In Arcadia (Touchstone Book 5) Read online

  Lira, by contrast, had suffered a long isolation, and among the Devlin Ruuel family that had settled onto Arcadia, Lira was the one who struggled to believe she belonged, and was wanted for her Self and not just the powers of a Touchstone that made her, like Cass, so valuable. Undeniable beauty and a figure already maturing at thirteen added complication upon complication, and that did not even touch upon the media who watched her perhaps even more obsessively than it did Cass.

  Laura had many thoughts on encouraging Lira, but was keeping them to herself. Her own role as parent meant trusting in her daughter and son-in-law, supporting without pushing. Being 'Unna' meant she got to follow their lead while focusing on fun treats, so she simply offered to teach them all how to make a wreath once they were back from school that day.

  Hearing this as he and Kaoren returned, Rye said: "We can go to Middle Meadow. There are lots of flowers there I haven't catalogued yet."

  Rye was a born naturalist, and Arcadia his personal project. Whenever he spoke of it he shed his natural diffidence and glowed with enthusiasm. Laura had brought a great many seeds and plantlets for him from Earth, and had thoroughly enjoyed stocking her new flower beds with his assistance.

  The family began to discuss their day's rather complicated timetable, so Laura sat back and just enjoyed them, and marvelled at her daughter, who had survived a great deal, and was now proving to be not half bad as a working Mum-of-five. Of course her employer, the interplanetary defence force called KOTIS, made certain to accommodate Cass as much as possible, meaning she could take Tyrian with her for many of her current assignments. And Kaoren, who was easing back into his work for KOTIS as a Setari captain, could bring order to any level of chaos.

  As the breakfast dishes were tidied away, a text box popped up in the 'screen' inside Laura's head. Standard English alphabet, which was another accommodation KOTIS had been careful to provide for Cass' convenience.

  Cass: Jules is still in bed, I suppose?

  Laura: I expect so. He's found a new game he really likes.

  Cass: Aren't you worried about him, Mum? He practically gets up at midday each day.

  Laura: Well, so does your Aunt Sue. They're both night owls.

  Cass: But Aunt Sue at least goes outside when she's up.

  Laura: Don't worry, Cass. I make sure Julian's cave is aired at least once a week. But if you'd like to revisit the occasions when I couldn't get you up before midday on a Saturday when you were sixteen...

  Cass: Blah. Okay, okay, whatever. I'm just...he isn't unhappy, is he?

  Laura: He is blissful. But also learning a new language, and dealing with all the Earth things that aren't here. He puts in solid time in virtual school, and comes out of his cave when I ask him to. I think we can leave him to that, just for the moment.

  Cass sighed heavily, but turned her attention to getting her collection of children down to the dock for their trip to school.

  Mildly entertained, Laura enjoyed any hugs offered, and then strolled back to her house, choosing not to mention to Cass that she was fairly sure Julian's withdrawal was related to visits to Arcadia by numerous pretty girls, combined with the presence of Sight Sight talents. The idea that Kaoren—not to mention Sen—could see his reactions to some of the island's visitors had clearly occurred to Julian almost immediately after their arrival.

  Sight talent etiquette meant Kaoren was highly unlikely to ever show any sign of noticing anything Julian didn't say out loud, but Sen was still learning proper circumspection, and reticence didn't change the fact that they would know. Laura certainly wouldn't want to suffer teen pangs before an audience who could catch glimpses of what went on beneath surface composure. This was a dilemma Julian would have to resolve himself, and Laura would leave him alone to do it.

  Setting aside the question of her own time, Laura spent the remainder of the morning wandering about her new garden, checking the growth of seedlings and thinking about what to do with the empty space out back. Her usual landscaping style was an enormous amount of mulch and a cottage garden denseness, but she'd never had an area so large: a long meadow rising a little way, and then sloping south and east from the little hill where her house had been planted.

