The starlight remains in his eyes. And he’s glowing. Completely lit up, his body swirling with those cosmic colors again. He wears a strained, confounded expression as if he got what he came for but doesn’t understand how it happened.
“You’re glowing again,” I whisper as if he doesn’t know.
“Map it!”
The King paces before us. He gives Gamalt a long, curious stare as he stands beside him.
“Why has it not gone away?” He gestures to Gam’s body.
“She is compatible, my King.”
“Impossible.”
Everything but urgent curiosity fades from me as I look between them. “Compatible? With what?”
“Map it.”
They ignore me as Gamalt rises to his full height and circles his hands in a deliberate pattern in the air. I blink, sure I’m hallucinating, as strands of light appear in mid-air. He seems to manipulate them into a diagram that flows into some sort of cosmic map. It flows through galaxies and planets that I don’t recognize, but then I see it, clear as day. The Milky Way. My home galaxy.
Tears well in my eyes at the familiar shape of muted colors and stars. The map flows past the Milky Way and planets I first learned in kindergarten appear before my eyes. There’s my sun, my moon. My home.
Earth.
Tears roll down my cheeks.
Gam rotates the figure of Earth in the air, turns it top over bottom and around and around. The more he manipulates it, the faster my tears fall. Glancing at me, he pauses to watch my face. Pulling away from the map, he turns to me and drops to one knee. Taking my face between his huge hands, he wipes at my tears and looks at his wet fingertips.
“Why are you leaking?”
I don’t have an answer. No, that’s not it. I have many answers, but I don’t want to share anything with him or the King. I want to be alone, away from here so I can’t see what they might do to my planet.
“I’m not.”
“Clearly, you are.”
I shake my head determinedly. “Nope.”
“It makes me feel urgency when you leak. As if I must make it stop.”
“Then get rid of that map.”
The King is doing something with a small handheld device. Copying the map, I think. It dissolves from the air. He smiles self-satisfactorily.
Gamalt stands and his colors begin to fade.
“This planet is your home?”
My eyes burn now, and I can’t stop my lower lip from trembling. Some Assassin Krunch I am.
I turn away and that must be enough confirmation for the King. He makes a satisfied sound.
“Let’s keep this Earthling, see if she can be useful. I fear Maneshha will take retribution for the failed wedding and when she does, we will be ready to fight.”
“She has already planned threats against the palace, my King. My fears align with yours. She will escalate.”
“Make sure the assassin is ready for battle. And Gamalt, watch yourself.”
My stomach sinks. They want me to fight the crazy lady, maybe infiltrate her fortress and off her?
