El and Onine (7 page)

“It can’t be Tiro—no, it’s Onine.”

He smiled but I only saw his pity. “Onine is gone.”

***

I could not do it. I could
not raise my fingers to feel your skin. We were alone, I had my chance, but I
could not do it. You look at me with those dark eyes and I feel lost, or
perhaps I am found. Kypria has made her intentions for me clear, but I find it
difficult to deny myself any longer. I know you enjoyed the transcendency I
allowed you to experience. I could see it on your skin, as my heat raced
through you, making your fine hairs stand on end. You glowed, floating in my
nature as you were. I was so close. I was so close. I was so close. But I am
not brave.

I long to see you but know I
must stay away. They will eventually come for you and I must let them, unless—but
I am not brave … I cannot save you though I am ready to give myself up for you.
I am ready to lose myself to you. Do not give in. Do not let them take you. Do
not choose them. Wait for me …

***

When Tiro arrived, I hadn’t slept. Tal had left me
at the edge of the yard and I stayed outside with Bendo until the eye’s light
spread itself across the wheat field and into my garden. As the cart rolled
along the golden cobblestones, I thought of Onine. I hadn’t seen him since he’d
been in my garden and I secretly hoped he’d greet me again while I sat with
Bendo in the dark. The heat we’d exchanged had faded with Tal’s embrace and I
longed to renew my Kyprian spark—I couldn’t believe he was gone.

“Why did you meet Tal?”

Em caught me by surprise and I blushed through my
veil, worried she could read my thoughts.

“I, um, well he wanted to tell me about your assignment.”

“Why?”

I shrugged.

“That’s a lie.” She wouldn’t stop looking at me. “I
know about you two.”

“There’s nothing to know,” I said. “We’re just
friends.”

“He’s a seed-bearer. He can’t be your friend.”

“He was—” I held my tongue.

“He’s mine now,” she said. “If you don’t like it,
you can take it up with the council.”

“There’s nothing between us.”

“I’m sure. I doubt he has anything left to offer.” She
tried to goad me but I wouldn’t have it.

“Careful,” I said. “Your pettiness may be reflected
in others.” I was determined to stay calm but my inner fire opposed my will.

“Now that we’ve started,” she continued, “he’s drained.”

I couldn’t stand the thought of her with the sapient
I’d held so close to me only a moonscape ago. The small bowl of milk and grains
I’d eaten sunk like a stone and hit the bottom of my stomach, rebounding all
the way to the cleft at the base of my throat. I swallowed hard and my eyes
watered.

“Oh,” she said. “Have I upset you?”

The image of them together was impossible to squash,
and I was ashamed.

“We should have a youngling by the warm season,” she
said. “Any news on your reassignment?”

I shouldn’t have spoken. I should’ve resisted but
she simply got the best of me—or perhaps the worst—and I let my
secret out. “The goddess has selected me for another.”

“Who?”

“A Venusian.” My admission silenced Em, though I
hadn’t intended it to. “I’m actually honored to be chosen for such a … an
important …” I couldn’t think of a word to describe the terrifying honor
bestowed upon me by the Kyprian goddess. I couldn’t even come up with a lie.
The mood in the cart changed when Em no longer felt the need to one-up me. She
pitied me and I disliked her even more for it.

“I’m so sorry, El.”

I didn’t need to hear her say it to know she thought
it was the most wretched thing that could happen—a nightmare any cultivator
would fear. When the cart stopped, I thought she was going to turn around and
say goodbye, but instead she reached out and touched me on the forehead. She
mumbled something when she got off but I couldn’t hear her through the veil.

When I was alone, I thought of her and Tal together.
I pictured his bare body on top of hers, his mouth against hers, his heart next
to hers. I didn’t want to see them in my mind but couldn’t help it. I closed my
eyes and envisioned a bare-chested Tal standing in front of me, his sculpted muscles,
dark hair, every bend and curve of his broad frame. My sudden desire could’ve woken
a sleeping body. I felt him in the pit of my stomach—lower still.

The cart stopped at the Bathing Temple and I struggled
to shake off the fire I’d stoked inside me. I rose from the bench when I heard
Tiro get off his zephyr and chastise the youngling who tended to his beast. I
feared seeing the master, knowing I was selected for him. I wondered if he knew
the goddess had chosen me.

“El!” He yelled for me as though I were a field’s
length away rather than a mere stick’s.

“Yes, master.”

“The keeper wants to see you in the silo,” he said.
“Hurry up!”

