Sang the Setari

12. A Rose By Any Other Name

A/n: Please refrain from comments until reading the chapter and author note at the end. Thanks and enjoy!
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My heart thundered as I made my way down to the hydroponics level and to the rose garden. I took a deep breath and released it slowly before entering.  I tapped into the secure link he had sent. No one but the two of us would hear anything or be able to access this file in the future.

Tsee Blackbourne sat on the stone bench cupping a small flower bud in his hands, smoothing his fingers over the delicate petals. He sensed my approach and his face lifted, steel gaze settling on me.

"You came. Thank-you," he said inviting me to sit down next to him. He let out a deep breath himself before opening the conversation, "The others have talked to you about an...arrangement...for all of us. However, you wonder about my feelings because of the distance you sense between us.  That is what your message said, correct?"

I nodded wordlessly, trembling at the thought of what he might say.

"That is my doing, I fear," he said, placing the rose bud in the space I had left between us on the bench. "I have refrained from demonstrating any affection that the others so freely are able to do.  There are reasons for that, though I can understand your confusion about any connection you and I might share."

We sat quietly for a moment and he continued.

"Miss Sorenson, Sang, I need to tell you something under strictest confidence. Which is why I asked you here and we are having this conversation on a secure voice channel.  You have heard others mention and no doubt noted my distinct resemblance to my uncle, Tsur Selik Buble?"

He waited for my nod.

He spoke deliberately in an even, clinical voice. "Selik had a twin brother, Nolan, who was injured in a training exercise as a Kalrani.  He expired, but at the time, their father Isten Coric Buble was conducting research in genetic cloning.  Coric preserved Nolan's DNA and years later Citrine Blackbourne, Selik's sister, secretly served as a surrogate for the sole viable embryo he was able to...create."

Ends to Muina...was he saying...?

He gestured to the roses around us.

"This was her garden. Her pride and joy." He closed his eyes and added, "She and Coric were both killed in an Ionoth attack shortly after the birth of the child."

He opened his eyes again and looked directly at me.  There was a storm dancing in those steel eyes now.  With profound emotion he admitted, "I am that child."

My knee-jerk reaction was to reach out to him, to try and offer some comfort at his distress.  But I stopped short of placing my hand over his.  After all, he was a Place Sight, not someone to touch uninvited without serious cause. His attention narrowed to our almost touching hands.

His voice was tight, saying, "It's shocking, I know. Some would say repulsive..."

"No!" I interrupted him and breached etiquette by grasping his hand.

He closed his eyes again and mouth pressed closed as my turbulent emotions washed over him upon contact. 

I started to say, "I don't think you are..."

But he interjected, "I know.  You are too kind, Miss Sorenson.  There is more to say."

He gently pulled his hand from mine.

"With most psychic talents the training involves activating those abilities at will.  For Sight talents, the focus is on control.  It is an effort to not use Sight abilities.  You know that touching for Place Sights translates emotion and makes physical intimacy significantly more complex."