The Royal Pursuit (17 page)

She was touched by her friend’s
concern. “Thank you. I should have told you. You would have been
the right person to go to about it, but the only person I talked to
after that was William.”

“
William
Nichols?”

“
Unfortunately.”

She raised her eyebrow. “You were
crazy about him. You talked about him nonstop.”

“
Yes, I did. And I couldn’t
get over him for the longest time.” She tried not to shiver at the
memory of how pathetically devoted to him she had been.

“
I didn’t want to mention
this in front of your husband, but William called me a few times to
find out where you were,” Stacey said. “Of course, I had no idea.
He had to call my parents to find out what my phone number was. I
kept telling him you were nowhere to be found. He just said the
last time he talked to you was when you were in North Dakota. I
think that was five years ago.”

Ann refrained from rolling her eyes.
So William only wanted to talk to her because she was no longer
available to talk to.

“
Do you still have a thing
for him?” Stacey asked.

“
No way!”

She looked relieved. “That’s good to
hear. He was telling me that his ex-wife, Carol, was a big mistake
and how he wished he could go back and do things differently with
you. I think he wants to renew your relationship with
him.”

“
He had four years to be
with me, but I wasn’t good enough for him. I finally wised up and
married someone much better.”

“
Do you ever wonder what
would have been if you hadn’t moved and you ended up with
him?”

“
I don’t have to wonder. I
know. I would have been miserable. I’m glad Hathor showed up when
he did.”

“
I’m glad for you.” She
smiled. “Okay. Now back to Florida. After your parents died, what
happened?”

“
I stayed in Florida for
two years and got my Associates of Arts degree. Then I transferred
to a college in North Dakota. I was twenty-one at the time. I was
going for a Bachelor’s in Psychology. Well, that was when Hathor
showed up out of nowhere, and I mean that literally. He told me
that I was to be the queen of a planet called Raz that was in the
Enchanted Galaxy.”

“
And he was kidding,
right?”

“
No. And believe it or not,
that’s what I am. I went to Raz and now rule there.”

Stacey looked skeptical.

Ann nodded, understanding her
hesitation. “Don’t worry. It sounds like I made it up, but it’s the
truth.”

“
Is that how you became a
mermaid?” she slowly asked.

“
Not really. I’m on a
mission to retrieve the Stone of Immortality from the Nicals who
stole it from the Olympians.”

When Ann saw her eyebrows furrow, she
explained everything that had transpired since the Augurs sent
their request to meet with her on Raz.

***

While the women talked in the kitchen,
Hathor finished dressing after his shower. He came out of the small
room, wearing Kent’s clothes. He’d forgotten how comfortable a
cotton shirt and blue jeans were. When Kent led Hathor to the
kitchen, Stacey lead Ann to the shower.

“
I guess we’re going in
shifts,” Kent joked. He pulled his long black curly bangs out of
his eyes. “Would you like to eat or drink anything?”

Hathor nodded. “That would be great.
Thank you.”

Kent grabbed a glass of water and a
ham and cheese sandwich from the fridge. “I figured the girls
wanted some time alone to catch up on old times. Stacey really
missed Ann. She talks about her once in awhile. She thought Ann
died about five years ago.”

He set the drink and sandwich on the
table in front of Hathor before he sat down across from him. “She
did a search for Ann a few months ago,” Kent continued. “She
discovered Ann’s last known whereabouts was in North Dakota. The
search records say Ann died five years ago, probably as a Jane Doe
in a hospital somewhere.”

“
Jane Doe?”

“
That’s the name they give
a woman who shows up dead without any identification or known
relatives or friends to claim the body.”

“
Oh.” Hathor had wondered
how the people on Earth explained Ann’s disappearance.

“
Thankfully, Ann is still
alive. It was so weird. Someone called Stacey out of the blue a few
months ago and it sent her into a panic to find Ann. Okay, it
wasn’t really a panic. But she seemed intent on warning Ann about
something. Yet, just now, she didn’t seem to be worried about Ann.
I don’t get it.”

Hathor frowned. “Do you know who
called her?”

Kent looked at the ceiling
thoughtfully, as if he’d find the answer there, then shook his
head. “No. Stacey said his name, but I don’t remember
it.”

“
William Nichols?” Hathor
didn’t want to say the name. He didn’t even want to think of the
person who gave him so much grief in the past, but he had to
know.

“
That sounds right. Do you
know him?”

“
He’s come across my path a
couple of times.”

“
You seem to dislike him as
much as Stacey does.”

Hathor forced himself to relax so he
wouldn’t give anything else away. What could William possibly want
with Ann now?

“
You look familiar,” Kent
said.

Hathor looked at him, surprised. Kent
shouldn’t remember him.

Kent smiled widely. “Of course! You’re
the student I took to the music store. That was the day I met
Stacey.”

He released his breath. That was the
only memory Kent should have had of meeting Hathor. He nodded.
“Yes. I was the one you took to the music store.”

“
I guess you didn’t get the
job. I went back to the store to thank you for introducing us, but
none of the employees knew who you were.”

“
No. I didn’t get the
job.”

“
We’re back,” Stacey said
as she and Ann entered the room.

Hathor put his arm around Ann’s
shoulders when she sat next to him. He pulled her close to him. He
would always be grateful she chose him over William.

She wore her hair down, her damp curls
falling softly over her shoulders. The sides of her hair were
pulled back by a heart-shaped barrette that Stacey had given her.
She wore a red shirt and black jeans. It reminded him of how she
looked as a high school student.

Stacey sat next to Kent and said, “Did
Hathor tell you where they’re from?”

