Zoe Thanatos (17 page)

What if she had an accomplice?
Someone close to the Crown, perhaps? No. No one would be foolish enough to help
her when the risk was so great.

The King cleared his throat. “Well,
either she’s very stupid or very smart. One way or the other we’ll find out,
won’t we?”

Evan merely nodded. “I suppose so,
Your Highness.”

“Well, run along and tell the Queen
I’m home now. I’m sure she’ll be wanting that back as well,” he nodded in the
direction of the book Evan held in his arms. He had forgotten about it
completely.

“Don’t you want to see the Queen
yourself?”

The King shook his head carelessly.
“I’m sure the news will be just as good coming from you.” Perhaps any other man
in his position would smile and pretend he didn’t understand the King’s
undertones, but Evan didn’t. On some level he imagined that the King knew about
his relationship with the Queen and understood there was little he could do
about it. Evan wouldn’t disgrace them both by pretending it wasn’t happening.

The King turned and stalked off in
the opposite direction of the Crown Soldiers, leaving Evan alone. With a sigh,
he headed back to the Straton’s residence, and to the Queen.

Zoe rubbed her hands over her arms
in rapid succession, silently cursing whoever decided to put the gate to Terra
in the middle of a frozen field on the other side of the globe. Eva was focused
on the Communicator, swiping her finger over it in every which way. She was
starting to have doubts.

For a moment she considered the
possibility that they were too late and the gates on Terra had been
deprogrammed. A part of her wished it was true, but deep down she wanted to
take part in something no one else could lay claim to. To Evan, Eva, and the
others from Terra, going to another world was an ordinary event; as far as she
knew she was the first person from Earth to do it.

“It shouldn’t be long now,” Eva
announced.

“So what exactly is a gate?” Zoe
asked, hoping the answer was interesting enough to distract her from the
hypothermia settling into her body.

Eva considered the question for a
moment, her attention momentarily taken away from the glowing glass device.
“Have you ever taken an elevator?”

Zoe tried to keep from rolling her
eyes. Maybe Eva didn’t know as much about Earth as she seemed to. “Yes, of
course I have.”

“Think of it like an elevator: one
starting point and destination, a pathway in between, and a vehicle to carry
you between each point. That’s what the gate does.”

Zoe imagined a long and
never-ending elevator shaft plummeting up into the sky far beyond where the eyes
could see. It took just over three days for the astronauts on Apollo 11 to
reach the moon, and that was only 238,900 miles away. In minutes she would be
in another universe entirely. The comparison had considerable gravitas.

“And in the process it’s going to
disassemble me then put me back together on the other side?”

Eva smiled. “Something like that.”
Oh,
sure
, Zoe thought.

A ping of light caught Zoe’s
attention. It sparked close to the frozen ground and travelled up and around,
forming the shape of an arc, leaving a dazzling trail of light in its path. The
center was like a blacked out wall, but Zoe could see it had some depth. It
resembled what she imagined a black hole to look like. A breeze of bitterly
cold air blew into her mouth as her jaw dropped open.

“Follow me closely,” Eva
instructed.

Zoe recovered and adjusted the
carrier hanging from her shoulder. She watched in continued awe as Eva
approached the gate, and the arc grew thinner and taller around her body to
accommodate her shape. She walked through the arc and disappeared into the
black void.

Zoe knew there was no time to
hesitate, and yet she felt her mind telling her feet to run off in the opposite
direction. This was it. She couldn’t back out of her decision, not after
everything she’d learned, and everything she had yet to find out.

She willed her feet to move forward
instead of backwards. The arc adjusted to her shape and as she moved closer she
felt a cold sterile breeze coming from the void.

With all the courage she could
muster, Zoe stepped through the arc and into the darkness.

Evan entered the Throne Room and stopped
dead in his tracks. Apart from the Crown Soldiers, who had doubled in number at
every entrance, the Throne Room was empty. Never once had the great room not
been filled with residents. He started again, hearing the unnerving sound of
his footsteps echoing against the vaulted walls and columns that stood like
giants around him.

