CHAPTER 12

Sleep did not come to me; it had not come to me since I watched the Amber Wraith walk away down the Atlantis corridor, Lothar and the Marines in his wake. As I stood on the terrace of my quarters looking at the night sky studded with the shimmer of distant stars, that image of his straight back and broad shoulders, the white hair cascading down the golden black of the leather and the clipped step, was imprinted in my mind against the blackness of the sky.

The sorrow within was so deep that there could be no tears, no sobs, no tearing of mourning vestments… I was empty. I did not understand how I have come to this; when and how I had allowed myself to come to this. When did I cross that invisible line beyond which there was no return?

I stared at the sky, my hands gripping the rail, the feel of the Wraith' hand still on mine, like a wound or a burn that lingered; except it was not pain but forlorn tingling. I counted the stars up there, this seventh night without sleep and as I counted and formed star patterns and constellations in the heavens, I fell down the chasm of my decision; or perhaps soared to the very top of the sky.

I took my compad and touched it. Colonel Santos, on his ship, answered first.

"Colonel," I said, "you're awake."

"Night and day don't really mean much."

"Can you come down for a chat?"

"When?"

"Now. As soon as you can get here."

"One hour."

"Thank you. In my quarters."

"Yes."

Next I summoned Doctor Bernard and Doctor Janson.

A little over an hour later, Santos, Bernard and Janson were seated in the comfortable circle of armchairs in my sitting room, facing the long table with books and the night veiling the world outside the open terrace doors. I poured everyone a glass of wine—a rare Tokaji I had brought with me from Earth long before. The wine that had been aged, in succession, in five oak barrels, clung to the sides of the crystal glass like oil and it was like velvet on the tongue.

Bernard closed his eyes with pleasure as he sipped it and Janson narrowed her eyes with equal delight. Santos nodded with appreciation then his eyes looked at me with suspicion. "What is wrong?"

"Or what is right?" Janson asked. "I don't suppose you would waste a wine like this on 'wrong.'"

"You don't know Doctor Vries like I do, Jenn," Colonel Santos rumbled. "She's dulling the pain of her next blow."

"I agree," Bernard said and put down the glass.

"Nothing is wrong," I said and sat down, with my back to the night and black ocean. "Nothing is right, either." I set down the glass of wine, a golden drop still left on the bottom. "I have a question for each one of you. I want your most honest, brutal answer; the answer the goes deepest inside you." I took in a breath. "Colonel Santos, with all the military might we've put in this and with all the losses of life—and they are not insignificant—both on our side and on the side of the humans in Pegasus; and yes, let's count the losses among the Wraith—are the humans of the Pegasus safer since we've arrived?"

Santos turned the glass in his hands. "No." He put the glass down. "With the Wraith roaming around without—shall we say, sleep—the humans of Pegasus are even more exposed."

"Doctor Bernard," I turned to my chief scientist, "Have we made things better for the Pegasus—human and Wraith alike—and for Earth, or worse, with our scientific discoveries?"

Bernard was hesitating. "It's a two part answer. First, we've made things worse. We've stirred things up and unbalanced the natural course of things. We awoke the Wraith, and now, with our presence, they won't go back to sleep. However, without our arrival on Atlantis, which happened to be in the Pegasus, we could not have acquired all this technology."

"Couldn't we continue to acquire this technology if Atlantis was no longer in the Pegasus?"

A long silence fell in the room.

I looked at Janson. "From a medical point of view, other than we've discovered a species that does not die from old age and deterioration and has no diseases as we know them, what have we gained?"

She answered without hesitation. "Nothing. And we will learn nothing until we capture Wraith and use them for… well, research."

"Would you?"

"There is no need to even ask such a question." She looked suddenly angry. "Never. And you would never allow it even it wasn't me here. They are…" She shook her head is if to remove some abhorrent image from her mind. "No, never."

