The descendant of refugees from Earth after a cataclysm wiped out the human race, Jade makes the difficult decision to leave the love of her life, Shira, and join an expedition excavating a dig in the southwest desert of what was once the United States.
There Jade encounters an injured Teneran named Paris, who belongs to, a race that brought the technology of the time jump to Earth, allowing humans to travel out of the solar system. For a year, Paris has wandered the land seeking Joshua, his human partner, who also ejected from the crashed ship.
When Jade unearths a book from library ruins, she learns who Paris and Joshua really are. The story of their love and Paris’ dedication to finding his lost beloved makes her question her decision to leave Shira. She has to decide what is more important: to contribute to the historical record of the human race, or return to the woman she loves.
I felt his mind touch, but at first glance mistook him for a boulder, one of the lava rocks formed when the five volcanoes lining the horizon erupted. Whenever I hunted there, I imagined the magma seeping through cracks in the Earth, spreading out over this vast field, hot and bubbling, and then cooling into the basalt under my feet thousands of years before the cataclysm struck this planet.
He stood at the mouth of the cave in the largest of the volcanoes. Dressed in black, and so perfectly still, if the light had been different, I might have passed by. But then he moved, revealing himself.
I froze.
Bands of raiders roamed this desert, and I was far from our settlement. I unsheathed my laser weapon. Shaded my eyes with one hand. The boulder deconstructed into a tall figure. A hood covered his face. A cloak swept the ground. The sun reflected off something shiny at his throat.
The cave was near the flat top of the volcano cone, approached by a steep hill strewn with loose stones. I took a step back, gauging whether I had enough head start to outrun this stranger. Then the mind touch came again, a gentle brush that warmed my throat and caused me to hope beyond all reason that Shira had come.
I whirled, imagining her running up the path from the settlement, hair flying over her shoulders, grinning and waving to me. But when I looked back the way I had come, only empty desert stretched to the east. A single lizard darted under a cactus. My heart plummeted. I turned back toward the volcano. The black figure had not moved.
It could not be otherwise, I told myself. The supply ship from Devon was not due for months. There was no way Shira could have reached Earth.
Suddenly cold, I shivered. Again, the flash of silver. Then the mind touch, gentle but insistent, seeking something lost.
“Who are you?” I called.
He turned and pushed back the hood, revealing a long, narrow face, skin white as milk, frizzy black hair to his shoulders.
“I'm armed.” I raised my weapon.
“You have nothing to fear.” His voice sounded like two stones rubbing together. “If my presence disturbs you, I will go.”
I was embarrassed that this empty land had caused me to become so wary. I lowered my weapon, but also unstrapped the covering on my hunting knife. When he showed me his empty hands, long, narrow, and black-tipped, I saw he was Teneran. Before I asked, he said, “I seek one who is lost. Perhaps you have seen him.”
I took a few steps up the hill. “Does he travel alone?”
“I am uncertain. He is tall and solidly built.” He motioned to his chin to indicate height. “His hair is the color of your desert.”
“No one has come by for weeks.”
The black-clad figure drooped.
“I felt your mind. Or else your disguise as a boulder would have been effective.”
A trace of a smile softened his solemn face. “You are a mind speaker.”
“As are you.”
He shrugged. “A slight gift.”
“We are humans from Devon, scientists, unearthing our past.” I pointed toward the river. “Our settlement is down there. By the river. We are more than fifty adults.”
“How long have you been on Earth?”
“Me, less than a year, the settlement for three. I came to uncover records said to be buried in this valley. Much was lost in the transition to Devon.”
His cloak stirred. “You are an anthropologist?”
“And an historian. I felt called to learn about my heritage. The evacuation happened so quickly, it’s hard to reconstruct what happened.”
“I have visited Devon. It is a beautiful world.”
A memory of Shira running beside the turquoise sea filled me with sudden grief. To shut it out, I focused on the stranger. “What are you doing here alone?”
