Why had he kissed her palm? Why had he admitted his attraction to her? Braxx had no idea—he only knew it was a bad idea. Molly was kind and sweet and gorgeous…and much too good for him. If she only knew the true story of his crash…of the things he had done…if she could see his sins, written in the scars on his face, he doubted she would be in any way attracted to him.
Just leave her alone, he told himself grimly. You know she’s not for you. Keep things professional, like she said. It’s the only way to get through the next three solar months.
He was grimly determined to do just that but it was difficult considering that he literally couldn’t stop touching her. Not in an amorous or lustful way but because she was blind and needed his guidance on the alien planet.
Molly showed him the way she preferred to hold him by the elbow as they walked, which shouldn’t have been an incendiary touch at all. But just having her near and feeling her soft fingers anywhere on his body seemed to set Braxx on fire. He was half hard, his cock throbbing in the black flight leathers he wore, as they traversed the alien landscape.
To try and distract himself from the female at his side, he began to describe everything to her as they went—which was what Molly wanted anyway.
“We’re in the forest now—most of the vegetation is purple and pink rather than green, as it is on Earth,” he told her. “There are many tightly closed buds—these are night blooming jerub flowers. When open, they exude a sweet scent that draws insects and small animals which they trap and digest.”
“Wow—like a Venus Flytrap, huh?” Molly remarked.
“If a Venus Flytrap was as big as your head,” Braxx said dryly. “The jerub flowers are extremely large but then, so are the native insects due to a slightly higher ratio of oxygen in the Tal’os atmosphere.”
“Are you saying they have giant bugs here?” Molly shivered. “Because I really don’t want something huge and hairy crawling all over me in the middle of the night.”
“You’ll be all right as long as you stay in the lighted village during the evenings,” Braxx assured her. “Most of the Tal’ossi insects are attracted to scent, not light.”
“Good to know.” Molly nodded. “Are we close to the village now?”
“Not far,” Braxx said. “We are skirting a field of the multicolored tanta grasses the Tal’ossi use to make their negus. It’s forbidden to walk through such a field because the grass is very tender and easy to break while it’s still growing. Once they cut it and put it in a vat of jerub juice, it becomes much more pliable—almost silky to touch.”
“Wait—so they used the digestive juices of the carnivorous flower to, uh, tenderize the grass they use to make clothes? Fascinating! Tell me more,” Molly begged.
Braxx couldn’t help smiling at her enthusiasm. He’d been fascinated by the details of Tal’ossi life as well, when he’d first made contact with the primitive aliens, but he’d had no one to share his wonder with. It was nice to be able to include Molly in his discovery and explain everything he knew about this new people to her.
They had landed at the end of Tal’os Trenta’s short day so the shadows were already growing long by the time they reached the hut of the Wise One. It was a long, low structure built of the pale pink and deep purple wood which grew in the forest and the flat roof was thatched with pink and green moss.
For a world where sight wasn’t as important as other senses, there was certainly a lot of color on Tal’os Trenta, Braxx mused, as he had the first time he had visited
They came to a stop before the wooden door and Braxx murmured, “We have arrived. This is the domicile of the Wise One who acts as a kind of medicine woman to the Tal’ossi of this particular Top Dweller clan.”
“Now what?” Molly asked in a hushed voice.
“Now we clap and sing a request for admittance. Listen to me first and then you repeat,” Braxx instructed. “All greetings and farewells must be sung—it’s a very important part of Tal’ossi etiquette.”
He clapped a simple one-two-three, one-two-three rhythm and sang in a strong voice, “Oh Wise One, Oh Wise One. Please grant entrance. Please grant entrance.”
“Oh!” Molly seemed impressed. “You have a gorgeous singing voice, Braxx!”
“Um…thank you.” He could feel his cheeks getting hot at the unexpected compliment. “I don’t sing much but it’s necessary here on Tal’os. I remember the first time I tried to ask entrance to the Wise Woman’s hut—I was too embarrassed to sing so I just spoke. But you can talk until you’re hoarse—she won’t let you in if you don’t ask properly.”
“Can I try it?” Molly asked. She cocked her head to one side. “You know, I can’t get over the way I can tell you’re talking in a foreign language but I can still understand it.”
“That’s the translation bacteria,” Braxx told her. “Yes, if you want to come in, you have to clap and sing as well. The Wise Woman is probably watching us right now and she knows she has two visitors, not just one. Until you ask admittance properly she won’t allow either of us inside.”
Molly began to clap. “Oh Wise One, Oh Wise One. Please grant entrance. Please grant entrance,” she sang in a soft, clear voice which Braxx found quite lovely. Then again, he found all of her lovely.
