Widows of the Sun-Moon

by Barbara Ann Wright

  It was her turn to drop the shovel. “You knew?”

  “That they mature faster and live longer? You didn’t?”

  “Are you in the habit of fucking teenagers or the elderly?”

  “Teenagers? Not since I was one. The elderly?” He looked to the sky as if remembering. “Well…”

  She kicked a small rock at him, and he dodged, laughing.

  “They’re aliens, Delia. What did you expect?”

  “Not…” She didn’t know what to say.

  “Let’s put it this way: does knowing stop you from daydreaming about your lover’s thighs, a characteristic you’ve spoken often about?”

  She sighed and thought about Nettle, all long and lean and muscular. “No.”

  “Why just daydream?” a voice behind them said.

  Cordelia turned slowly. Nettle sat on the edge of the pond, no telling how long she’d been there. Liam certainly hadn’t given her away. “Hello,” Cordelia said and heard the way her voice changed, the soft, deep quality reserved for Nettle.

  “That’s my cue,” Liam said. “I’ll leave the shovel over here, not like you’re going to care.”

  Cordelia ignored him and went to lean her head against Nettle’s knees. “I’m sorry it’s still bugging me.”

  “My thighs? Or are you speaking of my age again, Sa?”

  “All my worries disappear when you’re with me, if that makes it any better.”

  Nettle reached down, helping her clamber out of the pond. When Cordelia sat on the edge, Nettle swung on top of her, knees resting on either side of Cordelia’s legs. She took Cordelia’s hands and placed them on her outer thighs, giving them a squeeze. “You make my mind easier, too.” She bent forward, and Cordelia thought their lips would meet, but Nettle leaned around her face and tongued her earlobe.

  Cordelia gasped and let her hands wander higher, but the tip of a brown root broke the ground nearby, and she sighed, knowing what that meant. Pool had something to say.

  The root coiled around Nettle’s wrist, and her gaze went elsewhere as they spoke mind to mind. Cordelia waited for Nettle to tell her what Pool said, but a shockwave traveled up her legs from where she and Nettle still touched.

  She felt Pool’s amusement but also a slight current of reprimand as Pool conjured the image of Wuran. He was coming to meet with them any moment, coming to trade leather for the wood that Pool shed as easily as cast-off hair. Pain slid through Cordelia’s temples, and she felt the shock of Pool and Nettle before Pool’s root withdrew.

  Cordelia would have slumped back, but Nettle caught her shoulders. “Sa?”

  “I’m…all right.”

  Nettle stood with sibilant grace and pulled Cordelia up. “You heard the queen?”

  “Heard, saw, something like that.” She rubbed her aching temples. “Sometimes I get these…visions or feelings, as if I can see a light when I look at Pool’s tree or Shiv’s, but nothing like that has ever happened before.”

  Nettle looked to the root. “The queen is coming.”

  “I know.” Cordelia could feel her moving closer.

  “She will know what to do.” She smiled a little. “If you can speak as drushka can, perhaps it is a boon.”

  “Hurts like hell.” She rubbed her head again.

  More roots broke the ground, bringing Pool. They could move her underground for quite a distance, as long as her roots could reach. There hadn’t been that much solid earth in the swamps for her to stretch, but on the plains, she’d popped up quite a few places when her human associates weren’t expecting her.

  “Sa.” Pool bent and peered into Cordelia’s face, her green eyes wide. She was taller than Cordelia or any of the drushka, and she’d once told Cordelia that any drushka who could live as long as a queen would continue to grow. Her green hair, the color of queens, curled over her shoulders, longer than any of her tribe. “You do not look any different, but the feel of you…” She sucked her teeth. “I have noticed the change.”

  “How do I stop it?”

  She cocked her head. “Why should you wish to?”

  Because it was alien and different! But she couldn’t say that. It was just like the age thing. Or was it? As a child, she’d passed all the aptitude tests that would have let her become a yafanai. She’d chosen to be a paladin instead. Maybe this was like that, and being electrocuted and healed had awoken some yafanai part of her brain. It didn’t mean she had to be a yafanai or a drushka or anyone but herself.

