Chapter Three

Three

The dry air caught in Noel's throat, making her wonder how August could speak the humans' guttural language without coughing. She'd watched the light from their sun fade while she and August had talked to the humans, the blue and violet sky beyond the tree growing dark until, quite shockingly, an artificial light flicked on, illuminating the tree from underneath. Humans were clearly dependent on light to function. No wonder their eyes were so small.

The light in the courtyard had since been turned off to allow for the majority of the agents who had expressed a desire to remain to gaze at the stars. It was so dry here that they were visible, and Noel stifled a shudder. Space. She was looking at space… No wonder their air is so thin. It probably drifts away at will.

"Do you want to see the stars before you go?" August said, and Noel jumped, not having heard him approach in the drier air.

"No, but I would appreciate knowing if they are the same as home."

"They are not." August fingered his change of clothes in appreciation. "I have seen their star charts," he added. "Some stars I recognize, but they are not in the right place." He took a slow breath. "Are you leaving directly, or do you want to tour the barracks first?"

Noel glanced at the door that the humans had left through. Well, most of them, she thought, her gaze going to Renee now slumped into a vastly overindulgent chair as if waiting for August. "Soon," she said, both eager and reluctant to leave. It would be late on the other side of the portal as well, but there were bound to be holocasters looking for news despite her instruction to not give them a word until she returned. "Do you trust them?"

August's wing knuckles rose. "I do not trust Hancock beyond what his words say. Jackson, I trust to do what is best for his people, and as long as that coincides with what is best for us, I rest easy. I trust Renee to do what is best for both of us on all fronts. And Will. Provided we do no harm to them. You have not met Monroe, but him I do not trust."

She followed August's gaze to the courtyard, and a handful of her people clustered around Will, the human pointing up at the sky with a portable red light. After seeing the state of the wounded, she was shocked that any of them wanted to stay. Perhaps they shared a fascination with the dangerous with humans as well.

"Thank you for the new clothes," August said, bringing her wandering attention back.

"You are welcome."

"Will you be authorizing an Earth-side server soon?"

"Perhaps." He was rubbing his bare wrist, and her wings shifted as she angled to the labyrinth. There was no way to communicate past a portal, and until they knew the humans wouldn't outright steal their technology, she wouldn't risk it. He would have to get his information secondhand.

The lack of communication was vexing, and not just because they couldn't check the ring scores. Elsewhere, portals could shift from incoming to outgoing by need, directed by gate agents using visual and verbal checks and double checks to prevent accidents. Here, she'd have to instate a common-law motion. Perhaps outgoing when the Earth sun was up, and incoming when the sun was down, with an hour gap to prevent accidents.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" she asked as she went to the beginning of the pattern. "No one knows if the evolutionary changes can be reversed. You might not be able to fly again if you stay here. Your fingers are already shorter, and your wing membrane has thinned."

August flexed his hand, eyeing it in worry. "I will stay."

"Until I need you," she said, and his eyes nictitated.

"Noel, give them a chance," he implored suddenly, wings clamped to his back. "Don't let Tayler determine whether the portal is closed or not. We need this world. Here. Try this."

Noel's lips parted in surprise when he took a shiny foil bag from a fold of cloth, opening it to bring out a mottled amber disk so thin that light passed through. "What is it?" she said as she reached out, and August glanced at Renee waiting for him.

"It's a chip," he said. "Renee eats them."

Noel's fingers closed on nothing, and she dropped her hand.

"Try it," he said, shifting to put his back to the human jin. "It's a root. I took it from Renee's tray a few days ago when she said she was gaining too much weight."

"I am not going to eat discarded food," she said, but her eyes widened when August opened the bag and the tang of salt hit her. "Salt?" Noel whispered, and August nodded, holding it out again.

"I tried it because it looked like a piscy wing, but it's a root, cooked in plant juice and dusted with salt."

She took it, remembering the sudden shock of the blueberry. Feeling foolish, she placed it on her tongue to rehydrate, blinking at the sudden surge of flavor.

"You chew it," he said, but she didn't, relishing the heavy layer of the rare mineral.

Perhaps this is why the ten volunteers wish to remain, she thought. So much salt that it could be thrown away. "They have deposits of salt?" she asked, and August shrugged.

"Apparently."