My whole body tingled when I heard Onine was there. Tal
was wrong, I knew it—I knew he hadn’t left. I hopped down from the cart
and ran up the slope with a speed that had my feet tripping on the stones of
the pathway through the golden brambles. I held the trim of my frock up so I
wouldn’t stumble and land face down before I reached the keeper.

The water pumps were stored in the slender tower at
the rear of the bathhouse. I’d only been inside the silo once when Minosh had
to speak to the sapient who tightened the valves. One of our tubs wasn’t
draining properly and we were expected to mend it ourselves. Minosh didn’t know
how to fix it at the time, so she asked the silo attendant to show her. When I
reached the door to the silo, I pulled the cord for that same attendant. When
he didn’t come, I pushed on the door. I thought Onine left it open for me since
it wasn’t locked. The tower was dark and quiet except for the whistling of the pipes.
I couldn’t see through the steam so I waited by the door where the eye’s light peeked
in through a crack.

“Keeper?” My voice sounded lost amidst the squealing
pipes. When he didn’t answer, I spoke his name into the darkness. “Onine?”

The pipes ceased screaming, as though on cue, and
that’s when I heard his tsk-tsk. “On a first name basis, are you?”

My knees locked. I felt like a firebug trapped in a
jar—frantic and caged, forced to glow. I knew how close he was when the
point of his stick stung my back. “Please don’t,” I said with nothing to lose. I
didn’t feel ashamed to beg for my salvation, willing to fight for my freedom,
my purity, my chastity.

“Do not speak,” the master said. “Your emotion is
repugnant.”

I tried to hide my fear but it came through in my
voice. I bit my bottom lip to keep from speaking again.

“Remove your frock.” I shook my head. “I am not
asking.” His voice was dull, all joviality having fled, and he stood so close
to me it sounded as if his mouth hovered at my ear.

“Don’t do this,” I whispered. “Please don’t do
this.”

“Do not speak, sapient.” I felt the slap of his
stick on the back of my thighs and I kneeled with the pain. “Stand up,” he
commanded.

I did and reached for the eyelets at the back of my
head to remove my veil.

“Not the veil, the frock.” He wanted to see my body.
“Show me what I have gained.”

The shame overwhelmed me but I obeyed and slowly pulled
at a sleeve. I tried to stall but he poked me with his stick and egged me on.
“No one is coming for you and I am impatient to see my prize, sapient.”

I freed my arm from one sleeve, baring it for my
master. My limbs shook so much it was difficult to slip off the other. Tiro
jabbed his stick into my lower back. “That’s it,” he said.

With both arms out of their sleeves, I reached up for
the pinafore overtop my frock and removed it and then pulled the frock down
slowly. I was bare beneath the veil that still covered my chest. My body was
nothing like a Venusian’s and I was horrified to show it. My hands dropped to
my sides and the entire frock slipped to the ground. I struggled to hold in my unwanted
tears. I didn’t know which was worse: the humiliation of being naked in front of
a Venusian or the anticipation of my immolation.

Blind as I was in the steam and darkness, I didn’t
know Tiro could see me. When I felt his stick on my stomach, and the veil rise,
I thought I’d die. I held my breath and closed my eyes. I saw Tal in the darkness,
as I imagined his coming to my rescue just as he said he would.
No
, was all I could say in silence.

Tiro cracked his stick on the side of my ribs and the
sting crippled me. I couldn’t stifle my shriek, but bit my lip and silently
begged for my end to come. I wanted to reach out and touch the Kyprian. I
wanted to thrust my torso into his hands and face my death head on—into
the fire I’d happily go.

“Stop moving, sapient.”

The steam in the silo hovered around us, as it clotted
in the darkness. I could feel Tiro’s eyes brood over my naked body as they so often
lingered on the curves of the bathers in the Temple. I counted the lulls in his
stilted panting, each breath the length of a moonscape. When he finally spoke
again, it was with sounds that assaulted my ears until the unimaginable
happened and I was able to translate his shrieks just as I’d done with Onine’s
in the garden.

“I am eager to have you,” he said. “Your keeper delays
my success despite the council’s selection. They say my goddess has decreed you
mine but Onine’s whims hold me no longer. My apprenticeship is over.” Tiro
wasn’t addressing me but spoke to me all the same. He couldn’t know I
understood him. “You will be my vessel, sapient. Mine alone and I will take you
back to Venus once they have arrived. They can do what they want with Terra.
Venus will be ours again. Midan has promised.”

