Close Remembrance (18 page)

After the uproar in the crowd died down, the Keiths were taken away, and Korum got up, heading toward the exit. What he wanted now was Mia, but he couldn’t go home yet.

He needed to reach out to the Elders again to move the project forward – and to check on his petition about Mia’s parents.

* * *

“You have a visitor, Mia.”

Startled by the unfamiliar female voice, Mia looked up from her reading material. Through the transparent wall, she could see a young human woman standing outside. Blowing out a relieved breath, Mia realized that the voice she’d just heard had to be Korum’s intelligent house letting her know about the guest.

“Of course,” Mia said, as though she talked to alien technology all the time. “Can you please let her inside?”

“Yes, Mia.” And the wall in front of the visitor dissolved, creating an entrance.

Getting up from the floating plank, Mia smiled at the dark-haired girl who gracefully stepped through the opening.

“Hi,” Mia said, knowing she was probably greeting someone she’d already met before.

“Hello, Mia,” the girl said, giving her a gentle smile. “I know you don’t remember me, but I’m Delia. We’ve met a couple of times before. I’m also a charl here in Lenkarda.”

“It’s nice to meet you again, Delia.” Mia was glad that her guest seemed to know about her condition. “I apologize in advance about my lack of recognition –”

“It’s not your fault,” Delia interrupted, her large brown eyes soft with concern. “How can you even apologize for something like that? I came by to see if you were all right after what happened. It must be so devastating, to wake up not knowing where you are or how you got there . . .”

Mia studied the girl, noting her quiet, yet luminous beauty and the maturity that belied her apparent youth. “Thanks, Delia,” she said. “I’m actually surprisingly okay. I don’t know why, but I seem to be dealing with everything quite well.”

“And Korum?”

Mia gave her a questioning look. “What about Korum?”

“Is he –” Delia hesitated a little. “Is he being kind to you?”

“Of course.” Mia frowned. “Why wouldn’t he be? He’s my . . . cheren, right?”

Delia gave her a radiant smile. “Of course. I was just heading to the waterfalls, where you and I first met. Would you be interested in coming with me? It’s a really beautiful spot. I don’t know if Korum showed it to you yet –”

“He hasn’t,” Mia admitted. “And I would love to join you.” She was curious about this girl – this other charl – and she was hoping to find out more about Lenkarda and her former life there.

“Great,” Delia said, still smiling. “Then let’s go.”

The walk to the waterfalls took a little over twenty minutes. As they made their way through the forest, Mia asked Delia about her story, wanting to find out how she’d become a charl. Then she listened in shock and fascination as the Greek girl told her about meeting Arus on the shores of the Mediterranean almost twenty-three centuries ago and how her life had unfolded since.

“When I first arrived on Krina, humans were treated very differently than they are today,” Delia explained. “Two thousand years ago, many Krinar thought we were little better than primates, with our lack of technology and primitive social mores. A few, like Arus, recognized that we were not all that different from them, but most refused to think of us as an equally intelligent species. That attitude still persists today to a certain extent, although the rapid pace of progress here in the past couple of centuries has impressed many on Krina.”

“They thought we were like monkeys?” Mia frowned, not liking that at all.

Delia nodded. “Something like that. I can’t really blame them; after all, they were the ones to create us and make us into what we are today.”

“How did they do that?” Mia asked, having wondered about that for a while. “I mean, a Krinar can almost pass for a human, and vice versa. Appearance-wise, it’s like they’re a different human race, rather than a separate species. I know they guided our evolution, but it’s still kind of crazy . . .”

“It’s actually not all that crazy,” Delia said. “They tinkered with our genes for millions of years, suppressing those traits that would’ve made us look different from them. They allowed certain subtle variations – like eye, skin, and hair color – but they ensured we would be very similar to them otherwise. It was something their Elders wanted, I believe.”

Mia looked away, pondering that for a while as they continued walking through the forest. “So what do you think they want with us now?” she asked once they reached their destination.

“The Krinar?” Delia sat down on a grassy patch near the water and turned toward Mia.

“Their Elders,” Mia clarified, sitting down next to her.

“Who knows?” Delia shrugged. “Even the Council doesn’t fully know the motivations of the Elders. They’re something like gods to them, although the Krinar don’t have religion in the traditional sense.”

“I see.” Mia considered everything she’d learned so far. “So how do the Krinar think of us now? Korum said I worked in one of their labs. Surely they wouldn’t let me do that if they thought that I was just an unusually smart monkey. Not to mention, they marry us . . .”

“Marry us?” Delia looked surprised. “What do you mean?”

“Isn’t that what being a charl is? Like being married to one of them, only without the official ceremony?” That was the impression Mia had gotten yesterday from her conversation with Korum.

Delia regarded her with a thoughtful brown gaze. “I guess you could think of it that way,” she said slowly. “Particularly if you apply the definition of marriage as it used to be in the past.”

“In the past?”

“Yes,” Delia said. “Before your time. When a wife lawfully belonged to her husband.”

“What do you mean, belonged?”

“By Krinar law, a charl belongs to her cheren, Mia. We don’t really have any rights here. Korum didn’t tell you that?”

Mia shook her head, feeling an unpleasant tightness in her chest. “Are you saying we’re their . . . slaves?”

Delia smiled. “No. The Krinar don’t believe in slavery, especially not as it was practiced during my time. Most charl are very well treated and loved by their cheren. They truly do regard them as their human mates. But it’s not exactly the type of equal relationship a modern girl like you would be accustomed to.”

Mia stared at her. “How so?”

“Well, for instance, a Krinar doesn’t need your permission to make you his charl. Arus asked me, but many cheren don’t.”

