2. Morelle

2

MORELLE

A s Morelle walked beside Brandon toward the vehicle parking area, her anxiety grew with each step. The morning sun felt warm on her scalp, reminding her of her compromised appearance, although why she was bothered by that was unclear.

As someone who had spent her entire life on Anumati covered from head to toe, she could have been bald under the hood and the veil, and no one would have known or cared.

She had been a statement—a thing—a princess—a priestess in training, but not a female with desires and mundane concerns like being fond of her beautiful hair.

Resisting the urge to run her hand over the soft fuzz of new growth, she clutched the purse that was more for appearances than to hold anything of importance. She didn't have anything to put in it other than her earpieces or the teardrop, but she was wearing both, so the thing was empty.

Brandon put his hand on the small of her back. "Are you nervous or excited?"

"A little bit of both," she admitted. "I'm excited to see the world beyond the village. As for the testing, I'm nervous about Amanda having the same results as the head priestess. I might have no special talents."

The priestess had put her through countless tests and pushed her to her limits by any means available to her, whether it was starvation, isolation, exhaustion, or even beatings, but despite feeling the power prickling under her skin and the desperation to use it, nothing had ever happened. In time, Morelle had accepted that the feeling of energy circling just under the surface was nothing more than her frustration and restlessness.

"Having special abilities is not as important as you might think." Brandon led her into a big hall made of glass. "I don't have any special talents either, and I'm a council member, which is an important position in the clan that is based on merit. It's not just about the talents you are born with. It's the abilities you develop and your drive to succeed." He pressed a button that was located on a panel next to a set of metal doors.

"What is this?" she asked, pointing at them.

"It's an elevator or a lift that takes passengers up or down. I'm sure you had them on Anumati."

"We did, but the first and only time I used one of those was in the spaceport. The temple and the palace were only two stories high, and we used the stairs."

The spaceport elevators had been crafted mostly from glass, which had made the experience of traveling in them terrifying.

The speed had been dizzying, and the passing levels rushed by in a blur.

Thankfully, this elevator had no windows at all, only a mirror, and Morelle couldn't tell how fast it was going, only that it was going down.

Still, the small space wasn't free of traps. Her own reflection still startled her despite having seen it multiple times over the past several days, and it wasn't just because of the lack of hair. Morelle was still getting used to being outside without her robes and veil, her face and body exposed for all to see that her eyes were blue, not black and huge, and that she had actual breasts that were clearly outlined by her blouse.

When the doors opened, it was to a large hall with many rows of vehicles and many thick columns that held up the ceiling.

The vehicle Kian stood next to was larger than the others, and it was black. She recognized his two bodyguards, the friendly redhead and the stoic blond.

"Good morning," Kian greeted her and Brandon.

"Good morning." She smiled and offered him her hand like she had seen Brandon doing.

The sooner she learned Earth customs, the better.

He shook it lightly and then exchanged greetings with Brandon.

The redhead opened the back door for her. "My lady?" He offered her a hand as if she needed help getting inside the vehicle.

Striving to be polite and abide by Earth customs, she accepted his hand.

When they were all seated in the vehicle, she glanced at the Odu who was sitting behind the wheel and offered him a smile through the small mirror mounted above him.

Morelle was no longer anxious around the Odus after spending four days at Annani's and being served by them. She'd also met Kian's, Amanda's, and Alena's Odus at the family dinner on Saturday, and they had all been perfectly pleasant and accommodating.

The entire family had been just wonderful, welcoming her and Ell-rom with open arms. It was enough to melt even her cynical heart and make her experience profound gratitude toward her mother, who had sent her and Ell-rom to Earth to find their father.

But, even though she would have loved to know Ahn, Morelle was grateful to Ani, the queen of the gods, for sabotaging the settler ship and having it arrive on Earth seven thousand years later. If they had arrived on time, they would have most likely perished with all the other gods, and even if they had arrived after the bombing, they wouldn't have been welcomed by such a loving family.

Kian, who was sitting across from her in the roomy interior of the vehicle, regarded her as if trying to guess what she was thinking about. "If you are wondering why Amanda and Syssi are not here, they have gone ahead to prepare the lab. They are also going to stay and finish the rest of their workday after we leave."

