Taken. Now, you act like Lanteri’s already gone.”
Hart’s outrage deflated his mother’s anger and she slumped
to the kitchen chair in front of her like a spent windsock. She put
her face in her hands and silently wept into them, her body
shaking with her repressed sobs.
It was Hart’s turn to be deflated. He watched his mother
break down in front of him for a couple of silent moments before
picking up the kitchen chair, setting it right and sitting across
from her. He let the worst of her grief, anguish and rage pass
before offering her a kitchen towel as an apology. For several
long minutes, the two of them sat there in silence. Him watching
her and her wiping at her face, regaining her composure bit by
bit. “Toor,” she said, “was special to me. He promised me he’d
never be Taken. He promised me …”
“He was your favorite.” There was no accusation in Hart’s
voice; just a simple knowing truth. Saneri looked away but did
not deny it. This lack of denial murdered the last bit of his child’s
heart. He swallowed his own grief and pressed on. “Now,
Lanteri’s your favorite.”
“She’s the only girl child of age in this harvest zone. She’s
special.”
“What about Nori?”
“Nori’s too old. They haven’t Taken anyone over the age of
fifteen in at least twenty years.”
“Then why aren’t you worried about me?” The betraying
words were out of Hart’s mouth before he knew he was going to
ask the question. But now that the words were on the table
between them, he could not snatch them back. At least his mother
had the decency to look shocked again.
“What? Of course I’m worried about you! What would make
you think …? Why? Oh, Hart, I love you. Of course I’m worried
you’ll be Taken.” She paused, waiting for him to respond but he
just continued to look at her, stone-faced. “You’re different.
You’re stronger. Solid. Dependable,” she tried to explain.
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“Not the prize that Toor was and Lanteri is?”
His mother gave him a look. “Now you’re just being sullen.
Stop it.” She wiped at her face again but this time it was more of
a nervous tic.
This casual maternal admonishment made him smile though
he did not really understand why. Perhaps it was that the
admonishment was a sign that she really did care about him and
what he did.
Saneri took the small smile as a sign of encouragement. “I
love you, Hart. You’re the one I can depend on. You always have
been.” She paused, took a breath and then forged onward,
“That’s why I need you to protect your sister.”
“Because you and Dad can’t.”
She looked away and nodded, but not before he saw the
flinch of pain on her face. “Yes. You’re closer to her. She
idolizes you. You … I-I think you’re her only hope.”
Now that the truth was out between them—almost all of it
anyway, Hart nodded at her, feeling better. He was Lanteri’s only
hope. He knew it. He had always known it. “Don’t worry, Mom.
I’ll protect her. I promise.” The look of gratitude on his mother’s
face was painful but he smiled at it. “I know what to do.”
*
Lanteri and Hart sat in their bedroom not speaking. They both
watched the window as the sun set late in the summer’s evening.
Their silence spoke volumes to each other in sibling-speak. They
were both worried. She looked to him for comfort and he gave it
in a sudden slap at the button that closed the blinds and signaled
the room’s automatic sensors to produce a dim light. Then, he
patted the spot next to him on his bed nearest the wall. She came
willingly enough despite wanting to seem adult. There was
enough of a child’s need for comfort that she took it went it was
offered.
They sat like that on his bed, Lanteri pressed to her brother’s
side and he with his arm wrapped around her shoulders in a
protective embrace. When she spoke, her voice was soft. “What
was Toor like?” She could not see Hart’s frown but she sensed it
and looked up.
He did not look down at her. “He was a lot like you. Good
with animals. A dreamer. Always forgetting about the time.”
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Hart smiled, “I was always saving him from punishment.
Reminding him to do his chores. To come home on time. To
remember what Mom and Dad said to do.”
“I’m not like that. I remember things.”
Hart looked down at her. “You’re right. I guess you’ve got a
bit of both me and Toor in you. Part dreamer. Part … not
dreamer.”
Lanteri smiled a brave smile at him, “I’m a princess.”
“Yes. You are.” He returned the smile in kind.
The two of them lapsed into silence again, watching the
minutes tick over on the clock. Hart did not know what she
thought of but his mind raced. Finally, he shifted, waking Lanteri
from her doze.
“What’s going on? Are they here?” There was a hint of panic
in Lanteri’s voice.
“No, silly. We’ve just got to get ready.”
“Oh,” she yawned. “How?”