She moved the chip from side to side, getting the last of it before swallowing the now soft, fibrous root whole. "I expect daily sealed reports by courier," she said as she stepped onto the labyrinth and a shiver of sensation lifted through her.

"I will dictate them myself."

"And a sample of all new foodstuffs to be tested," she added when the gentle, expected lassitude rose up. "No more risky testing on yourself. You are not a science piscy."

"Yes, Noel. I'm only a portal away," he said, and she turned to the pattern and began to walk.

That is what I'm afraid of, she thought as the black ceiling and white floor grew more defined and she wove first one way, then the other, until at last, the event horizon fronted her right where she started. She could see August through a haze of probability, visible though the entire Nextdoor universe lay between them. Breath held, she stepped forward…

…for her foot to touch not Earth, but home, in the blessedly humid, darker levels of the portal building.

"Madam Noel," the desk agent said in relief, already tapping out a message of her arrival.

She breathed deep, groaning in relief as her eyes fully unnictitated for the first time in hours. The snap floor was empty and the labyrinth glowed faintly behind her, slowly dimming to nothing. "Thank you for maintaining an empty floor," she said as she stepped from the portal, and the older mer lifted a wing knuckle in acknowledgment.

"Sira Zuriel's instruction," he said, surprising her. "There are celebrations in the street, but the halls here are empty. He wants to talk to you the instant you return."

"Stiff wind," she swore, and the mer's eyes widened. Her ears were already beginning to reacclimate, and she appreciated that everything sounded normal. Even the stale scent of musk rising from the old mer was a relief after Earth's dry, barren air smelling of nothing. Except their food, she mused as she licked her lips for the last hint of salt.

Her holo dinged as it reconnected to the server, and she sighed, wings shifting, as message after message came in. "I'll be in my office," she said as she stepped from the portal and headed to the door. "Overnight," she added as she saw the threats from Zuriel followed by multiple requests from Marriel concerning interviews. There was a final notice from her aide that she was being asked to leave the building, and that she'd be working from home and to let her know when she got back.

"Madam Noel?" the gate agent asked, and she finished typing a quick request for Marriel to find out how the injured were doing. The older mer was opening a sealed swab packet, his wings held low in apology. "Ah, medical wants a sample," he said, leaving his desk to bring it to her. "They figured you wouldn't come in."

"They were right," she said sourly as she ran it over her teeth, wondering what they would think of the salt residue.

"Thank you, Madam Noel."

"I'll be in my office working up tomorrow's holo release," she said, not knowing why, except that she had expected to come home to the mess she had left, and all she found was a single gate agent minding the door. After hours or not, she'd expected someone here to either fire her or take her to a party.

And so, when she left the portal tunnel and found herself in the eerily quiet main tower, she stifled a shudder. There was utter silence, the usual myriad of whistles and clicks nonexistent. Even the fans that had created the updraft she was so proud of had been turned off.

"Elevator it is," she said, her words echoing faintly. She wasn't sure if the lack of updraft was due to Zuriel's demand to empty the tower, or if they turned the fans off every night. Her thoughts were so deep into her holo release that she didn't notice the tall, pale figure in the elevator until she all but walked into him.

"Oh!" She clicked in embarrassment when he reached past her and pushed a button. "I thought I was the only one in the tower."

"Madam Noel," he said, stepping in front of the panel when she reached for it.

She dropped to the back, even as the elevator began to rise. "What do you think you're doing," she demanded, her wing knuckles high, and he clamped his wings in a show of nonaggression. His wing hem had been cut into little v 's, giving a menacing cast to his otherwise passive countenance.

"Your presence is requested, Madam Noel," he said, and her eyes went to the panel. The floor lit was reserved for the servers that ran the place, and her eyes nictitated in doubt. It was cold above the cloud line, which was why they put the computers there.

He's wearing gloves, she thought, and she retreated farther, finding more threat in the thin, transparent plastic than in his wide shoulders and muscular back.

The lift chirped as the door opened, and he immediately stepped out, one hand ensuring that the doors didn't close. The pristine floor, unusually cool temperature, and antiseptic-scented air were uncomfortable, and she shook her head.

"Madam, please," he said, wings rising in a soft threat.

She took a deep breath, tapping a message to Marriel before stepping through the door. The guard retreated to give her room as the doors closed behind her.

"Thank you. This way," he said, and she followed him, keeping her distance as they went down a long, unremarkable hall.

