Invaded (17 page)

Hugging herself, Cara gazed into the heavens and mentally recited Aelyx’s words:
Soon we’ll stand together and watch the L’eihr sky from our colony
. An electric charge
passed through her. They were really going to do this—build a life here. She could
picture it: barefoot strolls on the beach under a tri-moon glow, weekends spent fishing
and gathering
shells, nights in Aelyx’s arms, falling asleep to the sound of distant waves.

This was paradise. They didn’t even have to worry about hurricanes.

Jaxen surprised her by capturing a loose lock of hair and tucking it behind her ear.
“What are you thinking?”

Not wanting to encourage his casual touches, Cara moved away. “I’m imagining what
a typical day would look like.”

Aisly strode to Jaxen’s side and answered for him. “Much like your days now. You’ll
scan for updates, engage in physical conditioning, eat in the dining hall. But instead
of
classes, you’ll report to your assigned vocation.”

Cara didn’t like the sound of that. “We won’t be able to choose our own jobs?”

“No.” Jaxen kicked aside a chunk of driftwood and began walking over the dunes toward
town. “Our method of optimal placement in the workforce is too efficient to
abandon.”

Paradise just lost a point.

Troy emerged from the bushes, zipping his fly. He nodded toward the ancient ruins.
“Are they going to leave that temple standing?”

“It’s not a temple,” Jaxen said, staring into the rubble. “It’s a tomb. Or it
was
.”

“For a warrior queen and her consort,” Aisly added. “Killed in battle. Their bodies
lay undisturbed until recently.”

That sounded cryptic. “They didn’t tear it down for the colony, did they?” Cara asked.

“No. The remains were exhumed and relocated decades ago.” Jaxen pointed ahead and
quickened his pace. “Hurry. We don’t have much sun left.”

As they strode onward, something needled at the back of Cara’s mind—a warning bell
of sorts—but she couldn’t put her finger on the problem. She scanned storefronts and
offices as she passed, finding nothing amiss. In fact, the apartment complexes were
homier than she’d anticipated, complete with benches along the sidewalk and the beginnings
of a swimming
pool in the courtyard. The L’eihrs weren’t big on leisure time, so she knew this was
a concession for them.

“Can we go inside?” Cara asked. She wanted to see the living quarters she’d share
with Aelyx.

“No,” Jaxen said. “They’re not finished. All you’d find are stairs and plumbing.”

“Too bad.” She gazed up and down the vacant street, half expecting a tumbleweed to
blow down the center of town. “I’d love to get a sneak peek at…” She trailed
off, finally realizing what had been bothering her.

It was the streets. They didn’t exist at the capital because citizens shuttled from
place to place or took the air train. But now that Cara looked around, she noticed
the absence of
landing pads, too.

“Wait,” she said. “Where will our shuttles land? And why are there streets here?”

Jaxen and Aisly shared the briefest of glances, just long enough for Cara to get the
impression they were hiding something.

Recovering quickly, Jaxen offered a placating smile. “In keeping with human customs,
we’ve begun the manufacture of small motorized vehicles for your use on the colony.”

“Cars?” Cara asked.

“Powered by the sun,” Aisly added. “Like everything else here, so you won’t need to
worry about fuel dependency.”

Cara noticed they didn’t answer her first question. “Where will we keep our shuttles?”

After a moment of hesitation, Jaxen admitted, “You won’t have them.”

“At all?”

“No.”

Paradise lost another point. No, make that a dozen points. Because without shuttles,
the colonists were trapped here—powerless, isolated, and utterly dependent on the
continent to travel
any farther than the beach.

Paradise morphed into prison.

Troy clearly understood her concern. He didn’t say anything, but he whistled the theme
to
The Twilight Zone
and used his index finger to make twirling motions toward his head.

“What if there’s an emergency?” Cara asked.

Jaxen didn’t miss a beat. “You’ll have com-spheres.”

“But a com-sphere won’t fly me off this island.”

Drawing a deep breath, Jaxen brought both his hands together as if in prayer. “Listen,
Cah
-ra. I give you my word: The Way means you no harm. But you have to admit that human
colonists have a history of rising up against their founding nations. This is more
to protect our society than anything else.”

Cara didn’t buy it. What did he think the colonists were going to do, wage war with
a few shuttles and a handful of alien coconuts? No, this was a deal breaker. Human
beings weren’t
wayward children who needed to be managed. She wouldn’t live inside a cage, even if
it did resemble one of those fancy resorts her family could never afford to visit.

