Chapter 12
ARDRUC
I wanted answers to those questions and many more too, but at the moment I struggled to focus on anything except Elena’s obvious exhaustion and pain. To address the latter, she needed ten more minutes in the medical pod. And for the former, a good night’s sleep.
Unbidden, an image appeared in my mind of Elena sleeping in my bed, with my arms around her and my wing folded over her to keep her safe and warm. I had never in my life envisioned such a peaceful moment. I yearned for it so much that I ached.
I was also acutely aware that if I suggested such a thing, I would likely see proof of her skill and training in J’Noran hand-to-hand fighting. She had earned a series of sashes throughout her childhood and adulthood, according to information in her personnel file.
What I said and did from this moment on would determine whether I had a chance to salvage something out of the mess I had created.
I could not change the things I had done up until now, but I could make better decisions going forward.
And perhaps one word or action at a time, I might be able to repair some of the damage I had caused.
“Ardruc,” Elena said, her gaze searching my face.
Truly, I could not tell if she said my name any differently that time versus any time before this or if my own thoughts had made it sound this way, but the syllables caressed my ear altogether more like music than a spoken word.
“Given the immediate threat seems to have passed, I suggest you should first heal your burns,” I said.
Even to my own ears, I did not sound at all like Dr. Ardruc Husiorithae, Nova Cal Director of Research.
Instead, I sounded like a man who knew he was treading on the very thinnest ice, and who must now grovel for his life.
“After that, we can discuss our next steps.”
“Oh, you suggest. No orders for me?” Elena tilted her head, a ghost of a smile on her lips that faded all too quickly.
“I guess when you’re right, you’re right.
” She glanced down at herself. “I’ll have to take off this blanket, though, so you’re going to turn your back.
And sit so you’re not towering over me while I’m lying down. ”
I moved one of the tall medical bay chairs from the counter to near the head of the bed. I sat facing away, and positioned myself so I was not looking at anything that showed her reflection. “Is this acceptable?” I asked.
“Yes.” Rustling behind me indicated Elena had settled back into the medpod. As its scanners and equipment activated, she let out a breath. “I need to be distracted,” she said. “Talk to me about these plasma tendrils.”
While the medical pod treated her burns, I described my encounter with the tendril on the roof that then led me on a chase through the sky around the station.
“Like a child,” she murmured. “Playing a game, hiding in the forest, peeking at strangers from behind trees and then running away.”
“Perhaps,” I said. “Ordinarily I would dismiss the idea of a plasma ‘child’ as impossible, but as we witnessed a half-dozen impossible things in the last hour, I may have to redefine that term for myself.”
She chuckled, then whimpered. “Ouch. Please don’t make me laugh…which are words I never thought I’d say to you. Ever.”
“I will endeavor not to be funny,” I said.
“Was that a joke, Ardruc? Surely not.”
A warm sensation pooled in my chest at the sound of her saying my name in that light tone. “Of course it was not a joke,” I said. “It is well known that dragons have no sense of humor.”
“I must have missed that detail in my astrobiology course.” She sighed. “I did try to tell you about the plasma tendrils, you know. It shouldn’t have taken tonight’s encounters to get you to listen to me.”
“I know. I am sorry.” We had enjoyed such a lovely moment of levity, but the grim reality was that I had to confess to yet another transgression. Nothing to do but say it. “I am also very sorry to say that tonight is not the first time I have seen one of these tendrils.”
Rather than reply, she very audibly took several deep breaths, as if fighting to remain calm and still.
I described my brief encounter with a tendril in the forest and how it had played a note on my lat’sar.
“So it played music because it saw you playing?” she asked.
“That’s amazing. Almost as amazing as how someone as brilliant as you could have made so many terrible choices over the past few months.
Really, I am mystified.” Her tone turned wistful.
“I wish I could have seen it and the playful kora. The one that came in here wasn’t playful.
But maybe they aren’t korae. What do you think they are? ”
“I do not know,” I said. “For the past several days, I endeavored to find more evidence of similar occurrences in my records and those of scientists who studied here before me. I wanted something to analyze that could provide answers as to how what we saw was possible.”
“And of course you didn’t tell me.” Elena sighed. “And?”
“And I found nothing. I also searched for any examples of similar life forms elsewhere in the known galaxy. There were none. These life forms may be unique to this world.”
“That’s what my gut has been telling me.
” She exhaled. “Okay, while I’m lying here unable to move for another four or five minutes, do you have any other confessions?
Let’s just get it all out in the open. I have no idea how we go forward from here, but I don’t want any more surprise admissions, or to find something out on my own.
Whatever else you’ve done, you have to tell me now. ”
She was not offering forgiveness yet, or even the hope of it, but I would be a fool not to make a clean breast of things.
“I have only one more confession to make.” I cleared my throat. “I drank some of your coffee.”
She gasped. Forux raised his head and growled at me.
“I am sorry,” I said earnestly. “I tried to develop a liking for it, since you enjoy it so much.”
“I…” She hesitated. “Okay, I’m furious at you for being the reason I am running low and having to ration, but that is actually kind of sweet. I may not feed you feet-first to Forux after all.”
Forux put his head back on his paws and snuffled. Whether his reaction was disappointment or relief, I could not tell.
“Coffee situation aside, what do we do about the tendrils?” Elena continued. “Should we contact the Ministry and report what’s happened?”
