The road was littered with rocks. Small ones. Big ones. Piles of rocks of every size. Rocks she’d passed lying at the base of the valley walls.
She’d been right to fear an ambush—just wrong about where.
Her pack was likely crushed beneath another pile. “So much,” Aryl said wryly as she returned the viewer, “for my supplies.”
“Alive-rocks stay that side,” Marcus assured her. At her skeptical look, “Promise. Maybe they not like Oud.”
If the Human attempted humor, Aryl was in no mood for it. “You’d better be right. I have to stay here.” She stamped the ground with one foot.
He gazed wistfully at his path through the grove, then back to her. “Aryl sure?”
“Yes.”
Definitely unhappy. “I bring my things.”
Chapter 8
ARYL MADE A FACE. “I don’t know how you can eat that.”
With a chuckle, Marcus took back the stick of what he called e-rations and offered her a shiny box. “Try this. It safe for your metabolism.”
“‘Metabolism,’” she repeated dubiously.
“Means Om’ray body. This good.”
Good, Aryl had to admit, described most of what Marcus had laboriously carried down his path to where she waited. They sat beneath a bright yellow fabric roof, protected on three sides by walls of a similar material. It had been limp cloth until the Human had attached one of his devices to it, then became rigid and strong enough to block the chill wind.
Her feet rested near another marvel. Not fire, but a heatbox unlike any Aryl had seen. Heat radiated from whatever side Marcus chose, to the degree he selected. Better still, the fabric tent reflected the heat around their bodies until Aryl was warm to her core for the first time since leaving the canopy. The Human shed his coat and wiped sweat from his forehead, but didn’t complain.
There was water, cups whose interiors heated it—without warming the outside—for the dark and fragrant strangerbeverage called sombay, and sitting pads of decadent softness set by buttons. An accommodation, as Marcus called it, sat discreetly behind the tent—a marvel of compact tidiness.
And protection. Three small metal rods pushed into the dirt formed a triangle around them. Marcus had fussed over their placement, trying several spots before being satisfied. He’d declared the flimsy things would keep away any threat.
While intrigued by this claim, Aryl kept her knife at hand and hoped for no threat at all.
They’d established their tiny camp in front of the Cloisters, facing the depression into which the Oud had disappeared. Since truenight, two of the stranger-glows hovered in the air to illuminate the disturbed ground. Aryl had argued against them, worried the Oud would refuse to return. Marcus worried more about being surprised and insisted.
Aryl took the shiny box and opened the lid. It was half full of hard green balls, the size of the tip of her littlest finger; they rolled noisily when she tipped it from side to side. “This is food?”
“Full supplement,” the Human assured her. “Food, yes. Do this.” He dropped one into his steaming cup, waited a moment, then drank. “Aaahhhhh. Try! All need.”
She sighed. “Don’t you ever cook?”
Marcus laughed. “Waste time. Risk local contamination. Better this.”
More of his words. More of his ideas. Thoughtfully, Aryl put one of the balls into her cup of sombay, watching as it fizzed then dissolved. She took a small sip. No perceptible change in flavor, but the liquid had thickened to the consistency of soup. The strangers’ technology pervaded everything they did; there was no telling what they were capable of, no way to hold them to their word.
“Aryl should not worry. Safe are.”
Marcus had read something from her posture or expression. She studied his face, wishing in vain it wasn’t normal and proper and thoroughly Om’ray. The Human was not-real to her inner sense, disconnected from her reality of place or self.
But if she touched his skin, she could touch his thoughts. She could read his emotions. She’d done both, once before. Which made Marcus real, didn’t it? Real and vulnerable in the most devastating way possible to any Om’ray, despite his devices.
“Safe are,” Marcus insisted, blind to the closest threat of all.
Not that she’d ever—she’d never let anyone—
Aryl stopped there, thoroughly disturbed. “I appreciate the shelter, the food,” she said, gesturing with her cup. “But I don’t understand why you’re helping me.”
He ducked his head then looked up at her with a small smile. “Om’ray need reason to help?”
“No, of course not.” She hesitated. “Not to help other Om’ray. The Oud and Tikitik—they don’t ask or need our help.”
“You helped me.”
Aryl squirmed inwardly. “You wouldn’t have survived.”
“Ah.” The smile widened. “Good reason.”
“I don’t need your things,” she asserted, unsure why she felt off-balance. “I’d be fine without them.”
Marcus nodded his head again. “Know this. Yena don’t fall. I remember now.”
Was he making fun of her? Aryl stiffened. “This is my world, not yours.”
The Human moved his hands in a fair approximation of an Om’ray apology. Observant, or a ready mimic? Both, she thought. “Like help, yes.” Marcus turned his face to look sideways at her, his expression grown earnest. “Like you, Aryl Sarc, Yena, Om’ray. Yes yes yes. Like you. Understand?”
She hoped not, suddenly aware of him in a way she hadn’t expected. His familiar face and form were too close. His greenbrown eyes, too intent. The slow gentle smile as he waited for her to reply? What did that mean?
She could touch him and find out.
Instead, she eased farther away. “A friend,” she suggested. “Like Janex.”
The reminder—or her avoidance—wiped away the smile. Marcus gave an exasperated sigh. “Janex friend. Good friend. Janex never need help, mine.” During this confusing sequence, the Human palmed a small disk. He held it out and a group of figures appeared on the other side of the heat box, standing slightly above the ground. Images, she realized immediately. Humans, by their stranger-clothing.
Marcus stood and went into their midst, his hand passing through each face as he provided a name, as if he longed to touch them. “These need me. Understand? This Cindy.” A female with a wide smile and cheerful, round face. His voice grew tender. “Howard.” A lanky, intense child, with Marcus’ eyes. “Karina.” A younger child, curled in another’s arms. “Kelly,” he named her, his hand lingering within the image of a tall elegant female, with flowing red hair.
“You’re Chosen?” Aryl blurted. Not only Chosen, but a parent twice over? Maybe he’d attribute her flaming cheeks to the heat. An unChosen couldn’t be attracted…like that…to a Chosen. Or a Chosen to anyone but his or her mate. It was the nature of being Joined; no other pairing was possible. She reassured herself. He was not-Om’ray. How was she to know his state?
She should have. He was in charge of others and their machines. He had expertise and training. Marcus Bowman was no unChosen like her, bumbling through lessons and life. He was adult, respected, accomplished.
Claimed.
Then why did she feel…vulnerable?
The Human couldn’t read her thoughts. That mercy at least. Although he could be uncannily perceptive for a not-real stranger.
“Not understand ‘Chosen.’ Oud not have right words. Kelly is me. My heart. Lifepartner.” Tucking away the disk, Marcus returned to Aryl. The images took a moment to fade and disappear, leaving rubble and truenight behind. “Far far away,” he said in a faint voice, reaching for his cup. “All.”