Chapter One
Lydia
I’ve fucked up. Badly.
I’m frozen partway down the ladder that leads from Killan’s house to the sunken forest. I’m gripping the railing so tightly my knuckles pale, and my fingers ache in protest. My heart pounds in my chest, and my internal voice shouts at me for thinking today would be a good day to face my lifelong fear of heights.
I’d been so lonely, though, trapped inside with nothing to do but sulk about the failure of LOVE GALAXY. Smith abandoned us almost two months ago, and nothing’s changed since then. I’m still trapped on Ril II, with no idea of how to get back to Earth.
I hate it here. It’s windy all the time, a howling wind that sucks the soul out of everything it touches. Nothing can grow on the planet’s surface, and there’s dust everywhere, which wreaks havoc with my asthma. If I want to keep breathing, I’ve got to stay underground, away from the wind.
The problem is there’s not much to do underground. There’s Killan’s house, where I’ve been staying, which is connected to Sorin’s and Roan’s smaller cottages by tunnels. There’s the algae farm.
And then there’s the forest.
It’s growing in an enormous collapsed cave, the trees protected from the wind by the cave walls that stretch many meters overhead. Unfortunately, the only way down into the forest is via a ladder, and it’s that ladder I’m clinging to, too scared to keep moving in case I slip.
I’m definitely up high enough that I’d die if I fell.
I scrunch my eyes closed and release a ragged breath, as sweat prickles my forehead and drips in rivulets down my spine.
Briar and Harlee have been sweet, attempting to sympathize with my feelings. But it isn’t the same now they’re both happily in relationships and pleased to be staying on Ril II.
Sorin and Roan, their alien boyfriends, have been avoiding me. At first, it was subtle enough that I convinced myself I was imagining their reluctance to remain in the same room as me for long. But almost two months of them coming up with excuses to escape my presence, and I know I’m not being paranoid.
Not that I can blame them. I’d hate my company if I were them.
And Killan…
Killan is frustrating. He’s never hidden his dislike of me, preferring to pick fights than to keep his distance. It’s not my fault LOVE GALAXY imploded. And it’s not my fault Smith crept away in the middle of the night, abandoning us Humans with no way of returning to Earth.
I’m stuck on this stupid windswept planet with nothing more than a few clothes and toiletries. I don’t have any money. I don’t have any way of communicating with anyone off-world. Everything I eat and drink is provided by Killan. Every night,when I go to sleep, I’m sleeping in Killan’s bed. And every time I shower or flush the toilet, it’s Killan’s water I’m using.
I hate every second of it.
I hate having to rely on the charity of a man who resents me being in his home.
So that’s why I’m here, clinging to the ladder as my hands slowly grow slick with panic-sweat, terrified I’m going to fall. I needed to get out of Killan’s house, at least for a little while. And the forest is the only place on this entire planet that provides some semblance of privacy. If only I wasn’t so fucking scared of heights.
Distant voices echo through one of the tunnels, and I wince. The only way this day could get any worse is if someone were to find me like this.
Painfully slowly, I slide one hand a few inches up the railing, hoping that I’m closer to the mezzanine than to the cave floor and that I’ve got some chance of returning to Killan’s kitchen before I’m discovered.
“…a commitment ceremony,” Roan is saying as he steps from the tunnel into the forest cavern. By the sound of it, he’s come from the direction of the underground lakes, where the algae farm is.
“You are Mates,” Killan answers, and my stomach sinks. Of course, he’d be the one to find me. “A ceremony would change nothing.”
“I know that,” Roan says.
Their footsteps pause, and I guess that Roan has turned around to glare at Killan. “But it is important to Harlee, and so it is important to me.”
I glance down. They’re standing at the base of the ladder, and I catch a glimpse of green scales before my muscles tense with renewed fear at the sight of the long drop. Quickly, I returnto staring straight ahead at the rock wall to which the ladder is attached.
“A wett-ing ceremony?” comes Killan’s incredulous voice. It echoes a little in the cavernous space. I can hear their conversation almost as clearly as if they were standing directly behind me.
Still, it takes me a moment to realize he was trying to say “wedding,” but he butchered the pronunciation of the unfamiliar English word. Evidently, there isn’t an equivalent word in his own language, or he’d have used the translation instead.
“We exchange fingers,” Roan explains, sounding smug that he knows something his older brother doesn’t. “And then we kiss and spend the rest of our lives together.”