"But someone could come in my place and in your place and they might not have such misgivings or principles. Someone like Feng for instance. I've seen what his device did. And, it has happened before, if you recall. They did experiment on a Wraith. That was wrong. What will prevent someone else from doing that again?"

The deep silence returned. Then Bernard spoke: "What are you thinking, Elena?"

"One more question," I said. "And think well—you, Santos, as a military man and you, Bernard as a man versed in the theories of probability of the universe. How long, do you think, before the Wraith get the address for Earth and when they do…"

Bernard breathed through his nose sounding like a seal. "The more time passes, the more things mix, the more events accumulate, the probability increases. It is only a matter of time before the Wraith find the address for Earth. They're not stupid. And they're cunning."

"No kidding…" Janson murmured and threw me a side glance. It was she who asked my next question: "And if they do, and they do show up above Earth, what happens then, Colonel?"

"Hell happens," the Colonel answered. "Not an option. I'd rather that I did everything possible they didn't get it."

"Exactly," I said: "I need the three of you with me on Earth, in front of the IAC to testify and provide data and information. Truthful, honest and no punches pulled testimony, without the private agenda and motives of a scientist and military man. Please think about it, until you truly see my point. And if after all the thinking, you don't, I'll accept that."

Bernard made another seal sound. "I need to think about it and see if I come to the same conclusion, shedding my own desire to discover things, regardless of what they mean, or what they create or cause."

"I don't need time to think," Janson intervened. "I've been thinking about it. Although, like Doctor Bernard… my scientist's heart would break."

Santos was silent.

"I still want you to think, for as long as you need. And then, let me have the answer."

Bernard stood up. "So, we will think."

"We will think."

Santos stirred. "I think an analysis of benefits versus risks of Earth exposure to attack from space would be very conclusive to the IAC and all the powers that may be." He grinned. "None of them are scientific minds so they are not driven by the great desire for knowledge. Actually, they prefer ignorance. The ignorant is quickly frightened. I think we need to use a little fear."

"I'm not ignorant," Bernard rumbled, "and I'm scared shitless of the Wraith."

As they headed for the door and they palmed it open, I said: "None of you seems to show any consternation or knee-jerk reaction."

Janson mused: "It was inevitable."

Bernard added, from beyond the threshold: "It was always believed that it would be the decision of the Atlantis leader."

Bernard had been right; and of course, I was aware of that—it was always understood, and expected, that it would be the decision of the Atlantis leader. It became MY decision.\

The IAC, the military and the President accepted my decision after only two days of testimony from my team. I have to say that I had calculated correctly—Atlantis had been a thorn in the side of the military and the politicians for a while and it was only the fervor and clamor of the scientists that had kept them from rudely giving a direct order to terminate operations. My proposal was eagerly welcomed.

And so it was that one month after our return from Earth, as dawn rose over the planet of Atlantis, the city lifted from the ocean, a great tidal wave in its wake and as the massive waves rippled away and faded and the last drop of water flowed over the edges of the embankments, it left the atmosphere and entered the blackness of space, a luminous, fantastic vision against the panoply of stars.

Like an honor guard, hive ships of the alliance lined on either side, silent, black cutouts in the heavens, a few lights flickering to mark their existence. Only one hiveship, the most massive, flashed its lights of red and amber as the hyperspace window blinked and Atlantis disappeared into it. Then the hiveships blinked and flickered into their own hyperspace and melted away, once again the masters of Pegasus. A strange peace fell, as all motion stopped. The space of the sky was empty.

However, when the planet moved in its orbit and withdrew its shadow, and the distant sun's aura shivered at the edges, the burst of rays revealed one hive ship still suspended in the space above the Atlantis planet. It was the largest of the ships, the one which had blinked its lights in a vague salute. It now glowed in the fire of the sun with a dark, amber smolder. It seemed to watch and track the small, silver transporter emerging from the sun's growing light. As it approached, the hive ship bay doors opened and a cloud of darts emerged, swarming around, leading the small pinpoint of silver towards the gaping opening in the underbelly of the ship.

