by Unknown
“Maybe you heard,” Anna replied. “The factions have been sending word from all over Angondra to the Lycaon, asking for the women from Earth to come to them. All the factions are desperate for reproductive females. This planet is in serious danger.”
Emily nodded. “I heard. So you walked here all the way from Lycaon territory? That must have been hard.”
“Not alone,” Anna replied. “The Lycaon warriors escorted us to the border. Then the Avitras border guards brought us here and Penelope Ann took care of us until we settled in. She’s been an angel to us.”
Emily shot Penelope Ann a sidelong glance. She stood to one side and observed the sisters together with a distant, passionless expression. Emily turned back to her sister. “Do you have a mate yet? Have you found a home and family here with the Avitras?”
“Not yet,” Anna replied. “Penelope Ann let me stay here until I find a more permanent home, but I haven’t settled where I’m going to go or what I’m going to do.”
“I’m sure there are plenty of men who would be delighted to have you,” Emily remarked.
Anna shrugged. “There’s no rush. On Angondra, it’s the females who pick their mates. The men wait until a woman picks them.”
Emily lowered her eyes. “I know.”
“What about you?” Anna asked. “You look wonderful. I haven’t seen you so healthy and happy since you quit search and rescue.”
Emily couldn’t stop herself from smiling. “Maybe it’s all the hiking I’ve been doing out in these mountains. I was in a coma in the Ursidrean infirmary for six months. Then I decided to find you, Frieda and Aimee. Faruk—I mean, the border patrol medic who found me….”
“Found you where?” Anna interrupted.
Emily took a deep breath. “When the Romarie ship broke up in the atmosphere, I was thrown out. I landed in Ursidrean territory, and Faruk found me and brought me back to the city. He saved my life.”
Anna stared at her. “I can see that.”
Emily blushed. “After I was well enough, he agreed to take me to the Lycaon border so I could find out what happened to you. That’s where I met Chris and Turk.”
“Who are they?” Anna asked.
“Turk is the twin brother of Caleb, the Lycaon Alpha,” Emily replied. “Chris is his human mate. They took me to the Lycaon village, where I found Aimee. She told me you and Frieda were here.”
Anna nodded. “Aimee sure has changed.”
Emily looked around. “Where’s Frieda?”
Anna glanced at Penelope Ann. “That’s the thing. We don’t know.”
Emily started. “What do you mean, you don’t know?”
Anna shifted in her seat. “Frieda disappeared two days ago. One minute, she was standing on the balcony of our friend Tea’s house. The next minute, I turned around and she was gone. We don’t know what happened to her. Piwaka and his guards searched the whole territory, but they never found any trace of her. They never found even a footprint on the ground.”
Emily frowned. “That’s not possible.”
Anna nodded. “I know. That’s what we all thought. At first, we thought she must have fallen off the balcony. It takes time to develop the balance and coordination to live up here without falling. But if she had fallen, we would have found her either in the branches under the balcony or on the ground. She was nowhere. They never found even a drop of blood under that balcony.”
Emily shook her head. “This is impossible. She can’t have just evaporated into thin air.”
“Believe me,” Anna told her. “No one is more mystified by this than we are. The Avitras are the most concerned about it of anybody. They would do anything to find out where Frieda is.”
Emily jumped to her feet. “We have to find her.”
Anna pulled her back down. “The best people to find her are already searching for her. That’s why Aquilla isn’t here. He’s mustering all his guards to find her. If you want to find out what happened to her, you should stay here with me. The minute they find anything, they’ll relay the information back here and we’ll be the first to hear it.”
Emily sat down next to her sister with a heavy sigh.
“We’ll find you a place to spend the night,” Anna told her. “You don’t have to go back to the Ursidreans. Stay here with me.”
Penelope Ann spoke up for the first time. “You can’t stay here. If Aquilla finds out you brought an Ursidrean here, he’ll kill your whole party. He can’t stand those hairy beasts.”
