by CS Hale
The training I’d done with Erris and Valemar allowed me to silently slip down the hallways. The comm panel was easy to find — its white light illuminating the door to the cargo hold. For the first time, I wondered if I’d cast a shadow standing there in front of all that light.
No. The sun had been out both when Alill had left and during the long ride here. None of us had cast a telltale shadow on the ground, just a darana and a single rider.
I breathed out a slow breath and crossed to the panel. I exhaled slowly again and wiggled my fingers. As I sucked air back into my lungs, I let my fingers fly.
On. Comm out. Open line. Destination – Shororato HQ Krajiny system. Message: Hormani on Teridun 4 trading chalcopyrite. Signed – PS Astrid Carr. Close line.
My body turned and I had shifted my weight to my toes before I even swiped the panel closed. I’d begun to hurtle down the passageway toward the door when the beeping began.
“What the fuck?!” Captain’s quarters, my inner file supplied. “What the hell?!”
Doors swished open as the crew, having been alerted to the transmission, tumbled out to find me.
“That bitch is here!”
I was four feet from the door. Three. It slid open, and I threw myself against the wall as the guard raced in. As soon as he was past, I dashed out the door. It brushed my heel as it closed behind me. Heymond scooped me up, flung me on his back, and ran off into the night.
For the first ten minutes, my nerves prickled on heightened alert, fully anticipating that we’d get shot. That the thermals would get turned on, making Heymond and me easy to spot. Easy to kill. Retribution for what I’d done.
When the ship blasted off, I was certain it had targeted us. But once it had lifted into the sky, it just kept going.
When I realized that it really, truly wasn’t coming for us, my stomach decided it had enough. I motioned for Heymond to put me down. I bent over double, and dry heaved for about a minute as my stomach purged itself of all my pent-up emotion.
Heymond rubbed my back and spoke for the first time since the dungeon. “It’s okay, my princess. Everything will be okay.”
I wanted to shout, “No, it’s not!” But I kept silent and let him comfort me.
After about ten minutes, he spoke the words that spurred my body back into action. “We need to keep moving so that we can meet up with Alill and Conmel. They’ll have food and water for us. And Valemar will be waiting for your return. The karawack will let him know that things went fine, but wouldn’t you rather tell him yourself?”
I nodded and straightened up. Heymond put me onto his back and we set out into the dark again.
The sun was just beginning to glow behind the peaks of the Archjarn when the rocky hills finally gave way to the grass of Fairfada. Another bout of nausea hit me, and I brought up bile. It was actually more comfortable than the empty heaves of earlier.
“It’s the lack of food and water,” Heymond told me. “Your body is rebelling.”
“Yeah, it couldn’t be that I’ve had nothing but blo—” I said and puked again. As I bent over, hands on my knees, I noticed that I had a shadow. I wiped my mouth on the edge of my tunic and stood up. Heymond glimmered into view. His gray, shadowy form slowly saturated then developed color. Early holo transmissions had done the same sort of thing — gray fuzziness filling out, taking shape, and, suddenly, a perfect image.
I moved away from the sick and sat down. I tried not to think about water and the sour taste in my mouth. “How long?” I asked.
Heymond sat down next to me. “How long, what?”
“Before Alill and Conmel get here?”
Heymond looked back over his shoulder at the edge of blue peeking through the mountains. “Any time. We haven’t come out exactly where we went in. I wasn’t —” He broke off and whistled. “I knew that thing could fly, but …”
“Yeah. And that’s a small ship.”
Heymond jerked. “I thought your ship …”
“Escape pod. Meant for two people. And only to get from where you are in orbit onto the planet you’re above.”
“If the ship that just left is small, what’s large?”
I put my hand on his arm and held it as I crushed his world. “There are ships as big as Aedenfal. The High with the Low.”
“Oh, dear Father.” Heymond’s voice went weak. “And that’s what you just called? That’s what’s coming?”
