Zarl had taken it upon him­self to tu­tor the Earth­ers on his planet’s lan­guage and cus­toms. His pa­tience was nev­erend­ing with the Mataras, even when frus­tra­tion made them less than re­spect­ful in the pres­ence of an em­peror. Michaela’s oc­ca­sional out­bursts of pro­fan­ity seemed more a source of amuse­ment than shock to Zarl. Jes­sica was be­gin­ning to un­der­stand how in­dul­gent Kalquo­rian men were of their women.

  “My clan makes me Kalquo­rian only speak now,” Michaela said in stac­cato bursts. “The writ­ing dif­fi­cult still.”

  “To­tal im­mer­sion in a lan­guage is the best way to learn,” Zarl said. He changed the sen­tence float­ing in mid-air with the flick of a fin­ger. “Your turn, Jes­sica.”

  Jes­sica bit her lip as she stud­ied the writ­ing. In a mo­ment she had it. “To­day the coun­cil is hear­ing dis­cus­sions on Earther Matara health con­cerns.”

  “Ex­cel­lent, my daugh­ter.” Zarl shifted in his chair and winced.

  In the six weeks of their jour­ney to Kalquor, Jes­sica had learned the signs of his bat­tered body’s dis­com­fort. Her nurse’s in­stincts took over, and she jumped up from the seat­ing cush­ion where she and Michaela perched. “What hurts?” she asked.

  Zarl sighed, but he knew Jes­sica wouldn’t re­lent un­til he ad­mit­ted to what­ever aches tor­mented him. “The right leg.”

  “Let me el­e­vate it.” Jes­sica snagged an­other cush­ion and placed it on the floor be­fore him. She gen­tly took hold of his bent an­kles as he low­ered his hover chair to the floor. She set­tled his legs on top of the cush­ions and checked the chronome­ter across the room. He was still sev­eral clicks away from his next dose of pain med­i­ca­tion. Even su­pe­rior Kalquo­rian medicine couldn’t erase all the hurt the monarch suf­fered.

  Zarl nod­ded at her, his ex­pres­sion eas­ing. Jes­sica wasn’t fooled. The tight­ness of the skin around his mouth and eyes be­trayed he still felt dis­com­fort. Since there was noth­ing more she could do for him, she let it go.

  She’d been sum­mon­ing the courage to press Zarl on his in­juries for weeks. It wasn’t be­cause she could help him any­more than his own medics but be­cause Nar­pok fig­ured so much in the tale. With the trans­port sched­uled to ar­rive at Kalquor within the hour, it was now or never.

  Kneel­ing at his side, her head bowed in re­spect Jes­sica ven­tured, “May I sat­isfy my cu­rios­ity, my fa­ther?”

  Zarl’s fin­gers brushed her hair with real af­fec­tion. “You may ask me any­thing your heart de­sires, Jes­sica. The mother of my grand­child can­not of­fend me.”

  She looked into his kind, care­worn face, her heart warm­ing at his ex­pres­sion. He was noth­ing like her fa­ther, and yet Zarl was al­most as pre­cious to her.

  “Cla­jak said you were in­jured in the same ac­ci­dent that killed your Matara and most of Nar­pok’s par­ents.”

  His ex­pres­sion sad­dened, and Jes­sica al­most wished she hadn’t spo­ken. “In­deed. We might have lost Cla­jak too, but he sud­denly took ill be­fore that trip to Joshada.” Zarl man­aged a chuckle. “I think he pre­tended to be sick to avoid be­ing shut up in a trans­port with Nar­pok. She was al­ready dread­fully spoiled, even then.”

  “Is she re­ally so ter­ri­ble?” Jes­sica prompted.

  “I sup­pose be­cause Nar­pok was promised to Cla­jak at an early age she feels en­ti­tled to have all she de­sires. Her par­ents in­dulged her as well. As a small child, she is­sued or­ders and made de­mands as if she was al­ready the em­press. The older she gets, the worse she be­comes.”

  “Why were you go­ing to Joshada the day of the ac­ci­dent?”

  “My Matara and I had of­fi­cial du­ties to at­tend. Yuder was needed at home due to a dis­pute be­tween two re­gions and Tidro stayed be­hind to care for Cla­jak … even though Cla­jak was a grown man and clanned to Egilka, who was his right­ful care­giver. My son hardly needed a nurse­maid.”

  Zarl gave Jes­sica a sly smile. Jes­sica grinned back. Even now, Tidro fussed over Cla­jak as if he was a pre­cious baby chick. She could tell it em­bar­rassed her Dramok mate to no end.

  “Nar­pok and her fam­ily came along on the trip so our some­day blended clans could spend time to­gether. Since Cla­jak man­aged to evade the out­ing, Clan Pwal­dur de­cided they would go shop­ping. You must have your clans take you to Joshada for fur­nish­ings, clothes and such,” Zarl told the Earth­ers. “Their crafts­men are un­matched.”