I had been weighing the same question since my encounter in the forest. Everything that had happened tonight had infinitely complicated the matter—including my admissions about my behavior and Elena’s reaction.
“I am unsure of the best and most correct choice,” I admitted. “I would like to hear your opinion.”
“Well, well. So the all-knowing director of research is having a scientific and ethical quandary and wants my opinion?” she said, her tone mocking. “Will wonders never cease?”
Before I could reply, the medical pod beeped and powered down. She sighed. “Oh, thank all the gods above and below.” I heard rustling behind me. “Okay, you can look at me.”
When I turned, I found Elena sitting up on the bed, one bare leg hanging off the side as she held the blanket gathered around her chest.
She touched her cheek. “I feel like I’m okay now. Does it look like I am?”
I glanced at the diagnostic screen, then at her face and right hand. “It appears so. The diagnostics show all damage to your epidermis and heart has healed. How do you feel?”
Elena made a face. “Before all this happened, if you’d asked me that, I would have told you ‘I’m fine’ and gone back to my quarters to cry into Forux’s fur in private.
” She puffed out a breath. “But now, I’m going to say I honestly feel like shit.
” She glanced at her chest, where the very tip of the mysterious mark was just visible above the edge of the blanket. “And I’m worried. And a little scared.”
I reached for her hand, then hesitated. “May I?”
She studied me. “Why should I say yes?”
I considered my words carefully. “Because I would like to comfort you if I can, and I too am worried.”
The corners of her mouth turned up. “Well, if you need to, you can hold my hand.” She turned to dangle her legs over the side of the bed and raised her right hand, palm out.
If holding her hand earlier as she lay unconscious had felt like a crossroads, this mutual touch felt like a momentous first step down an entirely new road full of possibility and promise.
From an arm’s length away, I placed my much-larger palm against hers and spread my fingers in an invitation. After a beat, she laced her fingers through mine and held on.
The evening—no, the past four months—had passed in endless avalanches of emotions, many of them conflicting. I braced myself for more of the same.
Instead, when her fingers closed on my hand, all the tumult washed away, leaving only peace in its wake. In all my years, on all the planets I had visited, I had not known such wonder as feeling utterly at peace in my soul.
Perhaps that showed on my face, because Elena tugged on my hand, urging me to move closer. I did not want to tower over her, so I used my free hand to raise the bed to bring us eye level to one another before moving to stand in front of her with one thigh pressed against her knee.
I bent my head to her shoulder and drank in her scent, noting every nuance like a Bacorian sommelier tasting the finest of wines.
Everything about it soothed me, except the metallic smell of her fear and the heavier traces of weariness…
and what might have been loneliness. Those scents and feelings resonated with me most of all.
I took a chance and wrapped the end of my tail very loosely around her lower leg, hoping the sensation would comfort her as it comforted me. She didn’t relax, but she didn’t glare or shake me off.
“This feels like meeting for the first time all over again,” Elena said, then frowned. “No, that’s not quite right. I don’t know if the Ardruc I’ve known for four months was the real you, or this is, or neither, or both. Who the hells are you?”
That was a very good question—one of many I now had to confront.
“I would like to think the asshole I have been for the past four months is not the real me,” I said, which earned me a fleeting smile.
“The man I was before you arrived was not kind or hopeful or desirous of companionship either, however. I have been lost since I met you, trying to figure out who I am beneath all the facades I have chosen to use. That probably makes little sense to you.”
“No, it makes sense. More than you know.” She squeezed my hand. “I’m tired, though, and I can tell you are too. This isn’t the time to make life-altering decisions about whatever this is—” she waved her hand at the air between us “—or what to do about the tendrils and the mark. We need sleep.”
I wanted to be in my lab, analyzing data and searching for images of the strange tendrils, but she was right: I needed a clear head. Far more was at stake than my research into the korae. The future of Hyderia hung in the balance…and potentially Elena’s life as well.
But the thought of Elena and Forux leaving my side to sleep in her little bunk in her little quarters made my feathers prickle and my stomach churn.
“Will you sleep—” I began.
“Can I sleep—” she said at the same time, then chuckled. “I guess neither of us feel like sleeping alone tonight, huh?”
“I suppose not. You are most welcome to stay with me.” I reached for the bed controls to lower it so she could stand, but she caught my hand.
“I need to think,” she said. “I thought I hated you. I did hate you. You were so incredibly unkind.”
I swallowed hard. “I know.”
“Even knowing now why you did it, it’s not going to be easy for me to work through that.
” She held my gaze, unblinking. “And I’m not making any promises or offering forgiveness anytime soon.
Just because you believe I’m your true mate doesn’t mean I’m going to feel the same.
We’re not starting over. We’re starting from here.
And I am tired, and scared, and confused, and hurt, and really, really angry, though I’m too exhausted to look like it.
So if you were thinking about seducing me tonight, forget it.
We’re going to sleep so we can wake up tomorrow and start sorting out this mess.
” She let go of my hands. “Okay, now you can lower me down.”
Thoughts of seduction had not entered my brain, though she might not have believed me if I said so.
That image of sleeping curled around her surfaced again, but even that was likely not what she had in mind.
I would settle for having her nearby—close enough for her scent to reach me, and to comfort her if she wanted or needed that.
She might, since she had asked to stay near me tonight.
A chance was more than I deserved. Anything more was as much of a miracle as sentient plasma.