###

The Amber Wraith—the Commander once again—stood with his back to the corridor that coiled into the cavernous chamber of the hiveship bridge, facing the three screens on the far wall, the middle one showing the moment, frozen now in time, of Atlantis entering the eye of hyperspace. As the Wraith who had piloted the small, silver transport that had just entered the hive, came into the bridge chamber, the Commander did not turn or even shift from his straight back stance at the console. Several Wraith stood at their own posts, his second on his right. The only one who turned his head slightly, just enough to peer over his shoulder, was the blue eyed Wraith, the future Ship Wraith, when the time would come, Lothar.

When the pilot Wraith stopped behind the Commander, there was, as one would expect, a brief mental communication as to the data gathering and observation of the departing Atlantis. The Wraith punctuated his silent report—that took no more than a second-with a sharp incline of his head. It was at that point that the Commander became first very still, then with a brusque turn of his head he let out a sharp hiss. He didn't turn or even look over his shoulder.

I stepped around the Wraith that had been standing between the Commander and me.

He swerved around so unexpectedly that I flinched. His eyes were shadowed, but I sensed that his slit pupils had widened and than narrowed. My heart was racing and that shadowed stare on me did nothing to quiet my heart.

Another low hiss, this one quite cold and menacing sent the Wraith in the chamber away, to disappear into the misty maze of corridors surrounding the command bridge. I was alone with the Commander, with the Amber Wraith, nothing between us but the cold air and the silence of the hive. There was no alliance, no Atlantis, no terms, no Earth and no Horizon with its weapons to place me in the Wraith scheme or frame of reference. I was alone, defenseless and human.

I had never felt as naked as I did in that moment. For the first time I felt I faced a predator; a very cunning, quick and gifted predator. Suddenly, the madness of my decision, the idealistic naïve beliefs of my decision—the sheer stupidity of it—washed over me. Involuntarily, I took a step back.

"Do not be absurd, Elena Vries," the Amber Wraith finally spoke, halting my instinctive, panicky retreat with the low purr of his voice. "Your belief that I would harm you, even without the force of Atlantis behind you, is disappointing."

I smiled sheepishly and he descended the steps of the command console dais. "What are you doing here, Elena Vries?" He threw a quick glance at the image of Atlantis frozen in time. "What human insanity has gripped you?"

I was silent. What could I say? Suddenly, I did not know what to say. The speech I had rehearsed in my mind had been wiped away from my memory with the one glance from the amber eyes.

He now stood in front of me, only a few steps away. "Nothing of what I proposed," he whispered at me—or was he talking in my mind?—"can ever be now." Then he added: "But I thank you for sending Atlantis back from where it came."

I straightened up and went into idiot human 'leader' and 'I-am-duty-bound to set the world right' mode. It was a screen that at this point felt a lot more comfortable than owning up to what lurked deep inside me. Instead of answering directly—answer what?—I said, putting on my most official tone, one that I had to admit I handled a lot easier and more naturally than one of emotional declarations to anyone; although oddly, I would find it easier to do it with a Wraith than a human; perhaps because Wraith didn't really grasp most of it.

"Commander," I said, putting an end to the circuitous thinking in my head, "I understood that your next action would be to go into hibernation. Would that be the whole Wraith population of the Pegasus?"

He seemed surprised at the turn of my answer to his question. "As I am sure you have already concluded from your studies of the Wraith, yes." There was something metallic in the tone of the voice.

"What's the sequence leading up to hibernation?" I asked, ignoring the pinpoint gaze of his eyes. Was he expecting something else? Was he?