“Then I’ll have to reconsider my decision to stay here,” Cara said, opening the door
for negotiation. “This is a sticking point for me. Can’t you spare a
few—”

An earsplitting shriek interrupted her and tore everyone’s attention skyward, where
a ball of fire streaked into the atmosphere. Cara recognized it at once—it was identical
to the
“meteorite” that had crashed her
Sh’ovah
. This time she narrowed her eyes and focused on the sphere, checking for any detail
that might give her a clue to its origin. But
all she could discern was flame. It picked up speed and barreled into the ocean with
a mighty splash, making her wonder how many other spheres had crashed in these waters.
She didn’t care
what The Way said; that thing was man-made. The repeat appearance confirmed it.

Troy verbalized what she was thinking. “Was that a satellite? I’ve heard of small
ones falling out of orbit.”

Jaxen and Aisly exchanged another loaded glance.

“No,” Aisly said. She strode to Troy’s side and smiled up at him. Staring deeply into
his eyes, she crooned, “It was only lightning. There’s a storm coming,
don’t you think?”

While Cara scrunched her brows in confusion, Troy’s face went all dopey and he nodded
in agreement. “Yeah,” he said, turning his gaze to the cloudless sky. “We should
head back to the shuttle before it rains.”

What had just happened?

Jaxen turned to Cara and cupped her cheek in his palm. When she tried backing away,
he took her face between both hands and peered at her, softening his focus as if to
use Silent Speech.

Oh, God. She had a feeling she’d just discovered the siblings’ hidden talent.

Cara didn’t know if it would work, but she blocked her thoughts the way Elle had taught
her during one of their practice sessions. She cleared her mind of everything but
her default safe
image, which happened to be a red kickball. While Jaxen tried connecting with her
consciousness, Cara summoned that ball, envisioning its textured surface, its rubbery
scent, the springy feel of it
beneath her fingers.

“
Cah
-ra,” Jaxen said, low and smooth as melted chocolate. “You don’t need to worry. You’ll
find happiness here.”

Red ball
. She focused with all her might.
Bouncy red ball.

Jaxen’s breath stirred against her lips, and for a moment, she feared he might kiss
her. But he released her face and stepped back, studying her with a confident grin.

He thinks it worked.
Cara decided not to give him any reason to doubt it. She faked a dazed expression
to match her brother’s, then lied her ass off.

“I’m not worried.”

“
I
mpossible,” Aelyx said. “Mind control only exists in legends. There has to be a logical
explanation.” He hadn’t spent much time with
Cara’s brother, but Troy struck him as the less intelligent of the two—by leaps and
bounds. “Perhaps Troy really thought a storm was coming.”

Elle dipped her head into view from the top bunk. “That’s what I said.”

“Well, you’re both wrong.” Cara’s eyes narrowed, sending Elle darting out of view.
“Troy’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but he’s smart enough
to know when it’s raining. You weren’t there—I was. And I’m telling you that Aisly
used a Jedi mind trick on my brother, and Jaxen tried the same thing with me. You
can
choose to believe it or not, but that’s what happened. And I’ll tell you another thing—I
think The Way knows what they can do, and that’s why they keep them
around.”

“I don’t see how it’s scientifically feasible,” Aelyx said.

“Neither do I,” Cara conceded. “But I don’t know how shuttles fly or how transports
jump through wormholes, and those things happen. Until I met L’eihrs, I thought
telepathy was impossible. If you can communicate with your minds, it’s not that big
a stretch to assume you can do other stuff with your minds, too.”

Aelyx supposed she had a point, but he still didn’t believe it. “Does Troy remember
anything helpful?”

Cara poked the top bunk to get Elle’s attention. “Tell him what Troy said when we
got home last night.”

“I asked where they’d been all day,” Elle said. “Troy told me they’d flown to the
colony, but they’d cut short the trip because of rain. He did appear a bit
stunned, but he always looks that way when I undress for bed.”

Cara leaned forward, her voice urgent. “But it never rained yesterday—not one drop.
Explain
that
.”

Troy probably needed his head examined, but Aelyx didn’t say so. “Where is he now?”

“In the washroom.”

