As I worked beside them, I lost track of time, and I started when Kaya touched my hand, signalling me with an image of the rising sun. Light was appearing in the sky above us. I stood slowly, feeling the unexpected stiffness in my knees and back. So this was what work felt like. She touched me again, softly, a picture of myself, hands in the dirt, filling my vision. She was impressed.
As we rose into the air, I couldn’t help but stare at the others, flying with us, their translucent wings shimmering in the rays of the rising sun. Lexi would love it. Lexi. Was I a traitor for having made it all night without seeing her face in my mind? Or were my thoughts betraying me now, bringing her image back to me when all I wanted to do was forget? Lexi, whose sight was so limited at night, whose skin thrived in the rays of the sun, who was most definitely a child of the day.
In the cool of the cave, alone in my room, I lay on my stomach in my bed. The household was silent; I missed the sound of the city lulling me to sleep. I blinked slowly and then, I was standing in the middle of a cornfield, looking at a small, red farmhouse on a flat plain. Somebody touched my shoulder, and, without looking, I knew who it was. Not because I read her thoughts; I didn’t. I simply felt her. Lexi leaned her head softly on my shoulder, and I glanced down at her. She was older now, and her lips were turned up into a small, contented smile. The baby, cradled gently in her arms, slept, and curled up around the shoulder, just touching the edge of the fine, strawberry blonde hair, was the soft curve of a translucent wing.
When I opened my eyes again, it was night. I sat up, forcing myself to shake off the image of a life that could never be.
Chapter 17
“Come,” Teket said, gesturing for me to attack him again. The kid was relentless. He studied and worked in the fields now, but he saw his future clearly. He’d be a watchman. I moved towards him, crouching low like he’d shown me. “Come!” he shouted again. He’d been quicker at learning some of my phrases than I’d been at his. I had thought it would eventually be easy to feel at home. There was no more hiding. No more holding myself apart. No more watching from a distance. But as the days began to blend together, I found myself feeling almost as much an alien here as I had in my world before. I couldn’t seem to learn the language. No, that wasn’t quite true. I wasn’t sure I was really trying. I came to recognize phrases and derive some meaning from conversations I overheard, but the effort was exhausting, and I stuck to reading thoughts.
Taking a breath, I readied myself. Teket had been teaching me how to fight—how to really fight—since I got here. Almost nightly, before my shift started, we’d meet at the small landing near our cave to train. He wanted to be a watchman, and he wanted his brother at his side.
I sprang, managing to grab his arm and twist it behind him. He jerked his arm free and jabbed me in the ribs, swinging around and freeing his wrist from my grasp. I lunged towards him again, moving just in time to allow his blow to glance off my shoulder. I let my wings carry me up into the air and, even as he came up after me, I used the surge of wind to help me swing him around and force him, face down, onto the ground. He struggled, but keeping him pinned was easy. He’d been a good teacher. I wished I’d had his training before I was stabbed.
I got off Teket quickly, before I accidentally sent him my memory. He didn’t need that in his head. He scrambled to his feet, grinning. “Good, good,” he said, not minding the loss. He turned to face me again. “Come!” I obliged. I wasn’t sure I wanted to be a watchman, but I wanted my brother to know that his dreams mattered. And since I didn’t really have any of my own, his would have to suffice.
“Iuik!” Kaya called as I flew through the dark towards her. I was late, but, as always, she’d waited to go in. I’d lost track of time training with Teket. Training with him was invigorating. Working the earth with Kaya, though, was something else entirely.
She helped me more than she needed to, and working with her felt natural. I wondered, sometimes, if this wasn’t what love was supposed to feel like: the slow, easy bloom of friendship.
I landed at the entrance and flashed her a grin. “Sorry,” I said. She was familiar with the word by now and she smiled back at me. She took my hand and I followed her to the gardens. We were harvesting tonight. Of all the things we did together, gathering ripe produce was my favorite. They still did it by hand, like they did most things here.
Sakari waved at me from across the garden when she saw us. Nobody had done that before I’d come. Now it was a standard greeting between my family and me. Family. Even thinking the word was strange.
