Desert Stars (40 page)

Words utterly failed him. How could he
convey the significance of what he had learned? His quest was at an
end; his duty fulfilled. He could return now to his desert home
with a clear conscience and no regrets. How could he adequately
express that?

“
I think I’d rather stay
on the
Bridgette
,” he said instead.

Lars shrugged. “Suit yourself. But if
you ever change your mind, look me up; I can help get you
settled.”

“
Thanks. I’ll remember
that.”

The docking procedure passed in a
blur. The groan of the docking clamps, the hiss as the airlock
opened, the disorienting climb down the ladder upside down—Jalil
was too absorbed in his own thoughts to notice any of it. Only when
his booted feet hit the deck did he return to the
present.

“
So what did you learn?”
Nash asked him as he stepped away from the ladder.

“
What?”

“
Will Farland—what did he
tell you?”

“
Oh.” Jalil blinked and
shook his head. “I learned that he’s my second cousin.”

“
And your
family?”

While Lars walked around them toward
the bridge, Michelle stepped out of the sleeping quarters and
leaned up against Nash. He responded by putting his arm around her
waist and pulling her close.

“
My family?” said Jalil.
“They’re… gone, I suppose. Only one grandmother’s still alive, and
as for aunts, uncles, and cousins, most of them have fled the
system.”

“
Oh wow,” said Michelle,
her voice subdued. “I’m so sorry.”

Jalil shrugged. “There’s no need to
be. They may be my flesh and blood, but I never truly knew
them.”

“
So your real family’s on
Gaia Nova?”

Her comment brought back
an image of his dream—of the Najmi camp, surrounded by verdant
prosperity, and Mira waiting for him to return. He took a deep
breath and swallowed as long-buried emotions flooded back to
him.
Welcome home—welcome home to your
family.

“
Yes,” he whispered. “You
could say that.”

“
Then you should come with
us,” said Nash. “That’s where we’re headed.”

Jalil’s heart skipped a beat, but
before he could say anything, Lars walked over to them.

“
I wouldn’t spend much
time there,” Lars said, his voice grave. “News reports show that
the Hameji are on the move—a sizable fleet just slipped past the
Gaian blockade. Nine to ten says they attack Gaia Nova in less than
a standard month.”

An awful sinking feeling grabbed hold
of Jalil’s gut. He remembered the slagging of Kardunash IV and knew
intuitively that Lars was right.

“
Are you sure?” Nash
asked. “The Gaian Imperial Navy is pulling their fleets back in
from all corners of the Empire. Do you think the Hameji can beat
them?”

“
They haven’t been
defeated yet.”

Save me,
Mira’s words came rushing to Jalil’s mind. Her
desperate pleading from his dream cut him to the core.

“
We have to go back,” he
said, clenching his fists in determination.

Everyone in the corridor stopped and
turned to look at him. “What do you mean?” Nash asked.

“
My family—my real
family—they’re still out in the Gaian Desert. If the Hameji slag
that world like they did K-4…”

His voice trailed off as his voice
caught in his throat. The others said nothing.

“
Please,” he continued, “I
can’t save them without your help. I don’t know how I could ever
repay you, but if we do nothing, my family is going to
die!”

Nash looked down at Michelle, who
nodded. He turned back to Jalil.

“
Sure, we can help you. It
shouldn’t be too hard. ‘Chelle can take you down on the shuttle
while I take care of my own business from orbit.”

“
Besides,” said Michelle
with a small smile, “you’re one of us now.”

Jalil felt so giddy with excitement he
was almost ready to fly to Gaia Nova on his own.

“
Thank you,” he said. “A
thousand times, thank you.”

Nash shrugged. “Don’t mention it. It’s
the least we could do.”

“
It’s also the most you
could do.”

They all laughed at that. Lars slapped
Jalil on the back. “Well, I suppose that settles things. It’s been
good knowing you, friend; I wish you the best of luck.”

“
God-willing,” Jalil
muttered as he took Lars’s offered hand and shook it. Even so, he
could think of nothing other than Mira and the desperation written
on her face in his dream.

Save me.

Part VI

Chapter 19

As Mira finished packing the last of
her meager belongings, Rina peeked in through the shrouded doorway.
Her eyes widened, and she hesitated only a moment before coming
inside.

“
Are you going to leave
now?” she asked.

“
I’m afraid
so.”

“
But—but where are you
going?”

Mira smiled to hide—or perhaps
deny—her growing anxiety. “Far away,” she said, putting a hand on
her sister’s shoulder. “Do you remember the temple?”

Rina nodded wordlessly.

“
There’s a giant glass
mountain next to it, where the land is covered in water. Aunt Nawal
lives there, on a mountain surrounded by the sea. That’s where I’m
going.”

“
But when will you come
back?”

A lump rose in Mira’s throat. Rina’s
young eyes pleaded with her to stay, but after all that had
happened, she knew that it would be impossible.

“
I’m not coming back,
Rina,” she whispered. “I can’t.”

Rina’s face scrunched up as if she
would burst out crying at any moment. Instead, she buried her head
in Mira’s shoulder. Mira wrapped her arms around her and held her
close, consoling her without words.

“
I’m going to miss you,”
Rina said, her voice thick with unshed tears.

“
Me, too.”

After a long while, Rina let go and
stood back. “Majd says you did something evil. She says you’re
leaving because Mother and Father are ashamed of you.”

Mira rose to her feet, trying in vain
to quell the bitterness in her heart. She hefted her bags and
looked Rina in the eye.

“
You’re going to hear a
lot of bad things about me when I’m gone. None of them are
true.”