“Has he shown any odd behavior since then? Experienced hallucinations or—”

“No, he’s fine,” Cara said. “And Jaxen’s pretending that nothing happened, like he
never grabbed my face and tried to brain-rape me.”

Aelyx didn’t know what to say. None of it made sense.

Cara pinched her finger and thumb together. “He came this close to kissing me, too.”

“What?”
Aelyx’s vision went spotty, and he damned near fell off the bed. “Why didn’t you
say that to begin with?”

“Oh, sure,” Cara said. “I tell you Jaxen can brainwash people and you don’t care.
But I mention an almost-kiss and
that
’s what gets your
attention?”

Precisely. Aelyx doubted Jaxen’s alleged mental powers, but he had no trouble believing
the son of a motherless
f’exa
would try to seduce Cara. Aelyx wanted her by his side,
far away from Jaxen’s influence. “Maybe you should come home with your brother.”

“And risk the alliance?” she said, reminding him of what was at stake. “Being here
is one of the conditions, remember? I can’t come back until spring.” She chewed
her bottom lip and fell silent awhile. When she spoke again, she kept her gaze fixed
on her blanket. “Listen, what do you think about…maybe…”

“Maybe what?” he prompted.

“Defecting from L’eihr and living on Earth after the alliance is sealed.” She peeked
through her lashes. “The colony isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. I know
Earth isn’t your favorite place right now, but you might grow to like it someday.
Right?”

Aelyx tried not to betray the chill that gripped his stomach. If Cara refused to remain
on the colony, they couldn’t be together. He supposed he could eke out a life on Earth,
but humans
would have to stop trying to murder him first. As much as they enjoyed killing one
another, he imagined his odds weren’t very good. And breaking his vow to The Way would
mean severing ties to
his heritage. He’d never be permitted to return to L’eihr, not even to visit. He loved
Cara, but he loved his people, too.

“It’s not that simple,” he said. “Can’t you…” What?
Try harder? Lower your expectations?
He didn’t know what to ask of her, or even if he had
any right to.

She shook her head blankly, probably struggling to make similar requests of him. “They
want to trap us there. We won’t be free to come and go as we please.”

“But you’re not free to come and go now,” he told her. “You can’t take a shuttle and
fly it to the spaceport, then simply walk aboard an Earth-bound ship. You have
to apply for passage and wait for approval. The colony will be no different.”

“You don’t understand.”

Elle’s head appeared again, upside down, from the top bunk. “You don’t know what you’re
asking of him,” she said to Cara. “I can’t believe you’re
willing to quit so easily. The
Cah
-ra Sweeney I’ve come to admire wouldn’t give up without a fight.”

In an act of surrender, Cara turned up her palms. “What am I supposed to do? Jaxen’s
part of The Way. He’s like everyone’s boss—times ten. You should’ve seen
how he snapped his fingers and suddenly I was off the hook for that poisoning incident.
Nobody questions him.”

“But even he has a superior,” Elle said. “Why not appeal to Alona?”

“Wait.” Cara raised one orange brow. “I can do that?”

“Of course you can,” Aelyx told her. “It’s your right as a citizen.”

She speared him with a glare. “It’s not like they gave me a handbook at my
Sh’ovah
, you know.”

Despite the tension, Aelyx found himself smiling. Gods, he loved this girl—her humor
and passion, her temper and heart. She filled empty spaces inside him he’d never known
were
vacant. He simply couldn’t lose her. With one finger, he reached out to trace the
curve of her face. “Please keep fighting.”

She nodded but didn’t meet his gaze. “I’ll try.”

Aelyx left her with an extra-firm “I love you” and disconnected to dress for the day.
He didn’t like the dejection in Cara’s voice, but he hoped the gift he’d sent
would cheer her up. He tucked his com-sphere inside his back pocket before striding
into the living room.

Ordinarily, now was the time he’d peel off his clothes and climb into bed, but Aelyx
had special plans this evening. At his urging, the military had facilitated a meeting
between him and
the HALO leader, Isaac Richards—a heavily guarded meeting set in a public location,
per Isaac’s paranoid request. Stepha had refused to attend and “acknowledge that cretin’s
existence,” but Aelyx didn’t mind going alone. He’d finally secured permission to
share the truth about Earth’s water crisis with Isaac. Once the lead Patriot understood
the
gravity of terminating the alliance, surely he’d cease the assassination attempts
he continued to deny.