Chapter 2 #2
Instead, I felt…nothing. Rather than flourishing within the confines of the sect, Olme appeared pathetic and broken.
Even so, I could not feel sympathy for him. He and my mother, Earra, had chosen this path and forced my younger brother and me to bend to not only their will but that of the sect leader. My brother had chosen to convert to the cult’s ways. I had not, and had suffered so very greatly as a result.
Perhaps if Minister Ganna knew of any of this she would not have judged me so harshly for not wanting to hear the contents of this message.
Given it was Olme on the screen, I expected to hear Earra had died. That elicited a twinge, but only a brief one. My mother had been as harsh in dealing out punishments as Olme.
“Ardruc,” Olme said. His voice startled me by how little it had changed, despite his appearance. He sounded and appeared stoic, though I noted a tightening of his eyes that indicated he mourned. “Your brother has died after a long illness.”
Grief made my hearts ache and my throat grow tight. I had never disliked my brother. He had embraced sect life, but I had never sensed he truly believed like Olme and Earra and the others did. I had once hoped he might follow my lead and leave. It broke my hearts when he chose to stay.
But if I had thought for even one moment Olme had reached out with this news in an attempt to make peace, or even as a simple courtesy, I would have been mistaken.
“Our beloved leader has said you must return to your family now,” he continued. “You will be married to your brother’s wife.”
My fists clenched. Like hells I would.
“You rejected the wife our beloved leader selected for you and turned your back on our faith and family for your love of science—” Olme nearly whispered the word “—but surely by now you must have realized there are no truths to be found in those studies.” His expression hardened.
“After your betrayal, Aora was bound to your brother, but now he is gone and she must have a spouse. This is your duty—”
“Computer, stop,” I grated.
Olme froze in mid-sentence, his brow furrowed and eyes glowing.
Yes, that was the Olme I remembered: righteous and angry.
Angry at my failings, my curiosity, my love of science, my betrayals—my betrayals, as if their decision to abandon all reason and fall under the sway of the sect leader, whose name they were considered unworthy to speak, had not betrayed my brother and me in the worst and most unforgivable ways possible.
My pain and grief were multiplied by the knowledge that if my brother had died from a long illness, as Olme claimed, his death was likely a result of the sect leader’s anti-science teachings. Few illnesses were incurable on Fortusia, or anywhere in Alliance space.
My betrothal to Aora, a woman from the sect I barely knew, had pushed me to finally escape the compound. The sect and its leader had taken so much from me. They would not take my right to choose my own mate, or with whom—or if—I would have children.
I did not call my departure a betrayal. I called it my freedom. And on a rainy night at the age of nineteen, I had chosen freedom over the cruelly narrow life my parents and the leader wanted for me.
How deluded Olme and Earra must be to think they could make such a demand of me now and I would come crawling back to the compound to do their bidding.
“Computer, delete message,” I said, my voice calm.
The computer beeped. The screen went dark.
I would grieve in my own way for my brother, but thanks to this message, I could finally close that chapter of my life. Any other messages that came my way, I would leave unacknowledged.
A weight lifted off my shoulders. I took another deep breath and exhaled.
Rg would not return to the lab for two hours. The forest called my name. I wanted to go for a walk, perhaps play my lat’sar to soothe my heartache. Or better yet, take to the sky. My wings longed to stretch and catch the wind.
But in a few minutes, a transport from Nyvor would deliver mycologist Dr. Elena Regis, a human scientist born and raised on Fyloria.
I did not have time to retreat to the forest or the sky today, as much as I longed to do so.
My duties as director of research for the Nova Cal station included welcoming a fellow scientist, escorting her to her apartment, and providing a tour of the facility.
According to my research, Dr. Regis was brilliant and insightful but distressingly prone to unusual leaps of logic. At least those leaps often lead to breakthroughs. Discoveries would help raise the status of this station and ensure its continued, though limited, funding.
I was not thrilled by her unorthodox methodologies.
I had always found purely scientific methods to be the most worthwhile.
But as our fields were very different, my own work and practices should not be affected by hers.