His words scared me. It was him—he was the one
who’d take me away from here. I had to escape Tiro before then. I had to get
away.

He traced the outline of my torso with the edge of
his stick, running its point across my belly and inching lower. “I shall soon
unlock your precious womb and make you mine. The lava beds on Venus will be our
palace—and your prison, my sapient.” Tiro smiled in the darkness. Amidst
the steaming, squealing water pumps, I could imagine his smile. I held my
tongue, desperate to respond, but I’d never let him know I understood his every
word.

When the air lifted and cooled again, he was gone. I
caught my breath as though I’d been submerged in a vat of liquid—viscous
and smelly lava. I pulled my frock up around me, hooking the hooks with
dexterity despite my shaky fingers. I couldn’t rid myself of the sweat he’d
given me. I wanted to rush out into the eye but my legs wouldn’t carry me. I dropped
to the ground where I stood and pulled my knees into my body. I hid my face in
my veil and cried as I’d never cried before, sobbing with the delight only a
sapient could know.

I barely heard the attendant come up the steps and when
he opened the door and let in the eye, I felt relief. My dark skin soaked up
the rays of light to quench the deep thirst that had rattled my bones. I rose
from the ground to greet the eye, willing it to burn away my humiliation, as I
made my way back to the Temple. I didn’t see Onine and avoided Tal, but when Tiro
came to take me back to my shanty at the end of my shift, I faked bravery. I wouldn’t
give him the satisfaction of seeing my fear.

The eye hung in mid-sky, as I made my way to the
cart. Tiro was up on his zephyr and the light struck him in such a way as to
make a nimbus appear. The eye shone across him and through him like he was the only
creature worth its attention. The alien’s refracted radiance made him seem more
brilliant and his beauty multiplied, his gold skin tainted with jade flecks. In
the light, Tiro almost looked … squamous?

“Stop staring, sapient.” His bark broke my
concentration but I held my gaze. He laughed and held out his stick to threaten
me.
You are mine
, he mouthed before jabbing
his point into the air. “Hopeless creature,” he said with a snigger.

ONINE

I was barely a few tongues high when I first saw my
goddess, bathing with the sisters of the Astros in the lava beds on the
shadowed side of Granite Peak. The beauties were unaware I could see them and I
had wanted to avoid the pools, but they were the only place I could get the
onyx I needed. As I came over the ridge of the vast rock plain, my eyes were
pulled to her light. It was like a concentrated spark made up of the entire
cluster of stars that trimmed our galaxy. The sisters paled in comparison to my
goddess and it was then I knew my dreams had done her the gravest injustice. Her
beauty’s effect on me grew uncontrollable with time, and whenever I stood a
mere pittance from her flame and saw her in full regalia, even if on her
pedestal, I would unravel. It is nothing to say I love Kypria—my desire
is the only reason I sacrifice everything.

Rather a genius with stone and lava, I worked the
forge even after I was inducted into the Kyprian retinue. When my goddess commissioned
her hall of jade, I sent my apprentice to the surrounding hubs for the milky rock
that is rare on Venus. But it is useless to mourn the misfortune now, his returning
with the slick jade trader from the planet Menaleck. Foolishly, my apprentice gave
away our coordinates, making us vulnerable, and taught a contentious species
how to breach our fiery atmosphere. We anticipated the cost an alien migration would
have on our bountiful landscape but when Menaleck’s ambassador, Midan, arrived,
we were blind to his coming destruction.

“The ambassador has seen Ur and promised the jade?”
My apprentice was keen to hear about the visitor and his dealings. I nodded
though impatient for him to return to his smelting.

“At what price?” He asked.

“Unlimited access to the fire brines,” I said.

“Does Ur want him to stay?”

“I cannot speak for the sire of Venus.” I pulled the
rod from his hands and stirred the lava bath myself.

“The ambassador’s arrival may help them gain the vow
of the unpledged ones,” my apprentice said.

The suggestion made my fire brighten though I would have
preferred to hide my irritation. My apprentice spoke of the rebels who were
undecided in their devotion to my goddess, those of the old regime who still worshipped
Ur. A generation had burned away since then, but some of the stronger fires
remained loyal to the sire and renewed their allegiance despite his command to
worship his progeny. Even after he announced his departure, they persisted.

“How can Midan help Venusian matters when they are
not his concern?”

“The ambassador has ingratiated himself with the sire’s
regime,” my apprentice said. “Though it seems he has also fallen under Kypria’s
spell—”

“You forget yourself,” I said. “You mean to say my
goddess has pleased our visitor with Kyprian flame?”