Emily stiffened. “The Ursidreans are not hairy beasts. I could say the Avitras are feathered freaks.”
Penelope Ann clenched her teeth, but before she could answer, Anna laid her hand on Emily’s arm. “We’re together now. You can tell your friends you don’t need their help anymore. You can stay here with us.”
Emily got to her feet again. “I’m sorry, Anna. I wish I could stay with you, but I promised Faruk I would come back. My place is with the Ursidreans now. If we aren’t welcome here, we’ll go back to our own territory. I know Turk and Chris want to get back to their own village, too.”
Anna got to her feet. “When will I see you again? How will I let you know what we find out about Frieda?”
“I don’t know,” Emily replied. “Maybe you can send word to me through the Lycaon. You can send word to Aimee, and her troop of warriors can relay that information to the Ursidrean border patrol. I have a feeling the Ursidreans are going to be on better terms with the Lycaon from now on.”
Anna followed her to the door. “I sure wish you didn’t have to go so soon. You just got here.”
Emily cast one last look in Penelope Ann’s direction. “Me, too, but we’ll see each other again. I’m sure of it. I’m really glad you’re happy here. I know you’ll settle in and make a home for yourself.”
“And I’m sure you’ll be happy with….” She smiled. “With Faruk.”
Emily gave her sister one last hug. Penelope Ann didn’t come to the railing to say good-bye. Emily swung her leg over the rail and started climbing down the tree trunk. Anna leaned over the side and waved to her until she climbed out of sight.
Chapter 13
Emily jumped down to the ground. Her friends pressed around her. “Did you find them? Where are they? Are they all right?”
Emily caught her breath. She glanced around at the border guards. “Let’s get out of here.”
Piwaka blinked at her, but he didn’t say anything. He and his band kept a close circle around the group and escorted them out of Avitras territory. No one spoke until they arrived at the base of the hill leading up into Lycaon territory. The Piwaka signaled to his men, and the circle opened.
Emily bowed her head to him and backed away up the hill. The others walked backwards behind her. Piwaka and his men formed a line across the bottom of the hill. Just before he vanished among the trees, Piwaka inclined his head to Emily. The same enigmatic smile played on his face.
As soon as the Avitras border guards fell out of sight, Emily and her friends turned and hiked up the hill. They didn’t stop until they came to the place where Turk told Emily to take the lead. She looked back over her shoulder. Then she sank onto the ground and hugged her knees to her chest.
Chris rushed to her side. “What happened down there? Are your sisters okay?”
Emily heaved a shaky sigh. “One of them is.”
“Where’s the other one?” Faruk asked. “Is she….”
Emily shook her head. “They don’t know where she is. She vanished.”
Faruk frowned. Chris started back. “What do you mean—vanished?”
Emily took a deep breath. “My sister Anna is there. She’s staying with Penelope Ann—and Aquilla—until she makes her own permanent home. She looks great, and she’s happy there. It’s Frieda who disappeared.”
“What happened to her?” Chris asked.
“No one knows,” Emily replied. “She was standing on a balcony near one of the houses. The next minute, she was gone. The Avitras have sear
ched their whole territory for her and never found a trace. That’s why Aquilla wasn’t there. He’s getting his guards to search for her. They never found her body or even a drop of blood under the balcony where she disappeared.”
Chris and Turk exchanged glances. “That’s impossible.”
“That’s what I said,” Emily replied. “That’s what everybody is saying.”
“So what are we going to do?” Chris asked. “We can’t just leave. We came all this way to find out what happened to your sisters.”
Emily stood up. “We have to leave. We can’t stay here. Penelope Ann said Aquilla might kill our whole party if came back and found an Ursidrean in his territory. I guess he’s still burning up about an Ursidrean killing his brother.”
“So what are you going to do?” Faruk asked. “You could stay until they find your sister, and we could go back……I mean….”
