Page 1 of Seven Oars (Rix Universe #3)

Their evening meal was quick and finished early. One by one, the women dropped used paper plates into a bag Fawn held open. Rosamma carefully added hers in too.

It was Fawn’s turn to take out the trash.

Rosamma watched her leave the cabin, humming a tune as she went.

Fawn was the most approachable of the group, with a hearty, ready laugh, the kind of person who never met a stranger.

Feeling awkward and decidedly un-Fawn-like, Rosamma settled on her cot and picked up a book, pulling her soft shawl tight around her shoulders for comfort more than warmth. She wanted to finish the book before they left Meeus. Ren had warned they couldn't take too many things with them.

Things. The women in Rosamma’s party worried about leaving things behind. They talked about them and lamented their loss to one another, shaking their heads and wiping the occasional tear.

One woman, Anske, owned a house and liked to describe in detail the meticulous arrangements she’d made for its upkeep in her absence. She repeated every step over and over, as if to reassure herself that everything would be alright. Of all of them, only Anske planned to return to Meeus.

Rosamma’s heart gave a treacherous squeeze. This beautiful planet, Meeus, was their home. And by anyone’s standard—certainly by hers—it wasn’t a bad one. She liked her home and had never sought a different life.

But Ren had.

Instead of reading, Rosamma stared into space. Her fingers found the end of her long, thin braid, a childish habit she’d never quite broken.

The other women quietly went about their evening rituals. There had been fifteen at the start, but only eight remained committed. It was easy to change one’s mind when things didn’t go according to plan. She wished she could say, like those who had dropped out, that the uncertainty had become too great, and she was no longer comfortable taking the risk.

But she couldn’t say that. She was firmly part of this would-be passenger group, waiting to board a spaceship bound for a livable asteroid called Priss.

Unable to concentrate on her book, Rosamma let her eyes wander around the large room, criss-crossed with camp beds. Uneasiness washed over her anew. The women waited on pins and needles for Ren’s new alien friend, Lyle, to take them away from here. That was all they wanted.

But Lyle, their pilot, was so sick…

Fawn’s hearty laughter rang from just outside the door.

“What part of being quiet doesn’t she understand?”

Alyesha’s deep, low voice came from the shadowed corner where her bed sat. It was the most private and, therefore, the most coveted spot in the cabin. When they’d first arrived at this place, several women had engaged in a subtle jostling to claim it, and Alyesha had won. Alyesha often won.

Old Gro grumbled something offensive, never looking up from the small screen game she was playing.

“Fawn is so energetic,”

Mara offered in her typical peacemaker tone.

“It’s hard for young people to stay cooped up for so long.”

The door opened to let Fawn in, her hair windblown and a smile on her face.

“Rosamma!”

she hollered.

“Your brother’s here.”

“Don’t shout,”

Alyesha snapped.

As if mocking her, a long, hooting siren announced a spaceship's departure. The throaty revving of powerful engines rattled the windows, rising into a roar. It continued for several minutes, then the ship took off, taking away the sound and replacing it with the silence that seemed especially deep after this assault on their eardrums.

“Yeah. Don’t shout,”

Anske said into the quiet, parroting Alyesha’s earlier words with sarcasm.

Alyesha flopped onto her camp mattress.

“You know what I mean! When they are not flying.”

Ships took off from the nearby spaceship depot multiple times a day. Most were quieter, but once in a while, a beast like this one would wake them in the middle of the night. When that happened, Rosamma couldn’t help but imagine herself launching into space, surrounded by all this mighty power that was at the same time… fragile.

“He told us to stay quiet,”

Alyesha pointed at Ren, who poked his head in the door.

“I did tell you that,”

Ren confirmed.

“Voices carry. This is supposed to be an uninhabited zone.”

The women were camped out in what used to be a convention room at an old training camp. The camp had long since closed, and the surrounding area was now designated as a buffer zone between the city and the spaceship depot.

They were squatting in this neglected, musty building because Ren wanted them as close to the spaceship depot as possible without actually crossing into its heavily guarded perimeter. Inside that perimeter was a small ship that Lyle, with Ren’s help, planned to commandeer. When the time came for them to board, seconds would count.

Ren came in, a tall man, on the lean side no matter how much he ate. The sight of him was familiar and dear to Rosamma. He was as much a part of her as she was of him.

He came alone.

