When the Winter Comes
By
Pat Foley
Chapter 11
After days of rain and cold winds, the day we started back to our original camp was a gift: sunny and almost warm, by human standards. Since the weather had taken a nice turn, we took our time walking back. We paused often to gather whatever food we could find, thoroughly gleaning unspoiled patches of grain, nuts and fruit when we came across them, and piling our cart high. At night, we would build a fire in a clearing. While we rarely found a natural shelter, we rigged a combination ground cloth and tent out of one of the reflective sheets and rolled ourselves up in the other. We wouldn't have been able to do it if the weather turned nasty again – not even Sarek. But the weather held.
Truth to be told, part of the reason we took our time going back was that neither one of us was in the greatest shape. Sarek had yet to completely get over his cough. I don't think his Vulcan lungs had ever recovered from the insult they'd sustained during his near drowning in the river. I was limping more than ever. But with the sun shining, and a cart filling with food, walking toward a good shelter, it was a pleasant enough trip. And we savored it. We hadn't been together all that much while Sarek was busy with his chores and I with mine. And before the war, he'd been caught up in negotiations for months. Before that, in our other lives, we had our respective careers. To spend day after day together, solely in each other's company was something that simply hadn't happened often in our marriage. In fact, given that even alone in whatever homes we'd had, Sarek had had with him a retinue of aides, attendants and servants, it was safe to say we'd never been so alone. And we'd rarely had time before where neither of us had duties taking us in separate directions. Now, after the recent fight over his scouting departure, we had the luxury of retrieving our relationship, enjoying each other's company and working together toward a simple common goal of gathering food and going 'home'.
In this planet where his recent survey seemed to confirm we were entirely alone, Sarek finally dropped some of his Vulcan reserve. Rather than behave outside of our shelter as if we were in "public", he now behaved as if the whole planet was an extension of our private quarters, meaning he relaxed his usual Vulcan sensibilities about public touch, which oddly or not, we'd been hanging onto. Force of habit, I suppose. In whatever embassy or home we'd lived in, there had been other people there too, people that it would have been impolite to behave so before them, except in our private quarters. But now there was just us. We often walked hand in hand now, or when I got tired and was limping more than usual, arm in arm. Perhaps it was just that Sarek acknowledged we could both use the support. He was more than a little battered too. Perhaps we were just letting go of one more useless trapping from our past lives.
We only talked about it once. Sitting before our campfire. Sarek was meditating, eyes locked on the fire. I was idly star-gazing, trying to find some familiar constellation in this far flung arm of the galaxy. We both were hunched up under our reflective tarp to keep warm. After a while, he finished his meditations, unfolded his hands and looked down at me.
"You won't find Sol visible from here," he said, commenting on a habit of mine, to look for my birth sun from where ever we were posted. Usually it wasn't visible. For all that humanity gives itself airs believing they are the major ruling force of the universe, Sol itself is a dim star, and not in a central location in the galaxy.
"I was just looking for anything familiar. Funny how hard it is to recognize anything when the perspective changes."
He flicked a brow at my choice of language. Vulcans wouldn't find it funny; they'd consider it logical. But he was used enough to my turns of phrase he didn't comment. Instead, he gave me an astronomy lesson for this sky, pointing out Rigel and Tellur, and Andor. "And there," he concluded, "is Eridani. Quite bright this evening. There is very little haze. You can almost see the tri-part halos."
I, of course, could not see any halos, haze or not, not having his keener vision. But if I followed along the line of his finger, I finally discerned a tiny pin-prick of a star with a faint reddish glow. "Is that really Eridani?"
"It is indeed. All night," he added, with an attempt at a tease.
I gave him a scornful look for such a poor effort, but didn't spare much time for it before going back to look at this talisman, so far out of reach. "And it has really been there, all this time?"
He blinked at that. "It would be unfortunate for the residents of Vulcan and her sister planets, if Eridani were not, in general, always firmly fixed in her standard galactic orbit."
"Oh, Sarek. That's not what I meant. You mean, you could see it all this time?"
He tilted his head in a Vulcan shrug. "There have been hazy or rainy nights--"
"That's not what I meant. I mean, you've always known it was there?"
He just raised a brow at me, as if I had asked him if he could have forgotten his own name.
"I didn't quite mean that." I didn't pursue it further. No wonder we seemed to spend half our marriage asking if we understood each other. We had such different mindsets. I gave it up for now, and settled back down against him, looking at the tiny pinprick of red. "So near, and so far. Does it bother you?"
"Bother me? To know Eridani is in the heavens?"
"To see it hanging, just out of reach."
"Not quite 'just' out of reach," he qualified.
"You know what I mean. You don't find it frustrating?"
He tipped a brow at that.
"I suppose you don't."
He looked down at me. "Do you?"
I sighed, and looked down at my fingers, pleated up the reflective sheet. "I haven't had much time to think about it, before."
"Precisely."
"But now," I looked back up again at the stars Sarek had defined for me. I knew them all so well. Knew their planetary systems, their principal capitals, their government buildings, many of their planetary representatives. I imagined them all going about their various businesses, dealing with Federation politics. Sarek knew them all, even better than I. Looking back at Eridani, I thought about everyone on Vulcan there. Knowing Sarek was lost, perhaps dead, things must be in a considerable turmoil there, though being Vulcan, not a hint of that would show. But still, they must be worried about him. Even in the Federation, his presumed loss must be the cause of some concern. "Where are they all?" I wondered out loud. "How can no one be looking for us? For you, at least."
"This system is in chaos. There's been a war. It may have moved on from this colony to the antagonistic systems. No doubt has. The quadrant may be under severe military restrictions, even if the Federation has moved in."
"If?"
"There are sovereign considerations, even in a civil conflict between systems. You know as well as I that the Federation must move doubly carefully, with a war actually commenced, and if they have no other intelligence. Too abrupt intercession could spark a greater conflagration. And they undoubtedly have concluded that we died in the first explosion."
I bit my lip at that. "Not everyone will think that."
"Perhaps not. But such convictions are seldom considered valid evidence. Someone will come. Eventually. Not necessarily for us."
"Eventually." I paused to consider that. "Months? Years?"
"It depends."
"Aren't you going to quote me odds?" I asked, half afraid to hear them.
His fingers, ever so briefly, carded through my hair. "Only if you wish," he said finally. "And you will have to be specific as to what odds you desire to hear."
"For a quick pickup, they're not good, are they? In general."
A pause, while he looked down at me. "I believe not."
"Then I don't want to hear them." I sighed and reached out a hand, which he took. I lay back against him, and we both looked up at the stars. "It's a beautiful night, isn't it?"
"Yes."
I knew, and he knew, it would not be beautiful for ever, or for long. But it was beautiful now. "It could be worse," I said finally.
"Worse?"
"We could be on Tellur." Leaning against him as I was, I could feel the slight contraction in his stomach muscles as he controlled his reaction to my joke. I turned over to look to see if I could discern it in his face.
"Amanda," he said, chiding me, and he shook his head, ever so slightly in reproof.
"Admit it; that's why you love me. Because I make you laugh."
"You don't make me laugh."
"But I nearly got you that time."
He drew himself up in Vulcan demeanor. "No."
I held my own counsel over the reaction I'd felt in his body. "But you do love me."
"You are quite incorrigible. How can you--?"
"Admit it, you do."
"I--" Sarek said, and then he bent his head down, and made me forget what he refused to say in words, in deeds.
Indeed. It was quite a lovely night.
And if Eridani blushed a little redder, perhaps she shouldn't have been watching.
To be continued….