He was permitted to enter the
Straton residence and found all of the Queen’s personal attendants gathered
around in a group. A hushed silence quickly fell upon them as though they had
been whispering in secret and didn’t want him to hear.

“Ladies,” he greeted with half a
smile. “What’s going on?”

Every single one of them looked to
Julia, the attendant Evan had previously met. She looked around her before her
gaze met his. “We are to wait here until the King has arrived and then go to
our residences,” she explained.

“Then go home. The King is back
safe and sound.” He walked to the doors leading to the Queen’s private
residence and waited as Crown Soldiers opened them. He heard the whispers of
the Queen’s ladies pick up again as he entered, their voices simmering to a
hush as the doors closed behind him.

A large square glass table had been
placed in the room since his last visit, with two place settings on each end.
The Queen emerged from a corner of the room, dressed down in a simple short
black dress. Her hair was pulled neatly behind her head, showing off the lovely
curve of her chin and long neck.

“You look pleased to see me,” she
smiled appreciatively.

Had he been staring? He cleared his
throat and held the large book out towards her in his hands. “I believe you
were looking for this.”

The Queen took the book in her
hands and smiled victoriously at it. “And the King?” Her eyes lifted up to meet
his.

“He’s fine. I think he went
somewhere to decompress after all that has happened to him.”

“Yes, I’m sure he has.” She didn’t
sound as though she cared too much. Then again, she didn’t have to. She placed
the book inside an open vault engaged in a nearby wall, and then shut the door
closed until its seams blended perfectly into the surrounding glass.

“The Elder woman and her
accomplices from Last City are in the Military Complex with Alcander and Hector.”

“Good. Would you like to join me
for a meal?” Her hand waved at the two place settings.

Evan hesitated. “I would, but I
should probably find my sister.”

“I sent Evadine on an errand for
me. It could be a while before she returns.”

Evan’s eyebrows crumpled. “Where
did she go?”

The Queen looked surprised by his
question. “To find something for me,” she answered indignantly. “And anyway if
the King doesn’t want to come home and share a meal with me then I will happily
take you in his place.”

He shifted uncomfortably where he
stood. “What if he comes back?”

She took a seat at one end of the
glass table and pointed to the other. “Honestly I couldn’t care less. Join me,
please.”

Evan did so, seating himself
opposite the Queen. She smiled at him coolly, seemingly amused at his expense.

“You’ve never cared if the King
found out about us,” she observed.

Evan shook his head. “I don’t
know,” he mumbled, mostly to himself. “With everything that’s going on with
this Elder woman and the book something just feels unsettled.” The woman’s
words were still fresh in his mind, as was the knowledge that someone from the
original family was still alive.

“Did she say anything to you?” The
Queen picked up a glass filled with a golden colored liquid and took a slow
sip.

“She said many things. Some of
which were quite unbelievable.”

“Such as?” she asked sweetly.

“Well, she still claims to be Thea
from the original family, and that she’s not the only surviving member.”

Her eyes narrowed at him. She put
the drink back down on the glass and looked at him shrewdly. “That’s
impossible.”

Was it
? Was Zoe Thanatos the
other surviving heir of the original family? The Queen could never know. He had
no doubt she’d go looking for Zoe, that she would possibly send him to do it,
or worse yet, a Crown Soldier. He shuddered at the thought of Zoe coming
face-to-face with Alcander or Hector.

No. If the Queen thought Zoe was
the surviving heir to the original family she wouldn’t lock her up or hide her.
She’d make sure Zoe was gone for good. He needed to know for himself if it was
true and then decide the best way to handle the situation. He could hide Zoe
from the Queen. Keep her safe from her reach. But how?

It was as though an invisible hand
had reached inside Zoe, took a firm grip of her center, and pulled her chest
first through a long, thin tunnel. Her extremities dissolved around her,
shattering into long stretches of atoms that undulated like a wave of ripples.
She was nothing but a consciousness, her active mind a ribbon through the waves
like a double helix.

