Mirror Space - Marianne de Pierres [68]
‘Not the Araldis that we know. But these islands are new territory, and there seems enough flora to sustain something that could harm us. Juno?’
‘The Principe is right, Djes.’ The Carabinere scout glanced around the circle to make sure everyone heard him. ‘I have flown over similar with Principe Franco. We saw birds and other small things.’
‘Small things.’ Innis guffawed. ‘Mebbe the checclia might bite our toes.’
Trin contained his anger at the man’s disrespect. It was not the time for tempers to be lost. ‘Only fools are brash in strange places.’
Innis continued to laugh, inciting the others near him to join in, but Kristo cut across them all.
‘He’s right, Innis. We’ve got this far on his say-so. Why would we go breakin’ what ain’t broke yet?’
‘Even if we can’t see a reason?’ said Mulravey.
‘I say we move, if he thinks we should.’
The support was unexpected, and a moment passed around the group, brief but significant, before they stood, ready to move on his bidding.
THALES
Thales’s desperation to see Aleta again settled after a few hours and left him bleak. He’d spent the hours sitting in a kafe on the main transit thoroughfare, watching Edo go about its night business. It was not a quiet world, even during the main sleep cycle.
When he finally felt he could face returning to his apartment, he left the kafe and washed in a public cubicle. As he splashed the flavoured water over his face, he felt neither remorse nor embarrassment for his evening’s dalliance. Yet decency told him not to return to Bethany smelling of intimacy with another.
Shame she had not extended the same courtesy to him.
He planned to simply pack up his small stock of personal effects and find lodgings elsewhere on Edo. The thought of accepting any more of Lasper Farr’s ‘hospitality’, or his sister’s affections, made Thales sick to his stomach. It seemed he’d learned a great deal about himself in a few short hours - not all of it pleasing or uplifting.
And yet despite his bleak mood, his experience with Aleta had given him some peace back. Glimpsing into the core of his own weaknesses and vice left him feeling stronger in some way. Liberated almost.
Perhaps now was the time to shed his upbringing and discover the person inside; the one without the ideals: the shallow, selfish, needy inner man.
He wondered if Villon had perceived that man within him, underneath the layer of naive idealism.
Strangely, the philosopher’s face remained clearer in his memory than Rene’s; the kindly eyes so interested in life. To the last. Villon may have had many of his own dark moments, Thales thought, and yet he’d remained buoyant and without bitterness.
I will never match Villon.
Nor was he sure that he wanted to. As he flashed his hand across the entry key to the apartment the bleakness lifted with that thought.
‘Thales!’ Bethany was curled on the couch naked. She looked startled, as if she’d been asleep.
‘I’ll just get my clothes,’ he said quietly.
She sprang up. ‘There is no need. I-I’ve been thinking a lot - and I want to talk to you. Why I did ... that...and other things.’
Thales stared at her. In the darkened room she looked younger than her years and yet he knew the truth of her age, the truth of her desires.
‘There is not much to be said. You were right, Bethany. I don’t love you - it has been convenience, for both of us, and now that is finished. Listening to you won’t change that.’
She took a step towards him, reached out her hand. ‘Please, give this. . . upset a chance to heal before you make a decision.’ The quaver in her voice was unmistakable, but it didn’t move him.
He brushed past her into the bedroom and collected up his pitiful possessions. The total of the things he owned: a few toiletries, one set of overalls and another pair of loose travel pants and shirt all provided by Lasper Farr, and the aspect cube he’d brought from Scolar that stored his academic records and other private information. The credit clip that Rene had given him was wedged into the base of the cube. He was not completely without resources,