Emily smiled at him. “I’m not staying without you. You came all this way to help me. If you aren’t welcome here, I’m not staying, either. If they find Frieda, they can send word back to the Lycaon. I’m sure Anna will inform Aimee, and Aimee can get word to me through the warriors on the Ursidrean border.”
Faruk rubbed his chin. “This is no good at all.”
Emily waved her hand back over her shoulder and started walking back the way they came. “The Avitras don’t have a clue where Frieda is. I would be sitting around waiting, and for nothing. I’m not going to risk your life, and Chris and Turk’s lives, and the promise of our life together, on that. Let’s go.”
Faruk, Chris, and Turk exchanged glances. Then Faruk set off after her. Turk took a step forward, but Chris held him back. Faruk caught up to Emily with long strides. He walked at her side for a while. They crossed the hilltop and down the other side into the shrubbery at the edge of the forest. Emily looked over her shoulder. “Where are the others?”
Faruk took her hand. “They’ll be along in a minute.”
Emily started walking faster. Her hand hung limp in his. The usual charge of unbreakable connection didn’t translate up her arm into the rest of her body the way it usually did. She cast her eyes this way and that in a desperate search for something. “We should get down to the stream before night sets in. We’ll have to find a place to camp.”
Faruk didn’t answer. Once, she tripped over a fallen branch, and he caught her by the arm. “Steady.”
Emily got her feet under her and looked back again. “Where are they?”
Faruk stopped walking and turned her toward him. “Stop a minute, Emily.”
She looked up into his face. “What is it?”
He drew her close. “Something happened up there. What was it?”
Emily blinked. Then her chin dropped onto her chest. “I told you. Frieda’s gone.”
He took hold of both her shoulders and squared her to face him. “It wasn’t that. Tell me what happened.”
Her breath heaved in and out of her lungs. “I didn’t know….”
He stared into her yes. “You didn’t know what?”
“I don’t know where Frieda is,” she stammered, “but it doesn’t matter anymore. If the Avitras had welcomed us the way the Lycaon did, I might have stayed until they found her. I could have stayed with the Lycaon for years and felt at home. But I couldn’t stay there without you. I didn’t know it until Penelope Ann told me I had to stay alone if I wanted to stay. I couldn’t turn my back on you. I couldn’t let you walk away while I stayed behind—not even for Frieda.”
His expression softened. “Is that it? Is that what this is all about?”
She melted in his hands, and he pulled her against his chest. “I don’t want to stay there. I won’t stay there even if it means I never find out what happened to Frieda. I’m going home with you.”
His arms sheltered her, and he pressed his lips against her hair. “All right. Let’s go home.”
He went back and got Chris and Turk, and they all set off toward the Lycaon village. They stopped for the night next to the stream, but no one talked the way they did the day before. Emily stared into the fire. A thousand thoughts crowded her mind.
Chris and Turk rolled themselves up in their blankets early, but Faruk sat next to Emily and waited for her to say something. Deep into the night, she roused herself and cleared her throat. “You should go to sleep, too.”
He sniffed. “You should go to sleep. You’re the most exhausted of us all.”
She raised her head to look at him. “I’m not exhausted.”
He shook his head. “You’ve been through the most. You need rest. You’ve been racing all over the countryside, and now you’ve lost Frieda. You shouldn’t push yourself so hard.”
Emily blinked at the flames. Only now when he mentioned it did she start to feel the weight on her shoulders. She might never find out what happened to her sister. “I won’t go racing all over the countryside anymore. I’ll rest when we get back to Harbeiz.”
The fire crackled. “Have you thought any more about our problem?”
She didn’t look up. “No.”
“I have,” he told her.
Emily’s head shot up. “You have? What have you thought of?”
“I’ve been thinking I can give up the mountains,” he replied. “I’ve been thinking I’ll tell Donen I want to coordinate the training of the border patrol from the city instead of traveling out to the borders to do it.”
“Is that possible?” she asked. “I didn’t know there was a coordinator position in the city.”
