Born of Sand (Tales of a Dying Star Book 5) (4 page)

"That is a complicated question with a complicated answer." And with that he opened the door and left, the sound of a metal bolt sliding into place behind him.

Mira waited for someone else to follow. No one did.

She looked around her small room, lit with dirty light by the yellow bulb recessed in the ceiling. Worn and rusted metal surrounded her. Aside from her cot, a lone bucket occupied the other corner opposite the door. Mira shuddered when she realized its purpose.

Where was this place? Sand bunched up at the seams where floor and wall met, but that could have been leftover from their desert trek. She could feel a low, pulsing vibration in her feet every few seconds. Distant, like machinery.

The ground
, she remembered. It had opened up before her, and a spaceship had flown out. The more she focused on the memory, the more real it felt. But ships didn't just emerge from the sand. Something had to be there. Farrow had said she found this place randomly. A desert base, hidden beneath the sand?

No, that couldn't be true. Nothing lived out in the desert, nothing but
perrin
roots and carrion birds.
And the sand beasts
. Stingers. Yet she knew what she'd seen.

Laying down on the cot proved difficult with her arms tied behind her back, so she curled up on her side facing the wall. There was no blanket--she wouldn't have been able to cover herself even if there were--but with the room so humid she didn't need one.

The small space reminded her of the room she shared with her girls. She would huddle with them and tell them stories until they fell asleep, and then Mira would stare at the wall, at the cubby hole where she stored all their saved credits. She'd been so hopeful, then.

With good reason
. She'd done all she could, and her daughters were safe.

The memory of the hope felt so real that Mira began considering her future. She'd wandered into the desert because she had no options: she couldn't remain at the Station, not for Bruno's price, and she couldn't go home lest the peacekeepers capture her for thievery. Those had been the only two options available.

But now there was another place, another option. They spoke of the Melisao in a vile tone, here. No matter the color of Spider's eyes he hated them. It was easy to see. Were they fighters, or just trying to survive away from the empire's grip?

And if they have ships...

Mira fell asleep with new hope.

*

Mira woke to new fear.

The screeching door jolted her awake, twisting her head to face the entrance. Spider strode inside with the speed of anger, grabbing her by the hair and pulling her head back to expose her neck. The laser pressed close to the skin, the heat coming off like a stove top. Mira moaned, powerless to give way.

"
How much do they know of this place?
" he asked.

"I don't know anything! Please, I only--"

"What strength did you claim we have? Did you tell them of the Station? How did they know about the electroids there?"

Something had happened. That was immediately clear. Spider wanted to blame someone, and Mira proved an easy target. "I don't know what has happened," she whispered, "I don't know anything. I was only wandering the desert, waiting to die."

He leaned forward until his face almost touched hers. His braids brushed against her skin. The heat from the prod rose, made her skin itch. She could see the bags around Spider's eyes, the white streaked with mostly red. He shook as his rage reached a crescendo.

Abruptly he pulled the prod away and tossed her down. With his other hand he punched the metal wall with a fist and screamed at the top of his lungs, "
AHHHHHHH
."

He whirled and punched the opposite wall, still screaming. He seemed to have forgotten her. Tears began to flow as Mira huddled in the corner like a terrified animal, watching him rage.

Spider picked up the bucket and threw it against the wall, spraying its contents. It bounced around the room hollowly, and he kicked it once, twice, denting the thin metal and pummeling it and finally caving it in underneath a boot. He crouched down and put his head in his hands, squeezing the braids until his knuckles turned white. His body shook with rapid breaths.

When he finally raised his head, his face was a mask of calmness.

"Are you a shade?" he asked quietly.

The sudden shift in temperament terrified Mira more than his anger. She said nothing.

"Are you a shade?" he repeated, rising. "Were you trained in Luccar? On Melis?"

"I don't know what that is," she whispered.

He moved to her, kneeling on the cot and reaching for her. He gripped her jaw with his free hand, and used the other to grab at her eyes. "Hold still," he muttered as she began to whimper. "
Hold still
."

Mira held still, except for her trembling.

Spider used his thumb and pointer finger to open her eyelid, still holding the laser prod in the remaining fingers. He moved one finger and prodded her exposed eye. His gentle touch surprised her. Scared her.

"Please," she said, "I don't know anything."

"Do not move," he warned.

He let go of her jaw and switched the prod to his free hand, aiming toward her left eye. The light filled her vision until it was all she could see. "Please, please, don't..." she muttered. Spider didn't hear, or didn't care, or both. The crackling laser drew closer until she could no longer focus on it. Spider squinted at her in concentration.

Mira's lips moved in silent pleas as the edge of the laser touched the skin inside her eye socket, making a soft
hiss
.

With the precision of a surgeon Spider flicked the laser to the side.

Nothing happened for a long moment. And then darkness filled her eye.

She screamed at the sensation, the blindness and the pain, and rolled back against the wall as if somehow she could get farther away from the man. She rubbed her eye against her shoulder and it left a wet smear, black and red.
My eye is bleeding
. She rolled and screamed and pleaded for what felt like an eternity.

She heard another voice, growing in intensity, shouting at her. "Mother blind me, shut up. Barely a scratch. Wanted to see if your eye was synthetic."

Mira rolled and clutched her face against her shoulder in some semblance of protection.