Rina nodded. “I know. I don’t believe
them.”

They looked at each other for a moment
before she clamped onto Mira’s knees. “Please don’t go,” she cried.
“I don’t want you to go—please don’t!”

Mira reached down and ran her fingers
through Rina’s hair. “This isn’t goodbye forever,” she said softly.
“When you make the pilgrimage, come visit me. I’ll be
there.”

“
I will—I
will!”

“
Mira!” came
Shira
’s harsh voice from around
the corner. “Get a move on—we don’t have all day!”

“
Coming,
Mother.”

“
I’m not your mother
anymore, you worthless bitch!”

Mira sighed.
Shira
’s insults no longer stung,
but they did fill her heart with an awful hollowness. She gently
ushered Rina aside and stepped out into the corridor.

The predawn sky glowed
with the promise of day. Outside, the merchants loaded the last of
the supplies onto their hovercraft and checked the vehicles’ gun
turrets in the chill morning air.
Shira
waited next
to the door with Sathi, her arms folded. No one else had come to
see Mira off, though she had no doubt they were watching her
through the peephole.

Her father nodded and gave her a sad
smile, while her mother stared ahead impassively. Mira almost
stared at the ground as she walked past them, but decided instead
to lift her gaze and meet their eyes, unflinching. Rina might be
watching, after all, and she wanted her sister to know that she
wasn’t ashamed.

“
Is the convoy loaded?”
she asked, her voice soft. Her father nodded slowly.
Shira
said nothing.

Mira turned and looked over the camp
that had been her home for so long. Strange to think how it had
once been her entire world; after all she had seen and been
through, it seemed little more than a ramshackle settlement on the
edge of nowhere.

Perhaps it was for the best that she
was leaving. She’d already arranged (in secret, of course) for the
convoy to take her to New Amman. Even if news of her exile had
spread that far, her cousin Sarah was a city dweller and was far
removed from the tribal politics of the deep desert. Mira could
already imagine the cool evening breeze blowing in off the cliff as
the yellow lights inside of Aliet Dome gave the glass mountain its
soft, starlike glow. And even if Sarah didn’t take her in, Mira
would find a way. That much was clear to her now—whatever happened,
she would find a way.

We all live in the world
of our own choosing.

As she crossed the dusty compound, a
movement out by the horizon caught her eye. It seemed almost like
one of the birds from Etilan Dome—but no, that was impossible;
there were no birds in the desert. Still, she turned her head to
get a better look.

What she saw made her stop cold in her
steps.

A tiny black dot circled around the
nearest mesa and approached the camp with a speed hundreds of times
that of any caravaneer. As it drew closer, the men of the merchant
convoy scattered and ran for their guns, yelling in New Gaian as
they prepared for an attack. Sathi turned and sprinted toward the
front entryway, shouting orders.

Mira barely noticed any of that,
however. She stood transfixed as the shuttle approached, heart
pounding in her chest for reasons she couldn’t understand. It was
close enough for her to make out the wings now, much like the plane
that had taken her from Terra 2 Dome to the New Amman spaceport. As
it came within a hundred yards, the jets on the bottom of the craft
angled to slow it down, the blast of hot exhaust making the air
shimmer and ripple. The merchants swung their gun turrets toward
the shuttle, but held off firing as it slowly touched down not
twenty feet from where Mira stood.

As the dust settled and the roar of
the jets slowly died down, the sound of shouting came from behind
her. She hardly noticed, however; the still-humming shuttle seemed
so alien and out of place, here on the edge of nowhere.

“
Mira! Mira, what are you
doing?” a voice called out from the tents. It was her
father.

She turned and saw that
the whole camp had been raised. Surayya and Amina, Tiera and
Zayne,
Shira
and the younger girls—even
old Zeid came hobbling out to get a better look. They all had the
same incredulous expressions on their faces—an expression that Mira
herself no doubt shared.

She turned and squinted against the
sun, lifting her hand to block out the blinding light of the
dawning sun. A single figure stepped out from around the back of
the shuttle, brilliant rays of light shining from behind him. Mira
frowned, but as the figure drew closer, her heart skipped a beat
and her legs went weak. Even though she couldn’t make out his face,
from the way he walked, she knew him immediately.

It was Jalil.

* * * * *

“
Mira?”

Jalil’s breath caught in his throat,
and his heart leaped in his chest. Even in her headscarf, with her
hand partially obscuring her face for the sunlight, he knew that it
was her.

He started forward toward her, but
Sathi intercepted him, arms wide with a smile quickly spreading
across his face.

“
Jalil, my son! My son
from the stars! Habibi!”

Within moments, Jalil found himself
locked in a warm embrace. He stuttered and fumbled his greetings,
but the rest of the family soon swarmed him, driving him even
further away from Mira.

“
Jalil? Is that
you?”

“
How did you—”

“
My baby!”

Zayne pushed her way through the
others and threw her arms around him, tears streaming down her
cheeks. Jalil almost cried himself, the emotion on her face was so
palpable.

Away from the crowd, Sathi
and
Shira
conferred quietly with each
other. His father nodded to Mira, who picked up her bags and headed
back for the camp—but not before stealing a hurried glance at him.
Their eyes met, and for all the bustle and activity around him,
nothing else mattered.

But why was she carrying bags out
here? He looked over his shoulder at the merchant convoy, now
rumbling off. These weren’t people they knew—it just didn’t make
sense.

“
And who’s
this?”

His mother’s question brought him back
to the more immediate present. Michelle had disembarked from the
shuttle, and now stood a short distance away from the others, arms
folded.