“Probably not. But ships larger than the one that just left. And other assorted sizes. The Shororato will bring with them enough weaponry to take down an entrenched mining operation as well as smaller ships to scan for alien technology.”
“Like your ship?”
“Like my ship,” I confirmed, and mentally wrapped a hand around my heart so I didn’t wince. “It will need to be taken someplace easy for the Shororato to collect it. I’ll let Valemar know.”
Heymond sat there absorbing the beginnings of this new reality. “I can see why you didn’t want to be the Moon Princess,” he said after several minutes of silence.
“You expected a savior.”
“Which you are. But you’re also —”
“A destroyer.”
It took a while before Alill and Conmel found us. Heymond and I ate breakfast, had our first food and water in a day. Another long day stretched before us. Twelve hours to cross the Fairfada. Four to six hours to Aedenfal from there. This time, I sat in front of Alill instead of behind so he could hold onto me. It had been twenty-four hours since I’d slept, and I would have fallen off once the motion of the darana lulled me to sleep.
The darana coming to a standstill woke me up hours later. We were still in the midst of Fairfada — I opened my eyes to see bending grass all around us. Before I could ask why we’d stopped, I noticed a black dot in the sky. A karawack. It glided to us and landed on Heymond’s shoulder. He lifted it down and took the message from its leg before returning it to his shoulder. We’d be less conspicuous if it rode there and didn’t follow us overhead.
“It’s from Valemar,” he said as he unrolled it. “He’s going to meet us at the switching post.”
My heart beat faster. Six hours sooner. I was going to get to see him six hours sooner.
“How long was I asleep?” I asked Alill.
“About four hours.”
Every bit of me was bone tired and sore. “How are you even upright?” I asked him.
“Practice. And Conmel and I took turns sleeping last night. I’ve had a couple of hours.”
“Has Heymond slept?”
Alill shook his head. “No. And I don’t think he will until he’s handed you over to Valemar.”
We stopped for lunch about noon. Climbing down from the darana made me wonder how I’d ever manage to get back on. Parts of me just wouldn’t unbend.
The food was among the best I’d ever tasted. Just bread, cheese, and a dried fruit bar washed down with water, but my belly had been so achy and empty for so long that I could have been eating Iberico pork and washing it down with Cambari wine.
Heymond had to lift me into the saddle, and we set off again. Another six hours before we reached the trees and fields of Bánalfar and the switching post.
I wanted to cry when it came into view. Cry from exhaustion. Cry from relief. My heart leapt when our approach was noted and Valemar came out to greet us. Alill helped me lift my leg over the saddle and I slipped into Valemar’s waiting arms.
“I don’t think I can walk,” I said as my feet hit the ground and my legs buckled. How had I ever ridden halfway across Bánalfar and back?
Valemar scooped me up. “You’ve had a long journey with little food. We’ll take a wagon back.”
Valemar carried me inside the post. I hadn’t seen the interior before since Heymond and I had needed to keep our presence unknown the previous day. The post was outfitted like an inn. Trestle tables lined the front room. The smell of food drifted in from the kitchen. A set of stairs led to bedrooms above.
We ate a me
al while the wagon was arranged. Valemar took reports from Conmel and Alill, and asked Heymond if we’d had any trouble.
“No trouble,” he replied, but his face reflected the fear of having seen the ship take flight, of the knowledge of what was coming.
Valemar’s eyes narrowed, but he didn’t ask further, didn’t ask me if I’d been successful. And I decided we could wait until we were back in Aedenfal to tell him what needed to happen next.
The sun had begun to set by the time we left. Conmel and Alill were going to rest overnight at the post. Our new King’s Guard rode with a remarkably alert Heymond. Valemar settled himself into the back of the wagon and opened his arms for me. Curled in the warm embrace of my husband and with the rhythmic rocking of the wagon, it wasn’t long before I was fast asleep.