As Kaya and I moved down the quiet rows, her hand brushed against mine. As clear as if I’d thought it, I saw myself, in her mind, lean over and brush my lips against hers. The image was infused with the longing I felt in my own mind.
So what was stopping me? Kaya was beautiful. She was generous and sweet and open with her thoughts and feelings.
I turned away and I heard her sigh beside me. I knew it wasn’t just the kiss. Kisses could wait. She wanted to know how I felt. How I really felt about her. But how could I give her that, when I wasn’t even sure myself?
I didn’t have to be reading her thoughts to know she was disappointed. Not just disappointed, though. Hurt. After a moment, I touched her hand again. I let her feel my emotions with me: confusion, sorrow, affection. She squeezed my hand but her mind was shut to me. I showed her a picture of her own hands through my eyes, the calm and patient way she tended the plants, her sure fingers as she pushed the seeds into the dirt. The way her eyes sparkled when she laughed. Warmth, now, from her. Forgiveness.
After a moment, she touched my hand, showing me an image of herself as a little girl: eyes bright, black hair just touching her shoulders. She remembered the scent of the dirt, how it drew her in. This was her calling. She showed me an image of myself now, working the earth along side of her. Our calling. She wanted me to see that I was her match, that I could love this earth and this moment and—her. And I wanted to. I pulled my hand away. I just couldn’t find a way to convince my heart.
There were slight changes in the weather, but none so stark as in America. It was mostly just varying degrees of cold. I didn’t mind it—my body thrived on the air and steady activity. As the seasons changed, Teket began to work outside in the fields more, and I joined him most of the time, instead of working the cave with Kaya. It was easier to think through my feelings when I wasn’t around her all the time. She noticed and pulled away from me. I still caught her looking at me, but something between us changed. My stalled reaction, my withdrawal, had spoken more than words could have. Maybe that’s what I liked about working with Teket. He was good at reminding me of the other options I had. Nik hadn’t been exaggerating about how the girls here were beautiful, and Teket, at about fourteen, was all about pointing them out.
Teket looked up from the fence we were working on and tapped my arm, sending me the image of the girl opposite us, her back facing us as she wiggled around, digging out the snow that was packed in close to her tense legs. His hands stilled, the fence momentarily forgotten. I shot him a quick smile and continued tethering the pieces tightly together. He nudged me again and, when I met his gaze, he raised his eyebrows quizzically. I knew he wanted to know why none of his suggestions generated any interest. I shrugged, and he showed me an image of Kaya, her black eyes sparkling at me as she laughed. He wanted to know if she were the reason. I wanted her to be. If she were the reason nobody else interested me here, then my choice was easy. But if she were, why was I here with him instead of in the cave, kissing her?
I knew the answer, of course, even as I thought the question. How could any of these women compare to the girl with the changing eyes and the crazy hair and the spirit that fit so perfectly with mine? For the first time, I let him see my memories of Lexi. The way her hand fit in mine, the softness of her touch, how her eyes lit up when she looked at me. I showed him the curve of her lips when she smiled, and the cute way it turned down into the smallest, unintentional pout wh
en she didn’t get her way. I let him hear her voice as she sung for me and I allowed him to feel the way I felt when I had her in my arms, high above the world, allowing her to fly. I blinked the memory away, turning back to the fence.
He didn’t say anything more; he just stood beside me quietly for a moment and then returned to working, his countenance downcast. Much later, when I thought about it, it occurred to me he had realized something at that moment I hadn’t yet. This would never really be my home.
I should have been able to stay. It was where I belonged. I was with my family and others exactly like me. But none of it was good enough. It could have been, maybe, if Eric had found me before I found Lexi, but life doesn’t always work out that way. No matter how much I was loved, it could never be home for me because it couldn’t be home for Lexi. She was my home.
This new knowledge didn’t hit me all at once, of course. It seeped in gradually: a general sense of dissatisfaction that always seemed to hang on me, the fact that I caught myself rehearsing ways to show my family I was leaving.