One that has cameras in the corners, she thought, staring at them as they went past.

"Answer her questions shortly, but thoroughly," said the guard, for that was what he had to be. "Don't volunteer anything. Wear these."

She took the mask and gloves, bewildered.

"You may greet her verbally, but not tactilely," the mer said as he stopped at a pair of double doors and punched a series of numbers into the receiving panel.

"Earth has no contagions," Noel said as the lock's tumblers shifted with a loud thunk.

"She will enter after you," he said as he held the door for her, and she crossed from the hard, white floor to a soft foam that felt wonderful on her feet. "And she will leave before," he added. "I will escort you back to the elevator."

"I didn't know this was here," she said, riveted to the unexpected view. As she had thought, they were above the cloud line, and stars winked at her—stars that August might be looking at now, though from light-years away.

"Madam Noel?" he said, and she turned, only now realizing that he had opened another door, smaller this time. The new room also had the same luxurious flooring. The lights were soothing, and the air warmer, even as it coated her parched throat.

Two chairs, a small table between them. A wall holo in the corner. A tea bowl and two cups waited, the former steaming to send the scent of fresh green into the air.

"She'll be with you in a moment," the guard said as Noel entered the clearly upscale meeting room.

"Who?" she asked, turning fast at the small click of a lock.

Frowning, Noel dropped her mask and gloves on a chair before striding to the door to find it was, indeed, locked.

"I had every right to confront whoever was responsible for the condition of my people!" she whistled loudly. "I am the leader of this project, and I don't have to account my actions to anyone! If the only reason you gave it to me was because you thought it would never amount to anything, then that is your misconception, Zuriel, and I will not be silenced!"

There was no answer, even when she hammered on the door and tried the lock again.

Frustrated, she stood before the table, the wonderful scent of good tea filling the air.

"As it lifts," she muttered, not happy as she repositioned the chair to face the door before sitting in it. Silent, she stared at the tea bowl, finally giving in and pouring herself a cup.

She eased deeper into the chair. "Holo on. News," she said firmly, but the hazed patch of light remained hazed, and her wing began to twitch in annoyance. Her wrist holo didn't work, either, and she wondered if Marriel had ever gotten her last message.

"As it lifts," she said again, tugging on the mask and gloves and settling back to wait.

And wait.

And wait.

Until the last of the tea was gone and the gloves and mask were again wadded up and on the table. The silence of the room began to overtake her anger, and her eyes slowly nictitated shut, flashing open at the soft sound of a click.

"Madam Noel?"

It was a small jin, so old that the red of her protein diet had lightened with age, marbling her wing edges and fingers with gray. Noel sat up, her eyes going from the jin's arthritic wings to the cracked, full tea bowl in her hand.

"They can't fire me for doing my job," Noel said as she blinked the sleep from her eyes and checked her wrist holo. Three in the morning?

"No." The old jin shut the door behind her. "But we can make you disappear. Don't get up. You're tired."

Noel resettled herself, no longer sure she knew what was going on.

"Sorry for the delay," the jin said as she set down the tea bowl and eased into the seat across from Noel with a sigh. "But the air and water samples took some time to work through, and you didn't keep your gloves on. Would you like more tea? It's from the cafeteria, but it's hot."

Unsure, Noel nodded. "Yes. Thank you."

The grizzled old jin deftly poured two cups, taking one as she settled back and eyed Noel as if in thought. "Rise easy on your updraft. You're not in danger of losing your job tonight."

"Who are you?" Noel said, letting less of her ire show than she wanted. "This is my project, and I don't appreciate being detained in my own building."

"I'm Sidriel," she said, her eyes nictitating in anger. "And you are too smart to not know I'm risking a lot talking to you here. As it is, you have landed yourself in a need-to-know position, and I'm the only one who can tell you." She sipped her tea, her anger easing. "I simply haven't decided if you're worth the risk."

Noel took the cup, worried. This wasn't Zuriel's doing. "Tell me what?"

Sidriel ran her gaze over Noel, lingering on the shadows of tattoos and the rings still piercing her lower wing hem. "First," she said confidently. "The new world? I've seen the first reports. Your personal thoughts would be appreciated. Keep it brief."