A glass room materialized as she
was rebuilt atom by atom. A bright light temporarily subdued her, nearly
burning the corneas and sensitive nerves that connected her eyes to her brain.
She squinted, slowly adjusting her eyes to the artificial light. It emanated
from the glass, the structure itself twice the size of a pay phone booth. The
air was clean with a strange sterility that felt surprisingly cool. From
somewhere nearby she could hear the faintest electronic trilling, a crescendo
of sounds that reached an apex before declining back down into silence. Each
tone sounded as though it were a measurement, but of what she wasn’t sure.

An unlit rectangular shape the size
of a door unveiled before Zoe’s eyes. It opened with a pneumatic hush into a
narrow glass corridor that lead to yet another door and a room beyond where she
could clearly see Eva standing, looking at her expectantly. Eva encouraged her
with a nod, her hand sweeping back and forth towards her in instruction.

Zoe stepped into the corridor, a
second and longer pneumatic hush blowing a burst of cool sterile air over the
length and width of her body. The second door opened with another, leading into
the large concrete and steel room where Eva was waiting.

“For what it’s worth you look
intact,” Eva joked with a smile.

A laugh blew through Zoe’s cheeks,
pushing out the breath she had been holding. A tingling vibration sent
electrical charges along the nerves beneath her skin, shimmering like invisible
lights up and down her body.

“How long does the tingling last?”

Eva pursed her lips. “I don’t know.
I’m so used to it I barely feel it anymore. Do you need a moment?”

Zoe shook her head. “No. I think
I’ll be fine.”

“Okay. Our residence isn’t far.
Just try to look like you belong.”

The thought occurred to Zoe that
technically she did belong. Around her several more people were entering the
room from other glass corridors, what she assumed were the gates. Each one
joined in a group that bottlenecked through another long glass corridor. Zoe
attempted to casually look around at the others, noticing immediately they were
dressed in all manner clothing. Most looked as though they had come from Earth,
dressed comfortably in slacks or jeans, blouses or shirts with ties. A few were
dressed like Eva in form-fitting fabrics that Zoe could only describe as
leotards.

As they collectively made their way
through the corridor, Zoe picked up bits of their conversations, trying to put
the pieces together into a cohesive narrative. Most didn’t know what was
happening. Some speculated after the Queen and King’s health while others
grumbled their disdain for having to come back earlier than planned. She heard
one woman’s voice say Eva’s name, followed by Evander’s. No one seemed to look
twice at Zoe.

A great hall opened up before them
as they stepped from the corridor. Lines of people dressed in the form fitting
clothes were queued up to board what Zoe presumed was a line of trains, each
one stretching out into even longer glass corridors.

“This is the Transport Station,”
Eva whispered in Zoe’s ear. “Usually only those who work for the Crown, or
residents who are traveling by way of the gates, come through here. It looks
like everyone is being sent back to their private residences.” There was a
thread of worry in Eva’s voice. As they walked briskly through the enormous
building she noticed uniformed security - the military perhaps - guarding every
entrance and exit. A group of young women in long purple dresses with elaborate
hair designs walked among the crowd, their chins held up high and backs
razor-straight as they moved.

Many seemed to recognize Eva as she
escorted Zoe through the room, most of them then turning to whisper to the
person standing next to them. Few looked directly at Zoe.

Another corridor brought them into
a yet larger hall, two walls of glass on either side displaying panoramic views
of a lush tropical forest. Miles of dark green trees spread out around them,
vines languishing between the great branches.

“This is our Government Center,”
Eva continued in a whisper. “Everyone who works for the Crown is based here,
except for the Crown Soldiers. They like to make it look peaceful here, hence
the trees,” Eva nodded to the glass windows.

“They aren’t real?” Zoe asked.

 “Pretty convincing, isn’t it? All
of the glass is programmable, so you can create any view you like. Evan’s room
always looks like whatever universe he’s just come from.”