by Lucia Ashta
I was perhaps having a mystical experience. And all it took to get me here was an otherworldly sunset. Upon Origins, I’d get twice as many of them.
I might have to get used to the idea of being a princess of a planet.
When Tanus’ voice finally reached me, it was as if it had traveled a great distance to find me. Like an anchor to a magical, flying ship, it brought me down back to earth—er, Origins.
“Where’d you go?” he asked, curiosity dancing across his green eyes, the eyes I felt I could get lost in just as easily as I had the greens of the sky.
I wasn’t ready to speak yet. I was back on the ground with him, but I wasn’t yet ready to disrupt the feeling of where I’d gone. I could still taste it. Like the aftertaste of a decadent chocolate that had just finished melting on my tongue, I didn’t wish to do anything to lose what little was left to me.
He didn’t press me for an answer. His knowing smile suggested he understood more about me than I did. That he respected who and how I was. Another gift I’d apparently had to travel to other worlds to discover.
He turned forward, walking for several more minutes, before he drew our entire entourage to a halt. “The village is just over the hill. Olph, I want you to take Ilara and Lila into the forest. Hide them and all the horses. Let’s be safe. No one should be coming along this path, but let’s not take chances. Hide them well. I’ll take Kai with me. Okay?”
“Got it,” Dolpheus said as he moved to take my horse’s reins from Tanus. “If you need me to join you, just give me the sign.”
Tanus nodded quickly, but I didn’t think he’d call Dolpheus away from me. He hadn’t said it, but it was clear my protection was foremost. I imagined he’d only decided to leave me behind with Dolpheus so he could remind the villagers what fate would befall them if they let slip word of my survival.
“We’ll be back soon,” Tanus finally addressed me, and I debated for a moment whether or not I should express my wishes. I didn’t want to make things more complicated than they already were—they were complicated enough, thank you very much.
Then I remembered that, while here, I was a princess. “I’d like to come. I don’t want to stay behind.” Even if he was my lover, perhaps I was expected to give orders, not suggestions. “I have the desire to see how these people live. They are my subjects, and so I will accompany them to assure their living conditions are acceptable.”
From the nearly identical set of raised eyebrows Tanus and Dolpheus sported, I deduced that what I’d said came off a bit ridiculous. Why? I didn’t think it was because I wasn’t expected to give orders. I hoped it wasn’t because the previous version of me didn’t care about the living conditions of her subjects. Dealing with an unknown world and its implications, I had no way of knowing for sure the cause of the soldiers’ amused looks.
When Tanus answered my royal request, his lips were tight. “I don’t advise it, Your Majesty.”
I’d gone from “my love” to “your majesty,” and it wasn’t because he was worried the villagers would suspect the nature of our relationship. They were already bound to keep my existence secret. Therefore, they couldn’t reveal anything about it.
He continued, “The less we risk your exposure, the safer you’ll be.”
“You said no one will be coming down the path. So who will there be to see me? I’ll conceal my eyes while in the village.”
“We weren’t supposed to encounter a league of Dark Warriors and their kidnap victims either. I don’t advise we take any unnecessary risks, Your Majesty.”
I pretended to ponder what he’d said, to weigh the pros and cons of his proposed action. But when all of my life was uncertain and unknowable, risks were relative. I wanted to go, so I would. He wouldn’t dare try to stop me.
“I’m coming with you,” I said.
He gave me a look that made me question what he might do to try to stop me from putting myself in what he considered harm’s way. We exchanged a charged look before he relented. “Fine. But you stay at my side at every moment. And, under no circumstances whatsoever, do you reveal your eyes.”
“Deal.”
He snatched the reins back from Dolpheus and muttered unintelligibly as he led the train back into motion. His words weren’t meant for me. Even if they were, I knew I didn’t want to hear them.
Apparently, the state of disgruntlement sounded the same on Origins as it did on Earth.
TWENTY-THREE
WITH MY VEIL back on and my eyes averted, it was difficult to study the villagers’ living conditions as much as I would have liked. But from my high vantage point atop my spotted mare, I could make out enough to determine these people lived in relative poverty. They had no gadgets or advanced technological devices that I could see in the dim light of twilight. They didn’t even have horses, unless they kept them somewhere beyond the boundaries of their village.
Their community consisted of a series of remedial huts, constructed of something that looked like wood, but I didn’t think it was. I longed to dismount to feel one of the walls, though it was unlikely to happen. Tanus kept flinging vigilant looks toward me, then to our surroundings, to each rejoicing person that approached our group, then back to me again. The cycle looped.
I wanted to tell him to knock it off, that he was making me nervous, but I couldn’t. Whatever I said would be overheard. Besides, perhaps I shouldn’t have insisted on coming, the dangers much worse than I imagined. For why else would Tanus look as if he expected one of these innocuous-looking people to charge me at any moment?
The tribe’s relief at the return of its women and children was palpable. I couldn’t fathom that these people might be violent. Their enthusiasm at seeing their families returned was genuine. It had to be.
The old and young, and every person in between, rushed the seven women and two children. They embraced and ran hands over their bodies, seemingly to reassure themselves they were unharmed. It was a confusion of busy limbs.