Though I spurned my apprentice’s remark, he was
correct. Midan had fallen under Kypria’s spell and her flame corrupted him,
impure as he was. His desire for our goddess grew so great, in fact, it
demanded more of him than he could offer and soon the ambassador proved a warmonger
bent on dominating the group of unpledged Venusian. Despite the strength of the
Kyprian retinue, Midan’s arrival spawned a large number of rebels and civil war
threatened our planet.

But our
brave and ingenious goddess proposed a plan for those of us willing to follow
her. Though a pacifist, I volunteered for the Kyprian guard shortly after she
suspected Midan’s plan for her planet. Long before the ambassador had a secret army
of Venusian at his disposal, Kypria had a clandestine guard of her own. Our existence
on Venus was coming to an end and when we received the message from Ur, we knew
what had to be done. Our sire sent his progeny the coordinates to the dark passage,
the only way out from under the reign of Midan. I never doubted Ur but when he
left on his interstellar quest with a small group of Venusian, his abandonment
was our loss. The fate of our star had been decided long ago, written in the
tome of the deity and impossible to avoid. Since the sire would never return,
the Kyprian guard vowed to use the dark passage to keep Ur’s progeny from the
yoke of another despite its risk.

We held a private meeting in my goddess’s solarium
to strategize our departure. We would attempt an exploratory jaunt first and
then make plans for a permanent escape.

“We shall leave when Jupiter sets,” Kypria said, as
she stood on her pillar of jade.

Our flames rose up to greet her fire.

“Goddess,” I said, “how can we know the terrain? The
atmosphere?”

“She is a sister planet,” she said. “A twin.”

My goddess had never been to this planet and yet she
knew everything she needed to breach its sphere. Despite its cold and watery
landscape, she expected us to survive the migration since it boasted a small
verdurous patch of land. We were creatures of fire and lava, however, and acidic
smoke was our substance—I doubted we could inhale the planet’s air and
live to speak of it.

“Goddess,” I said. “How can we get acclimated to
such a hostile environment?”

She appeased my early fears with seeds of greater
ones. “Its surface will melt under my fire,” she said. “And we will change our forms
to live in harmony with the planet.”

The thought of changing forms was beyond
unreasonable and my Kyprian siblings flickered at the notion. “What new life form
will we take?”

She answered with a word foreign to Venusian tongue
but one she had seen etched in the tome. I asked her if this life form was different
from ours.

“In every way,” she said. “Which is why it has been
chosen. It is a form without beauty—without heat.”

“Do you fear extinction, goddess?”

“Fire and clay,” she said. “The union must be.” Her
exquisite countenance held my gaze and I would have been satisfied to admire it
for eternity.

“Is there no other way to save you, goddess?”

“Ur has spoken,” she said. “My sire’s coordinates
are plain. The dark passage must be taken, the breach to the planet’s banks
made. Kyprian will live on despite the inevitable changes to come.”

The flames of the Kyprian guard rose unanimously in
assent.

“Please send a few of us first, goddess,” I said.
“We must assure its safety before—”

“Impossible,” she said. “Only my flame will ready
the way. You cannot pierce the sphere without it.”

“But what if this planet—”

“My sire has spoken.”

Saturnia’s sister came forward then, out from the fire
of her goddess. “The planet’s creatures are sentient, organic beings thriving
on the richness of the soil. Our colonization will avoid enmity and strive for peace.
Our union with these beings is fated and thus we must embrace the gift from our
sire. This passage will lead us to freedom and eventually renewal.”

“But must we abandon our form?” I said.

My goddess raptured the others, mesmerized them with
her flame, and spoke to me alone. “You are gifted,” she said.

I thought she meant the jade stones I had erected in
her solarium. They were meant to be symbols of our heritage, the rocks of
Kypria. “Manipulation of stones has been my trait since before inception,
goddess.”

“I am not speaking of your artistry.”

I could not respond with a word—speech
suddenly seemed an impossible act. Perhaps it was her beauty or the truth of my
love that stayed my tongue.

“Saturnia’s sister has told me you can carry the
spark,” she said.

Saturnia’s sister saw all within our flames. She
knew our gifts before we did. Kypria’s question wanted an answer but I remained
without one for some time. The goddess leaned forward on the pillar and looked
directly into my violet eyes.

“Do not be afraid,” she whispered. “I am not.”