When she had finished, they repeated the ritual, only this time together. When the last note died away the pink and purple wooden door swung open and the wrinkled blue face of the Wise One was finally revealed.
“Ah, Braxx—he that comes from the sky,” she said, smiling at him. “You are most welcome here.”
“Thank you, Wise One.” He bowed his head deferentially.
He didn’t feel self-conscious about his scars around the old female because she also had a deformity. Though most Top Dweller Tal’ossi had large, round eyes to capture every bit of light, she had one round eye and one tiny shrunken one, which was like the small, atrophied eyes of the Deep Dwellers, who hardly used their sight at all. She had told Braxx once, when she saw him looking at it that she “had a foot in each village.”
“For my father was a Deep Dweller and my mother was a Top Dweller he had taken in a raid,” she’d explained to him. “That’s why my skin is neither dark nor light but somewhere in between.”
Indeed, instead of being pale, baby blue or deep indigo, her wrinkled hide, which was displayed through the strands of her negu, was a kind of medium blue-gray.
“This is the female I told you of—Molly, she who wishes to learn your ways,” Braxx said, bringing Molly forward.
The Wise One held out two wrinkled hands.
“Welcome, welcome,” she sang. “Welcome to our land—Molly who seeks knowledge of the People.”
“Thank you,” Molly sang back, smiling.
“She’s reaching out to you with both hands,” Braxx murmured, trying to help her avoid giving offense. “You must take them in your own—it’s a gesture of greeting.”
“Oh, sorry!” Molly exclaimed. She reached blindly for the other female’s hands, grasping the Wise One’s wrinkled fingers and smiling. “Thank you, thank you,” she sang again. “It’s so very good to meet you.”
The Wise One nodded in apparent satisfaction.
“You are very welcome, child,” she said to Molly, speaking rather than singing now that the greetings were made. “But I perceive that you have the affliction of the Deep Dwellers.”
“The affliction of the Deep Dwellers?” Molly frowned.
“She thinks you can’t see very well—the Deep Dwellers have notoriously poor eyesight,” Braxx explained in a low voice.
“Oh—yes.” Molly nodded and spoke to the old woman. “I do have something like that. Actually, I cannot see at all. I’m blind.”
“No sight at all?” The Wise One frowned. “We must see what we can do about that. But come in, come in…” She stepped aside to let them pass and Braxx led Molly into the hut.
The Wise One’s hut was built to the proportions of the female Tal’ossi, not the males, so he had to duck his head carefully lest he bang it on the doorframe. Even when he straightened up inside, the top of his head was a scant inch from the ceiling and the twigs the roof was made of tended to snag in his thick, black hair.
“Come to the sitting place,” the Wise Woman directed. “And we will have nider blood and speak.”
She led them to a sitting area with a small hearth in the center—the place where she counseled other Tal’ossi when they came to ask her advice, Braxx knew. There were several cushions, made from animal hide and stuffed with dried herbs and leaves, scattered around the central hearth. They made a pleasant rustling sound and released a soft floral fragrance when Braxx and Molly sat on them.
When she was certain her guests were settled, the Wise One busied herself with stirring the thin, pale pink liquid she had in the pot over the hearth.
“There’s a heat source here,” Molly remarked in a low voice. “I can feel it in front of me. I would guess it was a fire but…” She frowned. “I don’t smell any burning or hear any crackling. Why is that? What is it?”
“It is a fire—of sorts,” Braxx told her. “But it isn’t a fire that you or I would recognize as a fire. It’s a little pile of clear red crystals that range in size from your smallest finger to the length of my palm.”
“Crystals that give out heat?” Molly frowned. “How?”
“Through the power of the Cha’llah, child,” the Wise One said, handing Braxx a bark cup of the steaming pink liquid.
“It’s one of the most remarkable things about the Tal’ossi,” Braxx told Molly as he accepted another steaming cup from the Wise One and placed it carefully in her hands. “They are able to harness this power for any number of uses. They use the Cha’llah infused crystals for heat, for light, even for propulsion in certain kinds of primitive vehicles. It’s an amazingly versatile power source.”
“Where do they get the crystals and where is the Cha’llah?” Molly asked curiously.
“Both come from underground—from the realm of the Deep Dwellers,” Braxx told her. “They trade the charged crystals to the Top Dwellers for fruits and vegetables—things they are unable to grow themselves in their underground village.”
“The Cha’llah blesses us all, both Top and Deep Dwellers,” the Wise One said, taking a place on a cushion which rustled and released a cloud of sweet fragrance when she sat on it. “Now sip your nider blood and we’ll speak of what can be done about your eyes.”