toward me, and even as I opened my mouth to cry out, I heard Sarzhin’s voice say my name, and the great folds of his cloak flowed around me, pulling me into his warmth. His arms were around me, and I pressed myself to him, sobbing at last, clinging to him with desperate fingers. And then all around was light and the green of growing things, as the house seemed to heal itself the longer we held each other, until at last we sank down on the floor, mouths touching, hands reaching…reaching…

  I sat up in bed with a gasp, and the familiar, faintly goulash-scented confine
s of my family’s living room met my straining eyes. Save for the incessant pounding of the rain overhead, all was quiet. No one seemed to have been disturbed by the nightmare.

  No one except me, of course.

  Shivering, I pulled the covers up to my chin and tried to will away the lingering sensations from the dream—the feel of his body against mine, the touch of his mouth. It had felt awfully human.

  Because it was a dream, I told myself. A crazy, stupid dream…brought on, I guessed, by the over-spiced goulash. Even now my stomach rumbled a bit, unsure as to how it should handle such a dish after months of eating the more subtly seasoned Zhore food. Yes, that had to be it.

  Even so, I found myself reluctant to go back to sleep. I tossed and turned, and after a few more minutes fished my tablet out of my satchel and brought up a silly adventure vid I’d probably watched a dozen times already, about the adventures of a ship’s crew just on this side of the law, with a new twist or turn every few minutes. Usually it would have amused me. This time, though, I found it almost impossible to concentrate, my brain still buzzing with the sensations from my dream. Never mind that they weren’t real. They had felt real.

  Too real.

  No one seemed to notice I was bleary-eyed and cranky the next morning. My parents probably attributed it to the fact that we had to queue for the shower, as the homestead had only the one bathroom, and so I had to wait almost two hours before I could get ready in the morning. By the time I finally did get in there, the dream had begun to fade, and I forced myself to think of other things, to convince myself that these little inconveniences were nothing, and that I should be glad to be seeing my family again. If only the house didn’t feel as if it were about to burst at the seams with five adults crammed into it.

  What Cole and Libba could possibly find to do to occupy themselves for a full two weeks here, I had no idea, but it turned out Libba wanted to go over some of the wedding plans with my mother, and the two of them spent a good deal of time on the computer comparing designs and menus. I supposed Cole was going to pay for all of it—fare off-world included—as I knew my parents could never afford such an expense.