By the Sea of Sand

by Megan Hart

  She made her rounds of the others, making sure everyone was accounted for and not in need of anything. All of the residents had been here long enough that they didn’t really need much from her any longer, but it was still her responsibility to check on them, just as it was her job to make sure the lamp was working. Rehker, as usual, was reading in the parlor with his feet on the stool. He charmed her with a smile when she came in, tried to flirt with her. She was used to that. Pera, on the other hand, was busy working on some sort of long document in the other corner. A viddy script, she said sometimes. Other times, a memoir. At any rate, she ignored Teila completely, which was fine with her because Pera could be uncomfortably intense.

  In the dining room, Teila found Adarey and Stimlin. No surprise that the women were together, as it was rare for either to be apart from the other. They’d been strangers when they came here, both suffering the after-effects of their time in battle and both having lost their partners, they’d quickly become a couple.

  Adarey looked up when Teila came in. “The delivery ship came. Vikus said he’d sign for the shipment, but he’s not around.”

  Stimlin said nothing, but then she never did. She ate a bite from the plate between them, then passed the fork to Adarey. The kitchen had plenty of tableware, but Teila had stopped trying to convince the pair they didn’t need to share.

  In the kitchen she found the delivery bot waiting patiently in standby mode. This far out there’d be no other deliveries it had to make, and it had probably been programmed to hold as long as necessary for the appropriate authorization. When she passed her hand over the bot’s control panel, its faceplate lit up. The bot whirred and clicked. Rust had bruised it all over.

  “Stay tuned,” the bot said in its grinding metallic voice. “Stay tuned.”

  Whatever that meant, Teila had no idea. This bot was so old it probably hadn’t had its dialogue functions upgraded in a long, long time. It didn’t seem to matter when she didn’t answer, because as soon as she’d finished punching in her acceptance codes, the bot went to the back door where the delivery ship’s transport scooter waited. The ramp extended and the carrier bots began transporting the boxes and bags of supplies into the kitchen. Teila knew better than to simply trust that they’d get everything off the scooter—there’d been too many times when it had pulled away without fully emptying its cargo and she’d had to wait another full cycle before it came back. But when she checked the flatbed, the scooter was empty. She watched it trundle back to the edge of the sea, where it was hooked by the delivery ship’s wires and pulled aboard. Habit made her wave at the ship, though she could see no signs of crew.

  It wasn’t true, what the Rav Aluf had told her when he returned her husband. Yes, the days of the sea being black with whalers had ended, but there were still plenty of pleasurecraft and tradecraft that passed by. They stayed far out to sea, very few of them ever coming close enough to even risk running aground. She sometimes watched the enormous luxury party boats from the lamp room. When the wind was just right she heard the sounds of their music, though she had to rely on her imagination for visions of the food and drink and dancing the passengers enjoyed.

  Her father had told her stories of the tables set with gold-rimmed plates, utensils forged from platanium. The finest wines and best cuts of flesh, not farm-simulated but genuine. He and her mother had taken such a voyage for their wedding journey, and he’d promised Teila that one day he’d take her, as well. That had been in the days when whalers made their cycle’s fortunes with a single haul, before the government had stepped in to regulate the milka trade. Before the war had escalated, before the rationing and new laws. Now only the wealthiest could afford to take pleasure cruises, and though she had her father’s estate to keep her from poverty, Teila was far from wealthy.

  She didn’t regret it. Life on a whaler was hard. Life in the lighthouse at least was steady, if not occasionally dull. It wasn’t the life her father had chosen for her, but what she’d chosen for herself. She might dream of luxury, but she’d seen what too much money and power did to people. She’d never be poor, and she’d never be rich, but she could at least be content with where and who she was.

  At least she knew who she was.

  She found a surprise waiting for her in the kitchen. Jodah stood in front of one of the mechbots, both hands up defensively, while the bot itself clicked and whirred brokenly. Jodah turned when she came through the door, his stance aggressive enough for her to pause before he relaxed. Just a little.