Maybe Lexi was the worst thing that ever happened to me. I pictured her mouth again. So much time had passed already. Would she want to see me? Would she be, like she’d said, waiting? Or had she moved on, met someone new, attributed everything that had happened with me to some strange fantasy. She must have left for college already. It wasn’t as if we’d been together for long, although it felt like I’d known her forever. In reality, I had now been away from her longer than I had been with her. But it didn’t change the fact that I couldn’t pretend anymore that I would ever be satisfied without having her in my life. How could I leave my family, though, for a girl who might not even be there anymore? And how could I go back to being the person I was before?
“Iuik.” My mother’s quiet voice startled me as I stared up at the brightening sky from the entrance of the cave. She came to stand beside me, and I rested my hand on her shoulder. Instantly, her warmth flooded me. She’d missed me every day I’d been gone. I’d seen her memories by now, the ones where she wept over my blankets, where my father forgot his anger at her as he held her sobbing body, where each moment with her other two children felt incomplete because of my absence. But I rarely felt her grief from that time anymore, which is why I was startled when I felt a new, quiet sadness from her.
“What’s wrong?” I asked. I turned to look at her, tilting my head. Lexi’s face appeared, exactly as I’d shown my brother. He’d shown her.
“I won’t go back,” I said, focusing on my emotion when I’d been found by those children, on the overwhelming relief when I’d seen the love reflected in my mother’s face, on how right it felt to be part of a family, part of this family.
“No, Iuik,” she said, her words slow and careful. She repeated the image of Lexi again, and then envisioned me flying towards her. I knew she felt my sorrow, even as I fought against it. She was giving me permission to go.
“You don’t understand. I can’t go back to who I was.” I couldn’t keep it from her. And I couldn’t go back to Lexi and pretend I didn’t hate myself. Closing my eyes, I sent my mother the memories I was most ashamed of. I let her see me as I watched my marks, as I mapped out their routines, as I broke into their homes and took things I hadn’t earned. I showed her how I watched violence and cruelty and did nothing—nothing. Hot tears streamed down my cheeks as the shame of who I was washed over me. She would know, now. She would hate me. She should hate me.
When I opened my eyes, she’d turned to face me. She lifted her arm and placed her hand on my cheek, looking into my eyes. “Iuik,” she said, smiling gently. She mirrored an image I’d shown her of myself, walking through a darkened apartment, and replaced it with one I’d shown Teket of Lexi. The way Lexi looked at me left no room for argument; Lexi had known me—really known me—and she hadn’t seen me as worthless at all. The image changed, and I could see myself now through my mother’s eyes as I worked the soil along side of Sakari and outside with Teket, as we flew through the night together, hands joined. There was no condemnation in her emotions, and no repulsion. Only sorrow for me and an unwavering love. I shook my head. She couldn’t understand...
As if she could hear the words in my thoughts, her scene shifted again. This time, I saw her, standing with Nik beside my sleeping, infant form in that valley. Her sense of regret was palpable. She’d lied to everyone to hide their relationship, and she had hidden her thoughts from her husband, denying the very thing that made their ability to communicate so beautiful. She knew shame.
The picture faded and I saw herself in her own mind, standing alone, half in shadows, half in light. Her eyes were downcast. Slowly, she lifted her chin, peering at first straight out in front of her. She began to shift her gaze skyward, her expression changing, from steady indifference to... hope. Light filtered down, slowly surrounding and enveloping her. I blinked. Somehow, her meaning was clear. Forgiveness. It wasn’t her past that defined her.
The sentiment reminded me of Lexi and her story of the dragonfly. This hope for something bigger than ourselves and our own actions. “I love you,” I said, knowing that, even though we didn’t speak the same language, she could feel exactly what I meant.
She wrapped her arms around me and held me. I suddenly saw us embracing again, wrapped in a warm, shimmering light. We stood in the entrance together, in the warmth of the early morning sun, until my brother’s arm touched mine. It was day.