“There isn’t,” he replied. “I would invent one.”
Her eyes popped out of her head. “Will Donen go for that?”
“Under the circumstances, I’m sure he will,” he replied. “I’ve been responsible for training the patrols for years, but it was my choice to do it in the mountains instead of the city. The patrols come back to the city every few months to resupply and report on their operations. It makes sense that they would do their training there, too.”
“Are you sure you can be happy with that?” she asked. “You might get itchy feet sometimes.”
“I’m certain I will,” he replied, “lots of times. The advantage of this plan is that I can go out into the mountains to do training there, too. But I’ll be based in the city, so we won’t be separated the way we would be if I stayed on patrol.”
Emily nodded. “I’ll go along with any plan that makes you happy. I don’t want you sacrificing your happiness to stay with me.”
“You make me happy,” he replied.
“You didn’t like working in the infirmary because you wanted to be out in the mountains,” she told him. “What makes you think this will be any different?”
“I won’t be in the infirmary,” he replied. “I’ll be working with border patrols, and I will be out in the mountains. I’ll just be out in the mountains near the city, and I’ll come back there when I’m finished. When I get the itch to get out of the city, I’ll go.”
Emily smiled for the first time since she left the Avitras. “I might just come with you sometimes.”
He put his arm around her shoulder. “That would be great, and we wouldn’t have border patrolling to interfere with our time together. We could just enjoy ourselves.”
She settled into his embrace. “It sounds perfect.”
They listened to the fire hissing through the logs. The stars blazed overhead, but there was no aurora. “What do you think you’ll do back in the city?”
Emily shifted her weight. “I don’t know. I haven’t given myself a chance to think about it. I’ve got a lot of skills. I suppose I’ll show up to the labor pool like everybody else and see what they have available for me. I’ll do just about anything as long as I’m not in the military.”
“That rules out practically about every job on their books,” he told her.
“Aria works in the infirmary,” Emily pointed out. “I’m sure there are plenty of civil jobs I could do. Young people need teaching, budgets need balancing—it�
�s a regular city full of people trying to live their lives. That takes work.”
He breathed into her hair. “You’ll find your place.”
“And you’ll be there,” she went on. “I won’t be alone.”
“You wouldn’t be alone either way,” he pointed out. “You made friends with Aria and her family. You have a base to start with. In a way, you have more waiting for you back in Harbeiz than I do.”
“What do you mean?” she asked. “You’ve been living there all your life.”
“I’ve never had a home of my own there,” he replied. “I’ve been in and out like a vagrant. I don’t have any real friends there. Maybe that’s why I never wanted to go back. All my friends are on the border patrol.”
She wrapped her arms around his chest and held him close. “I’ll protect you.”
He chuckled under his breath. “Thank goodness for that. I couldn’t handle it if you didn’t.”
She lifted her face to him, and they shared a long kiss. The fire warmed them against the crisp night air at their backs.
He pulled away. “We should go to sleep. We have a long hike ahead of us tomorrow.”
Emily pulled their blankets around them, and they stretched out next to the fire. Faruk took her in his arms again. The pleasant warmth of the fire and his protective presence made her drowsy. She closed her eyes and floated into a dreamy haze.
She gazed down from above over the whole territory she’d covered. Lycaon territory with its low huts and its welcoming fires lay to the southeast. Avitras territory, where Aquilla and his men still searched for Frieda, lay to the west. And Ursidrean territory, with its vibrant city, lay to the north. Harbeiz blazed in the distance with a thousand electric lights, and a beacon of hope and contentment called her back to it.
Her future beckoned to her, with children tumbling around her feet and meaningful work drawing her into a community of purposeful people. And the whole blessed vision came from Faruk. It stemmed from the fountain of her love and connection with him. He fed it and nurtured it and gave it life.
She opened her body and soul to him, and embraced him and the vision and the life that came out of him. He planted the seeds of it in her, and between them, it became real.