CHANGELING: Book Two in the Weaver Series Read online

  Needless to say we were late to the Hub.

  Flotsam and Jetsam gave us a double death ray glare for keeping them waiting and didn’t pick up on the fact that Kal hadn’t had a grip on our arm when we ‘ported up. With bad grace Flotsam reached out to take our bicep in her usual perfunctory grip but Cass took a step back.

  “We can do it on our own…same place as always, right?”

  The sisters stiffened in unison and gave each other a searching look. They seemed unsure if they should report immediately or take us to the Hub and then report. One thing was for certain—we were seeing Sil today in the lab.

  I didn’t want to wait and neither did Cass so we shot Kal a parting smile and pulled The Atrium to the front of our mind. The light shining into the open oval where students and staff alike congregated to visit in person sprang to life. We usually materialized with our guards in the same spot daily. Symbols on the ground that meant nothing to us marked designated areas for arrival. Perhaps it was to avoid teleporting into an occupied space? Cass kept our eyes closed as we jumped. It felt like our innards took a dip in an elevator.

  Our ears heard the echoing sounds of conversation and all of the tiny noises of life being lived. I sensed a disturbance in the air pressure behind us. A heavy hand wrapped around the back of our neck, pressing the still wet strands of our hair that had slipped sneakily under our collar onto our nape. A shiver went down our spine at the unexpected cold. Warm breath caressed our left ear before Jetsam spoke.

  “You will not do that again or I will break your arms and claim you fell.”

  I felt the grip at our collar tighten right before she pushed us several stumbling steps forward. Cass drew us up straight and proud then turned to our guards. I could feel our face was blank and hard like panel of bulletproof glass.

  “How novel—an empty threat, because we never hear those.”

  Flotsam lurched toward us and Jetsam snagged her elbow.

  “Fid Tal will be hearing of this.”

  I shrugged our shoulders and Cass said, “No doubt. She hears about everything.”

  We turned our back and raised our wrist to consult our schedule as if they were no longer there. The corners of our eyes picked up the decreased activity around us. Mez was nowhere in sight. My outlook for the day dimmed as if gunmetal rain clouds had covered the sun.

  Cass cracked wise and said, “Wow, you’ve got it bad, Silver. Don’t worry about Butthead. He’s probably in class or something. We’re really late. Do you think we should find a nook and wait until the first Web session is over? It’s too confusing to meld in on the end of a lecture.”

  “Sounds good, Sister.”

  I was only half listening and my twin tossed me a mental eye roll which I ignored. Our second session of the day was Mathematical Communication. We usually sat back and let our mind wander unless the instructor called on us. For that class the professor was a short, round, blueberry-skinned bearded gentlemen from a planet called Clarion. His facial hair was pure white and wiggled under his nose like a symbiotic life form. In person he reminded us of a Walrus Napoleon. We were very careful not to think that unofficial title in class. He’d tried to catch us out a few times in discussions but after we proved we were paying attention he left us to our position on the outskirts of every lesson.

  Cass and I learned best from the outside looking in. That said loads about our life but I wasn’t into psychoanalysis and neither was my twin. We ended up claiming the same nook we’d ambushed Mez in. Just because we didn’t want to be bothered Cass cloaked us in a light field. It turned out we weren’t the only students running late. As we settled on a firm slate blue cushion several black robes blurred past. My sister took deep breaths to center our sense of self and then entered the Web to go over our last lesson on binary etiquette. It was boring but it was one of the classes Sil suggested so we were stuck.

  After a suitable amount of self-torture Cass and I left the brilliant endless mindscape of the Web to reconnect with the sensations of the physical. The first sense to come back was hearing. We froze as a voice we recognized spoke directly in front of us. I opened our eyes to an up close view of powder blue cloth. Pez was nearly on top of us so he blocked our view of the person he was speaking with.

  “I hope like Hell he doesn’t decide to sit down, Silver.”

  “Shhh, listen to what he’s saying.”

  The person we couldn’t see was male and his deep low voice didn’t sound familiar.