  “It came at me,” he said.

  Teila’s brows rose. “It’s a mechbot. It can’t hurt you.”

  “I know that. Now,” he added angrily. “But it took me by surprise.”

  Somehow, she thought, that had been the problem, and not anything the poor old bot had actually done. That it had managed to take Jodah by surprise. She put a hand over her mouth to hold back a giggle, but a little bit slipped out.

  “Let me see if I can fix it.” She pushed past Jodah, who stepped back. Fortunately, the bot had only been dented a little. Vikus could probably fix it, and the irony of that—needing him to fix a bot whose sole function was to repair things around the property, was not lost on her. “I’m not sure I should bother. It’s so old, and there are no more replacement parts since the SDF commandeered them all.”

  She paused, wondering if her mention of the SDF would cause him to react, but Jodah said nothing. She opened the poor bot’s control panel and punched in the keycode that would send it back to its charging station. Its gears ground, and for a moment she was certain that was it, it was irreparable. But then it moved, clanking and wheezing, down the hall. She’d found them in odd places before, their batteries run down before they could make it back to their docking stations. She’d check later. For now, she turned to Jodah, who still looked ashamed.

  “Are you hungry?”

  “No.”

  “Then . . . why are you in the kitchen?” She gestured at the boxes of supplies just as Vikus and Billis came in from the dining room. “Boys, we need to get this put away. Jodah can help.”

  “Not my name,” he said through gritted teeth.

  She paused, but kept her voice calm though her heart had begun to beat faster at his tone and the way he’d clenched his fists. “We can call you whatever you’d like.”

  “What’s he doing down here?” Vikus asked brusquely.

  Jodah was on him before the young man could take a second breath. His forearm went under Vikus’ chin, pushing him against the wall while Vikus flailed. “You should be more respectful.”

  Silence, not a word from any of them. Billis, to no surprise, had retreated across the room at the first sight of violence. Vikus stopped struggling. Teila, remembering the squeeze of her husband’s fingers on her throat, wasn’t about to agitate him, even though she knew in her heart he wasn’t going to hurt Vikus. Once he’d loved the younger man like the brother he didn’t have.

  “What would you like us to call you?” Teila asked quietly. “And please let Vikus go.”

  Her husband did and stepped back with a wary glare that faded into a grimace of embarrassment. He nodded stiffly. “Your pardon.”

  Vikus shook his robes to straighten them and gave Teila a narrow-eyed look, but he nodded back. “Granted.”

  “If I could call myself anything I wanted,” Billis spoke up suddenly, “I’d pick something really silky.”

  “Silky?” One of her husband’s brows lifted. “You think I should pick a silky name. Like what?”

  Billis moved forward eagerly. “Like . . . Dentrel. Or Vesperil.”

  “Viddy performers.” Teila laughed. “Billis, I don’t think he wants to name himself after viddy performers.”

  “Anyway, he doesn’t want to pick his own name. He wants to use his real name. Even if it’s gritty and not silky, right?” Vikus put in a little snidely.

  Teila frowned at him, but her husband didn’t seem to care this time about respect. He nodded and ran a hand over hi
s face. He looked at her.

  “I must’ve come with records.”

  “Yes,” she said hesitantly. “But they told me that your name was Jodah.”

  “Everyone’s name is Jodah when they can’t remember their own.” This came from Billis in the corner, who gave Teila a shamefaced shrug when she whirled to glare at him.

  She looked back to her husband, who’d never been Jodah even before he picked his adult name. It would be so easy right now to suggest he call himself Kason, but she couldn’t do it. “Jodah is a fine name, but if it doesn’t suit you, or if it makes you angry—”

  “It’s not right. I know that.” He punched a fist into his palm. “It doesn’t feel right.”

  Teila looked at the time meter hung on the wall. “It’s almost time for the midday meal. Why not join us, and . . . maybe we can help you figure it out. Or at least figure out what you’d like to be called.”

  He nodded slowly. Carefully. “Yes. All right.”