"Our DNA reacts to certain stimuli such as stress, lack of certain kind of… food, or rather the reaction of the food—fear, distress, becoming more debilitating to the humans and to their energy, or the human population becoming younger, or older as the adults are culled—time lapse between hibernations that causes stress on the Wraith physical and thinking system, and other events that we do not fully understand. All Wraith receive the signal at the same time, or within the same time frame, that it is time for hibernation. It triggers modifications that bring on chemical changes in our bodies that are conducive to hibernation and prepare us for it."

"What happens if you ignore the signal?"

He allowed a small grin. "We get very bad-tempered."

"More so than you are already?" I quipped back.

"We get positively unpleasant."

"I am sure," I mused. "Have you received this signal?"

He stared at me. "Yes. A long time ago."

I let out my breath. "That explains the rude comportment of the Wraith…"

He came a step closer. It had been a quick and aggressive move. "You are here, Doctor Vries, to ensure that hibernation happens? I didn't think humans cared what happened after they left; certainly not to the extent to leave someone like you behind."

"It was my choice." No weakening, I warned myself as I pushed my chin up. "Yes. I want to ensure that Atlantis' departure and the cessation of our project was the correct decision in affecting the balance of the Pegasus galaxy. I am here to ensure that the terms of our alliance are fulfilled. I want to ensure that the Wraith hibernate for hundreds of years. You must be feeling very sleepy and grumpy. I think you need a good, long hibernation."

He tilted his head and peered at me, the line of his mouth tight. He looked as if he didn't believe me.

Darn Wraith… Had the Blue Wraith been talking to you?

Yes

"I understand about the signal," I said "and that you get quite cranky if you don't obey it, but what ensures that there are no rogue Wraith factions that use the hibernation of others to, well… grab for power?"

His lips tightened. "You think us so simple?" He let out a hiss. "The Queens initiate the hibernation of their hives." The slits of his eyes narrowed. The eyes were slightly green now. "The Primary Queen of the most powerful and numerous Wraith hives commands her hives and Secondary Queens and then commands the lesser hives. She ensures that all hives go into hibernation. It is the Queen, by the way, that provides the genetic material that puts hive and Wraith into the hibernating state." He paused for a second; for effect, I was sure. "The Primary Queen of the most powerful hives becomes the Queen of all Wraith at that point. She does not hibernate. She is the Keeper. She awakens her hive first and the others follow."

He hissed at me; I did not know why.

Yes, I did. I smiled. "Last I looked," I said, "you were the most powerful group of hives in the Galaxy. It is you who would ensure that all hives hibernate." I felt smug. I can play the same game as you.

No, you can't.

"Very clever, human." There was nothing nice in his voice. "But you are mistaken, and your plan is wasted. You stayed behind for nothing. I am no longer the most powerful hive. Not since I had to kill my Queens. I am at the bottom of the hierarchy of the hives. I don't even have a Ship Wraith. But, fear not," he turned his back to me and ascended the steps of the command console dais. "The Wraith will all go in hibernation. In time. Your precious Pegasus humans will be safe for centuries." He faced the screens across the chamber, his back to me. "They will multiply and grow fat and soft; and indolent. They will forget the fear of us until we awake again. That is the problem of short lives—forgetfulness."

I allowed myself a sigh.

He half turned his head. "What will you do, Elena Vries, when we go into hibernation?"

My innate flippancy and sarcasm always surfaced and took over when I felt disturbed. "I'll become the generalissimo of a small planet…" Then I added, this time without the flippancy in my voice: "That will not be an issue or concern, either to you or to me."

He turned slowly and regarded me from the top of the dais. There was suspicion on his face. He had not prodded into my mind; but that did not mean that he could not 'hear' echoes. "What do you mean, Elena Vries?" He hissed softly. "No more games, Elena Vries." I don't know what you are concealing, but I know you are concealing something.

I looked into his eyes, glowing with that amber light that had so struck me the first time I looked into them. "I am here to give you a Queen."