  “I don’t know,” she said.

  Pool chuckled softly. “Never doubt that you are human, Sa. Only one of your kind would be so bothered by something which could benefit you greatly. Perhaps something new yet familiar will be a comfort.” She held out her hands, and one of her roots laid a wooden sword across her palms.

  Cordelia took a step forward. It was an almost perfect replica of the paladin blade she’d once wielded, except for the color, a deep brown that was almost black, and the twining ivy motif on the hilt and grip. “It’s beautiful.”

  Nettle took her arm, giving it a squeeze while Pool wrinkled her nose. “I knew you would appreciate it. It will keep itself sharp.”

  Cordelia tore her gaze off the weapon. “Are you saying…”

  “Call to it. We shall see how far your connection to us has grown.”

  Cordelia licked her lips. Pool hadn’t just made her an ordinary blade. She’d created a living weapon, the kind she made for her own people, which kept itself sharp and would obey the mind of the user, but that mind had to be able to connect to the queen.

  Her hand shook as she took the blade. A weapon no one could take from her? It was still weird, but it was weird and good.

  She focused on the feelings she’d been denying, the connection she’d felt. The whisper of the wind faded to a dull hum, and she saw the sword as a shard of light in her grasp. She didn’t know what to say or how to call it. She would have felt like a fool speaking aloud, so she pictured what she’d seen drushkan weapons do: sprout little wooden tendrils that held them to the wielders’ hands.

  Little limbs snaked from the sword’s grip and twined around her fist. She sucked in a breath, losing control and turning the sword back into a sword, but the tendrils stayed put.

  “You will have to practice,” Pool said. “It will come easier.”

  “You’re seriously giving this to me? I don’t know what to say.”

  Pool chuckled. “As long as you can see the good in it at last.” To Cordelia’s surprise, she leaned forward and touched her lips to Cordelia’s forehead as she would one of her drushka. Cordelia resisted the urge to lean away, wishing they could have hugged like humans instead.

  *

  Horace waited for Wuran with Cordelia and the others on a slight rise near Pool’s great tree. She still seemed hesitant to bring the tree close to any other humans, and Horace didn’t blame her. Trust shouldn’t always come easy.

  As whenever he thought about trust, his thoughts wandered to Simon Lazlo, though they didn’t go there as often as they did eight months ago. When Simon had first burned out Horace’s psychokinesis, it was all he could think about. He still had his telepathy, but he’d spent long hours searching inside himself for something that wasn’t there anymore. When Simon had first augmented his power, Horace had thought it a curse. He’d had a hard time keeping everyone out, more trouble than he’d ever had before, but Simon had apologized over and over and then he’d helped Horace control it. It had seemed like a gift again, especially as he realized just how many people he could help, how many he could heal. He’d brought people back from the brink of death. Without that ability, what was he?

  Now, with telepathy, he’d helped his new drushkan and human family by aiding the occasional insomniac or person plagued with doubt or drowning in their own troubles, but when someone had cut herself badly, he’d searched hard inside himself before it even occurred to him to look for a bandage. One of the drushkan healers, a shawness, had taken over, wrapping the wound and croon
ing a healing song. Horace had found a quiet place to cry.

  Now he tried to look forward, missing his gift less and less, or so he told himself. He liked meeting with Wuran and the Uri. They distracted him from fantasizing about what would happen if Simon walked over that hill, across that valley. Would there be hugging or murder? With the help of the drushka, Horace had dived back into his first aid knowledge, but he didn’t know if it would be enough to ever forgive Simon or not.

  Cordelia wandered over to him, and he smiled. He’d liked her ever since their journey into the swamp. She was muscular and tall, intimidating, but the slight lines at the corners of her brown eyes spoke of frequent smiles, and as she gave one to him now, he was reminded how good of a friend she could be.

  She tucked a strand of brown hair behind her ear. It was longer than when he’d known her in Gale, and he wondered if she’d grown it out a little since she wasn’t a soldier anymore, or if it was a symptom of something else, some kind of metaphorical letting down of her hair as well as a literal one. Or maybe she just didn’t have the time to think about it with all her new people to manage.