  Teila snapped at Vikus and Billis. “Right, then. You two. Let’s get these boxes unpacked.”

  She caught him looking at her, dark brows drawn, pale eyes fierce. The first time she’d seen him look at her that way, she’d fallen in love with him. Now it took everything she had not to throw herself into his arms and kiss him into remembering who he was.

  Chapter 11

  He was not yet used to being up and about, amongst others. He ought to have been. They were soldiers too, if not exactly like him then at least similar. It wasn’t that he felt like they were judging him. He was just one among many, he was sure, who’d come and gone from the lighthouse over the years. His problems were better than some and no worse than others had suffered. And yet, he still felt out of place and uncertain when he made his way downstairs after the monotony of being alone in his room became too stifling.

  The day before he’d spent the midday meal at the table with the others, half-expecting them to clamor for information from him, but nobody had paid more than a moment’s attention to him. It had been a comfort to sit and eat in silence while conversations went on around him. Not excluding, but not prying, either.

  Teila had not brought up the subject of what to call him at the table. He’d asked her afterward to show him his records, and seeing it there on the viddy screen hadn’t convinced him it was true. He knew in his gut he was someone else. He hadn’t been able to think of something better for her to call him though, and he hated it.

  That small interaction with the others had made it impossible for him to remain sequestered, however. His room had no viddy monitor and he’d have tired of it quickly even if it had. He needed to be active. He needed to move. He’d spent too long inside. He sensed a lot of weaknesses in himself. He wanted to work his body and make it stronger.

  He wasn’t hungry, though he looked in the kitchen and knew he could help himself to whatever he wanted. He didn’t want to sit in the parlor, either—Venga had turned the viddy monitor to some program blaring discordant music and flashing so many pics it would surely give Jodah a headache. The old man sat too close to the monitor anyway, blocking the view. In the study, Jodah looked at the catalog of reading material on the communal handheld, searching for something he hadn’t read.

  As if he’d remember if he had.

  “That’s only for in here, you know.” Pera had been sitting in the shadowy corner, unnoticed.

  Jodah looked up at the sound of her voice. “What?”

  “The handheld,” she said. “That’s for in here. For anyone to use who wants it. You can’t take it upstairs or anything, because that wouldn’t be fair to the rest of us.”

  “I won’t.” He held it up, weighing it. “How old is this thing?”

  She had a gritty laugh, dusty as the sands outside. “Really old. Rehker told me Venga brought it with him when he came, and that was a long, long time ago.”

  “So it’s Venga’s handheld,” Jodah said. “Not just for anyone who wants it?”

  “No. He doesn’t use it anymore. It’s for the whole house.” She got up and came closer, standing shoulder to shoulder with him. She wore her hair short all over but for the front, where the white strands fell forward over her eyes. “But if you want to order anything, you put it on the house account and Teila deducts it from your personal account.”

  This gave him pause. “What if I simply want to use my own handheld?”

  “Do you have one?” Pera looked at him through the fringes of her hair.

  “I could buy one, couldn’t I?”

  “I don’t know,” she said with a small smile that revealed tiny, perfect teeth. “Depends on how much money you have, heywhat?”

  Along with the medical records, Teila had shown him the ones for his personal accounts. He had enough money for anything he could ever ask for or need. Certainly for a handheld newer than this one. He hefted it in his palm again, then put it down. The data stream brightened for a moment, and he winced.

  Pera moved closer. “You’re enhanced. In the brain.”

  Jodah nodded, fingers pressed to his temples. He blinked, hoping to force the constant stream of light to fade enough for him to be able to ignore it. “Yes.”

  “I was stationed with some enhanced officers. If you ask me, it causes more trouble than it’s worth. Filling people up with metal and wire. It makes you faster,” she said, stroking an unexpected finger down the front of his robes. “And stronger. Sure. But it also takes something away, doesn’t it? Something important.”

  “I can’t remember,” Jodah said hoarsely. “What it was like before I was this way.”

  “You can’t remember anything, can you?” Her expression was cooing, but her tone cold. A little mocking. Her fingers curled into the front of his robes.

