Phoebe North: Starglass

I heard his voice in my head. Portrait artist isn’t even a specialist position. It would be a step down for us. You would be doing nothing for your people, your ship. . . . As I crossed the pastures, then passed the school where I’d spent every day for the last ten years of my life, my father’s words thundered in my ears.

Do your duty, Terra. I won’t have you disappoint your mother’s memory.

What a joke. If Momma knew what I was like these days—a knotty-haired truant, always blushing and tongue-tied—she’d be disappointed for sure.

Sometimes I was glad she hadn’t lived to see what I’d become.

My classmates waited for me near the lift at the fore of the ship. They loitered around the paved pavilion, looking bored in their formal wear. Rebbe Davison had squatted against one of the stone curbs. He was young for a teacher—at six we’d been his first class of students—and had dressed smartly in a dark linen suit. The white thread on his shoulder stood out in stark contrast. I felt a twinge of guilt as I saw him lift himself up from the ground, mud on the hems of his pants and the seat of his trousers.

“Terra Fineberg,” he said, but not sternly—I don’t think he had it in him to be stern. “We’ve been waiting for you.”

“Sorry,” I said, shoving my heavy hair from my face as I hustled to stand beside Rachel. “I overslept and—”

Rebbe Davison waved his hand, cutting off my excuse. To be fair, he’d heard plenty of my excuses over the past decade. If he’d had his fill of them, I couldn’t entirely blame him. He looked out across the class, quietly taking a head count.

“That’s everyone, kids,” he said, and went to the lift to press his hand against the panel. My classmates began filing in, in scattered clumps of twos and threes.

Rachel and I lingered near the rear of the crowd. She turned to me, looking me up and down. Her gaze was pointed. I tugged on the hem of my sweater, trying to conceal the fact that I was wearing the same rumpled cotton shirt and pants that I’d slept in. She looked great, of course, in a tweed skirt, gray blouse, and dark red stockings. Her clothes were clean and new, like they always were.

“Late on Vocation Day?” she said at last, cracking a slight smile. “That’s bad even for you!”

My shoulders tightened. “Well,” I said, trying my best to look like I didn’t care what she thought. “It’s not like it really matters to me what assignment I get.”

Rachel rolled her eyes. She’d spent the past year fretting over her future job. She wanted to work in one of the shops in the commerce district, channeling her fashion sense into something that would gain the approval of her own merchant parents. And she wanted me to work with her. I’d done nothing to disabuse her of this notion.

“Sure you don’t,” she said.

“Move it along, girls,” came a firm, clear voice from behind us. We turned—Rachel opened her mouth to offer a sarcastic word in return. But her expression softened when she saw who had spoken. It was Silvan Rafferty, and a smile curled up one corner of his lips. I felt my heart stutter in my chest, but his dark-lashed eyes were firmly on Rachel.

All we’d ever shared was that one kiss. But just the season before, he’d turned sweet on my friend. They walked through the atrium together, just like the older couples, holding hands and making out in beds of dry leaves. She was smitten, and so I never told her what had happened between me and the doctor’s son just before Momma died.

I pretended I didn’t care. But Silvan had grown handsome, well muscled and tall. His amber skin was smooth. Shining black curls tumbled down his shoulders. A smirk was always lifting his lips, as if he were secretly laughing at his own private joke. He grinned at us now.

“We’re not ‘girls,’ Silvan,” Rachel said as we stepped into the crowded lift. Silvan stood between us. I could feel the heat of his arm right through his shirt. “We’re practically women.”

“You look like a bunch of silly girls to me,” Silvan replied. Rachel darted her tongue out at him and then exploded in a fit of giggles. He whispered something to her. I couldn’t hear his words—only the heavy murmur of his lips against her ear.

My face burned. I turned away, watching through the glass walls as the pastures disappeared beneath us as we flew up into the bow of the ship.

The captain’s stateroom was at the bow of the ship, far from the atrium and the shops and the busy traffic of the day. Despite the name, Captain Wolff didn’t live there. Her family occupied a house in the ship’s stern, surrounded by other Council members. This was meant to illustrate how she stood on equal ground with other Asherati. But of course, no other citizen had a personal guard standing watch over his front door.

The suite was reserved for ceremonial purposes—vocation ceremonies, retirement parties, things like that. Rachel had told me how some couples were married there, but only if their families were in good standing with the captain. I’d never been invited to such a wedding.

I’d visited the stateroom only once, at our school convocation when I was six. I remembered how dark it was and how the ceiling was made of glass, but my memories didn’t do it justice.

For one thing, everything was clean. Most of the ship felt ancient, rickety, and dusty. We had a few computer terminals in school, but the old tech was mostly too important to waste on ordinary citizens. There were rumors that the Council families had their own terminals, though most of us were stuck with books and paper. But in the hall that led to the captain’s stateroom, little blinking lights and computer screens were set into the walls. Everything felt strangely new. No expense had been spared.

We filtered in. The ceiling panels here weren’t lit to simulate daylight. It was midmorning, but the sky above was star splattered. Hazy illumination spilled out of sconces in the wall. The black marble floors beneath our feet seemed to shine as much as the dark space above.

Our families were waiting for us. Rachel spotted hers and gave a wave of her slender hand to her mother, who waved back from her seat in the crowd. But when I found my father, he only turned away—muttering something under his breath to Ronen.

My brother had brought Hannah with him, of course. We never saw Ronen alone anymore, not since their wedding four years before. They moved together like a freakish two-headed lamb, her hand firmly glued to his arm. But she was the only one who smiled at me, waving. I forced myself to wave back. In truth, I felt bad for her—married to someone like my brother. But at least the marriage had been good for him . A gold thread was laced through the brown cord on his shoulder, marking him as a Council member now. It was only honorary. I don’t think he’d ever been to a meeting. But it made our father happy.

Beyond our seated families, at the far end of the room, a pair of metal doors gasped open. The captain’s guard stepped through, resplendent in their pitch-black uniforms, brass buttons gleaming against wool. I recognized the woman who led the pack. It was the guard from the night before. She carried a woven basket in her arms, weighted heavily by sealed rolls of paper.

Captain Wolff followed on their boot heels. Her uniform matched theirs—all black and brass. But where they wore bloodred braids on their shoulders, the cord on hers was violet, threaded with gold. Supervisory staff and a Council member, too. She was the only one to wear those colors.

At the center of the room sat a podium, ready and waiting. Captain Wolff marched right up to it, smiling. But the way the scar twisted her lip made it look more like a grimace. She rested her hand on the hilt of her ceremonial knife as she spoke.