Vanya and Guge seated themselves at the head table. Tuk, Annja noticed, chose to remain close to her and Mike. She smiled. It was a touching gesture of friends.h.i.+p. They were all placed at the head table.

A plate was put in front of her and platters of food were pa.s.sed around. Annja helped herself to the meal and ate and drank her fill of peppers, carrots, rice and strange and wonderful-tasting plants and fruits she'd never seen before. She drank out of a cup filled with a fruity wine that quickly relaxed her and allowed her mind to open to the wonder of the scene before her.

The Guge people seemed genuinely ecstatic that Tuk had returned to his homeland. They kept approaching him and talking to him about his adventures in the outside world. Annja noticed that there were several women who made it apparent they thought he was quite handsome.

Mike sat next to her, eating his way through plate after plate of food. Annja looked at him. "Aren't you full yet?"

"Not even close. I'm famished."

"You're healing. Your body knows it needs fuel for the repair process." She glanced down at his torn pants. "How's the leg?"

"Feels great. After they st.i.tched me up, they put some type of balm on it that I think acts as a pain reliever." He reached for another helping of food and looked at Annja. "Everything okay?"

"Everything's great," she said. "I guess I'm just a little bit in awe of this place. It seems almost too amazing to be true."

"I know what you mean. I've been here longer than you two and I'm still in shock."

"Not that it's affected your appet.i.te," Annja said with a laugh. "Apparently."

Mike held up his hands. "I'm a growing boy. I need to have my strength, you know."

"Yeah, I got that." She looked at Tuk, who was talking with his parents again. "He looks so happy."

Mike nodded. "Orphan suddenly finding out that his parents are still alive and that he's going to be the king of some long-forgotten land? Yeah, I'd bet that would put a smile on my face, too."

Annja nodded and reached for her gla.s.s of wine. Mike nudged her.

"Hey."

"What?"

"You sure you're okay?"

Annja sipped the wine. "Yeah. I don't know. I've never known my own past. And I guess it's kind of being brought up again seeing Tuk find his way back to his family. But I'm still searching for the answers I need." She sighed. "Maybe I'm just jealous."

"Anyone would be," Mike said. "This is a pretty d.a.m.ned amazing thing to have happen. But I guess we're lucky to be here, right?"

"And what about Tsing?"

"What about him?"

Annja looked at Mike. "Well, what happens after we leave this place? Tsing is going to want to know how we found our way here."

"Who says he has to know?"

Annja frowned. "When we come walking back from that plane wreck with little to show for it, I don't think he's going to be the understanding type."

Mike bit into a peach. "Maybe we don't go back."

Annja shook her head. "We can't stay here, Mike. We don't belong here. This isn't our home."

"Home is where the heart is," Mike said.

"Thank you, Mr. Cliche." Annja sighed. "Look, Mike, this was never my obsession. I signed on to help you find this place. But I never said I wanted to run away from the real world when we found it."

"Run away? Is that what you think I'm doing?"

"If you want to stay here, then that's exactly what it looks like."

Mike frowned. "Annja, you don't know everything that's happened in my life since the last time we got together. A lot of c.r.a.p came down on me. Not the least of which is my failing health."

"Your cholesterol? That's easily taken care of if you simply change your eating habits."

Mike smiled but there seemed little mirth in it. "It's not just my cholesterol, Annja."

"Something else?"

Mike nodded. "I'm dying."

"What?"

He put a hand on her arm. "This isn't the time to bring it up. But the fact is, I have a very short time to live. I have an inoperable brain tumor. If they try to crack my skull and get it out, it will just kill me."

Annja felt her throat swelling shut. "How long?"

Mike grinned. "I didn't ask. I didn't want to know. It always seems to me like that's just a death sentence right then and there. Doctors tell you that you've only got six months and, whammo, you drop dead at exactly six months. All I know is the tumor is there and it's a ticking time bomb. And, eventually, I will die."

"Eventually, we all die," Annja said.

Mike nodded. "Granted. I would have liked a little more time, though. Say thirty years or so. Get married, have a few kids of my own. Would have been nice to have those experiences."

"You could still have that."

Mike shook his head. "I'm not that selfish. What would I do, go out and find someone to fall in love with me, have children and then crush their hearts when I kicked off? That would really make me something of a jerk."

"It's not selfish to want to be loved, Mike."

Mike took a drink of wine. "However, my time is extremely limited. And personally, I can't think of a place I'd rather be than here with these people. I mean, if you could choose how you wanted to go out, wouldn't it be in a place like this? Surrounded by beauty and peace. Everything here is so utterly perfect."