He seemed to freeze for a second. He shook his head. "No. You would—"

"I have so decided, and it is my decision, Commander. The consequences to my short life are my choice." I lifted my chin and stared him straight in his eyes—not an easy thing to do, staring into the cunning and all seeing eyes of a Wraith. "You cannot refuse. It is a deep insult to do so."

He seemed to retreat a little; not physically but in his presence. "I do not wish to insult you, Elena Vries. But, I do not wish to kill you either."

"You do not know that it would kill me."

He inclined his head. "Why are you doing this?"

"To ensure that the Wraith will go into hibernation. To ensure that the most powerful hive is the one allied with Atlantis and therefore will keep the terms of the alliance."

His eyes shimmered. "When I was on Atlantis, I heard one of your soldiers use an expression to answer someone who had made a statement similar to yours in truth, or lack of it. I hope I am using it properly—bullshit!"

That human barn expression coming out of his mouth overcame all other considerations and I let out a laugh. But, then I started to tremble, either anger or the result of nerves coming to the end of their endurance. I clenched my fists. Was that a small step back he had just taken? "What do you care why?" My voice was shrill. This time there was no doubt he had taken a step back. "As a matter of fact, spare me the conversation. The only reason you are even asking is because you're afraid—"

"—Afraid?" he sneered.

"—that I might have some trick up my sleeve. Like give you a Queen that will turn into a mosquito after you go into your precious hibernation. Or may be turn you into a frog." I plastered on my face all the disgust I could conjure. "I assure you, Commander, this is no trick. I am not Wraith."

"Indeed."

"You would not understand," I stated with vicious contempt. You're just a bug… No, this was not working out the way I imagined, with soaring music in the background, moon high in the sky and white, silky hair fluttering in the breeze. Nope, none of that was happening.

I looked past him. "The Blue Wraith—the ancient Ship Wraith-told me a story from his past and also about something an Ancient taught him." I returned my gaze on him. "Did he ever tell you about the Ancient woman?"

There was a gleam of intrigue in his eyes. "He was an Early One. He had many stories none of us, the later ones, would understand."

"He was bound to her to the very day he died. What he had learned from her had bound him."

"You want to bind me the same as she did?"

His Wraith mind worked nimbly, I sighed inwardly. "Yes."

"Why?"

"Because I so wish it. Because—" I broke the thread of my answer. I looked at some distant point across the chamber.

He stood mute.

I said softly,"You once used this very human concept called love to get what you wanted. Now you will get what you want. But you had no understanding of it. But I will make you understand this concept and that will bind you; and there will be a price to pay."

I had never seen on a Wraith' face the expression I now saw on his; it was still uniquely Wraith. It was a blend of emotions a human would never concoct—defiance, haughtiness, awe and reverence. It faded quickly, like a wisp of something untouchable.

He bowed his head, in a manner he would, I knew, only in front of the most powerful, and revered Queen.

I said, against the strangeness of the gesture and the feeling it gave me: "But you still don't have a Ship Wraith."

He raised his head slowly. "There is one. The blue eyed one. Lothar, as you call him."

"That cannot be, you told me."

His gaze of amber veiled me; or was it his thoughts and his name? "I am now honor bound to ensure that the Queen will have a Ship Wraith to establish her position of Primary." He squared his shoulders. "It will be done."

###

This time I was not escorted to my suite of alcoves perched high on the wall of that conical chamber, but to a long hall with burnished, translucent floor that looked like luminous glass and walls that were like mosaics of flowing light layered with the embroidery of the blue amber that was the ship's structural skeleton. At the far end, the wall, from floor to ceiling and from side to side, had turned transparent, the ribbons, swirls and spirals of stars and galaxies glimmering in black space.

I was seated at the opposite end of the hall, facing the window, on a throne-like bench with high back and arms, soft and warm around me, yet looking as if made of hard metal and amber. The outfit with which the worshippers had robed me, was a very deep red trimmed with black metal and beads of amber.