"I wasn't wondering that at all. But what do they need to prepare for me? Amanda said that the tests are very simple, and the lab is set up for them."

"They're clearing the space," he explained. "The lab usually has quite a few people working there—researchers and research assistants, as well as volunteers and paid participants. We thought it best to have your testing done privately."

The unspoken implication hung in the air. They didn't want witnesses to whatever might happen in case she exhibited a deadly talent like her brother's.

Morelle's stomach tightened.

On the one hand, she yearned to have an incredible gift like his, something that would indicate that she was also remarkable, but on the other hand, she was terrified of what it could be.

"Are you concerned about what Amanda might discover?" She leveled her gaze at Kian.

"There is that," he admitted easily, "but we are also a large group, and none of us look like the average human."

"In what way?" she asked.

The redhead leaned forward. "We are better looking by a lot."

"Oh." She smoothed her hand over her head. "I guess that’s the gods' heritage that's apparent in your visage and my bald head standing out."

Kian crossed his legs. "Even without hair, you are a very striking female, Morelle. You will draw attention because you are beautiful, not because of what is or is not on your head. Be prepared for curious looks as we walk from the parking area to where the laboratory is located."

It was nice of him to say that she was beautiful, and it was also good that he warned her about the looks she would get. Morelle would have thought that they were directed at her because of her baldness.

"Thank you for telling me. I would have felt very awkward otherwise." She shifted in her seat. "I'm excited about seeing the place of learning where Amanda works and also about visiting the nursery, but I'm afraid that the visit will be a waste of time. I don't have any talents. After all the tests that the head priestess put me through, I will be very surprised if Amanda finds that I do."

The head priestess had always been disappointed when nothing she'd tried caused Morelle to manifest a talent. But what if she'd been looking for the wrong things or used the wrong approach to reveal them?

As the vehicle began moving, the windows turned opaque, and Brandon took her hand. "The vehicle drives autonomously until we reach a certain distance from the mountain entrance. It's one of our security measures, so the entrance to our village remains a secret."

"Is it because of me?" Morelle narrowed her eyes at him. "So I won't know where it is?"

"It's standard protocol for everyone living in the village," Kian said. "If one of our people gets captured, the information cannot be tortured out of them."

"By whom?" she asked. "The Doomers or the humans?"

"The Doomers," the redhead said, "but also the humans to a lesser extent."

Morelle still didn't know much about those terrible enemies who had been mentioned on several occasions, and every time she asked Brandon about them, he found a clever way to change the subject, which was starting to annoy her.

Although she had to admit that when the method was kissing, she didn't mind as much.

They had done a lot of that after the first time, and she was eager to explore more, but Brandon insisted on taking things slow because she was still recuperating.

That was a good incentive to push herself on that weird machine Gertrude had guided her to use.

"What happens if the vehicles all break down?" Morelle asked. "Amanda mentioned something about a pulse of energy that can disable all electronic devices on Earth. How would people find their way back home?"

A pulse like that wouldn't have interrupted life on Morelle's home planet because the Kra-ell were not as dependent on electrical energy, and gods lived underground, so their tech was protected, but the impact on Earth would be catastrophic.

"Council members and Head Guardians know the way," Brandon said.

That made sense, and she hoped that one day she would be entrusted with that knowledge, too. Morelle didn't want to be the outsider with the secrets anymore. She wanted to be a valued member of her community.

At some point, the windows turned clear again, and the Odu took over the driving. At first, the world outside the windows didn't seem much different than the one she'd seen in the village, but then they reached a populated area with tall buildings that were covered in glass and gleamed in the morning sun.

"The facility where the lab is located is called a university," Brandon said. "Does that translate well to Kra-ell?"

She nodded. "The gods have them. The Kra-ell don't, or at least they didn't when I was there."

"According to the gods who arrived not too long ago, the Kra-ell have institutions of high learning now," Kian said. "But nothing that compares to the elite universities of the gods. Those are reserved for their upper class, and even commoner gods can't get in."

She shook her head. "Thousands of years later, things are still pretty much the same over there."

"It seems to me that time on Anumati moves at a different rate." Kian crossed his arms over his chest. "They are such an ancient civilization, and they live forever. They don't want things to change. They are comfortable with how things are."