The ship was actually easy to find. On the west end of the lake, down an unmarked gravel road, up a rocky rise, in the shadow of a stand of pines, a shiny, silver, saucer-shaped craft was parked between two large boulders.
I tied my hair back and got out of the van. I didn’t take anything with me, not even my guitar or the little patchwork pursethat I’d made out of a pair of old blue jeans. I left the door of the van open and walked toward my destiny.
I didn’t get any vibes from the ship. I didn’t ask myself who was inside or what they might want from me. I didn’t have any expectations of what I would find when I reached it. I wasn’t even thinking—as I should have been—about collecting an alien folk song or two to add to my catalog.
Did Iwantto be abducted?
I’ve had a lot of time to think about this. I’m not sure exactly how long. Definitely months, maybe years. And I’ve decided that I must have expected that I would stay on Earth, because I would have shut the door to the van if I knew that I’d never come back. If I knew that I’d be taken, locked in a cage, and whisked away.
Sometimes, when I can’t sleep because the pins-and-needles in my fingers and toes are pricking me too sharply, I think about that van and whether it’s still there at the end of that road, the driver’s seat upholstery getting soaked by Wyoming thunderstorms. Birds making nests on the dashboard, mold growing on the floor mats. My guitar’s spruce soundboard softening and splitting.
And I work out answers to all the questions that nag at me.
Do my parents think I’m still off on my graduate-school road trip, out of touch because I’m out of dimes for the payphone?
I think they do.
Was Gary relieved when he got back to camp and saw that I was gone?
I think he was.
I turn over in my tiny cage, my shoulder pressing painfully into the wire mesh of the floor. I can’t stretch my arms out fully, and I think that’s part of the reason why my fingers always feel like they’re asleep. Or maybe they know they’ll never play music again, so they’ve decided their usefulness is at an end and have walked off the job.
But I’m also sick, really sick. My stomach hurts all the time, and when the aliens let me out to exercise, my muscles don’t work right. They make their laugh-sound when I stumble and flail, like I’m doing it to clown around, but I really can’t help it. Even though I am desperately thin now, skinny enough to count my ribs, I’m never hungry for the sharp, gray-green cubes they feed me. They hurt my mouth and they hurt my stomach and they hurt coming out the other end, too.
Every day, I think I’m not going to make it to the next day. But then every day, I do.
Chapter 2
Oljin
The High Priest smells of the cold season, of rain on earth, of rotting grass. Why do the priests who worship our star always stink of the dark?
“The signs should be clear to you,” he says, frowning at me and my younger brother, Chanísh. “Your father reported a strong scent, an undeniable urge. A sort of magnetic pull on his heart toward his queen.”
Behind us, my mother, Honhura, Alara of our planet, goddess-given queen of us all, gasps and sobs into the tail of her headscarf as she slumps on the blackrock throne. I want to comfort her, but I know she’ll push me away. Since my father died, she has been inconsolable, unwilling to accept any affection from me and my brother. Unwilling to make any decisions regarding the rule of our planet.
I want nothing more than to shoulder this burden for her, but I cannot take the throne until the goddess shows which son of Grenzar she favors. Most believe it will be me, the oldest. But I have spent enough hours studying in the archives to know that this is not always the case. Sometimes the goddess favors a younger son or even shines on someone not of the royal line. Perhaps neither of us will be Jara.
One thing is certain. It has never taken this long for the goddess to reveal a new queen. Perhaps Alioth wishes my mother to rule, even in all her devastation. Perhaps she believesboth Chanísh and I are unfit to lead. Or perhaps the goddess is testing us. Testing our patience. Testing our faith in her.
“It is your duty to seek out your Alara,” the High Priest drones. “Pursue your fated queen to the utmost. Report any symptoms of the bond that you experience directly to the temple. Even if you are not certain, we can assess the female and determine whether she is goddess-blessed.”
Chanísh kneels and presses his forehead to the floor. “May Alioth illuminate my path,” he says reverently. Hope echoes in his tone, although his skin does not betray his feelings. He doesn’t meet my eyes when he rises.
The priest turns to me with a frown as dark as his black cloak. “You do not pray for your queen?”
I shrug. “The goddess knows her own designs. She will favor me or she won’t, but begging for it won’t change her mind.”
The priest glowers. “Alioth rewards the faithful with her smile.”
I can’t help looking at my mother on the throne, broken and shadowed. The goddess did that to her chosen one. I’m not sure I wish that on any female, especially not one I loved.
“Her teeth are sharp,” I recite. It’s one of the oldest sayings in our language, but it’s taken on a new, more painful meaning lately, now that I’ve seen what her blessing has done to my mother.
I turn to Chanísh. “Will you join me to negotiate with Frath?” The nearby planet sent some of their highest-ranked leaders to establish a trade partnership with the new Jara. Unfortunately, we still don’t know who that will be.
“No. I have better things to do, like seek my queen.” He’s rewarded with a bow from the high priest, who is ready torevere him, it seems. But I know the path Chanísh will take from the palace leads straight to a pleasure house. Who knows, maybe he’ll find his queen there. Even I have to admit the pleasure houses are full of more eligible females than the Frathik delegation.