Then they danced.
I’d never seen anything quite like it. I was mesmerized, working hard to follow every movement and gesture while simultaneously averting my eyes. Their rejoicing reminded me of shows I’d seen on the National Geographic Channel, where the camera crew managed to film some remote, isolated tribe. Here was the same sense of community and support, the ease with which they celebrated the blessings and transitions of life.
These people began to dance as they migrated away from us and up the path to their village, even as they moved toward the clearing in the middle of their huts, the communal gathering space. The ground was trod into dirt of such an intense red here that its color was noticeable even at nightfall.
The familiar beat of drums erupted from several of the huts, and then their players emerged. They’d run to get the instruments to lend rhythm to their dance.
The Suxle Sun had finished its setting, and the sky was nearly black. These people were enough light to brighten the darkness around them.
Tears I wouldn’t let fall moistened my eyes, the ones I couldn’t let anyone see. The beat of the drum rang through me and my body responded as if this were the beat of my own ancestors, of my own blood. How it could be that I could connect so deeply to a people on a foreign planet, how their ways could be so similar to those of isolated tribes on Earth, I had no idea. I only knew how I felt. How shaken I was to my roots, how my roots felt as if they wanted to lengthen and entwine with those of these people. The ones who danced to mark their latest blessing. Not to mourn that some of their own had been kidnapped in the first place, but to celebrate their return.
It seemed that even Tanus relaxed his guard as he watched. If this was how assassins lured their targets into trusting them, then it was working.
The beat of the drums sounded in the darkness of the night as if all life responded to its pulse.
When the singing came, a tear broke free to roll down my face. I didn’t cry—except for this one time, for the reason I couldn’t identify.
The words might have been English, but I wasn’t sure, and it wasn’t just because of their wailing pitch. It was, perhaps instead, because I’d traveled to a place beyond words. A place I didn’t realize existed. A place I’d had to travel to another planet to discover. My cynical ways, which had become such a part of me on Earth, were beginning to feel foreign, as alien as the landscape.
It seemed impossible to feel jaded before the genuine expression of this tribe.
Whether Tanus was feeling the same as I or not, I couldn’t know. But he dropped the reins and reached up to hold my hand.
I squeezed his hand, larger and stronger than mine, with all the hope I suddenly had for my future. With all the bewildered emotion that coursed through me.
It seemed that I’d traversed a universe to find the one thing I might not have found otherwise: my true self.
When the wailing songs sped up in pace, and the drums matched them, the men, women, and children danced with unconstrained passion, as if there weren’t a moment of life they wasted without enjoying it to its fullest.
The Plune Moon was peeking above the horizon as the woman who’d helped me identify the plants came over to Tanus and me, with Dolpheus on my other side. She met my eyes before bowing her head—subtly, so she honored her binded oath—then faced Tanus first and then Dolpheus, requesting permission. Tanus nodded, and she spoke. “Will you join us in our celebration? We owe our safety to you, and we’d like to honor you in dance.”
I noticed how she omitted the “Your Majesty” that she’d included every other time she addressed me. I already felt safer with these people—theoretically strangers, in reality something so much more important—than I had with nearly everyone else in my life before now.
Of course I wanted to dance. I longed to be a part of what they had, a part of this people.
I moved to dismount my mare but then stopped. I turned to Tanus and squeezed his hand in silent question. He was trying so hard to protect me, I could afford to ask his permission—as long as he granted it.
I was allowed to show him my eyes. He was the only one ever to make me see them as a blessing, an unfathomable gift. Although he met mine now, I could barely see his green eyes. It was too dark. But I felt them.
When he squeezed my hand, I knew he understood why I simply had to join these people. I thought he might join me, but then he released me. With his blessing, I went into the midst of what I’d searched for my whole life without realizing it.
Immediately, I began moving to the beat. Without thought as to how I moved or what I did, I embodied traditions as ancient as either planet I might call home.
I smiled at the woman in the near dark then closed my eyes. All of the cosmos seemed to swirl within me.
TWENTY-FOUR
IT SEEMED this was a day for discovering universal truths. Even though I wasn’t waiting for the other shoe to drop, it did.
Another of the women had invited Kai into their dance, and he danced several people away from me, seemingly indifferent to his injury. Tanus, Dolpheus, and Lila edged closer to the circle, obviously wanting to be a part of it to the extent they felt capable. As the Plune Moon broke free of its timidity and cast the circle of life worshippers into a eerie purple glow, I noticed Tanus’ feet tapping and Dolpheus’ hips moving. Apparently, they weren’t immovable. In that instant, I longed to see what they were like when the gravity of the situation dispersed and they were allowed to be men instead of soldiers.
Lila, well, I couldn’t tell much about Lila, other than that the feisty edge to her features had softened. I was in the midst of wondering what her story was when the shit storm descended upon the vale of tranquility these people called home.
Beneath the purple light, I observed the woman who invited me to dance share meaningful looks with several of the elders, who then spread whispers across the gathering, before I turned to search out Tanus. He was already moving toward me, and he yanked me out from amid the tribe before I realized the cause for alarm.