Her voice shook the solarium, as though it too shuddered
in the presence of her greatness.

“I-I-I do not know what that means, goddess.”

It was common for us to be confused by our gifts
since most of us were spared from special burdens at inception. Some were
simply heat bearers made for worship. My goddess smiled and pointed her scepter
at my chest. I held my fire, as she plunged the liquid metal into my front and
stirred the flame within. She leered at me, as she prodded me for proof of my
gift. I closed my eyes, though I wanted to look at her forever, and was
grateful she remained in the darkness. When she pulled her scepter from me, she
laughed.

“Excellent,” she said. “Saturnia’s sister has done
well.”

The goddess released her retinue from rapture and
dismissed each of us with an order to return at the rise of Jupiter. As I
exited the solarium, I saw Midan for the first time. Until then I had only
heard the rumors of his grotesque shape, but as I passed him then he greeted me
with a flick of his forked tongue. Though wearing Venusian apparel, his scales
showed in the light of the solarium. He ignored my flame but we exchanged
looks.

The wait for the rise of Jupiter was long. My
apprentice pledged himself to me when he was told he was unfit to go with us. I
promised I would send for him if successful. In the meantime, I assigned him to
keep an eye on the newcomers.

“You will report back to me when I call,” I said.

“If the dark passage is safe and the planet hospitable,
will it replace Venus?”

“Nothing can replace home.” I reassured him our stay
on the other planet would be temporary. We would never give up Venus.

“What does Terra mean?” He had heard me speak the name
we had given the twin planet.

“It is named for its substance,” I said. “The matter
that coats its surface.”

“It’s not lava then?” My apprentice was eager but unskilled
in many ways. He was fanned into being around the time I was, but only because
his lineage boasted a line of gifted masons. He proved less capable than his
ancestors and was assigned to be my disciple shortly after my talent became
renown. “Is there a forge on Terra?”

“Perhaps we will need to make one,” I said. “Once our
settlement is secure, you will be given your place.”

“With you?”

“Our goddess will oversee her retinue just as she
does here,” I said. “We will certainly need to construct a solarium and temples
befitting Kypria.”

“Will Terra change us?”

No truer concern had been voiced. My apprentice knew
the answer despite his inability to know the truth. “Let us speak of other
things now,” I said. “How will you ingratiate yourself with the ambassador?”

“Through the jade trader.”

“Yes, he will do.”

My apprentice stirred the lava and I poured in the
bromine, as we discussed his plan of espionage. The dark red fumes rose from
the crevasse and colored his flame—his aspect had never looked so sinister.
I was relieved when he smiled and said, “Will you send for me?”

I promised him I would, though I was uncertain of my
return. I feared our descent to the cold, uncharted planet, but making an escape
back to Venus worried me even more.

***

The first expedition to Terra proved successful, and
difficult. Our celestial bodies were jettisoned to the watery planet through
the dark passage located with Ur’s coordinates. We suffered an icy quarantine
that snuffed out several of the younger guards. For those of us who did survive,
the journey was painful. Our forms mimicked the stars, as we traveled past them
in space. We morphed in and out of bodies, lighting up the universe, as we trailed
through the opening to the twin planet. We hung in the sky above the lush
plains of wheat—auroras in the darkness—before plummeting to the
edge of Terra’s horizon and dropping into its soil.

From microscopic bursts of space static to
clay-covered beings, we multiplied our spirits and rose a dozen Kyprian strong,
decked out in the flesh that would keep us from succumbing to the planet’s atmosphere.
We learned to breathe Terra’s air and expel unwanted waste from our new form,
which I will admit was the most difficult to get used to.

The terrain was vast but sparsely populated. Before
we touched down on the cold soil, our goddess lit the landscape on fire and
melted the seed down to gold. Everything condensed to metal with the touch of
her flame and she excavated the soil with one stroke. Lava shot up from the
green pastures and sand soaked up the lush marshes of the forests. The living
trees froze mid-growth and grew strong with the tin covering of Venusian
element. Newly erected in granite and gold, Terra’s surface bowed before its new
goddess.

Soon we encountered the first beings, those who survived
her immolation. With their swarthy bodies covered in hair, they were ugly
creatures. The beasts folded before my goddess, as she bathed the planet in her
warmth and stole their energy, wiping out most of the species we met. When we
finally made contact with the forms we had come to emulate, my goddess was disappointed.
At first sight, she wanted to destroy them despite our original intention to
colonize and repurpose the beings. When she found Mara, however, she decided to
uphold our plan.