“Where’s Paloma?”

Rosamma asked, referring to Ren’s girlfriend, co-conspirator, and often the driving force behind his wild ideas, like this plan to space-immigrate from Meeus illegally.

“Home. Still working out the kinks in the security breach. No room for mistakes and all that.”

“God forbid,”

Gro muttered.

The women tuned in, listening to Ren’s every word.

“Don’t worry,”

he grinned, addressing the room.

“Paloma doesn’t make mistakes. My baby’s good like that.”

Someone chuckled. Rosamma smiled too, but inside she felt a little perturbed. She loved Paloma. She was happy for Ren. She only wished Paloma weren’t the imaginative and intrepid hacker who always poked her nose into business that could end very badly for her and Ren. Even the most meticulously laid-out plans could go awry.

“How are you doing, Rose?”

Ren sat beside her on the spindly foldable bed, which wobbled precariously. Their hands found each other and linked.

“Not bad at all. Ready and set to become a space tourist.”

He smiled her smile back at her.

Aside from their smiles and similar light-colored eyes, they looked nothing like a brother and sister, much less twins.

Ren was a normal-looking human male.

And she was a freak. A half-formed version of a human. Or an unfinished Tana-Tana alien. She was both and neither, as if caught in the middle of some unfortunate full-moon transition between the two races.

That was on the outside.

On the inside, their situations were reversed. She, Rosamma, had all the physicality and characteristics of an average human woman, whereas Ren leaned strongly toward his Tana-Tana alien side. He even moved like a Tana-Tana when he wanted, fast and stealthy, ghost-like.

Their linked hands warmed and created a small bubble of energy felt only by the two of them.

“How is Lyle?”

Rosamma asked, her voice low enough that the rest of the room couldn’t hear her.

“Not as well as we want him to be.”

Ren didn’t say anything more, and that only meant there was no good news. Their capable Rix pilot, Lyle, was dying.

Rosamma’s heart broke for him. Despite his checkered past, Lyle was such a good man. Alien. A really solid one. He loved and was loved in return. He didn’t deserve to die now.

“Do you think I can…”

“No. You can’t, Rose.”

Ren’s voice was gentle but firm.

“He needs more than your energy.”

Rosamma lowered her eyes to their clasped hands.

“What is going to happen to all of… this?”

she whispered. As far as she knew, Ren and Paloma didn’t have another friendly space pilot with Lyle’s particular skillset, such as stealing ships from space depots.

Ren chose his words carefully.

“We shall wait for him to recover. Cricket has faith, and so should we.”

Rosamma nodded. It had to be brutal for Cricket, Lyle’s love, to watch her world crash and burn, and have her heart ripped out of her chest because her mate was slipping away. If Lyle died, Cricket’s life would be nothing but a string of bleak gray days without joy.

Suddenly, Rosamma’s own loneliness had an upside. She was safe from the pain of a debilitating heartbreak. One couldn’t lose what one didn’t have, could they?

After they finished their energy exchange and unlinked their hands, Ren hung around for a while and talked to the women, explaining the need for more patience.

They accepted the message with outward calm, but it was easy to sense everyone’s disappointment.

“We’ve been waiting here for three weeks,”

Alyesha said once Ren had left.

“And he wants to wait longer?”

She looked square at Rosamma, as if trying to pry a different answer out of her when Ren wouldn’t say what they wanted.

“Just another week,”

Rosamma said meekly.

It could be two weeks. It could be forever.

Gro lay down and put her hands under her head, a toothpick stuck in her mouth.

“Fine by me. Let’s wait another week.”

Her feet in worn-out shoes wiggled idly.

Alyesha tossed her long hair. Her dark eyes flashed.

“Not everyone has time to lose, Gro.”

Most women were intimidated by the opinionated Alyesha, who steamrolled over others with practiced ease.

Not Gro.

“What’s your rush, girl?”

Alyesha was younger than Gro, but not that young. Her impeccable, possibly genetically enhanced appearance had that timeless sheen that could place her anywhere between thirty and fifty-five.

Whatever her real age, she didn’t care for being called a girl.

She gave Gro a killing look, but instead of arguing, smiled tightly.

“Someone’s waiting for my company on Priss eagerly.”

Gro scoffed.

“If you’re so important, they can wait another week. Or what’s the problem?”

Before an argument could ensue, Eze pulled out a snack and ripped the packaging noisily.