  She was on her tiptoes before he knew it, her lips brushing his before he could think to move away. The kiss, so brief it was barely anything, somehow stung. Jodah shook his head as Pera pulled away, and she gave him another of those small grins. The pink tip of her tongue crept out to press the center of her upper lip.

  “It’s okay,” she told him. “It’s the way we all are around here. Crazy as drywhales.”

  Drywhales, those that had been stripped of all their oils and left behind to suffer the grind of sand in their sensitive joints. If it didn’t kill them, the agony sent them into a frenzy powerful enough to sink any size ship. It made the normally mild-tempered creatures fierce and violent and furious . . . and vindictive.

  “I’m no drywhale,” he said.

  Pera smirked, tilting her head so the brush of her hair drifted across her eyes. They gleamed through the white strands. “Of course you’re not.”

  When she leaned to kiss him again, Jodah turned his head so that it would land on his cheek rather than his mouth. Pera had a soldier’s reflexes. She stopped the kiss before it got that far.

  “No?”

  “No,” Jodah said. “I’m sorry.”

  Pera gave him a long look through the filter of her hair. “You’re not sorry. But that’s all right.”

  A discreet cough from behind them made Jodah turn, while Pera didn’t move at all. It was Rehker, smiling that odd, wide grin of his that didn’t reach his eyes. When he crossed the room to take a seat on the lounge, he passed Pera close enough to brush her sleeve with his fingertips. She closed her eyes at his touch.

  Jodah didn’t miss that.

  Nor the way her breath heaved, or how her nipples tightened, poking the thin material of her robes. Or how she stood so still when Rehker passed, as though she were trying her best not to leap after him. Jodah sensed the tremor of her muscles.

  “Don’t let me interrupt,” Rehker said smoothly.

  “There’s nothing to interrupt,” Pera answered in a low voice.

  “Then come sit by me. I’m sure Jodah won’t mind.” Rehker patted the spot on the lounger next to him, and when Pera took it, he leaned forward, hands on his knees. Not looking at her. Not touching her. His attention was focused on Jodah, yet the tension
between Rehker and Pera was palpable.

  Rehker clutched his hands together and gave Jodah a sincere look. “We haven’t really had a chance to get to know each other. You and me. You’ve been here long enough, surely we should’ve had some time to spend with you by now. You kept yourself upstairs for so long, I thought you’d never come down.”

  “I’ve been unwell.”

  “So have we all, brother, so have we all.” Rehker rocked a little on the lounger, his fingers linked tight. Pera couldn’t take her eyes off him but he didn’t even glance at her. “But you’re no brother of mine, are you? I presume too much. You’re enhanced. You were an officer, huh?”

  “I . . . yes.” Jodah set the ancient handheld on the table.

  “But you don’t remember what rank.” Rehker laughed, not waiting for an answer. “It’s okay. Hardly any one of us does. We come here broken. Teila puts us back together, doesn’t she, Pera?”

  “Sometimes,” Pera said with a little startle when he spoke to her.

  Rehker looked at Jodah. “Sometimes. But you . . .”

  The other man got up and strode toward him to stand just a little too close. Jodah had known men who favored the company of men before. Not that he remembered, exactly, just that he knew without overthinking it that he could tell the difference between Rehker’s interest in him and Pera’s. Both felt predatory and both lacked any sense of sexuality.

  “You,” Rehker said when Jodah didn’t give him any ground, “are very high ranking. Aren’t you?”

  It felt right to answer yes, but Jodah didn’t. “How could you know that? Did you know me?”

  Rehker tilted his head. “No. We didn’t serve together. I think they’re very careful not to place any of us together, in case of problems. But I can tell by looking at you.”

  Jodah gave the man a hard, unyielding glare. “Tell me, Rehker. What do you see?”

  “Enhanced, definitely. You’ve lost weight a lot of it, and your face is haggard, but you haven’t lost muscle. You’re still strong . . . even when you feel weak. Yes?”