The door slid quietly open behind her. She heard it, Just didn't turn to see if it was Dalden or not. The depression that had settled in as soon as she was alone, was weighing her down. Too many emotions, doubts, fears, and so much of it centered on him.
He stood in front of her. He looked concerned, probably because she was on the verge of tears and looked it. Was he for real? How could he be? A barbarian from another world just wasn't acceptable. But did he believe it? As they could make her forget, could they make him have memories that weren't real, a whole lifetime of memories inserted in his mind to make him think he was other than what he was? She really wanted to believe that, rather than he was just another actor in this "play."
"So you are not as accepting as you claimed you would be?" he said.
"I know this isn't real," she replied tonelessly. "You say it is. One of us doesn't have our facts straight."
His hands came to her shoulders, pulled her close enough so they were just touching. She had to tilt her head back now to still meet his gaze. Those lovely amber eyes were filled with sadness.
"I cannot make it all go away for you," he told her. "I would not want to. That would mean giving you up, and I will never do that."
"You mean Martha's means of making people forget what has passed?"
"Yes.
"No, I wouldn't want that either." She laid her head on his chest, wrapped her arms tight around him. "But it's occurred to me that to accept this is to accept that I'll never see my family again. Can you understand why that thought is abhorrent to me?"
"Certainly, yet is it in error? Your star system is farther than most from mine, yet is it still reachable. You will see your family again if that is your wish."
She looked up at him again. "You mean that?"
"I am not breaking your ties with all that you know, merely loosening them for now," he replied. "You have a new family. You have me."
He was doing it again, amazing her at how easily he could adjust her emotions. He was reputed to have none, but he sure knew how to mold hers. A few words and half the burden had been lifted from her shoulders.
It wasn't the first time. Actually, it seemed to be a constant with him. The way he looked at her, touched her as if he cherished her above all things, said Just what she needed to hear ... it was no wonder she fell for him so hard and so fast. He might not love her, might not even be capable of it, but he sure knew how to make her feel loved. And every time he did, he bound her heart more firmly to his.
Was it by design? Deliberate? Part of the plan? Brittany shoved those doubts away, savoring the relief he just gave her. She hugged him tighter, thanking him without words. He might be too good to be true, but he was one fantasy she could live with for the rest of her days.
"You're amazing."
"It pleases me that you think so."
"Don't get conceited," she said as she leaned back to grin at him. "I didn't say you were perfect. Close, but no cigar."
His hands continued to caress her in a gentle, soothing manner, rather than sexual. Was he still worried that she was falling apart at the seams? Or was he keeping Martha's "practice hands‑off" warning in mind? She really hoped it wasn't the latter.
"What else‑pleases you?" she tested, trying not to sound sexy, merely curious.
But that easily, his golden eyes filled with heat, and that quickly, he was kissing her. Martha wasn't always right. As a stress reliever, Dalden's lovemaking beat a massager, even their unique one, hands down. just his kisses alone could do that, and for the simple reason that as usual, all thoughts, worries, fears, flew right out of her mind the moment his lips touched hers.
He lifted her, carried her to the bed, positioned her carefully on top of him as he laid back on it, so she wouldn't be distracted by any adjusting it did. As if anything could distract her just then. He took her into that realm of ecstasy again, so new to her, yet already addicting. His heat surrounded her, the strength of his passion thrilled her.
His lovemaking was all the answer she'd needed, yet he still said awhile later, "It pleases me when you want me. It pleases me to hold you close to my heart. Everything about you, woman, pleases me. And it pleases me most to know that you are mine."
Tears came to her eyes. "Did I say you weren't perfect? You can have that cigar now."
He laughed, gathered her close. If she was dreaming, she really didn't want to wake up.
Chapter Thirty‑six
IF BRITTANY DIDN'T HAVE SPECIFIC MEMORIES OF EACH and every day, she could almost think she'd slept through most of that trip, time flew by so quickly. She'd marked the days to begin with, but after two weeks and then a month passed, she had to give up the notion that they had a short time limit for convincing her. She was forced to conclude that the time involved was part of the project, to determine Just how long it would take for her to crack. She was obviously just a test subject, after all. When they got around to doing this to their real objectives, they'd want to have a good idea of a time frame for it.
So much time spent on just her? Maybe not. The "ship" was certainly big enough that there could be dozens of others Just like her there at the same time, and they just managed to keep her from running into them.
She had gotten that tour of the "ship" she'd asked for. And she had ended the day being even more impressed by the immense scope of this project, and the immense expense involved. Even if that lift wasn't really taking her to different levels of the ship, was just taking her back to the same floor where walls had been changed to make her think she was seeing different rooms, it was still a mind‑boggling expense, the creation of all this. And she wondered if she was the only test subject who had yet to be convinced even partially, let alone fully.
They never lost patience with her disbelief, never tried to double their efforts to change her thinking. She was grateful for that, because it let her enjoy her time with them. It was almost like reading a book. Once she looked at it in that light, she found it an amusing pastime, to make them flesh out their story, to ask all kinds of questions about their part of the universe.