  “You have had ample time, Pez. Fid Tal knows nothing. Her incompetence only proves our point and serves our purpose. There is no excuse for your failure. We need that research. Kai was only the first step—we must take the next.” The unknown Aniy’s tone was urgent and filled with fervor.

  Pez moved closer to us—so close his kaftan rubbed against the black cloth stretched over our knees and Cass held our breath. I didn’t believe Pez to be particularly smart or gifted but what if his companion was? Kal had picked us out of seeming thin air when he thought we were an intruder. Terror at being exposed licked through our limbs and locked our joints in place until I reminded my twin we could just bend ourselves somewhere else. The scent of ozone would give us away though so we stayed the course and kept our ears and eyes open. It would be better for Kal and his strategy—whatever that might be—if they never even knew they’d been overheard.

  “Do not presume to pressure me. Kai was a disaster. Look what Sil’s experimentation got them—a lunatic escaped to a nothing planet and a mess to clean up. You would do well to move on. There are other ways to further our cause than turning ourselves into genetic garbage.” Disdain coated every syllable.

  The unknown conspirator sucked in a breath so sharply it sounded painful.

  “If Kai were here you would not dare to speak that way.”

  Smug satisfaction filled the air as Pez replied, “He is not here and he no longer matters. He has become irrelevant.”

  A beeping broke the tension. Pez looked to his wrist above us in confusion. Our heart careened around in our chest like a .22 caliber bullet. It was our alarm for second session. Pez turned and we got a glimpse of the Aniy he’d been blocking with his body. We had time for the barest impression of an anger-clouded face with full cheeks and a crooked fighter’s nose. He swiped an arm through the empty air over our head.

  The unknown man snapped, “You idiot!” then disappeared, leaving the strong scent of ozone in the small horseshoe shaped study nook.

  Our adrenaline spike kept us from thinking straight and we couldn’t picture anything in our minds but the blackness of fear. Cass sprung to the side and towards the floor, aiming for the students passing by on the tier. Pez’s arm just missed us on the down stroke as we brushed against his robes. I tucked our head into our chest as we rolled from the couch and then scurried like a rat on all fours. The thing about living on a planet of tall beings was that they always aimed high. Traffic was picking up so hopefully we could get lost in the crowd. Pez couldn’t very well chase us without raising eyebrows.

  We pushed ourselves to our feet and darted into the center of a group of passing students. They didn’t even feel us as we kept their pace. I risked a quick head turn backwards and Pez was gone. Just to be on the safe side Cass kept our light field up until we got to class. It was hard to lie still and become centered. Every little noise as other students settled in around us was a distraction. Finally I took control and yanked us both into the Web.

  Mathematical Communications was even more of a torture than normal as Walrus Napoleon waxed prophetic on the importance of passing on broad truths rather than societal rules when establishing first contact with a new civilization. Our instructor’s Web presence was a dull unpolished blue and his voice droned as if he were trying to crush us with the influx of information he regurgitated. Cass wanted to just leave but I urged against it.

  “You know more than Fid Tal watches us, Sister. If we change our routine someone will notice. Kal would say to hold tight.”

>   “Who the Hell is Kai? Is that Shiva and what does Sil have to do with his genetic makeup, Silver?”

  Our minds were so tightly locked down from outside interference I imagined us as a slick glassy surface coated in oil. Now was the time to think not panic. We were going to have to get better at controlling our emotions in stressful situations. Not being able to concentrate enough to teleport had been a major fail in my book.

  Cass agreed. “We’ll have to ask Kal or something.”

  Walrus Napoleon noticed our distraction and lobbed a question our way. I answered with one half of my mind as the other half re-analyzed the unknown Aniy’s words. It hadn’t escaped us that the name Kai was close to the name Kal. What if this was another relation of our guardian’s?

  With the Aniy custom of multiple marriages with multiple partners there was no telling. Sil had said Kal’s father had many wives and many children before the Bindao struck.

  Cass asked, “So you think Kal is related to Shiva?”

  “That’s assuming Kai is Shiva, but yes.”

