Chapter Ten Selena
Closing my eyes, I emptied my mind, putting away my doubts and stress so I could give Odelm my undivided attention.
The music started slow and emotional, then slowly transitioned into a faster piece with quick, precise movements. Each note of every song shared his emotions with me. I was the one riding high, then plunging into despair, soaring and dipping with his incredible performance.
Odelm was the master of my feelings as he moved from stately melodies, filled with lilting and beautiful passages, to a more upbeat tempo.
Slowly, I felt a pressure against my mental shields.
I waved it off as one of the Circuli testing my limits. Bolder citizens tried to do so from time to time, trying to test my strength and see if I was worthy enough to have not only four nestmates, but a pair of princes in my clan.
They could never sever my bonds with my nestmates, but that didn’t make them any less curious. How had a demi-human come to have four nestmates? And how had I become Prince Zirene’s Seedbearer?
At every step of my journey, someone always questioned me, my past, and my possessions.
It had grown old.
I’d thought that giving Destima’s citizens a paradise to live and flourish in would be enough for them to leave my clan and me alone, but no matter how many times I gave, they always wanted more.
I felt the pressure again, but this time, it was joined by a dizzy spell.
Slowly, I could feel my body fall over, but my eyelids were too heavy to open.
A sharp pain stabbed my head, causing my mental shields to waver for an instant as the dizziness overtook me.
One moment of weakness in my mental shields was enough for the presence to slither through, entering my void. A cyan, spherical presence floated before me, its thread cutting through the remainder of my mental shields. I tried to envision severing its power the way Mwe had taught me but failed.
“I don’t think so, female,” the familiar, yet mysterious tenor voice spoke. “You have been a hard person to track. Nevertheless, I’ve finally found you.”
“What do you want from me?” I demanded. “Haven’t you heard of diplomacy? Or are you too barbaric to negotiate?”
“You tell me, Selena Darcaw, Seedbearer and Mate of Zirene Darcaw and ruler of—what did you call it? ‘Destima’? Ah, yes, the moon Destima.”
A shiver coursed through my ethereal form.
“How do you know my identity?” I hissed, refusing to show weakness to this arrogant male.
“I know a lot about you, Selena,” he chuckled. “You see, you have my brother, and I want him back.”
“Obviously, you don’t know as much as you think you do, because I don’t know who your brother is,” I scoffed. “So how about you stop wasting both of our time and leave me be? Clearly I don't know what the Stars you’re talking about.”
“That’s where you’re wrong, Selena,” he taunted. “The Stars have led me to you and shown my Cosmic Soul that you’re the key to finding my brother. Now, we can do this the easy way; just tell me how I can get him back. Or I can force you to.”
I tried to recall our earlier conversation, only to pull a blank.
“I don’t understand why you think I have anything to do with you or your brother. Just because some Cosmic Soul—whatever that is—told you something false, you’re pinning his disappearance on me?” I barked. “Look, I am not Verya, nor am I Vhalxt. You already know so much about me, I’m assuming you know that I’m not a kidnapper.”
“I don’t know what you are, only that you were created by one of my enemies, the Yaarkins. Add that to the fact that you’re involved in my brother’s disappearance, and that makes us enemies.”
“And here I thought the CEG Assembly was prone to jumping to conclusions,” I muttered, already sick and tired of repeating myself.
“I haven’t encountered them yet, but when I do, I will make sure I’ve harvested all the information I need from you.”
“Harvested?”
His cyan sphere moved tight circles around me as if he was interrogating me in my ethereal form. “What do you think I’m going to do to you when I come for you? I am going to force you to tell me everything you know, and then dispose of you for your insolence once I get my brother back.”
“You plan to kill me even though I’m trying to tell you that I’m innocent?” I asked in disbelief. “I have rights. If you believe in the Fates and Stars, then you should know that murder of the innocent makes you lose their blessing—”
“You are not in the position to lecture me.”
A familiar fuchsia-black thread burst through the crack the cyan presence had made, forming a similar spherical form between the deranged invader and me.
“Who gave you the right to abuse your Fate’s blessing and violate this female’s mind? Must I remind you of CEG law concerning the invasion of another’s mental walls?” Oeta hissed.
The cyan sphere backed away as if wary of her unexpected presence. While I wasn’t entirely pleased to see yet another being within my void, where only Zirene and I should have access, I was relieved to have a strong ally to face this intruder.
“Your laws don’t apply to me,” he mocked. “And I will gladly penetrate her walls when my brother’s life depends on it.”
“That breaks the law of the Fates and Stars, and you know it!” Oeta challenged, her glow growing a shade brighter. “Selena has nothing to do with you and your brother, so why do you believe she does?”
“Something about a Cosmic Soul telling him,” I began. “Whatever that is, they told him that I was the key to bringing his brother back. Yet he isn’t taking me at my word when I say I have no clue what he’s talking about.”
“Cosmic Souls never lie!”
“Well, maybe this Cosmic Soul read the Stars wrong