Four worshippers—two on each side of me—were seated in the shadows, their eyes, as the old books would say, 'fixed on the hands of their mistress'. Beyond them, along the walls, stood faced Wraith, their head inclined, and masked warriors, shadowy presences that suddenly did not feel like a threat. They were not guarding me; they were in attendance.

I searched for the familiar form of the Amber Wraith. He was not among them. Somehow, I had not expected him to be.

The silence struck me again. There was no echo, no shuffling, no rustling; not even the sound of a breath, in spite of the fact that the hall was not empty of breathing and moving beings. I mulled over that silence as I considered that a hive, without a Ship Wraith, was terribly silent, lacking even a distant whisper from its core. It was lonely without a Ship Wraith. The Blue Wraith had kept me constant company, even when silent; so had the Amber Wraith, when he had been a Ship Wraith. He had continuously been around me, softly touching my mind and even me, taking away the loneliness of a human with the strange companionship of a Wraith.

I had made my decision. There was no turning back.

I closed my eyes. The colors and distant scent of heather of the Blue Wraith drifted in my mind; not from outside, as it had been when he was alive, but from the lonely recesses of my own mind. I thought of all the things he had said, some mocking, some brutal, some haunting; some even kind. I thought of that Ancient woman, whose name I did not know, whose face I wanted to conjure but all I could see in the eye of my mind was a vague masque; I thought of what she had felt and wondered how close it had been to what I felt. She had given her life for the Blue Wraith; she had given her life to save him. How and why and what—I didn't know the details. Perhaps they didn't matter. However, the parallel with what I was doing struck me now like a bullet in the heart. Perhaps, she and I had been the only human women in the universe to have captured a Wraith in this manner; it seemed, using this poor statistical basis of two, that the outcome for such a victory was death. A high price… The Wraith were expensive.

I smiled at the thought. But that moment of mirth faded quickly as I realized that the price the Ancient woman had paid—at least in her mind—was far greater: she had also renounced ascension, that obsession of the Ancients for which they had trampled much and many.

My mind drifted in some kind of reverie that focused on that one thought—ascension. Did the Ancients really ascend? The Blue Wraith had said that they had just turned to dust. He had said it with conviction; he had snarled but he had not said it in irony. He had said that the Wraith were a result of that bid for ascension; for immortality. The Ancients wanted to be gods. Instead, they created the Wraith. In some absurd twist, the Wraith became the gods of the Ancients—capricious, cunning and clever, ruthless and avenging, destroyers of the Ancient arrogance.

The Ancients had turned into dust; the Wraith even if not strictly immortal because they could be killed; they were the closest one could get to immortality. Even the universe sooner or later would twinkle out of existence.

Dust and immortality.

Victory and death.

Dust. Nothing.

What will my Amber Wraith do with my body?

I flinched.

Shoot it out the airlock, you fool!

What do they do with the husks of those they've used?

I opened my eyes, nausea rising in my gut.

A worshipper was kneeled in front of me, holding in offering a cup of liquid, steam rising from it with a herbal aroma.

I knocked it out of her hand, the cup flying through the air, the liquid splashing over her. The cup hit the steps with a tiny noise against the organic surface and rolled away.

"I'm sorry," I exclaimed, startled by my own violent gesture.

The worshipper scampered away, out of my line of vision. I followed with my gaze the path of the cup as it rolled away and stopped. My gaze kept moving forward, across the burnished floor, towards the galaxies and starts filling the great window at the far end.

A warm flicker touched my heart.

The Amber Wraith was seated at the window on a long bench, facing the stars, his back to me. He was motionless and seemed to be in some kind of meditation. I've heard of Wraith drawing themselves into far and deep thought, perhaps communing with the essence of their very existence. Was there a soul there, after all?

They were an Ancient experiment gone too far; no soul; just immortality. But Death still came to them. And then they turned to dust. Just like me. Just like the Ancients.

