I sat up straighter, jarred by the abrupt turn of the conversation. “Pardon?”
“Zohro. He was trained as a surgeon back on Zabria. Before Tenn and I were married, we were in a shed on the back of this property and a beam collapsed. It was raining. There was this big storm.” Her voice became choked. She blinked a few times, then continued. “And it wasn’t just Zohro. When Tenn was trapped, I ran back in here. Rivven came hauling ass right back out with me. Not a moment’s hesitation. I’ll never forget the sight of Rivven, down on one knee in the mud, doing everything he could to get that beam off of the person I loved. Not ’til the day I die.”
A heavy silence descended. My eyes drifted to the door that stood closed between Rivven and us.
“Anyway,” Tasha said with a loud sniff. “Xennet and Dorn arrived at just that same moment. Together, they all got the beam off of Tenn and brought him in here where Zohro started getting him fixed up.” Her eyes were shiny, but steady, as they met mine. “I believe to my core that these are good men. All three of them. They’re all different, of course. You’ll get a chance to interact with all three of them before you decide.”
“Decide?”
“Who you want to marry.”
Man. There it was. Just like that. She made it sound so simple. Like it would be nothing but a childhood party game. Like someone would blindfold me, turn me around three times, and then see who I landed on.
“Uh huh,” I replied, glancing away.
“The first round of marriages were assigned,” Tasha explained. “Darcy, Cherry, and Magnolia all had their husbands chosen for them before they arrived. But that was before I knew about this planet’s status as a penal colony. And then, Magnolia fell in love with Oaken’s cousin, Garrek, and they ended up married instead. So, obviously, that method was flawed. Toavoid those sorts of situations in the future, I was planning some kind of social event for the spring. I would have let you attend, of course, but since you were ready now, it made sense for you to come.” Her face took on a thoughtful expression. “But I was thinking, like, a rodeo. Maybe a fair, even. Where interested human women could come and meet the men and, if there was a connection, move forward in the program.”
“What if more women show up than men are available?”
After I made my choice, there would only be two left.
“Oh, there are more men in more provinces than just this one,” she said. “Warden Tenn has five men under his supervision. Silar, Fallon, Garrek, Oaken, and Zohro.” She listed them off on her fingers. “They’re all married now. That was the first province the program was established in. The pilot province, if you will. Warden Hallum has three men here. But there are more wardens, more men. We could expand, if the demand is there. It’s certainly there on the men’s side. But it’s a lot harder to convince women to come here now that I’m making the penal colony thing so upfront. That’s why I made those calendars and sent them out.” She grinned. “I’m so glad they’re already working!”
“Absolutely,” I said noncommittally. Guilt was poking and prodding at me. She had mentioned it again. The “demand.” The desire these guys had for wives. It made sense. They were isolated out here, living alone, essentially exiled from their world since they were children. It wasn’t a surprise that the chance at marriage – companionship, partnership, sex – was so exciting to so many of them.
And I felt like a total asshole. Because that aspect of things hadn’t been exciting to me. At all. It had merely been a necessary component. The hoop I’d have to jump through to live here.
“By the way,” Tasha said, leaning towards me, her voice quieting. “Is there anything we need to know about why youdecided to join this program? I mean, obviously you saw the calendars.” Her eyebrows rose, and I nodded. “But besides that…Is there anything we need to watch out for?”
My brows furrowed. It hurt a bit to do it, the muscles feeling strained from the migraine. “Such as?”
“Such as…Oh, I don’t know…” she said casually. A littletoocasually. “A mafia debt collector on your trail, or something like that. Not that that would be a problem!” she added quickly. “You wouldn’t be excluded from the program for having anything like that in your past. We just need to know if there’s a chance anyone with bad intentions could show up here looking for you.”
“Oh, God, no,” I said. “Nothing like that!”
Tasha looked relieved. So relieved I couldn’t help but wonder if something similar had actually happened with one of the other ladies.
“Great,” she said. “Can I ask, then – other than seeing the calendar, of course – what made you decide to take the leap? Even knowing about the penal colony thing?”
Words stuttered and stopped in my head, sentences coming to false starts before fading.
What was I supposed to tell her?
That basically everyone I’d ever once been close to was dead now? That nothing at all remained to tether me to the sooty, smog-ridden city of my birth? That my real self had been buried under funerals and factory shifts, and that I was only now trying to excavate her with nothing but the bristles of a paintbrush in my hand? That my life had been thrown even further off-course by one shitty man with too much power, and that I was now essentially throwing myself into the power of another man, hoping that would somehow turn it all around?
“I just needed a change,” I said. My throat ached around the words. “I needed…I needed to see a blue sky.”
At that moment, Rivven came through the kitchen door, making both Tasha and I turn our heads.
“Blue,” Tasha murmured with a soft smile, “certainly is a beautiful colour.”
9
RIVVEN
Ihad hoped to make use of the time before Xennet and Dorn arrived. To spend most of it with Shiloh. But it did not happen on that first day. Chores kept me out of her orbit, and when I did have some time to stop and take a break, she was resting upstairs.
In my bed, presumably.
