Free Starbreak by Phoebe North Page A

crumbling into chaos. And a whole world down here, dangerous and new. I winced but didn’t answer.
    “I came down here to stop you from ruining our chances of settlement. Now you might be useful,” she said, speaking cautiously. “My mother said that Mara Stone was pleased with your progress in your vocation. But unless it’s about plants, I don’t want to hear a single word from you. You’re only a botanist—a talmid at that. You’re no diplomat. Do you hear me?”
    Her small brown eyes bored into me. She wanted an answer, so numbly I nodded.
    “I remember my mother talking about Alyana Fineberg,” she said, letting out a low sigh. “Common-born, but she always wanted to be a leader. Thought she could rise up the ranks through the Children of Abel, march us into glory. We all know how that ended.”
    I’d never wanted to be a leader. In that moment I wanted nothing more than to be left alone. But Aleksandra took my silence for a protest. She spat on the ground, hard.
    “Remember who’s in charge,” she said. I wasn’t about to forget it as I watched the dark shadow of her back disappear behind the flimsy fabric walls of the tent. My throat was dry. I clutched my rifle. There was no way I was going to follow her in there, lay my head down in a sleep sack only a few meters from her plotting, murderous hands.
    I pulled the synthetic blankets out of my pack, then wadded up the bag beneath my head. Still dressed in my sweat-drenched flight suit, I squeezed my eyes shut. I was sure that I wouldn’t sleep that night, out in the open, the wind frigid and biting against my cheeks.
    But from almost the moment my eyes closed, I was plunged into the world of turbulent dreams.
    •  •  •
    We sat in a patch of thorny brambles only a few meters apart. But it might as well have been kilometers. I clutched my arms around my naked body, shielding myself.
    Come, he said, reaching a willowy arm out to me. I wanted tograsp his hand in mine, to furl my body around his, as tight as a fiddlehead. But I couldn’t. East. We were going east. Aleksandra had decided.
    And yet he said it again. Come! If those black eyes reflected anything, it was the heat of his desire. But I couldn’t figure out how to bridge the gap between us. The ground was frozen, hard and slick. And netted with thorns.
    Over the past two days—during our shuttle journey and our sojourn in the Zehavan wilderness—I’d kept one goal in mind: reaching him. And no wonder. Through hard month after hard month, he’d been my respite. His hands, preternaturally long, had graced my white belly. His mouth, soft and wet, had pressed against my throat. I hadn’t understood the passions that lurked beneath my flesh, but I knew that he made me happy. If there was one certainty, it had been that.
    Now I hesitated. Maybe I’d made a mistake in coming to the planet. Maybe I was only a foolish girl, as Aleksandra said, sixteen and with a head stuffed full of dreams. After all, I’d been stupid enough to think myself in love before, but I’d been wrong about that. I remembered standing in front of Koen Maxwell, whom I’d hoped I would marry, waiting for him to make a move. I’d been starved for his kisses, for the steady pressure of his hard hands against my skin. And then, when Silvan came along?
    I’d been so glad to lay my body down in the soggy leaves, tolet him press his hands over my belly, my hips, my thighs. It didn’t matter what the Children of Abel wanted. It didn’t matter that there were times when I hated Silvan, despising those pretty lips and the words that tumbled from them. All that mattered was feeling: his body on top of mine, his fingers and tongue and lips and palms, the way his slender hips jutted out, and the fine fur over his belly. How was this any different? I’d endangered all of them—killed Mar Schneider too—just so that I could feel loved.
    The boy reached for me. I saw his arms stretch out, long and blue. I felt his desire,