  “Wuran is nearly two hours late,” she said.

  “And you hate waiting.”

  “More than anything,” she said with a sigh. “Some of the drushka went looking.”

  “Why didn’t you go?”

  “I’m not as fast.”

  He chuckled and patted her on the back. “I’m sure it won’t be long now.”

  She gave him a sardonic smile. “I’m glad you can be mellow.”

  He shrugged. In his darker moments, she’d brought him some of the plains dweller scuppi, and there had been a few drunk, long nights with her or Liam or both. He liked getting drunk with her alone, though. Even though Liam had Shiv, he also had a tendency to flirt, and when Horace was drunk, he did more than flirt. His friends in the temple had once declared drunken Horace to be the king of bad decisions. Cordelia had to sit between him and Liam a few times. Horace dreaded to think what Shiv would do, though he wasn’t sure how the drushka felt about monogamy. Some seemed to have multiple lovers at once. Best to avoid a reason to have that conversation, though. And he didn’t want to play around. He was a one man at a time man.

  The drushkan scouts hurried over the next rise, Nettle at their head. Horace squinted, thinking them awfully bunched up until he noticed they carried Wuran between them. Cordelia streaked toward them, and Horace shook his head before jolting into a run. Reach hurried, too, calling for Nettle to put Wuran down.

  “What the hell happened?” Cordelia asked.

  “Attacked.” Wuran’s face was a mask of blood, one eye swollen shut. “The Svenal.”

  Horace felt along his head while Reach searched the rest of his body for injuries. A deep cut curved along his forehead into his hair. Horace reached into his medical bag, a drushkan gift. All shawnessi carried one, they said. He pulled out a roll of soft bandages and wound them around Wuran’s forehead.

  Cordelia fired off questions, but Wuran could only mumble answers, his non-swollen eyelid fluttering.

  “Sa,” Reach said, “go easy.”

  “We need to know!”

  Frustrated, Horace pulled at the place where his micro powers used to be. They needed Wuran to tell them what had happened but also if he was hurt anywhere else. Reach was doing her best, but if his back or organs were injured, and it didn’t show…

  Wuran took a deep breath, and his swollen eye opened slightly as his other opened wide.

  “Wuran?” Cordelia asked.

  “The Svenal!”

  She knelt and took his hand. “What happened to the rest of your people?”

  He shook his head, and tears leaked from his eyes, leaving tracks through the blood. “Some went hunting. Others were taken, killed. They wanted the children!”

  “Where? How long ago?”

  He gripped her hand and tried to sit up. “Help us.”

  “I will.” She stood. “Come on, Horace. Leave him with Reach. His people will need your help.”

  Horace left Wuran in Reach’s hands. Nettle called for reinforcements, and when they came from over the hill, Liam leading them, they all followed the drushkan scouts into the plains. But running had never been Horace’s strong suit. The drushka and the ex-soldiers were pulling away, and he cursed. Cordelia was right. Wuran’s people would need his help, and he couldn’t do that if he was leaning on his knees and wheezing.

  When he pulled a burst of speed out of nowhere, he thought he’d gotten a second wind, but Wuran’s clearing head came back to him. Maybe he’d given Wuran a telepathic nudge, but he didn’t think so. He’d reached for his micro powers both times, and something had answered.

  He pulled at his power again. Soggy and weak but there, and the realization almost made him stumble. His powers were returning. What could that mean? Were Simon’s powers returning, too? Simon had been healing people for so long, he’d no doubt forgotten about the body’s miraculous ability to heal itself.

  But Simon had burned out their powers for a good reason. Everyone would come running to him for immortality now. And some wouldn’t be asking. He looked to those around him, those he trusted. In the end, Simon hadn’t trusted anyone, maybe with good reason. Horace let his power die back down and kept his mouth shut.

  *

  Cordelia had to admit, it felt good to run into battle again, even while worried about Wuran’s people. She pictured the men, women, and children she’d befriended, and her battle rage bubbled to the surface. But this would still be human against human. She told herself to wound if she could, to only kill as a last resort, just as her paladin training had taught her when it came to dealing with other humans.