I stood up and descended the steps. I walked slowly down the long hall, passing the guarding Wraith, their head inclining deeper as I passed. What were they thinking of this human they had to honor? Were they even thinking or was the communal thinking of the hive the same as that of its Commander, its former Ship Wraith? Was that what a Ship Wraith did? Create a communal thinking with the hive and the Queen? Why couldn't Lothar be the Ship Wraith of this hive? Was it because the Amber Wraith was still a Ship Wraith and he could not be controlled?

He said that there will be a Ship Wraith for the Queen we will create.

What will become of my Amber Wraith? A wanderer, alone… Would he be allowed to hibernate in this hive?

Would he find another hive, a Queen to take him in? Would any hive take a Ship Wraith who had lost his hive? There was no pity for the fallen, no room for the loser.

Would they kill him if he lingered too long in this hive? Would Lothar kill him?

If that was the way of the Wraith, yes, he would.

What a tangled madness. Had he not had to kill his Queens because of me; had he not had to reveal his position to Atlantis because of me; had I eliminated Feng the day I heard of his treachery…

But a Wraith is immortal. They are so because they survive and have an instinct to survive unimpeded by sentimental and emotional claptrap and drivel. They live for thousands upon thousands of years; they survive thousands of years of strife, battle and treachery and power plays because they are unsentimental in their quest for ways to survive. Their energy and creativity is focused on surviving, and they value, in some strange way, life more than those who are short lived; like me. They do not die for others; and they do not die with others, given the choice. They do more than survive; they prevail.

I stopped behind my Amber Wraith and softly stroke the hair falling on his back. Its silken touch flowed against the skin of my palm and sent a shiver through me. It was not like human hair, cold and dead. It seemed to have life in it, to caress back. I lifted the hair with my both hands and let it fall in a slow, silvery veil. My hands felt it vibrate with delight.

I walked around the bench and stood in front of him. His head was slightly bent, his gaze on his hands, fingers joined at the tips.

He lifted his gaze to me. "You are full of thoughts," he said.

"Do you know what they are?" I asked.

"No."

I looked into the amber eyes and I was not sure what I saw there, but all the sardonic flippancy, all the anger and confusion I felt was replaced with the desire—absurd, I told myself; you're dealing with a Wraith—to comfort whatever darkness troubled him. Had anyone ever shown a Wraith tender comfort? Of course not.

Perhaps the Ancient woman had to the Blue Wraith.

"And what are you thinking of, my love?" I said softly.

The pupil widened just a fraction and only for a moment. "I am thinking of the Wraith name I will give you."

And the thought fills you with the darkness a Wraith would call sadness.

"You will give me such a name?" I echoed.

"So that you can hear me when I call."

I sat down next to him, although I had no idea if that would be the acceptable thing to do.

"I like red," I said. "And the smell of violets." He would not know what a violet is. "It's a flower on earth." Very small and dainty and fragrant.

I spied a vague smile on his lips. He nodded softly.

I arranged a long strand of his white hair on his shoulder.

"You like to do that," he mused.

"It feels alive. It's different than human hair." I played with the wisps of hair, feeling their caress between my fingers.

"It is different," he answered. "I can feel you touch it and the warmth of your hand; and you."

I contemplated the ribbon of hair draped on my palm.

"The Ship Wraith—the one you call the Blue Wraith," he said, "told me that the Ancient woman he knew also liked to play with his hair."

I placed the strand of hair back, neatly along the other neatly combed strands of his hair. Did he comb it, or did it arrange itself like that? Suddenly, I thought of that hair alive, moving. "What did he tell you about her?" I asked as I watched intently the hair to see if it moved.

It didn't, of course.

"He told me that she died for him."

I was silent of a few seconds. "Did he tell you how it came to be?"

"I would've thought you would ask me why."

"I don't need to."

