by Thomas Locke
Dillon’s teeth chattered as he said, “This is warm?”
“Even in summer, some Lothian nights the surface temperature drops to where iron breaks like candy. This cavern is a training ground for Praetorians and the Lothian military . . . Do you understand when I say ‘not pretending’?”
“Live fire,” Dillon offered.
“Correct. Today the Lothians celebrate. So we have this to ourselves. To your left is an opening to the outer world. That is where we will make our live-fire exercise.” He held out his hands once more. “Ready?”
They transited to one side of the cavern, up near one ice-clad wall. Sean needed another moment, longer than the first, to come to terms with where he stood.
Josef said, “The Lothians export their shield technology all over the empire. The shield here is semi-porous—you understand what that means? It allows in some of the cold and none of the atmosphere.”
Sean tried to listen. He really did. But the entire scope of their position left him catching every third word at most. They stood atop a natural column, maybe sixty feet wide, and so high the mist boiled about them like a cloud bank. The cavern’s floor was lost. The sense of impossible height was magnified by the cave mouth, which loomed behind Josef. The opening had to be several miles across. Now and then something touched the energy surface, causing electric spiderwebs to radiate out a ways, then fade back to nothingness. Beyond the shield, the Lothian surface gleamed beneath the two dim suns.
Dillon asked, “You okay?”
“I . . . guess.”
“You’ve gone all green.”
“I’ve just discovered I don’t like heights.”
“Check out the side wall.”
Sean looked where Dillon pointed and saw a dark stain with a deep flame-scoured gouge at its heart. Dillon sounded totally matter-of-fact about it all. “Gives a whole new meaning to live fire.”
“This doesn’t bother you?”
“You kidding? This is the coolest thing since trains riding on the ceiling.”
Josef motioned for their attention and said, “I will transit to that second column. When I arrive, I will wave my hand. When you have prepared your shields, you will wave back. At that point I will reveal a battle tactic that feeds upon this world’s natural energy. What do you think that might be?”
“Cold and ice,” Dillon instantly replied.
“Correct. This is the core component of a recruit’s initial training in battle tactics. Use the energy that is available. Here, as you say, it is cold.” The giant waited for a moment, then said, “Remember, wave back only when you are shielded.”
Josef took a step away and vanished, then reappeared on a second column that Sean only noticed at that moment. Josef’s position was midway between where Sean stood and the cave mouth. The transit only heightened his sense of surreal unease. It made no logical sense. He stood in the middle of a huge, flat stone surface, wider than the school’s main assembly hall. But he couldn’t get over what waited just beyond the distant lip. Like he was being sucked toward it, even without moving, drawn to the point where he flipped over the ledge and fell forever.
Dillon obviously felt none of this. “Hey, I just thought of something. You know how I turned the fire around when the house got toasted? Maybe I could try that with Josef’s ice.”
“Too late now.” Just releasing the words threatened to bring up Sean’s last meal.
“No, hang on, I’ll go ask.”
Before Sean could tell his brother not to transit to an unknown point, he was already over on the other column, standing by Josef. Sean was too far away to see the professor’s expression, but something about the way the giant straightened and stepped back made Sean pretty certain Josef was as spooked by Dillon’s move as Sean.
Dillon popped back into view and said, “Josef says I should go for it.”
“He didn’t look happy to have you show up.”
“No, he was okay. Surprised. But pleased. Kinda like watching a clown pop from a hole, I guess.” Dillon held out his hand. “You think we could connect like last time?”
Actually, it was precisely what Sean wanted to do at that point. Gripping his brother’s hand made him fairly certain he would not fall. Which was ridiculous. But still.
Dillon took hold of Sean’s hand and said, “You can’t be hot.”
“In here? Are you nuts?”
“Then why are you sweating?”
“Man, I am about this close to tossing my cookies.”
“Well, just be sure and turn downwind.”
“I can’t get over how calm you are.”
“This is great. Okay, Josef is waving. Shields up?”
“Yes.”
“Cool.” Dillon waved. “Remember, feed me the power and let me pull the trigger.”
Sean was about to say he had no interest in shooting anything. But there wasn’t time to reply. Because Josef began his assault.
The giant seemed to grow even bigger, drawing upon the power. Sean knew this was happening, even though all he saw with his physical eyes was how the professor began waving his hands. Josef looked like a demented conductor, steering the energy into a whirlwind. Sean watched as the drifting mist and the snow and the cold began sucking in, growing into this massive ball that expanded until it was broader than his platform. A circular tornado with Josef at its center, weaving his arms, building, building . . .
Sean had something to focus on now. The dizzy feeling was replaced by genuine fear. The guy was going to shoot that mass at them.
Dillon laughed out loud. “Frosty!”
Sean had never actually hated his brother until that very moment.
“Remember!” Dillon shouted. “Feed me the force!”
Sean decided there was no point in telling Dillon where he’d really like to insert the force. He just squatted down. Clenched the stone base with the hand not holding Dillon’s. Almost able to carve his fingernails into solid rock.