I BARELY STIRRED when we arrived at the High. Valemar carried me to our room, stripped off my sweaty, dirty clothes, and put me to bed. I pulled his arm closer around me and fell back asleep. I had at least a couple of days before the Shororato would arrive.
I awoke in the morning with two thoughts: I desperately needed a bath, and I didn’t want to move. But there were things that needed to be said, preparations that needed to be made, so I rolled over and stared at the fierce, beautiful face of my husband.
My movement woke Valemar. He smiled. “Good morning, wife.”
“Good morning, husband.” Pain flooded my body. Job done, I could no longer hide the cost. Tears crept down my face.
Valemar frowned and reached up a hand to brush them away. “What is wrong, Astrid?”
I smiled. I’d done it. I’d fulfilled my role. I’d fulfilled the prophecy. The Moon Princess had driven away the outsiders. There would be a new life for Bánalfar.
“The Shororato will be here in two or three days.” I bit my lips as a sob rose up my throat. “You need to move my ship into an open clearing, somewhere away from people.”
Valemar’s frown turned into a scowl. “Okay.”
“And I —” But I couldn’t make the words come. “The Shororato will scan the planet for alien technology, so I —”
Pieces of my heart began to break off and slip away, a growing cascade of shattered glass that slipped through my mental fingers, taking the little that remained of my courage with them.
But I had to tell Valemar. The last piece of the mission still needed to be completed. The piece that I had kept hidden from him — that I needed to be there with my ship. I blinked back tears and forced the words out.
“The chip … in my head.”
Valemar’s eyes flew wide. He gasped. “No!”
“I don’t belong here,” I whispered as my soul began to burn, slowly turning into ash.
“Mother and Father, Astrid! What have you done?”
I tried to smile, but my lips simply trembled. “I’ve saved you all.”
VALEMAR FLAT OUT refused. I was his. He had claimed me. He was not going to leave me by my ship. He was not going to hand me over.
“It’s not a death sentence,” I told him. “It’s simply prison.”
“For how long?” Valemar asked. I could see the calculations spinning behind his eyes.
“Life,” I whispered, and he erupted into a rage again. “If you do this, if you keep me from them, they will come into the High to get me.”
“Fine,” Valemar snarled, every bit the lethal warrior. “My planet. My rules.”
I sighed and sat down. “Raislos is going to have the same reaction over the armor. I don’t see him giving it back without a fight.”
Valemar scoffed and continued pacing our room. “Technology is one thing. A person is another.” He stopped mid-stride and turned around. “Could Ferrick remove this chip?”
“It’s too deeply embedded,” I said. “And even if he could, I’d lose my knowledge of your language. We’d no longer be able to speak to each other.”
“We wouldn’t need words,” Valemar said. “We’d still know that we love each other.”
And then my fierce, proud husband broke down.
In the end, there was nothing I could say or do to sway him. He called the people of Aedenfal to the Cair and told them what we’d done. He told them that the outsiders were from farther away than the moon, as was I. He told them that we’d called an enforcement brigade to remove the outsiders, and that those people would be entering Aedenfal to talk to me. He told them that if they were afraid of strange people or ships that flew in the sky they were free to leave the city, but that these things would now be part of life in Bánalfar, part of life on Crenfor.
I had expected the people to panic, but the prophecy had done its work. For hundreds of years they had looked for people to journey from the moon. Now, it had simply happened. Earth had worried about alien invaders and hadn’t trusted the outsiders when they had finally appeared. Bánalfar and Crenfor had anticipated a savior. That others would follow and help the Moon Princess was simply to be expected.
At first, Valemar had feared I’d run. But why would I? If I was going to spend the rest of my life without my husband, then I wanted every moment with him that I could get.
“That’s why you got the tattoos,” he said at the end of that very long day after I’d broken the news. “You wanted to take part of Bánalfar with you.”