  “How far?” she called.

  “Just there,” Nettle said, pointing over a rock-strewn hill.

  It was late afternoon, and she hoped they could get this settled before dark fell. When she spotted movement among the rocks, she called, “There!” Before she could speed toward it, an invisible force sent her flying.

  The drushka and humans scattered. Cordelia rubbed her chest, but nothing had hit her. “Yafanai!” she shouted, hoping to give everyone a heads-up. Maybe it wasn’t the Svenal. Maybe the Storm Lord had attacked the Uri for some reason.

  Liam slid to a stop at her side. “What the fuck?”

  An arrow plonked into the ground nearby. She dove behind a boulder with Horace while Liam took cover by another rock. “Arrows!” Liam shouted.

  Everyone went for cover, Nettle ducking at Liam’s side. Liam cocked his hand to the left and held up two fingers. She nodded. He’d spotted two people and would go for them. After a word in Nettle’s ear, the two of them took off.

  “Find that yafanai,” she said to Horace. He nodded and closed his eyes. She drew her wooden sword and covered him.

  “A macro,” he said. “Not a yafanai. Untrained, hardly more than a boy.” He slapped the ground. “This would be so much easier if my micro powers were better.”

  “Better?”

  He took a deep breath and started to open his eyes.

  She waved at him to concentrate. “Where is he?”

  “He’s lashing out. I don’t think he has much control. There are more people, there and there.” He pointed over his shoulders. “He is terrified, Delia.”

  She pressed her lips together hard. She didn’t want to hurt a kid, but if it was him or her people… “Can you attack him power to power?”

  “Maybe. He’s…” His eyes flew open. “No, he’s a telepath, too!” He grabbed her arm, and she felt a tingle pass over her scalp, probably as he tried to raise his shields over them both, but when he sagged like a ragdoll, she knew he hadn’t been quick enough.

  “Shit.” She lowered him to the ground, checked his pulse, and peeked over the rock. The telepath had knocked him out, but if she could get the telepath, he might wake up. She ran around the boulder and took cover on the other side of an occupied one. When a woman with a shortbow stood to take a sh
ot, Cordelia grabbed her and dragged her over. She squealed until Cordelia elbowed her hard in the face, silencing her. Cordelia rolled the woman out of her long vest and put it on, hoping to blend in enough to take more of them out.

  She got close to a man before he blinked at her and pulled a long bone knife. She charged, but a sling bullet bounced off his head. From behind him, Liam gave Cordelia a salute. She grinned as she crouched, but his eyes widened, and he flew toward her as if on invisible wings. Cordelia braced herself to catch him, but they slammed together and fell.

  Her head connected with a rock, and everything went fuzzy. Her heart pounded in her ears as the world spun in and out of focus. She pushed Liam off, but he was shaking his head, woozy. Someone tiptoed into her periphery, his eyes wide. He seemed barely more than a boy. She tried to get up, to leap at him, but her legs betrayed her, and she slipped into darkness.

  Chapter Seven

  Simon sat on a cushion and let his powers drift over the Svenal woman in front of him. The problem was in the uterus, easy to spot, but that was just a symptom. He focused harder, but the ultimate cause for her illness eluded him. He resisted the urge to let go of his trance and tear his hands through his hair. He’d been with the Svenal nearly a week, but it wasn’t enough. He needed more of his power back, and he needed more time, something the Svenal didn’t seem to understand.

  Samira entered the tent behind him and cleared her throat with a deliberate edge.

  Simon opened his eyes and sighed. “Thank you, Sheila. That’s all for now.”

  She put a hand on her belly. She was in her first trimester, but if he couldn’t figure out what had gone wrong with the Svenal, her pregnancy wouldn’t progress past that. “It’s all right now?” she asked.

  He didn’t know if she meant the baby or the pregnancy. Desperate as they were, the Svenal seemed to distance themselves from what might happen to them by referring to all babies as it.

  “No,” he said, unable to lie to her earnest face. “But I won’t give up. Just give me a little time to think.”