Our interactions would be minimal. Perhaps I would ask for weekly or biweekly briefings simply to stay informed on her progress and otherwise ignore her.
Elena was the daughter of famed physicist Dr. Hilda Disen, chair of the heliophysics department at the most prominent university on Fyloria.
Elena seemed to want to distance herself from that connection and had chosen to use her artist father’s last name rather than carry the weight of the matrilineal name Disen.
I could empathize at least somewhat with that impulse.
My parents had no fame, but their adherence to the sect was a matter of public record.
I had chosen instead to use Husiorithae, the second name of Earra’s mother, my grandmother, who had not fallen under the spell of the sect leader, and who had gifted me my beloved lat’sar.
I set aside the unhelpful emotions caused by Olme’s message, straightened my lab coat, and checked my reflection in the bank of screens above my desk.
I appeared…unsettled. The feathers in my hair and wings were ruffled and my tail swished, as if I were a young male equatorial dragon either defending territory or courting a mate.
Utterly ridiculous for an adult scientist and director of research.
I shook out my feathers, stretched and folded my wings, and stilled my tail. Now my reflection showed a thirty-four-year-old Fortusian scientist with smooth feathers and notable calm and confidence in his body language. Much better.
My sharp ears caught the familiar hum of the landing pad sensors directly above this lab change tone. The landing beacons had activated.
Elena was arriving nearly fifteen minutes ahead of schedule. Annoying, but I preferred an early arrival to a late one. The sooner I got her settled, the sooner I could return to the imaging lab and immerse myself in my research.
I took the steep stairs from the single-story lab’s main hallway to the roof rather than the lift, as I found it cramped given my height and wings. The diminutive Nyvorans had not constructed the lift with Fortusians in mind.
The roof hatch opened, revealing the sleek gray Nyvoran Ministry of Natural Sciences transport on final approach.
This hemisphere was currently experiencing summer, which meant comfortably warm temperatures.
The cobalt blue sky was cloudless, the breeze gentle.
Very pleasant weather for Elena’s arrival, though perhaps for her studies she might have preferred clouds and rain.
Her apparently beloved fungi thrived in the soil of Hyderia’s thick forests, especially in such weather.
The short-range interplanetary transport landed on the pad. Once the engines and thrusters powered down, I approached the transport’s side.
The door unsealed and lowered to form a ramp, revealing the interior of the transport—and a purple Fylorian arval with thick fur, two oversized eyes, four ears and four stumpy legs, and five fluffy tails.
The little monstrosity fanned out his tails and snarled at me. I showed him my own teeth, but he held his ground.
“Forux,” a female voice scolded from out of sight inside the transport. “Be nice. We’re trying to make a good first impression.”
I blinked. Had Elena brought a pet to Nova Cal? A pet covered with fur that would befoul my pristine labs?
Dr. Elena Regis appeared in the transport’s open doorway. “Sorry about that,” she told me cheerfully. “He’s my bodyguard.”
For travel, Elena had chosen a practical and comfortable tunic shirt under a thermal vest, slim pants, and boots, and had styled her long blonde hair in a braid.
I might have considered her lovely by either human or Fortusian standards if I noted such things. My tail swished a few times before I wrapped it around my leg.
She settled the straps of an oversized backpack on her shoulders, leaned down to scratch the arval's head, and flashed me a quick smile. “Come on, Forux. Let’s not keep the director of research waiting.”
Without waiting for help, she wheeled two travel cases down the ramp by their handles. At the bottom, Forux eyed me distrustfully from behind her left boot.
Elena let go of her rolling crates, blew a few loose strands of hair out of her face, and smiled up at me. “Dr. Husiorithae, it’s such an honor to meet you. Oh, wait.” She gave me a perfectly executed small bow, a common form of greeting in my home region on Fortusia.
When she met my gaze again, her bright blue eyes sparkled. But when I did not return the greeting, a little furrow appeared between her brows. “I hope I did that right,” she said.
I could not answer. I could not think. My breath caught in my lungs, my muscles seized, and my feet felt rooted in place, as if I had been too close to a bolt of lightning and experienced a shock.