“Like this.” Hart reached up to the shelf above his bed and
found a small wad of dingy rope. “You’re gonna sleep in your
clothes tonight and on my bed with me.” He tied one end of the
rope around his left ankle and then tied the other end of it around
her right ankle. “If they come to Take either of us, this will
connect us and the pulling should wake one of us up. Then, we
have to save the other one. OK?”
“I’m gonna save you?”
He shrugged. “Maybe. I don’t know.” He kept his head down
so she would not see the look on his face. He did not want her to
know that he knew what was coming.
Lanteri nodded. “I’ll save you.” She curled up next to him,
facing the wall while he remained on his back.
“Lan?”
“Yeah?”
“What’s the first rule of being a princess?”
“Never, ever abandon your people—for they need you more
than you know,” she said. There was a smile in her sleepy voice.
“Good. And the second?”
Lanteri’s body relaxed in the comfort of the familiar game.
“A princess is a servant to all of her people. She’s supposed to
care for them and never let them down. Ever.”
“Yep. What’s the third rule?”
“A princess must be kind and generous but firm because she
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has to make the hard decisions that others cannot.”
“Because ’nothing good ever comes easy.’” He quoted to her.
There was a moment of silence before she spoke again. “Will
you always be my subject?”
“Yes. Always,” Hart said. He smiled to himself, allowing
his
eyes to close and await that which was to come.
*
They came as they had for the last five years. This was the
sixth time that Hart would face them, the Takers. They came in
light, sound and beauty. They looked like they could be any one
of a dozen humanoid races but not. They were all beautiful.
Shining. Perfect. Too perfect. But, God, they were beautiful.
Hart was standing in a field of grass and flowers that could never
exist on Artemis V. The sun was shining in that bright, cheerful
way that made the Harvesters rush to cover the delicate purpuran
flowers that could only survive in the shade.
The air smelled cool, clear and clean. There was no hint of
the musty smell the permeated everything on Artemis V. He
knew he was still at home in bed, but at the same time, he was
also here, in this impossibly perfect place of beauty and light.
There were several of them in the distance, the Takers, watching
him. He wanted to go to them but refused to be moved. They had
to come to him.
A boy approached. It was the same boy who had approached
him every year for the last five years. This boy, with brown hair
and blue eyes, grew a year older with each meeting so that he and
Hart were always peers. Never one older or younger. “Hart,
we’re still waiting. Waiting for you.”
Hart ached at the sound of his name. “I can’t go with you.”
He saw the boy’s smile falter and it hurt his soul.
“Please. Hart, why not? You deserve a better life. You
deserve to play in the sun and the grass. That world is no place
for a child.”
Hart shook his head, “You aren’t real. You can’t prove
you’re real and that what you say isn’t a lie.”
The boy sighed with weariness of the familiar argument. He
tried something new, “Your brother-”
“Is dead!” Hart interrupted, not willing to listen to anything
about Toor. “You killed him five years ago.”
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The boy shook his head. “No. Far from it. He’s here with us
and happy. He misses you. He told me to tell you to remember
the Day of Purple Hands.” For once, the boy did not look happy
or sad. He looked confused. “I don’t know what that means and
he wouldn’t tell me.”
Hart felt his stomach lurch. The Day of Purple Hands was the
day he and Toor had decided that if they were not allowed to
wear the royal purpuran purple color, they would dye their skin
with it. It had been Toor’s idea; a small act of defiance against
the Company and the circumstances that had made their family
all but indentured servants to those that employed them. They
had gotten in so much trouble. They had been grounded for
weeks. But both of them had considered it a victory over the
Company. It was something Toor would remind him of.
But he could not leave Lanteri.
“It doesn’t matter.” Hart turned from the boy, though it was
hard to turn from that light.
“But, why?” There was a desperate plea in the boy’s voice.
“Why can’t you come with us?”
Hart’s answer was a whisper. “Because a prince never
abandons his people—for they need him more than he knows.”
The boy walked up close behind Hart, putting his hand on
Hart’s shoulder. “My time is running out. I won’t be able to keep
coming back. You’re my other half. You’re the one I was meant
to save. If I can’t save you, I don’t know what I’ll do. It might
kill me. Please. ”
The feel of the boy’s hand on Hart’s shoulder was warm and
comforting. It almost unraveled his resolve right then and there.