"
Shut the fuck up.
" He grabbed her by the hair and pulling her up against the wall. Something touched her eye and she shrieked anew, until he slapped her across the cheek.

That had the desired effect, immediately shocking her to silence.

Other voices filled the air, and Spider let go of her to argue with them. Mira clenched her eyes shut so tight her mind seemed to hum and vibrate. Pain like searing fire covered her face.
Oh stars, it hurts!
She heard the sound of rusty hinges miles away.

Mira flinched as someone touched her chest. The person made a shushing sound with their mouth, trying to sooth her. She opened her good eye and saw the last thing she expected to see.

A young girl crouched on the cot, frowning, looking down into her face. "Hold still," the girl said in a voice like a high-pitched whistle. "This won't hurt."

He's gouged my eye
, Mira wanted to shout, but she was so surprised that she did as she was told.

The girl had long eyelashes and couldn't have been more than twelve. She held a bunched-up washcloth in her fist, and reached toward the wounded eye. Mira flinched, but then realized that the girl's touch did not hurt. The pain had somehow gone away.

"There's a lot of blood for not much damage," the girl piped.

"He cut me," Mira whispered. "With the laser."

"Just a nick," the girl said. "On the edge. I have better view than you. It's not bad, I promise."

Mira was just about to tell the girl that she was wrong when she removed the cloth. "Okay then, give us a blink. Go on, now." Mira blinked the eye a few times--which did sting--but after a moment her vision began to return, hazy and blurred. "See? Not too bad! Seen much worse what comes back from the city after a fight."

Tentatively, Mira squinted her eye open and closed, feeling the sting on the lower eyelid. It no longer bled freely, as best as she could tell.

"Who are you?" Mira asked.

The girl leaned back and put a proud hand on her chest. "I am the doctor here," she said haughtily.

"The doctor?"

"Sure as the stars shine! The best one what we have, at least. There's no one else but me."

It felt like a strange juxtaposition having a little girl take care of
her
. Mira had a thousand questions. "What's your name?" was the first.

"Binny. Like the binnytoad what hops down at the shoreline."

"Nice to meet you, Binny. My name's Mira."

Binny nodded solemnly. "I know. We all know. You're all anyone talks about."

"What's a
shade
?" Mira asked. "Spider asked if I was a
shade
."

Binny's eyes grew wide. "
Shades
are the spies bred by the Melisao." She said the word
shade
quieter than the rest, as if by mere mention one might appear. "
Shades
sneak and spook and become whatever they want, with knives and whispers and lies."

Mira forced herself to smile. "Well I'm definitely not a
shade
then."

"You might be!" Binny said, poking her in the chest with her cloth, suddenly angry and afraid. "Farrow says we don't know. That's why Spider has to check. We have to
know
."

She hopped off the cot and disappeared out of the room, the door grinding closed behind her.

Mira laid back down and stared at the wall, not sure what to feel.

*

Hours later the screaming of the door hinges caused Mira to leap to her feet in fright, but it was a hefty woman who slipped inside the door instead of Spider. She held a small yellow bread roll and a metal jug.

"I thought you were Spider," Mira confided, trying to sound friendly. "Don't like him much at all."

The woman said nothing. She placed the metal container on the ground and ripped the bread in half, then into fourths, then held one piece out to the prisoner. Since her hands remained bound, Mira took it with her mouth. She forced herself to chew slowly, savoring the bite, despite her ravenous hunger. It felt like she'd been wandering the desert without food for weeks.

"I saw a spaceship," Mira said after swallowing. "It rose out of the sand like mist, and shot across the desert."

The large woman stared blankly.

"If you have spaceships," she added, "then does that mean you can leave the planet? Fly away, wherever you wanted?"

"If we were fools," she spat. "Melisao don't much like us leaving."

She shoved the next piece of bread into Mira's mouth as if to shut her up. Mira chewed in silence. The woman had the strangest scent, like precious soil, or spices.

"You all can't be bad," Mira eventually said.

She glowered. "What's that supposed mean?"

"You have children here. Any place that has children can't be bad."

The woman snorted. "Fool. You think the Melisao have only adults? Or the pirates on the ice moons of Ouranos? There's children everywhere."

"But
you
," Mira said around another bite of bread, "are not bad. Are you?"

"Good and bad. Good and
evil
. Only words, subjective and incomplete." She bent to pick up the metal container, and lifted it to Mira's lips so she could drink. "A person is not a lamp, to be on or off, one thing or the other. I don't consider myself a bad person, no, but there are plenty who would. And plenty I've done to deserve their scorn." She got a faraway look in her eyes, as though looking through Mira.

"And Spider? He has good in him?" Mira asked.

The woman laughed, pulling back the water and holding up another piece of bread. "Maybe some. Deep down, under all the sand."

Mira mustered what pitifulness she could and said, "He has a look in his eyes. He wants to... do things to me. With his laser."

"He thinks you're a
shade
. He does that same thing as anyone would: whatever they can to protect themselves."

Mira frowned up at the her. "I would never harm someone with a weapon."

She shrugged. "You consider yourself innocent, then?"

"I
am
innocent," Mira insisted. "I'm certainly not bad. I've committed crimes, stolen credits from my factory. But I did so for my daughters. A harmless crime."

The woman fed her the last piece of bread and wiped her hands together. "So a bad deed is excused when performed by you, but not Spider? Do you always judge others based only on their actions, while judging yourself on your intentions?"