Eze was a Sakka alien, the only non-human in their group. Rosamma didn’t know what Eze was doing on human Meeus, how long she’d lived here, or why she couldn’t leave through legal channels. Just like she knew nothing about any of the others. None had shared their stories.

Mara worried her lip.

“Do you think we won’t be able to go, after all?”

“We’ll find a way.”

Anske’s blue, wide-set eyes blazed with determination. It saved Rosamma from hedging and spouting platitudes.

“I can’t fail. I have a higher purpose!”

That made Gro raise her head and Eze pause chewing.

“This delay is a holy test,”

Anske continued, unaware—or unconcerned—by the heightened attention from Gro and Eze.

“We should use this time to reflect and seek repentance.”

Mara’s daughter, Daphne, darted across the room and pressed herself to her mother’s side. Daphne was a younger version of Mara, pretty and round-faced, only skinnier, paler. In her late teens, she acted like a young child and had the vocabulary of a five-year-old.

“I’ll be damned.”

Gro half-rose from her bed to stare at Anske.

“You’re a fucking missionary!”

“Gro!”

Mara slapped her hands over Daphne’s ears.

Alyesha laughed out loud.

Fawn swung a wide-eyed look between Anske and Gro.

“Bro! A missionary. For real?”

Anske straightened as she realized she’d become the center of attention.

“So what if I am? People on that asteroid have no roots. They need spiritual grounding, and someone has to deliver it. By appealing to other people’s faltering morals, we build our character. Don’t you agree, Fawn?”

Anske’s direct appeal to her morality and character caught Fawn off guard. She looked around wildly.

“Oh, I don’t know, Anske. I just want to get away from here. To see the world. Maybe find a man.”

She twirled a strand of hair around her finger.

“No luck with men at home?”

Alyesha curled her lip at Fawn while giving the younger woman’s nice, plump figure a slow, deliberate once-over.

Fawn was not unaware of Alyesha’s superior attitude, but she wasn’t intimidated by it.

“Not that. I’m from Pepper Pass. Nothing but corn fields and cow pastures. All the men are farmers—so boring.”

“Boring!”

Sassa muttered. She was a small, tired-looking young woman, so quiet she often disappeared into the background.

“A good problem to have, boring men.”

Eze, the Sakka, set aside her unfinished snack. “Well,”

she said to Fawn, “you definitely won’t find cow manure or corn husks on Priss.”

“I’m ready for an adventure.”

“You’ll get an adventure,”

Eze promised.

“Just be careful what you wish for.”

Fawn's eyes sparkled with excitement.

“I wish to find interesting men.”

“Sure. Only they’re no human men, love.”

Sassa burrowed deeper into her little cot.

Another spaceship took off nearby, howling like a disturbed demon and rattling the windows.

Using the noise as an excuse to end the conversation that had suddenly turned personal, the women returned to their narrow camp beds. Once again, they had closed off, united in their silent determination to keep their distance.

Long after all the noise had died down and the darkness had fallen, Rosamma lay awake in her narrow bed, wrapped in a shawl.

The women around her were so different from one another. So different from her. For now, their life paths had aligned, but it wouldn’t last. Their separate futures lay ahead, swirling ominously with the unknown.

Treacherous thoughts about staying behind meandered through Rosamma’s mind. She and Ren were forever linked together by their half-breed nature that required them to exchange energy to survive. If only they could exist apart…

Once they took off, Rosamma would lose every familiar sight and smell, every little comfort that surrounded her on Meeus.

Priss, the terraformed asteroid, was a miserable place. Lawless and rough, a kind of a last frontier, it had thin recycled air and poorly purified imported water, both rationed out for the residents. And most residents weren’t even human.

Funny, Rosamma thought, that she should worry about aliens, herself a mixed-race. Yet the prospect of living among them frightened her. She was so very human—not just by half of her blood, but by virtue of her upbringing. Human culture was all she knew. It was familiar. It was home.

Tears leaked from her eyes. She curled into a fetal position and covertly blotted them away with her shawl.

Do I have to go?

She was so afraid of flying into space. Afraid of so many things. She was timid and frail, the worst character ever for an adventure.

But if she stayed behind, Ren would stay too. And Rosamma couldn’t refuse her brother a fighting chance for a better life with the woman he loved.

It was hard to live other people’s dreams.