Then the force struck. A blast of ice and snow and power, a tumult that Sean actually heard. Like they had stepped inside the heart of a frozen waterfall. The roar was flecked with the sounds of stones and ice striking the shield, a tight drumbeat, fast as machine-gun fire.
Dillon shot Sean a thought bullet. Feed me. Feed me.
All Sean could think about was where they were and what would hammer him if his shield didn’t hold. Even so, he managed to flick a tiny fragment of his attention out to the shield, catch hold of a stream of the torrential energy, and draw it in. It felt like a toffee pull, except made of ice and rock and energy, but still. Even with his fear and his shaken state, Sean was actually able to follow what the first time had been a gut-level act. The toffee line coursed down his arm and through his grip and into Dillon.
Sean formed the thought bubble and sent back, Go.
Dillon probably didn’t mean to roar like he did. But the force of his rebel yell was enough to shrink Sean down further to the floor.
His brother was actually having a good time.
The onslaught lasted another few seconds. Or hours. Depending on who was asked. Then the assault ended, and the world went quiet.
Josef transited back into view. He was chuckling. “Well, well.”
“Man, did you see that? I was killing it!” Dillon moonwalked around the platform, punctuated by the giant’s bass laughter. He started cocking an imaginary shotgun, swinging the weapon in circles, banging away at moving targets. “Dudes think they’re bad news, man, do I have a little surprise in my pocket.”
Josef looked down to where Sean was gradually uncoiling from his crouch. “I take it you are ready to transit back to home base.”
“You got that right.”
Dillon deflated. “Aw, man. Can’t we do it one more time?”
Sean rose to as close to full height as he could manage. “Absolutely not.” He decided he wasn’t even waiting for them. “I am out of here.” And he left. Bang and gone.
31
His brother arriv
ed back an hour or so later, thrilled over what he had accomplished. He woke Sean, who was dozing on the balcony, and announced that Josef wanted to send Dillon up for advanced battle training. As in, ship him off to the Praetorian Academy. The place where every other recruit from the Examiner’s school had washed out. Josef was as excited as Dillon, finally having a student who might, just might, make it through.
Sean listened to his brother describe what was in store. Dillon danced through the process of showering and dressing, never stopping his constant chatter, not for an instant. And Sean grew increasingly certain that behind his brother’s adrenaline high lurked the same three questions that burrowed deep within him.
What about Carey?
What about their hunt for who was behind the attacks?
What about them?
The third question sat like a lead weight attached to his abdomen. Because one thing Sean knew for certain. Even if the powers that be asked, even if they begged, there was no way Sean would ever be going to battle school.
Dillon sang his way down the stairs and whistled across the lawn. Carey answered the door, and his brother said something that made her laugh. The sound was there long after the door shut. Sean sat and watched the dusk gather and knew he had no interest in another night sitting on the balcony. Alone.
He transited back to the school. It was odd, because for the first time ever he actually liked arriving in that featureless grey room. He didn’t change into sweats because he wasn’t staying. He slipped down the hall and passed through the portal that before had always been locked, and took the stairs up to the glass-walled mega-room.
There were several dozen other people scattered around the vast hall, some stretched out on cushions, others in portable chairs, one group dining at a candlelit table. He walked over to an empty space along the wall that faced the suns and stood there. Unhappy and content at the same time.
“I thought this was where I’d find you.”
Sean wheeled about and watched Elenya walk toward him. She wore her own version of at-home casual, or so Sean assumed. A shoulder emerged from a top that was pink and not exactly translucent, but certainly a far cry from the school’s staid sweats. She wore shorts or a short dress, accent on the word short. He had never seen her legs before, and they were really nice. Her sandals had velvety ribbons that laced up almost to her knees. A matching band held her hair back. She was, in a word, beautiful.
Sean had always assumed the true beauties were out of his league. And all the responses he had seen from them confirmed this. As Carey grew closer to his brother, Sean had the lurking suspicion there was something about his personality or some hidden trait the beauties could smell or sense, something that just plain turned them off.
So here he was, thirty thousand light-years or so from his home turf, dealing with the mystery of a truly awesome lady who clearly was interested in him.
There was no reason why Elenya’s sudden appearance should add to his sense of uneasiness and disquiet. But it did. And he hated it.
Sean asked, “How did you know I was here?”
“You can establish a link, Sean. It sends you an alert whenever the other arrives at the school.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“You miss a few things, climbing through nine years of schooling in a month.” She held out her hand. “Shall I teach you what you don’t know, Sean?”
The invitation was delivered so calmly, so matter-of-factly, that he had taken hold of her hand and turned back to the frozen double sunset when it hit him. What she said. What she meant. Maybe.
He was still trying to work through how to answer when she asked, “How do you see your shield?”
“I don’t.”
“Of course. I mean . . .”
“What I visualize when I’m making it.” He felt slightly embarrassed. “Like a big golden egg.”
She nodded slowly. “And your brother?”
“I have no idea. It’s never come up.”
“You men. You are ashamed of this, perhaps?”
“It just seems kind of personal.”
“I will stop.” But her voice was even more musical than usual with hidden laughter. “Men are astonishing.”
