"He's sinned."

Surely not. Laene had always been reserved and less than open about his deeper struggles. Certainly, we could all tell that the thought of claiming his mate concerned him, but that wasn't uncommon in Ryshkare Val'Dornn, or at least those that had a similar upbringing. But he couldn't be so concerned that he truly would join the unsearching? ...Would he?

Kados must have seen the confusion on my face, or maybe I projected the feeling. I wasn't sure in the wake of my surprise. "The bells, this day cycle, they were for him."

I could see the annoyance and anger plain on Kados' face, but I only felt a radiating sadness and melancholy in the air.

"He left and refused to acknowledge it...to acknowledge her," his eyes shimmered, but he blinked it away.

It was sacrilege and abhorrent, the concept of coming so far and having the possibility of meeting the other half of your soul and denying it.

"It could be that she isn't the one. I felt it...a connection when I saw Addison's picture the first time. He might have felt no connection."

"He wouldn't even look at her picture."

"It's still possible that it isn't a match."

"Sixty-three percent, Esayr. It's a sixty-three percent chance that she is his. Yours was nineteen. It is more likely to be a true match than it is to be false." Kados ran his hands through his hair sending his curls into wild tangles. "Why?" There anguish in his voice and the space around us. "How could he?"

"Let me speak to him."

"What can you say to him, that I can't? You can't assuage his fears like you could with anyone else."

My fingertips itched to press into the cool metal of the door and seek out Laene within his chambers. What could I offer to him that no one else on this ship could? "I can be unbiased."

"How? You of all of us know the joy of claiming your mate and laying eyes on her? How could you be unbiased?"

"I lose nothing if he chooses to join the unsearching. I've found my mate and the loss of his addition to the genetic study will not affect me. I can listen to him without that clouding my judgment at least."

Kados shrugged but just before turning away he whispered, "We argued about the matter. I-I can't fathom anything that would keep my brother or me away from our female. I just...don't understand."

"It's not your job to understand him. He is well into maturity and can make his decisions. All we can do is be here for him should he need help."

"He's denying the very help that he needs." Kados' voice was frosty as he turned to our Prince, "Or am I wrong?"

Prince Roan canted his head considering the question, "Laene would find answers to many of the questions that haunt him if he continues his searching."

"Is she his?"

"That I cannot say," Prince Roan was always evasive in his answers --or more accurately probably-- all of the princes were evasive. Non guided Val'Dornn still didn't know the extent of what a Prince knew or didn't know.

"It would be quite the anomaly if she were. It would be more than a boon to our studies." Kados glanced my way, begging me to inquire.

"In what way?"