  This was an entirely pleasant aspect, and so she was tempted to just leave it be. But she also kept picturing it as a sheer mass of flowers, or all manner of complex garden rooms. Weeding wouldn't be the usual deterrent, since she'd been gifted with a specialised robot 'drone' that would take care of any plant she didn't 'permit', and so she could consider establishing a really extensive garden.

  Her main challenge in planning anything was that she didn't know how to garden in a climate involving a couple of months of snow. She'd brought along a few ebooks covering the basics, but there would be considerable guesswork and experimentation involved in her garden, especially where Muinan plants were concerned.

  So many factors. Unknown pests and diseases. A year that was forty-one days longer than Earth's. 'Weeds' that might turn out to be Muinan plants she would like to include.

  Weeds that might eat you, given some of the things that had shown up on Muina.

  A lifelong study of Earth-to-Muina gardening would no doubt be valuable, but gardens were something Laura simply liked, not something she wanted to devote every hour of every day to, so she hesitated to embark on anything really difficult. Perhaps for now she would keep the grassy meadow, and concentrate on the small beds around the northern patio, even though many of them would likely only work for shade-loving plants. Still, the strawberry runners she'd planted were doing very well in the sunniest spot, and she was looking forward to a small harvesting and sampling session before autumn kicked in.

  A text message flashed onto her 'inner screen'.

  Sue: Clean up and come have second breakfast.

  Laura: Sounds like a plan.

  Susan—named for a Narnian Queen—was the younger of Laura's two sisters. A photographer, Sue had always been the most adventurous of the family, and had happily upped sticks to follow Laura to a whole different planet. Laura, although she was enjoying Muina enormously, felt a little more whole to have Sue with her.

  Out of habit, Laura greeted her sister with Auslan, even though Muinan medical science had effortlessly reversed the slow loss of hearing that had started in Sue's pre-teens.

  Sue signed back absently, then said: "Hey, did your boobs perk up after our last visit to the medics?"

  "I...you know, maybe a little?"

  "I suppose it's hard to tell with those mosquito bites. I swear mine are sitting an inch higher. I was talking to Didi Senez about standard health care here and, unless they have a particular issue they just go once a year for 'damage repair'. That seems to have been what we got over the last two visits—it sweeps out obvious cancers and works on worn cartilage and muscular issues. That's why your knees don't hurt any more. And, apparently, it helps with boob sag."

  "Both results to appreciate."

  "Didi is going to something she calls 'skin treatment' next week, and says we should book in with her. It's more cosmetically-focused—wrinkles, jawlines—but much the same process. They squirt nanites into you and then direct them to specific issues. Scar removal, moles, cellulite—all the little lumps and bumps. Growing hair where you want it and not where you don't."

  Laura thought for a moment, then shrugged. "Well, if it doesn't involve surgery, why not, after all? I'll think of it as a very intensive facial. Will it delay the trip to Telezon?"

  "Not unless their nanites eat our noses off, or something. I swear, every second movie I've watched here involves nanites eating you."

  "And the rest are about the Setari." The elite psychic soldiers Cass worked with were an interplanetary preoccupation.

  "Hardly ever happens, though," Sue went on. "Being eaten by nanites. I looked it up."

  "'Hardly ever' makes me suddenly far less inclined to see what skin treatment is like."

  "I expect they could grow our noses back if they're eaten off.
Speaking of which, don't wait for the kids. They're cleaning up after painting Maddy's room."

  "How did it work out?" One of Sue's three house guests, Maddy Caldwell, had wanted real decoration in her room, not the projected images common on Muina, and her sister Alyssa had designed an Australian-themed mural for her.

  "Not bad. I took a couple of very nice shots of them in-progress, too."

  They chatted idly about the complications of Cass' fame, which spilled over on to the handful of Earth immigrants who had joined her on Arcadia. Not only did it mean Sue felt she couldn't publicly display her photographs, but jaunts like the planned trip to the region called Telezon inevitably required a security detail. Even a shopping trip required security.