  He went on. “Pwal­dur him­self didn’t join us, but I don’t know why. I re­mem­ber his clan was quite put out with him over it.”

  “How did the ac­ci­dent hap­pen?” Michaela asked. She also knelt at Zarl’s feet, caught up in the tale.

  “We never fig­ured out what went wrong.” Zarl rubbed his bearded chin thought­fully. “The trans­port lost all power as we en­tered Joshada’s at­mos­phere. Nar­pok’s fa­ther Nobek Mox was an ex­cel­lent pi­lot, and he took over the con­trols when our nav­i­ga­tor pan­icked. He did all he could to land the ship, but we knew we were fall­ing to our deaths. We sent Nar­pok off in the one es­cape pod, which was how she avoided in­jury.

  “We crashed. I held my Matara’s hand the whole time. I re­mem­ber think­ing it was like the end of the world. The trans­port broke into pieces all around us, and bod­ies flew ev­ery­where. Then all was black.”

  “I don’t know how long I was un­con­scious. I woke to the sound of Nar­pok scream­ing. My body was a hellish prison of pain, and I couldn’t bear to move, yet I looked to see if my beloved Irdis had sur­vived. My hand still clasped hers; some­how I had held onto her through it all. She lay on her back on the ground, star­ing up at the red sun­set sky above us. I knew right away Irdis had died. Even in death, with blood mask­ing her face, she was the most beau­ti­ful crea­ture I had ever seen. I hoped I would soon fol­low her. Life with­out her was too empty to con­tem­plate.”

  Michaela was cry­ing, and Jes­sica brushed tears of her own from her cheeks. It wasn’t just Zarl’s story or the agony on his face that af­fected her. It brought back her own ter­ri­ble mem­ory, the one that in­sisted on in­vad­ing her dreams.

  The sun had been put out. The black sky pressed down on her, bro­ken shards of it pok­ing into her body. Nearby her sis­ter moaned. Jes­sica called to her, but Lind­sey didn’t an­swer ex­cept to moan again in a weak, grind­ing tone.

  Where were Mommy and Daddy? Had the sky fallen down on them too?

  Zarl con­tin­ued, break­ing into Jes­sica’s thoughts. “I think I lost con­scious­ness again. The next thing I re­mem­ber was see­ing Nar­pok stand­ing near her dead mother. She stared down at the body and screamed non­stop. Her mind was gone.”

  “The trauma must have been huge,” Jes­sica whis­pered.

  “She re­cov­ered af­ter a few months of in­ten­sive ther­apy. She was for­tu­nate Pwal­dur had re­mained on Kalquor. I’m not sure Nar­pok would have come back to her senses if she’d lost all her par­ents.”

  Zarl gri­maced, and Jes­sica laid her hand on his. “More pain?”

  He nod­ded. “Our speed has changed. Most can’t tell on a trans­port this size, but I al­ways feel it in my bones.”

  The door chimed. “En­ter,” Zarl called. With ex­cited ex­pres­sions, Cla­jak and Ko­rkla came into the room.

  They bowed to Zarl. Cla­jak said, “We’re ap­proach­ing Kalquor, my fa­ther. May our Mataras join us in the ob­ser­va­tion room?”

  “Of course.” Zarl brought his chair sev­eral feet up to hover. “I’ll come as well.”

  Cla­jak took Jes­sica’s hand in his, kiss­ing her knuck­les. “Come, my sweet. Come see your new home.”

  * * * *

  Dis­ap­prov­ing lines ap­peared on Tidro and Yuder’s faces when Zarl en­tered the ob­ser­va­tion room. No doubt they knew the pain he en­dured, but they kept quiet. They flanked his hover chair as it car­ried him past the clus­ters of seat­ing cush­ions and ta­bles. He stopped at the bank of win­dows that lined one wall. Jes­sica smiled to see his face light up with plea­sure at the sight of his beloved home planet. Tidro and Yuder stood on ei­ther side of their Dramok. Each rested a hand on his shoul­ders with the ease of over a cen­tury’s com­pan­ion­ship.

  Michaela also stood at the win­dows sur­rounded by her clan. Govi and Raxs­tad flanked her, and Ko­rkla stood be­hind her, his hands gen­tly rub­bing up and down her arms. The four clus­tered close enough to touch bod­ies.

  Jes­sica took her place be­tween the two clans. Her men ranged around her as Michaela’s clan­mates did, and Cla­jak’s arms wrapped around her to draw her against his body. Be­vau and Egilka took her hands in theirs.

