Page 66 of Taken to Heimo
“The colony is a haven for humans. You may even be related to Voraxia’s queen. We could test your DNA…”
“Centare!” She bangs her fist hard on the table between us. It makes me jump. “I said centare. I just want to get you back home. You and your warrior.” She takes another swig. “Where’d you find him, anyway? He’s an Evernor champion if I’ve ever seen one. I haven’t ever seen anything that fights like he does.”
“He’s the Krisxox of Voraxia.”
“That would explain it.” She nods, upending the bottle down her throat and when she looks back up at me, her spooky eyes are half-lidded. “Well, tell him if he ever wants to make a killing, the fighting pits are always happy to have him back.”
I shudder visibly and she sees it and laughs. “You, on the other hand, better stick close to that one. He tore an Oosa alive from the inside and you don’t have so much as a drop of blood on you.” She looks me over, gaze sweeping my frame before landing on my carpet, where I’ve been rubbing my hands. “Well, alright. You don’t have any ofyour ownblood on you.” My abaya is covered in blood. All of it Krisxox’s.
Tears prick the backs of my eyes and my hearts yank in my chest. I feel…unsteady. Shaky. Broken.I just want to go to him.
“Hey! Don’t do that. Warriors don’t cry.”
“I didn’t say I was one,” I stammer, fists clenching over my knees. “I won’t ever be and I don’t want to be.” I sound downright teary now. Maybe the solar’s events catching up to me. “I want to live in a universe where beings use reason to communicate with one another, not their swords or their fists.”
She shakes her head at me, but there’s a softening around her mouth that reminds me of a faraway word —compassion. Then it’s gone just as quickly. “Then you picked the wrong universe. Tell me when you find the one you’re dreaming of.”
She shoves the cork back in the bottle, shaking the little bit that’s left of it up against the flickering yellow light overhead.
“Or maybe, the right male picked you to help you get through this one.”
“Hexa.” I sniff, getting ahold of myself. “He did.”
“Lucky you.” She cocks her head. “Go on. I can see you itching to get back to him.”
I stand without hesitating. “Thank you for saving us.”
She empties her flask and tosses the bottle back in the metal box. It lands with a distinct clink and a loud rattle.There are more bottles in there.She settles back against her loveseat. It’s lumpy and brown in most places, red in others. The color combination is disconcerting against the blood that covers both of us. Neither of us have bathed. On this decrepit transporter, I’m not even certain bathing is possible.
“You know, I can’t decide if you’re completely hopeless or kind of sweet.”
“You should meet Krisxox when he wakes. I’m sure he’d agree with you.”
She rolls her strange eyes just as a dash of green crosses them. If her colors are anything like Voraxian colors, then that would mean she’s amused.
“That so?”
“Ontte. And here. If you ever want to know more about humans, I wrote a manual. You should have access to it.”
I flip open my life drive and draw up a scan of the manual. She glances it over, then pulls a small black box out of the left pocket of the leather Eshmiri vest she put on as soon as she shed the robe she’d been wearing earlier. Paired with patchwork leather pants, she truly does look Eshmiri in everything but skin.
But I suppose skin never changed the soul beneath it. Beneath that skin, we get to be whoever we want to be and if she tells me she’s Eshmiri, then she is.
“Yeah alright, I’ll take a look.” The black box releases a wave of energy that I feel in the hairs that lift on my forearm. A laser shoots out of it, performs a quick scan, then is gone.
She slips it back into her vest and as I make my way to the door to Krisxox’s chamber, I say, “Thank you for saving his life.”
“Whatever. I’m just giving y’all a lift. I was heading to that side of the grey zone, anyway.”
I don’t believe her for a moment, and in that moment, I hesitate. “Where have you been, Ashmara?”
She leans back and pulls her hood all the way up over her head to cover her wild eyes. “Everywhere.”
“And you truly do not wish to return home with us?”
“Heelee, there’s no such thing as home.” Her full lips quirk up in one corner.
“You’re wrong, you know. There is home. Perhaps it isn’t with us, but the stars will lead you home and you’ll know it when you find it.”