He could not stop the words any more than he could extinguish the flames. “I don’t want to be men, Elenya. I don’t want to be grouped.”
She sobered. “I have upset you.”
“What is it with you?” He could see faces turning his way. There was probably some Lothian protocol about arguing in public. He hated being the center of such unwanted attention. But he could not stop. “How can you be so . . . in total control over everything?”
Her laughter was gone now, her eyes very grave. “What you mean is, how can I be in such control when we are together, yes?”
He gripped the railing with both hands, squeezing the words from his confusion. “We’ve only just met and you treat me like . . .”
“Like I’ve known you for years. That is it, yes?”
He bowed over until his head was down below his shoulders, his entire body tense. He was going to blow this. He just knew it.
She touched his shoulder with a pair of fingertips. “I have known about you and watched you since the first day you came to the school. Since the first hour.”
Sean remained where he was, bowed over, staring at his feet. But listening.
“I have no interest in most men, Sean. You need to believe me.”
He said to the floor, “I believe everything you tell me.”
Her grip on his shoulder grew firmer. “I want to become a Counselor. I want a partner who will be with me in this. Most of these students, they are so . . . limited.”
“You don’t know anything about me.”
“I know you come from an outpost world. I know you and your twin were discovered by accident. I know most of the older students resent you and fear you. Why? Because you know no limits. None.”
Slowly he straightened. But he couldn’t bring himself to look at her. The suns hung within their rose-tinted ring of fire, one degree above the horizon, turning the distant mountain range of ice and rock into gemstones and lava. “My brother showed me one of my own limits today.”
But she was not done. “My mother has always resented my father’s gift. She loves him and he loves her. But this has always stood between them, how he can transit from world to world, and she can only travel when he takes her. It is his power. And she . . .”
Sean spoke to the glass. “She wants what he has.”
“I do not know men, Sean. It was wrong of me to say what I did. It was an expression I have heard my older sisters use. I only know two lessons about love. One from my mother, who is a biochemist. She uses what is known as a planetary metabolic index in studying the subtle diversities between humans of different planets. Some traits she has found do not change, regardless of how distinct are their mutations. One such trait is, the female gender matures faster than the male.”
He could see her reflection painted upon the dual suns, the beauty and the zeal. One word clung to the glass like it had been etched into the surface. Love. Along with the intensity carried by everything she said.
“The other lesson came when I was nine, the same year I entered this school. My oldest sister had joined with a mate, supposedly for life, and less than a year later she was back home again. Crushed and brokenhearted and groping for answers. The same thing happened to my middle sister just a few months ago. The family is still reeling from this, how two beautiful and intelligent young women could both have their lives wrecked by love with the wrong man. My father told them both something that stays with me. He said, ‘Love is a ruthless game unless you play it right. And then it is not a game at all.’”
He turned toward her then. And repeated, “You don’t know me.”
“Nor you me,” she agreed. “But do you think perhaps we should seek to gain this knowledge?”
He could not meet her gaze. It was like she could strip him
bare, not of clothes but of his flesh and bones, leaving his very soul exposed. He turned back to the window, as conflicted as he had ever been in his entire life. And more scared than he had been on the pillar.
And yet despite how he felt, Sean found himself describing for her what had happened that day. The cavern and the cold and the pillars and his fear. Dillon’s excitement. His own terror, gripping the stone, wanting nothing more than for it to be over. Dillon’s return and the electric thrill he carried of being invited to battle school. Then Sean tried to describe what it meant to hear his brother so enthusiastic about a step that meant them being separated, probably for good. And his concern over how Dillon might lose the finest love he had ever known. Using that word for the first time ever to describe Dillon and Carey. For Elenya to understand what it meant—Dillon’s love and their own relationship—he had to unravel at least a bit of the tangle about their parents.
He started crying.
He had never, not once in his entire life, wept in public. But this was as much beyond his control as everything else about that day. He tried to make it sound like a series of coughs, like he was choking. So ashamed he could have dissolved into the floor.
Elenya maneuvered him by will and motion, drawing him around, not allowing him to hide his face. She held him not just tightly but from sandals to hairline, melted in so close she could almost breathe with him, weep with him. Which was the only thing that allowed him to regain control. He took a pair of shuddering breaths and tried to release himself so he could dry his eyes, but Elenya wasn’t having any of that. She pulled his arm back around her, then lifted her free hand and wiped his face herself.
And then she kissed him. Long enough for his heart to stop and then restart.
Sean tasted tears, but he could not tell whether they were his own or hers.
32
If somebody had asked Sean how he’d feel about meeting a beautiful girl who would see it as her job to chase and land him, Sean would probably have replied that he’d be high as a skyrocket with his tail on fire. That is, if he didn’t laugh the questioner into next week. But when Sean returned to the loft that evening, what he felt most of all was confused. Okay, yeah, he could still feel her lips on his, and that was beyond great. But it didn’t make all the other stuff just turn to smoke and fade away. Nor did it fill the empty void at the dinner table, where he ate alone. Or how he turned in on his own, then lay there waiting until Dillon showed up sometime after midnight.