The idea that this boy needed him and needed to save him was
almost too much. Then, another sensation distracted Hart from
the warmth of the boy’s hand. Something was tugging at his
ankle. He looked down and saw the dingy rope from his shelf
that he had tied around his ankle pulled tight. It was not a part of
this world. It was a part of his home.
Lanteri.
Lanteri was being Taken. From him, from his mother, from
his family. Hart shrugged the boy’s hand from his shoulder. “My
sister needs me.” He closed his eyes and groped for his sister. At
first, he thought he was too late, and then his hand found his sister
curled in a tight ball in the corner of the bed. He grabbed her
upper arm and squeezed tight. “Lanteri, stay with us,” he
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whispered to her, praying she could hear him.
Hart opened his eyes upon that field of beauty and light,
drinking in the wonder that it was. In his hand, he could feel, but
not see, Lanteri’s arm. “I can’t go with you. My family needs me.
And I can’t let you take Lanteri.” He felt the boy step back from
him but did not turn around. He could not turn around to see the
sorrow he knew was etched all over the boy’s perfect face. It
would be too much to bear.
“I’ll go now,” the boy said. “But I can’t wait much longer.
We’ll meet only one more time on the next double full moon.
You have one last chance to free yourself of that hellish place
and then, all hope is lost. Please …”
Hart squinched his eyes shut against the temptation of this
place and willed that the boy with his promises of light and joy
would just go away. Mercifully, the scent of that place
disappeared and the boy did not speak again.
*
“You bruised my arm,” Lanteri said as she looked at the
finger shaped marks on her arm in the twilight of the morning.
Her voice was subdued as she refused to look at him.
“I’m sorry,” Hart said, apologizing for more than the bruise,
as he bent over to untie the rope from around their ankles. As he
wadded up the rope again, he could have sworn he smelled that
other world on it. He threw it from him towards the shelf and did
not bother to see if he hit his mark. He looked down and saw a
bruise around his ankle. “You bruised me, too.”
Lanteri turned in a sudden motion, threw her arms around
him and pressed her face into his chest. Her voice came out in
choked sobs. “Why didn’t you tell me it’d be like that? Why
didn’t anyone tell me they’d be so pretty?”
He hugged her to him and petted her hair. “Shhhh,” he said
as he rocked her. “Shhh, it’s OK. You won’t remember soon.
You won’t remember anything about it. It’ll be just a dream. No
one remembers, really. That’s why no one talks about it.”
“They were so pretty. It was just like my dream, my picture.”
“I know, Lan, I know.”
She pulled away from him and looked at his face, “Do they
come for you every year? Is it like that every year?”
He smoothed away a tear smug from her cheek and nodded,
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not wanting to lie to her again.
He grimaced at the look of pain
on her face.
“How do you not go? Why do you stay?”
Hart closed his eyes and wondered that himself. “I think of
you,” he said. “I stay because of you. You need me. And so do
mom and dad.”
“But, what if it’s not a lie? What if … it’s really what they
say?”
“You can’t think like that. You can’t, Lanteri. Think of what
it would do to mom and dad if you were Taken. If we were Taken.
It would kill them.” Hart shook his head. “Don’t think like that
ever.” He could hear the lack of conviction in his voice and was
certain that she could, too.
She frowned, “I can’t remember what she looked like. I can’t
remember anything but the shining sun.”
He turned from her, “Go wash your face and then wake up
mom and dad. They’ll be glad to know you’re still here.”
Lanteri got up and walked to the door. She paused, looking
back at him, “I want to remember.” When he did not answer, she
shook her head and left to do as he told her to do.
He shook his own head, murmuring “No, you don’t,” under
his breath. He did not remember most of the time. It was only in
the weeks before the next double full moon that he would
remember the field with the flowers and the boy. Last night was
the first time the boy had given him proof that Toor was still alive
and happy. Last night was the first time the boy had told him how
much he needed Hart and that their next meeting would be their
last.
For five years, Hart had resisted for the sake of Lanteri, if not
for his parents. Now, he knew for certain the Takers wanted both
him and his little sister. Next year, they both could be Taken to
that place of wonder, to be reunited with Toor, and to live their
lives in the sun instead of the shadows and mud. He knew it
would kill their parents to lose all of their children to the Takers
but, right now, Hart was not certain that knowledge would be
enough next time.
Jennifer Brozek is a Hugo Award-nominated editor and an
award-winning author. She has worked in the publishing
industry since 2004. With the number of edited anthologies,
novel sales, RPG books, and nonfiction books under her belt,
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