  “Well how many renegade Axsians are there on Earth?”

  “Save it for later, Cass. Let’s pretend to pay attention. I don’t want Walrus Napoleon to flunk us because we aren’t taking him seriously.”

  Our class was sort of beautiful. The dull blue sphere of our instructor was the epicenter of a mini galaxy of Weavers. In here none of us were that different. Our lights shown in various colors and sizes but we were all pure intellect cast in an oasis of infinite space.

  The lesson ended and we opened our eyes to a looming face. Cass jerked in surprise and then her anger bloomed like a weeds in a vacant lot. I recognized Mez immediately but for my twin it had brought to mind Laser Eyes leaning over us before the torture. To forestall Cass’s instinctual need to retaliate physically I lifted our head up and grazed Mez’s lips with ours. The soft but firm warmth of his mouth felt right and microscopic lava flows erupted in our navel.

  My sister fled leaving an aftershock of disgust and indignation.

  Mez leaned closer when I would have pulled away and tangled a hand that was big enough to palm our skull into our hair. His fingers cradled our neck gently as if we might break. The kiss lasted for a few more seconds and I was sad when our lips parted. I could go for this kissing business.

  I felt lazy and unsatisfied at the same time. His eyes were like shining black sapphires, reflecting back two identical versions of our face with an expression I didn’t recognize. He chuckled and insecurity reared its ugly head.

  “What? Did I do it wrong?” My voice was on the edge of becoming a squeak.

  Mez’s mouth slid sideways and his chin dimpled. “No. You did it very right.”

  I relaxed into the lounger and the feel of his fingers still tangled in my hair was warm verging on the precipice of sweaty. Maybe Mez was nervous, too. My gaze wandered around the class with its white marble walls and twelve foot ceiling. Walrus Napoleon was wiggling his white mustache in disapproval at the front of the room. A curious mix of anger and embarrassment made our cheeks feel hot. I rocked our head in Mez’s fingers playfully.

  “Move so I can get us up.”

  He pulled a few hairs out as we separated his movements jerky and awkward.

  Cass popped back in. “Are you done? That was disgusting.”

  Mez stood, and then pulled us upright by a wrist.

  Out loud my twin said, “Don’t think you’re forgiven just because Silver kissed you, Butthead. Even if it was all pretend you still enjoyed yourself a little bit too much with the shenanigans.”

  We noticed one of Mez’s hangers-on loitering by the entry arch. My sister supplied the name—Wyl. His body seemed frozen in time as if an omnipotent watcher had pushed the pause button just on him. He was the biggest, oldest one of the group and the silent instigator for most of the pranks we’d suffered through. Wyl’s reddish-brown hair was back in a low ponytail exposing a square jaw and accentuating the long dusky slope of his forehead.

  When Mez turned to see what had attracted our attention Wyl clicked his teeth and hissed before backing up into a passing student and then melting into the sea of black.

  I strode toward the arch when I spied our teacher making his way from the front of the room, expression saturnine. Mez’s long legs only needed one extended step to catch up. Totally not fair.

  Cass gave a short hard sound that resembled an aborted laugh. “I guess the cat’s outta the bag now. You think he’ll run and tell your mommy?”

  I angled our head up to see his expression and noticed the top of our head was almost even with his armpit. Times like these I was sorely tempted to give in to Cass’s badgering about manipulating our body to grow us even just a tiny bit taller. The memory of escaping Pez in the study nook was too fresh though, so I shredded the idle thought like confetti.

  Mez gave a sinuous neck weave. “It is likely. I cannot fault Wyl for it or any of the others. Their families are dependent upon the Fid’s good will—which is notoriously fickle.”

  His lips weren’t moving like a badly dubbed Kung Fu movie, they actually matched his words. We were so used to everyone but Kal speaking in a tongue the translator had to convert that it was a shock. The same slur of certain consonants peppered throughout our guardian’s English was present in Mez’s pronunciation.

