Read Episode #1 - "Torn": Star Chasers (Volume 1) for Free Online Page A

asked as she circumnavigated a sharp crag with both arms lifted out for balance. Neither of them wanted to answer. “I mean, you two talk of places I have never seen and will never see. I don’t understand.”
         Ty furrowed his eyebrows and squinted, dropping his conversation with Rhyess. Ty wanted to tell her how lucky she was. Paliy was one of the few places that had no apparent class separation. Rhyess, not knowing Shilastar well, responded, “I could live here forever. The sun and land are so beautiful. The work is clean and not ordered.”
         “Why must you leave? Stay if you like. An honest day’s work will get you an earnest meal and a place to stay.” She added, further qualifying her statement, “Except if you are Ty.”
         Ty objected, but Rhyess inadvertently cut him off. “I wish I could,” he said. “Could stay, that is.” He turned his hands palms up and looked a mound of calluses, a lifetime of labor. He glanced at his legs, the thickness of stout young trees, and the bulge of his arms. He turned his hands up again and sighed. “You know...” he began sadly. “You do something for all of your life, and it is all you know. “I mend steel and stone all day long and most times long after the darkness has come, if I am above ground.”
         Ashamed, Rhyess turned his face away. looking out over the rock-strewn fields and hills they were in. He realized how tiny his life was compared to everything around him.
         “There is always bed and meal here for you,” retorted Shilastar, misunderstanding.
         She didn’t know what it was really like to work, pouring out the toil of your life. She only knew the world around her, and what she knew of the outside was through Ty and now also Rhyess. In her mind, Ty always came and went as he pleased, and she saw him as common as anyone else. She knew little about the classes, or her proper place in the order, for she didn’t have to worry about it. On Paliy everyone was equal, and it was through those eyes that Shilastar looked out on all else.
         “Wow!” exclaimed Ty, changing subjects as delicately as possible, “Isn’t that magnificent?” He had marched on to the top of the rise and the view from its precipice was most rewarding. He made a full circle, chasing the horizon as far as he could see around him. The small band took a much needed reprieve at the summit. Shilastar retrieved several vials of cool liquid from a small functional box made of a thin, light insulated material.
         The ruins in full view became the topic of conversation. Shilastar took an earnest interest in the telling of their history. Even if Rhyess hadn’t been with them, she would have told Ty the story again. She explained how they had been constructed twelve generations ago by the first settlers of Paliy, how the first families spread out across the land claiming distant provinces for their own, and how in turn the first city had come to fall to ruin.
         “You know,” Ty said, “every time you tell that story...”
         “I know, it gets longer and longer. You tell me that every time also. Let’s go, I’ll race you!”
         “Down that? I don’t think so, I’ll follow you,” replied Ty, eyeing the downgrade.
         Shilastar went first, followed by Ty, and then Rhyess, They all held onto one another for safety and ballast. Shilastar had just taken her fifth step downward when the sky blackened. It was silent and the air was completely calm. The three stood still. Shilastar and Ty nearly toppled backward as they strained to look up. An enormous craft settled into a staging orbit directly overhead, temporarily blocking out the light from both suns even in its outermost point of orbit.
         It seemed like an elongated orbiting moon, which Ty held in absolute wonder. Rhyess didn’t budge from his spot, but he wasn’t awed or fascinated like the other two. In fact, he hardly seemed to notice.