  Thinking this over, Laura began poking around the various options of the Muinan internet, and was deep in sub-menus when Sue said:

  "Well, well. The infamous Tsur Selkie."

  Laura looked out the door to the patio, but there was no sign of a visitor on the path leading down to the dock.

  "Check your email," Sue murmured, and added: "I do hope he's as flinty as advertised."

  "I don't think Cass meant that description as a positive," Laura said, checking her email. Tsur Selkie was a KOTIS officer Cass had described a number of times in her diaries. According to Cass he was short, abrupt, and 'like Clint Eastwood'.

  The email was certainly short, simply requesting a preliminary meeting in a Muinan fortnight—the first of a series to gather background in relation to Earth.

  "I'm almost disappointed he didn't just plonk an appointment in our calendars and expect us to show up."

  Sue giggled. "If he's half as humourless as Cass made out, I'm positively going to have to be restrained from spreading some high grade nonsense."

  "Psychic psychic, remember?" Tsur Selkie was another Sight Sight talent. "Chances are high he'll be able to tell when you're lying."

  "Yes, but what will he do about it? Will he just write it all down, and thank me? Will he look cross? Call me out? This," Sue said, definitely, "is going to be fun."

  Laura shook her head in resigned amusement. "Try not to annoy him too much. We specifically want to prod the Muinans toward opening a trade relationship with Earth. I don't really know how much influence Tsur Selkie will have over that, but alienating him hardly seems like a good idea."

  "What is a 'Tsur' anyway? Starting all the military ranks with 'Ts' seems unnecessarily confusing, especially when Muinan uses 'Tsa' for a general civilian honorific, and..." There was a short pause as Sue researched her question, then she snorted and said: "It just means Sight Sight Advisor. Doesn't show where he is in the KOTIS hierarchy at all."

  Shrugging, Laura sent an acceptance, made a note in her calendar, and turned back to her new project. "Check this out," she said, sending a link.

  Munching on seaweed snacks, Sue reviewed Laura's work, then said: "Is 'Tiamat' supposed to be you?"

  "Everyone needs an artistic alias."

  "Because it makes so much sense to sell the things you create entirely anonymously, rather than cash in on Cass' ridiculous fame."

  "Exactly."

  "I was being sarcastic."

  "Yes, I'm aware of your default state."

  "I can understand not wanting to be dependent on Cass, but...well, no I do see where you're going. I suppose I could do something similar with my pictures, at least those that don't depict people. Unless I want to devolve into a paparazzi stalker of my own family, there doesn't seem to be a huge amount of money in photography, but there is a market for 'image sets' for room décor. Screensavers for walls. Going to tell Cass?"

  "I might have to, to be able to arrange anonymous postage. I'll worry about that if I sell anything at the exorbitant prices I intend to charge."

  They discussed possibilities until Sue's three house guests arrived. Unlike Julian, these were new Muinan residents that did cause Laura concern. Maddy, Alyssa and Nick had not been part of the original 'move to Muina' plan. Nick, who was Sue's technically-ex stepson, and Alyssa, Cass' best friend from high school, had known the true explanation behind her disappearance, and of Laura and Sue's plan to join Cass on her new world, but there'd been no suggestion of them coming along until Maddy, Alyssa's younger sister, had relapsed, and her parents had gambled desperately on stories of nanite technology and cures for cancer.

  That had worked. Maddy had been released from medical care a week ago, and—while not yet robust—was no longer in danger. But she and Alyssa were both desperately homesick. Nick was more difficult to read. He clearly embraced all the wonders of Muina, but he had spent such a large part of his life keeping an eye on his alcoholic father that Laura very much doubted that it was simple for him to walk away from that tie.

  Since the dimensional gate to Earth only opened once in a Muinan year, the three could not even send letters to ease the homesickness, not even a message to let Maddy's parents know that she had recovered.

