The Aurora Borealis Keeps Its Lament novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: The Long Dark

At the Wastelands Branch Sabina assigns Alba the data hut, and at midnight Iker asks her to read him a dial page and she refuses.

The Wastelands Branch had one road, and it ended at the station gate.

Past the gate there was only ice and a sky so black I could not tell where it began.

It was three in the afternoon and the sun had been gone for a week.

I climbed down from the supply truck with a duffel bag, a thermos and a coat that was not warm enough.

Behind me a second duffel hit the snow, followed by a suitcase the size of a coffin.

"Carry that and I'll love you forever," said Paloma, climbing out after it.

"You told me you were staying in the Capital."

"I told you I'd think about it. I thought about it for one night." She pulled her scarf over her nose. "I'm not letting you freeze alone, Alba. I put in for the press post. There are barely a dozen people here, and I have three kilos of chocolate."

I laughed for the first time in two weeks.

It came out as a cloud.

Across the yard, the station doors opened and a woman in a white coat came down the steps with both hands out.

Sabina Lorca.

"I came a week ahead to set things up," she said, and hugged me hard. "You wouldn't believe the state of the logs. I've been dying for someone sensible."

"You transferred here too?"

"Science lead, for now. The Institute wanted someone steady on the ice." She smiled, and her small gold glasses fogged. "And I'm glad it's you I get, Alba. I mean that."

Behind her, two men carried a long crate toward the main building.

Iker followed them.

He walked with one hand lightly on the rail and his chin slightly lifted, listening to the crunch of boots in front of him.

He did not look at us.

He walked past, said, "Sabina," to the air, and went inside.

Paloma leaned toward me. "Can I just say that I'm going to hate him for you, and you can tell me when to stop."

"I'm not asking you to hate him."

"Noted. I'll do it anyway."

Sabina took our bags and led us down a long corridor lit by yellow lamps.

"The data hut is yours," she said. "Iker's order came through the week you applied. It's a good room, quiet, with a heater. All the instrument logs from the last ten years are in there, and nobody has looked at them."

"He signed that himself?"

"He asked for it." She opened the door. "He said you'd want to be the one to sort them."

The hut was a long room with steel shelves and a single window that looked at nothing.

It smelled of paper and warm dust.

I put my duffel on the desk.

I had come here to get away from reading things aloud for a man, and the first thing I had been given was a room full of pages.

"Thank you," I said.

"Get some sleep. We'll start tomorrow." Sabina squeezed my arm. "You did the right thing coming. I'm proud of you."

She left, and Paloma went to find the room with the beds.

I lay awake on a narrow bunk and listened to the wind lean on the walls.

At midnight, someone knocked.

I knew the knock.

Two knuckles, then a pause, then a third.

I opened the door a hand's width.

Iker stood in the corridor in his dark coat, a stack of paper held against his chest.

He was looking at the doorframe above my head.

"I'm sorry," he said. "It's late."

"What do you need?"

"The night readings are in. Fourteen pages from the spectrometer." He held the stack out toward the side of my face. "The lamp on my desk is out and Sabina is asleep. Would you read me tonight's? Only tonight."

I looked at his hand.

It was shaking a little.

I thought: this is what he wants, then. Not me, but my voice reading numbers to him in the dark.

"No," I said.

He did not move.

"I'm not your assistant here, Iker. You made that very clear on the steps. I'm done reading to you."

The hand with the papers stayed out for a long moment.

Then it lowered.

"You're right," he said. "I shouldn't have asked."

"Ask Sabina."

"I'll ask Paloma." He turned his head toward the corridor, away from me. "Goodnight, Alba."

He walked back down the hall with his hand skimming the wall.

I shut the door and stood with my forehead against it.

I had finally said no to him.

It was the thing I had wanted most for years, and it left me feeling that I had stepped on something small and alive in the dark.

← Chapter 2 · All chapters · Chapter 4 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend