Alienated

Chapter Twenty-Seven

“The good news.” Cara always wanted the good news first. It tempered the bad, though if the Elders had decided to make Aelyx pay with his life, there’d be no softening that.

She tugged Aelyx’s bicep so he’d stand beside her. If she understood correctly, he wasn’t supposed to sit in the presence of an Elder—even if they were the same age. Jaxen seemed like a nice guy, but why tempt fate?

“Please,” she added.

“Certainly.” Jaxen leaned against the podium and crossed one foot over the other. “I’m happy to tell you The Way will continue alliance negotiations.”

Interesting choice of words. He hadn’t said The Way would give Earth the technology to decontaminate the water supply, only that they’d negotiate, which involved give and take. She didn’t want to imagine what kinds of concessions her people would have to make in the deal.

“And the bad news?” She backed against Aelyx’s body and pulled both his arms around her waist. He hugged her tightly, and she covered his hands with hers, bolting them in place. If his leaders had decided to execute him, they’d have to take her, too.

Jaxen turned his gaze on Aelyx and held it there. “Both you and Syrine will be punished for what you’ve done, a consequence harsher than the iphet but less unpleasant than death.” His lips twitched in a grin as if he’d amused himself. “I convinced the others to let the punishment fit the crime. Since you worked so hard to destroy the alliance, we’re send­ing you back to Earth to help repair it. You’ll have to admit to humans what you’ve done and find a way to earn their forgiveness.”

That didn’t sound so bad.

Jaxen nodded at her and continued. “But Miss Sweeney will return with me to L’eihr, followed by the other two human exchange students.”

Cara felt her eyes widen. “But,” she objected, “I haven’t graduated yet.” And I don’t want to go without Aelyx. She kept the last bit to herself, hesitant to rock the boat—or spaceship, as it were. “Why don’t you send me back to Earth? Then I can help get more people onboard with the alliance . . . maybe even recruit colonists.”

Jaxen grinned. “Persuasive as you are, I’m sure you’d be an asset to Aelyx and Syrine. But completing the exchange now is a show of good faith—a sign that humans trust your safety on L’eihr as we trusted Eron’s safety on Earth.”

Translation: you’re a walking insurance policy. She felt Aelyx tense behind her. He asked, “How long until I can come home and join Cara?”

“As long as it takes,” Jaxen said simply. He studied Aelyx for a few silent seconds before his voice turned smooth and teasing, like they were old friends. “Don’t worry, Aelyx. I’ll take good care of your l’ihan while you’re gone.”

Aelyx didn’t say a word, but the tremor rolling through his rigid muscles spoke volumes. Clearly they weren’t friends at all.

“I’ll leave you two alone.” Jaxen stepped toward her wear­ing a disarming smile. He pressed two fingers against the side of her neck in the standard good-bye, then yanked his hand away and strode briskly from the room.

She spun to face Aelyx, melding their bodies together. “Well, that could’ve gone better. But it could’ve gone a lot worse, too.”

Ignoring her sentiment, Aelyx rubbed a thumb over her throat as if to erase Jaxen’s touch.

“It’s not so bad,” she insisted, trailing one finger along the smooth edge of his jaw. “Think about it. If we were still on Earth, you’d go home in the spring, and I wouldn’t be able to see you again till the fall semester. This way is better.” She kissed the triangle of skin above his shirt collar and breathed him in. “It’ll go by fast. Then we’ll have all the time in the world.”

“Mmm.” He slipped his thumbs beneath the front of her tunic and captured her waist in his palms. “That is something to look forward to.”

“And we still have a little time before you leave.” Which she intended to make the most of, starting now. “I don’t want to spend any more of it in this room.”

“Hey,” Troy said, “you know what’d be really awesome, Alex?”

Cara plopped onto her bed and stretched out, surrendering to a sudden yawn attack. “His name’s Aelyx.”

“Whatever.” Troy rolled his eyes and went back to snoop­ing through her cabinet, which someone had stocked with clean uniforms, toiletries, and silvery gadgets she didn’t know how to use. When he stumbled across a small white packet, he whispered, “Score!” then tore it open and started eating the contents.

Patiently enduring her brother’s assholery, Aelyx smiled and joined her. He pulled her into a chaste cuddle. “What’d be really awesome?”

“If you stopped touching my sister.”

Cara couldn’t help laughing at that. After hightailing it across the globe when she needed him most, then disappear­ing to another galaxy and never e-mailing, Troy thought he could suddenly resume his role as the protective big brother? “Bite me,” she told him with a single-finger salute.

“I’m serious, Pepper. It’s grossing me out.” He shook a metal golf ball at her, identical to the one Tori had found in Aelyx’s underwear drawer all those months ago. “And maybe you can forget what he did, but I can’t.”

“That’s how forgiveness works, nimrod.” Cara nestled her cheek into a magical spot between Aelyx’s chest and shoulder that seemed custom-made for her face. “Kind of like when your brother ditches you for two years, and you keep loving him anyway.”

That shut him up for a few minutes.

While Troy continued perusing her things, the steady rise and fall of Aelyx’s chest and his fingertips stroking her hair lulled her into a trance. She was just drifting to sleep when an obnoxious buzz filled the room. She waited for it to stop, thinking maybe this was the L’eihr equivalent of an alarm clock, but it kept getting louder.

With a groan, she pushed to sitting. “What’s that?”

Aelyx raised one brow and darted a quick glance around the room. “What’s what?”

“Um, the annoying buzz that’s rattling my skull?” She turned to Troy. “You don’t hear it?”

Troy shook his head and smirked, probably gearing up to make a snide remark, when he suddenly said, “Oh,” and gave a slow nod. “Does it seem like someone shoved a beehive up your nose?”