“Did Korum ask
me
?” Mia waited for the answer with bated breath.

“I don’t know,” Delia said regretfully. “I’ve never been privy to the particulars of your relationship. However, from what I know about Korum – and from the fact that you helped the Resistance before – I would guess that he wasn’t quite as considerate of your feelings as he should’ve been.”

Mia frowned. “What do you mean, what you know about Korum?”

Delia looked at her, as though weighing whether to proceed further. “Your cheren is a very powerful, very ambitious man,” she finally said. “Many on the Council think he has the ear of the Elders. He’s also known to be quite autocratic and ruthless with his opponents. That’s why I was initially worried about you – because I didn’t think Korum would be a particularly caring cheren. But I think I was wrong. From what I could tell, you seemed happy with him before. The last time we met, at Maria’s birthday, you were practically glowing. And even now, when most women would be feeling lost and intimidated, it looks like you’re doing well – and Korum has to be the one responsible for that.”

Mia studied the other girl, wondering if there was something else Delia was not telling her. “You don’t like my cheren, do you?”

“I don’t know him personally,” Delia said carefully. “I just know that Arus and he have clashed in the past over a number of different issues. But I’m glad he’s good to you. When I first saw you, you seemed so young and vulnerable . . . and I couldn’t help but worry about you. Now I see that you’re stronger than I originally thought. You might even be a good influence on Korum. Arus thinks your cheren truly loves you – which is something we would’ve never expected from him.”

“I see.” Mia drew in a deep breath and looked away, trying to process what she’d just learned. Perhaps her silly thought about Korum as a villain wasn’t as far-fetched as it seemed. Not for the first time, she wished she could remember the past couple of months, so she could better understand this complex relationship she was in. What exactly was Korum to her? What did it mean to be his charl? And which was the real Korum? The tender lover of last night, or the ruthless Councilor Delia had described?

Perhaps he was both. Mia considered that for a minute. Yes, she could definitely see how that could be the case. After all, Korum himself had told her about how he had used her in the past to crush the Resistance. Yet he seemed to truly love her now – and Mia couldn’t help the warm feeling that spread through her at the thought.

Turning back toward the Greek girl, Mia looked at her. “Delia,” she said quietly, bringing up a topic that had been worrying her since yesterday, “do you know what happens in an Arena fight?”

“Yes.” Delia gave her a sympathetic look. “You know about Loris’s challenge?”

“Korum told me about it yesterday,” Mia said. “Have you ever seen one of these fights? Are they common?”

“They’re not as common as they used to be a long time ago, but they still happen with some regularity. There are usually a couple of fights a year, sometimes more.”

“And how dangerous are they?”

Delia hesitated for a second. “Arena fighting is the number one cause of death for the Krinar,” she finally said. “Followed by various accidents.”

Mia felt like she’d been punched in the stomach. “Does someone always die during a fight?”

“No, not always. Sometimes the winner can control himself enough to stop in time. Generally, though, Krinar men don’t have the best control over their instincts during the heat of battle.” The Greek charl didn’t seem particularly bothered by that.

Mia swallowed. “I see.”

“But to answer your earlier question, I do think Krinar attitudes toward humans are changing,” Delia said, coming back to their previous discussion. “Two thousand years ago, the idea of a human working in a Krinar lab would’ve been unthinkable. They’ve come a long way since then, and I see things improving more and more every day. The fact that they’re living here on Earth, among us, is a game changer in many ways. They see now that we truly
are
their sister species, that we have the potential to achieve as much as they did.”

“They no longer think we’re just smart monkeys?” Mia said, only half-jokingly.

Delia smiled. “Some still do, I’m sure. But it’s no longer the consensus view. And the more relationships like yours and mine there are, the more accepted humans will become in the Krinar society.” She paused for a second. “So you see, Mia, you don’t have to be fighting the Krinar to help your people. You just have to get one of them to fall in love with you.”

* * *

Five thousand miles away, Saret got up and smiled at the human girl lying curled in a little naked ball in his bed. She was petite, no more than five feet tall, and her dark brown hair fell in soft waves around her narrow face. Other than her brown eyes, she looked very much like Mia. He’d found her in Paris yesterday.

She stared at him, and he could see the fear and hatred on her small face. It was unfortunate that she’d been engaged when he met her, with her wedding planned for next month. She had been understandably resistant to his attentions, and he didn’t have the time to seduce her properly.

It had been wrong to take her, of course. Saret knew that. At this point, however, it didn’t matter. Everyone already thought him a monster, and stealing one human was a harmless prank in the grand scheme of things. He had bitten her during sex, so he knew she’d found pleasure with him too. She wasn’t Mia, but he had still enjoyed fucking her, pretending that the slim body in his arms was the one he truly wanted.

Saret knew he had no hope of eluding the guardians for much longer; it was only a matter of time before he would be captured. Now that he had gotten a chance to think, he realized how Korum had known what to expect. It was very simple, really. His enemy must’ve been monitoring his charl even more thoroughly than he had admitted to Saret. In hindsight, Saret should’ve expected something like that; it was his own fault he’d underestimated Korum’s obsession with Mia.

No, Saret knew he wouldn’t be able to hide for much longer. He’d been utilizing various disguises, but he could sense the guardians getting closer. Yesterday, he had taken a risk and connected to the Krinar network. He’d tried to hide his identity, but he was sure Korum would eventually find his traces in cyberspace. Still, Saret had needed to know what was happening in Lenkarda and whether the Council had found out about his plan.

What he’d learned had made him both angry and excited at the same time. Angry – because his carefully planted nano dispersion devices had already been discovered and neutralized. And excited – because he finally knew how to get rid of Korum once and for all.