"It's populated," Noel said, and Sidriel waved a hand in dismissal. "The indigenous population fears their environment even as they protect it. August, my lead environmentalist, says they're fascinated by what scares them." Noel hesitated, remembering the ten who had asked to remain, having lived through their nightmare and found strength. "Perhaps we are the same and can find common ground there."

"Go on," Sidriel prompted as if surprised at the direction of her assessment.

"The world itself is shockingly rich in diversity," Noel continued, wincing at the bitter taste of the tea. "They claim millions of species, which might be possible with the debilitating amount of sun they are exposed to. Entire food chains building on the light from the sun."

"Millions," Sidriel said, one eye nictitated in disbelief. "Surely an exaggeration."

"They have no reason to lie." Noel awkwardly shifted her wing knuckles. "And they do lie. August is learning both their verbal and nonverbal language as creation sparks have difficulty translating it naturally. It consists mostly of guttural noises made deep in the throat, and it took two weeks for his vestigial throat cords to adapt. He's also becoming proficient in their body language, which is why I have agreed to let him and ten from the original group stay. They insist."

Sidriel glanced at her wrist holo. "The environmental report says we may not be able to adapt to their daytime conditions."

"I disagree," Noel said, and Sidriel made a chirp, not of surprise, but perhaps at Noel's audacity. "The report was based on the hospitalized team members who had been subjected to overly harsh conditions. August's group has been treated more gently, and the better conditions are allowing secondary evolutionary changes to show themselves. Changes such as a decreased finger length, thinner wing density, and a thickening of the nictitating membrane, not to cloud, but to darken the light reaching them. I'll have a report by tomorrow as to the internal changes. Would you—"

"I have access to it," Sidriel interrupted. "Tell me about the salt found in your system."

Noel's gut tightened. "The range of their foods appears to be extraordinary," she said. "I've given August leave to study the best prospects for importation, but most if not all depend on a high-sun environment and won't survive here. I personally sampled a blueberry and pontan chip. Both are plant based and—"

"I've seen the report. Stop," Sidriel said, then inclined her head to soften her words. "I have decided your value. The information you have been working from is false."

Noel's wing knuckles drooped. "I saw the world myself. August has no reason to—"

"Not that information." Sidriel clicked in annoyance. "The condition of our world. Did you never think it odd that such a large sum was spent on your wild theory of using creation spark manipulation to promote spontaneous portals?"

"I thought it simply good sense," Noel said, but an unsettled feeling was growing in her as if the updraft she rose upon was suddenly not there and she was about to fall.

"You were given access to enough energy to run a city for a year," Sidriel was saying. "The funds to build an entire building in the dead center of our largest city, a building devoted to portal exploration and management, staffed only by those who shelter a creation spark? All for a thin idea that was so ill thought of that even the government wouldn't back it?"

Someone did, Noel thought as she studied the old jin. "Perhaps you believed it would work?" she guessed.

Sidriel chortled a whistling laugh. "Yes, I believed it would work." She hesitated. "We know of Earth, not by guess, but by observation."

Noel's wings drooped, the rings on the hem chiming as they hit the floor. "I agree that we have been there, yes, through spontaneous portals over time. There are images of us in their history, but observation? We would need a functioning, two-way portal, and we have never—"

"We have." Sidriel sipped her tea. "Gained and lost."

"Then…" Noel glanced at the empty holo screen as if betrayed by it. "It's not in our history."

"It is." Sidriel set her cup down, busying herself with her wrist holo. "Just not the history that's available to the general populace."

Noel jumped as her wrist holo pinged. A file too large to be sent had landed in her personal folder.

"You will not share that with anyone, and it will fragment in three days," Sidriel said. "Put simply, we've tried to colonize Earth three times, failing each attempt. We lost thousands of creation sparks doing so. I don't intend to lose a single one more."

Noel looked up from her wrist holo, cold. "They don't know about creation sparks. I'm sure of it. If they did, the sparks we carried would have begun translating immediately. August said it took weeks."

"The delay of which I find fascinating." Sidriel poured more tea into both their cups. "It's believed that we were forced to abandon Earth previously because humans can bond with sparks. Same as us. Better than us. Use them with a markedly higher dexterity, as did the Nix."

"But they don't know of them. At all," Noel insisted, feeling betrayed.