“Yeah.” It kind of did.

“That’s your com-sphere,” Aelyx said, laughing. “You’re the only one who can hear it.”

Troy tossed her the metal golf ball.

“Say your name,” Aelyx told her. “That’s always the default password. You’ll have to reset it later.”

She closed her fingers loosely around the vibrating metal and brought her hand to her lips as if playing an imaginary trumpet. “Cara Sweeney.” Instantly, the humming stopped, and the sphere quit tickling her palm.

“Now set it down.” Aelyx patted a spot on the bed.

She obeyed and backed up a few paces, just in case. Then her jaw dropped and she glanced back and forth between Aelyx and Troy for confirmation that she wasn’t tripping on some weird alien drug. On a scale of one to ten—one being normal and ten being whompass crazy—seeing Mom and Dad flash to life in miniature form right beside her pillow rated a twenty.

“They were cleaning out Aelyx’s room and found his sphere,” Troy said. “I had it reset so they could use it.”

“So they’re real?” She knelt on the floor and gripped her mattress, leaning in to study her tiny parents the way she’d scrutinized bacteria under a microscope in science lab. If she squinted, she could barely make out the living room sofa’s tacky magnolia pattern.

Six-inch Dad scratched his nose. “You’re making me ner­vous, Pepper.”

“Unbelievable.” Sinking back on her heels, she took a moment to absorb what she’d seen but didn’t believe. “Inter-galactic video conferencing.” She extended her palm toward Six-inch Mom, who did the same, giving the illusion of their mismatched hands joining in midair. “I was worried I’d never see you again.”

Mom tried to respond, but her voice hitched, and she tucked her forehead against Dad’s shoulder. Cara’s heart sank as she realized how much pain she’d caused her parents. Now both their children were gone. Aelyx knelt by her side, interlacing their fingers and giving a reassuring squeeze.

He smiled at her parents. “I hope you’re not tired of me yet, because I’m coming back to Earth while Cara takes my place on L’eihr.”

“And it looks like the alliance will go through,” Cara said, “so I can come home to visit when the program’s over.”

Mom took a few moments to let that sink in. “But it’s so sudden—you didn’t even get to pack. Can’t you come home first?”

Cara shook her head but tried to stay upbeat for Mom’s sake. “Lucky for me I’m good at traveling light.” Before she forgot, she added, “Will you tell Tori I said good-bye?”

“She called yesterday,” Mom said, “to let us know Eric’s okay and to see if you’d really left, because she didn’t believe it. When I told her, she did a lot of cursing in Spanish.”

That made Cara smile. “Tell her about the sphere, Mom. She’ll keep it a secret.” Cara wanted to hear her best friend call her a pendeja so badly her chest ached. She wanted to see Tori’s miniature form stamp her high-heeled foot and grip her hips like Wonder Woman. Maybe flip her the bird, too.

Mom promised to invite Tori over for a “conference call,” but because the name Sweeney was still synonymous with traitor, she didn’t know how long it would take for them to arrange it. Tori didn’t want to give the Patriots any reason to doubt her loyalty, and Cara didn’t blame her.

When they finally said good-bye and disconnected, Troy begrudgingly left her alone with Aelyx, but only because it was time for supper—Vina, his favorite. Nothing came between Troy and a good meal, not even the possibility of his kid sister getting lucky during his absence. But before shutting the door, he pointed at the top bunk and announced, “I won’t be gone long. And I’m crashing here tonight, so don’t get your hopes up, Alex.”

Cara grabbed the lump of fabric she’d been using as a makeshift pillow and hurtled it at her brother, but he eas­ily slapped it aside and danced into the hall. Right before disappearing from view, he laughed and called her a dorkus. Maybe he hadn’t matured so much after all.

When she turned to rejoin Aelyx, she noticed a distant glimmer of light winking through the glass porthole behind him, a twinkle that wasn’t there before. The ship must have rotated since they’d returned to the room. She moved closer to identify the source of the light.

Aelyx followed and wrapped both arms around her waist, resting his chin atop her head. He pulled her close, and she felt the steady beat of his heart against her shoulder.

“It’s a planetary nebula,” he said. “A dying star.”

“Wow.” Stars really knew how to go out in style. It was stunning—illuminated wisps of orange and pink clouds form­ing an oval around a center of cornflower blue, like the eye of God staring back at her. “And me with no camera.”

She wished she could enjoy the moment, but a circuit of worries and what-ifs played inside her head like credits at the end of a film. Was she really ready for this—to pack up and move to another galaxy? Unlike Aelyx, she hadn’t researched her new home, and she didn’t know an edible root from a parasitic seedling or how to behave in polite society. Of course, Troy had managed not to single-handedly end alliance negotiations between their planets, so maybe L’eihr standards for manners weren’t as high as Aelyx had led her to believe. But either way, she’d have to navigate this new life without him, and the prospect left her tingling with a mixture of fear and anticipation.

“There’s one visible from L’eihr, too,” Aelyx said. “Bigger and twice as spectacular.”

“Really?”

“Mmm-hmm.” He tightened his hold around her waist. “Every time you see it, I want you to think of me. I’m going to mend that alliance in record time, and soon we’ll stand together, just like this, and we’ll watch the L’eihr sky from our colony.”

It’ll go by fast, Cara repeated to herself. Then we’ll have all the time in the world.

Decades from now, this brief separation would seem like a hiccup. Now wasn’t the time to sulk, not with so much at stake. Once L’eihr and Earth sealed the alliance, she and Aelyx would be together again.

They’d survived so much already—a few measly light-years couldn’t keep them apart.