Close Remembrance (The Krinar Chronicles 3)

Spotting Mia, Maria gave her an enthusiastic wave. “Hi there, come join us!”

Mia approached, smiling at her. “Happy birthday!” she said, handing Maria a small box wrapped in pretty paper.

“A gift! Oh my dear, you really shouldn’t have!” But Maria’s face glowed with excitement, and Mia knew she’d done the right thing in asking Korum to help her come up with a present.

As eager as a child, Maria tore apart the wrapper and opened the box, taking out a small oval object. “Oh my God, is that what I think it is?!?”

“Korum made it,” Mia explained, pleased by her reaction. Maria obviously knew enough about Krinar technology to understand that she’d just received a fabricator – a device that would enable her to use nanomachines to create all manner of objects from individual atoms. Of course, the computer that Korum had embedded in his palm enabled him to do the same thing without any other devices – and on a much bigger, more complex scale. However, he was one of the very few who could create an entire ship from scratch. Rapid fabrication was a relatively new technology and still fairly expensive, so not all Krinar could afford even a basic fabricator – like the one he had designed for Maria. It was a highly coveted object, Korum had explained.

“Oh my God, a fabricator! Thank you so much!” Maria was almost beside herself with excitement. “This is so great – I can now make whatever clothes I want!”

“And other things too,” Mia said, grinning. The little fabricator wasn’t advanced enough to make complex technology, but it could conjure up all manner of simpler objects.

“Clothes,” Maria said firmly. “I mainly want clothes.”

Everyone around the table laughed at the determined expression on her face, and a red-headed girl yelled out, “And shoes for me!”

“Oh, what am I thinking!” Maria exclaimed amidst all the laughter. “I haven’t even introduced you to everyone yet. Everyone – this is Mia, our newest arrival. As you can see, she’s unbelievably awesome. Mia, you know Delia already. The lovely lady to her right is Sandra, then Jenny, Jeannette, Rosa, Yun, Lisa, Danielle, Ana, Moira, and Cat.”

“Hi,” Mia said, smiling and waving to all the girls. The flood of names was a little overwhelming; there was no way she’d remember all of them right away. Normally, she was shy in social situations where she didn’t know most of the people, but today she felt comfortable for some reason. Perhaps it was because she already had so much in common with these girls. Few others outside of this little group could even begin to understand what it was like to be in a relationship with someone literally out of this world.

Taking a seat on the empty floating chair, Mia stared around the table with unabashed curiosity. Like her, all these girls were immortal. Did that mean that some of them were older than they looked? For the most part, they appeared young and strikingly beautiful, of various races and nationalities. However, a couple of them were merely pretty, and Mia wondered again why the godlike Krinar were attracted to humans in the first place. Was it the ability to drink their blood? If taking blood was as pleasurable as having it taken, then she could see the appeal.

Turning her attention to Delia, Mia thanked her for letting her know about the party in the first place.

“Of course,” Delia said. “I’m glad you could make it. We heard you weren’t in Lenkarda for the past week; otherwise, Maria would’ve sent you the formal invitation earlier.”

“Yes, I was in Florida, visiting my family,” Mia explained and saw Delia’s eyebrows rise in question.

“Korum let you go there?” she asked, and there was a note of disbelief in her voice.

“We went together,” said Mia, popping a strawberry into her mouth. The berry was sweet and juicy; the Krinar definitely knew how to get the best fruit.

“Oh,” said Delia, “I see . . .” She seemed slightly confused by this turn of events.

“Do you ever go visit your family?” Mia inquired without thinking. “Are they still in Greece?”

Delia smiled, looking unaccountably amused. “No, they’re no longer around.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry . . .” Mia felt terrible. She’d had no idea this girl was an orphan.

“It’s okay,” Delia said calmly. “They passed away a long time ago. I now only have bits and pieces of memories about them. We didn’t have photographs back then.”

Mia began to get an inkling of the situation. “How long ago is a long time?” she asked, unable to contain her curiosity. No photographs? Just how old was Arus’s charl?

“Oh, you don’t know Delia’s story?” the brown-haired charl who’d spoken before asked. “Delia, you should tell Mia –”

“I didn’t get a chance, Sandra,” Delia said, addressing the girl. “I only met Mia once before.”

“Our Delia here is a bit older than she seems,” Sandra said, an anticipatory grin on her face. “I just love the newbies’ reactions when they hear her true age . . .”

Intrigued, Mia stared at the Greek girl. “What is your true age, Delia?”

“To the best of my knowledge, I will be two thousand three hundred and twelve this year.”

Mia choked on a piece of strawberry she’d been eating. Coughing, she managed to clear her throat enough to wheeze out, “What?”

“Yep, you heard her right,” Sandra said, laughing. “Delia is only a bit younger than some of the pyramids –”