Sidriel shrugged, her wing knuckles clicking together over her head. "When we reached an Earth-side threshold population, humans began to use their energy as we do. It was several thousand of us the first time. Just shy of that number the second. The third time, we had perhaps five hundred across before humans began showing an affinity for manipulating creation energy. My theory is that the lost creation sparks are still there, dormant, but pushing the limiting factor up. One of your long-range tasks will be to find the stray, dormant sparks, bind them into an inert state, and transport them home."

"I don't understand." Humans can use creation energy? What happened to the missing sparks? Did they just let them go? "How did we lose the portal?"

"They outcompeted us," Sidriel said. "Every time. And, Noel, we need this world. If we don't take it this time, we die. We do not have an alternative."

Noel's head snapped up. "It's not our world."

Sidriel's eyes nictitated in a sly expression. "Who's to say whose world it was to begin with. We share the same bacteria, many of the same viruses. Their folklore includes piscys, Nix, and Piers. They just don't remember us apart from magical beings. Angels and demons, they called us the last time. They thought we were two species." Her wing hem shook. "Emissaries from their gods of good and evil, and still they drove us away. Not this time."

Noel was silent, trying to understand. She'd gotten the funding not because her theory was sound, but because their world was dying. Faster than anyone had been allowed to know. They had been to Earth before, driven out when the creation sparks that made the joining of their worlds possible began to work against them.

"Fly easy," Sidriel said soothingly, and Noel looked up, still confused. "No one is proposing to invade them in force. I will not make the same mistake my predecessors made. Trade is a better warrior than the sword."

"How long do we have?" she whistled softly, and Sidriel's wing knuckles cracked together nervously.

"With no intervention? Two, maybe three generations, and they will not be pleasant."

Noel's chest seemed to clench. All they had was a hellhole to flee to, a burning desert they could survive only if the creation spark in them shifted their bodies. Not everyone would make it; creation sparks belonged to the affluent and long-lived. And the lucky.

"It's time enough, Noel. You saved our way of life. And for that, you will be remembered."

Noel clasped her hands, wishing it was a joke. "What do you want me to do?"

Sidriel tapped her wrist holo. "Encourage August and the ten volunteers learning…Englesh to remain. See what changes the world makes on us so we can prepare by telling our people these are desirable things. Continue to follow Hancock's rules. Limit the number of people across the portal to a hundred until we know if humans can still use creation energy. Keep our people close to the portal for safety and possible evacuation. No one is to be out of snap range. Ever."

Noel's eyes nictitated in alarm. "If we leave, we can't reopen the portal. Twenty-three need to remain or it will be gone forever."

Sidriel raised her wings in reassurance. "I have already authorized twenty-three free creation sparks to be buried at the base of the labyrinth." She clicked, amused. "Some of them were the death payouts for your people who returned intact. The inert, captured sparks will maintain the portal if a fast evacuation is needed. I will not lose Earth." Sidriel's toe knuckles popped, one after the other. "You will not lose it for me. Understand?"

She bobbed her head, thoughts churning.

"Instruct your lead environmentalist to watch the humans they have contact with to see if they begin to use creation energy, but do not tell him why."

"I will." That humans might be able to use creation energy wasn't unheard of. Piers were able to use ambient levels of spark energy to repair their bodies. Nix were said to be able to see the future and past, which was probably why they had been beaten into submission and exiled to their dead world. The legendary Hirwofas were said to be able to become beasts.

"Keep proceeding with possible imports," Sidriel said, bringing Noel's wandering thoughts back. "They will give us the opportunity to move slowly and discover if indeed humans still maintain the ability to use creation energy. You are to encourage trade."

Noel shifted a wing in question. "Madam, perhaps their imports will be enough and we won't have to take such drastic measures. It is their world."

"It is a world," Sidriel said, her whistle punctuated by a sharp, derisive click. "And if an accord could be found, we wouldn't have failed three times before." Her wings slumped, and she softened. "Rest easy, Noel. This plan spans untold generations. They will never know. The Piers didn't."

Noel's eyes fixed on Sidriel's. "This isn't our world, either," she whispered, frightened.

Sidriel lifted her shoulders, smug. "They are all our worlds."

"And the Nix?" Noel said.

Sidriel's wings drooped. "They realized what we were doing and fought back. Don't let that happen here. Earth is all we have."

Noel nodded. That Earth was all the humans had didn't seem to bother Sidriel at all.