  Green-tinged Kalquor grew un­til it filled the win­dows. The sky bright­ened as they en­tered the at­mos­phere. As they left the void of space, the sound of the trans­port’s en­gines swelled un­til their low hum filled the room. The light in­ten­si­fied, and Jes­sica blinked against the grow­ing glare. She re­fused to close her eyes. She was too ea­ger for her first glimpse of Kalquor’s land­scape.

  Afraid to dis­turb the an­tic­i­pa­tory si­lence, Egilka leaned close to mur­mur, “We can darken the win­dows.”

  “I’m okay,” Jes­sica whis­pered back. She willed her eyes to ad­just as the first layer of clouds swal­lowed the trans­port.

  They broke through af­ter only a sec­ond, and an­other layer of clouds ap­peared be­neath them. Jes­sica fi­nally had an idea of the tremen­dous speed they trav­eled at as the clouds rushed to­wards them. Once more, the ship was en­veloped in swirling white and gray mist­i­ness.

  Sud­denly they cleared the clouds, and the Kalquo­rian land­scape curved be­fore her. She and Michaela gasped si­mul­ta­ne­ously at the sight of the emer­ald sea be­low. Be­yond the flat ex­panse of ocean lay a patch­work quilt of col­or­ful coun­try­side. Dark jewel tones of green, blue, yel­low, and red stretched across the hori­zon.

  As they hur­tled ever closer to the sur­face, de­tails as­serted them­selves. White-tipped waves ap­peared on the flat plain of sea. Mono­lithic rock for­ma­tions dot­ted the pearles­cent pink sands of the shore­line. Rear­ing over the pris­tine beach, jagged sil­ver-gray cliffs stood like in­scrutable sen­tries. Be­yond the cliffs, the patch­work back­drop ren­dered it­self into a rain­bow-hued for­est.

  “It’s beau­ti­ful,” Michaela breathed, her voice awed. She sounded as breath­less as Jes­sica felt.

  “Is it what you ex­pected?” Cla­jak asked his Matara.

  Jes­sica shook her head. “I had no idea.”

  “Wel­come home, Princess Jes­sica,” Egilka said. He squeezed her hand.

  They swooped close to the tallest cliff, its craggy face pock­marked by holes. “There is the royal home.” Be­vau pointed at it.

  Jes­sica searched the rocky top, but saw noth­ing that sug­gested habi­ta­tion. “I don’t see any­thing.”

  A move­ment in one of the open­ings in the side of the cliff caught her at­ten­tion. It took a mo­ment for the trans­port to come close enough for her to see some­one stood there, watch­ing their ap­proach. “You mean the cliff it­self? That’s where you live?”

  Cla­jak hugged her closer. “When­ever pos­si­ble, we avoid dis­turb­ing our planet’s nat­u­ral land­scape. Most Kalquo­ri­ans live in the moun­tains, caves, and cliffs of our planet.”

  Jes­sica swal­lowed. She was to live in a cliff? She loved na­ture, but liv­ing in a rocky cav­ern didn’t sound com­fort­able. She glanced at Michaela, who looked con­cerned as well.

  Be­fore she could pur­sue fur­ther thoughts on the sub­ject, the trans­port flew into a cav­ernous open­ing in the cliff. Stark walls sur­rounded them, the nat­u­ral stone as pol­ished as any metal­lic land­ing hangar. The trans­port set­tled to the smooth floor of the cav­ern. The en­gines idled, and then dropped into si­lence.

  Zarl’s sigh rang in the hushed room. “That’s bet­ter,” he breathed.

  “You must go straight home to rest now.” Tidro’s firm tone brooked no ar­gu­ment. He glanced at Cla­jak. “We will dis­pense with the for­mal­i­ties of your re­turn.”

  “Of course,” the prince said, rais­ing his voice to drown out Zarl’s weak protests. “You know we de­spise such need­less pageantry any­way.”

  “Their new Matara de­serves a proper wel­come,” Zarl in­sisted even as Yuder took con­trol of the hover chair and an­gled it to­wards the door. Cla­jak’s clan fol­lowed the em­per­ors as they left the ob­ser­va­tion room for the cor­ri­dor. Ko­rkla’s clan brought up the rear.

  Yuder threw a glance back at Jes­sica. “In­deed she does, but it may be best to let her get set­tled be­fore sub­ject­ing her to an end­less round of in­tro­duc­tions and in­ter­views. We don’t wish her to be­come too stressed in her con­di­tion.”

  Zarl har­rumphed but said no more as they wound through the trans­port. Jes­sica fought back a grin. Us­ing her ‘del­i­cate con­di­tion’ as an ex­cuse would keep Zarl from mak­ing a fuss she wanted no part of any­way. For once she wel­comed the Kalquo­rian no­tion that a preg­nant fe­male had to be han­dled with ex­ces­sive care.

