Chapter 9
When Carmen woke up the next morning, Renier was gone. She found a fresh set of clothes lying on the end of the platform, and when she dressed and went out of the room, she met Aria at her door. They found a tray containing an assortment of fruit, tubers, and leafy vegetables sitting on the platform in the main room. A wooden bowl containing a white liquid sat next to the tray. Carmen tasted it. “It tastes like honey.”
“He must have left this for us to eat,” Aria remarked.
They soon demolished the food, and Carmen stood up ready for the day. “Let’s go exploring.”
Aria shook her head. “I’m not ready. We just got to a safe place. I need to stay put for a little while.”
Carmen peered into her face. “Are you sure you’re going to be all right?”
Aria nodded, but she turned back into the apartment. “You’re not the one who almost got shot in the head back there at the gathering. You’re not the one who almost got dragged back to the Romarie. I need to stay safe inside for a day or two before I go out.”
Carmen nodded. “Okay. I’ll be back in a little while.”
She watched Aria go back to her room and shut the door. Should she be concerned? What if Aria never came out again? Carmen turned away. She couldn’t worrying about that now. She descended the same steps to the ground in front of the......what was it? She couldn’t call this Felsite colony anything other than a city, although she had to remind herself it hadn’t been built by humans. These Angondrans must have an advanced technology, even if they chose not to travel in space. Earth didn’t have space travel, either.
At the bottom of the steps, a female Felsite met her with a smile. Like all Felsite females, her her short golden hair formed a neat ring around her face. Females didn't grow a big mane like the males. Her hair sparkled in the sun. “Good morning. I was hoping to meet you here.”
Carmen stiffened. “What’s wrong? Have I broken the rules or something?”
“Not at all,” she replied. “I’m Leroni. I’m Renier’s sister, and I wanted to welcome you. I want to make sure you have everything you need.”
Carmen let out a sigh of relief. “I’m sorry. My friend and I are still getting used to this planet. We only just came here yesterday and....”
“Renier told us about your experience with the Romarie,” Leroni replied. “We will do everything we can to help you, and I understand why you don’t feel comfortable here just yet.” She looked around. “Where’s your friend? I could show you both around if you like.”
Carmen waved her hand toward Renier’s apartment. “She doesn’t want to leave the apartment yet. She almost lost her life yesterday, and the Romarie tried to take her back with them. Renier and I fought to save her, but this is the first time she’s felt safe since we left home. She wants to stay inside for now.”
Leroni stared at her. “Renier said you were a brave warrior. Now I understand what he meant.”
“I’m not a brave warrior,” Carmen replied. “I only want to help my friends.”
Leroni smiled. “I can see why he likes you so much.”
Carmen blushed but didn’t answer.
“Come on,” Leroni told her. “I’ll show you around, anyway. This is the main block, where the Alpha families live.”
“Alpha families?” Carmen asked. “Renier said he was Alpha here.”
“He is,” Leroni replied. “But he inherited that role from our father when he died. Our whole family lives in this block, and so do some other families who could take the Alpha role if circumstances required them to.”
Carmen frowned. “If Renier is the leader of the whole faction, why does he live in such a small apartment? Shouldn't he be in some fancy big house of his own?”
Leroni gave her a quizzical look. Then she nodded. “You must mean that apartment he took you to last night when you first arrived.”
“Wasn't that his apartment?” Carmen asked.
“It wasn't his apartment,” Leroni replied. “It was your apartment. You and your friend can stay there as long as you like.”
“But where does Renier live?” Carmen asked.
Leroni pointed to the top of the city. “We live in our family apartment up there. Renier hasn't taken a mate, so he'll live with his family until he raises a family of his own. Then he'll move into a big fancy apartment up on the top tier where he can survey the whole city. It wouldn't work very well for a single male to live alone, would it?”
Carmen blushed, but she couldn't stop herself from asking. “Why hasn't he found a mate yet?”
“All the factions lost significatn numbers of females in the plague,” Leroni replied. “Renier must have told you that. That's why the Alphas went to the gathering hall. They're desperate.”
“But that gathering hall had hundreds of people in it,” Carmen pointed out. “They can't all be the supreme leaders of their factions. Renier said there were five factions. That means only five people should have attended the gathering.”
Leroni nodded. “Renier is our Alpha, but like I told you, he's the head of our family.Our other relatives have to stay involved in political matters. If anything happened to Renier and they had to step into the Alpha role, they need to know what's going on. Besides, most of them are desperate to find mates, too. They were so desperate they were willing to go see what the Romarie had to offer. They knew it wasn't a good idea, but they agreed to do it anyway.”
Carmen looked around. “But I saw lots of females here last night, and Renier said you have enough to regenerate your population without getting females from the Romarie.”
“We have females.” Leroni's light laugh rang off the city walls. “After all, I am a female. But Renier couldn't exactly mate with me, could he? I'm his sister. Most of the Alphas are in a similar position. The only females left of breeding age are too closely related to them. They have to look elsewhere. The Alphas of the other factions are in the same perdicament.”
Carmen shook her head and turned away. “I have a lot to learn about this place.”
Leroni laughed. “Take it one step at a time. You have all the time in the world to learn our twisted politics. There must be something much more interesting you want to learn.”