The drumbeat faltered for a moment before continuing, but then it lacked the power it possessed just moments before. It was no longer a celebration of the pulse of life, it was a ruse meant to buy us time.
Even though the responses setting off around me in a chain reaction were trained and subtle, something had happened.
The other shoe was dropping.
One of the men, an elder, reached us before Tanus could decide what to do with me. As the man with hoary hair and beard spoke urgent whisperings in Tanus’ ear, I spied the danger.
A troop of men thundered down the hill. They were as of yet no larger than toy soldiers, but they’d close the distance quickly. Their horses were fast. They’d be upon us long before we had the chance to hide all that would give our presence away.
Without knowing who exactly approached, I bristled at the dishonor I anticipated. I sensed that the purple time of the Plune Moon should be reserved for those actions that honored life and death, respecting all that could be accessed in the spaces in between.
Tanus yanked on my arm and pulled me toward one of the huts, close on the heels of the elder. Dolpheus was running toward Kai and Lila, gathering the reins of the horses as he passed. Kai rushed toward the two horses closest to him, then ran back to join Dolpheus.
In that instant, I realized that our horses would give us away nearly as readily as my cosmic eyes. This tribe didn’t own horses, certainly none as fine as ours.
Then I saw no more of Dolpheus and Kai scrambling to hide the massive creatures that weren’t so easily hidden. Tanus pulled me inside one of the huts at the edge of the communal gathering space, and the elder yanked the flap closed behind us. In the part of my brain that struggled to register the danger in which we suddenly found ourselves, I noticed that the walls weren’t made of wood at all. More likely, it was some kind of fabric. If I had to liken the hut to anything I recognized from Earth, I’d say we were in a teepee with right angles and without a smoke hole at its apex.
Tanus ran a scrutinizing glance up and down the elder’s body before coming to a surprising conclusion. He addressed me. “I’m going to go help Dolpheus and then I’ll be right back. You stay put. Keep your veil on.” His meaning was apparent. He trusted this elder more than I thought he would, but he didn’t trust him with the unnecessary knowledge that I was the princess.
Softer then, “You have your knives. Use them if you must.” He gave me a quick kiss on the lips, exchanged a parting look with the unarmed elder that spoke volumes, and ducked through the flap to the hut.
His kiss burned on my lips, reminding me how much I had to live for, how much I had yet to experience. My first kiss on a foreign planet. My first kiss with a man I thought I might grow to love.
I hoped whoever these men charging toward us were, they’d come and go quickly. Perhaps they meant no harm to the gentle, inoffensive men and women of this tribe.
Yeah, right. With a pang of the gut, I suspected I was about to witness a sampling of humanity’s ruthlessness.
TWENTY-FIVE
I WANTED to help but didn’t know how. I wanted to speak with the elder, who was acting as sentinel at the entrance to the hut, as if he understood who I was and that I warranted additional protection. I wanted to tell him I was no more important than any of them, but couldn’t find the way to speak with him and not reveal my eyes. I made eye contact when I spoke. I always had. Looking into another person’s eyes was the only way I knew to weigh the veracity of what he said.
Suddenly, I was uncomfortable in my own skin, tired of hiding who I was—whoever I was—wanting to fling this itchy veil to hell and back.
That was precisely when Tanus scurried back into the hut, rushing to my side.
Then everything went silent.
The drums and singing, which had filled the purple night like the scent of fragrant blossoms, ceased abruptly. There was no more sense in feigning, apparently. Whoever the men were that came this way, they didn’t expect the villagers to not fear them.
The hooves of horses rattled the ground. Without understanding the kind of threat they might pose, I began to shake. I tried to calm myself and hide any outward evidence of my nerves, but it was no use. The day had been long—bordering on eternal—and I’d had enough of things I didn’t understand but feared just the same. My nerves were on edge, my emotions raw, my brain raddled with deep understandings and fleeting details I struggled to hold on to.
Tanus noticed, and he drew me into the crook of his arm, holding me against his chest, where the regular, strong beating of his heart affected me. My shivering began to subside, even if I felt ridiculous on this alien planet, preparing to meet a threat in a miniskirt and a veil.
I deliberated before asking, but finally I decided I needed to know more than I needed to protect my cover with this kindly-looking elder, who continued to stand guard at the entrance to the hut. I asked Tanus, “Who comes?”
His head turned toward me. I couldn’t make out his eyes. The hut was dark. I sensed his regret regardless. “The Royal Guard,” he whispered.
“What will they want?”
His shoulders shrugged with me in his grip. “I don’t know. But I doubt it’s anything good.”
I doubted it too.
“When the devil comes, he does so in disguise,” he said, and I reluctantly agreed with this saying unique to Origins, but applicable to life on Earth. Ostensibly, the devil was everywhere.
The moments we waited for the devil to reveal himself for what he was passed by in agonizing slowness. I missed the purple glow of the Plune Moon, which suggested that things weren’t always as they seemed, and that, at times, the most important things of all occurred without our awareness.
When the voice finally came, it shattered the silence. “What do you people have to celebrate?” the male voice asked.
I pitied whomever he was addressing.
“The return of our women and children,” another man’s voice responded, strong in its calm.