  The group dis­em­barked, and Jes­sica blinked in the bright­ness of the dock­ing bay. She stared around the ex­pan­sive space. Six small shut­tle ve­hi­cles, no doubt in­tended for planet-bound trans­porta­tion, lined up be­fore the larger trans­port with mil­i­tary pre­ci­sion. “You’d never know we’re in a cliff,” she said, mar­veling at the thor­oughly mod­ern ap­pear­ance of the hangar.

  Cla­jak and Ko­rkla’s clan stood back, talk­ing qui­etly amongst them­selves. Jes­sica and Michaela wan­dered around, look­ing at the fea­ture­less walls from which lights glowed, the as­sem­bled Kalquo­ri­ans lined up like toy sol­diers along one wall, and the open­ing they’d en­tered the cliff through.

  Jes­sica looked over her shoul­der to see the em­per­ors mov­ing to­wards the wall where the un­smil­ing red-form­suited Kalquo­ri­ans waited, their ex­pres­sions uni­formly fierce. Nobeks, Jes­sica thought. The Royal Guard, per­haps? As one, the group bowed low to the Im­pe­rial clan.

  A door in the wall slid open, and a Kalquo­rian in blue robes stepped into the room. He too bowed and hur­ried for­ward to greet the em­per­ors.

  Jes­sica turned back to the hangar’s cliff-face open­ing. Michaela had reached the edge, look­ing out over the windswept beach and emer­ald sea. Jes­sica joined her, in­hal­ing deeply of the salty air. “It smells like Flor­ida,” she said, long­ing touch­ing her voice. She won­dered if she would ever see her fam­ily again.

  “I’ve never lived near the ocean,” Michaela said. “This is beau­ti­ful.”

  Ko­rkla silently slid to her side, his arm snaking around the dancer’s waist. Jes­sica was star­tled to see his and Cla­jak’s clans had joined them. “The view from our suite is mag­nif­i­cent.”

  Cla­jak glanced back to watch his fa­thers leave the hangar. The Kalquo­rian who had been speak­ing to them was now headed in their di­rec­tion.

  Cla­jak leaned to­ward Ko­rkla. “Un­less there’s some emer­gency that re­quires im­me­di­ate at­ten­tion, all mat­ters are to be vid- or au­dio-re­layed.” He gave his aide a wicked grin. “I wish to de­vote the next cou­ple days—” he paused point­edly “—ac­cli­mat­ing Jes­sica to her new home.”

  “Ab­so­lutely, my prince.” Ko­rkla bowed his head slightly, glanc­ing at Jes­sica’s blush­ing face. Michaela snick­ered, and ev­ery­one else seemed to be fight­ing grins. Jes­sica fumed, glar­ing at Cla­jak.

  Ko­rkla started away, but Cla­jak caught him by the arm. “See to it your clan post­pones any non-emer­gency du­ties so you may do the same for Michaela.”

  Now it was Michaela’s turn to red­den as her clan chuck­led. Ko­rkla bowed deeply be­fore hur­ry­ing to in­ter­cept the aide head­ing to­wards them. “Thank you, my prince.”

  Jes­sica looked out at the lovely view of the sea lap­ping at the pearles­cent pink beach. The sky was a soft azure with clouds scud­ding across the hori­zon. “Do you get se­vere weather out here?” she asked.

  Be­vau an­swered, “Some­times, but within a cliff, storms mat­ter lit­tle.”

  “I didn’t think of that. I guess there’s no dan­ger of the roof cav­ing in on our heads then.”

  Jes­sica plucked at the long sleeves of her tu­nic. The in­te­rior of the trans­port had been kept cool, but the warmer Kalquo­rian weather made her sweat. “It’s hot.”

  “It’s sum­mer here,” Egilka replied. His arm stole around her shoul­ders and he turned her in the op­po­site di­rec­tion. The group walked to­ward the door the em­per­ors had de­parted through. Ko­rkla waited for them, and the aide he’d been talk­ing to was al­ready gone.

  As they reached Michaela’s Dramok, Cla­jak said, “I trust we may show our Mataras their new home?”

  Ko­rkla nod­ded. “There is noth­ing press­ing to con­cern our­selves with. I do have good news to share. Coun­cil­man Ra­jhir’s Matara gave birth this morn­ing.” His eyes were wide. “Fine healthy twins; a boy and a girl.”

  The men gasped as one, and Jes­sica was re­minded of how Cla­jak was one of the youngest of his race. A birth of any kind would be a big deal on Kalquor; twins were no doubt a mir­a­cle.

  “How amaz­ing,” Egilka said, his voice hushed in re­spect. Jes­sica thought she heard sad­ness as well. “They’re the first of the hy­brids, aren’t they?”

  “Yes. Two other women are due this month.”

  “Is Amelia well?” Be­vau asked. They were nearly to the door, and Jes­sica was ea­ger to see what lay be­yond it.

 

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