“As a matter of fact,” Carmen replied, “my friend and I need to learn about your food. Renier gave us a big steaming piece of raw meat to eat last night, but our species doesn’t eat that sort of food. We cooked it on the lamp, but I don’t suppose we can do that every day. This morning we found some fruit and something that looked like milk in a bowl. We need to find out about the food you have here so we have something to eat.”
Leroni laughed again. “All right. I never thought food could be such an issue, but then again, no one but Felsite has ever been here before. Come with me, and I’ll show you where to get that food.”
She led Carmen across the stretch of flat rolling countryside in front of the city to a river at the bottom. Rustling trees lined the banks, and grassy knolls ran down to the water. She showed Carmen all the trees bearing the fruit Renier left them, and she pointed out the plants with tuberous roots. Last of all, she stopped in front of big tree with rough bark.
Leroni raised her hand and flexed her fingers, and claws sprang out from the end of each finger. In front of Carmen’s eyes, she scratched the bark with her claws, and the tough wood parted into long slits. The white liquid Carmen found in the bowl in the apartment oozed out in beads, and Carmen touched her finger to it. She stuck her finger in her mouth. “Thanks. This is a big help.”
Leroni burst out laughing. “You’re a strange creature, aren’t you?”
Carmen had to laugh along with her. “This situation must seem silly to you.”
Leroni stopped laughing. “Not really. I don’t know how you’re coping with it the way you are. I can’t imagine how awful it must be for you and your friends.”
Carmen turned away. “Let’s not talk about that. I’m having too nice a time with you as it is. Tell me about Angondra. Tell me about the factions.”
“What would you like to know?” Leroni asked. “There’s the Felsite, the Ursidreans, the Avitras, the Aqinas, and the Lycaon. You know that.”
“I know,” Carmen replied. “Tell me more about them.”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that,” Leroni replied. “The truth is the factions don’t know very much about each other. Most of us stay in our own territory. Only the Alphas travel to the other territories when they have to. Most Felsite have never even seen another Angondran.”
“But there were hundreds of different people at that gathering yesterday,” Carmen replied.
“They were Alphas,” Leroni replied. “They wouldn’t have been there otherwise. The only time the factions meet is to fight with each other or to negotiate a truce. If the factions hadn’t started fighting the Romarie, they would have started fighting each other.”
“Do they really fight?” Carmen asked. “I thought they were peaceful.”
Leroni shrugged. “Sometimes they’re peaceful and sometimes they’re not. The factions are too different from each other to get along very well. The Aqinas will tell the Ursidreans the Felsite said such and such about them, and the next thing you know, everybody’s marching out to war. Then the other factions get dragged into it, and before you know it, they have to get the Aqinas to negotiate a truce when it was the Aqinas that started the fight in the first place.”
Carmen rubbed her head. “How am I supposed to understand all this?”
Leroni patted her on the shoulder and laughed. “Don’t even try. I’ve been living here all my life, and I don’t understand it myself. Let’s go back to the city. I want to show you something.”
They strolled back over the meadows and hillocks to the foot of the city. Leroni stopped in the shade of a giant tree. “This is it.”
Carmen looked around. “What?”
Leroni pointed to a massive stone under the tree. “Do you see that hole?”
Carmen craned her neck and looked into a gaping black hole in the side of the rock. “What is it?”
“It’s an oven,” Leroni replied. “Our people use it to temper their stonework for building. They mix stone with mud and fire it in there.”
Carmen stared at it. “I didn’t know your people did that sort of work.”
Leroni shook her head. “That’s not why I’m telling you. Those tubers I showed you make a kind of powdery dust you can cook into other kinds of food.”
Carmen’s eyes flew open. “Do you mean like flour?”
Leroni waved her hand. “I don’t know what you call it. I’m just saying you can cook the tubers and eat them cooked, or you can grind them up into this dust and cook them into different kinds of food.”
Carmen stared at the hole and nodded. “I think I understand. Thank you so much for showing me this. It helps a lot.”
Leroni beckoned her around the other side of the rock. “And there’s this, too.” She pointed to a pit dug into the ground. Three big flat rocks with black soot marks lay on the ground around the pit. “We use this place for making flat bricks. We spread our mud mixture on these rocks and bake them over a hot fire. They make a hard flat brick.”
Carmen frowned. “What are you trying to tell me.”
“You said you couldn’t cook your meat over a lamp,” Leroni replied. “You could do it here. You could gather wood from the trees over there when you collect your fruit and tubers. Then you could bring it here and light a fire. You could cook your meat on the fire, and you could bake your food on the hot flat rocks.”
Carmen stared at her. Then she threw her arms around Leroni and kissed her on the cheek. “Leroni, you’re a genius!”
Leroni laughed out loud. “Listen to you! You’d think I just gave you a space ship to travel back home.”
Carmen brushed a tear away from the corner of her eyes. “You don’t know what this means to me. Thank you so much.”
Leroni waved her hand. “Stop it. I didn’t do anything.”
Just then, Renier strolled down the steps from his apartment and caught sight of them. He came toward them and nodded at Carmen. “I’ve been looking for you. I got word that one of your friends has been found.”