Sleep did not come easily to Nis that first night in Quet’tzos. The temporary housing that Lesch and Kerchek had mentioned turned out to be a spacious set of rooms in one of the towering buildings she’d seen after disembarking from the airship. From the windows, Nis could look out over much of the city. As the night wore on, the dots of light throughout the city blinked out until only a few lights remained. Only then could Nis make out the stars in the sky above them.

Nis left the large sitting area and returned to her room where she’d left her pack. Withdrawing her journal, she returned to her seat in the sitting room beside the windows and began flipping through the pages until she found the entry she’d been looking for: the stars she’d mapped out from her dream not that long ago. 

It was the drawing that had gotten her in trouble with her parents for sneaking out to compare her drawing with the stars above their home. If it hadn’t been for that drawing, she probably would still be at home with her parents in Dural.

“Can’t sleep?” Meric asked.

Nis turned to find Meric walking out of her own room to join Nis.

“I heard you moving around and thought I’d come and join you if that’s alright.”

“Sure,” Nis replied and turned back to her drawing.

As she compared the two, Nis felt a surge of excitement as she began to find the similarities between her drawing and the night sky. Without being able to see from horizon to horizon, Nis could only do a partial comparison but regardless she was able to match enough stars to be confident that this was, in fact, where Mel had been when she’d memorized these stars.

“You doing okay?” Meric asked after some time.

“Yeah, why?” Nis said, turning her attention back to Meric.

“I just thought that, maybe, your other life wouldn’t be too happy to see all this.”

Nis considered that for a moment.

“I thought she’d be upset too, but so far all I’ve felt was frustration when we first arrived.”

Meric nodded and it was clear to Nis that something else was bothering Meric.

“Are you okay?” Nis asked.

Meric shifted uneasily on her chair before answering Nis with a question of her own.

“You ever dream about something form a past life that bothers you?”

“Sometimes,” Nis said. “Some worse than others.”

“Did you ever talk to the archivists about those?”

“Probably,” Nis said. “But we didn’t talk about my dreams that often. Usually we just talked about history and if there was something from one of my dreams that was connected I’d bring it up.”

“And they were never bothered by those things you did?”

Nis shrugged, though she was beginning to worry where Meric was going with all of this.

“Why would they?” Nis Asked. “It may have been my past life, but that person wasn’t me now. They knew I wouldn’t do those things. Is there something in one of your past lives –

“I didn’t say that,” Meric interjected with more haste and emphasis than she clearly had intended to use. “Sorry,” she apologized, “I just wonder how these people will react to some of our past actions, you know? Lesch did say they didn’t see much difference between a person now and the people they’ve been in past lives.”

“She said that?” Nis asked, not quite remembering whether or not Lesch had said such a thing.

“Uh huh,” Meric nodded.

“Well, I doubt they’ll be too concerned by anything we may have done in our past lives ever since we were Mel and Tique since we seem to have spent those lives in the south.”

Meric didn’t seem comforted and she began to pick at her nails nervously.

“How much do you remember about Mel’s life?” she asked.

“A fair amount,” Nis admitted. “More than any of my other lives. Though, I only have a few memories from when Mel was with Tique, and besides this one stargazing dream I don’t think I’ve ever dreamed about Mel’s time here in Quet’tzos. Why all these questions?”

Meric wouldn’t meet Nis’ eyes.

“Come on, it’s okay,” Nis assured her. “You can tell me.”

“Alright, but, please don’t tell Lesch or any of the others.”

“Okay.”

“It’s…everyone thinks Tique is from here, or that her past lives are from here, but they’re not.”

“What? I thought the whole reason Tique was in danger was because she was talking about her past life here.”

“It was and it wasn’t,” Meric replied. “The life before Tique was born in Dural and then her family moved across the sea to the coastal town, posing as locals from another fishing village.”

“Why would they do that?”

“We were stealing lives,” Meric explained. “In a life prior to that one, I’d been part of a team that discovered if a person was buried in a place away from their native lands, they would have a chance of being born into that new land. At first we just experimented with the lands nearest our own but once these lands across the sea were discovered it became a race to see how many graves we could rob and transplant back over in Dural. That’s one of the reasons why Mel was being sent to search out more efficient routes to reach the sea, though I doubt Mel ever knew that.”

“So the reason people were upset with Tique,” Nis began in awe of this revelation.

“Was because Tique wasn’t keeping the body snatching a secret, though by the time she met Mel she’d figured out that that was what had upset so many people and decided to start keeping that detail to herself.”

“Can you imagine how people would have reacted if Tique had been able to tell enough people about that?” Nis wondered aloud.

“As far as I can remember,” Meric said darkly, “almost everyone Tique told, that didn’t already know about the grave robbing, was put to death. Her parents were among the first to die because of what they’d heard.”

“That’s terrible.”

“I know,” Meric agreed. “But what do you think Lesch and the others would do or say if they found out that I was part of the reason for the life stealing in the first place?”

Nis could only shake her head. From her perspective, those lives were so far in the past that any actions by them shouldn’t be held against Meric. She had no real idea as to how the people of Quet’tzos would respond.

“What am I going to do?” Meric asked, concern heavy in her voice.

“For now,” Nis replied in as calming a voice as she could make, “we don’t have to tell them anything about all that.”

“I’m not a very good liar,” Meric moaned.

“You don’t need to lie, just don’t tell them about it.”

“You know they’re going to ask us about Mel and Tique,” Meric argued. “You’ve seen how they treat you, how they looked when they found out who I was. Mel and Tique are heroes to them. They’re not just going to leave us alone about it.”

“I don’t know what else we can do, then,” Nis said, “I mean, what are our other options? Go back to Dural?”

Meric didn’t immediately cast aside that suggestion, which worried Nis.

“You can’t honestly be thinking of going back, can you?” Nis asked.

“Not for you,” Meric replied hastily, “but maybe it would be best if I went back.”

“How? Are you going to sneak out and walk all the way back to the coast, build a ship and cross the sea? Then all you have to do is sail back upstream for several weeks before crossing back over the mountains and into Dural.”

“Stop it,” Meric demanded. “I’d just ask them to fly me there.”

“Don’t they want to keep themselves and their existence a secret from everyone in Dural?”

“They could fly me to the lake at First Respite,” Meric said. “From there I could make it the rest of the way home.”

“And what would you tell them at the archives when you got there?” Nis asked.

“The truth,” she replied. “I got separated from Trow and Gorvis and you got away.”

“That’s about as true as you not telling the people here about your past lives,” Nis pointed out.

“Yeah, well,” Meric muttered, “this way doesn’t feel so wrong.”

Nis let out a sigh as she considered Meric’s predicament. Without knowing how seriously the people here would react to the truth about Meric’s past lives it was impossible for either of them to know what they should do

“Give it a few days, at least,” Nis suggested. “That way we can get a better feel for how things are here. It may be that all this is nothing to worry about.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Meric said but seemed to agree with Nis about waiting a few days before making any final decisions.

“We should try to get some sleep,” Nis suggested at last and she got up from her seat. She didn’t feel like going to bed yet, but knew it wouldn’t be good for either of them to stay sitting there worrying about these things. Best to at least try and get some sleep.

“I’ll go to bed in a bit,” Meric said.

Nis gave her a nod and made her way to her room, closing her door behind her. The bed was tall and comfy, much softer than anything she’d experienced before in Dural, and yet sleep was still elusive. She laid there in the dark for quite some time and never heard any sounds to indicate that Meric had gone back to her room.