Chapter 18
My mother’s message freed me to leave. I showed the rest of my family my intention that morning. The next night was bittersweet. As we ate breakfast together, we touched frequently, sharing the memories we’d made. This was our goodbye. I thought of Kaya. She would be hurt that I left without telling her—that I left at all. But she was beautiful and good. She would find a mate who could love her completely.
After breakfast, Sakari took my hand. Instead of taking me to the growing caves, she flew me around the perimeter of our village. Leaving, we knew, was forbidden. Nik had had to remove his wings in order to leave; I’d seen what that had done to him, how bitterness and hatred had twisted his whole person. I didn’t intend to do the same.
She took me out to the ledge where the children found me, the night I’d gotten here. The skies were empty. Empty, but not unpatrolled. Sakari touched me, and I saw the watchmen, flying low with weapons poised. The image evaporated.
Back at home, my mother showed me the rest of the plan. I would leave the comfortable sandals behind, trading them for the sneakers I’d worn here. They were more durable and better for my intended trek through the snow. I’d also leave behind the tunics I’d grown so accustomed to wearing, aside from the white one I would wear. Instead, I would take my black shirt and rough black denim with me. I’d gotten used to the softened wool tunics worn by my people and the freedom of movement that loose cloth allowed; I wasn’t looking forward to the restricting trappings of my former attire. Alone in my room, I slowly placed my black clothing inside my bag, rolling it tight so I could fill the rest of the space with a small canteen of water and the food my mother had prepared for me. I brought the pack to her, and she took it, brushing my fingers with hers as she did. Hope and despair co-mingled.
My brother came out of his room and stopped me before I returned to mine. He quickly threw his arms around me. He stifled a sob in my chest and I held him close, placing my hand on his hair.
When he finally let me go, I walked quickly to my room, careful not to look back. I took off my tunic and laid it on the bed, getting under the warm blankets and staring, wide awake, at the wall.
It was next to impossible for me to sleep during the night but, somehow, I had my first dreamless sleep since I’d arrived there. When the light of day dawned, I was up with the sun. The cave was quiet; I’d asked my family to stay sleeping while I left. I didn’t want them to be implicated in my defection. I also didn’t want to be reminded of reasons to change my mind. I stood in front of the heavy, brown curtain for a long time, m
y fingers running along the familiar texture. I slowly moved it aside and stepped into the main area of the still cave. I made my way to the mouth. The day workers had already begun their shifts, and the watchmen would be patrolling from the east. This was it. As I walked around to the north of the mountain, I scanned the skies again. Empty. Then, keeping my body parallel to the face of the mountain, so close I could have reached out and touched it with my fingertips, I flew down, swiftly and single-mindedly. I had to pace myself, though. Whenever I began moving too quickly, my ears started to feel full and then I was forced to stop and allow my body to adjust to the change in elevation. The air became warmer, less comforting. It took me much of the day to put enough distance between my home and me to feel confident that I wouldn’t be easily spotted. The only way they would find me was if they went looking deliberately and, chances were, I wouldn’t be missed right away. Finally, I could see the white earth below. Staying low, I continued to fly along the ground. I should have felt completely alone but, even as I created distance between my family and myself, I felt their warmth; it was a tangible, unmistakable sensation.
As the sky darkened, I forced myself to slow my flight, landing carefully in the thin covering of snow. It took a moment to get used to the feeling of solid ground beneath my feet and another to steady my legs. I set out quickly and quietly, walking close to the tree line, hoping my shoe prints wouldn’t reveal my presence to the search party that would, undoubtedly, be sent out. I hadn’t used my legs for any distance since I’d arrived and, after a few hours, my calves were cramping. I forced my body to walk through the pain. As the night neared its end, it took controlled effort not to cry out with every step. Finally, just before dawn, I pulled myself into a small cropping of trees and collapsed against one of them, panting with the effort. They would be ending the main search effort soon, but members of the watch would still be looking. I slept very little, despite my physical exhaustion and, by the first rays of dawn, I was up on my feet again, walking through the snow, my muscles screaming in protest.
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