She learned that Dalden's mother was a heroine on her own planet, that she was also the one to first discover Sha‑Ka'an and bring it to the attention of the rest of the universe. She knew that his planet was closed down to off‑world visitors, that anyone arriving there had to stay in the Visitors' Center and conduct their business from there, that few exceptions were made to this rule. That wasn't always the case, but "tourists" had caused too much trouble in the early clays of discovery, apparently, enough to make themselves unwelcome.
She spent a lot of time with Shanelle and learned that it was Falon's family that was ultimately responsible for ousting the visitors from their world. After his sister had been raped by one of them, they'd been ready to go to war if the planet wasn't made off‑limits to off‑worlders. Brittany figured this was a very good excuse to not show her very much of Sha‑Ka'an, but Shanelle had assured her that exceptions got made for lifemates, that she was a Ly‑San‑Ter now and so one of them.
From Shanelle she also learned that like her own world, each country in Sha‑Ka'an was somewhat different from the next, some with different rules and regulations, some with different philosophies, and in some the people looked different as well, though the amazing height and brawn were apparently a planet‑wide thing.
Shanelle's lifemate and his brother were examples of that. From a far distant town, they were black‑haired and blue‑eyed, while everyone from Dalden's town fell into the golden to light‑brown hair and eyes category. The women from Falon's town apparently weren't quite as restricted, either, as they were in Sha‑Ka‑Ra, but that was one aspect of Sha‑Ka'ani life that Brittany did not want to learn about yet.
She became friends with Shanelle. At least, the feeling was there that they were friends, even if it was all pretense on the younger girl's part. She even became friends with Martha, amazing as that was, when she had yet to meet the real Martha, and had to wonder if she ever wo
uld. But Martha had a dry sense of humor that Brittany took to‑after she stopped allowing it to annoy her. And Martha was still her main source of information. Because she was faceless, Brittany could ask her things that she wouldn't ask the others.
One of those things was their differences in speech, which had confused her from the beginning. Several weeks into the journey she finally got around to asking Martha, "Why do you and Shanelle talk‑I guess normally is the word I'm looking for? While Dalden, and Jorran's people as well, for that matter, sound foreign? If Shanelle is his sister, why doesn't she talk like him?"
"Dalden speaks pure Sha‑Ka'ani. What you hear is his translation of your language. The same with Jorran, who speaks pure Centurian. Shanelle and I, however, speak Kystram, and not pure Kystrani, but their Ancient dialect, which includes slang. We speak it because Tedra has a fascination with her Ancients, to include using their slang, and my main dialect is set to be identical to her preference. "
"But why would that be different, if you're using a translation as well?"
"Because of the similarities that we've found between the Kystrani Ancients and your people. Your history has closely followed theirs, so closely that even your slang is mostly the same. So in effect my language, the one Tedra prefers, is already the same as yours in basic content, as in same meanings, same slang, even same phrases. If I tell you that you got your socks knocked off when you met Dalden, you know exactly what I mean, don't you? A normal Sha‑Ka'ani wouldn't have a clue, however, since they don't have a similar phrase in their language."
"Why didn't you say Dalden wouldn't have a clue?" Brittany had asked.
"Because he would. I told you Dalden is unique, a product of two cultures, though he'd prefer it were only one. Both of Tedra's children received a major part of their education from me, but only up to a point. Shanelle wanted to know everything and continued to learn, Dalden didn't. After he made the decision to follow his father's path exclusively, he wanted no more teaching from me, and he's tried to forget everything he'd already learned about the rest of the universe. He can talk Just like Tedra, he just won't."
"So he took after his father, and she took after her mother?"
"In speech, yes, but women tend to be better at adapting, and Sham is a shining example of that. She can be the absolute perfect Sha‑Ka'ani daughter, obedient in every way but one, or she could move to Kystran and take up the life career of flying ships for trade or world discovery‑‑she spent a year there learning those careers."
"Back up. Every way but one?"
"Come on, kiddo, common sense would tell you that since she's been educated on how things are elsewhere, she's not going to like every aspect of how they are at home. Ignorance is bliss, as the saying goes, and she's not ignorant, which is why she learned to fly. She had every intention of leaving home to find a lifemate on some other world‑until she met Falon and got her socks knocked off just like you did."
"And she's happy to stay at home with him now?"
"Oh, yes." Martha spared a condescending chuckle. "There's something about that love emotion you people have that
makes
you perfectly willing to be where your mate is, whether you like where that is or not."
"Is this finally my preparation for not liking Sha‑Ka'an?" Brittany said suspiciously.
"Not at all. You may love the heck out of it, once you get used to it. No crime as you know it, no fear as you know it, no worries about war, disease, sickness, Jobs, or anything else you're used to worrying about."
"Utopia with a catch?"