"His match is a female in your mate's Riniere."

~~~~

I stood facing the smooth silvered metal of Laene's quarters. Kados and Prince Roan had left me to face Laene and offer him...something, whether it was acceptance or a push I wasn't yet quite sure.

My mind was spinning over the news that Kados had told me. It was nearly unbelievable that two mates could be so closely connected. We're not yet sure that she's his. It could simply be a fluke. "Laene"

I was met with silence.

"Laene?" I called a little louder but still received no response. I pulled my hand back to rap on the metal of his door just as it slid open. Likely the ship had informed him it was me outside and neither Kados nor our Prince. I stepped into his chambers carefully, but even the muted sound was overloud in the silent room.

Laene was similar in personality to the way that he kept his room, utilitarian and lacking frivolous items. He certainly wasn't devoid of personality and personal touches, but he did tend to only reveal them to those he was close to.

I walked past clean white walls and polished flooring toward the singular living and dining space of single male quarters. I'd expected to find him on his couch, but it was empty of him. Instead, I found him off to my right, head bowed and shoulders slumped over the cooking shelf.

"Laene?"

"I'm fine," his voice was quiet.

I paused a moment, thinking over how I wanted to broach this conversation. He was obviously amenable to talking since he'd granted me access to his chambers. "Forgive me, friend, but if you have to start the conversation that way I'd be hard pressed to believe it true," I paused allowing him the opportunity to fill the silence that followed. When he didn't I continued on more quietly, "Laene...you don't look fine."

All at once, his shoulders crumpled and shook and for the first time in my life i heard him suck in a shuddering breath that sounded too much like a sob, "I'm not fine. I'm not fine." He repeated it over and over again.

The silence in the room was deafening to me. I was lacking the singular ability that gods had seen fit to give me to help in moments like these. I couldn't even feel a glimpse of the turmoil that my friend was torturing himself with, but despite all of that I wasn't useless. I gripped Laene's shoulder spun him all the while tugging him towards me, into an embrace.

At first, he stood their awkwardly unused to such displays but after a time he gripped the fabric of my shirt more firmly. "What do I do? What do I do? I don't know what to do," He agonized shaking his head nearly constantly.

I pulled back and grabbed the sides of his face, not only at least to still him before he could break to pieces in front of me, but to make sure he could look into my eyes before I said what I needed to say, "What do you want to do, Laene?"

His eyes searched my face, wide and red-rimmed, tears pooled in long dark lashes that seemed at odds with his light brown hair. There was surprise in his gaze as if he'd never quite considered what he wanted. "What do I want?"

"What do you want to do. Laene?"

"I can't--"

"Are you afraid?" His look sobered at my comment like he'd almost take offense at what I'd asked him, but as he looked at me I watched his expression soften again before he gave me a slight jerky nod.

"Yes."

"What are you afraid you'll lose? What are you afraid that you won't be able to achieve? That's what you want. So, what do you want, Laene?"

"What if she is unhappy?"

"I didn't ask you to voice your fears. What do you want? Whether or not you act on those wants we'll address later. What do you want?"

Laene was quiet for a spell. I thought he might not answer me, but he finally spoke. "I want happiness; hers and mine. I want to see her, to breathe her in and know I've found her. I want things that have always seemed so out of reach. I want her."

I nodded. I'd never suspected anything less. It's incredibly uncommon for one of the Vall' people to join the unsearching. One of the few things regarded as shameful and outside of the realm of what the Gods forbid us was the act of denying one's Temani Bercari and refusing one's search for their soul.

"What is stopping you?"

Laene pulled away from me and paced around the food prep area, restless. With the absence of that connection the oppressive silence he lived with faded, allowing the muted itch of emotion that I was so used to, to return. "I told Kados I needed time, but he took it as an affront. He continued to press, most days it is manageable, but with this...it is a matter we both have strong feelings about and neither of us could handle the other's reaction. I stormed out. I'd never meant it to be a refusal." Laene opened the temperature control unit and peered in. Seeing nothing worth eating he closed it and resumed his pacing.

"Do you need to talk through it? The aspects that are bothering you?"

His hand stole to the collar of his shirt, flattening it meticulously. "I had anticipated more time before this possibility. It is still that after all."

"Did Kados tell you, your percentage?"

Laene nodded, "He told me that as well as a few choice words regarding my possibility subjecting her to a lifetime of never finding the other half of her soul." Anger flashed across Laene's face at the memory.

"Kados is...troublesome on his best days and when it comes to his work I can imagine he was more than unmanageable. That fact doesn't make up for his actions, but at least it might explain them."

"You are not wrong," he rolled his neck as if to relieve strain, "Had I not been blindsided I would have expected his reaction."

The fact that a Ryshkare Val'Dornn could possibly be the second to find their soulbind was unusual. More than unusual, really. Ryshkare Val'Dornn notoriously struggle to find their soulbinds. Of the two-hundred males to walk the surface of the small blue planet to search for their mates, Laene would have been the first Ryshkare Val'Dornn. I searched his face, eyeing the dark circles and the mussed hair. "Help me understand, Laene. Your decision is your own, I just want to help."

He rubbed a hand along his jaw, motioning for me to follow him he drifted like a ghost to the couch across the room. He dropped wearily onto the cushions, "I'm afraid."

"Of?"

"Her." He blinked quickly and I could almost feel the anxiety behind the action. "Everything. It's been a possibility that has plagued me all of my life, since my--" he coughed, "--since my parents. I don't want...to subject her to that. I would love her no matter what, but she deserves so much more than what she could have with me."

"Laene-" I started, but he cut me off.

"And what if she doesn't love me? I...don't think I'm that strong. It would kill me I think. With all of their government's misleading them, what if she comes here with only hatred in her heart? I've seen that relationship before and watched it play out to its bitter end. She doesn't deserve that."

"What if she doesn't? What if she just takes time, like Addison has? Do you remember when she came upon this ship? She needed time and comfort to adjust to these concepts, but slowly she's adjusting. I'd like to believe that those females that fate knit from the same cloth as us are ones that predisposed to this lifestyle. They are those that are more understanding and compassionate."

"There's no going back once I've made the decision. As soon as we lay eyes on one another our bond will tighten and our souls won't stomach the option of being away from each other. If she isn't happy I will have condemned her to this life."

"Whether or not you find it reassuring, the truth is there is still a chance the match isn't true."

"It is."

His candor and surety were surprising. A bloom of anxiety unfurled in my stomach at his proclamation, "How do you know?"

"Did Kados tell you the strange news?"

The stress ate its way up into my throat, "That she was one of Addison's Riniere?"

Laene nodded, "I could smell her on your mate when she first came in. I hadn't known it then, but the scent haunted me. I could smell it in the science wing when Kados pulled me in. Some kind of flower I think. It stresses me."

"I can feel it."

Laene's confused gaze whipped to me, "Surely not? At least you never have before."

I was so used to the feeling of emotions flitting around whenever I talked to another, though I'd known Laene nearly all of my life I would still occasionally forget and lapse into that mindset when talking to him as well. An anxiety that bordered on fear ate away at my insides, but it wasn't his. "Addison"

*****A/N*****

Back at it again with that update :). Life is settling down more, which is a blessing. So, I'm trying to get back into writing regularly. It's hard picking up the flow when you've been away for a while after you were used to handling a story almost every day.

Here's a pretty long update to make up for being gone much longer than anticipated. Hope y'all are doing well.

As always thank you so much for reading my story and taking the time to comment or vote. It means a lot to me. We just broke 2,000 views today, which is absolutely mind-boggling. I only ever anticipated 10 views at most on this story. I began writing this really just for entertainment and to try and push myself to follow through with something finally, so the fact that so many of you have taken the time to read these words that I spit out onto a page and post without editing is crazy. So thank you, thank you, thank you, from the bottom of my heart for taking the time to enjoy this wild ride. You're all so lovely.

P.S. any thoughts on who Laene's mate is? I've known who he was destined for since the very first page. Esayr, Laene, and Vailen all have had their mates set in stone since the beginning oddly enough. The others were harder for me to pinpoint.

Love,

Layla