  Laura, who knew the struggle of waiting, simply said good morning, and suggested that they might like to join the wreath-making expedition that afternoon. Shadows inevitably crept into every paradise, and she would do her small best to lighten those touching these children, since it was not possible to just wave a wand and make them think of Arcadia as 'home'.

  Chapter Two

  When psychic space ninjas retire from combat service, their formidable paranormal abilities can be turned to other pursuits. In the case of Maze Gainer—formerly Maze Surion—Telekinesis made him a landscape gardener who could rearrange your trees.

  A weeping maple wafted overhead. It passed over the deep, whitestone-lined pit that had replaced Laura's back yard, and settled onto the middle level of the series of steep whitestone terraces that had been built up to provide a 'back wall' for a curving pool.

  The drastic alterations were the result of a casual conversation on the day Laura had had breakfast pancakes with Cass. Although Maze had retired from Setari squad duty in order to concentrate on his family and his burgeoning business, he still participated in training and administration tasks, and occasionally rostered himself on for Arcadian bodyguard duty. Laura had been enjoying another visit to her favourite seat when he had jogged up on a training run and stopped to chat about the approaching autumn, and gardens in snowy climates. She had ended up giving him all her scans of Earth gardening books since, while the text was unreadable for him, there were countless pictures.

  Laura had pointed out a few of the gardens she thought particularly lovely, and woken the next day to an email attaching a complete design for a Japanese-inspired water garden to be installed at her back door. Barely a week later a large chunk of the hill had been carved away, and whitestone nanotech formwork had been set to grow, while Maze sourced plants to match his vision. Eager to get the major work done before his small family went on a trip to their home world, Tare, he had taken only another Muinan eight-day week before he was setting in place fully grown trees.

  "I always say there's nothing like watching other people work," Sue said. "That goes for double when they look like young gods and bring their own shower of leaves."

  "He would make a good Apollo, wouldn't he? Now I wonder how I can go about getting him to let me pay him."

  "Won't work," Cass said, from inside the house. She wandered out onto the long back porch and gave the settling tree—and the man floating above it—a wry look. "Not if he's told you it's a gift. Besides, he's really in love with all the scanned books you gave him. Tare and Kolar's climates are completely different from Muina's, so he hasn't really had a good range of examples of all the things that can be done with gardens. Alay told me he stayed up all night, first trying to look at everything, and then excitedly plotting out things he wants to try."

  "Well, if I do expand the gardens I'll make sure to hire him properly. You're sure you don't mind me working on the whole hillside?"

  "Why would I? I didn't put anything out here because I figured you'd like playing around with it. Besides..." Cass
nodded to the line of children sitting in a row further down the curving back patio. "Lots of free entertainment. Hell, this even got Jules to make an appearance. And Rye's not the only one excitedly planning other gardens for you. They've all been looking through those books too, and have mapped out something modest and easy to look after that's only twice as large as the gardens at Versailles."

  "I might need more gardening drones for that. And the whole island. This will be more than enough for now: I think it's going to be beautiful."

  Cass looked pleased, and then paused, studying Laura's face. "I can't get over how different you look. Do you see yourself in the mirror and not recognise yourself?"

  Laura gave her a dry glance. "I just look more like the me in my head. Not quite the me in my early twenties, but closer than I have been for a while. You'll probably always think of yourself as how you look now." She paused. "And on this planet, I suppose, that will be mostly right for a long time. I get startled when I see Sue, though. She looks fabulous."

  'Skin treatment' had not been entirely painless, but no noses had been lost, and the results had been well worth the long, moderately embarrassing session. It was no wonder Laura had so much trouble guessing the ages of people on Muina.

  "Maddy's looking happier too," Cass said, watching the children cheer on the arrival of another tree.

  "She's feeling better physically. It makes a big difference." Laura touched Cass' arm lightly. "You can't cure her homesickness. We all knew this was a more-or-less one-way trip. And she's alive."

  "I guess so."