Freda keeps brushing out my mother's wheat-colored hair, almost absent-mindedly running the brush through the tresses. My mother stares into the mirror, blankly at her own eyes. She hasn't spoken to me, and indeed Freda says she hasn't spoken since Tom unlocked the jail door and removed his black hood.
Freda catches my eye in the mirror. There's so much in that one glance that I can't take it all in. Exhaustion, concern, sympathy, sadness, hope. All the things we want to say to each other, yet where to begin?
"Thank you." The words just fall from my mouth.
She smiles but looks down at my mother's hair. "Oh? For what?"
"For... everything." How can I list all the things she's done? She keeps her eyes on her work, her long, nimble fingers parting the wisps of hair and bringing them back together in a lithe and graceful flow. Her arms sway back and forth with the rhythm of her smooth motions, and she begins to hum very quietly.
My mother suddenly reaches up and holds Freda's hands still. She rises, her bloodshot eyes filled with sadness. She looks into Freda's eyes for a long time, gently cradling her hands. With a sigh, she says, "I'm so sorry, child." She gives me one small, weary smile. "Dane was right."
Freda scrunches her face in confounded amusement. "Right about what?"
"About you." She releases Freda's hands and kisses her lightly on the cheek. "When Darius' war is over, your burdens will grow a hundredfold. But now... now there is hope."
She sweeps her fingers lightly across my cheek one time before turning to the door. As she leaves, she looks back and says to us both, "As long as you have faith, there is hope for us all."
Darkness spreads across me, and I can't hide it. I want to spit at her that it is faith that drives Darius to his war. Faith in false truths, faith in realities that do not exist. In the next few hours, the faith of Southshaw will be shaken at its roots, as the people get to meet Tom and Lupay. The fearsome ghost-man that eats children alive. The deadly mutant that will bring destruction to Southshaw.
And they will see Freda and me, the exiles resurrected. The Semper, the protector of peace, turned murderous ally to our enemies in the north.
Oh, faith will be not just shaken. It will be annihilated.
And then where will hope be found?
"Dane," my mother says with a gentleness I've not heard in her voice since I was very little. "The only faith you need is faith in each other." With that, she slips through the door and latches it quietly shut.
From the distant reaches of the house floats Tawtrukk cursing and a titter of Chiliss' clucking. Freda half turns to me as we both laugh just a little at the noise. Birdsong lilts in through the open window on the warm, morning breeze filled with pine and blue sky and spring lake.
"Well, Semper. What will you do now?"
Frowning, I go to the open window and look out over the clearing, past the trees, at the western slopes. Hidden under there is an entire city of people, sealed in a living tomb for hundreds of years. What else might exist beyond those peaks?
I heave a thick sigh, enjoying the aches in my ribs. "Stop Darius, I suppose. Find Gregory's friends and cut off Darius from behind. Find a way to ally with Tawtrukk to confront Darius at his attack point." I didn't sleep at all in the night, trying to think of a way to bring Southshaw back to what it was before Darius had Baddock kill my father. But it can't happen. Too much has changed. Truth is no longer Truth, and I can't lead while lying to my people.
Freda comes up behind me and puts one soft hand on my shoulder. I hide my wince at the pain that shoots down my arm. I don't want her to pull her hand away.
"No," she whispers softly into my ear. "I mean what will you do right now?" She slides in next to me, and I feel her body press gently against mine. It's not as soft as it was the first time we touched, but it soothes me all the way through like I've never felt before.
I turn in place, her arm slipping down to wrap around me, and mine slipping around her waist. I pull her close, feeling how all her curves fit snugly against me, relishing the warmth of her body, treasuring the rise and fall of her chest against mine as we embrace and breathe together.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Photo courtesy of: Tiffany Talbott
Peter rarely uses his Electrical Engineering degree from Berkeley these days. Instead, he writes adventure fiction, short stories, and light verse when he's not coaching or playing soccer, camping with his boys, or brewing beer. He has a day job as a corporate social responsibility executive, running the nation's largest workplace charitable giving campaign which raised over $60 million for charity in 2012. In his career, he's worked on the B-2 bomber, the first PDA (Casio “Zoomer”), and the first smart phone (Nokia 9000). A Connecticut native, he lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife, two sons, and two cats. He can be found on Twitter at @dudleypj and on the web at www.peterdudley.com.
Visit his author page with other books he’s appeared in, including Extinct Doesn’t Mean Forever, and the SFWC Anthology.
Forsada, the second book in the New Eden series, is available as of January, 2013. Details can be found at www.peterdudley.com.
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