"I guess it is," Annja said. "But I don't want you to stay. I want you to come back with me."

Mike grinned. "Now you're being selfish."

"Yes. I am."

Mike hoisted his gla.s.s and they clinked them together. "At least I'm not the only one."

Annja took a drink and then looked around the table. The party had lost all of the joy for her. She watched, as if peering in through a window, how Tuk and his people bonded.

Music started as the meal finished. More wine flowed and the people took to dancing all over the gra.s.s. Even Guge and Vanya enjoyed a few dances before sitting down again. At one point, Vanya looked over at Annja and smiled. Annja smiled back but she felt no happiness.

The idea that Mike would be dying soon felt like a hole had been torn in her heart. She'd lost close friends before, but this felt different. Mike was a different kind of man. He never expected anyone to understand what it was that drove him. He made no apologies for being who he was, and he was utterly comfortable in his own skin.

Annja respected that. And she respected what he had accomplished in his life. Barring the incident with Tsing, Mike had nothing to be embarra.s.sed about. He pursued what he loved and did so with all the joy of a child.

Annja wished she had some more of that mirth in her own life. But that seemed to be a precious commodity. And somehow, the music that played around her tugged harder at her heartstrings than she cared for.

"Annja?"

She looked up and saw Guge standing there. She tried to smile but felt it die on her lips. "Hi."

Guge's eyes peered deep into hers. "Perhaps we could walk awhile?"

"Sure." She rose and followed the king away from the party and back toward the grand staircase.

Guge smiled at her. "I'm afraid I'm not as young as I used to be. These celebrations tend to wear me out."

"I see."

"But what's your excuse?"

"Sorry?"

He turned to her. "You wear the look of someone who has lost a friend."

Annja sighed. "I guess in a way I just did."

"Who? Surely not Tuk. He seems to have a genuine fondness for both you and your friend Mike."

"It's not Tuk," Annja said. "It's Mike."

"Oh?"

"Apparently, he's dying."

Guge said nothing for a moment and then looked at her. "Surely it is not the injury to his leg?"

"No. He has a brain tumor. It's a disease where something grows inside his head until it kills him."

Guge nodded gravely. "I see. And there is nothing that the doctors in the outside world can do for him?"

"According to him, no. They've told him that it is inoperable. They can't take it out for fear of killing him."

"That is unfortunate," Guge said.

"I don't mean to be down during such a time of celebration," Annja said. "He only just told me, though. It's weird. I was so overjoyed to see him earlier and everything seemed so great. And now I feel like he's already dead."

Guge laid a hand on her arm. "He is most certainly not dead yet, Annja. And you should remember that."

Annja nodded. "I know. I just can't stop thinking about it. We've always been friends and now I'm not sure what to do."

"That is the thing about the universe, my dear. It doesn't succ.u.mb to the desires of the likes of us. It simply is. And the things we wish to change are the very things that often must happen. We simply don't have the power to make the universe obey our whims."

"Yes," Annja said. "I know from experience it doesn't listen to the likes of my desires, but that doesn't stop me from trying again and again."

"That's because you are a human being," Guge said. "And ours is always of the mind that we can control our destiny."

"He's just such a good person. I hear about the evil men that walk among us and wonder why the universe doesn't take them?"

"The universe doesn't distinguish between good and evil, per se. Only in certain incarnations will it see things in such a light. To the universe, evil and good simply exist. Neither is better than the other. They simply are."

Annja sighed. "I wish it was easier than it is."

"If it was easier, then we would have no chance to learn and evolve ourselves to a higher level of existence."

Annja sat on the stairs and hugged her knees. "I don't know how long he has. And he's thinking that he doesn't want to leave here to go back to his home. He's entranced with this place."

"We have noticed. You, however, don't seem so."

Annja smirked. "I've been told my destiny lies elsewhere."

Guge nodded. "So it would seem. You carry a burden unlike any other outsider we have ever seen."

"You have no idea," Annja said.

Guge cleared his throat. "We will talk more of this in the coming days. But we must return to the party now."

"Why?"

Guge's brow furrowed. "Because I think Tuk has just received what the outside world calls a phone call."

19.

Tuk nearly jumped out of his seat when the tiny phone began vibrating in his pocket. He'd forgotten all about it in the rush to celebrate his homecoming. It was something he'd longed for for so long that this sudden reminder of the world he used to know at once shocked him and made him melancholy.

He excused himself from the table amid many startled glances, and walked away from the party, pulling the cell phone out of his pocket.

"h.e.l.lo?"

"Tuk, where are you?"