  Mez shortened his stride and snaked a hand around our back to settle against our left shoulder blade as we moved in and around the other students. Our animosity was no secret and everyone knew who Mez’s mother was, so the double takes and whispers where no surprise. We continued walking down, not up, on the open railed walkway. Cass liked to think of it as a slinky that spiraled all the way to the Atrium floor.

  All of a sudden Mez doubled over with a gasp like he’d been sucker punched in the gut.

  “What is it? What’s wrong?” Though she wouldn’t admit it, even Cass was concerned.

  His knees buckled and he wrapped one long arm around our waist to bury his face in our stomach. I placed both hands on his sleek shining black hair. We were really getting stares now.

  “Mez, what is it?” He was squeezing us so tightly it was getting hard to draw a breath. Muffled sounds of speech vibrated against our abdomen as Mez rubbed his forehead side to side.

  “We can’t understand you, Butthead.” Cass was getting worried.

  He stopped shaking his head and reared back to reveal a face destroyed by some strong emotion. “My mother—she is calling me. I refuse to go.”

  The idea of someone being able to yank us somewhere without our permission was anathema—immediately Cass switched gears to team Mez. Kal had fleshed with Gerome to pull us through the Web and out of our Warp prison cell well over a year ago. Kal had also called Jaz to him when we were attacked by the poisonous vines our first day in Denu. It was impressive that Mez could hold out against his mother’s will but obviously he was hanging on by his fingernails. I had an idea.

  “Would it help if we bend somewhere else?” Cass asked.

  Mez’s brow crumbled inward like a prune as he strained to speak. “I cannot concentrate to take us anywhere.”

  We were gathering a crowd now and a random person asked if we needed help. Cass barked out a ‘no’ then held out a palm so they would keep their distance. This was getting out of hand.

  “We’re taking you to Kal. Hold tight.” Both of his arms encircled our waist, curling around to end in fists of our sash. Mez’s breathing was uneven and shallow as if pain wracked his body.

  Cass took off to warn our guardian and I gathered all my memories to picture our room in shimmering dim detail. Doubt crept in that we could carry a rider but I firmed my resolve—we had the Bindao and I had to believe that would offset any newbie fumble I made. Once our location was set and as real as it could get without actually being there, the periphery of my vision began to crumble and flake. Slowly our warren took shape as the teleportation became complete. I looked down and laughed. Maybe because it was a place I had already �
�ported we’d ended up on our bed. Mez shifted his grip around our waist and the soft mattress under our feet gave too much. Felled trees probably descended with more grace than I did in that moment.

  On the way down a knee hit something bony and I heard Mez grunt in reaction. I struggled back into a sitting position and tried to straighten our robes at the same time.

  “Are you okay, Mez?” I was breathless with exultation at my first successful ‘port with a rider and more than happy that I hadn’t scrambled our bodies into molecular soup.

  Cupping his jaw with a bemused smile, Mez answered, “I can’t feel the call anymore.” The puzzled happy expression evaporated and he frowned. “When were you going to tell me that you can bend, Leoght Cor?”

  “Uhhh, it’s recent and we’ve been busy.” It sounded like the excuse it was.

  He extended a hand. When I slid fingers into his, both of our palms were clammy. Mez yanked us forward onto our knees then got us standing again. His black on black eyes searched ours, pitiful and beseeching.

  “You don’t trust me yet?”

  I might’ve thought he was really hurt but his full lips twitched. I palmed Mez’s face and jumped off the bed to run right smack into Kal’s chest. Neither of us had heard him enter the room. Cass popped back into our head.

  “Is Mez okay?”

  She seemed worried until I threw the memory of my first bend with a rider her way. Then she was anxious.

  “Silver, I’m not happy about the chance we just took! Neither one of us knows what the Hell we’re doing. What if you killed Mez and us?”

  The shrillness of my sister’s mental voice made me want to cover our ears. Instead I swatted Kal’s hands away from our shoulders and plopped into our brown chair to say out loud, “Seriously, Cass? There’s a first time for everything. Stop worrying about it. Nothing bad happened. Mez and I made it in one piece and the teleportation interrupted Her Highness’s pull on him. It’s all good.”