"The Guards of the Ancients were pursuing and hunting down the Early Wraith, the ones who had rebelled. She hid the Blue Wraith from them.. She shielded him with her own existence and gave him time to escape when he was discovered."

"She caught the fire meant for him," I mused.

"No. The penalty for concealing and abating a Wraith was death."

I looked at him, stunned. "They executed her? Like-they put her up against a wall and shot her? The Ancients?"

"A different kind of death sentence and execution than the one you think; a lot less crude and a lot more cruel—she was denied their precious Ascension." He let out a subdued snarl. "In many ways like the death of a Wraith—a denial of immortality."

"But there was no Ascension." A meaningless death sentence. But she didn't know that. She had, in her mind, given her immortality for the life of a Wraith.

"In her mind, there was," he echoed my thought. "In reality?" He shrugged. "They were at the end arrogant fools." Like all humans, I expected him to add. But he did not. He turned his face to me. "She had told the Blue Wraith of an Ascension Ship somewhere at the edge of the galaxy—she knew the secret of its location-and made him promise that he would take her there when she died. I do not know the sequence of events, but he fulfilled his promise and took her to the ship. It was out there, unguarded. No one thought that a Wraith could reach it." He grinned. "But they did; by then, the Ancients were defeated and gone. The Ancient woman had lived longer because of the Gift of Life. But, at the end she was ready to die. By the time he got to the Ascension Ship, she was barely alive. He found pods, tier after tier of them. He put her in one, as she had taught him." He paused, grinning vaguely at the galaxies shimmering in the window. "She had told him that in time, their bodies would be dissolved and transformed into a form that contained their very essence and thoughts, a bodiless entity that could be perceived by the eye as a blue luminosity. In this state, they would be absorbed into the universe and thus ascend." The grin became more gleeful, the sharp teeth showing. "Wraith are a curious and suspicious race; also a patient one. He waited to witness Ascension. He even contemplated following her. But, all of them, including her, slowly turned to dust. Even their bones crumbled. Just the machines flickered." He let out a long breath. "Yet, he told me, he would try to call her. Of course there was no answer. When he became a Ship Wraith, he no longer called her. And then, when you came, you reminded him of it and he called her again." He shook his head slightly. "He thought he had heard her answer. Just as he died. An illusion. Delirium. He was dying."

"Yes, an illusion. But a moment of comfort."

"Yes, a moment. Nothing more."

"Wraith don't think there is anything after death?"

"Why would there be? That's immortality, is it not?"

I left it there. I didn't want to talk of death.

I put my hand on his, the warm skin and cold of the finger guards competing for my attention. I leaned against him and rested my head on his upper arm.

I didn't want to face death alone.

"What will you do if Lothar becomes the Ship Wraith?" I asked.

"We are a resourceful race, Elena."

I nodded, the side of my face against the leather of his sleeve and the warm, silken hair.

I heard a distant song and smelled the scent of flowers in a warm forest. The gold and red leaves trembled in the breeze and they became veils of scarlet and amber rising to the sky, wrapping the galaxies. The beauty left me breathless and tingling with warmth and delight.

"What is this?" I whispered.

"Your name."

"Oh…"

"Do you accept it?"

"Yes." How could I not, when it gave me such happiness?

"Then it is done."

With the gift of my name he gave me another gift, for a Wraith one of the deepest intimacy; an intimacy more powerful than that of the flesh, more intoxicating and compelling than any human could conjure with their bodies—the touch of his mind on mine in ways I never imagined a Wraith, or anyone, could. There were no boundaries and there was no inhibition.

It was a long while before I moved, enthralled and captured in the web of his thoughts.

And then I felt something else. The hiveship was not silent anymore.

There was a Ship Wraith present in its core. Lothar. A Ship Wraith had to be there, I understood—oh, I understood so many things now—for a Queen to come into the world. I stood up and waited. My human mind did not know for what, but Amber's Wraith mind twined with mine to give me the knowledge.

It was time.