More chuckling. "If everything was absolutely perfect, doll, you'd get bored real quick. Now back to Sham. She'd make an ideal ambassador for Sha‑Ka'an, actually, because like Tedra, she's well versed in every known language in the universe, and respects each species for its own uniqueness. They both fully support the League's hands‑off policy on underdeveloped planets, even though they might wish it were otherwise for Sha‑Ka'an. They agree that a species must be left to develop at its own pace, for good or bad, that its full potential won't be reached otherwise. It's been proven by low‑tech worlds that once they start trading with more advanced cultures, their own development stagnates, setting them back centuries in the way of personal growth."
"Why?"
"Because their creative people will naturally feel that anything that they could envision has already been created, so why bother."
"How is that avoided?"
"It's not, it's happened time and again. So now when the League discovers a new high‑tech world, they rejoice, but when they discover a primitive world, they step very carefully. Trade gets restricted to the mundane, space travel isn't offered, educating the primitives on what's out there is minimal. A few non‑League planets and rogue traders might break this policy, but for the most part, it's abided by."
"That doesn't sound like what happened with Sha‑Ka'an," Brittany pointed out.
"They were an exception, because one of their natural resources is so greatly needed by the rest of the universe. But that's worked out well because they finally restricted off‑world involvement themselves, so they get to progress at their own pace, while the League protects them from invasion by advanced worlds. And the League has a good representative there in Tedra. She's the perfect go‑between, because she wants what's good for both sides."
In a contained environment like the Androvia, Brittany had expected to get bored pretty quickly, but she never did. She learned to play some of the games in the Rec Room, which really amazed her. She wasn't up to date by any means on computer-type games, never having owned a computer herself, but being able to control what seemed like real people in simulated wars and watch the action on movie‑size screens was impressive. It was like watching a movie, but you were the director of it, or the master puppeteer in control of the actors.
And she had discovered a crafts room and ended up spending a lot of time there. It was for the crew, which the Androvia currently didn't have, or for people who might have personal hobbles they didn't want to give up just because they had elected space travel careers. Most of the stuff in the room made no sense to her, but the small section with stored wood and tools certainly did.
She cluttered up Dalden's quarters with her creations: a new table and chairs, and a nightstand‑and she insisted the bed remain out at all times for it. She made a double‑seated rocker that he'd never seen the like of and was sturdy enough for him to sit in with her. They used it each evening, sitting in front of the bank of windows, staring at the stars and the occasional streaking comet, and once, another ship that freaked her out until Martha's soothing tones assured her it was just a passing trader.
No, she was never bored. Corth II amused her a lot, too. He had a keen sense of humor and often used it to try and annoy Dalden, successfully. Martha explained that while Dalden had never experienced jealousy before and would discount it as being an emotion he wasn't capable of, he wouldn't experience it where other war
riors were involved because he fully trusted them, while Corth II was a different matter, and unpredictable.
Which was why Dalden didn't mind her making friends with one of the young warriors who had an interest in woodworking. Kodos had always had a desire to make things with his hands, but had never come across anyone who could teach him how‑until her. That was his story, anyway, and one she chose to accept, because teaching him was something else to keep her busy and her mind occupied on other than the end of the project.
No, Dalden didn't mind at all her counting Kodos as a friend, but he did mind any time she spent with Corth II, who was an outrageous flirt. His flirting she didn't take seriously. And Martha's insistence that he wasn't a real man but an android that she and her good buddy Brock, another Mock II, had mutually created, Brittany filed away with another mental "yeah, right." If Dalden knew he wasn't a real man, why would he be jealous?
Martha, of course, had an answer for that, too: because an entertainment unit had been used for t
he android's body, he was fully capable of sex‑sharing like a normal entertainment unit, and Dalden knew that. But Corth II was anything but normal, was apparently a free‑thinking computer that wasn't restricted to stationary housing, and answerable only to Martha and Brock.
Brittany had wanted to know why Martha hadn't given herself legs, since that was possible. Martha's reply was that you didn't tamper with perfection. Brittany had a good laugh over that.
She had made a point of not asking about things that she figured were going to upset her. Why rock an unsteady boat, after an? The rules and laws she'd been warned she would hate fell into that category. But the journey was coming to an end, so she was forced to finally put the matter to Martha.
"Isn't it time for me to learn their laws?"
"Not really." Martha used a bored tone, which was actually reassuring in this case. "As long as you're with Dalden, he's not going to let anything go wrong. When you're left to your own devices, then you'll need to know what you can and can't do alone."
I am going to be told before I break any, right?" Brittany persisted.
"Tedra wasn't, but then Challen was Just like you, convinced that she had to be from his planet and so already knew everything about his planet, including all laws. He refused to believe in off‑worlders‑actually, he knew she was telling the truth about who she was, he just didn't want to believe it. Sound familiar?"
That had annoyed her. They'd shown her some pretty fantastic things, or they would be fantastic if they were real. She just didn't believe anything was real.
So she wasn't the least bit apprehensive about arriving on ShaKa'an. If she thought she would be meeting Dalden's real parents instead of actors representing them, she'd probably be a nervous wreck, worried about all the normal things one worried about when meeting the family of the man she had committed to.
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