“
We didn’t get that far,”
Hathor replied.

“
Do you want to tell him?
Ann filled me in on the details and it’s fascinating,” she told
Hathor.

“
I was born on Raz. It’s a
planet in the Enchanted Galaxy,” Hathor began. “I came to Earth to
bring Ann to Raz because Raz had picked her to be its next queen.
On Raz, the queen is the one who has all the power.”

“
If she’s the queen and
you’re married to her, then you’re the king, so you share some of
that power,” Kent said.

“
The king doesn’t have any
power. He serves the queen and gives her a daughter.”

“
I don’t think of Hathor as
my slave,” Ann quickly said. “That’s not the way it is. I know it
sounds bad, but he’s my equal. He just has a different role than I
do. But that’s beside the point. He brought me to Raz.”

“
That was five years ago,”
Hathor added. “That’s why she disappeared from Earth.”

“
Raz is like the fantasy
stories you read about in books or see in the movies,” Ann
explained. “You know, the stories with magical creatures like
unicorns, fairies and goblins. It’s a beautiful place.”

“
So what are you doing
here?” Kent asked.

“
The Nicals stole the
Olympians’ immortality,” Ann answered. “The Olympians are the Greek
and Roman gods and goddesses who left Earth after the fall of the
Roman Empire. They are similar to what you read in the myths, but
they are regular people. They really aren’t deities. The only
reason people on Earth worshiped them was because they have a magic
stone that gives them their immortality.”

“
Their loyalty is solely to
the queen,” Hathor added.

“
They treat you well,” Ann
said.

“
Only because I’m with
you.” He smiled at her. “Ann, I don’t care. I like being with them,
too.”

“
They are biased in their
treatment of me,” she admitted to Kent and Stacey.

“
The Nicals went to planet
Olympia to get the Olympians’ immortality,” Hathor continued.
“Because of that, the Olympians are in the process of dying. Ann,
Athen, and two Palers went to planet Lone to retrieve the
Olympians’ immortality for them.”

“
Palers?” Kent
asked.

“
Palers are from planet
Pale. They are a great ally to have. Thanks to Ann, Raz and Pale
are on friendly terms.”

Ann’s cheeks turned pink. “Oh, I can’t
take credit for that. I just happened to be in the right place at
the right time.”

Kent chuckled. “You are so lucky. You
get to travel across galaxies and meet other life forms. It must be
one big adventure after another.”

“
It’s hard not to get
jealous,” Stacey agreed. “The best we have is Atlantis.”

“
Anyway, you went to look
for the Nicals,” Kent said. “Did you find them?”

“
They found me,” Ann said.
“They kidnapped me and my group. One of them let me escape because
the man in white planned to kill me if he found out I was
pregnant.”

“
Is the man in white a
Nical?” Kent asked.

“
No. I don’t know who he is
or where he came from.”

“
Why does it matter if
you’re pregnant?”

“
The Augurs said he wants
to kill her before she can give birth to our child,” Hathor
replied. “The child is destined to play a big part in defeating the
plans the man in white has. The Augurs told us to meet them
here.”

“
Who are the
Augurs?”

“
They’re from the planet
Aug. They have this small device that can tell the
future.”

Kent raised his eyebrow. “Hmm…I don’t
suppose there’s a connection between the Augurs and what we found
in Atlantis.”

“
What did you find?” Ann
asked.

“
The people who lived here
had technology for telling the future. We found it in the arc. It
doesn’t work anymore.”

“
There could very well be a
connection,” Hathor said. “It would explain why the Augurs wanted
us to meet them on Earth.”

“
We’re going to meet
aliens?” Stacey gasped.

“
Since you’re here, you
most likely will,” he replied.

“
What does an Augur look
like?” she asked.

“
They’re human. They have
black hair and wear black clothes. They’re known for their honesty,
and when they make ridiculous demands, it turns out that they are
doing so because it’s in your best interest.”

“
Wow. This is incredible.
You interact with these other beings on a regular basis and it’s no
big deal?”

He shrugged. “We’re used to it. We
still have much to learn about other planets and the beings on
them, so it’s not like we know everyone or everything.”

Kent whistled. “What an adventure that
would be. Just learning about different aliens and their planets
would be great.”

Stacey grinned at Ann. “You definitely
have a terrific job.”

“
Sometimes I wonder if I’m
really up to it,” Ann confessed. “I don’t feel
adequate.”

“
You do a wonderful job,”
Hathor assured her.

“
He always says that,” she
told Kent and Stacey.

“
Maybe that’s because it’s
the truth,” Kent said. “He doesn’t strike me as the kind of person
who’d lie.”

They heard the door of the submarine
open.

“
I know this is a strange
request, but would it be too much to ask if you two didn’t mention
where we’re from or why we’re here?” Hathor asked. “I don’t know if
Earth is ready for aliens.”

“
We’ll just tell them we
found you sending out an SOS and rescued you,” Stacey said. “Does
that sound believable?” she asked Kent.

“
I don’t know. It’s a long
way to the top,” Kent replied. “I’m not sure we can say anything
that won’t sound weird. We’ll just keep it vague.” Kent turned his
attention back to Hathor and Ann. “Your secret is safe with
us.”

Hathor squeezed Ann’s shoulders. He
was thrilled to see them again, and she felt the same way. He knew
they could trust them. They had proven that in the past, even if
they didn’t remember it.

Chapter
Fifteen

Lake Solitaire

Planet: Lone

Athen was weary by the time they
reached Lake Solitaire. He hadn’t slept in days, and his fatigue
was beginning to press down on him, making him clumsy in his
walk.