Nara stood at the door of the Or residence. She had visited before, often when Choron was home from his runs in the asteroids, but she had never become accustomed to the place. Unlike most homes on Orefall, theirs was a permanent structure with foundations that ran deep into the rock of the small planet. Choron had taken her to the cellar sometimes, and there they had added their initials to the generations carved into the dark stone. As a family of merchants stretching in time farther back than official records reached, the Or clan never left Orefall.
At least, none had until Choron had chosen to break from tradition. His father had been angry for years after Choron's stint in the Church, but he had eventually regained hope in his only child upon Choron's return from his first trip as Miro's apprentice; father and son had found a common ground while speaking of the metals market.
What have I been during these years? she wondered. No letters ever came to her from Choron, but on the rare occasions they spent alone with each other, he would quietly place some rough-hewn gem in her hand, telling her the tale of how he had found it in his travels. They had never shared a kiss; alarmed at her desperate insistence, he sometimes tried to describe what he felt. She recalled one day when she had asked him what she meant to him. “Nara,” he had said with effort, “I feel right now that we have something to accomplish before I can be allowed to love you.” He couldn't explain what he meant.
She looked at her reflection on the luxurious wood and glass door while she knocked for the second time. By the standards of her people, she was gorgeous: fine features rarely seen from miner stock; a lithe body that had attracted the attention of even the exotic off-world traders; fair hair cut to rest on her shoulders; black eyes that had seen things she could never forget. Her looks had given her a choice of suitors over the last few years, but she worried that Choron's subtle rejection of romance had infected her: every one of her relationships had lost its excitement within one month.
Just as she prepared to knock on the door a final time, Pira peeked out from behind the rich curtains covering the glass on the inside, smiled upon recognizing Nara, and opened the door. “Hello, my dear,” she said. “I'm afraid Choron is still away. He should be back soon.”
Nara caught herself before she could wince. “No, I know. I'm actually here to speak to you.”
“What an unexpected pleasure!” She opened the door wider and stepped aside. “Please come in.”
“Thank you.”
After the preliminary politenesses were over, and the two were seated at the counter in their vast kitchen with cups of tea in hand, Nara began the conversation she had rehearsed on her way to the household.
“Pira, do you remember the time ten years ago when the Church tried to excommunicate me?”
“Why, of course. And over such a silly thing, too. They said you were possessed by demons.” The woman's tone indicated that it had been anything but silly, and Nara looked down at her teacup.
It's for Choron, she told herself. “We came to an agreement behind closed doors: I would stop speaking of my dreams, and they would allow me to stay with the Church. If I broke my promise, they would strip me of my name and rights.”
“Yes, I remember Choron telling me about that.” She leaned forward. “He also told me the dreams never stopped.”
“They didn't.” Nara shifted in her seat. “It's been hard to stay quiet these last four years. You were right to call them visions: I've seen things in advance more times than I can count. I could have prevented so many small tragedies, like the metal shortage two years ago. It didn't always make sense to me, but the vision's meaning would reveal itself over time.”
“I can only imagine what it took to keep this knowledge inside.” Pira waited until Nara looked into her eyes. “Why do you speak of this now?”
“You asked me a few days ago if I had seen your son in a vision. You were right.”
Choron's mother grew pale.
“I did not wish to frighten you; the dream seemed bad, but I could not be certain what it meant. So I said nothing. But last night, what I saw in my dreams made the one before pleasant in comparison.”
Nara shivered at the thought of it. She had experienced everything Choron had: ending Miro's life with sedatives; the pain; the intense hallucinations, so much like her own. In trying to interpret her previous dream, she had triggered this most recent one. Nara told Pira only about Miro's death and about Choron's launch; the poor woman would be frightened enough without knowing what her son had seen in his searing revelation. Nara let her digest the news, adding, “I have never been more certain that I was speaking the truth.”
The older woman nodded and took a sip of her tea. Her eyes followed thoughts that were far away. “Nara, before I do anything drastic, I want to know for sure.”
“Choron is my best friend. I have come to you at the risk of my honor so that we can help him before it is too late. If the Church ostracizes me, my future will include little more than prostitution and death. If I lie, may God condemn me to that wretched fate.”
“That is all I needed to hear. Thank you for telling me. I will do what I can to protect you. But what can we do for Choron? How long does my son have to live?”
“Two days, at most, unless he receives medical attention. We can't find him and return before then. Is there anyone still that far afield?”
“There must be; several other prospecting teams have relayed messages from Choron. Why?”
“What if we ask them to rescue Choron?”
Pira thought for a moment. “You know prospectors: they live and die by a strict budget. From what Choron's letters said, Miro found a path through the asteroids that led them to the Great Rock. Even with the information they collected during the trip, they were in the red when they got there.”
“They're worse than miners, aren't they?”
The two fell silent for a few minutes. Nara hated to think that Choron would die because of greed. “Perhaps,” she said hesitantly, “you could offer a reward for Choron's return?”
“I was thinking of something like that, but I am not the one who controls the family fortune. It is Flanik who can offer such large sums of money. I am prepared to do whatever I believe necessary, but the real question is: will he feel the same way?”
“According to Choron, your husband was on the Church's side during my trial.”
“Yes.” Pira sighed. “I'm afraid that Flanik will report you immediately without letting your side of the story surface; the rest of Orefall would only learn that you foolishly broke your silence.”
Nara had guessed as much. “Does Choron send coded transmissions to you?”
“He does.”
“We might be able to use the code to forge an emergency broadcast from him.”
Pira straightened and looked into Nara's eyes. “That is a perfect idea. His transmissions are always relayed from a masked location; as long as we don't send the forgery from here, no one will know the difference.”
“I think it might work. What should the message say?”
“S.O.S. should be enough.”
Choron's mother took Nara to her room, found the code that would encrypt the message, and gave it to Nara. She also fished through her drawers until she unconvered a heavy coin purse undoubtedly filled with gold. “I've been saving this. Use it to take a taxi to the transport station. Go home and send the message as soon as you can. The rest will hopefully see you through any hard times that might arise if the Church discovers the truth.”
Without another word, she escorted Nara to the door and kissed her cheek. “Say hello to your mother for me.”
The trip home, while shorter than usual, gave her time to think. To Nara, it was plain that something important was unfolding. Her visions had never seemed to serve a purpose: they had only led to her misery. It wasn't simply that someone at last believed her, either. The things Choron had seen—and that she had been allowed to see them—told her that they were at the center of it all. Those words of Choron's that had disappointed her years before came back to her with new meaning: “I won't take you as my woman. You and I are not meant to be together in that way, not yet. We have more to do before then.”