“There was just so much staring at my marriage mark that I could contemplate,” I said. “Where these are simply beautiful.”
Valemar took my hand and ran his lips long the barat leaves on my arm. “They are symbols of protection, and they will protect you now,” he said with utter surety. “You may have been an outsider when you came, but you were in need and we protected you. You did not need to call the Shororato, but you did.” His fingers tightened on mine. “I made a vow to shield you from cold and sun and harm. I will not let these people take you. If they insist, it will be war.”
I cupped his face and kissed him. “No,” I said. “There will be no talk of war. If that occurs, then I will not have been a savior, I will have been a destroyer, and I will not let that happen.”
Valemar couldn’t speak. Tears flowed down his face. His hands, his jaw began to tremble. He reached out and touched me. His hands drifted from my arms to my face to my side. Nothing brought him comfort.
I opened my arms and gathered him to me. “Hush, my love. Everything will be fine.” I gently rocked him back and forth as he cried, whispering words of comfort even as my own tears ran down to join the ones already dampening my chest. He had a future without me, and somehow, I needed to make it all right.
The High and the Low fell into a state of anticipation. My escape pod was transferred to an open field and four guards set by it to keep the curious away. We received reports that Raislos was furious. The Hormani pullout had been abrupt, leaving him with no explanation. He could scarcely credit that Bánalfar’s queen had summoned help, that she had friends powerful enough to frighten off his well-paying customers. Yet, raiding ceased on the Fairfada. The Cordair soldiers with their Awrakian armor were recalled to Rock Dorach to defend it in case of attack.
Valemar and I spent our days in the solar, just holding each other. Our nights were spent in tender, gentle lovemaking, as if the other would break and fade away if we asked for too much.
A buzz awakened me the third night, the chip in my head vibrating from the scan. Valemar woke when I trembled. “They’re here,” I said.
Valemar held me fast against him. “You’ll not disappear? Be taken right out of my arms?”
“No,” I said. “They’ll know you’re with me. But we can expect visitors at the High in the morning.”
We received a report at first light that my ship had gone. The four seasoned King’s Guard had thrown themselves to the ground and prayed for the Mother to spare them when the escape pod rose into the air, all on its own, the leader among them had been ashamed to report.
“Very understandable, under the circumstances,” I told him. “I myself have seen things that have defied explanation, and they are fr
equently terrifying.”
The guards dismissed, Valemar and I entered the throne room to await the Shororato. A karawack arrived with a report that a flying ship had landed not far outside of Aedenfal and that men dressed in white armor and carrying black boxes had disembarked from it. Valemar sent word that they were not to be disturbed and to be shown the way in, if at all possible.
“Will they be able to speak Alfari?” Valemar asked me.
“I don’t know,” I said. “It took several hours for my chip to assimilate your language. They might have set up listening posts last night and have already collected it, but it is possible that I will be the only one able to understand them.”
We sat and waited. Shale ghosted in through the side door and stayed near it, refusing to meet my eyes when I glanced her way. Twenty minutes after her, whispers announced the arrival of the Shororato before Orin led them in. I’d spent the day before teaching him how to say, “This way. Our queen is expecting you,” in Karjiny.
My heart still fell at the sight of a full general and his four soldiers. They hadn’t worn their helmets — a good sign — but if the Alfari had thought my appearance strange, the cat-like Kalunka and fish-like Inet among them said that these people were not of this world.
The general, at least, was humanoid. “Protocol Specialist Carr, you are in violation of Supreme Order four six nine — contact with an off-limit planet. I am going to have to ask you to come with me.”
Valemar smiled. That dangerous, indulgent smile. “There is no Protocol Specialist Carr here,” he said, and I realized that the general had spoken Alfari. Valemar’s eyes flicked over the man.
“General,” I said, realizing Valemar was trying to figure out what to call him.
“General.” Valemar flashed his dangerous smile again. “The woman before you is Queen Astrid Carbrev, my wife.”